Bleeding Edge Interviews - Ep. 30: Phil Rich and Cole Millward of Nospūn

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Welcome to another episode of Leading Edge Interviews.
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My name is SuperDate and I'm here to bring you another conversation with one of the top
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stars in the world of progressive rock and metal.
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If you're ever curious about what goes through the minds of the people who create all this
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music and what inspires them, well, this is the place to find out.
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So if you're a fan of frog in any form, you've got to be absolutely loving 2023 at this point
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in time.
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It has been a bonanza for new great rock music both from established artists and as well
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from seemingly a heavy of debut albums that have come out so far this year.
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I've been lucky so far to talk to two of them and today we're adding a third to that list.
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I was lucky enough to get to sit down and talk with Tilla Bridge and Cole Millward,
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both of No Spoon.
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They are vocals and bass respectively and had a great time.
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Honestly, it was again, I'm loving this idea that the younger generation is coming up
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and their music is being formed by the stuff that I was listening to as an adult, that
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it's not just the 70s, frog bands, influence can keep playing more, but it's the people
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that were influenced by the 70s frog bands and it's this become this multi-generational
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continuation of the concept of frog rock and frog metal and I love it.
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I'm so happy to get to talk to Tilla and Cole about No Spoon, their band, their debut album
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Opus and it's a serious concept album both these guys are coming out of the gate full
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of war.
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I'm not kidding and honestly, goodness give was a great conversation.
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Three of us had a great time and I look forward to sharing that info with you right now as
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we talk to Tilla Bridge and Cole Millward of No Spoon.
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So, excellent.
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Thank you gentlemen for joining.
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We appreciate your time.
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Glad to get to talk to you guys.
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Always fun to talk to rising stars that are making waves, which is what you guys are absolutely
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doing at this point in time.
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Thank you.
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I appreciate it.
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Thank you.
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I'm going to start with a notice talk of and you know what?
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Among the things that you usually take care of before maybe you start officially recording
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is making sure I got the pronunciation correct.
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It's No Spoon.
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That's correct.
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Okay.
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The line over the U is indeed functional.
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Yeah.
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Yes, it is.
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We'll get back to that in a moment, but you start noticing the name No Spoon popping up
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a lot in the in the progosphere as I call it.
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And you start hearing some good things and you go, all right, let me go check this out.
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Check it out.
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And you go, okay.
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The good things I'm hearing are in fact founded.
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They are valid and they are very cool.
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So welcome to the world of progrock, progmetal in the greater blogosphere, progosphere, whatever
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you want to call it.
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You've gotten some attention.
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So kudos.
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Thank you.
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We're super happy to be here.
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Thanks for the talk to you.
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So real quickly here, No Spoon, curious about the origin of the name because I Googled that.
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I don't think I found a definition, but I may have given up too easy.
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Cole, you want to take that one?
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Sure.
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So a little hard to talk about it without somewhat mentioning a little bit of the band
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history, we're not technically totally new to this world, I guess.
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We sort of have existed in sort of various forms as a band for quite some time, like
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at least a decade.
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Wow.
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By this point, like we started when we were teenagers and we've had some members come
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and go over time.
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And therefore, of course, we've gone through a few different names over time.
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And as we started working on this particular album, there was this real sense of like,
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this feels a little new.
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Like there's some of the members who have been around for all of this time, but we think
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it's time to sort of present this as a new thing, not just a continuation of what came
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in before, but like this deserves a new name, sort of new branding, all of that stuff.
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And so we sort of started on what I think might be the hardest thing that a band ever
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has to do, which is coming up with the name.
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I honestly think that's true because like with these guys, I have the easiest time writing
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music, but we had the hardest time coming up with the name.
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That just always seems to be the case.
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And we wanted to pick something that sort of like connected all of us so that it wasn't
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just like something that only like one of us had some sort of reference to.
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So we all kind of are into the Matrix films, right?
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Because like good sci-fi, good action films, all that stuff.
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And of course, there's the famous line in there, you know, the there is no spoon thing.
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And so we're like, oh, that's a funny thing.
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Yeah.
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Can I jump in to my favorite part of the story?
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It's not just the band that also has a reference to the name.
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It's the production studio that Cole and our guitars, James, co-own and run.
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Called Giant Spoon Productions.
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And that name came about and thus No Spoon came about.
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Because back when we were known by another name, we were cutting our teeth on recording
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for the first time by ourselves.
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Yeah.
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Because this entire album was done in-house.
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And when we were when we were working out the kinks in that process, we were basically
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running it out of at the time Cole's bedroom.
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And I go over one day to like record some because at the time I think I was still playing
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rhythm.
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I went over there to like record some guitars or some vocals or something for our last piece
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of our last initial EP.
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And there was this three foot by foot and a half giant silver spoon just mounted on the
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wall in the middle of like right in the middle of the wall.
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And I walk in and I was like, so Cole, what's with the giant spoon?
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And he turns around like he's been waiting on this question.
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And with this like almost evil grin, you know, grinning through his teeth, there is no.
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Yep.
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And thus Giant Spoon was born.
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And later on, you know, No Spoon.
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No Spoon.
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I love it.
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I love it.
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And this is perfectly the word I'm looking for esoteric in nature.
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It's very weird and meta.
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And then of course, like the spelling was sort of a thing that we decided as like a
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as like we knew that if we wanted to be searchable online, it kind of had to be like a word that
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didn't exist yet.
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So that we would definitely pop up on like the first page.
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And so we were like, OK, No Spoon, that's cool.
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A nice sort of meta reference to like all of these things that sort of interconnect
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us, but like we can't just spell it normally.
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We have to spell it weird.
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And so we were all kind of laughing about it.
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But you know, at the end of the day, we were kind of like, you know, I mean, there's if
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there's a band out there called Spock's Beard, I feel like we can we can get away with this
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just odd spelling of a weird reference as a name.
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And and I think that quirkiness sort of fits the nature of the band dynamic pretty well.
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Right. Yeah.
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Yeah. And that's a that's a funny idea, not a funny idea, but it's a very modern idea
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because it's not the first time I hear people talking about the idea of
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I don't just want a name that is original.
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I want a name that's easy to search.
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It comes up quickly in the Google results.
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And, you know, like it's it's really in and of itself.
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It's a reflection of the modern age, you know, the way we live is that you can't just
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necessarily be original as easily and I think the as I guess as accessible as easily as
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if you have something really unusual and creative at the same time.
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So you guys have done it.
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On both levels there.
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Multi level.
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I think I feel like so many like with with how many people there are out here sort of
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doing this thing like almost every band name you can think of has kind of already been
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explored in some way or just like all these names are sort of already taken with so many
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people being creative about it.
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And so coming up with something that is truly new as far as band names goes.
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Pretty difficult.
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Right.
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Yeah, part of being in a band coming up with a name as the kids would say true dad.
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Anyway, well, again, great to meet you guys.
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This is I can already tell this is going to be fun because we're making matrix references
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right off the bat.
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Yeah, you guys have been around for like 10 years now.
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What what chain of events came about at this point that led to you making this album?
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Like what what if you've been around for a while and you hadn't made a debut now you
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did.
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So something changed, right?
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I would say so.
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At least for me on a personal level.
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Like I said, we had different iterations of this particular collective, you know, plus
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or minus members.
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Always in some sort of progressive format, right?
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We always love prog metal.
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You know, leaning harder into like old school like Dream Theater and Symphony
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X for our like very like initial like getting our toes wet.
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You know, very garage band.
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Then we went through an iteration where it was very like gent oriented.
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You know, like what mid 2000s.
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Okay, mid late 2000s.
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That, you know, we discovered bands like periphery and the contortionist hit home.
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So we explored that you can hear some of that in our sound.
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But honestly, I think what really happened was at least for me, there was a level
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of maturity that was reached where life kind of like happened, got in the way.
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Like for instance, I got married, had a baby.
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And it got to a point where the time that I was investing in the project was not
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fulfilling me like it used to.
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And it's because we didn't realize we had found like a particular like formula
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that was working.
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And we didn't realize like what we had in the end.
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We didn't realize like what we had in each other, like as members that like that.
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We had kind of stumbled on to the secret sauce completely by accident.
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We had no idea.
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And so when we, you know, start tampering with that and trying and
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experimenting, we lost it.
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And for me, it was so far gone that I would come home after, you know, trying to,
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you know, write or record or something like that.
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And I was so like no longer enjoying it that my wife said,
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I kind of need you here.
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So if you're going to leave and you're not going to get something out of it,
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why not just like let it go?
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Yeah.
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And I actually did.
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Like I actually stepped away from the group for a while.
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And that stung because I think three of us in this band are like the founding members.
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And so to be one of the founding members and step away from like my baby, you know,
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to broke my heart and a series of events took place.
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We all basically got the band back together as like its original founding members.
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Because we realized, oh my God, I don't think we realized what we had because we
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tried other things and it didn't work like none of it worked.
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And what did work, didn't feel good.
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Is what in a fun time.
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And so getting this particular group of individuals back together, it clicked all over again.
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It was we were off to the races.
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And I think for me, it was a realization of, hey, we might have found it by accident,
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but we can keep it on purpose.
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It's almost sort of like we like even though this is sort of like the proper debut
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as No Spoon, it's kind of like we've already gone through like as much of like band drama
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as we possibly can beforehand, hopefully so that like going forward, hopefully we won't have to
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deal with that quite as much.
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But yeah, I'm inclined to agree.
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We've had sort of a little bit of like a revolving door kind of thing with like some
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different members like keyboardists and drummers and stuff over time.
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And at some point we realized, we're just sort of looking back, we're like, hey,
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like that sort of period of time around like 2012, 2013, like the group of us that we're
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going on at the time, that was like the most fun that this had ever been.
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And we were like writing the coolest stuff at the time.
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So maybe we should sort of like get back to that.
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Right.
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Yeah.
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And, you know, we had we'd already sort of started working on this album by that point.
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We'd already been like writing and going through the process of learning how to put together
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like really kick ass like pro concept album and everything.
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And it had sort of its ups and downs in terms of like its progress, how we were able to move
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forward with it.
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And I think to what Phil is saying is like once we had that realization about like the
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right group of members to make it happen, it was like all of a sudden everything clicked.
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And it just like progress started going so smoothly where there had been periods of
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like a couple of years where it just felt like we were waiting for the mentality to be right about
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to finish writing and producing this record and everything.
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It felt like pulling teeth at time to get everyone to sort of like collaborate on it and work right
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to to everyone's frustration.
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Right.
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And then, yeah, the moment that we realized, oh, it's like we just need to get the right
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group of people.
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And the moment that we did, it was like just zero to 60, like within a span of months.
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After that point, like to put it into perspective, I think Cole James,
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some of my vocal bits came in later.
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But Cole James and at the time we had a keyboardist who was helping do some of the keyboard bits.
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I think they wrote a majority of the music in the span of about what a year.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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It was God five years later, five and a half years later.
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Yeah.
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Wow.
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Before I came back.
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Yeah.
