DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN
Due in large part to their immensely psychotic live performances, Dillinger Escape Plan have become one of the most notorious groups in extreme music over the last bunch of years. They are often afflicted by wounds and broken bones due their extreme physical live assaults, however the greatest wound came via the departure of long-time drummer Chris Penny. The guys were beaten down to an all-time low and the demise of the band seemed imminent. However, they've soldiered through the tough times and now they're ready to bring the pain back Down Under as they prepare to tour in support of their new album, 'Ire Works'. Vocalist Greg Puciato caught up with our journalist Jake 3 to have a not-so-brief chat about it all.
How are you? Good man, we have a week off now, we're kind of in-between tours. Obviously we're getting ready to come over there and we leave for that in like four or five days cause we have to go to Japan first. We just got done doing a two week run of US cities, so we're just kind of in the middle zone where you try to come home, do laundry, eat as much food as you can, and then go back out.
How do you feel about 'Ire Works' now that you've had some time to reflect on it? I think that it's... obviously I wasn't a part of 'Calculating Infinity' so I can't compare. Ben's the only one left that was around for 'Calculating Infinity'. In terms of comparing it to 'Miss Machine', when we finished Miss Machine there were things about that record we were unhappy with right away. The very next day we were trying to pick it apart and find the things we didn't like about it, and with 'Ire Works' it's been out for six or seven months now and I'm still really happy with it. There's nothing about it that I would go back and change. It's kind of one of those rare things in life where you go into something thinking that it's going to turn out to be a mess, and then it turns out to be the best thing that you could have done...Losing Chris, [losing] time, and finding Gil [Sharone - drums], and having to figure out a new drummer situation and everything like that, that was very stressful for us. You know it was very hard for us to think that we were going to come out of that with what we feel now is our best record. So at the time we were just hoping to be able to save our band because we didn't think we were going to be around. You know, we didn't think that we were going to be able to continue and then to come out of that with what we feel is our best record; it's a pretty good feeling.
In which ways did Chris leaving affect the creative process for making the album? Honestly man, we were worried about it obviously and it's one of those things where like when you're in an unhealthy relationship you can't really tell because you're in the middle of it, even though everyone around you is like, 'dude, what are you doing you've got to get out of there'. So we were hanging on to Chris and Chris was hanging on to Dillinger, even though honestly man for years there has been problems and we knew. Everyone saw it coming. We were just trying to hang on to it because we didn't think Dillinger could exist without Chris, and Chris wasn't sure that he would be worth anything without Dillinger, so we both didn't know where to go. As far as creative process is concerned, most of the songs were honestly written before we split with Chris, so there wasn't really that much of a chance to find out what the writing process with Gil is like. The only two songs that we wrote with Gil were 'Horse Hunter' and a lot of 'Mouth of Ghosts' were both written with Gil. 'Horse Hunter' is one of my favourite songs on the record, so if that's any indication of how the creative process is going to work in the future then things look good. As far as playing with Gil is concerned in the studio, we were at first worried that he was going to have a different feel than Chris, like the songs weren't going to feel the same. And he actually does turn out to have a different feel from Chris, but instead of it being a bad thing it turned out to be a good thing. He's got way more of a swing in his beats, like he's got more of a groove and rhythm, whereas Chris' strength was being very robotic and very precise. I feel like Gil has the same technical ability but he has a little bit more soul in his playing.
Were those two tracks placed last on the album because they were done last or did they just fit best there? It's really weird man, I got asked this before and we didn't put those two tracks on the record last because they were the last two tracks. It just kind of turned out that way, and I realised the album is almost in chronological order, which we totally did not intend. 'Fix Your Face' and 'Lurch' were two of the very first songs written for the record, and 'Mouth of Ghosts' and 'Horse Hunter' were the last two songs for the record, and everything else in the middle kind of is in the sequence that we wrote them. It was completely unintentional. I always say that a listener would never notice, but for us it's very interesting because if we listen to that record from front to back it kind of is a timeline from the beginning of 2006 to the middle of 2007; for us as a band it's really interesting to hear it in that context.
