Devin Townsend is best known as the founding guitarist/vocalist for the heavy metal group Strapping Young Lab and The Devin Townsend Band.  Media Mikes had a chance recently to talk with Devin about his latest solo releases and his future plans.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about your latest releases?
Devin Townsend: These two releases are the last releases of a four record project I started about 4 years ago. The four records together in my opinion are a representation of the process artistically that I think my life has gone through. I had quit my last band as well as stopped drinking and smoking. My wife and I also had a baby during this time. I felt the need to exercise certain things in my past that I may have had creative hang ups about. At the same time I felt it was important for me to make four very different styles of music to represent that versatility. “Deconstruction” and “Ghost” are the last two albums in the series. “Deconstruction” is a very stream of conscience, avant garde heavy metal record. I was lucky enough to be able to use the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, The Amsterdam Choir and a few other guests from the heavy metal world to do some of the vocal work. The album has a sort of left of center theme to it. “Ghost” the final album in the series is more of an ambient, new age record. There are a lot of flutes, mandolins and acoustic guitars on this album. Both albums came out on the same date and hopefully they will represent a level of versatility to what I do.

AL: Was there a certain instance that drew you to the idea of a four album series?
DT: Not necessarily. I think it comes more so from dissatisfaction in the past of having to write in a certain aesthetic. I remember during Strapping Young Lad being frustrated while writing because it had to be a certain thing. It had to be ferocious and fast. While writing the Devin Townsend Band records there was a part of me that found it frustrating to not be able to allow certain things. These four records are more of liberation for me to do what I want. Hopefully the next project I do will be free from any of those restrictions.

AL: Is there one of the four albums that sticks out as a personal favorite?
DT: Overall I think my favorite would be “Ghost”. That album is the least offensive to me. I think “Ki” has definitely has some interesting places where I could take that style. Over all it is the quiet and darker moments that I like. I like the crunchier stuff also but I think when left to my own devices I like quiet and dark music. The bonus track on “Ghost” titled “Watch You” I think does a good job of pulling those off. This is an area that I have really started to investigate.

AL: How did you get involved with the show “Metalocalypse”?
DT: Towards the end of my ten year with smoking weed Brendan Small the creator of the show put out a picture of the characters. One of the characters had been styled after me with the skullet hair style. It really tripped me out and I didn’t know what to think of it. I was paranoid about it as I didn’t want people to associate that image with things. Through a lawyer I asked him to stop. I was very adamant about getting away from it at that point. Luckily Brendan has a great sense of humor and just gave the character a comb over. Later on I got a call from Brendan asking if I would do some character voices for the show. I had the opportunity to explain about my previous paranoia and he was cool about everything. I ended up doing a few characters for him even though I have never seen the show. I think Brendan is a very talented guy.

AL: Can you tell us the idea behind “Ziltoid the Omniscient”?
DT: That was around the same time when I was quitting drugs. I think the image that I put across to the public was sort of a mad scientist type look. I had a kid at this time and everything in my life was changing. I realized a lot of the anger I demonstrated which was perceived as craziness was often just a choice I made and I wasn’t really crazy at all. Crazy is a very good place to hide because who is going to argue with you? I really looked at everything and figured out I had developed a very elaborate defense mechanism. “Ziltoid” became this personification that. When I cut my hair I glued it onto this puppet. The idea of being led by your addictions, your public persona or being a puppet to it was something I had on my mind. I thought creatively it would be a lot of fun to put some of the things I was no longer able to justify seeing in real life while still participating with them on a creative level. “Ziltoid” became that personification.

AL: Do you still have plans for expanding the character?
DT: Yes. After I finished “Deconstruction” which is an album very devoid of standard song structure I started thinking as a reaction to that album I wanted one that I could just sit and listen to. I don’t want to be besieged by some sort of metaphor or existential crisis. I just want to write a bunch of really cool songs. The next record I am working on is titled “Epicloud” which will feature 12 hard rock songs with a very theorial vocal vibe. After that I am doing a record called “Zed Squared”. This is something I have been working towards for many years. Essentially it will be the new “Ziltoid” record. It also is going to be a very theatrical production.

AL: Will there ever be a Strapping Young Lad reunion?
DT: Highly doubtful. The misconception people have about that band is that I have some sort of resentment to it. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Strapping Young lad was an immense part of my life and my development as a musician/person. What people have to realize is because Strapping Young Lad was in most cases me in its entirety. That it hasn’t gone anywhere. In order for me to move forward I need time. I don’t move quickly when it comes to making decisions. In the future what made Strapping Young Lad awesome will of course be 100 percent a part of what I am doing. I won’t go back to something I was when I was 25/26 to rekindle something that’s basic reason to exist was to move me forward to where I am now. I think a lot of times people who have a romantic attachment to a certain period of life it’s hard to convince them that there is something better out there. In time what I do in the future will not only include the element of Strapping Young Lad but it will surpass it.

AL: What are your plans for 2012?
DT: I am continuing to write for “Epicloud”. I have about 20 songs written but I would like around 30 to be able to choose the best 12 from. I then will make demos probably through January and February. We are scheduled to play the Sound Wave festival in Australia around that time and after that we come back and record “Epicloud”. I also have a bunch of cool things to announce for America and then we are hitting the summer festivals. Once the new album comes out we are going to be on tour hopefully with the budget and personnel to take the live show to a level nowhere near where we are able to do at this time.

Pearl Aday is the daughter of classic rock singer/ actor Meatloaf. Pearl released her debut album “Little Immaculate White Fox” which featured Pearl’s husband guitarist Scott Ian on guitar in 2010. Pearl has recently released an acoustic version of the album titled “The Swing House Session: Pearl Live & Acoustic”. Media Mikes had a chance to talk with Pearl about the new album and her plans for 2012.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about the latest album?
Pearl Aday: The album is currently available as a download only. Unfortunately we don’t have physical CD’s right now but you can get it on most online music sites. The album is acoustic versions of my rock album “Little Immaculate White Fox”. We got the guitarist on the album together and recorded for an afternoon at Swing House studios in Hollywood. We played the songs completely live and acoustic. The album was produced live by Jay Ruston who had produced a few tracks on my rock album. It was a lot of fun.

AL: What was the idea behind recording the “Little Immaculate White Fox” tracks acoustically?
PA: We wanted for the people who loved the original recording of the album to have an acoustic version as well. These versions of the songs are quite a bit different and feature a new twist.

AL: The album features one new track but is missing one track can you tell us about that?
PA: “Angel from Montgomery” was not on the original album. That song is actually a cover written by John Prine. We started putting that song in the set when we were touring for the album. That song was a nice mellow dip in the vibe that we would do acoustically each night. The three part harmonies on that song sound really beautiful. We got a lot of great feedback from playing it. The song “Broken White” we chose not to include because that song is much harder and is a real rocker. It seemed too much to transfer that day into an acoustic version.

AL: What do you think was the most difficult part of performing the songs acoustically?
PA: I didn’t think there was anything really difficult about it actually. It was just enjoyable and fun. We all knew the songs so well that it was fun to take them and strip them down. Reworking them in a different way created a different vibe and emotion.

AL: Can you tell us who played on the tracks?
PA: The album is just guitars and vocals. I, Scott Ian, Nalle Colt, Jim Wilson and bassist Marcus Blake are all featured on the album. Jim and Marcus are the two guys that I wrote a bulk of the music with on the original album. I love working with those two.

AL: What are your plans for 2012?
PA: I am working with my agent to set up some acoustic club shows in the Los Angeles area and possibly in the San Francisco area. I won’t be doing a full tour but just some local shows to get out and perform the acoustic album live. We also have a handful of new songs  in the demo stage that we are finishing. We are planning to take those in and record them for another full electric album.  That’s something that I am really looking forward to.

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Quick:  Who is Thomas Dolby?

If you said “The ‘She Blinded Me with Science’ dude”, you’re probably in a vast majority.   But, as Dolby’s long-time fans know, he’s far more than just being the artist responsible for the irresistibly catchy song that propelled him to the top of the charts and made him a staple of MTV’s golden era.   In addition to a being technological pioneer both inside and outside of the recording studio, Thomas’ musical career boasts a body of innovative work that includes five albums, the most recent of which – “A Map of the Floating City” – is his first since 1992.  It’s a triumphant return and one that hopefully marks the beginning of an equally prolific stage for him as a singer, songwriter and performer.

In talking with Thomas, he touched upon the things that drove him to create new music, reflected back on experiences from early on in his career, and how he’s seen the music industry and new talent evolve into the modern era.  We even had a chance to Cher our views on a certain vocal effect.