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Because like somewhere in that span of five and a half years, it had slogged down to such
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like a crawl and I couldn't wrap my head around what was going on.
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Nobody really could.
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It was just like plotting along and I'm like, this feels like it's dead in the water.
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Like this album is never going to happen.
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And, you know, life happens and you got to pay the bills and all that.
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And so I took, I took time off.
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And when we basically put those pieces together, I think it was like, you know,
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basically put those pieces back together.
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Like Cole said, in less than six months, everything just.
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And we had a debut.
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And I think the proof is kind of in the pudding a little bit, you know.
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We didn't really expect this.
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Yeah.
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Like to, you know, be talking to some of the people we're talking to and having interviews
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like this and being put on blogs and like top top end lists like frog,
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frog record or frog song of the week on certain websites and things like that.
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Like that's that's foreign.
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Because like, like Cole, Cole and I have said, we we were not new.
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You know, we we've released music before, but never music that did anything like this.
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Yeah, not on this level.
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And, you know, and it's interesting because it kind of links into one of the questions I had
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in my head to begin with was the idea that out of the gates, this album struck me as something
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that had been polished really, really, really to a high shine.
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More so than you tend to have expected from a band that is putting out their debut.
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You know, like most bait and debuts have, you know, some rough spots here and there.
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And I get some things that, you know, maybe sound like seem like they haven't quite fully cooked
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yet. They haven't quite fully gestated.
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And, you know, I think one of the things for me, because I do my research before I start to
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do an interview. So I hopefully don't sound like an idiot.
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So I know something a little bit what's going on, but always looking for the interesting angles.
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You guys didn't have a lot out there written about you, except reviews of the
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album. And when I was reading, it's like, okay, nobody else seems to have information I don't
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already have, which is in some ways both liberating and intimidating, because I got nothing to hang
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on to. And I've just got to explore my own. But it dawned on me. I'm like, as I listen to this
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album, as I read these lyrics, like this, this is not somebody's first steps.
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This is something that has been worked on pretty meticulously for a while. I got to think. So
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it sounds like that sound, that appearance is in fact accurate. You guys have really been working
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on this for an extended period of time. This doesn't just pop up out of the blue. It's
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been given some time to really form solidly before being put out as a product.
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So I have a lot to say about this.
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Taking away, Cole.
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Yeah. So there's, I definitely think there's just a lot that you learn in the years of being
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a band. And most of our experience has been in sort of in the local sphere, we're from
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Charlotte, North Carolina. So most of our experience is in sort of that Charlotte area.
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And there's a whole slew of challenges that you face as a local band, everything from,
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you know, pay to play battles of the bands to, you know, I don't like, just like unreliable
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business people. And like you learn like the different bands to work with and everything.
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And users just sort of develop a sense for the way things go. And, you know, we, in our earliest
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iteration of this band, we recorded an album and everything, some of the first music that we ever
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wrote. And it did not turn out the way that we wanted it to. We sort of had a sound in our heads.
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It was like, oh, this is so cool. We're going to, we're going to be like Dream Theater and everything.
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And then the album that came out of that was so disappointing in so many ways, like the,
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the sound wasn't there. It was basically as though it hadn't really been mixed. And in fairness, a
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lot of the people who were working on it were sort of doing like pro bono work. So there's only so
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much you can expect from that. And, you know, it was easy to see some of our immaturities as song
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writers. And we just sort of felt like, wow, this, this kind of feels like local band work.
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You know, and that sort of started us down a road of, we want to learn how to produce our own
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records. Like we want to learn how to do the audio side, like basically every part of it,
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we want to learn to be able to do that ourselves because we never want to go into a studio again
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and come out of it with an album that we don't like or that we're not proud of. Right. And so we
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ended up writing another EP and recording that all ourselves. And we're really proud of that
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music, again, from sort of the previous iteration of the band, really proud of that. But of course,
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that was like one of the first things that I ever mix. Because I'm the, the, the recording and mixing
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mastering engineer on for the band, essentially. And so we're really proud of the music itself,
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but the mix is still very novice level, I would say. And so after that,
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we want to plug the name. What for the old music or? Yeah, just so that people have a history,
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you know, like, because no spoon feels like it dropped out of nowhere. And if anybody was interested,
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you know, and it actually ties back into why we changed the name. The previous iteration of this
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group was known as Ozai. Oh, for all you fans, Avatar, the last airbender. Yes. That is a Fire
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Lord reference, which is why we had to change that name. Because back when we formed that band,
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what, O5? Somewhere. Well, no, no, no, no, that's too early. Too early. Or something 2012. Right.
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Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. It hadn't blown up on Netflix. You know, it kind of
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ran its time on Nickelodeon and died. And so we all thought, Hey, it's a cool name. Why not? And
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so we used it. There weren't any other acts at the time. Then it sort of like reawakened on
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Netflix turned into like a multi-million dollar name. Right. And, and now there's like 13 Ozai's
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that you can find readily available on like Apple Music Spotify and whatnot. And so we're like,
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Ah, yeah. Okay. Then now we look like we also look like bandwagoners, even though we've been on
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for years ahead of time. But yeah, and it was always like you would search that name. And that
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was never the first thing that would come up. No. And show. Yeah. And we weren't thinking that far
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ahead at the time. Like we were still, you know, just wanting to come up with a cool band name,
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you know. And so this time around, that was another thing we learned as like, you know,
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pain from experience. Right. Yeah. That's true. But so we, yeah, that, that music,
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I'll start going to cool. Take it away. Ultimately, where I was going with that was like
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around the time that, that I was sort of learning how to, how to do this, how to do like
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music production and stuff. I was listening to these records where the sound was so
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immaculate, where the mix was like, it was the greatest metal mixes that I've ever heard
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in my life. And I was so inspired by that. And I was just like, like with, with the way audio
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technology is right now. And, you know, like you can get yourself a copy of Pro Tools or Cubase or
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whatever. And there's all these plugins out there that are constantly on sale. These things just,
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just make the music sound great. The, the only thing that's missing is the know how. The only
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thing that's missing is the experience. And so it's like, there's, there's no reason. There's no,
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like monetary barricade to keep us from having an album that sounds as good as the best sounding
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albums out there. The only thing that's missing is our own experience. And so part of that,
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you know, five, six, seven years that we worked on this album was not just, you know, like coming
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up with the music and like lyric writing and refining the parts and stuff, but like recording
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demos and then recording them again and then deciding, okay, it's time to record the final
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album and then recording those parts over and over again. Like our song, The Death of Simpson,
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track three off of the new album. I recorded the bass tracks for that song no fewer than 10 times.
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And it wasn't because like, oh, like I'm just not satisfied with my performance. It was like,
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I would record the bass track and be like, yeah, that's cool. And then I would learn something new.
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I would get a new piece of gear or a new bass or something like that. And I'd be like, well,
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now I have to re-record those parts again. And I, that just happened so many times to where like
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after the final time, I was, I was actually like happy with it. I was like, I cannot allow myself
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to touch this again. I'm getting so tired of recording this one song over and over again.
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And so there was just this process of like all of us going back and forth while I was learning to
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do, to mix properly, where we were all sort of mixing it together to a certain extent that like,
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you know, I would put out a revision of the mix and everyone would be like, no, like this doesn't
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sound right. Like, you know, just like all kinds of feedback and, you know, doing that over the
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course of several years and sort of constantly holding it up next to those, those albums of mine
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that are like my favorites that I think sound the best. And being like, are these comparable?
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Like if I play ours and then one of my favorites or vice versa, like, do I feel a difference?
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Do I feel a difference in quality? Do I ever feel at any point that like, okay, cool. Yeah,
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the super awesome commercial mix is over. Now our song kicks in, does it still sound like a local
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band? Right? Or does it maintain that level of like quality? Could you, could you tell that we're
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not like a big label supported band or anything? And we weren't going to be satisfied with releasing
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the album until we hit that point. If it took us another three years to do it, that's what it was
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going to take. Wow. We just had to wait it out. And truthfully, the music was a little bit the
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same. It was like, like Phil said, a lot of the music was, was done between me, our guitarist,
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James, and our keyboardist at the time, David, sort of working on it. And there was very much
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this mentality of this album has to be perfect in every single way in our own eyes. Like,
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musically, every note has to be intentional. Nothing can be, I don't know, we had some of that
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early immature musician thing going on years ago where it's like, oh, that's a cool guitar riff.
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I'm going to write a cool bass part to go along with it, but they don't necessarily complement
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each other. It's just like a cool guitar part and a cool bass part, not a cool song. Yeah. Right?
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And it was that maturity that came later, I think that sort of really bloomed with this album.
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That was us making sure that every single, and I mean, every single note on the album was
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intentionally chosen and honestly argued over for hours. Yeah.
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Sorry, I don't mean to get loud, but no, it's true. It's true. And we're just having, you know,
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like Vietnam flashbacks over there, basically, you know? Yeah. So. There's ups and downs to that.
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I think, of course, the big thing is the fact that if you channel all of that into
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making something that is, as you said, intentional is exactly what you want it to be and sounds the
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way you want it to be. You can walk away from from the experience with something that sounds great.
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And you can. I don't get tired of listening. Yeah. Yeah. I still don't get tired of listening
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to our record. Yeah. And that might sound pretentious and I really don't mean it to be, but it's,
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I hold it up there with some of my favorite records of all time. Nice. And it's.
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And it's because it's just that. Yeah. It is exactly what we wanted to hear. In fact,
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I think that's part of what spawns like the creative spark to begin with. Yeah. Is like,
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my favorite bands aren't producing enough music to satiate that need. And so like,
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let's make some more, you know? There you go. That's the upside. And that's like,
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if I understand correctly, then then, Cole, you have a studio you own and run a studio, correct?
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Yes. Our guitarist James and I co-own and run the studio. Okay.
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And it's been production. I think somewhere along the line, I got the impression that I
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don't know where I got this from now. I'm questioning my own sanity, but that's daily.
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The idea that you had recorded it essentially at home with your own kind of in-home studio,
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which maybe is what this is. And so it's the same thing or it's not. Now I'm not sure what I heard.
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We do actually have, we now have a small studio space close to downtown Charlotte.
