An Interview with Nekrogoblikon
by Devon Pettengill
taken in April of 2007 at the Santa Barbara Roasting Company coffee shop, with Tim, Alex A., Ashleigh, and Austin.
How exactly did the band start?
Tim: Well, originally I had some material left over from Inquest that didn’t quite fit us—it was a little goofier. So I kind of wanted to put together some other songs and, just like, stick them online or write them for fun. What ended up happening was at some point I had this idea…the name Goblin Island came into my head and I thought that would be a hilarious title for an album, not connected to anything, just an album called Goblin Island.
So Nicky and I talked about it and he thought it was hilarious too. He wanted to help me out and record keys for it. So we ended up talking about it for a while and recording keyboards for [the song] “Goblin Island” during the summer, in late June/early July.
Of 2006?
Tim: Yeah. We liked it a lot. We recorded vocals for that song too and it was funny and we just kept going with it. Eventually after the first two songs we decided to make it a band—like put it up on MySpace under a name. We went through a few ideas—we were like Army of Goblins, Goblin Army—that would be a good name for a band. The thought process was: Army of Goblins, Army of Darkness, Necronomicon, Nekrogoblikon. That’s how the band got named and basically there was no forethought whatsoever. It was just a product of our sense of humor.
At what point did the music become not so much a joke and more of a serious thing?
Tim: Well, never really. I mean the serious part came when I decided to make it a full band. Nicky didn’t want to. Nicky wanted to just have it be me and him. He was interested in playing the music live and having a band [, but it would be hard given our distance]. We realized how successful we were and I saw that it was just completely overtaking Inquest. So I was like, you know what, this would be much better if this was my band. It was just really fun. So after getting the live band together it naturally became serious because you can’t practice, you can’t learn songs, if you aren’t serious about it. If you just goof off all the time it’s not a band, you know?
Who writes the lyrics?
Tim: It depends. Basically it’s whoever had the idea. Nicky and I have to work separately (Nicky lives in Berkeley, 300 miles from Santa Barbara), so what will happen is one of us will write a song, maybe most of a song, and we’ll collaborate by somebody putting up the initial idea, like, “Look I have these riffs,” and the other person will go like, “Oh, okay, I want to put this in right here.” And the song will get written. Recently it has been that whoever has written the song has written the vocals for it.
So it is either you or Nicky?
Tim: Yeah. For [the album] Goblin Island, it was kind of more a tag teaming. “Goblins Ahoy” was all Nicky and “Army of Goblins” all me, “Goblin Island” was all Nicky. But we always have input with each other, like I might go, “That doesn’t really sound good, let’s change it,” things like that. Or we’ll start recording it and little things will be too hard to do.
Where did the goblin theme come from?
Ashleigh: Goblin Island.
Tim: Goblin Island. The fact that we wanted to make an album called Goblin Island so naturally everything had to be about goblins.
I want to ask each one of you this. How did each one of you join the band?
Ashleigh: I was driving with Tim somewhere and talking about how I wanted a job where I just sat around and typed at a keyboard all day. And Tim made the logical connection that maybe he could sit me in front of a musical keyboard for a portion of the day and then I would be in the band.
And that’s it?
Ashleigh: That’s basically it.
Tim: What she’s leaving out is that she was a CCS Music Composition Major for the first year of college. She played trumpet in high school for a long time.
Ashleigh: I played trumpet for six years. I got a 5 on the music theory AP test. I’ve had a lot of musical training. I’m actually the least talented musician in the band.
Tim: Ashleigh brings [music] theory and analysis to the band that nobody else really has. We all—you know—know a bit of theory; some of us more than others. But Ashleigh is just a head above everyone.
Alex: She tells us exactly what we’re doing even when we don’t realize it…or what we’re doing wrong.
Tim: So that really helps. Obviously starting from scratch on keyboard it would have been really hard. It would have taken a lot longer and more work. But Ashleigh had somewhere to start with so it was just building up chops. And it seemed to fit us very well. I think she’s having fun.
