RC: And defying Sharon Osbourne once again, I've come
out with my camera to the Ozzfest just to catch up
with these guys. A quite prolific group I must
say, Memento, this is there frontman Justin.
Justin: How are you doing, nice to see ya'.
RC: This is a very in-depths work as opposed to some of
the other music that's come out. Now you guys were
in Vast originally?
Justin: Yes we were, I was a guitar player in that
band. That's actually how I came over to America
in the first place and at the audition Steve and I
got along very very well. We jammed for like three
or four hours and it was meant to be a half an
hour audition. The fact that we jammed that long
meant that there was something there, you know
what I mean?
RC: It makes it easier to remember cause Steven Clark's
already an infamous name from Def Leopard. You had
some great producers come in on this, you had Toby
Wright come in. We've had Korn on when they were
babies, he's mixed them. You had Brendan O'Brian
come in, Stone Temple Pilots, some big bands.
Justin: Alice in Chains is a big one for us too, just
in terms of the depth of the music. And Jerry and
Layne(Staley) together, as well as the rhythm section,
there just one of our favorite bands. The song
writing team in that team is phenominal and you'ld
be crazy not to learn from those guys.
RC: Absolutely
Justin: There's a fine line between learning and ripping
off, but you can't help but be influenced by a band
that hits you right here. If they hit you you can't
help but have them as an influence.
RC: Especially with Alice in Chains, I think one of the
main things is no matter how much commercial play
they got they had that dark side that you couldn't,
it was just there. I don't know if it was the
heroine that Layne was doing, it's hard to say, but
it was there. Those guys tend to capture it in the
studio every time briliantly, so I can imagine how
you guys were.
Justin: Absolutley, songs like Would, that was a single
for those guys and it was one of the darkest songs
I've ever heard. It was all over TV and all over
the radio too.
RC: It was in a movie too, Singles.
Justin: So was Birth Ritual too, Soundgarden, love that
track.
RC: Bad ass track, great Soundgarden track. We just saw
Audioslave out here, it was pretty powerful.
Justin: Did they rip it.
RC: Yeah, I was really surprised they did a White
Stripes tune, Seven Nation Army.
Justin: They can cover anyone pretty much.
RC: Now you have two videos off of this, which I
haven't gotten yet. I don't think someone in
Columbia's video department likes me very much. I
got all the stuff, a package full of shirts...
Justin: I'm pleading the fifth on that one, I'm an
Australian but I'm pleading the fifth.
RC: That's OK, I'll get it. Now you left a signed band
that's a pretty ballsy thing to do. You were
already in a pretty comfortable position with
Elektra records out on Vast, was that a hard
thing to depart from or was that pretty much cut
and dry?
Justin: For me it was cut and dry, for Steve it was a
little tougher cause' he had invested a lot more
time in it. He had been in the band for four and
a half years and I had only been in the band for
a year and a half. I was also on a mission from
Australia. Just some dude from Australia
traveling the country playing with Vast and for
me I was kind of happy go lucky and nothing really
mattered, which is a good place to be cause' you
can just totally follow your heart. It took a ton
of arm twisting but Steve was in once I mentioned
to him the fact that it'll be a band band. I mean
Vast is a great band but it's more a solo project.
RC: Yeah, exactly.
Justin: And it works that way cause he's brilliant.
John is an amazing song writer, writes beautiful
songs, powerful songs, and he can do it on his
own. Steve and I have always liked the idea of a
gang with a common purpose. Four guys that get
along well, four guys that can live on the bus
together. We're not driving eachother mental
wether it's mental, or it was financially, or
artistically. The idea of being a team and
everyone being equal, when you look at bands like
U2 who were an influence on us.
RC: You're influence range is just so wide, a wide
spectrum, cause' the total sound and depth of a
lot of the things you do, where it's not like a
lot of the bands today where it's just thrash,
thrash, thrash. You look for the subtleties and
that's nice to see, it's refreshing.
Justin: You get kind of get tired, or at least I know
I would, of being angry all the time in real life,
in the studio, in the rehearsal room, or on stage.
RC: Pittsburghers are pretty good at it, sorry guys.
Justin: I really noticed something today with this
audience they listened, they really listened.
You get your occasional mosh or this or that or
crowd surfing, blah, blah, but what I noticed was
the eye contact. A real intelegent audience who
are just fans of music.
RC: They're probably the most eclectic and diverse
people in Pittsburgh who comes out for like
Ozzfest and Lallapalooza. When they're all
mixed up in the city it seems like they're a
minority almost. You know, to be overwhelmed by
a blue collar city I guess...
Justin: I'm glad you said that, I mean Australia is
built on blue collar and I just find those
audiences are really generous, they appreciate
if they're being looked after. I think that's
your job when you go on stage. As much as it is
an art form, you're job at the end of the day
is to connect with people and if you're not
doing that, if you're disrespecting people or
if your to good for an audience, then your in
the wrong...
RC: You're in the wrong business.