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But it's far from like the biggest or most fully featured studio. But our mentality is kind of
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like, if you're coming to us to record, you're not necessarily coming there because you're hoping
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to see a million dollar console in the control room or something. You're coming there because you've
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heard our work and you want that on your project is essentially what it is. But the process of
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producing the album, like getting that studio space was something that happened during the process
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of producing the album. So the earliest parts of the production, like the earliest guitar and bass
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tracks were definitely recorded here in my living room. I have my own sort of like personal home
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audio space and a lot of it was just hooking up the gear and just tracking away here with our free
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time. And that's again, another one of those modern world things because at this point in time,
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this will be the third interview I've done with people in a band that debuted a Prog Metal album
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this year that one was recorded in a cabin. One was recorded, you know, in your studio more or less
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at home. One was recorded remotely from five or six people across the world, emailing their parts in
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and they all said, I love it. And I'm sitting here thinking, how screwed are the producers out
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there? They are so no longer needed. The people can make this stuff that sounds so great, like you
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guys are doing. Well, I guess the tricky part of that is like there's definitely, I mean, the
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audio industry has definitely increased and bloomed and become a lot more available to everyone
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because of technology, the fact that we can do all of this recording and honestly, very quick
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editing. This is not like the old days where editing meant cutting, physically cutting pieces of
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tape with scissors like you can do. You can do a whole day's worth of tape cutting in a matter
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of minutes now. Honestly, it was such a step up from the stone tablets that I was very happy to
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be able to cut the tape. It's beautiful. I personally think that the technology is really
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beautiful. And the funny thing is, I think what that has forced us into is that it's
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the obstacle, like kind of like I was saying, the obstacle is no longer the like how much money you
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have. Do you have the money to get into a studio or to own the equipment yourself? Now it is,
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do you have the wherewithal to train your ear and to train your brain how to create a great record?
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Like for everyone who's sort of like putting out a great sounding record from home, there's
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a thousand other people at home with the same equipment and the same plugins who are just
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struggling to get their snare drum to sound right. And it's tough and it's a real struggle.
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And I mean, I really want to emphasize it's not something like learning how to mix. It was not
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an overnight thing. It was a lot of pain. It was so much like comparing like that process I was
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talking about of like comparing my mix to my favorite mixes is so demoralizing to think that
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you've like created a good sound and then to suddenly compare it to something you know sounds
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good and realize how utterly crappy your sounds. It honestly makes me not want to touch my audio
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setup for a week because it's like it tells me how far I have to go. And so like it's kind of a
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it's kind of a there's two sides to the coin. It's that like it's it's totally amazing that we
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can do this from our homes now. But the challenge has really been put on like on our ears and our
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brains to be able to make it happen now. And I like that you you said two different things because I
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I think you can have like the intellectual wherewithal to be able to understand the process and like
430
00:35:12,440 --> 00:35:18,760
you know a lip service to what a mentor might be teaching you. Right. But there are
431
00:35:18,760 --> 00:35:23,960
sometimes where if you can't hear it it doesn't matter if you have all of the know how in the world.
432
00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:32,280
Right. A great example is like a like a I have known classically trained pianists
433
00:35:33,320 --> 00:35:37,960
who could play some of the most complicated like piano suites you could you could write
434
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:48,760
but they can't hear the notes. Right. If you ask them to sing the note back to you they can't do it.
435
00:35:48,760 --> 00:35:55,080
And if you ask them to write anything they are utterly incapable. Yeah. I think it's a bit of both.
436
00:35:55,880 --> 00:36:00,120
Yeah they can replicate and they have the knowledge to be able to tell you all the
437
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:05,160
technique and why it works and how it works. But if you ask them to create you anything using
438
00:36:05,160 --> 00:36:11,560
that knowledge they can't do it. And so I think honestly that's the question being like what are
439
00:36:11,560 --> 00:36:16,280
producers going to do. And it's like well I think now what separates good producers from bad
440
00:36:16,280 --> 00:36:24,520
producers isn't money and gear. It's their ear and technique. Yeah. Absolutely. And it's funny
441
00:36:24,520 --> 00:36:29,960
you say that because you're basically saying you're describing the the converse or the reverse
442
00:36:29,960 --> 00:36:38,680
or one of those things of what a friend of mine who went tried to make a serious career as a musician
443
00:36:39,560 --> 00:36:47,960
and had some minor level of success but he couldn't read a note of music at all. Read nothing.
444
00:36:47,960 --> 00:36:54,280
He always said look music is sound. You just you need to be able to hear and know how to
445
00:36:54,280 --> 00:37:01,560
make the sounds you want to make. And so what you described as someone who knew how to read
446
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:08,360
had that so-called I guess book learning aspect of it but didn't have the capability to
447
00:37:09,080 --> 00:37:14,360
take that sound and make something else out of it. So it's it's it's kind of underlined. It's not
448
00:37:14,360 --> 00:37:22,120
necessarily about how formal your training was or whether you can read music. Right. Right. In fact I
449
00:37:22,120 --> 00:37:32,280
think it's more important to understand like the concepts. Yeah. And to know your instrument
450
00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:36,360
whatever it is whether it's your voice or a bass or keyboard or whatever it is
451
00:37:37,080 --> 00:37:43,880
like know how to get a get around on it. Right. And then train your ear. I think that's far more
452
00:37:43,880 --> 00:37:52,280
important than training your eyes. Yeah. I do. Our guitarist I mean if you've listened to the record
453
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:58,680
you know he is a technically proficient mother trucker. He knows what he's doing. Yes. I don't
454
00:37:58,680 --> 00:38:04,440
think he can read sheet music. I can't. Like if you put if you put a page like quarter notes
455
00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:09,000
and all that stuff in front of him like I think he could get around on it. Yeah. But
456
00:38:09,000 --> 00:38:15,320
I'll ask you later. I don't think so. Don't quote me on that James. I'm sorry if I'm wrong.
457
00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:19,560
But I really don't think like you could throw him a piece of sheet music and he know what to do
458
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:27,240
with it. In his defense. But if you but if you said like if you started flacking away
459
00:38:27,880 --> 00:38:32,600
immediately he knows what key you're in. He knows what mode he's going to play. Yeah. He knows all
460
00:38:32,600 --> 00:38:39,320
the patterns in the mode if he wants to change it up and then on top of that he knows he has
461
00:38:39,320 --> 00:38:45,480
an ear for what he likes to as well. So he could play like hey what if at this part we changed to
462
00:38:45,480 --> 00:38:49,880
this and he's proficient enough in his instrument that he can show you what's in his head just by
463
00:38:49,880 --> 00:38:55,560
playing it. Yeah. He doesn't have to read your music. He can play it just by listening to you
464
00:38:55,560 --> 00:39:03,000
and then spinning it right back out. And I've watched him do it. And it's in his defense. I was like I
465
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:09,000
went to school for music and I learned how to read and everything. But like my my life and career has
466
00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:14,680
not kept me up with my like sight reading training. And so like if you said a piece of sheet music in
467
00:39:14,680 --> 00:39:21,320
front of me I can read it. But it's more like I have to translate it. It's just that that's a skill
468
00:39:21,320 --> 00:39:26,440
you have to keep up with over time. So like even though I learned how to read it it still wouldn't
469
00:39:26,440 --> 00:39:30,680
do me very much good. I agree that I think the bigger thing that I pulled out of music school
470
00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:35,720
was my ear as well for sure. I think that I think you know coming full circle that's kind of what
471
00:39:35,720 --> 00:39:40,840
we're we're getting at is that if you're going to focus on something like really focus on it get
472
00:39:40,840 --> 00:39:48,680
good at your instrument and get and train your ear. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And speaking of that clearly
473
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:55,960
listening to the album you guys are rather good at your instruments to a to a high high degree.
474
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:03,960
Hearing you already talk about the fact that Dream Theater is one of your original inspirations.
475
00:40:04,680 --> 00:40:10,040
I don't think there was a single review I read that did not basically say these guys are in the
476
00:40:10,040 --> 00:40:19,560
vein with Dream Theater and Haken. And that strikes me as very accurate. Clearly the chops are there
477
00:40:19,560 --> 00:40:25,320
so I was kind of curious. I'm going to take the fact that you just flash those horns and nodded
478
00:40:25,320 --> 00:40:29,160
that you're very cool with that description. I was always curious you know what's it like to be
479
00:40:29,160 --> 00:40:35,560
compared to other bands that way. Whether you agree with it and whether you're you're you're
480
00:40:35,560 --> 00:40:39,960
cool with it or whether you think some of these people are just going for the easy grabs because
481
00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:45,160
if you're going to grab a prog metal band Dream Theater is the first one you're going to pick
482
00:40:45,160 --> 00:40:51,640
in these days you know what Haken is very likely the second. Yeah. So I just have one thing to say
483
00:40:51,640 --> 00:41:01,640
to that. When the ugliest like this you get from an online review is that you're a Haken ripoff band.
484
00:41:01,640 --> 00:41:10,360
I'll take that. I don't think you're even close to the mark on that just because I was there for
485
00:41:10,360 --> 00:41:15,960
the process of this being written. But if that's the ugliest thing you can think to say of of this
486
00:41:15,960 --> 00:41:26,120
band I'll take that every time. Thank you. It's not a it's not a horrible insult to receive for sure.