Dave Picton:  “The Map of the Floating City” is your first new album of studio material in 20 years. What made you want to return to creating and releasing new music after all of that time?
Thomas Dolby:  I suppose I just had some new songs that I wanted to get out.  You know, they say often with an artist’s first album, that you’ve had 20 years of life experience to draw from and, with your second album, you’ve had six months of airport lounges and hotel bars. [laughs] I felt that I’d had another 20 years of life experience to draw from.  I had a lot of good ideas and things that I wanted to express.

DP:  “Map” certainly wound up being quite autobiographical in nature.   What influenced that approach?
TD:  Well, I think the biggest influence on me, really, is my environment.  I think especially that moving and becoming displaced and that feeling of dislocation is a strong sort of catalyst of new songs for me.  So that sort of explains the map and the three continents reflecting three places that I’ve lived.  There’s “Urbanoia” and it clearly shows that I’m not a city person.  In “Amerikana”, the aggregate of me living in the States was a really good one.  I’m drawn to indigenous American music because we don’t really have indigenous music here in the UK.  That may sound strange to say, but I tend to charitably think of us being very original and innovative and so on, but in fact what we’re really good at is sort of plundering musical styles from elsewhere in the world and putting a cool sort of wrap on them and re-exploiting them.  A sort of musical imperialism, you know?  [laughs]  So, with the “Amerikana” section, it was sort of a nod in the direction of roots and old-time American music but with a unique sort of British tint to it.  And then “Oceanea” was really about coming home to England and feeling very comfortable in the environment here.  I live in a tiny village on the coast where my mum’s side of the family is from.  She never had the chance to meet my family.  She would have been very proud to see them back here growing up and learning to love it the way she did.

DP:  Jumping back to the notion of combining musical styles and using them in your music, what things were you listening to at the beginning that made you want to go into music and stuff you continue to listen to throughout your career?
TD:  Fairly diverse and eclectic music. I was always more into individuals with a unique voice and rock and roll band music.

DP:  Any one in particular?
TD:   When I was a teenager, David Bowie was a big influence.  Zappa, Captain Beefheart, Joni Mitchell and Van Morrison were big influences.  These are all wide varieties of different styles of music but what they all have in common is a unique lyrical voice.  The music that they made with the arrangements they created and the production and so on all served to tell a story.  They all wrote songs that you could have sat down and sung on the piano and they still would have made sense.

DP:  Is there a favorite genre that you like to settle into and work with or are all of them pretty comfortable and enjoyable to work with?
TD:  Well, what I enjoy most is working with a genre that I’m not too familiar with because it’s an exploration.  I tend to steer clear of styles that I’m too fluent in because there’s less randomness to it.  It’s more predictable.  So I find it stimulating to work in a new style.

DP:  If I snagged your iPod and pressed “random”, what artists would I hear?  Would you be one of them?
TD:  Well, inevitably, there’s a few of mine on there because I need to take them with me to listen to all sorts of rough mixes and things like that.  But, besides that, you would hear Iggy Pop.  Bjork.  Dan Hicks. T-Rex.  Marvin Gaye.  Trentemøller.  Athlete.  Venus Hum.  BT.  And some of the others I mentioned earlier.

DP:  You embraced technology from the very beginning of your career.  A great many things have happened in that realm since your first album, “The Golden Age of Wireless”.  Has evolving technology changed the way you approach writing music and what do you think the effect of it has been on music in general?
TD:  I think that the main difference is that D.I.Y. music has become possible.  You couldn’t do anything yourself in 1980.  You needed somebody to fund you to go into a studio, which is very expensive and is the only place to make a high-quality recording.  You also needed somebody with distribution power or else the public would never get to hear what you made.  So there was sort of this obstacle course that you needed to get through before you ever got in front of an audience.   Many people that were very talented didn’t make it through those hurdles.  Today, there’s absolutely nothing to stop you getting out in front of the audience without any outside help at all.  For a few hundred bucks, you can have a recording studio on your laptop and services that, without any investment up front, will help you distribute your music.  This is great news for talented youngsters because all talented youngsters believe “Well, as soon as the world hears me, they’re going to fall in love with me and I’ll be a mega-star!”  But, back in my day, we were actually kidding ourselves.  We first needed the industry to fall in love with us.  That has very wide implications.  The first is that it’s a very healthy thing for the music itself because, back then, if you sat down to write a song, you were worried whether or not you can get a cassette to the A&R man or, even if you weren’t really signed, would the marketing department and the promotion guys really go for it? Is radio going to play it?  Is retail going to stock it?  You were concerned about all of those things and they preyed on your mind when you wrote a song. Or at least they did on mine.

DP:   Was this phenomenon one that was relevant to you in the period between “Golden Age” and your second album, “The Flat Earth”?
TD:  I think it was relevant to me to an extent because there was a lot of pressure on me to repeat the formula that had made “She Blinded Me with Science” successful.  In industry terms, the textbook thing to have done would have been to have trotted out another half-dozen quirky synth-pop hits with gimmicky videos and those people would have told me “Then, Thomas…you can gradually turn people around to your more personal intimate music.”  [laughs]  But I’m impatient.  I had a lot more depth in me and I wanted to jump right on to the more important stuff.  This didn’t sit too well with the industry.  There was friction there and it was ultimately disappointing, really, that the industry couldn’t get behind my more personal material especially when it turned out that, over the years, when the internet emerged and so on, you could get more feedback from the fans other than just record sales.  You could actually hear what they thought of one song or another and what they appreciated about your music and how they found out about it and so on.  Suddenly the internet enabled the audience to feed back to the creator and it turned out that – big surprise – songs that they were really into were not “She Blinded Me with Science” or “Hyperactive!”.  The songs that they were into were “Screen Kiss” and “Budapest by Blimp” and “I Love You, Goodbye” which are my favorite songs as well.  It was hard for me during the 80’s to persuade my record label that they should put some weight behind those and I partly have myself to blame for that because they’d seen me make a lot of money with “She Blinded Me with Science” and they felt “Well, why can’t you just do that?”

DP:  Was the inclusion of “Hyperactive!” on “Flat Earth” sort of fulfilling of that end of the bargain to an extent?  It certainly seemed to be a song that was out of place with the rest of the songs on that album.
TD:  You know, I don’t want to give you the impression that I despise the poppy side to what I do.  I mean, I like the spectrum of things that I do.  Even on the new album, something like “Toad Lickers” which is clearly a little bit tongue-in-cheek and a little ironic, is lot more frivolous than the more meaty material on the album.  So I do enjoy it.  There’s a side of my nature that wants to do those kinds of things as well as the other ones.  But I guess with a song like that there is a distraction.  It’s impossible for someone with a record label mentality or a radio mentality to see the wood for the trees, really.  You know, I’d go into my company’s office at the time of the “Flat Earth” album and they’d say “Oh, Thomas! You wouldn’t believe it!  All of the secretaries here are in love with ‘Screen Kiss’ and they’re all humming it and playing it and saying what a beautiful song it is!” and I’m going “Great!  Are we going to go with it as a single?”  “No…we’re looking for something more like ‘Hyperactive!’ or ‘She Blinded Me with Science’.”  So the good news is that these days you don’t have to be accountable like that to anybody else other than your audience.  As an example, the first song off of the new album that we promoted at all was “Oceanea” and there’s no beat to it.  It’s kind of radio catastrophe. [laughs]  But, at the same time, I’d seen the reaction of my audience to that song that it had the deepest affect on people.   And I thought “Well, you put your best foot forward”, you know? That’s what you go with.

DP:  For “Map of the Floating City”, did you put out a couple of songs, get the fan feedback and then say to yourself “Oh, I was going to go in this direction but this is an interesting idea, I think I’ll go in a different direction” or were the songs already in the can?  And to what extent does the interaction with your audience play into when you’re starting to write and compose songs?
TD:  I wouldn’t say that it affects me directly.  I think that I do it for a couple of reasons partly because I like the moral support that I get, both from the audience and the making of the music as well.  I feel that, rather than working in a void, there’s an active audience out there that’s ever eager to get a hold of my new material.  I tend to work on my own and just bring in other musicians for specific tasks so it’s not like there’s a core group of us that sit down every day to press on with the album.  So I miss that camaraderie but what I gain by having a tight loop with the audience is that I can sneak stuff out in a fairly stealthy way and get feedback from it.  Invariably they’re pleased with what I do, but every now and then something doesn’t get as good of a reaction as I had hoped and it sort of makes me go “Hmm…I wonder what they’re not seeing in this.”  So I think it definitely influences me but it doesn’t radically change the choices that I make in terms of the songs themselves and the way that they’re arranged and presented.  I’ll give you an example: on the original demo for the song “Oceanea”, I used a processing effect on the voice in the first verse which involved heavily compressing and filtering the vocal and keening certain syllables.  It’s kind of what AutoTune does in an automated way but I was sort of doing it manually. I did it that way specifically as an experiment because I thought that it gave it a certain vulnerability.  Because of that, I got some backlash from people that said “Eeewww…I hate AutoTune!  I’ve hated it ever since Cher!”