Do you feel it was due to some kind of subconscious thing, that possibly the mood of the music works chronologically because of the time period it was from? I do, I do actually feel that way because the beginning of the record, 'Fix Your Face' and 'Lurch' are very aggressive tracks and they're very tense and chaotic, and that was definitely the mood in the band at the time. Ben and Chris were fighting all the time, it was causing a lot of stress in the band and everything we were writing pretty much was coming out very aggressive, and the writing process was difficult and it wasn't very... you know, there wasn't a lot of people getting along. So I like those songs a lot but I definitely feel the songs mirror the attitude in the band, and the last two songs on the record are almost moor uplifting in a way, and that to us is how we started. I mean, when we went to California we pretty much had all accepted the fact that we were going to California to make the last Dillinger record. Gil was never supposed to be a member of the band and he told us that he was only going to record the CD and that was all he was going to do. So we didn't think we were going to tour anymore, we thought we were going to put that record out and call it a day, and that was going to be the end of it. As we started practicing together in California we realised there was a relationship between us and Gil creatively that we thought needed to be explored, and it brought like an energy to the band that we haven't had since probably 2003, in terms of just being excited to be in the band. Over the last two years it got to the point where it wasn't fun anymore.
Now that Chris has gone, are you able to get along with him or have you just gone your separate ways? We haven't talked to Chris in almost... Ben hasn't spoken to Chris in a year and I haven't spoken to Chris in about half a year. I don't wish him any ill will. I don't care about Coheed and Cambria. I don't care whether they do well or whether they do poorly, it means nothing to me. He's happy now apparently, according to friends and I feel that we're in a better place as a band. Sometimes you just hold one another back and you don't realise it. When it went down it was really ugly, like the actual split itself there were a lot of things said that probably are not ways that adults should conduct themselves, but now that it is all over with I'm just glad that, if he's happy, we're happy and everyone is fucking good then I don't have a problem with it.
How has the response been to 'Ire Works'? Honestly, very good man, which is surprising because you never really expect people to like what you are doing. You kind of just do it because you enjoy it and if someone else likes it then that's just a plus. For us, we take so long in-between records and we're not very into reading about ourselves or finding out online what people think of us or anything. We felt a little bit like we didn't even know that anyone cared about us anymore when we put 'Ire Works' out because it felt like so much had happened since 'Miss Machine' came out - that was 2004. Four years is a lifetime. Over three years is a lifetime for some people, especially young people. A lot happens in that time. A lot happens in the musical climate, and we just didn't even know if people were going to give a shit about us when we put that record out. All the reviews were really good and we were like, 'Okay cool, let's see what happens when we go on tour if anybody shows up', and all of the shows have been the best and most packed shows that we've ever played. It's just surprising to me. We've been around for almost 10 years at this point as a band in total, and that's like a super-long time to be a band. The fact that we're still managing to grow slowly is kind of ridiculous.
Could you tell me about some of the concepts behind 'Ire Works' and where the origin of the title comes from? Well, the title was one of the last things. Some people make a title for a record before they have any songs. We kind of were the opposite with this. We didn't turn the title in 'til the very last second. Liam actually came up with it. I don't know where he got that from or where he got that play on words from. Obviously 'Ire' is a word meaning like hatred or wrath, and it's obviously a play on 'fire works' or whatever. It just seemed to fit because most of the songs on the record were birthed from a very tumultuous time, and it just seemed like a collection of songs that were inspired by tense emotion. There was a lot of negativity going on in our band during the time of most of that album's writing, so it just seemed to fit, and that's why we also went for a very dark cover, a very like minimal cover to keep the vibe consistent, with everything being kind of bleak and dark.