487
00:41:26,120 --> 00:41:34,920
No. No. I'll take that one. Like it's I feel like it would be a weird surprise and definitely a lie
488
00:41:34,920 --> 00:41:44,600
as well for us to say that we haven't spent our entire like careers lives as musicians like listening
489
00:41:44,600 --> 00:41:52,440
to and enjoying the work of Dream Theater for sure. I mean it's it's like like you said they
490
00:41:52,440 --> 00:42:03,480
sort of are the quintessential prog metal band and our sort of aim our style in the prog like
491
00:42:03,480 --> 00:42:08,440
probably such a weird like genre to try to define because like I remember when I was first getting
492
00:42:08,440 --> 00:42:13,800
into it and I you know heard Dream Theater for the first time I was like I love this I just exhausted
493
00:42:13,800 --> 00:42:18,600
all of their discography I'm like I need to get more where can I listen to other bands that sound
494
00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:24,120
like Dream Theater and the problem is that there are none like there are other prog bands especially
495
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:30,360
at that time there was like I don't know I gravitated to like OPEF but OPEF doesn't sound like Dream
496
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:35,880
Theater. They're prog metal but they have their own thing and Symphony X okay well they have like
497
00:42:35,880 --> 00:42:41,640
some similarities I guess and that they're shreddy but they're a lot more neoclassical than Dream Theater is
498
00:42:41,640 --> 00:42:49,080
you know you've got Circus Maximus who they kind of have a little bit more of like an 80s thing
499
00:42:49,080 --> 00:42:53,880
going on at the same time but no one sounded just like Dream Theater and so it's kind of hard to
500
00:42:54,600 --> 00:42:59,880
to sort of you know parse what makes a prog metal band but just because they're sort of the
501
00:42:59,880 --> 00:43:06,040
quintessential prog metal band I tend to think of them as up the middle of the road prog like the
502
00:43:06,040 --> 00:43:12,360
things that you exp or prog metal at least what you expect to hear. Heavy riffs are really percussive
503
00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:20,280
drums you know big epic sections you know punctuated by heavy sections and more emotional sections
504
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:26,280
and things like that it's just a really wide ranging thing and so naturally if we were going to go
505
00:43:26,280 --> 00:43:34,120
for that same middle of the road prog thing obviously we were going to be finding ourselves
506
00:43:34,120 --> 00:43:41,400
in in that kind of description but we that that's sort of like perfectionist mentality that I
507
00:43:41,400 --> 00:43:48,760
mentioned earlier about like the writing and the production side has that same mentality has totally
508
00:43:48,760 --> 00:43:53,960
informed the way that we have approached our instruments like this whole time you know we've
509
00:43:53,960 --> 00:43:58,200
we've like covered Dream Theater songs like individually it's like I want to sit down and
510
00:43:58,200 --> 00:44:03,080
practice let's learn a Dream Theater song and it's it's always sort of been that way right and we've
511
00:44:03,080 --> 00:44:10,040
just sort of gotten better at doing that with time because you know it's practice practice practice and
512
00:44:11,400 --> 00:44:18,760
that James and I are also we're both and now Paul our drummer as well our music teachers
513
00:44:19,880 --> 00:44:25,480
and so we're we're sort of constantly engaging with different techniques to improve
514
00:44:27,560 --> 00:44:31,000
like you know musical playing ability it's it's kind of hard to
515
00:44:31,000 --> 00:44:39,000
hard to preach it when you're not also living it yourself right and so yeah like gradually over time
516
00:44:39,000 --> 00:44:47,000
it's like we developed the taste for being able to play a lot of notes very fast and just the
517
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:51,160
the perfectionist attitude of like okay I just played a lot of notes very fast what was a clean
518
00:44:51,160 --> 00:45:00,600
did I feel like I said something with those notes so yeah it's it's kind of just part of the language
519
00:45:00,600 --> 00:45:08,200
we feel that we're speaking in order to be able to play that stuff I guess yeah plus going going
520
00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:13,000
back to like the references like with with Dream Theater and Haken I think we end up following
521
00:45:13,000 --> 00:45:19,880
more in that camp with this record as opposed to like our previous EP is Ozai right okay um
522
00:45:20,520 --> 00:45:28,840
because as Ozai like I said we leaned more into the gent influence yeah which sticks out like you'll
523
00:45:28,840 --> 00:45:37,640
if you listen to that record um you'll you'll hear it in the music that is written and then also the
524
00:45:37,640 --> 00:45:46,040
vocals for that record we were trying to emulate all of those style bands and so there were harsh
525
00:45:46,040 --> 00:45:54,040
vocals as well as clean yeah on this one uh a to um make it easier for me to to reproduce on a
526
00:45:54,040 --> 00:46:04,040
nightly basis if we ever went on tour um we cut out a lot of the harshes but also um
527
00:46:04,040 --> 00:46:08,760
as as much as we loved gent gent has less mass appeal you can show Haken or Dream Theater to your mom
528
00:46:09,400 --> 00:46:31,400
and she'll be like oh that's pretty cool yeah I mean like it sounds silly but it's the truth like you can take it to your grandma and be like hey grandma what do you think of this band and you know James the breeze not gonna you know turn her ears to goo yeah
529
00:46:31,400 --> 00:46:54,040
turn her ears to goo yeah you know and we liked that idea we could still have our heavy impactful riffs but we didn't have to scream at you you know plus it it it's better for conveying a message which being a concept album you probably want to hear what we're saying
530
00:46:54,040 --> 00:47:05,400
it was it was both a stylistic choice out of um necessity you know to to help convey the message but also out of like
531
00:47:07,640 --> 00:47:19,000
forward thinking I guess is the way I'm trying to think a bit you know because the idea going going back to that earlier question earlier you know when we were talking about like
532
00:47:19,000 --> 00:47:31,000
what brought about No Spoon and what brought about the record of Opus and how did the band end up in this this moment where we're at now for me it was really about
533
00:47:32,200 --> 00:47:38,760
not only realizing what we had but getting serious about keeping it yeah and so if we were gonna get serious about making this
534
00:47:38,760 --> 00:47:56,760
our our foray into the world you know taking a real stab at it you know instead of just being a bunch of kids in a garage band what what would appeal and honestly I don't really miss trading out the harshest for the singing
535
00:47:56,760 --> 00:48:18,760
don't and if it's gonna have a broader appeal why not yeah yeah makes total sense and I think we kind of felt that uh you know it like there's definitely a lot of music that we like that has harsh vocals and everything
536
00:48:18,760 --> 00:48:48,600
Michelle is one of my favorite bands um and they're only harshes uh yeah but like for our own music it's kind of like a uh we could we could take it or we could leave it like it didn't it doesn't really make a huge difference to us whether we have it in the music or not and so the only other thing to consider is like well if it doesn't make a difference to us you know who else's opinion should we consider but like our sort of potential uh general
537
00:48:48,600 --> 00:49:18,200
listening audience and the the funny thing is like it feels absolutely right like our um our ozai EP that we did years ago um has harsh vocals in it and um my parents who are a little bit more casual listeners will say they never cared for it um but they love opus right they think the new album is amazing so I think that's you know that sort of speaks to that look we have a lot of uh
538
00:49:18,200 --> 00:49:37,320
friends and family who are sort of definitely not metal listeners much less prog metal listeners right um and they still love the album and that's honestly the most incredible thing to us I'm always happy to hear uh that metalheads and prog noggins are into uh our our into the
539
00:49:37,320 --> 00:49:56,120
I've never heard that before that one credit credit for that I think goes to uh goes to James's dad I think he walked into our writing session one day he's like what's up you prog noggins we're like that's awesome um so you know we're happy to hear that term to my grave now oh right
540
00:49:56,120 --> 00:50:13,000
uh we're we're happy to hear when when like that demographic loves the music but there's also something like really special when uh for total lack of a better term the normies also enjoy it it's like wow that's really cool you know like the same people that
541
00:50:13,000 --> 00:50:38,360
enjoy like Taylor Swift also enjoy opus that's tight when I borrow when I borrow my wife's car you know to go take our kid for an errand or something and she's typically listening to like you know kpop and that's sort of like genre of things and she has our record like playing in the car I'm like yeah
542
00:50:38,360 --> 00:50:57,080
really cool by the way sorry uh sorry for our long-windedness I don't know if you know what you're getting into but I love it I love the conversation I love talking that's amazing but yeah if you can sell the wife who's listening to kpop on what you're doing you know what you've opened the door that's all
543
00:50:57,080 --> 00:51:26,520
take sometimes you open a door to things you know years ago I never would have listened to much of anything with harsh vocals because one I can never much understand a lot of what they're saying and at the same time uh you know uh I'm an old head enough to go I'd like my clean vocals that's just the way it is and and I'm not ready to let go of that ever for an entire song but you know I want some opeth mix that in half and half put on some ginger and watch taziana go at it
544
00:51:26,520 --> 00:51:43,880
she's my metal goddess right now you know you and Paul both our drummer our drummer p dub oh yeah we call him p dub that's his nickname uh for Paul wood because his last name is wood that's his metal goddess as well
545
00:51:45,160 --> 00:51:51,160
the cat's called eight uh I love it stands for attention whore very good love that
546
00:51:51,160 --> 00:51:57,560
oh you you gave me ammo that's wonderful thank you
547
00:52:00,520 --> 00:52:13,080
so hey there is a new album out let's talk about that for a moment so this is this is a serious again it's one of those things you don't see often people doing first time out the door which is a
548
00:52:13,080 --> 00:52:29,080
story oriented conceptual album and and this is a story that's to me I like I think the word it's not the word I want but I forgot to go to thesaurus.com to find out the other ones a parable came to mind but it's essentially uh
549
00:52:29,080 --> 00:52:42,760
that there's a message in it and and as I started reading the lyrics and I'm and I'm seeing it and I'm going well this is starting off like a I thought it was gonna be a murder mystery and then it became
550
00:52:42,760 --> 00:52:49,400
something entirely different and and by the time I wrapped up I was like okay that's rather cool so
551
00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:58,120
I guess there's something that inspired that particular story among you guys is that a personal
552
00:52:58,120 --> 00:53:02,680
origin or is it more of an intellectual philosophical origin to it because I've
553
00:53:02,680 --> 00:53:05,640
I've seen story oriented conceptual albums come out of both
554
00:53:05,640 --> 00:53:13,640
both cool okay so the the original story concept came from me
555
00:53:15,720 --> 00:53:25,240
because I had a like it's it's funny I kind of wish that I could say that the story idea came from
556
00:53:26,040 --> 00:53:33,640
you know a bunch of time of like sort of either personal or intellectual digging and trying to say something or whatever
557
00:53:33,640 --> 00:53:41,000
but the the original concept which grants it the album is is quite different from its original concept
558
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:48,360
but it was a dream it was a dream just that like the particular time in my life
559
00:53:49,400 --> 00:53:55,000
that there are places in my life that I was sort of in at the time that I came up with the concept I wasn't getting very much sleep
560
00:53:55,000 --> 00:54:06,520
and so when I did sleep I slept really really hard and would sort of I mean I say hallucinate because that's kind of what it felt like but I was dreaming
561
00:54:06,920 --> 00:54:13,960
you know I wonder if I like was snoring too much and like wasn't getting enough oxygen to my brain and that's why I was seeing these things or whatever
562
00:54:14,520 --> 00:54:18,920
but I woke up in the middle of the night just having experienced this this story about
563
00:54:18,920 --> 00:54:30,760
a house and a bunch of people in the house and this seeming murder mystery kind of thing going on but then as dreams often do it takes a hard left turn into weird sci-fi crap
564
00:54:32,200 --> 00:54:39,560
and but but I woke up and I was like I can remember every single detail from it and so I you know like wrote it out into my into my phone and
565
00:54:40,280 --> 00:54:48,120
over time we sort of refined out a lot of like the unnecessary extra stuff that like it doesn't contribute to the story
566
00:54:48,120 --> 00:54:57,080
is like whereas with a book you may have page after page after page to describe every detail of what's going on in the world with a concept album
567
00:54:57,400 --> 00:55:08,440
you only have so many lyrics to get the point across and then everything else has to be music right and so we we trimmed the story down to sort of the the necessary parts
568
00:55:09,080 --> 00:55:15,640
and what's interesting about it like even though it sort of came from what feels to me like an arbitrary
569
00:55:15,640 --> 00:55:27,480
origin I definitely agree that there is these sort of like strange messages in there but for me it's like those messages became apparent to me
