|
 |
The Gauntlet: xDeathstarx |
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
The Gauntlet: How’s it going?
Eric: It’s going pretty good.
The Gauntlet: How long are you guys on tour for?
I’m not exactly sure. We go until the 23rd of March.
The Gauntlet: Have you guys been getting good crowd reactions?
Yeah this tour especially, we are a newer band so some places know us and some places don’t but overall the crowd responses have been good to the new material.
The Gauntlet: The bio picture shows 8 people in the band but your line up claims 7.
It was 8 when we got done recording, we replaced a singer and cut down to 7 we had that many members just because cause it was a good way to get as many as my friends involved as possibly
The Gauntlet: So do 7 people collaborate on the songs?
Well no, it’s me and my brother who write everything. It’s harder to write with seven people so we just write all of the songs.
The Gauntlet: How did XDeathStarX form?
I started the band and basically I grabbed a guitar and a bunch of people that never were in a band or weren’t in a band at the time. We were just hanging out, playing music and as we went along it became more serious and we decided that we like the music and kept progressing. So we got more serious with the music at that time.
The Gauntlet: Did you see XDSX getting signed at all when you started this?
At first not at all, I didn’t see us going anywhere.
The Gauntlet: Why Death Star?
I dunno, I thought the name sounded pretty tough and it was a fun name I just came up with.
The Gauntlet: Given all of the XX band’s out there, did you find yourself worried about the name?
Well at the time we started the band in 2002-3 and there weren’t a lot of x bands, especially in California, we were the only ones.
The Gauntlet: You guys seem to have more metal influence to your sound, what bands account for this?
All sorts of stuff, my brother’s favorite is At the Gates, I like a lot of that older death metal myself as well which really pushed us over from hardcore into metal.
The Gauntlet: What metal styles in particular do you enjoy?
I personally listen to a lot of metal, everything from black metal to power metal, I like a lot of it.
The Gauntlet: I noticed that XDSX is not a band that relies on breakdowns to carry its songs.
Yeah, thanks for noticing that, it’s because our album before “We Are The Threat” was breakdown oriented. I had an epiphany one night that we played this club and it wasn’t a hardcore show. And I was listening to my own song if I was a normal dude in the crowd and I could predict what this band was going to do in every song; fast part then a part to jump around to. My brother an I wanted to do an album that was worth listening to, not just breakdowns and not for dudes that just like breakdowns, especially songs that we didn’t put any breakdowns in, songs that sustain without being filled with those parts.
The Gauntlet: Do you guys ever have any problems with 7 people on stage?
Yeah, all the time, last night at the show in LI, we got there sound and the sound guy was pissed that we had three vocalists, we couldn’t get one of the guitars to work in the monitor, and another mic wasn’t working. We started with only one guitar player and 2 mics were working so we went for it anyway. The last tour, the PA system in NJ was so old there was one cable for one mic. So we had to pass it back and forth, we probably looked really ridiculous.
The Gauntlet: You guys will be playing Facedown Fest correct?
Yeah we get back and we play facedown fest, few weeks we are touring out to new England metal fest we are playing the earth crisis in California.
The Gauntlet: Will you guys be hitting the road following those shows?
We’re bugging bands we are going out whether with other bands or for ourselves, hc has become so sound scan ridden. I mean its weird the places that are more mainstream driven; we seem to have a better response than actual HC scenes. We play a more metal style of music so true blue HC kids don’t like us.
The Gauntlet: Did you guys play Facedown Fest before the new album hit?
When we played facedown fest we had actually recorded our album a year ago. It got pushed back and pushed back.
The Gauntlet: What kind of problems lead to the delayed release?
Problems like the recording at Trax East, we didn’t have money to do everything out there and came back home to finish it up, stuff went wrong and the release got pushed back. Eric Rachel is so busy at Trax East, you have to schedule 6 months to a year in advanced and if you miss that window you’re screwed for another 6 months.
The Gauntlet: How did the signing with Facedown come about?
When we came out we were signed to life sentence our first release they closed down and we shopped for a new one and found kung fu things went bad and we were able to get out of it. And that’s when we got hooked up with facedown.
The Gauntlet: That’s about all on my end Eric, Thanks for your time!
Thanks man cya.
XDeathStarX’s debut Facedown Records album “We Are The Threat” is out now.
|
|
|
