What's up, everyone? This week on the pod, I have Brett from Ignite, and this was awesome. He was super generous with his time, and anyone that knows me knows that in the 90s, easily, my favorite California hardcore bands were Ignite and Powerhouse, so this was super rad. Yeah, he was super generous with his time. We went through everything, and I hope you enjoy the interview. Please support the podcast by... Give me a like, a rating, or a review wherever you listen to podcasts.
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pod. 185 miles south. A hardcore punk rock podcast.
Alright, this week on the pod we have Brett from Ignite. Welcome. Hey, what's up, buddy? And full disclosure, Ignite was my favorite hardcore band in the 90s. So, definitely for California, along with Powerhouse. Nice. Good friends of ours. Yeah, you guys did a fair amount of shows with them.
We did Europe in 01, and then we did a bunch of one-off shows, some West Coast stuff. I think we even went and did Mexico with them at one point. Not a full tour, but just a show down in Tijuana. Yeah, we did our fair share. Good guy.
Yeah, and one of the most underrated bands ever. I think that just kind of maybe a casualty of when stuff doesn't come out on vinyl, sometimes it kind of gets left behind.
Yeah, they never really had a home as far as a label that I thought would do them justice of where they should have been. I thought they were in competition with anybody out there that was doing that style, and they just didn't get exposed as a lot of the other bands did, just because they were either on a victory or whatever at that time. Yeah,
total shame. But anyway, let's get into Ignite. Actually, we should go to pre-Ignite. Did you do any bands before you did Ignite?
Um, just like a high school band, which was just like, uh, no, it wasn't a punk band at all. It was more of like kind of a darky, dark kind of gothy kind of band, um, like a joy division kind of sounding band, but nothing that ever had a release. Um, and then when I met Joe Foster, um, uh, that's what got me started working on songs together. We were actually kind of played for a minute in another band. We kind of joined that band for a short, short time.
In like 92 or 93, people started actually writing songs for us. Yeah,
and how did you meet Joe Foster?
I met Joe Foster from one of the bands that I did before. He was friends with one of my singers, and he was going to maybe play guitar for us in that band. And then we reconnected like a few months later when he was looking for... a bass player to add to that band mad trade. So, um, yeah, just, uh, met him once. And then six months later, he got a number, my number from somebody and then reconnected with me and played in that band for a little bit. And then we started writing songs together.
Yeah.
Yeah. And were you aware of like his, his previous catalog, like the unity stuff?
You know what? I was pretty not aware of anything hardcore. Um, before I started playing with him, um, I had, uh, the Salad Day 7-inch on tape from a buddy from high school, and then my punk kind of music that I listen to in the punk world was more like Pistols, Ramones, Clash, that kind of stuff, more like the major label, 70s punk. Yeah, first ones.
Yeah.
Yeah, I had no idea about anything really hardcore outside of a few tapes I'd gotten from buddies in high school with minor threat and a few bands, but nothing about their life in general.
Okay, so he recruits you to do Ignite. Had they already jammed and they were just looking for a bass player? Is the demo already fully formed?
So me and Joe started, we played in that band Mad, played for like two months, and then we quit and wanted to start our own thing. So me and him and a drum machine started Ignite. Oh, my God. Yeah, so we just would get together two or three times a week, and he was doing a lot of overseas modeling at that point, so he'd be gone to Japan for a couple months and come home, and we'd be working on music, and then he'd go to Europe or something and come back.
So that first year that I met him, he was back and forth overseas, and in between we were working on music, just with a drum machine, and then we brought in Joe Nelson, because Joe had known, Foster had known Nelson previously. through the, like the justice scene in general.
Yeah. Do, do any of these, the demos exist still of the drum machine stuff? I have all that stuff. Oh, I'm going to be on you like a cheap suit, Brett. I'm sorry.
Some of them are songs that ended up on, uh, the first, you know, few releases. Um, some of them never turned into anything. Some of the music we kept in, um, turned into different songs and then a couple songs whole complete songs were just they just went away because they just couldn't fit
i bet it sounds really neat though because joe foster has such a good he does such a good job of like hitting like uh kind of like dark chords and so forth like it's very like tsl influenced and so with like the drum machine it probably gives it a real vibe it
sounded like adolescence to be honest oh it's so cool it Yeah, it didn't sound like Ignite too much. The first stuff we did with the drum machine, because we weren't really sure which type of beats to use. And so everything was a little bit more straightforward, not really the gallopy fast beat. So yeah, it was a little bit more adolescent sounding than Ignite, the early music anyway.
Yeah. So eventually you put together a demo. Yeah. And that's 1993. Yeah.
Yeah, we did that in 93. We got Casey. It was me, Joe Foster, Joe Nelson, and the drum machine. And then they had run into... And Gavin was actually playing. Gavin Ogle was playing. So there was four of us and a drum machine. And then Gavin had run into Casey Jones, I think, at Dead Records in Long Beach. And we started jamming with Casey, and that worked out. So yeah, that was the first five of us. And then we started actually recording like an actual... four-track demo at the rehearsal place.
Yeah, and these songs out the gate are songs that would be Ignite Classics for the first five, six, seven years of your career. The demo has Ash Return, Distance, Slow, Should Have Known, Far Away. Yeah,
exactly. Two or three of those were drum machine songs, and then Ash Return. I think Ash Return was the first song we wrote that wasn't one of the drum machine songs in the rehearsal.
Yeah, did you write the bass line or did Joe?
Oh, yeah, I wrote that.
All right. One of the win calls for Brett.
Yeah, that was, it was interesting because I just didn't want to play root notes. And I mean, coming from kind of that Joy Division, Peter Hook kind of world, it was like, I'm going to play high bass lines, high runs over. Like if Joe was playing a G chord, I just didn't want to play a low G. I wanted to play like a moving like. high bass note thing to kind of get a little bit of like the Joy Division feel into the music.
And then Joe would always go away from writing full chords into like, you know, different riffs and stuff. So with my bass line kind of being high and melodic and his kind of like crunchy kind of chords that he was using, we kind of came up with our sound pretty quick.
Yeah. And is this the only thing that you do with Joe Nelson?
Is this the only thing that...
Is this the only recording you do with Joe Nelson? Is this like the same recording that goes on the Scarred for Life?
No, we did the drum machine demo, then we did the four-track demo, then we went into, let's see, Moonsong Studios out in Riverside, and we did the, which was just going to be the seven-inch, but then it turned into a full-length because we got an offer to do a tour in Europe. And Austin Sound Records wanted to put something out, but they didn't want to put out an EP. They wanted to put out a full one. So we need to go into the studio and finish a few more songs.
So that's when Nelson's song is on Scarred for Life. The last three songs he's on yet. There's actually three different sessions with Nelson.
Okay. Yeah. No, just looking at the discography for 94 is so wild because, you know, you get a year, but you don't get a month. And you guys put out so much stuff. That's why I need your help here. So, uh,
yeah. So, so when we, we did the, where they talk seven inch, that was when Randy was singing. Right. And, um,
and we actually recorded. That's after. So Joe leaves. Joe
joins the band. Yep. Uh, Joe starts playing with us. We do do a demo with him. And then he's always out on the road with quick fan. Um, right. Because he's friends with those guys. So he's touring around with those guys and they get the rate at the machine tour. And he's like, I can't stay home to do, you know, just a band when I can go do this big tour. So he was in and out a lot. So then he had kind of recruited Randy to take it to the spot. And we raised, it was, I loved it with Randy.
I thought it was great. Um, I loved what he brought to the table, what he sang, but it just wasn't his bag. So he stuck around for probably six months.
Okay, so he's just in the mail for six months, because that 7-inch is fucking awesome, the where they talk 7-inch. And is Ringside self-released, or is that one of your buddies?
That's our buddy Evan, who's good friends with Joe Nelson. We just basically used his imprint just to have something to put it on. But we paid for the pressing and did it all ourselves.