570
00:55:28,280 --> 00:55:40,600
over time over the process of producing the album not initially like there's legitimately for me there are there lyrical moments that like after I wrote the lyrics because
571
00:55:40,600 --> 00:55:52,120
most of the lyrics were written between me and Phil right there are portions of lyrics that I wrote that I was just writing for story purposes I was just trying to you know tell the story
572
00:55:52,760 --> 00:56:05,720
and then later realize these lyrics have a parallel in my life and that's kind of frightening to me like now I wonder how much of my life I have actually poured into these lyrics without knowing it
573
00:56:05,720 --> 00:56:25,720
just like these in the album the character of the protagonist the character of the composer talking about this sort of you know one of the big themes is the frustration of trying to create the perfect work of music but it's always like on the tip of your tongue you can never quite get it out
574
00:56:25,720 --> 00:56:37,720
I mean and that's a little bit more on the nose because obviously that's something that a lot of us feel when we're trying to like create our best work and we just can't get it out sometimes you know it's writer's block
575
00:56:37,720 --> 00:56:38,720
yeah yeah
576
00:56:38,720 --> 00:56:43,720
but there were other like moments in the lyrics where I'm like wow this kind of feels like
577
00:56:43,720 --> 00:57:00,720
like I'm talking about my relationship with other people or with my family or something like that that totally was not intentional to begin with but I began to interpret my own lyrics in in sort of other ways after the fact so
578
00:57:00,720 --> 00:57:15,720
I don't know I kind of want to say it feels like the album sort of has a life to its own that revealed itself to me in kind of a same way that it might reveal itself to an actual listener right
579
00:57:17,720 --> 00:57:27,720
so I agree I think there's there's messages there it's just kind of funny because a lot of the work intended to begin with they just sort of I don't know it became a parent yeah
580
00:57:27,720 --> 00:57:29,720
yeah so
581
00:57:30,720 --> 00:57:46,720
there is there is like one or two like stories messages I guess you could say in there that I personally feel came about because of when we got to you
582
00:57:47,720 --> 00:57:51,720
toward the ending of the song of the writing process right
583
00:57:51,720 --> 00:57:54,720
because I think
584
00:57:55,720 --> 00:58:00,720
oh forgive me forgive me if I'm wrong didn't we write within the realm last
585
00:58:04,720 --> 00:58:05,720
um
586
00:58:05,720 --> 00:58:06,720
like the lyrics
587
00:58:06,720 --> 00:58:07,720
didn't we write the
588
00:58:08,720 --> 00:58:16,720
yeah within the realm was was the last one to talk about our song within the realm of possibility that's the big ol 15 and a half minute epic
589
00:58:16,720 --> 00:58:19,720
um
590
00:58:19,720 --> 00:58:22,720
that I believe yeah right
591
00:58:22,720 --> 00:58:27,720
that was the one to receive sort of like the bulk of its
592
00:58:28,720 --> 00:58:34,720
lyrical content I don't know if I want to say it was the last one to receive a lyric because I think maybe there were a couple of
593
00:58:34,720 --> 00:58:46,720
no we're like oh there's a missing word here or there that we needed to add in or something but the crux of the story I think really fell upon that song when we were writing it
594
00:58:47,720 --> 00:58:52,720
colon I because I think the original way that the story was going to end
595
00:58:56,720 --> 00:58:59,720
spoiler alert for anybody who hasn't listened to the record
596
00:58:59,720 --> 00:59:05,720
um when the main character was going to basically
597
00:59:06,720 --> 00:59:08,720
write all of the wrongs
598
00:59:09,720 --> 00:59:13,720
what was going to happen is they were actually going to be the character who went back
599
00:59:15,720 --> 00:59:23,720
and they themselves were going to get to go into all of these things yeah and while we were trying to write it that that kind of stuck in my
600
00:59:23,720 --> 00:59:28,720
pardon the old southern expression stuck in my craw a little bit I
601
00:59:29,720 --> 00:59:41,720
I didn't like the message because polls right as we kept writing and kept going about it all of these these messages that were really like relatable started popping out
602
00:59:42,720 --> 00:59:47,720
and that was one where no matter how I looked at it the message that came across was
603
00:59:47,720 --> 01:00:02,720
if you forgo living your entire life and all the experiences that there is to live and only focus on the one thing with which you have no experience in
604
01:00:03,720 --> 01:00:05,720
then it'll all work out in the end
605
01:00:05,720 --> 01:00:16,720
so basically like him throwing his whole life away to focus on the song the opus would be rewarded by him getting to go back and live the rest of his life and it's like that's not how life works
606
01:00:17,720 --> 01:00:19,720
you don't get a do over
607
01:00:20,720 --> 01:00:24,720
and so one of the ideas that was pitched was like hey
608
01:00:25,720 --> 01:00:27,720
we can we can do like two stories
609
01:00:28,720 --> 01:00:29,720
you know
610
01:00:29,720 --> 01:00:37,720
two ideas to really get the listener to think about thing one is what if he's not the one who gets to go back
611
01:00:38,720 --> 01:00:42,720
he's got to send what he knows he's got to pass on his experience
612
01:00:44,720 --> 01:00:51,720
Eric quote to the next generation right he's passing on his knowledge to his younger self which is something that happens in life anyway
613
01:00:52,720 --> 01:00:55,720
he basically becomes his own father figure right
614
01:00:56,720 --> 01:00:57,720
right
615
01:00:57,720 --> 01:01:00,720
and I already liked that but then
616
01:01:01,720 --> 01:01:07,720
incidentally what ends up happening is when we went back and started writing what happens in a
617
01:01:09,720 --> 01:01:11,720
back yet forward the song that follows
618
01:01:12,720 --> 01:01:15,720
what actually happened when the knowledge was passed on to him
619
01:01:16,720 --> 01:01:20,720
was the way he righted all of his wrongs was he started living life
620
01:01:22,720 --> 01:01:25,720
he got up earlier he did the dance
621
01:01:25,720 --> 01:01:32,720
he spent time with his family like he actually started living all the things that would give him the experience
622
01:01:33,720 --> 01:01:34,720
to write his opus
623
01:01:35,720 --> 01:01:36,720
right
624
01:01:36,720 --> 01:01:37,720
and
625
01:01:38,720 --> 01:01:42,720
that's how I choose to interpret it other people might choose to interpret it different ways
626
01:01:43,720 --> 01:01:51,720
but I liked the idea that two birds with one stone you know you might not get to be the one who fulfills your work
627
01:01:51,720 --> 01:01:58,720
but that shouldn't mean you begrudge the next generation from experiencing or from benefiting from your experience
628
01:01:59,720 --> 01:02:00,720
right
629
01:02:00,720 --> 01:02:01,720
and then the other one is
630
01:02:03,720 --> 01:02:06,720
you can devote all their time and effort into a thing
631
01:02:07,720 --> 01:02:10,720
but unless you live life a little bit what was it was it really worth it
632
01:02:11,720 --> 01:02:14,720
and would you even have the experience to accomplish the thing you're setting up to do
633
01:02:14,720 --> 01:02:21,720
sometimes especially like in this creative context
634
01:02:22,720 --> 01:02:26,720
we talked about it already the maturity of the writing changed
635
01:02:27,720 --> 01:02:34,720
we grew older we gained experience and our writing changed our taste changed and blossomed into opus the album that we wrote together
636
01:02:35,720 --> 01:02:36,720
yeah
637
01:02:36,720 --> 01:02:37,720
would we have been able to do that
638
01:02:38,720 --> 01:02:41,720
I mean clearly the answer is no because we didn't
639
01:02:41,720 --> 01:02:47,720
you know as a bunch of 18 year olds playing in a garage band we didn't have the experience yet we hadn't lived life so
640
01:02:48,720 --> 01:02:51,720
I liked and I think that was
641
01:02:52,720 --> 01:02:55,720
it was more of an intentional like choice that's one of the few
642
01:02:56,720 --> 01:02:59,720
stories in the album where it was like
643
01:03:00,720 --> 01:03:03,720
let's let's hone in on that
644
01:03:04,720 --> 01:03:05,720
yeah
645
01:03:05,720 --> 01:03:11,720
and let me tell you the original plan for it was not anywhere near that deep but I'm glad I got there
646
01:03:13,720 --> 01:03:20,720
it's it's funny because you know to a large extent what we've talked about as far as how you guys got from A to B and where you're at now
647
01:03:21,720 --> 01:03:25,720
is a lot of it was it happened when it was ready to happen almost so to speak that
648
01:03:26,720 --> 01:03:32,720
in some ways almost as you talked about that the album is semi-autobiographical
649
01:03:32,720 --> 01:03:34,720
because
650
01:03:35,720 --> 01:03:41,720
I like ready before you had the experiences when you came back to it after having had the experiences
651
01:03:42,720 --> 01:03:44,720
this is what the result was
652
01:03:45,720 --> 01:03:54,720
and see that's what I was talking about about like listening to it and being like wow that was not a meaning that I originally intended but like it sure does work
653
01:03:55,720 --> 01:03:56,720
yeah
654
01:03:56,720 --> 01:04:00,720
you know and that's beautiful and I'm gonna take that I'm stealing that
655
01:04:00,720 --> 01:04:02,720
you enjoy totally
656
01:04:02,720 --> 01:04:04,720
we'll take that you can take prog noggins
657
01:04:05,720 --> 01:04:06,720
there we go
658
01:04:06,720 --> 01:04:08,720
quid pro quo Clarice
659
01:04:10,720 --> 01:04:14,720
I um the other I think message I gotta have a to is a certain sense was the idea that
660
01:04:15,720 --> 01:04:18,720
he saved those other people through self-sacrifice as well
661
01:04:19,720 --> 01:04:21,720
that in a certain sense
662
01:04:22,720 --> 01:04:25,720
and and some of it probably went slightly over my head
663
01:04:25,720 --> 01:04:30,720
but there's that idea that he gave up some of that obsessive focus on the work
664
01:04:31,720 --> 01:04:37,720
and the result was that he's a quote-a-quote went back in time and saved the people that died
665
01:04:38,720 --> 01:04:41,720
by giving up on his self-obsession
666
01:04:42,720 --> 01:04:43,720
so
667
01:04:43,720 --> 01:04:48,720
right yeah because the way that's the way that story ends it's like yeah
668
01:04:49,720 --> 01:04:53,720
you have time to recreate the work and get it exactly perfect
669
01:04:53,720 --> 01:04:55,720
yeah but who will you have to share it with
670
01:04:56,720 --> 01:04:57,720
right
671
01:04:57,720 --> 01:05:04,720
couple of the things I noticed and again I visual the album cover I'm curious about the exact concept of that because
672
01:05:06,720 --> 01:05:10,720
obviously I think one the idea that the house is isolated in a drop of water
673
01:05:11,720 --> 01:05:12,720
there's also
674
01:05:14,720 --> 01:05:16,720
one of the vps I've worked with at my job
675
01:05:17,720 --> 01:05:21,720
would talk about the idea of somebody drowning in a teardrop
676
01:05:21,720 --> 01:05:25,720
the idea of just getting so over complicated with simple things that
677
01:05:25,720 --> 01:05:30,720
and I've said I'm going to wonder if that was the idea behind the image there because it's almost could be that too
678
01:05:30,720 --> 01:05:32,720
but I don't know
679
01:05:32,720 --> 01:05:35,720
another meaning we can add to the list
680
01:05:35,720 --> 01:05:36,720
there you go
681
01:05:37,720 --> 01:05:40,720
I don't know guys I'm giving you gris for the mill here
682
01:05:40,720 --> 01:05:44,720
that's actually that sort of reminds me of another one of those
683
01:05:45,720 --> 01:05:48,720
meanings that sort of made itself apparent to me over time it's like
684
01:05:48,720 --> 01:05:55,720
this this process that I've talked about about like us learning how to produce a record like all in all the technical sense like learning how to
685
01:05:56,720 --> 01:06:00,720
record and mix and all of the complexities that go along with that
686
01:06:02,720 --> 01:06:03,720
like
687
01:06:04,720 --> 01:06:12,720
and this is this is a little more about like my role in the band I'm more of the the technically minded guy I guess
688
01:06:12,720 --> 01:06:18,720
so I'm I'm the one who reads manuals for fun right that's the way I'll put it out there
689
01:06:18,720 --> 01:06:24,720
like so many things that I've done like in my own personal career which is kind of crazy have been like
690
01:06:25,720 --> 01:06:28,720
steps that were taken to make the band sound better
691
01:06:28,720 --> 01:06:36,720
there's money like like okay cool I have a studio thing now but all of that came from the fact that I learned how to mix so that I could make this record
692
01:06:36,720 --> 01:06:44,720
right I do the guitar repair right but all of that kind of came from the desire to like mess around with my bases to make my base tone sound better so that the band could sound better
693
01:06:45,720 --> 01:06:55,720
right tell even the reason that I went to like music school in the first place was so that I could learn how to you know properly communicate like with music theory and learn better concepts and improve my ear so that I could make the band sound better
694
01:06:55,720 --> 01:07:10,720
right it's like it all sort of has these these connections to it and I realized at some point like one of one of the themes or one of the sort of events that happens in the album that I think a lot of people get a little confused about because technically the events take place during an instrumental
695
01:07:10,720 --> 01:07:25,720
which has no lyrics so it's all interpretive or whatever the protagonist after a number of years of now being alone and still obsessing he begins to get into the music industry and then he gets into the music industry
696
01:07:25,720 --> 01:07:46,720
to what he's trying to work on in the hopes that all these peripheral things will make his opus workout in the end right to which he what what happens is he's extremely tired of thinking and very, very much
697
01:07:46,720 --> 01:07:48,880
in the hopes that all of these peripheral things
698
01:07:48,880 --> 01:07:53,080
will make his opus work out in the end, right?