DP:  Well, I hate to say it Thomas, but I was one of those people.  I wrote a review of “Map of the Floating City” that you wound up commenting on specifically in regards to that track and AutoTune.
TD:  Oh, OK.  Well it doesn’t bother me that people have those reactions.  As you noticed, despite that, I didn’t change it.  I stuck to my guns on it and I’m still glad that I did.  I perform the song live now and I miss that effect, not just because I can’t sing it in tune [laughs] but because it has a certain innocence about it.  Unfortunately, it pushed the wrong buttons for some people because they have a built-in prejudice about AutoTune and the flavor that brings to music and, in my case, it was a very deliberate thing.

DP:  One of the things I pointed out in our online dialog was that, to me anyways, there seems to be a difference between the song “Oceanea” as released on the EP and then what followed on the “Map of the Floating City” album.  I listened to the two versions quite a few times and it certainly seemed to me that on the EP version, the effect fades out after the first verse and, after that, it’s pretty much devoid of any vocal effect whereas the version that appears on “Map” has it throughout.
TD:  Well, since that discussion with you, I haven’t gone back and listened to both but, to the best of my memory, it’s the exact same vocal in the first verse on the EP and on the album.  I don’t remember changing or altering it further.  It could be that the rest of the mix around it changes your perception of it, but I believe it’s basically the same vocal.

DP:  Over the course of your career, you’ve done a fair amount of work on film soundtracks such as “Gothic”, “Howard the Duck” and “The Gate to the Mind’s Eye”.  Is that something you could foresee doing more of in the future?
TD:  I would consider doing it in the future.  I had mixed results with it.  “Gothic” is slightly in the news at the moment because of Ken Russell dying the other day and because people are looking retrospectively at his work.  It turns out that “Gothic” was quite a popular one and a lot of people single out my score as being something unique about that film. I really enjoyed working one-on-one with him.  In the other cases, it was more of a committee decision, you know, and it’s a bit disappointing that as a composer on a movie, you’re kind of relatively genial on the totem pole.  You’re sort of down there with the lighting guys and things like that, so if something is required to change for the sake of the movie, there’s no question that the composer has to sort of swallow it.  This was quite hard for me because I put a lot of love in everything that I do and nothing I do is throw-away.  So if, for example, a scene is cut, and I lose a piece of music that took me days to come up with and it’s not going to get used in the movie and yet the studio owns the copyright and therefore I can’t use it anywhere else, that’s a bit disappointing.  But you’re expected to just sort of expect that because you’re part of a larger team.  So I think that the right situation for somebody like me in film is when you get to work with one of the few actual auteurs that are out there.  I think a good example is Danny Elfman and his work with Tim Burton where very early on they established a relationship and Tim Burton became valued for his the individuality of his films and the fact that he has a single-minded vision that Danny’s music definitely was a major component in.   He’s done great great work but I wish we all could have as cushy a ride on a movie.

DP:  You recently remastered and reissued “The Golden Age of Wireless” and “The Flat Earth” as expanded editions that really fleshed out those two works for those who had heard them when they were initially released and serve as a great introduction for those who only know “Science”.  Are any other items in your backcatalog slated to get a similar treatment?
TD:  Well, not really.  There’s not a lot of wastage in what I do so there’s very few outtakes and demos and things like that.  I’ve got something that I’m interested in reworking which is when I put together my band, the Lost Toy People, in ’87-ish we went out on tour before we ever went into the studio to make the “Aliens Ate My Buick” album.  We did some sort of basement tapes which were straight to two-track tape.  We were pretty hot at the time because we had been touring, so the songs had a certain rawness about them that I thought was really interesting.  I also have quite a lot of video footage of us on that tour.  I’m quite tempted to remaster those tapes and piece it together – although it would be a bit of a cheat to use visuals from the tour and those tapes – and create a lost LTP basement tape type of recording.

DP:  Throughout your career, you’ve been able to have a wide variety of high-profile musicians including the likes of Mark Knopfler, Jerry Garcia and Eddie Van Halen as session musicians on your albums.  Is there any one of them that you’ve most enjoyed working with?  And are there any out there that you’d like to work with at some point in the future?
TD:   Well, I love working with other musicians.  It’s interesting that very often with guitar, which is not my instrument, I’ll have a song and think of a certain guitarist and imagine how they’d fit right in.  Interestingly with both Jerry Garcia and Eddie Van Halen, when I first started working with them, they picked up their guitars and tried to sound like Thomas Dolby which is not what I wanted at all. [laughs]  I just wanted them to be themselves so I could see the way they could fit in with what I was doing.  I’d say the exception to that rule amongst the guitar heroes that I’ve worked with was Mark Knopfler who actually listened to the song very hard from start to finish and then picked up a guitar and played me take after take all of which were just gorgeous.  He just said “As long as you want to keep winding the tape back, I’m happy to give you another one.”  So I winded up with like 15 or 16 different takes and it was very hard to choose between them because each one was unique and different.  He never played the same thing twice and all of it seemed like a really good expression of the feeling of the song.

DP:  When you work with other musicians, do you bring them in and actually work with them in person or are they working remote with the raw mix that you’ve provided them with and they, in turn, send their track over to you?
TD:  With the three that we’ve discussed, I worked with them in person but for quite a few of the guests on the new album, I wasn’t there.  Imogen Heap just recorded some jaw harp for me and sent me over a sample.  Regina Spektor I met once only when she did the TED conference a couple of years ago.  I just sent her the tapes and suggestions for her lines in English and she translated them into Russian and just sent me back some recordings.  Ditto with Natalie MacMaster, the Cape Breton fiddle player that plays on the album.  Uh, with Ethel and with my horn section, I went and recorded them in person because there’s a lot of arranging that had to get done on the fly.

DP:  Now that “Map of the Floating City” has been released, are you planning on any sort of live tour to support it?
TD:  Yeah, we’re trying to put a tour together for the spring.  Sort including South by Southwest and Cochella.  Where are you?

DP:  I’m on the east coast, Connecticut specifically.
TD:  Right.  I think we’ll be coming through something like the end of March.

DP:  I saw you a few years back at BB King’s Blues Club in New York City when you played there and it was a great show.
TD:  Oh yes, I enjoyed that.  Was that with a horn section or just me?

DP:  Just you. Will the new tour be a solo one as well?
TD:  I’ll have a small band with me.  As soon as things are firmed up, I’ll be posting the tour information on my website.  I look forward to seeing you there.

DP:  And I certainly look forward to being there.  It’s been a pleasure talking with you, Thomas.
TD:  Thanks.  Same here.   See you soon, my friend.

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James Durbin was a contestant on season 10 of “American Idol”. James recently released his debut full length album titled “Memories of a Beautiful Disaster”. Media Mikes had a chance recently to talk with James about his experience on the show and what it was like singing with Judas Priest.

Adam Lawton: What was the “American Idol” process like for you?
James Durbin: I originally auditioned for season 8 of the show however I was not in the right spot mentally at that time. I just wasn’t there what so ever in my life. During my time between the two auditions I started a family and really got my life and my priorities together. I was working at a Domino’s pizza and had put in for the day off so I could go an audition. No one knew that I wanted to be a singer. Everyone figured I was just going to be one of the joke contestants so my boss said I couldn’t have the day off. Two days before the audition the owners sat all the employees down and told us they would be closing due to not having any more money. Everyone was laid off and we weren’t doing very well financially at the time. My fiancé and I went to San Francisco and waited and waited to audition. I just ended up going for it and never looked back. I had no idea what things were going to be like once I finally got on the show. You do a lot of waiting in between rounds for your chance to sing and then it’s over. The show is almost like a marathon.

AL: Did you start off auditioning for the main judges?
JD: You actually have 3 pre-auditions before you are in front of the cameras. All that they really show on TV is the final round of auditions and tons of people in the stadium. They never show the first round where upwards of 20,000 show up to sing for 5 seconds in hopes of getting their opportunity.

AL: What was your initial reaction when you were told you would be singing with Judas Priest?
JD: I was told right after I sang “You’ve Got Another Thing Coming” during the Top 24 guy’s week. Judas Priest had contacted the show stating they really enjoyed my performance and if I made it to the finale would I be interested in signing with them. I thought holy crap! It’s Judas Fucking Priest and they want to play with me. I was in complete shock. I still am.