Justin: For real, whatever you wanna call it. I hate
it when I see a band that's arrogant, we do our
best not to be that.
RC: That's great, that's great to see especially with
a lot of things that have happened in the
industry, things being very controlled with Clear
Chanel and Viacom. Things going on, it's very
tarce. I've been doing this for eleven years and
it's been a wild trip, it's been rocky lately but
we keep at it. I wanna talk about rockiness now,
the night that Columbia approached you you guys
got in to a fight at the bar? A guy jumped on
stage and was that you that pummelled him?
Justin: I didn't pummell him as so much as I got
pummelled.
RC: Oh really.
Justin: I came off second best.
RC: His buddies came up?
Justin: His buddies made sure I came off second best,
but I mean Columbia had been in to the band for a
little while but they were smart enough not to
sign us straight away. So they gave a good eight
to twelve months of checking us out every now and
then and they got a new batch of songs that in my
opinion completed what would be the album to be.
And when they heard the last few tracks and they
were like now they got an album worth of
material. They've been grinding their teeth on
the live scene, this isn't a put together band,
now let's see that for real. There were some
people in town from the East coast who had to see
a gig on short notice, and what that meant was we
had to scramble for a venue within twenty-four
hours. The only place that we could find was the
Dragonfly, which is a great room we've done many
a shows there, but it was hip-hop night. It was
hip-hop night and we rocked up and even at sound
check it was like...
RC: What are these guys doing here?
Justin: Who are these guys? Why is there a guy with a
shaved head on stage and why are there rock
guitars blaring at soundcheck. But funny enough
the kid that came up on stage, he just had a
negative attitude the whole time and...
RC: I think a lot of that carries with hip-hop, it
does with metal but...
Justin: Yeah a lot of guys get in to it for the wrong
reasons. When I listen to it I feel loose and
like relaxed but some people, maybe some of the
lyrics or whatever, they kind of feel it's there
job to be ummhh... kind of assholes. Excuse my
French.
RC: Gangsta's, whatever they want, trying to emulate
it.
Justin: Yeah, this guy really was a gangsta wannabee,
a spoiled white kid from suburbia trying to be
cool and ultra hip-hop. And he was being
anything but hip-hop and cool and laid back, he
was being a dick. He made his way on to the
stage and he was kindly removed. And then I was
destroyed by his friends who blindsised me. It
was during our last song, it worked out. It
crecendoed at the end of the set there was
instruments all over the floor and pretty much
a barberall. I think the thing that Columbia
respected, and more importantly the audience
respected, even the hip-hop guys respected the
fact that we weren't gonna give up the stage
and we weren't gonna leave. Despite the negative
energy we were gonna push through and do the
best job that we could.
RC: Hold down the fort brother.
Justin: Yeah, in LA, with the backdrop of LA, it's
not like we're special or anything like that.
It's a little bit rare in LA for bands not to
be put together. Like a put together project,
write some songs that kind of sound like this
and we might have something for you. We just
did our own thing and...
RC: Trying to culminate the musicians and bring in
their own little I got an idea. I can put this
and this together I think it will sell instead
of keeping it music oriented. There's a lot of
that going on, like I see that with DJ Ashbaugh
from Beautiful Creatures. I've seen a lot of
different things happen with him. I know how it
is out there, it can be vicious. But you guys
prevailed good job.
Justin: Yeah, I think they just respected the fact
that we ended up becoming what we set out to
become which was four brothers in a band
looking out for eachothers backs on stage. And
we had our five ot ten loyal orange county fans
that drove up to every LA show we ever played,
and they were there and they kind of protected
us, thank you.
RC: Thank you for looking out for their backs.
Justin: I thank you for stepping in with the mic
stand, I think you might have saved my teeth.
He didn't save my ribs they got dislocated, but
he saved my face, this pretty face.
RC: Well it's got to be in tact for the video.
Justin: Well you know.
RC: They can do digital effects now.
Justin: This is the idiot proof lighter by the way
(reaching to a lighter hung on a string on the
window to light his cigarette). It's a great
idea, anyone at home who's constantly losing
their lighters just strap it to the wall.
RC: I don't think it's so much that people lose
their lighters, it's just that they loaned them
out and other people don't give them back.
Justin: Yeah I'm not a very popular person on the
bus when it comes to lighters.
RC: Yeah well we all have friends like that but you
can get away with it it's your band. I'ld like
to wish you guys the best of luck, the name of
the CD is Beginings, which is just a begining
for this band. So it's not gonna fall apart
soon, right Justin?
Justin: Not from inside. The band from inside is not
going to implode, I can tell you that much. And
as far as we're looking ahead, it's just getting
to the second album. That would be a privalege
in itself, being on Ozzfest is a privelage in
itself, and playing this country being an
Austalian growing up admiring blues and all the
great rock bands that have come out of America
and even the British invasion spawned by
America, there's a lot of love for this country
back home and to be over here playing is
awesome for us.
RC: Great, I wish you guys nothing but the best of
luck.
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