699
01:07:55,000 --> 01:07:57,280
What happens, it's sort of in the name
700
01:07:57,280 --> 01:07:58,960
of like 4D printing or whatever,
701
01:07:58,960 --> 01:08:01,680
he creates a machine or something
702
01:08:01,680 --> 01:08:04,360
that he sort of hopes will make the opus.
703
01:08:04,360 --> 01:08:07,400
This is after like 50 years or whatever working on it
704
01:08:07,400 --> 01:08:09,840
and it blows up, which he thinks is the end.
705
01:08:09,840 --> 01:08:12,800
But of course that leads to the very trippy events
706
01:08:12,800 --> 01:08:15,680
of within the realm of possibility.
707
01:08:15,680 --> 01:08:18,200
And I realized like sort of once again later,
708
01:08:18,200 --> 01:08:19,720
like I had a little bit of a,
709
01:08:19,720 --> 01:08:22,920
that was not a meaning that I originally implanted in it,
710
01:08:22,920 --> 01:08:25,240
but for me personally, it was like a,
711
01:08:25,240 --> 01:08:28,200
I started like most of us do,
712
01:08:28,200 --> 01:08:31,360
just like trying to come up with cool sounding music.
713
01:08:31,360 --> 01:08:36,360
And in the process, I have also sort of surrounded that
714
01:08:36,600 --> 01:08:40,200
with all these peripheral things like guitar repair
715
01:08:40,200 --> 01:08:42,160
and learning to do audio and everything.
716
01:08:42,160 --> 01:08:44,440
And it sort of had a personal meaning for me
717
01:08:44,440 --> 01:08:49,440
that was like a, let's make sure I'm not ignoring
718
01:08:49,760 --> 01:08:50,680
sort of the most important thing,
719
01:08:50,680 --> 01:08:52,680
which is actually like making the music.
720
01:08:52,680 --> 01:08:56,240
Like let me not get so bogged down in like,
721
01:08:56,240 --> 01:08:58,120
did I wire my pickups correctly?
722
01:08:59,520 --> 01:09:02,240
Or have I EQ'd my snare drum right?
723
01:09:02,240 --> 01:09:05,360
All of that to miss out on the,
724
01:09:05,360 --> 01:09:08,840
am I actually creating music that feels self expressive
725
01:09:08,840 --> 01:09:10,000
and things like that.
726
01:09:10,000 --> 01:09:13,200
So yeah, and to that end,
727
01:09:13,200 --> 01:09:15,040
the drowning in a teardrop thing,
728
01:09:15,040 --> 01:09:17,680
like are we making things overly complex
729
01:09:17,680 --> 01:09:22,120
and sort of missing out on the actual point
730
01:09:22,120 --> 01:09:23,120
of what we're doing?
731
01:09:24,600 --> 01:09:27,320
But the album cover was sort of,
732
01:09:27,320 --> 01:09:31,000
it's referential to events in the album,
733
01:09:32,040 --> 01:09:36,880
sort of, obviously like all of the events of the album
734
01:09:36,880 --> 01:09:41,880
kind of take place in this house, more or less.
735
01:09:41,880 --> 01:09:44,600
And so obviously, that had to be included,
736
01:09:44,600 --> 01:09:49,600
I think on the cover, like the top room,
737
01:09:50,200 --> 01:09:52,000
like window is lit or something,
738
01:09:52,000 --> 01:09:54,720
which of course, it's referenced to our character
739
01:09:54,720 --> 01:09:55,840
staying up late at night,
740
01:09:55,840 --> 01:09:59,320
working on the opus and everything.
741
01:09:59,320 --> 01:10:03,040
And then being enclosed in that sphere
742
01:10:03,040 --> 01:10:05,040
over like the dark water is sort of the reference
743
01:10:05,040 --> 01:10:09,080
to the fact that both in metaphor
744
01:10:09,080 --> 01:10:11,600
and in the literal sense in the events of the album,
745
01:10:11,600 --> 01:10:14,840
the universe has collapsed around him
746
01:10:14,840 --> 01:10:19,000
to where his focus, his view of the world
747
01:10:19,000 --> 01:10:22,600
is becoming slowly more and more like focused
748
01:10:22,600 --> 01:10:25,120
on the one thing towards beginning to cut out
749
01:10:25,120 --> 01:10:26,680
everything that surrounds him.
750
01:10:27,600 --> 01:10:32,360
So like metaphor, science fiction, literalism,
751
01:10:32,360 --> 01:10:35,440
I don't know, it's kind of up for interpretation,
752
01:10:35,440 --> 01:10:37,880
but there's lots of that in there for sure.
753
01:10:37,880 --> 01:10:39,240
And of course, we had to make it
754
01:10:39,240 --> 01:10:43,840
so that the album cover reflected that as best we could
755
01:10:43,840 --> 01:10:48,520
and sort of gives away some of the spirit of the album, I guess.
756
01:10:49,200 --> 01:10:52,440
Some of the other like little nitpicky details,
757
01:10:52,440 --> 01:10:56,280
like the water idea,
758
01:10:57,040 --> 01:11:01,640
I think we were initially trying to go for more like a snow globe
759
01:11:01,640 --> 01:11:02,840
or like blasts.
760
01:11:07,080 --> 01:11:08,720
But we did some like rough sketches
761
01:11:08,720 --> 01:11:10,080
and it wasn't coming out right.
762
01:11:10,080 --> 01:11:11,400
Like we didn't like the look.
763
01:11:11,400 --> 01:11:12,240
Right.
764
01:11:12,240 --> 01:11:15,880
And we wanted to capture the idea that.
765
01:11:17,240 --> 01:11:20,160
The bubble is like his world.
766
01:11:20,280 --> 01:11:20,680
Yeah.
767
01:11:20,680 --> 01:11:25,160
Is it shrinking or that it's failing.
768
01:11:26,360 --> 01:11:26,720
Right.
769
01:11:26,720 --> 01:11:30,160
In some way, like this, the globe that he's in is
770
01:11:30,560 --> 01:11:33,480
we had the idea of like making it look like it's disintegrating
771
01:11:33,480 --> 01:11:35,600
or cracking.
772
01:11:35,600 --> 01:11:39,520
And in fact, I think there are some cracks on the album.
773
01:11:39,840 --> 01:11:41,680
Have the look again.
774
01:11:41,680 --> 01:11:47,840
But the idea that came to fruition was what if instead of
775
01:11:48,320 --> 01:11:50,840
like frost or glass, what if it was water
776
01:11:51,720 --> 01:11:55,920
and the idea that the bubble is shrinking the way we could display
777
01:11:55,920 --> 01:11:57,880
that without having like a moving picture.
778
01:11:57,960 --> 01:11:58,280
Yeah.
779
01:11:58,280 --> 01:12:00,360
It's actually leaking.
780
01:12:00,360 --> 01:12:01,760
It's dripping.
781
01:12:01,760 --> 01:12:04,560
And with every drop, it gets smaller.
782
01:12:04,560 --> 01:12:05,400
Right.
783
01:12:06,520 --> 01:12:09,880
And that's part of the idea.
784
01:12:11,480 --> 01:12:13,080
That's some serious high concept there.
785
01:12:13,800 --> 01:12:14,560
Deep, bro.
786
01:12:17,560 --> 01:12:19,760
Which I'm going to check on this.
787
01:12:20,280 --> 01:12:23,440
Like the first couple of lines of the album, maybe the very first line.
788
01:12:23,440 --> 01:12:24,720
My memory is not that great.
789
01:12:26,040 --> 01:12:28,200
References Lakeview Drive.
790
01:12:29,600 --> 01:12:30,880
Now, right.
791
01:12:30,880 --> 01:12:33,160
Based on what I'm hearing, based on what you guys are saying,
792
01:12:33,160 --> 01:12:36,160
I got to imagine everything is very intentional.
793
01:12:36,800 --> 01:12:40,280
And the choice of that name is a reference somewhere.
794
01:12:40,280 --> 01:12:41,440
Am I right about that?
795
01:12:43,960 --> 01:12:47,120
Not necessarily to something internal to the album.
796
01:12:47,120 --> 01:12:48,320
It's a little more external.
797
01:12:49,720 --> 01:12:53,960
It's I think that's mostly like my own sort of personal
798
01:12:55,280 --> 01:12:58,920
like reference to the fact that at the time that we started writing
799
01:12:58,920 --> 01:13:01,000
at this album, I was living in a lighthouse.
800
01:13:01,360 --> 01:13:02,080
OK.
801
01:13:02,080 --> 01:13:03,040
OK.
802
01:13:03,040 --> 01:13:05,560
And so I was sort of waking up every morning and seeing the lake.
803
01:13:05,560 --> 01:13:09,560
And so for me, whenever I imagined this house, this setting,
804
01:13:09,560 --> 01:13:11,880
it's always a house next to a lake.
805
01:13:11,920 --> 01:13:12,240
Right.
806
01:13:12,240 --> 01:13:15,400
And it just kind of makes sense that a road next to a lake
807
01:13:15,400 --> 01:13:17,440
would probably be called Lakeview Drive or something like that.
808
01:13:18,560 --> 01:13:23,960
The the 42 part of it is just another Douglas Adams Hitchhiker's reference.
809
01:13:24,080 --> 01:13:25,080
Fair enough.
810
01:13:25,080 --> 01:13:26,400
I wonder.