AL: What can you tell us about your album “Memories of a Beautiful Disaster”?
JD: The album is being released via Wind-Up Records and was produced by Howard Benson. The title comes from me looking back on moments in my life that I thought were disasters. However after meeting my fiancé and having a child those things that bothered me from the past I can now look back on them and see the beauty and the pain. Those events made me who I am today.

AL: What was the recording process like for you?
JD: Everything on the album is entirely new material. I enlisted the help of some writers who wrote songs specifically for me. They call it personalized song writing. All in all I finished the vocals in two and a half weeks as we were working with a deadline in place. I finished way ahead of time. The process of recording was really fun and learning about everything related to recording was great. I had never done anything of this magnitude before.

AL: Can you tell us about your involvement in the film “Different is the New Normal”?
JD: I was asked by a production team if I would be interested in talking to a young man by the name of Ariel Small. Ariel has tourettes syndrome and was in the process of making a documentary about himself. I immediately jumped on the opportunity. The film isn’t just about tourettes but it brings life to tourrettes and makes it well known. Ariel was inspired by me to make this film. I really respect that and am very honored. Meeting Ariel and seeing how much insight he has for such a young man was great. The title of the film actually came from one of my quotes.

AL: What are your plans for 2012?
JD: Surviving the Apocalypse. (Laughs) I am going to just keep living my dream of being able to sing and make a living by doing so. This really is a dream come true. Huge thanks goes to everyone who has helped me in the process especially my family and fans. I owe everything to my fans. I am working on securing the right tour for 2012 as album sales have been going well so knock on wood things will keep going well.

The legendary NY hardcore group Biohazard has a new album coming out in January titled “Reborn in Defiance”. Media Mikes had a chance recently to speak with Biohazard members Billy Graziadei and Danny Schuler about the upcoming release and their plans for 2012.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about the new album “Reborn in Defiance”?
Billy Graziadei: We worked really hard on this album. It actually was a culmination of us coming together on the reunion tour. We had a lot of fun playing together again and everything just worked. We didn’t sit down and say we were going to make a record. It was just something that happened. I can’t wait to get the album out and play the songs live.

AL: Did you guys try any new approaches to the recording process?
BG: To be honest we had all kind of forgotten how to do everything. It had been so long since we all worked together we just didn’t know how to approach things. It was interesting to figure out how to all work together again.

AL: Have you guys settled on a favorite track off the album yet?
BG: I think they are all our favorites. I don’t think they would be on the record if we didn’t like them. Time will tell as to which songs will stand out the most.
Danny Schuler: Some songs just have a different vide when you play them live while other work better just listening to them on a CD. There is a certain energy level with the band that we like to keep around 10 or 11. We will just have to see.
BG: I remember after doing our first album in 1990 we had been touring and writing new songs for what would be our next album. We played some of them live and you could just tell they were different from our previous songs but they still fit. The songs on “Reborn in Defiance” I think have that same feeling. We are pretty excited.

AL: What are the release date/plans for the album?
BG: January 28^th the album will be available worldwide.
DS: The record will actually hit Europe first. We have been talking about doing some cool release things here in states. We love vinyl and it would be cool to see the album released that way however we will have to wait and see. Everything will start unfolding in the coming weeks.

AL: Can you tell us what Evan Seinfeld’s involvement is with the band these days?
BG: The album was recorded with the original band lineup. We actually recorded the album at the end of the reunion tour. We finished this album around spring time of 2011. Evan called us out of the blue in June and quit the band for personal reasons. We love what we do and decided to keep on going. I look at it now as this being a different era. The time frame is a little confusing but we just wanted to leave the record as it is.

AL: What will the tour line up look like?
DS: We are going to have someone else there with us.
BG: We have been touring with a friend of ours lately. We took him to China with us recently and we also did some shows in the UK. I think the back and forth Biohazard vocals are something that we all love and can’t do without.

AL: Going back into your guys history can you tell us how you got hooked up with the rap group Onyx?
DS: It was kind of a natural thing. We were managed by Def Jam back in the late 80’s early 90’s. We were pretty much the only heavy white band that was a part of their company for awhile. People didn’t like us too much because we were a real street band. We weren’t silly or anything. Billy had been approached about doing a remix of the song “Slam”. I don’t know how that quite happened but I did play drums on the track and some of us were in the video. That led to us doing some shows with Onyx as well as working on the soundtrack for the film “Judgment Night”. We got along well those guys and we were all from NY. There were a lot of parallels with what we were saying and with what hip hop was saying through our music.
BG: We got to work with Jam Master Jay through the “Judgment Night” film and that was really cool for us. We had grown up with bands like Iron Maiden, Agnostic Front and The Sugar Hill Gang. Everything seemed really natural for us. Where we were coming from was very similar. We never sat down and said “hey lets mix what you do with what we do”. We were friends and put some tracks together. After we did some other tracks with Cypress Hill and House of Pain we stepped aside and let Limp Bizkit collect all the money off that style. (Laughs)

AL: What are the rest of the plans for the band into 2012?
DS: We are doing the first group of shows here in the states with Madball. That kicks off towards the end of February. From there we go to Australia to do the Sound Waves festival. It’s going to be a lot of fun as we have five or 6 big festival shows across Australia. We have a short break and then we are going to start planning U.S. and European festival dates for the summer. We will probably make it back to South America as well this year.

Click here for our CD Review: Biohazard “Reborn In Defiance”

David Davidson is the guitarist/vocalist for the heavy metal group Revocation. The band recently released their 3^rd studio album titled “Chaos of Forms”. Media Mikes had a chance recently to David about the new album and the bands plans for 2012.

Adam Lawton: How did the band form?
David Davidson: Phil, Anthony and I formed Revocation in 2006. We were called Cryptic Warning prior to that but decided to change the name since our style had changed and developed so much. Right around the time that “Existence is Futile” came out we added Dan Gargiulo to the lineup.

 AL: Can you tell us about the latest album?
 DD: “Chaos of Forms” is our 2nd record for Relapse and it came out this past August. We’re all pumped on it and we are stoked about the feedback we’ve gotten so far. We feel that Chaos is our strongest work to date in terms of songwriting. The songs have been a blast to play live.

 AL: How does this release compare to your previous release?
 DD: It definitely expands upon our sound but at the same time it maintains the core elements of what makes us who we are. We’re all pleased with the flow of the record and we think it really shows the diversity of the band. On every release we want each song to have its own personality. We think that this release has a lot of character to it. We once again chose to work with Pete Rutcho to record, mix and master the album. We love working with him! Pete is a blast in the studio!

 AL: Do you have a favorite track off the album?
 DD: Currently “No Funeral”. We just did a video for that song and it’s really fun to play live.

 AL: What are the bands upcoming plans for 2012?
 DD: We’re going on tour with Children of Bodom, Eluveitie, and Threat Signal starting at the end of January. After that we don’t really have any plans. I’m sure we’ll be back on the road soon though; we can’t stay home for too long!

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Stix Zadinia is the drummer for the hard rock band Steel Panther. The band recently released their second full length album titled “Balls Out”. Media Mikes caught up with Stix recently to discuss the bands new release as well as what Stix has on his Christmas list.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about the bands newest album “Balls Out”?
Stix Zadinia: It is quite possibly the best record anyone will ever purchase! It is chocked full of hooks, killer lyrics, sweet ass playing and, bitchin vocals. The songs are pretty autobiographical.

AL: How do you think this album differs from your previous release “Feel the Steel”?
SZ: With the first record we wanted to be pretty in your face about what kind of band you were about to listen to. The songs had certain parts which were reminiscent of an 80’s hit. With “Balls Out” I feel that the album is 100% Steel Panther. I think the songs on “Feel the Steel” were more immediate and shocking because people had never heard us before. With “Balls Out” I think it will take you 2 or 3 listens before it really grabs you.  Every time you listen to the album your will probably hear something new. I made this record and I am still listening to it. I don’t think anyone is writing or recording anything like this these days. We just play the music we love!

AL: Did you guys try any different approaches while recording the album?
SZ: I tried hydroponic weed while we were recording. It worked out really well and it was killer! Musically our first record contained songs that had been around for quite awhile. With the new record we really sat down and thought about what type of album we wanted to do. It’s really like painting picture. You have to have all the ideas around before you start. We wanted to make sure that we put songs together that painted a complete picture of the band.

AL: Do you have a favorite track or two off the album?
SZ:  I absolutely love “Gold Digging Whore”! When we play that song live and we get to the middle section where everyone is chanting nothing beats hearing people spell out Gold Digging Whore. “Tomorrow Night” is a fucking killer tune as well as “17 Girls in a Row” and “Weenie Ride”. “Weenie Ride” is a song that is really special to me. Normally I play the drums but for this song I played the piano. To get to do that live is pretty fucking rad!