I guess I’ll just go through the line-up history. Ashleigh I guess was the first member of the band other than Nicky and me. But that all happened kind of at the same time. I didn’t exactly know how to go about putting together the band because I had to start from absolute scratch. I couldn’t just be like, “Hey, Inquest guys, let’s just start playing this now.” At the second Amenta show [Alex A. and Austin’s other band] these two kids were there. Alex Duddy [the drummer of Inquest] and I played an Inquest song after Amenta played. And these two kids came up to us and said, “Hey, that was really cool,” and we just talked to them for a while. They had just moved to IV to go to UCSB. One of them was a guitarist and one of them was a drummer and I was like, “Hey, we should jam. I’m putting together this band and it would be cool if at least one of you guys would help us out.” Jason was really good, he’s a really good guitarist, and he joined us. His brother Brian wasn’t as good at drums as he was at guitar, so we kind of half kicked him out and half he just left because he didn’t have time. But Jason we kept for a while. He learned all the songs really well, but we didn’t really get along with him like Ashleigh and I got along and Nicky and I got along. It was just kind of strained for a while.
Spencer I had known. We tried him out for Inquest when Alex Duddy moved to Orange County. We didn’t know if Inquest could continue because he lived so far away so we were looking for drummers. I had heard of Spencer through this guy Dan Behrman – who incidentally ended up starting Amenta. I talked to Spencer online and we had tried him out for Inquest but he didn’t really have time for it because he was working on his Computer Science degree at UCSB. He was really busy all the time and he didn’t fit us as well as Alex Duddy. I stayed in touch with him and now when Nekrogoblikon was getting put together he had actually messaged me on Facebook and said, “Hey, what’s this goblin project you’ve got going on. This is kind of cool.” Yeah, he was the one who messaged me about it, but he didn’t message me about joining, he was just like, “Hey, this is cool.” And we talked about it and I was like, “We really need a good drummer and you’re the best drummer I know. Could you please jam with us and if you like it maybe we’ll do something.” We jammed and he liked it, and it just seemed to work. He said from the start this was just a for-fun thing and I agreed to it just because he was the best drummer we could hope for. I figured either he’d get into it or we’d get big enough to where it would be worth it for him to play with us. We played a couple of shows and it was fun, it was good, but Jason just proved himself to be unprofessional, and he just bailed out on us. One day I was just really angry and I just yelled at him for a while. And then the search for a new guitarist began.
I thought, “What guitarists do I know?” There was one guy who was a big fan of Inquest and I knew played guitar so I asked him to try out for us and he said, “I don’t know how good I am, but sure.” And I forget if I messaged you…
Alex: You messaged me on AIM and said, “We just kicked out Jason,” and I was like, “I saw that coming.” I remember saying that. And you were like, “We might be interested in you.” And I was like, “Oh, sweet. Should I bring Austin?”
Tim: As far as bassists went because we play in B…bass is like obviously wanted, but not necessary. Same with Inquest, we never had a bassist. Well, we had a bassist for a short time but it didn’t really add anything. So it was like if we got a bassist, sure. We were going to have Chris Farwell of Inquest play bass for us on tour. But then Alex and Austin tried out, or well…Alex and Mike came over and we jammed for a little bit and I was like, “Well, learn one of the songs, learn ‘They Came From Space’”—which is probably our hardest one—was our hardest one at the time—“And whoever has it best after three or four days is in the band.” After the weekend I was like, “How are you doing?” and Mike didn’t even show up to show off his skills. I don’t think he even learned the song. But Alex and Austin learned all the parts and Alex actually learned all lead and rhythm parts and everything. We jammed, it was great, and obviously they’re in the band, and definitely for the better.
As for Alex Duddy… We always needed a live vocalist because Nicky couldn’t be in the band full time. Duddy had expressed interest, or I had asked him, “Hey, would you want to do vocals, because I know you can sing and growl?” He was kind of interested but he had a full time band with a band called Avarice that he was singing for. And they were signed and they were doing really well. So for a while we were just trying to figure out what we were going to do. One day we were hanging out at Java [coffee shop nearby] and Alex calls me and he’s just like, “Hey, is that singing position for Nekrogoblikon still open?” in a serious voice. And I was like, “Yeah, sure, man. Are you interested?” And he was like, “I’m in,” or something like that. He just said, “Yeah, I’m doing it.” And I’m like, “Alright. What…what happened?” and he was like, “Avarice just kicked me out.”