811
01:13:26,400 --> 01:13:27,600
So we love that.
812
01:13:29,040 --> 01:13:30,720
Exactly.
813
01:13:30,720 --> 01:13:33,560
Funny thing here, because when I first saw that,
814
01:13:34,480 --> 01:13:37,840
I realized my my brain in the moment was referencing somebody else,
815
01:13:37,920 --> 01:13:38,440
something else.
816
01:13:38,440 --> 01:13:40,280
And the first thing I thought was something.
817
01:13:40,280 --> 01:13:42,360
Wait, isn't that a band?
818
01:13:42,360 --> 01:13:45,040
I realized later Parkview Drive.
819
01:13:45,040 --> 01:13:47,240
But in the process of Googling Lakeview Drive,
820
01:13:47,920 --> 01:13:51,040
there is apparently a rather well known Lakeview Drive
821
01:13:51,040 --> 01:13:53,640
that is also referred to as the road to nowhere.
822
01:13:55,160 --> 01:13:56,160
What?
823
01:13:56,160 --> 01:14:02,240
Oh, that is sheer coincidence, but that is beautiful.
824
01:14:02,480 --> 01:14:03,480
Right.
825
01:14:03,880 --> 01:14:04,880
That's what I thought.
826
01:14:04,880 --> 01:14:06,520
They got to have intended that.
827
01:14:06,520 --> 01:14:08,440
They must have. They must be familiar with it.
828
01:14:08,440 --> 01:14:10,480
And they included it that way on purpose.
829
01:14:10,480 --> 01:14:11,480
But.
830
01:14:11,760 --> 01:14:13,160
And he made the sound.
831
01:14:13,160 --> 01:14:15,080
So wish we did.
832
01:14:15,080 --> 01:14:17,160
I so wish that was intentional.
833
01:14:17,160 --> 01:14:18,760
That would be so badass.
834
01:14:20,360 --> 01:14:23,560
But that's the universe once in a while likes to play
835
01:14:23,560 --> 01:14:25,200
little coincidence games with us.
836
01:14:25,200 --> 01:14:28,040
So it's pretty cool that they love that.
837
01:14:28,080 --> 01:14:29,080
That's so cool.
838
01:14:29,080 --> 01:14:30,480
The world just helped you out a little bit there.
839
01:14:30,480 --> 01:14:33,120
So we're going to we're going to add this little bit of flourish here.
840
01:14:34,160 --> 01:14:35,520
But that's awesome.
841
01:14:35,520 --> 01:14:38,000
So the question I think a lot of us are going to have at this point
842
01:14:38,000 --> 01:14:40,840
is we getting to see you guys door.
843
01:14:40,840 --> 01:14:45,040
We get to see you live somewhere in the near future, maybe opening for Haken or Dream Theater.
844
01:14:47,120 --> 01:14:48,440
I mean, one could only hope, right?
845
01:14:48,440 --> 01:14:49,440
Yeah.
846
01:14:50,680 --> 01:14:52,400
Maybe dreams Sonic can be an annual thing.
847
01:14:52,400 --> 01:14:54,000
They'll be, you know, come back next year.
848
01:14:54,000 --> 01:14:55,000
I hope so.
849
01:14:55,000 --> 01:14:56,320
I think it would be insane.
850
01:14:56,320 --> 01:14:57,320
I think.
851
01:14:58,320 --> 01:15:02,560
We have some things lined up that we can't really talk about yet.
852
01:15:02,880 --> 01:15:05,520
Fair enough. We do. We do have some stuff coming.
853
01:15:07,000 --> 01:15:10,600
I mean, hopefully it's a little way out in like a month or something.
854
01:15:12,920 --> 01:15:14,400
Something like that.
855
01:15:14,400 --> 01:15:16,800
Oh, I mean, that's that's encouraging in and of itself.
856
01:15:16,800 --> 01:15:19,080
That means, yes, there is something.
857
01:15:19,720 --> 01:15:22,360
Yes. And all they say is not where they need to be just yet.
858
01:15:22,360 --> 01:15:23,360
So.
859
01:15:23,360 --> 01:15:27,200
We are pretty close to accurate process.
860
01:15:27,360 --> 01:15:28,360
Yeah. Yeah.
861
01:15:28,560 --> 01:15:29,560
The.
862
01:15:30,160 --> 01:15:34,960
The mentality about like finishing the album, like while we were in the studio was like,
863
01:15:35,680 --> 01:15:39,680
I think part of it was because it had taken so long and we were so eager to get it done.
864
01:15:39,920 --> 01:15:43,360
We were like, we're not doing anything else until we finish this.
865
01:15:44,320 --> 01:15:46,240
Right. No other preparations.
866
01:15:46,240 --> 01:15:50,440
I'll like honestly, even to the extent that we we found ourselves in this awkward position.
867
01:15:50,440 --> 01:15:57,400
And once we had officially finished the mix and the master of the album, we're like, oh, OK, cool.
868
01:15:57,960 --> 01:15:58,960
We don't have art.
869
01:15:59,720 --> 01:16:03,880
Realistically, we probably should have been getting the art lined up like while we were doing that.
870
01:16:04,680 --> 01:16:10,280
Because we were like, nope, we are singularly focused on finishing this after we've been working on it for so long.
871
01:16:10,560 --> 01:16:12,440
And the same is true for rehearsals.
872
01:16:12,440 --> 01:16:17,400
We were like, we're not even thinking about rehearsals until this is done and out.
873
01:16:17,400 --> 01:16:20,600
And now that it is, we've we've gotten in a couple of rehearsals.
874
01:16:20,600 --> 01:16:25,960
We're sort of getting our our gear together, trying to make the live show flow smoothly.
875
01:16:27,680 --> 01:16:32,600
And, you know, sort of having to go back and relearn a number of parts because in some of the cases,
876
01:16:32,600 --> 01:16:39,760
there were notes that like we didn't touch for months or maybe even like a year after we recorded them.
877
01:16:40,120 --> 01:16:44,600
And so there's there's been a lot of going back and having to relearn the album itself.
878
01:16:44,600 --> 01:16:48,520
So, yeah, like the live show is absolutely going to happen.
879
01:16:48,520 --> 01:16:52,520
This isn't going to be a like a studio project only.
880
01:16:53,120 --> 01:17:00,320
We have a real love for playing in front of people, even if like most of our experience so far has been playing,
881
01:17:00,320 --> 01:17:02,520
you know, like in front of people in Charlotte.
882
01:17:03,520 --> 01:17:11,120
We we really want to expand that out and play that in in front of all of the people who love the album and Prague and stuff.
883
01:17:11,120 --> 01:17:18,560
So totally going to happen just a matter of like getting rehearsed to our satisfaction,
884
01:17:18,560 --> 01:17:22,280
because we're also not willing to like saying perfectionist mentality.
885
01:17:22,280 --> 01:17:26,360
We're not willing to come out on stage and half ass the live version of the album.
886
01:17:26,360 --> 01:17:27,360
It has to be.
887
01:17:29,360 --> 01:17:29,560
I don't know.
888
01:17:29,560 --> 01:17:35,360
It has to follow the the expectation in the Prague and in the metal world where
889
01:17:35,360 --> 01:17:41,720
you are able to replicate the album live.
890
01:17:41,720 --> 01:17:49,120
Yeah, it's it's got a sound convincing, especially because, you know, from like way back in the day when
891
01:17:49,120 --> 01:17:57,120
I don't know when everyone found out that Dragon Forces through the fire and flames was recorded at half speed and then digitally sped up.
892
01:17:57,120 --> 01:17:59,120
And like everyone was so upset about that.
893
01:17:59,120 --> 01:18:04,720
I truly personally believe that was like a landmark moment where in the metal world,
894
01:18:04,720 --> 01:18:11,720
now like a big part of metal live shows is bands demonstrating that they can actually play what they recorded.
895
01:18:11,720 --> 01:18:17,720
Because Studio Magic is is a beautiful and wonderful and dangerous thing.
896
01:18:17,720 --> 01:18:25,720
Yeah, I think it's especially important for bands to be able to replicate what they played so that people live can be like,
897
01:18:25,720 --> 01:18:31,720
ah, OK, so they weren't, you know, so the album wasn't deceptive that they can actually do this.
898
01:18:31,720 --> 01:18:34,720
And therefore we got to live up to that.
899
01:18:34,720 --> 01:18:37,720
So it's got to be rehearsed first for sure.
900
01:18:37,720 --> 01:18:40,720
You're talking to someone who is an old rush head.
901
01:18:40,720 --> 01:18:44,720
So back in the day, that was my standard.
902
01:18:44,720 --> 01:18:53,720
Yeah, that you could come on stage and play the album as it as it was, you know, as it was on the album live.
903
01:18:53,720 --> 01:19:01,720
And I think that without too much sticking around, you know, then of course they made power windows and kind of throw all that out the window.
904
01:19:01,720 --> 01:19:06,720
We're going to make a studio album that we can't possibly reproduce live without backing tracks.
905
01:19:06,720 --> 01:19:11,720
OK, thanks, guys. You're kind of undermining my entire point here of judging other bands.
906
01:19:11,720 --> 01:19:12,720
Sorry.
907
01:19:12,720 --> 01:19:21,720
It is a it is a tough thing balancing the the the vision with the desire to replicate it live.
908
01:19:21,720 --> 01:19:34,720
And I feel like there's there's always like concessions to have to be that have to be made, like, you know, when the guitarist has laid down a bunch of rhythm tracks and like layer them deeply.
909
01:19:34,720 --> 01:19:42,720
And there's also a lead track. There's a matter of having to figure out, OK, now what is the guitarist actually going to play live since he can't possibly play all of those parts at the same time?
910
01:19:42,720 --> 01:19:46,720
The answer is make your bass players play three different things at the same time.
911
01:19:46,720 --> 01:19:47,720
Yeah.
912
01:19:47,720 --> 01:19:49,720
There you go, Cole.
913
01:19:49,720 --> 01:19:50,720
There you go.
914
01:19:50,720 --> 01:19:56,720
Yeah, but thrown down the the the bass, the keys and the the the Mogue pedals.
915
01:19:56,720 --> 01:19:57,720
Yep.
916
01:19:57,720 --> 01:19:58,720
I got to get on it.
917
01:19:58,720 --> 01:19:59,720
That's what you do.
918
01:19:59,720 --> 01:20:02,720
But yeah, that was always my standard.
919
01:20:02,720 --> 01:20:09,720
So yeah, my expectation is with a lot of people that if you're going to put it on the album.
920
01:20:09,720 --> 01:20:11,720
Be able to play it live.
921
01:20:11,720 --> 01:20:17,720
And if you've got to put it on the album and recorded it at slower speed and speed it up.
922
01:20:17,720 --> 01:20:20,720
Chances are your life decisions have been poor.
923
01:20:20,720 --> 01:20:24,720
Yeah, I look at it.
924
01:20:24,720 --> 01:20:29,720
That's that's the problem. I can't believe I've gotten this far in life and never heard that before. That's funny.