Yeah. And you have the song Turn on there, which is like one of the greatest songs ever. You know, I
remember. It was one of my favorite early songs as well.
Yeah. I remember when it was like kind of getting pulled out of your set list and it was disappointing. It's like, oh, that song's going. It's not going to come back, I don't think. Because it's so perfect and classic, you know, it's like, I don't know. It's just kind of a no brainer to always be there. But of course, people evolve. Um,
yeah,
but no, I mean the total perfect, perfect song. Um, so then you do a couple of splits also. Is this, is this just cause you're going to Europe so much out the gate? Do you, how many times you go to Europe in 94? So
once we go, once we go in August, but it's, uh, well, I've never toured before. Um, we started off this band with a, with a European tour. We did local shows. We probably played like 10 local shows. And then, um, when the guy who owns Lost and Found Records in Germany caught wind of the band. And the way he found out about it was Gavin was over in February of 93 with No For An Answer, their first European tour.
And he meets up with the guy from Lost and Found and he asks Gavin, oh, anything new coming out of Orange County? And Gavin said, oh, I'm actually doing this band with Joe from Unity and Casey from No For An Answer and whatnot. And And he was super interested right off the get go. So he said, send me some songs. So Gavin sent him a couple of songs for us.
And he, uh, he said himself that we were in the studio and he's like, look, I can get, if you guys can go in and record more songs, I can get you on probably a tour with either sick of it all or slap shot, um, in the summer. And we'll put a full length out. Are you guys in? And I mean, we're like playing like local shows for nobody. Somebody calls you and tells you, hey, you can go to Europe, do a two-month tour on a tour bus with one of these bands, and do you guys want to do it?
And it was like, are you kidding me? So we scrambled, finished the Start for Life, added a few more songs to make it a full length, and we didn't even have a singer because Nelson was gone, Randy was out, and we just had Joe finish it so we could put something out, but we didn't have a singer at that point. And we agreed to do the tour. We were like, you know, full steam ahead, let's go do it.
We'll just we'll just figure it out we'll get a singer before summertime and uh so that's that's how scarred for life came to be not just the where they talk seven inch came into a full length because of the tour offer and uh and it was it was all really quick it was like it happened like in like the whole thing from recording to being on tour happened within like six months
yeah and there's also a slapshot split and a battery split both on yeah
so the was just basically a tour promo 7-inch. And then the next year when we came back, the same thing, the battery. We didn't tour with them, but they wanted to put another split out. That label was pressing anything and everything they could get their hands on.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, they're raging right then. So how do you come across Zoli? How do you meet him?
Zoli is discovered by Gavin. Well, not discovered. They knew each other from... the scene and going to shows and, uh, Zoe's brother and, um, and Gavin, uh, I think it was like in May or June of 94, um, Gavin's up at the Viper room, I think it was, uh, seeing the band Wolf, uh, Pete Stahl's band and, um, runs into Zoe at that show and, uh, you know, says, Hey, what are you up to? And he goes, nothing, you know, whatever. He was doing some stuff at the time.
And, uh, and he kind of explained the situation. Look, we've got a European tour all lined up. We've got an album done. We need a singer. Um, and yeah, that's so goalie. They had known Casey and, uh, Gavin had known both for years. I don't think Joe had ever met him before, but, uh, but, uh, yeah. So, um, he, he, He came down, long hair, full beard, like long beard, hair down to his waist. And we had just been in the process of trying out like 10 guys and nothing was working.
It wasn't even close. Like we were just like, just get somebody in the ballpark. And then Zoe walked in and we played like probably 30 seconds of Ash return and stopped. And it was like, all right, you want to do this? Because it was obvious that you could sing in time. He was on key and we didn't even know his range at that point. It was kind of funny because he didn't really believe us. He was like, what do you mean? I got the gig? Well, if you want it. We're like, yeah. He's like, okay.
He kept calling us all that week. Is this for real? Because I got some stuff coming up. I'll do this if you guys are really doing this. You guys aren't trying anybody else out. We're like, no. You want this? And, uh, it was funny. So I didn't expect him to cut his hair, cut his beard. Like that's the third practice. He showed up with a shaved head and no beard.
Did he have any idea what he was going to sound like before he belted? No,
no. And I was, I pulled up, he was sitting in his 68 VW bus in front of our rehearsal room with his dog sitting shotgun with his hat on backwards and long hair. And I looked over and I was like, Oh, I was like, this isn't going to like, it just, I don't know. We just tried out like 10 guys and none of them, they all were terrible. And, uh, and, um, and then he came in, grabbed the mic, grabbed the mic and started wailing on the song. And, you know, of course he's kind of flexing a little bit.
Cause he wants to prove, he wants to go to your club, to the store. So he's like screaming and singing. And we're just like, Holy mackerel. Like, this is incredible. So, um, So yeah, so that's how we got into the band, and we left like seven weeks later for Europe.
Yeah, and how did that go over? What was that like, that first
tour? Again, like I said, that was my first tour, so I had no expectations of what anything was going to be like. I didn't know how to pack for a tour. And just, you know, when we got the routing, waiting for the fax to come in to... Was it Revelation at that time? No, that was before Rev. Conversion records. We got the, no, it wasn't even conversion. It was just somebody's mom's work. We were waiting to get the facts. And we saw the dates and it was like 56 shows in 58 days.
Oh my God. But we were just like, okay, I don't know. Is this how it works? I guess so. So we didn't know. And, you know, a lot of bands still tour like that, but we had no idea that that was like a lot of shows and not many off days. But it didn't really matter because we were pretty naive to touring. Casey never really toured in No For An Answer that much. Chris Bratton mostly did a lot of the touring that they did. Unity never really toured. So Zoli had never really been in... a band before.
I mean, I think we did some, some stuff, but none of us had been like, none of us were road dogs. None of us had really done tours. Right. So when we got, we got out to Europe and we fly into Berlin and, uh, we called the booking agent and, um, we're in the wrong city. We're supposed to fly to Frankfurt. I mean, there was no communication, no emails. So they got to send a van to come get us and drive us from Berlin to Frankfurt to where the bus is picking everybody up.
And, uh, It was pretty surreal. It was like 24 hours of just like staying awake and then finally getting to the Frankfurt Airport and the Slapshot guys show up, the bus shows up, and it's a piece of crap, the bus. It's an old, old city bus, Austrian city bus converted into a bus with beds in it.
And the back door to the bus the back door to the side door still has those big like rods on them but they couldn't take those off so the rods went through those bunks so you had to sleep whoever had those bunks had to sleep like around those weird door rods and the bathroom the toilet was just sitting on the floor and it would just fill up and then the driver would have to go pick it up with the fans and dump it while on nights where everybody was drinking and it was long nights it would fill
up and it would he turned left and all the pee would spill out of it and run down the hall. And yeah, it was pretty gross. But we, again, we didn't know. And it was like, cool, this is awesome. So we got into the bus and headed to Sweden for the show, which wasn't a club show. It was a giant, giant festival with a fuller midnight oil on our stage. It was like refused, no fun at all. So it was like, 40,000 person festival was our first show. The side stage, of course.
But there was like five or six thousand people watching us for our first show in Europe. And I mean, from there, we just went, this is amazing. We got to take advantage of this. So we just tried to kill it every night because we knew if we got some good reviews and people liked us, we could come
back. What was the average show like, though, on the tour?
I mean, we played some squats in East Germany, which was not obviously East Germany, but it was the eastern part of Germany. We played some squats for like 200 people, but a lot of the shows were like 500, 600 to 1,000 and then whatever festivals we played. There was a few like indoor festivals, like big kind of warehouse type shows. And then that first festival we did in Sweden. But most of the shows were just typical club shows.
Yeah.
Five, six, 700 caverns. You know, up to half the blue side places, a couple of them.