Austin: Didn’t they get dropped from their label first?
Tim: No, no, they kicked him out first.
Ashleigh: They had to do layoffs…
Tim: Apparently he came to one of their practices and they were just like, “We already found a new guy. You don’t have enough experience to be our singer.” All of a sudden. even though I think Alex is a really good singer. [We found out later their label dropped them pretty much because they had kicked Duddy out]
Austin: He’s a really good singer.
Alex: Hey, works for us though.
Tim: Especially for like, a poppy band. So he worked out really well. I don’t know…he’s a good front man. But now we’re going through a line-up change because Spencer is leaving to go to Japan sometime late August. So we have to look for another drummer. We’re actually trying out a guy tomorrow. His name is Matt. He used to be the drummer of Convect, before Convect became Amenta. We’re like all the ex-members of Dan Behrman’s bands. We’re trying out that guy and a couple other people we messaged on Myspace that were interested. I guess that’s the lineup. I’m sorry it was so long.
Given the attention you guys have been getting and your popularity, what are your thoughts about making this a career if you ever get to that point? Would you do it if you were given the opportunity?
Alex: Obviously all of us love music. We would do this regardless of whether we got paid or even got attention for it. This is what we love doing but if we were able to get paid for it, able to put bread on the table from playing the music that we like playing…
Ashleigh: Bread and possibly bars of gold and checks.
Alex: Bread and ganj…then yeah, for sure.
Ashleigh: I’d enjoy it, but it’s not really in the cards for me…because who wants to be the second keyboardist in a metal band? I’m gesturing, you can’t tell this now, but I’m gesturing the balancing of scales. I have other things I’m doing, like I’m the manager of my job now, or I will be in two weeks. Nicky is the real keyboardist.
Austin: Yeah, I definitely want it to be a career for a while, that would be really cool. Obviously, you know, if I grow older or whatever, I wouldn’t want to be doing this forever. It would be a really cool thing to do for a few years if we could actually make a living at it.
So basically you’ll all graduate, you’ll all get your degrees, no matter what?
Tim: I’ve always loved playing music, especially playing live. Writing this stuff and having people enjoy it has become my passion over the last four years. For a long time I was seriously contemplating, if this explodes, like seriously, if we get signed to a major label, whether that’s Inquest, or Nekrogoblikon, or any other band I’m in…would I dedicate myself to it? Most of the time the answer is yes. I’m seriously thinking that if some label with a lot of pull picked us up I’d just drop out of college. I also have the luxury of having a job that doesn’t require me to have a degree. I would get paid more and it would probably be more secure if graduated college, etc. But I have a backup in that sense. Spencer obviously doesn’t want music to be his career. Alex Duddy…it’s been his life for a long time. But justifiably so, he’s a really talented musician and he’s really worked for it. It’s not like he feels he’s just going to sit around and then get famous or make a career out of it.
Tim: You know, the signing thing, and just the business thing in general, I think that will happen. We’ve had multiple recording deal offers, they’re just for smaller labels. Getting signed to Roadrunner is pretty much as high up as we could fathom to go, because they’re the biggest metal label. But it’s definitely not something I think we’re entitled to. I think we’d be really lucky if they gave us an offer. [That said, we’ve only been around for a year and it’s highly unlikely we’ll get signed by a major label anytime soon]
Ashleigh: Alex Duddy likes Bright Eyes. I’d just like to add that as a counter argument.
Tim: A counter argument to what?
Alex: To him being a good musician. But so does Austin, so if there are ever two guys in our band to make out with each other, it will be Austin and Alex Duddy, while listening to Bright Eyes.
Metal Archives has you listed as symphonic folk/death metal. Is that accurate?
Tim: Anything you want is accurate because I think genres are silly in general. I mean it’s a good way to categorize bands if you say, “Oh, they’re a death metal band” or “they’re more of a power metal band.” But I think it’s silly to label band that are somewhere in between really rigidly. There are symphonic elements, folk elements, progressive elements, death metal, power metal…so are we all these things?
Alex: At the end of the day we’re just metal.
Tim: Yeah, we’re a metal band.