AL: Was “Weenie Ride” a song that you wrote?
SZ: Satchel wrote the bulk of it. We did arrange it together and I sort of threw my two cents in about the chord work. Needless to say I added my own flavor to it and that’s what you hear.

AL: Can you tell us what’s going on with the Steel Panther television show?
SZ: There are a lot of great things going on with that. We just shot a new pilot presentation that is being circulated as we speak. The response has been insane from the people who make television shows. We originally shot a different pilot for Comedy Central but it never got picked up. The channel actually ordered 22 different pilots from a bunch of different production companies and didn’t pick up any of them. They spent like 2.5 million dollars on pilots and didn’t use a single one. It was kind of nice for us in a way that it didn’t get picked up at that time because we didn’t have the record out. I think now we have much more of a story to tell and we are in a better position. Once it gets on the air it’s going to be just that much cooler.

AL: Has Brian Posehn been involved with the newest pilot?
SZ: Brian is a really awesome guy and a good friend. He was involved with the first pilot but we decided to do something a little different with the newest pilot. Dean Cameron who played Chainsaw in the movie “Summer School” wrote and directed this episode. He helped us really hone everything in and it turned out awesome! You can actually check out the presentation on www.vimeo.com.

AL: Being it’s the holiday season. Are you guys going to release a Christmas song similar to last year’s “Sexy Santa”?
SZ: We haven’t thought about it yet. We should definitely do something! I will have to mention it to the boys.

AL: Is there anything special on Stix’s Christmas list this year?
SZ:  I would like a refill on my penicillin order. I had to switch doctors so I am hoping he gives me a new prescription. If not I am going to be miserable. Christmas and I have a long and cool history but other than the penicillin I think I have everything I want. I have a bitchin band, a ton of girls, free drugs and some kick ass shows to play. I don’t really know what else I could put on that list. I am in a really great spot.

AL: What are the plans for Steel Panther this coming year?
SZ: We have a bunch of stuff lined up. We are leaving in a week or so to do a UK arena tour with Motley Crue and Def Leppard. When we get back from that we are going to be all over the states playing various venues. We are also scheduled to go to Canada and Australia. Starting in February we go to Oslo, Norway to kick off a European headlining tour which is going to be knarly.

Andy Biersack is the lead singer for the band Black Veil Brides. The band is currently on tour with Avenged Sevenfold and is scheduled to release a new EP called “Rebel” in December. Media Mikes had a chance to talk with Andy about the EP as well as the bands plans for 2012.

Adam Lawton: Can you give us an idea of how the band all came together?
Andy Biersack: I had the idea for the band when I was 14/15. I had been playing with local musicians in Southern Ohio which is where I grew up. Playing in bands was always sort of my thing. It wasn’t until after I moved out to Los Angeles that things started to come together.  In the winter of 2009 the band became more than just a project.

AL: Black Veil Brides is a very visual band. What were the some of the initial ideas related to the bands look?
AB: We never sat down and said we were going to be a band that wears makeup. It just came out of stuff we all liked growing up. I was always really into horror movies and comics growing up. I also love Motley Crue and Kiss. When it came time to have a band it was sort of a natural thing. The look of the band is just something we all enjoy.

AL: Can you tell us about the bands new EP, “Rebel”?
AB: We had a little bit of time between Warped tour and our last European tour so we decided to go into the studio. We all had been itching to get back in the studio and we just didn’t want to wait till spring time. We had a couple songs that we like to listen and drink to on the boss so we recorded those along with a new song which we didn’t have done in time for the last album. It’s really just something new for our fans and for us to listen to in our cars.

AL: How did you guys choose the final cover songs that made it on the EP?
AB: “Unholy” was a song that we all had agreed upon from the start. For me I had the “Kiss: Konfidential” VHS which contained the music video for the song. That was something personal I brought to the band a long time ago. We had thrown some other ideas out there but ultimately we landed on “Rebel Yell” by Billy Idol. The song came together really fast and I am proud of how it turned out. We are actually playing that song live each night.

AL: How did you get Zakk Wylde involved with the project?
AB: Zakk is a hero of ours and he really is a legend in the rock/metal community. Our manager Blasko had played with Zakk in Ozzy Osbourne’s band so it really was just a phone call. Zakk was into the idea and came in and put the solo down. It was really a fun experience.

AL: What is the release date for the EP?
AB: As of now we are just saying Christmas. When it gets a little closer we plan to announce an actual date.

AL: What are the bands plans for the rest of 2011 and into 2012?
AB: We are currently touring with Avenged Sevenfold and after that we have some international shows lined up. We are going into the studio in the spring and we hope to have a new album out buy this time next year. Once the album is released we plan to hit the U.S. hard as it will have been some time since we last toured the U.S. extensively.

A big thank you goes out to Kevin C. for setting this interview up and to Cody .B for help with some of the questions.

For more info on Andy and Black Veil Brides you can go to www.bvbarmy.com

John “JD” DeServio is the bass player for the heavy metal group Black Label Society. The band is currently on the Epitaph tour which is also featuring Judas Priest and Thin Lizzy. Media Mikes had a chance recently to talk with JD about the tour and what the band has in store for the rest of 2011 and into 2012.

Adam Lawton: How did you originally get involved with Black Label Society?
John DeServio: I had known Zakk before he joined Ozzy Osbourne. We have been brothers for a long time and we were always jamming and hanging out. I came in back on the “Pride and Glory” tour which was with Aerosmith were we got to tour Japan. That was just amazing. Zakk put Black Label Society together in 1998 and he asked me to do it. I was there until 2000. I had decided to split and do my own music for a bit. I was playing in wedding bands and doing whatever to make money but I just really wanted to make my own music and get better at playing. I also played with Richie Kotzen for about 6 months prior to rejoining Black Label Society.

AL: What were your initial thoughts when it was announced you would be touring with Judas Priest?
JD: It was awesome! We were totally blown away. I grew up listening to those guys and I never thought I would be getting the chance to play with them every night.

AL: How have the shows been thus far?
JD: The shows have been great and everything has been really good. We play an hour a night and the fans have been awesome. This tour has exposed us to some new fans which is always good for us.

AL: have there been any highlights of the tour so far?
JD: I think every day has been a highlight. Being on stage and getting to listen to Judas Priest has been pretty cool.

AL: What can you tell us about the Black Label Society Christmas EP?
JD: The EP has a few Christmas songs played by Zakk and I think it’s a cool idea. We just love to play and Zakk did something similar to this on our last EP which had “The First Noel” on it. This EP has a full Christmas motif to it.

AL: What can you tell us about the upcoming tour with G N’ R?
JD: That will be coming up right after our run with Judas Priest ends. The shows are going to be mostly arenas which are always a lot of fun.

AL: What do you think your greatest musical accomplishment has been thus far?
JD: Tour all this time with Zakk has been an accomplishment in itself. (Laughs) It’s all been great. When I was younger I had the chance to play Madison Square Garden which for me growing up in that area was a big deal. I was playing with Vinnie Moore back then and we opened two nights for Rush. There have been so many great things that have happened over the years.

AL: Is there any place that you haven’t played yet that you want to get to?
JD: I would love to make it over to Israel and the holy land. I have had friends go over there and play who have said it was an experience they couldn’t explain. I think Egypt would be really great as well. China would be another place that I would like to play as well

AL: What other projects do you guys have coming up this year and into 2012?
JD: I have a few bass clinics scheduled for this year. I generally try and schedule those during every tour we do. I went to Berkley College of Music where I learned a bunch of stuff outside of just Heavy Metal. It’s cool for me to get to show off on some other types of music. Hopefully the clinics will open up some ears and inspire a few people. On this run of clinic I have been doing some stuff with Thin Lizzy’s bassist Marco Mendoza and our new drummer Chad Saliga who used to play for Breaking Benjamin. Those guys have been playing along with me so it’s been great. My band Cycle of Pain who released an album back in 2009 is currently writing a new album and we hope to get that out as well.

Andrea Blaugrund Nevins is the writer and director of a new documentary titled “The Other F Word”. The documentary focuses on punk rock musicians and the difficulties they face as fathers. Jim Lindberg is a founding member of the California punk rock band Pennywise. Jim and the band have a very prominent role in the documentary which is based of of Jim’s book “Punk Rock Dad”. Media Mikes had a chance to talk with Andrea and Jim about the film.