Yeah, that's amazing out the gate, though. And it just has to give you just a rush of confidence, right? Which Ignite had, like, you know, from the time I would have started seeing you, which would have been like 96. Like, you guys are just such a pro band. You know, and it has to be just a lot of that.
It was cool because we just recognized the opportunity. And we were like, okay, we were at home in California playing to nobody, trying to get on shows. And now we're playing in front of a ton of people every night. Let's just try and win them over. Let's try and kill it. Let's try and beat Slapshot every night. Let's try and make it so we can come back ASAP. And you can just tell there was a ton of opportunity there. And we wanted to take advantage of every second of it, every piece of it.
So we just... We were just, like, busting our butts and tried to just, like, kill it every night.
Yeah, well, Slapshot's touring on Blast Furnace, so you can beat him every night. He
can do that. Dude, the band they had together was really good. They had this guy, Barry. Yeah, this guy, Barry, the drummer, total pro. He was, like, fast-paced sound guy and just kind of a metalhead drummer. Really good. And Mike Bowser was, like, a grunge kid and just a really good, I mean, the lineup was solid. Like they were, we were like, I remember playing our first show with them at that Sweden festival going, Oh man, we just killed it. And then they came on. I went, Oh, okay.
Like these guys are a lot, these guys are a lot better enough. We were going to have to try and bust our butt.
Well, there was, there were seasoned, right? I mean, like that was their circuit. Like I never, I never, I never saw Slapshot until like a couple of years ago. They just never, they never came to the West coast. Like why would they, their East coast is just as close to go to Europe as it is to come to us.
Yeah. And that's true. That's true. So they had been doing it for, yeah, they had been doing it for a while and we were still trying to figure out what amp sounded good live and what, you know, we were, we didn't know how to, it's a lot different when you're sitting in your bedroom playing your bass or your guitar and then you get on stage and you got to crank a Marshall half stack or a Ampeg full stack, you know, up to, get it to sound where it sounds good on stage.
And there's, you know, there's a, there's an art to that for sure of getting a tone and, um, figuring out how to make your band sound good live. So that was definitely something that we kind of got thrown into the fire on. We just had to figure it out.
Yeah. That's so cool. Um, so you come back and then you do the first recording with Zoli, which is the, the in my time seven inch.
Is that correct? So the first tour ends, um, last show in Germany and the Lost and Found guys kind of want to strike while the iron's hot. So he goes, hey, why don't you guys take a train? Because we were all staying an extra month in Europe just to go vacation. We had these 90-day tickets. So he goes, hey, why don't you guys take a day off, get on a train and come to Bremen, Germany, where Lost and Found label was. He's like, I'll put you in the studio and we'll do
your next release tomorrow. And we said, yeah, sounds good. That's right. I actually wrote that down. Recorded it, lost and found.
Yeah, and that was a day and a half after the tour ended. And we recorded the In My Time EP in 22 hours. I think we had one day to do it. And again, not knowing any difference of how things are supposed to happen. Can you guys record five, six songs in a day? Yeah, sure, why not? And so, I mean, there's vocals and everything. This is so... We recorded all that. We started at noon and ended at 10 a.m. the next day.
Yeah, it's amazing that his voice is holding up after that whole tour.
Well, at that point, he was so dialed in with music. It was so warmed up over doing singing for two months that he could sing all night. And plus, we're 22 now. No, 23 at that point. Okay. So it's like, it didn't, you know, it wasn't like, there wasn't anything factoring into where on the body, especially coming off like a two-month tour where we've been playing every night, every night, every night.
Yeah.
So yeah, so we did the MI Time 7-inch in 22 hours.
Yeah.
Or sorry,
EP. The 7-inch is great. The 7-inch comes out on conversion. They do a 10-inch picture disc and a CD on Lost and Found.
Yeah. The Lost and Found came out first. And we were not happy with the mixes, and we took the rough mix from tape, just the audio tape we had, and made a conversion release off of just a, yeah. So that came out a few months later. And then quite a few years later, they did that picture disc. Okay. Yeah, so. Cool. That was kind of the process
on there. Yeah, and then, so you come back, and then do you see, like, the Ignite popularity drop? growing at this time now that you have releases out and you're playing around in Southern California and so forth?
Well, so when we got back in the end of 94, nothing was released in the States yet for us. It was only the Guard for Life in Europe and it was an import here. So we didn't have a domestic release. Right.
So,
We brought home a bunch, as many as we could, a couple hundred of the Scars for Life. But at that point, it didn't really represent the band because it was Joe and Randy, and now we have Zoli. But we need to get music out there. So we're selling these CDs that we brought home, a couple hundred of them, to Vinyl Solution, to Zeds, to sell, just to get the name out there. And we didn't have the In My Time CD available yet. So we started playing shows at the end of 1994.
But to answer your question, yeah, you could definitely tell people were doing their homework and getting the releases, buying the imports and stuff, because one of the first shows we played after we got back, compared to the show we played before we left when nobody was there, and then three months, four months later, we get back and play a show, and it was a pretty cool show, and people knew all the words to the songs. It was like, oh, okay, this feels like Europe. This is
awesome. Awesome. Yeah, and so the next year you do Call My Brothers? Yes. Yeah. And this is, most of these songs are already written. There's not too much new for call my brothers, but it's like you go in and you do a cohesive LP with Zoli singing everything. Yeah. Yep. What do you remember about the process of recording this record?
We had a lot of songs. There wasn't a few songs that weren't finished that we did finish like 50 in a month and a couple of the other songs trying to think what else wasn't. uh, release. No, that was only in my time. Um, yeah. And, um, yeah, maybe it was just 15 a month, but, um, yeah, we went in and there was like, it just felt like it, there was like loose releases everywhere. We needed one solid release for the state, um, with everything on it.
And, uh, we went in and wanted to retract everything, get a good recording for Paul, my brother. So we went into, for the record with, uh, Jim Monroe and, uh, That didn't take 22 hours. That took quite a long time. Because they're in the middle of doing other records, so it's like, hey, we have five days here, and then you guys can come back. And we were like, okay, this is weird.
But that was cool, because that was the first time where you could go home and sit on recordings and listen to rough mixes and make changes and write vocal parts and write guitar parts to songs instead of just trying to spit something out and... one day in the recording studio how we had done before so um yeah calling rose was cool um and then it was it was nice to just get that out in the states and then that also got imported to europe and um it was nice to have like an official release out so
we could actually tour on something in america that was available to people
yeah it comes out on conversion records in 1995 it uh it sounds best on clear vinyl And, uh, but, uh, do you, do you tour the States then? Is that your first time doing it in 95?
That's yeah. That's when we go out and hit the States hard in the summer of 95 with, uh, we go do a big run with earth crisis. Um, and then we go do another run with integrity and we played, uh, let's see, it was, uh, guilt. The band downer was on part of it.
Um, Damnation was on part of it and we did a full it was a full run and which is interesting because those were like some of the bigger hardcore bands of the time like they were those who were getting the full push for victory there was nobody at any of those shows I mean once
they leave their little pockets
yeah once you're outside of Chicago, New York you know there was like 12 people in Atlanta and They were throwing milk at Earth Crisis while they were playing, and it was, yeah, it wasn't like, oh, man, back in the day when the shows were all giant. That was back in the day, and there wasn't anybody at the shows, you know.
The big shows, Louisville was great, because I think that's where the field was from, and some of the other bigger A markets were good, but for the bulk of it, you'd go, like, play Alabama, you'd go play Florida, and there was nobody at these shows. But we did it. We went out and we had to do it. Jersey, New York, Philly, Washington, D.C. were all awesome. Those shows were all three, four, five hundred kids. But it was small. The scene was pretty small.
We did two full runs that year and then we ended up sick of it all in December. That was a real run. That was awesome. When we did like ten shows with them on the East Coast. That was the first time we got to play to like some a bigger room full of people that knew our stuff and were appreciative of like hardcore music in general. You know what I mean? So you'd be going and playing shows, but people know your stuff and they want to mosh and stage dive and stuff. So think of it all.