Austin: Is the folk what you’re asking about?
Yeah, what the hell is folk metal?
Austin: Well, it’s not really American folk, it’s more European folk music, like Celtic music or Scandinavian folk music is definitely a big influence in there. We’re listed under folk on iTunes and people think it’s a joke. But no, there is a big folk influence.
Alex: A lot of our influences—metal influences—are also influenced by folk. Look at old In Flames and Fintroll, things like that. You can hear it in their music, you can hear it in ours. Really obvious influences there.
Tim: We’ve actually been getting away from that and I think that may not be a good thing. I don’t know. The folk stuff I really like, I really enjoy it. The reason folk music is enjoyable is the same reason all these melodies have stayed in people’s consciousness and people’s minds. It’s because they’re really catchy. That’s the reason folk music has survived.
How do you respond to fans who say that you need to play up your gimmick more?
Tim: How do I respond to that? Uh…
Ashleigh: With a casual shrug and a fuck-off. Do you mean all fans or the people we respect?
Tim: So the question is really: What do we think of our gimmick?
Alex: There are people who leave us comments on Myspace saying, “You guys have too many pretty-boys in your band to be metal. You don’t look goblin enough. You’re wearing these collared shirts…that’s not goblin. What Tim I think has said before is that we would rather let the music speak for itself and kind of look more respectable. If we wore costumes we would just be compared to Gwar and Lordi.
Tim: I actually won’t take credit for that. That was actually Alex Duddy’s initial complaint about the band. We have really good music and people like us for our music first. I mean, they like us for our gimmick first and then they’re like, “Wait, this music is actually pretty good.” And that’s what should speak for itself.
Alex: The name and the theme are what draw people in, but in the end what they like about it is the music. Anyone who would discredit us or dislike us because we didn’t act more goblin are not really fans of the music to begin with, so we’re not missing them if they’re not coming to our shows anymore.
Tim: I think there is a theatrical aspect and a musical aspect. I know a lot of people are into the theatrics of music, like look at Britney Spears concerts, or pop music concerts in general. It’s a show, you know, I completely understand that, but I don’t think that’s what we should be about.
Continued next post...
by Devon Pettengill
taken in April of 2007 at the Santa Barbara Roasting Company coffee shop, with Tim, Alex A., Ashleigh, and Austin.
How exactly did the band start?
Tim: Well, originally I had some material left over from Inquest that didn’t quite fit us—it was a little goofier. So I kind of wanted to put together some other songs and, just like, stick them online or write them for fun. What ended up happening was at some point I had this idea…the name Goblin Island came into my head and I thought that would be a hilarious title for an album, not connected to anything, just an album called Goblin Island.
So Nicky and I talked about it and he thought it was hilarious too. He wanted to help me out and record keys for it. So we ended up talking about it for a while and recording keyboards for [the song] “Goblin Island” during the summer, in late June/early July.
Of 2006?
Tim: Yeah. We liked it a lot. We recorded vocals for that song too and it was funny and we just kept going with it. Eventually after the first two songs we decided to make it a band—like put it up on MySpace under a name. We went through a few ideas—we were like Army of Goblins, Goblin Army—that would be a good name for a band. The thought process was: Army of Goblins, Army of Darkness, Necronomicon, Nekrogoblikon. That’s how the band got named and basically there was no forethought whatsoever. It was just a product of our sense of humor.
At what point did the music become not so much a joke and more of a serious thing?
Tim: Well, never really. I mean the serious part came when I decided to make it a full band. Nicky didn’t want to. Nicky wanted to just have it be me and him. He was interested in playing the music live and having a band [, but it would be hard given our distance]. We realized how successful we were and I saw that it was just completely overtaking Inquest. So I was like, you know what, this would be much better if this was my band. It was just really fun. So after getting the live band together it naturally became serious because you can’t practice, you can’t learn songs, if you aren’t serious about it. If you just goof off all the time it’s not a band, you know?
Who writes the lyrics?
Tim: It depends. Basically it’s whoever had the idea. Nicky and I have to work separately (Nicky lives in Berkeley, 300 miles from Santa Barbara), so what will happen is one of us will write a song, maybe most of a song, and we’ll collaborate by somebody putting up the initial idea, like, “Look I have these riffs,” and the other person will go like, “Oh, okay, I want to put this in right here.” And the song will get written. Recently it has been that whoever has written the song has written the vocals for it.