Adam Lawton: Can You tell us how the idea for the film came about?
Andrea Blaugrund Nevins: Jimmy had put out a book titled “Punk Rock Dad”. I thought the book would be a great premise for a documentary. Jimmy had a lot of stuff going on at the time as Pennywise had a new album coming out and they were going on tour so everything tied in really well.

AL: What made you interested in writing the book?
Jim Lindberg: I have always been into writing and do quite a bit of it. I had the idea to put the book together about being in a band and being a father at the same time. We were throwing around ideas for titles and one of my friends said I should call it “Punk Rock Dad”.

AL: How long did you film for?
ABN: I think we filmed for about a year and a half. Jim was out on tour so we just kept adding footage. We also gave Jim a hand held camera which he used to capture some really great POV stuff.

AL: How did you decide who was going to be in the film?
ABN: Everyone who was in the film pretty much got involved through word of mouth. We would interview one person and they would say “oh you have to check out so an so”. We would go and interview them and then they would tell us about another great person to talk with. We really got a great group of people.
JL: It was great to have guys like Tony Hawk who don’t have the typical “punk rock” look however are still part of the scene. i myself don’t have tattoos or wear a leather jacket as I was never really into the look of punk rock. What drew me to the scene was the music. It was great to have guys like me shown along with the typical punk rock looking guys.

AL: Was it hard being filmed during the time of you leaving the band?
JL: I had told one of the guys in the band that I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep doing what we were doing. They had some knowledge that I was unhappy so it probably wasn’t as big of as a surprise to them when I did decide to leave. There was one point where I just threw my hands up and said that was it.
ABN: We tried to only show certain things. We weren’t filming 24/7 like a reality show. Even though we shot off and on for over a year the cameras weren’t around as much as it seems.

AL: Have you had any communication with the band?
JL: No. I have tried to reach out to them but haven’t heard anything. I would have liked for everything to be good between me and the guys. I offered to help them out in anyway I could. I even offered to help them find a replacement but things just didn’t work out that way.

AL: Looking back on the footage do you have any regrets?
JL: I regret wiping out on that skateboard. (Laughs) I told the to burry that film and to never show it but it some how ended up making it into the film.

AL: What are the release plans for the film?
ABN: The film opened in a few cities on 11/4. It was kind of a slow weekend release wise which was good for the film. It opens in Pasadena and Costa Mesa on 11/11. We also are in the works of distribution in Canada and overseas. Once the film has run its course in the theaters it will be airing on Showtime and the DVD is slated for a spring 2012 release.

AL: Do you both have any other upcoming projects?
JL: I have a new band called The Black Pacific. We are currently writing songs and playing shows. I was actually able to squeeze two of the bands song on the films sound track. I have just a lot of cool stuff going on. I am at the first part of my second life.
ABN: The DVD is going to have some sneak previews of the new band in the special features section. Project wise I am looking right now at making a documentary about someone who is trying to reconcile their ego after being out of the spot light. It sort of the next phase when you are forced to remove yourself from the spotlight for one reason or another.

AL: Is the soundtrack from the film going to be release as well?
ABN: I would love too, however the economics don’t look to great. It’s something that we are still discussing though.

AL: Is there anything else you would like people to know about the film?
JL: For those who get the DVD when it comes out there is going to be a lot of extras to check out. The material has been packaged really well. The Directors cut will feature some voice over stuff from Andrea, myself and Art Alexacis. That should be pretty informative and entertaining. You of course will be able to check out the film in the theaters and eventually on Showtime but for those people who really liked the film the hard copy is going to be really great.
ABN: While the film is in the theater we want people to use the whole DIY word of mouth method to promote the film. The more people who go to see it in the theaters the will allow it to be shown in more places. The film has really great 5.1 sound with a soundtrack that rocks! It will be awesome to see the film in the theater.

Rich Williams is the lead guitarist from band Kansas.  The band is responsible for such memorable songs such as “Carry on Wayward Son” and “Dust in the Wind”.  The band is currently touring the country with there Collegiate Symphony Tour.  Media Mikes was able to chat with Rich about the tour and what he enjoys most about performing on the stage.

Mike Gencarelli: What can we expect from this year’s Collegiate Symphony Tour?
Rich Williams: The tour is going great! This was something we started last year and because of the great response we received we decided to do it again this year. We are hoping that the more colleges we play others will pick up on what we are doing and they will want us to play at their school as well. It’s been a great time.

MG: What has it been like working with the college students on the shows?
RW: It’s a lot of fun. The students seem to really enjoy it and they get to do something they may normally not have the chance to do in their normal curriculum.

MG: What do you like most about performing live as of late?
RW: It’s hard to describe as this is what I have always done. A long time ago I used to work at a liquor store while I was in college and then I started playing. I really haven’t done anything else. It’s a normal day to me. Everything is really fun however, when we have a couple weeks off I tend to go a little stir crazy.

MG: Is there one song that you really enjoy playing live each night?
RW: There are a lot of songs I enjoy. We have added quite a few songs to the set recently. We added a song called “Down The Road” back into the set. We have been playing a lot of symphony shows as well as shows at state fairs. There are some songs that don’t work without the symphony so we have to fill that time in. We haven’t played “Down The Road” live in a year or two. A lot of times we will pick a song, rehearse it in the dressing room and then go out and play it. It’s fun not to be on auto pilot.

MG: What were the bands initial inspirations?
RW: Everyone in Topeka at the time was in a band after the British Invasion hit. Some people eventually lost interest or got a day job. After a while the musicians who were left were the ones who either wanted play the Holiday Inn lounge or who really wanted to make it.  We were all really inspired by the things coming out of Europe and none of us were ready for a real job yet. All of us wanted to do real original music and that’s what really got us started.

MG: What type of music have you been listening to lately that you really enjoy?
RW: I really don’t listen to music as of late. I am just so busy that I don’t have time for anything. If I do listen to something it’s probably because I walked past a speaker that was playing something and that’s what I am listening to.

MG: Your song “Carry On Wayward Son” was featured in the video game “Guitar Hero”. Have you ever tried playing it?
RW: Before “Guitar Hero” came out they sent me all the hardware for it. The thing is I never heard back from them. I wasn’t really too interested in the game but my kids did enjoy playing it. The game has brought a lot of new people to our concerts and it has really sparked something. In my opinion anything that promotes playing music is great.

MG: “Dust In The Wind” is often used quite a bit in movies. How do you feel about the ongoing popularity of the song?
RW: Those things are what keep us out there. Both the songs you mentioned are bigger than we are. People a lot of the time know the songs but they don’t know us as a band.

MG: Are there any plans to record and release new material?
RW: It would be great to do one but then there is reality. They take a lot of time and money to put together. We are out there playing because we love it. Not for the money. If we were going to be recording an album it would be us as a band paying for that. Besides the fact that I am not independently, radio won’t play anything new and people don’t really come to shows to hear new material. Once you realize that reality that people don’t truly care about new material you have to come up with a way to recreate yourself. That’s why we did the symphony album and tour. It’s a way of doing something different and fresh with what you already have.

While standing outside of the Orlando House of Blues’ green room waiting to interview Geoff Tate of Queensrÿche, three musical things can be discerned: the sound check of the opening band, Geoff doing some pre-concert vocal warm-ups and – very faintly – the calming strains of classical music.   It’s an interesting mix of stimuli to be sure.  When Geoff completes his exercises, he’s ready to talk – which is amazing given that Queensrÿche’s sound check went for an hour more than scheduled and that the band has less than two hours before they have to take the stage and deliver the goods to a packed house.

Tate’s look has changed many times over the course of the 30 years he’s been with the band.  Gone is the coiffed long black hair that appeared in the videos for “Silent Lucidity” and “Jet City Woman” from the band’s hugely successful 1990 release, “Empire”.  These days, Geoff is sporting a bald head and a pencil-thin goatee that cause me to immediately conjure up mental images of Ming the Merciless and Anton LaVey.  But Tate’s demeanor is far from threatening and certainly not in any way demonic.  For a singer known for his ability to carry high-pitched metal wailings, his deep voice is one that is surprisingly soft-spoken.

The green room’s two plush couches upon which he and I sit are rather relaxing – as is the Debussy that continues to softly play from his iPod’s dock’s speakers, something that will remain a constant throughout our conversation.

Well…at least for half of it.

Dave Picton:  So you’re on your 30^th anniversary tour.
Geoff Tate:  Yeah.  The end of it.  There’s the show tonight and then we have two shows on the boat and a show in Clearwater. Today is kind of a hectic day because we’re getting ready to go on a ShipRocked Cruise.  Certain equipment goes and certain things stay, you know?  We’re playing “Mindcrime” on the boat, so we’re rehearsing it now because we haven’t played the whole thing in quite a few years.