That was the end of
95. Okay. And before we move on from call my brothers, I just want you to look back on it. And where do you think it stands? Like, do you, do you believe that it's like a classic American hardcore LP? Do you, do you believe it's as good as I believe it is?
That album to me represents definitely a specific unique time for Ignite because of the lineup that was different then. And the way we wrote songs back then was completely different than how we write songs now. We didn't think about song structure. We didn't think about, oh, the chorus has to go twice and we gotta make sure this part's catchy or kind of as you start thinking about songs. and certain pop sensibility that you just get used to from listening to music.
Back then, it was just part A, part B, part C, part D, and whatever was cool, we stuck with. And then we just put vocals on top of the music that we thought sounded cool. And so that was kind of a unique time for us as far as on the musician side of it for the songwriting, which makes it special because you just, Some of the stuff that we wrote, it doesn't make any sense when you look at the song on paper, but it works because it sounds cool. And a lot of those songs were like that.
We just liked certain parts, so we wanted to play them. And parts we didn't, we clipped. And it was a different way to song write. We were younger. We did whatever we thought felt good at the time.
No, I mean, there's so many brilliant little tiny things on the record, like going to the verse riff slow. on Ash Return before you kick in fast. That's so gnarly. I remember being in the crowd and these things happening. When you do that riff slow, it's like, oh shit, now's the time. It's coming.
It's
building. Even if on paper it's not making sense, you really are because what you're doing is you're pushing the boundaries of straightforward hardcore in such a Like, in an artistic but not poetic way, I guess. Right. And there's just so many layers painted on this record, like, with Joe's playing, you know, and you're playing, and Casey Jones, like, doing, like, the off-time type stuff, and, of course, Zoli's voice.
I mean, this four piece is, with sticking in, like, the boundaries of, like, straightforward, fast, hardcore, it's, like, it's almost as far as you can take it in every direction, right? which is what makes it so like magical.
Yeah. Casey was very, very creative and he would come up with really cool stuff and he would have cool ideas for music too. He wouldn't, you know, he didn't know notes. He wouldn't say, go to the C sharp minor there. You know, he would just, you know, Hey, I'm hearing something like this. Can you guys, you know, so, and his drum beats were really cool. He always came up with really, he was listening to a lot of helmet sense field. And his whole background was, you know, total hardcore.
So he had that in his repertoire of, of knowledge for all the fast beats from, you know, bad green screen, minor threat, all that stuff that he grew up on.
But then, you know, he got into really heavy stuff, pious, been listening to a lot of like i said helmet and uh and so he was trying to incorporate all these like heavier beats and these halftime parts into the stuff and we thought it was really cool um because i really liked it because i didn't come from the the fast beat world but the stuff that i did have written and played in was all like kind of more melodic and dark and uh and then you throw joe's like kind of interesting chords and stuff
over it and then also just the hardcore chords um it made, yeah, it made our sound. It made our kind of unique-ish sound. Um, and it was a lot of fun because there was a lot of discovery for us at that point of, uh, incorporating these sounds that we liked from these other bands, you know, and, uh, like Smashing Pumpkins and Chinese Dreams had just come out. There was some really cool riffy stuff on there. It's cool bass stuff.
Um, there was just all this really cool music going on, um, in the underground and the mainstream from Nine Inch Nails to all the Seattle stuff which had all had elements of punk rock and heaviness in it um so it was I don't know it was fun it was fun listening and writing music back then because all this stuff was new coming out and you're getting inspired like every day and uh um and then working with those guys are Joe and Casey are both really creative guys so well and then Zoli you know
singing on top of it making it sound like Ignite you know it was uh it was a good yeah it was a good team it was That was like chapter two for me. Chapter one was the Nelson phase of the band. And then chapter, you know, the next chapter was the four piece with Zoe and Joe and Casey and me.
Yeah. And so then also in, in 95, the family CD comes out and this is, it's just calling my brothers, but they, it's a different sequencing on lost and found. Correct.
Well, it's called my brothers minus in my time. Okay. And a different sequencing. Yeah. Cause all those, those six songs have already come out. So it didn't really make sense to put them on. So we put, uh, those 10 or 11 songs, whatever it was on the family CD that made up the, the, uh, call my brothers minus in my time.
Okay. And then this is the last thing you do with lost and found. Um, can we just talk about the overall relationship with them? Cause like, you're actually, you were one of the only bands that was like with them. Like they weren't bootlegging you. You were like kind of putting, like they were putting you out legitimately. And it seems like you have a pretty good relationship with them.
We had an okay relationship with them. I mean, they were... If you grabbed any magazine in Europe from... I'm talking about from a magazine from the airport or a zine on a table at a show, they were advertising in everything. They were marketing and pushing harder than any label. And those guys loved the music and believed in it. Because we met them. We went to their warehouse and wanted to take pictures.
And they were fans of... the scene in general but I mean they were bootlegging a lot of stuff and I think they were just making a ton of money and had the means to market it so I mean we never got paid from them ever but they pushed us harder than any other label would have so it's like what do you want a few thousand dollars in royalties and not get pushed or do you want a label to push the crap out of your band everywhere across Europe wide and help make your band big.
So, you know, obviously it's smarter to take, luckily, and, you know, just by circumstance, we were on that label and they just, they pushed us. And, you know, like I said, they wanted to get us right in the studio, right after that tour while we were in Germany and record that EP, take advantage of that, get more out. Cause I think they could see the writing on the walls of bands when we sit down with them forever.
Yeah. So they wanted to take advantage of every opportunity that they had to put music out. So yeah, so there wasn't really any bad blood. I mean, we didn't... And here's another thing that they did do, which is basically like payment. When we got to Europe on the Slapshot tour, they sent us like 200 or 300 CDs for free to sell. And we were selling for like, you know, 20 to which marks, which is like 12 bucks or 13 bucks at the time. And all that was free.
So we got... you know we got we got paid uh that way but we never got a check from them we never knew how many feedings they sold we never knew what the value of our sales really was um i'm sure they made quite a bit of money and in hindsight i'm actually kind of okay with it the way things turned out
yeah i mean they definitely helped you get your footing as a band yeah so okay in 96 you do uh the past our means EP 12 inch EP. And this is with Rev. Um, so you get to join the revelation family, which is like a, a real honor for any hardcore band.
Yeah, it was cool because they, the catalog spoke for itself and, um, we were actually still signed conversion. I think maybe we, one or two releases and, uh, uh, Dennis moved away. The label kind of went under. So, um, we had met with Jordan and he was interested in putting out a, uh, uh, or actually with a contract we signed, we signed three albums with Revelation. So, um, and it was cool because they had a bigger reach and they had a bigger brand.
And, um, uh, you know, we talked to a few different labels at that time. We talked to Roadrunner and, uh, they didn't quite pull the trigger. We tried to talk to Fat Rec. We tried to talk to Epitaph, um, And we didn't get any bites from them. So, um, it made sense for us to do the revelation.
Yeah. And again, just awesome record, you know, of, of that, of that era of ignite, um, same year you do the good ridden split, which is just the song past our means plus the bad brains cover band in DC.
Yep. Yep.
I mean,
great. That was recorded in the same, same session there. Um,
it was recorded on the past. I mean, session, um,
Yeah, and it's now actually included on the Pastor Means, the re-release of it, the current one.
Oh,
all right. Jordan, yeah, they redid the artwork a couple years ago, two or three years ago, and added that song. So we had to go get that mastered and have it added to the track listing. So I think on the 12-inch and the CD it's on, or maybe it's not on the 12-inch. I know it's definitely on the CD, the Bad Brain song. And yeah, and that was similar to the Slapshot 7-inch that was put out as a tour promo, basically. you know to push the good riddance ignite tour that we were doing there
yeah and and by then the shows are i mean that's a great band for you to tour with in 96 that's pretty a perfect band to tour with um yeah oh do you remember all those shows being pretty good
yeah they were we actually um we had to join the tour uh like a week and a half late because something happened at home I don't recall, but we met up and started, I think in Virginia beach, we were supposed to start in Texas or Florida. And, uh, yeah. And yeah, all the shows were great.