So it is either you or Nicky?
Tim: Yeah. For [the album] Goblin Island, it was kind of more a tag teaming. “Goblins Ahoy” was all Nicky and “Army of Goblins” all me, “Goblin Island” was all Nicky. But we always have input with each other, like I might go, “That doesn’t really sound good, let’s change it,” things like that. Or we’ll start recording it and little things will be too hard to do.
Where did the goblin theme come from?
Ashleigh: Goblin Island.
Tim: Goblin Island. The fact that we wanted to make an album called Goblin Island so naturally everything had to be about goblins.
I want to ask each one of you this. How did each one of you join the band?
Ashleigh: I was driving with Tim somewhere and talking about how I wanted a job where I just sat around and typed at a keyboard all day. And Tim made the logical connection that maybe he could sit me in front of a musical keyboard for a portion of the day and then I would be in the band.
And that’s it?
Ashleigh: That’s basically it.
Tim: What she’s leaving out is that she was a CCS Music Composition Major for the first year of college. She played trumpet in high school for a long time.
Ashleigh: I played trumpet for six years. I got a 5 on the music theory AP test. I’ve had a lot of musical training. I’m actually the least talented musician in the band.
Tim: Ashleigh brings [music] theory and analysis to the band that nobody else really has. We all—you know—know a bit of theory; some of us more than others. But Ashleigh is just a head above everyone.
Alex: She tells us exactly what we’re doing even when we don’t realize it…or what we’re doing wrong.
Tim: So that really helps. Obviously starting from scratch on keyboard it would have been really hard. It would have taken a lot longer and more work. But Ashleigh had somewhere to start with so it was just building up chops. And it seemed to fit us very well. I think she’s having fun.
I guess I’ll just go through the line-up history. Ashleigh I guess was the first member of the band other than Nicky and me. But that all happened kind of at the same time. I didn’t exactly know how to go about putting together the band because I had to start from absolute scratch. I couldn’t just be like, “Hey, Inquest guys, let’s just start playing this now.” At the second Amenta show [Alex A. and Austin’s other band] these two kids were there. Alex Duddy [the drummer of Inquest] and I played an Inquest song after Amenta played. And these two kids came up to us and said, “Hey, that was really cool,” and we just talked to them for a while. They had just moved to IV to go to UCSB. One of them was a guitarist and one of them was a drummer and I was like, “Hey, we should jam. I’m putting together this band and it would be cool if at least one of you guys would help us out.” Jason was really good, he’s a really good guitarist, and he joined us. His brother Brian wasn’t as good at drums as he was at guitar, so we kind of half kicked him out and half he just left because he didn’t have time. But Jason we kept for a while. He learned all the songs really well, but we didn’t really get along with him like Ashleigh and I got along and Nicky and I got along. It was just kind of strained for a while.
Spencer I had known. We tried him out for Inquest when Alex Duddy moved to Orange County. We didn’t know if Inquest could continue because he lived so far away so we were looking for drummers. I had heard of Spencer through this guy Dan Behrman – who incidentally ended up starting Amenta. I talked to Spencer online and we had tried him out for Inquest but he didn’t really have time for it because he was working on his Computer Science degree at UCSB. He was really busy all the time and he didn’t fit us as well as Alex Duddy. I stayed in touch with him and now when Nekrogoblikon was getting put together he had actually messaged me on Facebook and said, “Hey, what’s this goblin project you’ve got going on. This is kind of cool.” Yeah, he was the one who messaged me about it, but he didn’t message me about joining, he was just like, “Hey, this is cool.” And we talked about it and I was like, “We really need a good drummer and you’re the best drummer I know. Could you please jam with us and if you like it maybe we’ll do something.” We jammed and he liked it, and it just seemed to work. He said from the start this was just a for-fun thing and I agreed to it just because he was the best drummer we could hope for. I figured either he’d get into it or we’d get big enough to where it would be worth it for him to play with us. We played a couple of shows and it was fun, it was good, but Jason just proved himself to be unprofessional, and he just bailed out on us. One day I was just really angry and I just yelled at him for a while. And then the search for a new guitarist began.