925
01:20:29,720 --> 01:20:31,720
Oh, well, live and learn.
926
01:20:31,720 --> 01:20:40,720
Among other things I've learned today, too, is that if I don't touch my mouse for long enough, despite the fact that I've got a video recording going on, my screens will go black on me.
927
01:20:40,720 --> 01:20:42,720
They will go to screensaver mode.
928
01:20:42,720 --> 01:20:46,720
Oh, I wonder why you were going for a bit there.
929
01:20:46,720 --> 01:20:50,720
And let's take out. I think at one point in time, I thought the whole system had shut down and what just happened.
930
01:20:50,720 --> 01:20:56,720
But then I could still hear you went, oh, OK, that is literally never happened to me before.
931
01:20:56,720 --> 01:20:58,720
Fair enough.
932
01:20:58,720 --> 01:20:59,720
Live and learn.
933
01:20:59,720 --> 01:21:00,720
All right. Well, cool.
934
01:21:00,720 --> 01:21:06,720
My personal hope not only is that you'll tour is that you're going to hit the Philly area because I'd love to see you guys live.
935
01:21:06,720 --> 01:21:07,720
That would be excellent.
936
01:21:07,720 --> 01:21:12,720
But you know, if you can, if you got any pull with the tour manager, tell them, get them out of here.
937
01:21:12,720 --> 01:21:15,720
I would say that's that's inevitable.
938
01:21:15,720 --> 01:21:18,720
We're more likely to get up there.
939
01:21:18,720 --> 01:21:22,720
I mean, East Coast is that's where we are.
940
01:21:22,720 --> 01:21:27,720
That seems like probably the logical, you know, starting tour thing.
941
01:21:27,720 --> 01:21:33,720
I don't think we're going to start by immediately going out to the West Coast, though we would like to.
942
01:21:33,720 --> 01:21:38,720
So, yeah, we totally plan to.
943
01:21:38,720 --> 01:21:44,720
I imagine it's probably going to start the way that it has to like with a lot of other bands, we're going to have to, you know,
944
01:21:44,720 --> 01:21:52,720
work our way up and like play with various local acts in in the cities that we go to.
945
01:21:52,720 --> 01:21:58,720
I mean, like we can dream about getting picked up and touring with a larger group.
946
01:21:58,720 --> 01:22:01,720
That would be beautiful and wonderful and magic.
947
01:22:01,720 --> 01:22:11,720
But I think it is reasonable for us to sort of echo the same sort of mentality that we have had with this album, which is that.
948
01:22:11,720 --> 01:22:15,720
I don't know, it goes with low expectations to be pleasantly surprised.
949
01:22:15,720 --> 01:22:18,720
Like we knew we liked this album.
950
01:22:18,720 --> 01:22:21,720
We just didn't know if everyone else was going to as well.
951
01:22:21,720 --> 01:22:24,720
So, I mean, right, like they mostly do.
952
01:22:24,720 --> 01:22:31,720
We're happy to be pleasantly surprised that someone wants to come along and be like, hey, you want to go on tour?
953
01:22:31,720 --> 01:22:33,720
Sure. Yeah, why not?
954
01:22:33,720 --> 01:22:37,720
Sure. Yeah, I expect it's going to happen.
955
01:22:37,720 --> 01:22:39,720
I expect it's going to happen.
956
01:22:39,720 --> 01:22:43,720
So guys, it has been my absolute pleasure.
957
01:22:43,720 --> 01:22:47,720
This is probably the longest interview I've done.
958
01:22:47,720 --> 01:22:49,720
I'm so sorry.
959
01:22:49,720 --> 01:22:52,720
No, honestly, honestly, it's one of those ones I'm looking at.
960
01:22:52,720 --> 01:22:54,720
We could keep going easily, easily.
961
01:22:54,720 --> 01:23:01,720
But I suppose at some point in time, you guys might have other things in life you want to get to.
962
01:23:01,720 --> 01:23:07,720
And, you know, at some point in time, you know, I one of us is going to need to have to take a bathroom break.
963
01:23:07,720 --> 01:23:09,720
At some point, right?
964
01:23:09,720 --> 01:23:16,720
We were sort of trying to determine, you know, which of us were going to be available to come have a chat and everything.
965
01:23:16,720 --> 01:23:21,720
And just your luck, you got the two most talkative of us.
966
01:23:21,720 --> 01:23:22,720
I'll take that.
967
01:23:22,720 --> 01:23:23,720
You're not wrong.
968
01:23:23,720 --> 01:23:24,720
Yeah.
969
01:23:24,720 --> 01:23:29,720
As I've said before, the people that'll listen to the podcast and watch the video are here for you guys.
970
01:23:29,720 --> 01:23:32,720
They're not here for my pretty face and my melodious voice.
971
01:23:32,720 --> 01:23:36,720
So the more you talk, the better.
972
01:23:36,720 --> 01:23:37,720
Right off.
973
01:23:37,720 --> 01:23:38,720
Getting to know you.
974
01:23:38,720 --> 01:23:39,720
That's what we're here to do.
975
01:23:39,720 --> 01:23:41,720
Well, Dave, we appreciate you having us, boss.
976
01:23:41,720 --> 01:23:42,720
Absolutely.
977
01:23:42,720 --> 01:23:43,720
Appreciate your time, guys.
978
01:23:43,720 --> 01:23:44,720
Thanks for joining in.
979
01:23:44,720 --> 01:23:46,720
Thanks for getting in touch like you did.
980
01:23:46,720 --> 01:23:48,720
I'm glad we were able to work this out.
981
01:23:48,720 --> 01:23:49,720
Totally.
982
01:23:49,720 --> 01:23:50,720
Very cool guys.
983
01:23:50,720 --> 01:23:52,720
And my absolute pleasure meeting you.
984
01:23:52,720 --> 01:23:54,720
I wish you the best with the album.
985
01:23:54,720 --> 01:23:56,720
Sounds like you're off to a roaring start already.
986
01:23:56,720 --> 01:24:00,720
Like you said, a song of the year album of the year discussions already.
987
01:24:00,720 --> 01:24:04,720
It's been a big year for Prague Metal and you guys have been one part of it.
988
01:24:04,720 --> 01:24:06,720
I hope you get together soon.
989
01:24:06,720 --> 01:24:07,720
I hope that's successful.
990
01:24:07,720 --> 01:24:09,720
Best of luck, guys.
991
01:24:09,720 --> 01:24:10,720
Thank you so much.
992
01:24:10,720 --> 01:24:11,720
You're welcome.
993
01:24:11,720 --> 01:24:12,720
Take care.
994
01:24:12,720 --> 01:24:13,720
Bye-bye.
995
01:24:13,720 --> 01:24:14,720
Appreciate it.
996
01:24:14,720 --> 01:24:15,720
Bye.
997
01:24:15,720 --> 01:24:16,720
As I said, we had a blast.
998
01:24:16,720 --> 01:24:17,720
It was a great conversation.
999
01:24:17,720 --> 01:24:20,720
Talk with these guys and learning about the history of the band.
1000
01:24:20,720 --> 01:24:28,720
And what you find out in a lot of cases is these bands come out so polished because they've been working so hard for years in all cases.
1001
01:24:28,720 --> 01:24:31,720
And these guys just, they knew what they wanted.
1002
01:24:31,720 --> 01:24:35,720
And when they were ready, they made it happen.
1003
01:24:35,720 --> 01:24:37,720
And they kicked ass right out the door.
1004
01:24:37,720 --> 01:24:39,720
The album is getting great reviews.
1005
01:24:39,720 --> 01:24:42,720
It is getting a lot of attention all over the place.
1006
01:24:42,720 --> 01:24:44,720
And it sounds like a tour is on the way.
1007
01:24:44,720 --> 01:24:48,720
So hopefully we get to find out some news about that in the very near future.
1008
01:24:48,720 --> 01:24:53,720
Meanwhile, I encourage you to run out and grab No Spoon, the new album, Opus.
1009
01:24:53,720 --> 01:24:58,720
You can find them on Bandcamp and probably everywhere else that you can buy digital music.
1010
01:24:58,720 --> 01:25:03,720
Keep an eye out for the tour. Sign on to their email.
1011
01:25:03,720 --> 01:25:07,720
Sign on to their newsletter so you can keep track of what's going on there.
1012
01:25:07,720 --> 01:25:10,720
Follow them on Facebook, whatever you need to do.
1013
01:25:10,720 --> 01:25:13,720
And hey, let's see what happens down the road with No Spoon.
1014
01:25:13,720 --> 01:25:15,720
I am looking forward to it.
1015
01:25:15,720 --> 01:25:16,720
Absolutely.
1016
01:25:16,720 --> 01:25:18,720
Thank you very much to Cole and Bill guys.
1017
01:25:18,720 --> 01:25:20,720
It was a great time.
1018
01:25:20,720 --> 01:25:23,720
I wish you the best of luck with the album and the tour.
1019
01:25:23,720 --> 01:25:28,720
May they both be huge successes for you because I want to see more down the road.
1020
01:25:28,720 --> 01:25:31,720
All right, guys. Thanks again. Take care.
1021
01:25:31,720 --> 01:25:36,720
Thanks for joining me once again for another episode of Bleeding Edge Interviews.
1022
01:25:36,720 --> 01:25:41,720
Don't forget, tune in to Toxic Radio every Sunday, all day Sunday,
1023
01:25:41,720 --> 01:25:45,720
for the All Prague All Day Brain Salad Sunday.
1024
01:25:45,720 --> 01:25:49,720
That's where you get to hear all the music that we just spent time talking about.
1025
01:25:49,720 --> 01:25:53,720
In addition, you can locate me out there in the world of social media,
1026
01:25:53,720 --> 01:25:58,720
whether it's on Twitter, where you can find me at Bleeding Triple Underscore.
1027
01:25:58,720 --> 01:26:02,720
That's three underscores, Edge, or maybe on Facebook,
1028
01:26:02,720 --> 01:26:05,720
where you can find me at Bleeding Edge Show.
1029
01:26:05,720 --> 01:26:09,720
Or last but not least, you can also locate me on Instagram,
1030
01:26:09,720 --> 01:26:12,720
Bleeding Underscore Edge Underscore Show.
1031
01:26:12,720 --> 01:26:16,720
Matter of fact, I'm also on threads now at this point in time with that same candle.
1032
01:26:16,720 --> 01:26:18,720
Find me there. Let me know what you think of the show.
1033
01:26:18,720 --> 01:26:20,720
Let me know what you think about Prague.
1034
01:26:20,720 --> 01:26:22,720
Let me know what you think about what you had for dinner tonight.
1035
01:26:22,720 --> 01:26:24,720
Doesn't matter. Check me out. Give me the like and the follow.
1036
01:26:24,720 --> 01:26:28,720
And thanks once again for joining me for Bleeding Edge Interviews.
1037
01:26:28,720 --> 01:26:32,720
And remember, don't be afraid to deviate from the norm. Keep it Prague.
1038
01:26:32,720 --> 01:26:59,720
And this is Super Dave, signing off.