They were big.
It was fun. That was a fun, that was a fun run of shows. Cool.
And then, so now the next like four years are, are kind of a little strange, right? There's not, there's not too much coming out. The sea shepherd seven inch and 10 inch come out. Those are just live recordings. Um, yeah, but those were kind of just, Go ahead. Well, Joe leaves the band and Casey leaves the band, right?
Yeah. So in 90, so we, we recorded past our means and, uh, that comes out on rev and we go to Europe and do our biggest tour to date in Europe in 96. We take straight face over there. And, uh, that was awesome. And then, uh, yeah, by the summer of 97, I think, um, Casey, yeah, Casey actually left in the middle of a tour.
Oh, wow.
We were on the East coast. We were on the East coast and, uh, and, uh, he, uh, we were in DC and we played the black cat. I think it was the black cat. Um, and the next morning he gets up when we're getting ready to hit the road to head to Virginia beach and just hail the taxi. And, uh, I'm kind of like, what is, what is he doing? And, uh, he climbed out in the back of the van too, which was weird.
Um, in between the trailer, out the back door, and had his bag, and then held a taxi, and then was in a taxi, and I ran over to him. I go, Casey, what are you doing? He's like, I'm going home. He goes, I'm going home. I can't do it anymore. I'm over it. And I go, what are you talking about? Wait, no, come on. Get out of the car. He's like, no, I got to go. I go, well, give me your backpack with all that. Cause he usually handled all like the merch money and stuff.
And he was way out, out, kind of a bad spot. And, uh, he's like, Oh, okay, here, just take everything. And, and, uh, he left, left the, uh, left the tour. And we were in, uh, we were in DC. And we had a show that night in
Virginia beach. Holy cow. So did you, were you able to find a fill in?
So we, there was a couple of guys from some of the bands we're playing with. They could jump in. But, um, like, kid that we knew, said, hey, I got a buddy who goes to, like, Berklee School of Music, and he's a crazy drummer. He can play with you guys. I go, well, has he ever heard us? He's like, no, it doesn't matter. Just sit down with him for a little while.
And I sat with this guy in the front seat of the car and showed him the eight, nine songs we were going to play with him, and then we were going to do four or five with the other guys. We just got to learn all the songs in like a half an hour. I just said, I'll just kind of, I'll just kind of mouth to you what beat it. I go, we're basically, we have a halftime beat, a fast beat, and there's a straight beat. Those are like, we could play songs where that will cover everything.
And, uh, it was kind of funny. So we pulled it off that night and it wasn't half bad to be honest with, uh, the guy who'd never heard the song. So then we played the show in Virginia beach. And then we had two days off to get to Florida and we flew out, uh, our buddy Doug, who had played in Vandals and Slapshot and a bunch of bands, and he told them the rest of the tour for it.
Holy cow. Yeah, that's insane. It
was a roadblock.
Yeah, for sure,
for
sure. That's serious roadburn to just cut like that.
Yeah, and it was
wild. Man, that's crazy. So how do you deal with Joe Foster leaving? Because he was like the main driving force initially and the main songwriter, of course.
Yeah. So, I mean, me and him had started together and, um, it was, uh, it was, and I knew, I knew Joe pretty well at that point. Joe's a very unique guy and he's very intense and, um, and he just had kind of lost the fire to play with the three of us. And, uh, he wasn't enjoying it anymore at that point. That was in February of 98. Um, and, uh, he just said, uh, on our way to the whiskey show. Hey, this is going to be the last show I play. And I went, I was like, really? He's like, yeah.
He's like, I can't do it anymore. I'm not in the spot where I want to continue on. And, uh, he has his reasons and his own, um, basically reasons for leaving that he told me about some of them, but, um, but yeah and uh so we went and played that show which that's funny you sent me the picture with you in the crowd yeah i didn't know i didn't know that that actually that picture was from that show
yeah i was able to kind of figure it out because i think i only saw you at the whiskey a couple times and so it had to have been that show because that wasn't like the af show i don't think
yeah i mean if were you at the af show i was Okay. Well, I mean, you could have been, you're probably right though. You'd probably know seeing yourself in the picture. Cause sometimes the pictures I see live, a third of venue and you've played it multiple times. It kind of hard, hard to figure out which year, what night it was. But, uh, but, uh, yeah, that was funny when you sent that picture and it was like, Oh, you're in that shot.
That was kind of cool. I like, cause I obviously have all your records. I just don't go through everything. And I actually discovered that like kind of late, like maybe five years ago. Like what? What the fuck? you know, but yeah, so funny. But, uh, so what are the, what are the band conversations like? Like, did you think about calling it quits or you're just like, we're doing too good right now. We got to replace him no matter what.
We say Craig had come in after Casey left and Doug filled in for that tour. And then we got home and the first drummer we tried out was, uh, Craig and Craig's like, he's ridiculously talented drummer.
Um, uh, the you know the level of musicianship that he had was gnarly and so having a drummer you know on that level kind of brought the whole band up I thought we were at that point you know at the time of our band when Craig got in the band and then kind of like you said it was going really well and when Joe left it like me and Craig didn't have any any notions to hang it up at that point.
We just thought we should find somebody that could play all the stuff and could write as well and try and do it. We talked to Brian and it was really quick. He was actually at that whiskey show too. I think we toured Canada a month later and he was on that tour with us. It was awesome.
I mean, Brian's a ridiculously talented guitar player as well, so it was like, the band got really, I thought, really tight and really good at that point, and I thought, you know, that, again, a lot of opportunities were in front of us.
Yeah, and did he come from 1134? Am I remembering that right? He did. Yeah, he did. Okay. He was one of the guitar players from 1134. Okay. And then, so, and then there's another thing I remember before Place Called Home came out. I think that, uh, there was like a demo circulating for a while. It might've been a year or two before the LP came out, have like a, like maybe a different version of veteran. Do you remember like demoing and so forth?
Yeah. So we were on rev and we owed them three records and we did an EP. So we still owed them two LPs on an EP. And, um, uh, we had gotten management at that time and, uh, and they, uh, thought it would have been best to try and get on a bigger label. Um, so we, they, we actually all went and sat with Jordan and said, Hey, um, this is what we'd like to do. We'd like to spend this amount of money on a record and marketing.
And, uh, Jordan was totally, I mean, I'm really good friends with him still. I'm totally down to earth. He's like, Hey, that's just not in our budget guys. Um, why don't you guys just see if you can find somewhere else to go and, um, we can just work something out. And, uh, So we started shopping. So we needed a demo to shop. So Jordan was cool enough. He goes, I'll front the demo costs. I'll front the money for the demo for you guys to help you guys shop.
And so we went in the studio, recorded Veteran, a couple other songs. So that was the ad-diff version of Veteran. That was like the demo version. And then we started shopping that demo to labels, indies, majors, everything to see if there was interest out there to... to try and go somewhere where we could get even a bigger reach than Rev.
Okay, and then you end up landing with TVT.
Yep. Okay. Yep, Sean Roberts over there was our A&R guy and came from the scene, New York guy, New York hardcore scene, knows all about us, really excited about the demo, and they signed us to TVT, which was almost basically a major at that point. They had a Nine Inch Nails, KMFDM, Seven Dust. They were working with some Snoop Dogg side projects. It felt like a major, but it was still technically an indie. And they were super excited.
The only reservation we had is that we weren't going to get any label brand recognition from going to a label like TBT. It wasn't going to be like being on Epitaph where you're just going to be on everybody who's a fan of that Tats Radar or Fat Rec or Nitro at that time or a label like that where you're probably going to get a bunch of people checking you out just because you're on that label. We knew that the TVT move wasn't going to get us that because I think VOD was on TVT at the time.