I thought, “What guitarists do I know?” There was one guy who was a big fan of Inquest and I knew played guitar so I asked him to try out for us and he said, “I don’t know how good I am, but sure.” And I forget if I messaged you…
Alex: You messaged me on AIM and said, “We just kicked out Jason,” and I was like, “I saw that coming.” I remember saying that. And you were like, “We might be interested in you.” And I was like, “Oh, sweet. Should I bring Austin?”
Tim: As far as bassists went because we play in B…bass is like obviously wanted, but not necessary. Same with Inquest, we never had a bassist. Well, we had a bassist for a short time but it didn’t really add anything. So it was like if we got a bassist, sure. We were going to have Chris Farwell of Inquest play bass for us on tour. But then Alex and Austin tried out, or well…Alex and Mike came over and we jammed for a little bit and I was like, “Well, learn one of the songs, learn ‘They Came From Space’”—which is probably our hardest one—was our hardest one at the time—“And whoever has it best after three or four days is in the band.” After the weekend I was like, “How are you doing?” and Mike didn’t even show up to show off his skills. I don’t think he even learned the song. But Alex and Austin learned all the parts and Alex actually learned all lead and rhythm parts and everything. We jammed, it was great, and obviously they’re in the band, and definitely for the better.
As for Alex Duddy… We always needed a live vocalist because Nicky couldn’t be in the band full time. Duddy had expressed interest, or I had asked him, “Hey, would you want to do vocals, because I know you can sing and growl?” He was kind of interested but he had a full time band with a band called Avarice that he was singing for. And they were signed and they were doing really well. So for a while we were just trying to figure out what we were going to do. One day we were hanging out at Java [coffee shop nearby] and Alex calls me and he’s just like, “Hey, is that singing position for Nekrogoblikon still open?” in a serious voice. And I was like, “Yeah, sure, man. Are you interested?” And he was like, “I’m in,” or something like that. He just said, “Yeah, I’m doing it.” And I’m like, “Alright. What…what happened?” and he was like, “Avarice just kicked me out.”
Austin: Didn’t they get dropped from their label first?
Tim: No, no, they kicked him out first.
Ashleigh: They had to do layoffs…
Tim: Apparently he came to one of their practices and they were just like, “We already found a new guy. You don’t have enough experience to be our singer.” All of a sudden. even though I think Alex is a really good singer. [We found out later their label dropped them pretty much because they had kicked Duddy out]
Austin: He’s a really good singer.
Alex: Hey, works for us though.
Tim: Especially for like, a poppy band. So he worked out really well. I don’t know…he’s a good front man. But now we’re going through a line-up change because Spencer is leaving to go to Japan sometime late August. So we have to look for another drummer. We’re actually trying out a guy tomorrow. His name is Matt. He used to be the drummer of Convect, before Convect became Amenta. We’re like all the ex-members of Dan Behrman’s bands. We’re trying out that guy and a couple other people we messaged on Myspace that were interested. I guess that’s the lineup. I’m sorry it was so long.
Given the attention you guys have been getting and your popularity, what are your thoughts about making this a career if you ever get to that point? Would you do it if you were given the opportunity?
Alex: Obviously all of us love music. We would do this regardless of whether we got paid or even got attention for it. This is what we love doing but if we were able to get paid for it, able to put bread on the table from playing the music that we like playing…
Ashleigh: Bread and possibly bars of gold and checks.
Alex: Bread and ganj…then yeah, for sure.
Ashleigh: I’d enjoy it, but it’s not really in the cards for me…because who wants to be the second keyboardist in a metal band? I’m gesturing, you can’t tell this now, but I’m gesturing the balancing of scales. I have other things I’m doing, like I’m the manager of my job now, or I will be in two weeks. Nicky is the real keyboardist.
Austin: Yeah, I definitely want it to be a career for a while, that would be really cool. Obviously, you know, if I grow older or whatever, I wouldn’t want to be doing this forever. It would be a really cool thing to do for a few years if we could actually make a living at it.
So basically you’ll all graduate, you’ll all get your degrees, no matter what?
