Let’s
start off with the basics since there wasn’t too much info on the web about the band.
Some of the guys are friends
since high school; kind of met up with them a little bit later on, we’re just five guys who love to play rock ‘n
roll music. It’s been our lives pretty much since day one… at least for me, I’ve always wanted to
be a singer… I was playing solo for a while doing pizza parlors, and that’s when I caught up with these guys;
they came to watch me one night in the pizza shop and liked what I did and we just started jamming together. We wrote
pretty much like five songs on that first practice; the next day I woke up and dropped out of college and told my job that
I needed to move down to about eight hours a week because I wanted to focus on the band. So I decided to be a rock star
and screw the college thing. We love playing; there’s nothing better than getting out and rocking out the audience.
I’ve
read that you guys have gone through a lot of drama as a band, how did you guys turn that around to make it a positive thing
for the band?
What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, for us… it was a bonding experience… not letting the
negative things effect us. A lot of bands let that tear them apart; us sticking together… being at the hospital…
when I had my major accident when I was paralyzed, that was probably the worst one, I had to prove to them that I was dedicated
and would get back on stage. Pretty much after that point… it glued us together. We’re family…
and brothers… all those horrible things that happened just brought us together.
Does the fact that you only have
partial feeling in one leg effect you on stage?
Yeah, it makes me really nervous… I’m still energetic on stage, but
I liked to be able to get up on speakers and jump. I used to be barefoot on stage, but now I’m starting to wear
shoes because my right leg is now shorter than my left. I trip a lot on stage, but I don’t fall… it does
effect what I can do. I usually try to ignore it.
Are you guys touring right now?
Yeah, we’re actually back out…
we’ve been home for about five days. We’ve got shows in St. Louis and Chicago… Louisiana.
Who
are you playing with?
The first week is actually mostly just us; we’re headlining in St. Louis and Chicago…
we’re doing some shows for the radio stations out there. Then we’re playing with 12 Stones in Louisiana;
and I believe, even though it hasn’t been confirmed yet… I believe we have a show with Buckcherry; which should
be really good. Then we jump onto the full 12 Stones and Nonpoint tour starting October 14th.
Besides
your hometown, where’s your favorite place to play?
I’m going to have to say Texas. Everyone is just so
damn nice down there; I love it. They love their rock ‘n roll… they want to have a good time with you and
hang out afterwards… give you BBQ… that’s my favorite place besides Salt Lake. We do really well
in Idaho, but Idaho is pretty much our second home.
Tell me about your last CD that came out…
After The Chaos 2… it’s still doing pretty good, it did really well for us. It started to
get a lot of momentum… we found a private investor and we did the promotions and hired a radio promotion company to
really push it. So we did a lot of grassroots stuff with it; it did good enough on radio that Devils And Angels song was actually up to like 32 on the national charts and that’s when the labels started
coming around. It’s still for sale at most independent stores around the country; I love it… I’m
glad we own it. (laughs)
What’s the plan for the future?
Life In-between
album comes out in January. Right now, we’re being told that we’re going to be on the Buckcherry tour in
January and February. It’s just starting to get crazy; we’ve been together for about eleven years…
that thing we’ve been working so hard at is at our doorstep. We’re just getting ready for that to be our
lives for the next couple of years; to really establish ourselves. I hope we get a tour overseas; I hope the CD does
really good and everybody likes it which will allow us to do another album. This is what we want to do for our career
and pretty much the rest of our lives. I hope it blows up; I want to take over the world with rock ‘n roll!