So it was us and them from our world and everything else kind of from a bigger world that had nothing to do with us.
But they were very excited about the demo and they were very excited about the band and the record and the presence you've got we sat down with us and you know told us about how he was launching tvt europe and he wanted our album to be the first album that came out so they could come out of the gates with something new fresh for europe and um so we were pretty excited about that that they were gonna um push it so hard in europe which actually never ended up happening because TV Europe ended up
never materializing so that was actually probably for Europe's sake one of the worst moves we could have made but you can't when you're sitting there with the president of a label and he's telling you about all these plans and you guys are going to be the we're going to be flying the Ignite flag in Europe and you guys are going to be the number one band on the because you guys already do so well there you know you hope that they're telling the truth or that what they're talking about is going to
happen you know you have to put your trust in these people and it happens all the time it's nothing special it's not a story that you know you know, it happens to bands all the time where, you know, what the label promises doesn't work out. So in hindsight, it probably would have been better to just do a punk rock label or a hardcore label for that release. I think it would have got worldwide, it probably would have gotten more interest, more views, more listens.
Do you think that this record like fell off a little bit like that? It didn't do as well as you were hoping?
No. Pretty much the opposite. It eventually gets licensed in Europe to BMG, and they push it like crazy. It's all over the place in Europe. We're getting on festivals, we're doing tours, we're playing shows. The band grows exponentially in Europe off of the album. For us, we thought the songwriting... It was different. It was the next chapter. It was like chapter three. It was the Brian, Craig, Zoli, Brett chapter of the band, the four-piece with the two new guys.
And we were super excited about how the whole thing came out. We thought we put everything into it, and we were really happy with the results. And then you go out and play the shows, and all these people are singing these songs back.
You run, and Veteran, and Bullets Included, and we're... we're, yeah, we're going on tour in America with the Misfits, we're touring with Bad Religion, we're playing all these really big venues, getting all this exposure, and it was definitely a step up for us on all levels.
Okay, awesome. Cool. Yeah, I mean, it's another good LP. I mean, the only knock for any sort of momentum would just be that it came out like four years after the last release, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, we toured.
We did. We toured a ton. And then we actually took a break. We took 2003 off completely, worked on some side projects. We didn't do anything to do with Ignite. I think that was the only year that we didn't play an Ignite show was 2003 in the history of the band. And yeah, so by the time we kind of regrouped at the end of 2003 and it was 2004, we kind of put a lineup together, the band, because Brian wasn't available to tour. We were bouncing between a couple of guitar players.
Um, and we got signed to Abacus in 05. So, um, when then we went into the, no, actually that's, yeah, yeah. And, uh, we started writing, uh, our darkest days at that point. So for us, other than the year, I know three of where we did tour and downtime, um, Everything else was pretty much tour, tour, tour, push, promote, and then take a year off and then try and get a record deal and write.
Yeah, how do you approach writing for this record? Because it's a big change, but it's a great change, I think.
For me, the difference was that we didn't So we didn't really have a guitar player that was full-time at the time of the writing. So I started writing for the first time all the songs that I was going to contribute to the album I wrote on guitar rather than bass. So I was demoing these songs with friends in studios with a drum machine, and I would go in and record a bunch of demos with me playing guitar on bass. Bleeding, Know Your History...
Poverty, Three Years, like all these songs, the first demos were neat. So that was the big difference for me on that one was that I approached it from like a guitar writing standpoint, which was different. And then Brian was kicking in songs. We started working with Nick, who had toured with us previously, but now he was on board with doing the album and doing the future touring.
So I think just the, the collaboration was the biggest, um, the biggest change on the writing of our darkest days because, um, we had quite a few guys and ideas, um, coming together, um, to make these songs for this album. And some of it was demos from previous stuff. A lot of, most of it was new.
Um, and we just wanted each song to be, uh, its own little like kind of masterpiece we wanted we didn't want to finish the record until every song was good um and that wasn't 100 necessarily us this was cameron webb who came in and uh was producing the album who um worked a little bit on the post-production of uh a place called home we did all the pre-demos with him but um pbt wanted us to go with kind of a bigger name person so we went with tom wilson who had done offspring and they were just
doing the aquabats and And that, so Cameron didn't get the chance to do A Place Called Home. So when we approached him about doing Our Darkest Days, he was really excited because he thought that, you know, he, when he was listening to A Place Called Home, he was missing some of the things that he wanted to put his touch on. So we went into, we had all these songs ready for Our Darkest Days. We knew Bleeding was great. We thought the other songs all had potential.
And Cameron basically, told us it was terrible he goes he goes and we're all pumped we're ready to go record we're playing in demos he's like you guys this isn't even close and we're like what are you really and uh he goes yeah go back in the studio for a month and rewrite all this this part's good i like this he's like keep what you guys want to keep if you're passionate about it he's like i'm not going to try and you know, tell you guys, if you guys absolutely believe in a part, stand up for
it and we'll use it. He's like, but these are the parts I think are terrible. These are the parts that I think are good. So we rewrote and rewrote and rewrote. And then we were in the middle of recording the album and he kicked us out of the studio and told us to go back and start writing again because the songs weren't there. So we rewrote that record like four times.
And finally, towards the end, we were starting to see that what was happening with that record was something special and that we had, what we had thought had nailed it. What the group of songs that we took to him, Cameron, and what we had towards the end, you could tell that the record was heading in a really cool direction. It was darker. It was heavier at parts. It was fast. Zoe was killing it across the board.
We started using tons of harmonies in the recordings, which we did a little bit on A Place Called Home. Cameron made Louis sing almost every part of the record in a high falsetto that he could blend in a part. It was an awesome experience to watch that whole thing progress and go from where the demos were to what ended up on the record.
In hindsight, it sounds like you appreciate that, but how does your ego take it like when he sends you home the second time? We
laugh. It's funny because he's so unique and he's kind of like the sixth member. And he gets super passionate about it. So he's not just like, hey, I need three days to work on this social D thing. Go work on something. You know, get out of here. It's not like that. It's like he's breaking down the songs. Why are you guys doing this in this section? Why is it doing this? And we're like, I don't know, because that's what it feels like. No, this isn't working.
It's just... I don't look at it as an ego thing at all. I just look at it as a luxury, actually, of having somebody like that that actually listens and cares and puts in the two cents of his opinion to make the songs better. You know, at the end of the day, we have to go play it and tour it and live it for the rest of our lives. He doesn't, really, because he's on to the next project and working on the next record. But it's awesome to know... the kind of effort he puts into it.
And, uh, I thought it was cool. I thought that that was the first time it actually felt like we worked with a producer that actually produced rather than just twisted knobs and was an engineer.
Sure. And is this your favorite night record?
Yeah, it's mine. Yeah. Yeah.
I, yeah, I love it. I mean, I hate to be the guy that to like the first one or the column, my brother's so much, but this is my second, this is my second favorite record. so i love this one too
yeah it was a different band you know it was call my brothers almost feels like it was a different band and it's it has its own like coolness about it and uh but i mean it is it's the same band it's the same name it's ignite it's just you know the band had to progress because of member changes and uh or change because of member changes and you know that's where we ended up we ended up with those guys writing those songs and uh it's just, it was a different band at that point, you know?
Yeah. But this is so good and fully formed where maybe, maybe a place called home is, is you guys are transitioning out of one thing and maybe halfway into the next thing. Like almost like it's a, it's an LP, but it's like the idea and where the band at is almost like in a, another demo stage. So where this is just fully formed, great LP. I think
a place called home, could have been as good if we had a different producer. We didn't change anything. We wrote 13, 14 songs, went in there and tracked them. And Tom Wilson didn't change anything on any song. We went in later and changed stuff on our own after we moved on and started working with Cameron at the end and changed a few songs, rewrote some parts. But I think with a producer that song. That album could have been on par with Our Darkest Days.