Is the visual side of Dillinger very important to you guys? To me it's extremely important. Some people in the band don't think it's as important. I know speaking for me and Ben visually, I feel like the visual aspect of Dillinger Escape Plan is as important as the musical aspect because most of the time people don't really understand this band until they see us play. There are a lot of bands in my life that I feel that way about. When I first heard Neurosis I didn't really get it and then I saw them live and I was like, 'this is fucking intense!'. You know, it's one of the most intense things I've ever seen. And I feel like for us as far as visuals are concerned, like performance, and artwork, and how we present ourselves, and how we represent our t-shirt designs, everything we do I feel like has to have a consistency. When people see us play or when people think in their mind, 'what does the Dillinger Escape Plan look like?', visually, to me, I want them to immediately know what it looks like when we play. What kind of t-shirts we have, what our artwork looks like, it's just as symbolic of what you stand for as the music. We're not just a recording, we are a band. If we were just a recording we wouldn't tour, we wouldn't make fucking t-shirts and shit like that, we'd just have our music, and we would sit at home, and it wouldn't matter. But I feel like for us it's the whole thing.
You're very lucky to get see Neurosis because they never really tour here. They never tour at all man. They need to tour more. We tried to get them to come on tour with us a million times. It's like pulling teeth trying to get those dudes to leave the house.
I guess it makes it more of a special thing when they do a live show. It becomes more of a ceremonial thing. They've definitely gotten to the point that when they play it's kind of like a big deal, but it is fucking pretty amazing man. I'm sure you've seen videos of them playing. There's nothing, you can't imagine, they're ridiculously loud and their visuals are... it's seriously like watching, to me, like the heavy equivalent of Pink Floyd or something.
Well I look forward to the day when I actually get to see them.
(Laughs) Over here man.
With downloading and that fact that people aren't actually always getting the artwork, how do you think that affects the way people view music? Well, I mean it's a double edged sword. Our album's sales aren't half of what they were at this point with 'Miss Machine' - like that's a fact. But it's really misleading because we're not smaller than we were then, it is just that we sell less albums. People don't fucking buy CDs, and it is not the end of the music industry, it's just changing. People are like freaking out because people aren't selling millions and millions of albums, but the reality is the music business has only existed for like 70/80 years or so in the form that it's in. Music has been around forever, but the actual selling of physical music has only been around for 80 or 90 years or so or whenever the record was created. It's not like people were buying music in the 1800s, it's just recently started, so it peaked and now it's come back down. But it's going to change, and you can't stop it. I personally think that CDs are going to be extinct in the next few years, like maybe five years before they're gone and you can't even buy them anymore. I think they're going to be like eight-tracks, and that's fine. I think things are going to go back to records, to be honest with you. I think that people are going to buy records and downloads. I would say 90% of people will download things, and whether they pay for it or not, who knows. Maybe people will buy limited edition records - you know Radiohead just did it and Nine Inch Nails just did it. Honestly, it is really inconvenient to have tonnes of CDs when people are used to having an iPod with unlimited space on it. It's hard to get people to want to carry around a physical CD for one, and number two the current generation of kids, like kids that are 13 right now have been able to get music for free. Kids these days are born with the internet, they know way more at 10 than I know now and there's no way that you're ever going to be able to stop someone who is used to getting something for free. It only really hurts right now because the industry hasn't figured out a way to compensate for the lack of revenue. So there's not as much money to go around but most of the money is taken by the record company anyway. Put it this way, our band sold 100,000 copies of 'Calculating Infinity', and we never got any royalty cheques. We're going to sell probably 50,000 copies of 'Ire Works' and we're never going to get any royalty cheques either. So it doesn't matter to us, it just means that some guy at a record company isn't going to have a bigger boat - you know, something like that. For a band that actually goes out and tours, and works hard, and sells t-shirts and shit like that, at the end of the day it's probably beneficial because, if I'm a 14 year old kid, $15 is a lot of money, and I don't want a kid not to hear our band just because he doesn't have 15 bucks. If he wants to go download it for free then more power to him, then maybe he will come to our show and buy some merchandise or something.
Yeah that's right, and I think it puts the power back into the artist's hands because if I download an album and it's really good then I will go out and buy the vinyl. I think people like you or me that really care about music actually understand that vinyl actually does sound better. You know what I mean? It does sound better, and it's pretty cool to hold a record in your hand and know that you do have this big physical piece of art. But for the majority of people that just want to hear a single that's on the radio, or download like one or two songs from a band, and they're not like super-fans or something like that, who cares you know, it's not the end of the world.