DP: The band has largely been the same group of guys that you’ve been working with since 1981.
GT:  Yeah.  Four out of five.

DP:  As you look back are there good memories?  Not so good memories?
GT:  Oh yeah, there’s both. Lots of both.

DP:  After a bunch of concept albums that you released within the past decade or so, such as “Operation: Mindcrime II” and “American Soldier”,  the latest new album, “Dedicated to Chaos”, finds the band going for straight-forward singles-oriented songs that often have new technology as a central theme.  What’s your take on technology?
GT:  Oh, it’s fascinating.  Very fun.  It can definitely be something that sidetracks you from a lot of things and definitely takes your attention away from a lot of other things while you’re figuring out the latest gadget.  A lot of really good things like studio stuff and recording equipment and all that has gotten really modular and now you can take it anywhere you want and record in rooms like this and airplanes.  We do a lot of work all on computers now   It’s great.  You can really sketch out an idea.  It helps in the studio in terms of composing and coming up with new stuff and making demos.

DP:  When you record demos now, how far are you going with the song?  I know that it used to be that it would be fairly crude like when Buck Dharma of Blue Öyster Cult recorded the “Don’t Fear the Reaper” demo, he was playing drums on cardboard boxes. Now you can have a demo be pretty close to what the final cut is going to sound like.
GT:  Well, sound-wise, you can get really close.  But working with the other guys in the studio is a whole different thing.  Personally, in my opinion, songs turn out better when everybody’s playing together.  There’s a kind of synergy that happens with the musicians and you take an idea a lot further along when you get other people involved.  You can take it on your own and get good sounds but you don’t get the really cool performances and the particular thing that they do.

DP:  “Operation: Mindcrime” has very much become heavy metal’s “Dark Side of the Moon” in terms of how timeless it truly is.  As of late, it’s also become very timely with events that are going on right now.  For example, there are a bunch of videos on YouTube of “Mindcrime” songs that feature photo montages of Occupy Wall Street.  What’s your take on the relevance of those lyrics to this cause?
GT:  Well, the movement is really interesting. Over the last couple of months, every city we’ve gone to, there have been protestors everywhere.  Thousands of them, not just a handful, you know?  The news likes to say that there are a lot of angry people out there – and rightly so.  It’s getting pretty tough to make a living these days in this country.  It’s a massive complex issue and there’s no simple answer to it. But it’s kind of what’s happened because our country is built on business and commerce.  That’s our culture, really.  And those things mean competition which wastes the other guy to get ahead.  If somebody can make more money selling jobs to overseas workers, they’re gonna do it if there’s no law that says they can’t. So that’s what’s happened.  We’ve sold all of our jobs and our manufacturing to other places and what have we got now?  We have a nation full of people that are trained for the service industry which is great but now that people aren’t spending money to go out and eat dinner what are you gonna do then?  Every action has a reaction to it. People think it’s fine to download music.  Well, downloading music has gutted an industry.  Where 10 years ago there were 50,000 or 100,000 people employed by the record industry, now there’s 3,000.  The industry is failing and the money is gone because somebody thought it was OK to steal the product.  You can’t fight that now that we’ve raised a generation of people who don’t see anything wrong with it.  In fact, I think they just passed a law that says file sharing is legal now.  Great.  Thanks.  Now you can steal my work.  Where does that end? It all affects everyone else, you know? So all of those people that are out of work in the industry now don’t have a job where they can go and pay to get their car fixed, so the mechanic is short on work now.  And because he’s short on work, he can’t buy the groceries he normally would buy at the grocery store so now the grocery store is hurting.  It all affects everything.

DP:  A domino effect happens.
GT:  Exactly.  It’s a massive massive problem that nobody has an answer for.  It’s something we really have to look at and study and maybe change the way we think and the way we do things.

DP:  I think fundamentally that’s one of the core things on which the movement is based.
GT:  Yeah. I think that’s probably at the core of what a lot of the protestors are talking about – at least the ones I’ve talked to.  There’s a lot of people who don’t know what they’re protesting against so they don’t know how to define it or verbalize it but there’s a LOT of people that do.  It’s an interesting movement.  There’s a lot of anger and frustration that it’s based around and when people get angry and frustrated, violence happens.  So we could be on the brink of something pretty major here over the next few months I would guess.

DP:  It seems to be growing.
GT:  It is. We’ll see where it goes.

DP:  Anyways, back to some music questions.  If I snagged your iPod and I hit random, what would I hear?
GT:  Well let’s look. [reaches over to turn off  his iPod and remove it from its stereo speaker dock]  We were just listening to Debussy.  Artists or albums?

DP:  Let’s go with artists.
GT:  I’ll start at the top. [calls up his artist playlist]

DP:  Wow. All over the map.  America. Aerosmith. Beck. Benny Goodman. Black Sabbath. Brian Setzer. Frank Sinatra. Candy Dulfer.  Awesome saxophone player!  There’s actually quite a lot of saxophone on the new Queensrÿche album.
GT: Actually, there’s been saxophone on every album since..uh… “Promised Land” I believe.  Anyway, as you can see, there’s a lot of variance here on my iPod. [laughs]  Do you know of Erykah Badu?

DP:  I do.  I love her song “Next Lifetime”.
GT: She’s one of my favorites.  And we’re just halfway through the list! I’ve got a lot of stuff.

DP:  You’re not kidding! John Lennon & Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band. Miles Davis.  Diana Krall. I’ve noticed there’s quite a lot of jazz.
GT:  There’s a lot of jazz on it.  A majority of the stuff on here is old jazz.

DP:  But certainly not exclusively.  Neil Young.  Moody Blues.  Loreena McKennit.  I’ve seen her live.  Absolutely amazing show.  Pink Floyd.  Sade.  Yes.  I just interviewed Jon Anderson and Rick Wakeman a month or so ago. Man…the list goes on and on.  And – but of course – Queensrÿche.  In the near future, what might I see on your Pod in terms of those guys?
GT:  [laughs]  I don’t  know.  We don’t really have a plan right now.  Honestly, this has been a really long tour and everybody’s just kind of burnt out right now.  It’s probably just time to get home and chill and recharge the batteries.  And then we’ll start talking in a couple of months about “Oh, do you wanna do something?” and we’ll see what happens.

Jeremy DePoyster is the rhythm guitarist for the metal-core group The Devil Wears Prada. The band recently released a new full length album titled “Dead Throne” via Ferret Records and is currently on tour supporting the album. Media Mikes caught up with Jeremy to talk about the new album as well as about the bands new iPhone app.

Adam Lawton: What can you tell us about the band’s new album “Dead Throne”?
Jeremy DePoyster: The album is not so much a reinvention of the band but more so a rediscovery. The album still fits in the mold of our previous releases while at the same time being a progression. There are some slower songs on this album which is a different sound for the band. I think the album is fun and heavy.

AL: Did you guys try any different approaches during the recording process of the album?
JDP: Yes. We pretty much did everything differently than we have in the past. A majority of the songs are written by our other guitarist on his lap top and we take them from there and re-work them. However we on occasion do write material together and jam on it as a group. That was what we did more so on the new record. All of the song structure was done ahead of time and by the time we were ready to go into the studio we had demo tracks for every song to use as reference.

AL: How many tracks did you guys go into the studio with?
JDP: The 13 songs that are on the record are what we took in with us. We had one song that wasn’t quite done yet but that was scrapped prior to pre-production. We knew going in that all the songs we brought were going to make it onto the album.

AL: How do you think the band has evolved since your first recordings?
JDP: I think it’s natural for everybody to progress as musicians. When we first started the band I was 18 and I am 24 now. I think we all have become more proficient at our instruments but also at how we approach songs and textures. For me I play a lot differently than I used to.

AL: How do you think this album stands out above those that have been released recently who are in the same genre?
JDP: I think you can see passion and reality over imitation. It is flattering to see a group of bands that have almost carbon copied what we have done as a band but, at the same time it’s not offering anything new to the musical world. I think that’s really the difference. We aren’t writing to sell records or make a career. When we started this band there was none of those things. We started the band to have fun and the other stuff just came along. I think that makes us stand out as well as the maturity of our material.

AL: Do you have a favorite track off the new album?
JDP: It depends on the day. Playing the songs live has also altered things a bit as well. I really like “Born to Lose”. I think that song is a good representation of who we are as a band. I also like “Chicago” because I wrote a majority of the guitar heard on that track. It’s a really personal song and is something we don’t normally have on our albums.