I still think it's one of my favorite Ignite records, but I just think I don't think it's quite as good as Our Darkest Days.
No, but you guys also haven't done a bad record, so it's fine. The catalog's great. Touring after this, any surge in popularity? Because this is a little more I, I, I would hate to say radio friendly. I'm just not that, uh, I'm not that versed in like indie music and, and popular music. But I mean, so to my ear, it's like, Oh, these songs might be more palatable if I, you know, I could put it on in the car with my mom. She'd probably like it, you know, my mom's cool though.
Um, but you know what I'm saying? Like is, did, did the popularity grow off this anywhere? Yeah.
Yeah, a lot. Everywhere. I mean, that was probably, that was, you know, got us to probably the level. It's interesting because the band is still interesting. Last tour we did last year, we had some shows bigger than we've ever played in some cities. It's been a weird phenomenon.
But, yeah, that definitely, we got, we started playing main stages at festivals off of Our Darkest Days where a lot of times most of the punk bands would play the side, punk and hardcore bands are on the side stage and then like you know, Sepultura and Motorhead and bigger bands are playing the main stage on these heavier festivals in Europe. And now we're playing the main stage, um, in the afternoon. Some of the medium sized festivals were headlining.
Um, and, uh, yeah, it's just, I think the album just connected with a ton of people. It's still weird when you go on a autograph signing at some festival in Europe and just there's 300 people in line and people are just talking about how our darkest days changed their life. And, uh, and how that made us their favorite band. It's still weird when somebody tells you that you're their favorite band, because I don't know, that's just an odd thing to hear.
Because I have my favorite bands and my things, and I grew up listening to Beatles and this and that and my whole path to music, and it's just funny. It's humbling. It's really cool. But that album got us to that point where I think we connected with a ton of people there was a lot of songs on that record that just resonated with a lot of people. And there was for better days, the acoustic song, which kind of opened up something new for us.
And, uh, yeah, it was definitely kind of a turning point for the band, um, definitely in Europe. And, uh, I think everywhere we go, um, still a lot of the songs that people want to hear when we ask them what songs they want to hear, how the songs are darker.
Yeah.
Sorry.
I'm going
to decline that. Um, all right. To be total completist. I got to say in, uh, in Oh seven, you do a little side project called the, I shouldn't say little, um, you do a side project. Last of the believers. Yeah. New age. And how does it feel playing with like a, a different group of people?
It's different. It's, it's, it's, you know, you've been playing with the same guys for so long and you get in a room with four other guys and it's like starting over kind of it. not entirely, but it's, you know, you used to playing with a drummer who has certain, you know, nuances and stylistic things that you're used to. And then, uh, guitar players and writing style, you get used to playing with the same guitar players for a decade and you kind of know what each other's going to do.
And you're kind of used to playing. And yeah, so playing with different, but I think it's good. I think it's good to play with other people. Um, it makes you think, uh, it's a different approach to music, even though it can still be the same style of music. It's, it's a, it's a different feel. So I thought that was a, I thought that was a good thing.
Yeah. And
for me, to me as a musician.
Yeah, totally. Um, but do you ever look at the singer and you're like, can you go a little higher? Like it's hard coming from Zoli to anyone else. Like, no, don't do it for real, dude. Like hit that down, hit that down note.
Yeah. Hit that super high note right there. Um, yeah, no, that's, that's just a luxury that I've had. Um, working with Zoli this whole time was, uh, him being able to do freakish things, but I, that's unexpected from anybody else. I mean, there's not too many people in the world that can sing like Zoli.
Yeah. And again, another, another little, uh, hardcore chapter. Cause you get to put out someone new age. So that's cool. Shout out, shout out Hartsfield. Um, and then Oh nine, you do another side project band nations of fire, which you're still doing now.
Yeah. Yeah. Nations still exist. Um, a couple of the guys live in Oregon. Me and Nick live down here. It's 98% inactive, but there'll be a point where we go play some shows or do something. Um, again, it's fun that, that band, the four guys enjoy being with each other in a van, in a room, in a studio, on the phone. Um, we have a good time. It's, um, it's, it's, it's very enjoyable group of dudes to play with.
So, um, it's always been a lot of fun to, um, do anything nations of fire um with uh chris and todd and nick
yeah cool um in 2010 zoli joins pennywise how how does that go over with ignite
um it was really cool um fletcher calls me after jim quit and hey brett uh So I'm just going to be straight up, we're going to check out Zoli and just wanted to get you okay with it first, which I thought was really cool. And then he, of course, then interrogated me for like an hour about everything Zoli. And I took the fifth on like 99% of it. No, just kidding.
Did he ask if he's going to have to go clean up Pelican shit?
He asked everything across the board. You know, how is he as a songwriter? How is he touring with Bob? And we had toured with Pennywise quite a bit at that point. So they're friends. They've been on the road together. He's always flown certain places on in-between shows with these guys and stuff. But, you know, he wants to get some insight because he's never been in a band with them. So, yeah. So he basically just said, we're going to try him out. There's no guarantee that he's going to do it.
And if he does it, I just want you to know that you guys don't have to stop doing Ignite. And I was like, that's awesome. I go, we're kind of doing this side project anyway. It's Nations of Fire, me and Nick. And I go, you know, make a great record and go out and kill it. Because at that point in 2010, we had toured for three and a half years on our darkest days. And it was time to take a break. I mean, we went everywhere. We toured 50 countries. We went everywhere.
Southeast Asia we went Australia I mean we South America we did everywhere everywhere we possibly could um off that record and we were still getting tour offers that we just said it was kind of funny because we decided at that point that we were going to start working on the new record and that's when we actually started demoing these songs for the new record was in um at the end of 09 and um we were just like we can't tour anymore we gotta put something new out but we just kept getting these
offers because um people were just the our darkest days whole thing that had you know done so well for the band so um um so it was actually yeah pretty good timing and he joined the band and i thought i thought without taking a break or writing at that time anyway it probably wouldn't be a bad a bad thing to have our singers singing anyway
sure yeah and he does a great job on the record
yeah A lot of people liked that record a lot. A lot of Pennywise fans, a lot of Ignite fans. To me, it sounds almost like a continuation of where A Place Called Home... That felt to me, if it was maybe an Ignite record, it would have been the record in between A Place Called Home and Hard Archer State. Yeah, I would agree. When I listened to it. But yeah, I thought it was awesome. It was cool. A lot of people... learned about Zoli being in that band.
He was in the band from August of 2009 until 2013. He was in the band for three and a half years.
A long time.
Yeah, a full album cycle, full touring. They did a full touring cycle before he got in the band to work out any kinks and make sure he was the right guy. They toured for a year and a half before they did the record. So yeah, I thought the Pennywise thing was awesome. I thought it was a good thing for Zoli. I thought it was a good thing for Knight. I thought it was, and the timing of it was perfect.
Yeah. No, I mean, it sounds perfect. Four years after the LP comes out and six years before your next record. Right. Totally. Yeah. 2012, Nations of Fire. You guys do your first LP, Redfield Records. And this is a cool record. How do you feel about it?
It was fun.
You know, again, getting in the studio, recording with those guys um is is a good time we got to go out to the blasting room to do the record with um with that whole crew out there um jason and bill and all those guys um so that was that was a pretty cool recording experience because that is so regimented on a calendar because they're in fort collins colorado and uh you can't work on a recording for a couple weeks and then come back it's like you go bang it out in the 18 days or the 22 days or
however many days you have allotted for it and then the record it better be done you know and um so uh that part of it was really cool working with those guys going out there doing the record being you know kind of sequestered for three weeks and just doing nothing but recording every day um and we went up to europe um did two cool tours off that record, played some awesome festivals, played some big shows. Yeah, it was an all-around really cool experience.
The next thing that comes out is also 2012, the Ignite, the live album, Darkest Days Live. Yeah, that was in 2012. It's kind of cool to do a live record. I mean, I think that's a sign of truly making it.