Tim: I’ve always loved playing music, especially playing live. Writing this stuff and having people enjoy it has become my passion over the last four years. For a long time I was seriously contemplating, if this explodes, like seriously, if we get signed to a major label, whether that’s Inquest, or Nekrogoblikon, or any other band I’m in…would I dedicate myself to it? Most of the time the answer is yes. I’m seriously thinking that if some label with a lot of pull picked us up I’d just drop out of college. I also have the luxury of having a job that doesn’t require me to have a degree. I would get paid more and it would probably be more secure if graduated college, etc. But I have a backup in that sense. Spencer obviously doesn’t want music to be his career. Alex Duddy…it’s been his life for a long time. But justifiably so, he’s a really talented musician and he’s really worked for it. It’s not like he feels he’s just going to sit around and then get famous or make a career out of it.
Tim: You know, the signing thing, and just the business thing in general, I think that will happen. We’ve had multiple recording deal offers, they’re just for smaller labels. Getting signed to Roadrunner is pretty much as high up as we could fathom to go, because they’re the biggest metal label. But it’s definitely not something I think we’re entitled to. I think we’d be really lucky if they gave us an offer. [That said, we’ve only been around for a year and it’s highly unlikely we’ll get signed by a major label anytime soon]
Ashleigh: Alex Duddy likes Bright Eyes. I’d just like to add that as a counter argument.
Tim: A counter argument to what?
Alex: To him being a good musician. But so does Austin, so if there are ever two guys in our band to make out with each other, it will be Austin and Alex Duddy, while listening to Bright Eyes.
Metal Archives has you listed as symphonic folk/death metal. Is that accurate?
Tim: Anything you want is accurate because I think genres are silly in general. I mean it’s a good way to categorize bands if you say, “Oh, they’re a death metal band” or “they’re more of a power metal band.” But I think it’s silly to label band that are somewhere in between really rigidly. There are symphonic elements, folk elements, progressive elements, death metal, power metal…so are we all these things?
Alex: At the end of the day we’re just metal.
Tim: Yeah, we’re a metal band.
Austin: Is the folk what you’re asking about?
Yeah, what the hell is folk metal?
Austin: Well, it’s not really American folk, it’s more European folk music, like Celtic music or Scandinavian folk music is definitely a big influence in there. We’re listed under folk on iTunes and people think it’s a joke. But no, there is a big folk influence.
Alex: A lot of our influences—metal influences—are also influenced by folk. Look at old In Flames and Fintroll, things like that. You can hear it in their music, you can hear it in ours. Really obvious influences there.
Tim: We’ve actually been getting away from that and I think that may not be a good thing. I don’t know. The folk stuff I really like, I really enjoy it. The reason folk music is enjoyable is the same reason all these melodies have stayed in people’s consciousness and people’s minds. It’s because they’re really catchy. That’s the reason folk music has survived.
How do you respond to fans who say that you need to play up your gimmick more?
Tim: How do I respond to that? Uh…
Ashleigh: With a casual shrug and a fuck-off. Do you mean all fans or the people we respect?
Tim: So the question is really: What do we think of our gimmick?
Alex: There are people who leave us comments on Myspace saying, “You guys have too many pretty-boys in your band to be metal. You don’t look goblin enough. You’re wearing these collared shirts…that’s not goblin. What Tim I think has said before is that we would rather let the music speak for itself and kind of look more respectable. If we wore costumes we would just be compared to Gwar and Lordi.
Tim: I actually won’t take credit for that. That was actually Alex Duddy’s initial complaint about the band. We have really good music and people like us for our music first. I mean, they like us for our gimmick first and then they’re like, “Wait, this music is actually pretty good.” And that’s what should speak for itself.
Alex: The name and the theme are what draw people in, but in the end what they like about it is the music. Anyone who would discredit us or dislike us because we didn’t act more goblin are not really fans of the music to begin with, so we’re not missing them if they’re not coming to our shows anymore.
Tim: I think there is a theatrical aspect and a musical aspect. I know a lot of people are into the theatrics of music, like look at Britney Spears concerts, or pop music concerts in general. It’s a show, you know, I completely understand that, but I don’t think that’s what we should be about.
Continued next post...