AL: Can you tell us about the “Zombie Slay” app?
JDP: We just released that a few months ago prior to us leaving for Australia. We have talked about doing something like this for a long time. Dan our drummer was really into the idea of having an app and having that communication with other I device users. All the other stuff out there we felt was just dull and boring. We wanted to make a game that would be super rad and could stand alone outside of the band. Over the past few years we have really taken control of what comes out of the band. We really try and have quality control over our products. We didn’t want this to be something a manager got on and tried to sell our fans tickets. We wanted this to be awesome! The guys did a really great job with it and the band was really involved with the testing process. (Laughs)

AL: What are the plans for the band the rest of this year and into 2012?
JDP: This tour that we are on now is really what is left for this year. This is our first big U.S. North American headliner in quite some time. We will be finishing this up soon as we have a lot going on planned for next year. Nothing has really been announced yet but everyone can be looking for those announcements soon.

Justin Singh is the lead vocalist for The Great Commission a faith based metal-core band hailing from Redlands, California. The band released its second album in July of this year titled “Heavy Worship”. The album was produced by Andrew P. Glover and is being released via Century Media/ANGR Records. Media Mikes had a chance to talk with Justin prior to the bands performance in Syracuse, NY about the new album and the bands upcoming plans.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about the band’s latest release “Heavy Worship”?
Justin Singh:  “Heavy Worship” was released in July on Century Media/ANGR records. It took us 2 years to write this album. We had received a lot of labels offers after our contract had run out with Strike First/ Face Down records but, we were really waiting on god to pick the right label for us. During that time we were just writing music and lyrics that we felt would represent the band. We took time and sat down with every song to figure out what it was saying. We wanted to make sure that the music on the album was just as heavy as the message. That’s the reason we titled it “Heavy Worship”

AL: How do you think this album compares to the bands previous release?
JS: I feel like this album is more of us. The first album was written with the idea of what would we want to mosh to in heaven. It was of just a fun album that had lyrics that glorified god and was just heavy. With “Worship Music” we took the same concept as with the first album but we upped everything. The lyrics on this album are not just lyrics. We wanted the album to be catchy but we also wanted the songs to have meaning and to show that we live the lyrics that we are writing.

AL: What led you guys to sample lines from “The Boondock Saints” and “Dawn of the Dead”?
JS: It will probably sound weird but I feel god speaks to me through movies no matter what the films beliefs. I get so into movies that I start to put myself into the situations. I loved the line in “The Boondock Saints” where Norman Reedus’s character explains why they do what they do. Instead of taking it in the literal sense I took it as there are a lot of evils in our life that need to be killed in order to better ourselves. The other clip was from George Romero’s film “Dawn of the Dead” and I feel that sometimes as people we become dead inside. The first line of that song is “wake up” and it’s about waking up this generation from its mundane life. It’s almost like going from being dead to alive.

AL: Do you have a favorite track off the album?
JS: That’s a hard one. It’s a tossup between “Don’t Go To Church, Be The Church” and “Draw The Line”. Both of those songs mean a lot to me for different reasons. “Don’t Go To Church, Be The Church” is awesome because I feel like from a Christian point of view in this culture were involved in it’s easy to say “We are waiting for revival”. We as people are revivals so the song is about breaking down the walls and the mentality that a church is a building. We can have church really anywhere from a venue parking lot to riding in a car. We can really talk about things anywhere. We don’t have to go to a particular building or place. “Draw The Line” is awesome because even if you are not a Christian you can still relate to the songs message. We all have our own person struggles and sometimes we have to realize that we are the cause of our own problems. Unless we change ourselves our current status isn’t going to change. It could be anything from addiction to being in a bad relationship. It’s on us to bring the better out.

AL: This band has a unique stand on Christianity as compared to other bands in the genre. Can you tell us about that?
JS: I personally only speak from experience. As we have started to branch out and not only do Christian tours but secular tours fans have come up to me and telling me about how they have been told they are going to hell for having tattoos and piercings or listening to heavy music. I was drawn to this music because of its aggressiveness. Growing up I was just captivated by the music. I always wondered why we couldn’t do this for god? When we partnered the two together we saw what happened. There are a lot of people out there especially in the south and across the states that say if you have or do any of these things you are going to hell. It’s not true! Even though we love Jesus we are a very anti-religion band.

AL: Can you tell the fans one thing they might not know about The Great Commission?
JS: (Laughs) I am going to go through them one by one. Angela is the biggest “Star Wars” nerd! She and her brother actually go to “Star Wars” conventions. Victor is a huge Nickelback fan as well as Backstreet Boys and Nsync. Me personally I am the biggest comic book geek. I am really into Marvel comics. Our drummer Alonzo is from Costa Rica and he is really into samba music. He incorporates a lot of that stuff into our albums. Solomon our bass player isn’t touring with us right now because he is at home preparing to get married. As soon as we get back from this tour a few of us are going to be in his wedding.

AL: What are the bands plans for the rest of 2011 and into 2012?
JS: We have been on the road so much lately that our friends back home in California have been kind of neglected. We are going to take December off from touring but we will be doing a few festivals in California and possibly Arizona. In January we are going start pre-production of the new album and start recording in February. From there we will hopefully be back out touring.

Michael Derks and Cory Smoot are their given names however most GWAR fans know them as the guitar wielding duo made up of Balsac the Jaws of Death and Flattus Maximus. Movie Mikes had a chance to interview Michael (Balzac) and Cory (Flattus) about the bands recent Australian tour and the band’s new album “Bloody Pit of Horror”.

Click here to purchase GWAR’s music and new CD “Bloody Pit of Horror”

Adam Lawton: How is everything going today guys?
Michael Derks: Ugh I am jet lagged as hell from Australia! (Laughs)
Cory Smoot: Pretty good man.

AL: How did each of you come to join the band?
MD: I was going to VCU and I had been playing guitar with Mike Bishop,who played Beefcake on the GWAR album “Hell-O.” Just as I started jamming with him, Steve Douglas who played Balsac was kicked out of the band. From there they asked me to join the band.
CS: Back in 2002, GWAR had lost their previous guitar player Zack Blair. I had always been a local guy in Richmond. I was playing in a band called Misguided which had opened for Rawg a few times and I was friends with Dave Brockie. One day they called me up and asked me to join the group. I think I am now the longest lasting person to play the Flattus character.

AL: Michael, what did you think initially about having to where the Balsac costume?
MD: (Laughs) it was fun. I wasn’t really excited about having to wear it but it wasn’t horrible. The costume has actually gotten bigger and bigger over the years. So back when I was asked to join it really wasn’t too big of a deal. At first there was really just a mask and some boots. Now I have huge legs and shoulders pads.

AL: How was it touring Australia for the first time?
MD: It was a lot of fun. The Aussies went crazy!
CS: It was really beautiful and awesome. It was summer time there which beats the weather we are having here right now.

AL: Were you guys surprised by how great the reception was?
MD: Everyone goes crazy for us we are fucking GWAR! (Laughs). If we had gotten anything less they would not have survived!
CS: The crowds were really great and the promoters really want us to come back again soon!

AL: What’s your favorite track off the new album?
MD: The opening track “Bloody Pit of Horror” which is actually just about the entire first half of the album. That song or songs really encompasses a lot of different styles. It covers a lot.
CS: I like “KZ Necromancer” as well as “Bloody Pit of Horror” which we get to change it up a bit and play eight string guitars.

AL: What was it like using an eight string guitar on that track?
MD: It was fun! At first I hated it. When I picked it up I thought it was ridiculous. It was a really weird feeling but after using it this whole tour it’s actually still ridiculous. (Laughs) I have gotten used to it and its kind of fun to hit that low F string.
CS: It was different but it wasn’t too hard to get used to. I had some experience on the last album using one so I knew what I was in for.

AL: You both worked as producers on GWAR’s latest DVD release “Lust in Space: Live at the National” correct?
MD: I actually did more of the engineering work of the audio mixes than the visual production side of things. Cory was more of the producer. As a band, we produce the songs collectively.
CS: Besides producing the DVD I also have produced the last two GWAR records “Lust in Space” and “Bloody Pit of Horror”. I also co-produced “Beyond Hell” and “War Party.” So I kind of have a dual role as artist and producer.

AL: What are your plans for when the tour wraps up?
MD: As soon as I get home I have to go back to work as a bartender because it costs a lot to be a big rubber monster (Laughs).
CS: I have a recording studio at home called Karma Productions that I plan to start spending a lot more time on. The wife and I have started to look for land which we can build a house and studio on.

AL: Any funny stories from this year’s tour?
CS: Oh there were some fun and crazy moments. Nothing was however too crazy other than the fact that we are GWAR and a certain amount of that stuff comes with the territory. The customs officers had a good time going through are stage gear (Laughs).

Click here to purchase GWAR’s music and new CD “Bloody Pit of Horror”