Making
it.
That was such a nightmare, that album. Or the DVD. We recorded it in 08, and it took four years for that thing to come out. Oh, my God. Yeah. So we recorded that in spring of 08 in Leipzig, Germany. And by the time we got the edits from the company in Europe... It took forever. We didn't like any of it. We didn't like the audio. So we took the whole thing and took it upon ourselves to do. Brian edited the whole thing. We built a behind the scenes kind of movie to go with it.
And that stuff starts taking time. And all of a sudden you're like 12 months, 18 months, 20. It's like, oh my gosh, after it was a year of us you know, we got all the files and everything. And then it was like 2011 and the thing's still not out yet. And finally we finished it and we were really happy with, uh, the final thing. But, um, yeah, it was like, uh, that was, that was a painful process.
Yeah. Um, 2016, you're back doing your next LP war against you. Um, how did the songwriting process differ from our darkest days? Um, you guys are just a fully formed machine, right? And just go and knock it out.
No, uh, it wasn't, it was a struggle. Um, we, uh, Nick quits in the middle of, uh, recording. Um, and he's a, he's a pretty big songwriter on everything that we're doing. Um, and it starts dragging on cameras in the middle of a ton of projects. Um, we're doing a Motorhead thing. Uh, I think a live record, um, with them, um, no, it was a studio album. Um, it was really disconnected. It didn't feel like there was a lot of, uh, it wasn't fluid, the recording, uh, experience on that one.
And, uh, we had a bunch of demos done that we had obviously this point in time, songwriting, getting, uh, everybody on garage band. So we're, we're making tons of demos.
And, uh, that part's awesome bouncing punks back and forth from each other but to me it just feels like we didn't finish the record okay it felt like it was a little bit rushed even though it took two years a year and a half however long it took a long time from when we started Nick quit we kind of had to reassess the whole album kind of reworking stuff and And yeah, I just don't think we nailed it on that one.
When we finished the record, it was the first time that I had questions more than answers. Call My Brothers, Past Our Means, Place Called Home, Darkest Days, when we walked out, when we had that final mastering session, I was like, we have something here. This one, I thought there was great moments, and I thought there was a ton of potential, but it just didn't feel like that we nailed it. Um, as far as, uh, what our job was on our side.
And I thought that Cameron was a little distracted too at that time, just cause there's all this stuff on the plate. And, uh, I just don't think that, um, we had the focus quite as we did on our darkest days or a place called home or Pastor Mings or Palmer Bridge to be honest.
Yeah. How do you feel about the record?
I like it. I think there's awesome moments. I love a lot of the songs. It's funny when you listen to a record, um, You hear songs. The biggest always kind of regret that I have on record is not as much the writing or the recording as it is the track listing. You don't sometimes realize which songs are going to be kind of the bangers and which ones are going to, I don't know, just the track listing. The
sequencing is hard for you.
Yeah, exactly. Cause I, I would, I would have resequenced it in a little different way. Um, and, uh, I think that would have affected the feel of the listening of the record. Um,
we just got to have lots of people put it out and they can be family too.
Yeah. Right. That's awesome. Yeah. So, um, I think the record solid, I just, the track listing bothers me and, uh, some of the, I just feel like we didn't finish some of the stuff.
it just feels like the natural followup. Like, I don't know what else you would have done. It's so hard to follow on a record like our darkest days. And this sounds like, I don't, I don't know. Maybe, maybe it is like the, it's the place called home after calling my brothers. Like, you know, it's just, it's kind of the same and just, but not the one, but it's still great. It's still really good.
Like you can't, you can't look at a place called home or a word you can see and be like, these aren't good records. Like there's still better than what 90% of other records bands put out.
I just think each record we did, um, call my brothers was a collaboration of all the Europe stuff we did. And we were happy with that because we played that stuff live and we knew that people responded to that. Well, we were stoked on those songs. And then, Pastor Means, when we wrote that, we went in with a goal and a direction that we were going to make a more aggressive record. That was, we wanted to make faster, edgier, heavier, harder.
We wanted to make it, we didn't want to put out a, because a lot of those albums that were coming out on Rev at the time were like Sandsfield and Varside and stuff like that was a little softer. So we wanted to be, we wanted to make the Pastor Means almost harder than Call My Brothers, which felt like we did and we accomplished what we wanted to do. Songs like Embrace, stuff like that were just like they fit perfect.
And Place Called Home, we went in and accomplished exactly what we wanted to do with that one. We wanted to make some more mature songs without losing any of the edge. Our Darkest Days, we had a game plan of making, you know, going, everything we had a game plan. This is the only album we didn't have a game plan really going into of what we wanted to accomplish with the record. And so it feels more like a follow-up record rather than its own thing.
I think that's really fair to say. That's a really good way of looking at it. Okay. Yeah, coming off that, you do another Nations of Fire record, Violence, on Redfield Records. And this is kind of cool, because you do a CDEP, and then it gets re-released on vinyl as a split with another band called Last Light. Yep. So it sees its vinyl release, but as a split. Kind of cool.
Yeah, we just... The guys over in Europe, our good friends, had an idea to do it as a split. And we were all about it because it wasn't going to come out on vinyl. And all the dudes in the band are vinyl nerds. So we're like, just for our own personal collections, we wanted to have those songs on vinyl. And they did a great job putting the right band for that and putting it out and pushing it. And a lot of people, yeah, we got a pretty good response from that one.
So that was a lot of fun, that record, too. We self-recorded. uh produced that one up in uh in oregon at our guitar player chris's house he's got a studio there that um we worked out of and that was that was a lot of fun doing it um completely ourselves
and that's chris chessy of uh yeah reach the sky fame yeah exactly yeah um well cool we went through everything i mean we'll we'll leave it on um year 2020 zoli leaves the band Um, we don't need to get into it. Maybe we'll do a followup at some point when you, uh, figure out how everything's going to go. Um, but that's, uh, that's a pretty big thing. I don't, I don't know if you want to touch on it at all. Um, you're welcome to, or we can just leave it as it
starts. Nothing really to touch on it at this time. I mean, it's still pretty new and, and so we're just kind of figuring out everything out right now. So, um, yeah, it's about where we're at with that.
Cool. Yeah. Um, Bray, you've been so generous with your time. I really appreciate you doing this. And, uh, thanks to Vogel for hooking it up.
Yeah. That's the man. I got a text from him. I was like, yeah, let's do this.
Yeah. I don't know if, uh, you knew how nerdy it was going to be, but that's what I like to do. I like to do that, that early deep dive.
Yeah, no. And I got, I still have all that stuff pretty much in my head. And, um, I got a decent memory for stuff when it comes to like the longterm, like, How was this recording experience? How was this album? What was this day? What did we do on this tour? So, yeah, that played in well.
Yeah, cool. I do need the drum machine demos. The sooner you send them to me, the less you'll get punished. I
think I'm just going to have to have you punish me on that one because I don't think anybody has ever heard those.
Oh, my God. I got to hear them at some point, Brent. Where do you live? Are you in California? Yeah, I'm in San Diego. But we're quarantining. Hopefully by the time this comes out, maybe things will open up a little bit. I'm
sitting in my car right now at a park. And a bunch of people were here, parked like two or three spots away, like talking with each other. It was like this weird social gathering. And I just came over to look at this golf course to see if anybody had hopped a fence and was playing. Because I try and play golf at least once a week, I'm not. pretty big golf fan. So I was like checking. So I was like kind of at the interesting time, 2020 Corona virus quarantine thing. Yeah. Hopefully it passes.
Yeah. Hopefully.
Yeah. So thanks so much for doing this, Brett. I got to ask, do you feel like you've been well represented?
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Yeah. I enjoy going back sometimes and opening up those chapters and stuff and kind of reliving that stuff because I think it's good to keep that stuff kind of fresh.
Yeah, I agree. All right. Well, thank you so much for your time. Awesome. All right. Goodbye.