I think there is still some confusion out there as to whether records actually sound better or not, and people never really get the chance to hear them. You need a really good record player too. It's only been recently for me that I really realised it man. I grew up and my parents had a lot of records, and I listened to a lot of records when I was kid. So then with tapes and CDs, they just seemed more convenient, and mp3s are so convenient. Then I just never really listened to music in anything other than an iPod or a car stereo. So I never really was paying that much attention to exactly how great it sounds, and then like I was home and I was listening to the CD of 'Ire Works' shortly after it came out, and I thought, 'It sounds good, blah blah blah', and then when we got the records in I put the record on, and it fucking sounded like it had so much more depth to it, and it sounded so rich and warm. It just felt way more alive than the CD, and I just thought like, 'holy shit, it's actually true - records do sound better than CDs!' I really didn't notice it until a few months ago.
There is definitely a bigger presence in the bass, it feels more real and I don't know, like organic. You feel it through your whole body a lot more. You do, you really do man! It's a lot warmer feeling. You know I was totally not aware. I thought people that bought records were crazy and that they were just hanging on to the past, like refusing to let it go you know, but it does, they do actually sound better man.
What was it that inspired you to bring in the glitch or IDM elements to Dillinger? Well me and Ben are very into electronic music, and not just the typical stuff that people name-drop, like Aphex Twin and Squarepusher and stuff, but we're into a lot of shitty stuff too. Not shitty but we really like people like Timbaland and producers like...there's a lot of really good people out there that aren't like cool names, you know that aren't Aphex Twin or Squarepusher. Because of the availability of electronic software and things like that in the last 10 years or so, there's a lot of people that are really good working in fields that most people think suck, like pop music, or hip-hop, or dance music. There's some really crazy shit going on in there. I feel like for us, it's just something that somehow or another we just became really interested in, and obviously we're never going to try and turn Dillinger into an electronic band, but we feel that we have enough artistic freedom to be able to incorporate some of it without really changing what we're really about. We put out what I consider to be a pop song on the last record - 'Unretrofied' is pretty poppy, and for us that's just as unconventional as glitch for most people. I would like to be able to - especially as we get older - keep the Dillinger Escape Plan name as an umbrella for anything we feel like we have to say. Me and Ben were talking before this record came out about how we don't want to have to start a million side projects if we want to do different types of things. It would be nice to be able to do whatever we thought was good, under this band name, instead of being like, well Ben has got eight different bands, and Greg has got four different bands, and Liam has got bands. If everyone likes it and we all feel like it feels good when we play it, it sounds good and works with the other songs on the record, then I feel like we should be able to do whatever we want.
Yeah I think it keeps it fresh. It's just good to hear. I think that a lot of people, especially in the metal crowd, if you mention to them some pop like Alicia Keys or you mention some hip-hop, then they just turn their noses up straight away and don't even give it any attention. There are bands like The Roots in hip-hop that are almost the best musicians I've ever seen play in the whole world. It's true, it's totally true man, and I don't understand where that attitude comes from. Metal is like one of those genres where people are like super closed-minded (and) rap is the same way. Like I know people who listen to hip-hop that will not listen to anything else, and there's people here who listen to country music - of all the horrible types of music to listen to - they won't listen to anything else. If you really want to get the most out of things, music can express so many different kinds of emotions and people can be talented in so many different types of ways. You can't say that someone like Alicia Keys isn't fucking immensely talented; she's immensely talented, just as talented as some tech-metal band, it's a different thing you know. She could probably never write a Meshuggah song obviously, but there's no one in Meshuggah that could probably sit down at a piano and write a song of hers either.
Do you have a favourite album right now that is something you've got into recently? I haven't been really listening to too much new stuff. I've been on like an old kick recently. When I was a kid I totally didn't give a shit about things like The Beatles or The Rolling Stones and stuff, I was just like, 'oh that's old, I don't give a shit about that, that's like for my parents and stuff', but recently I've been on a kick of just old stuff, you know from like the '60s. New stuff, I'm trying to think. I really like the new Meshuggah record, I know we already talked about Meshuggah, but as far as heavy stuff goes, I really, really think that they knocked it out of the park, because I feel like their last couple of releases before that were suffering a little bit - you know, they kind of seemed like they were stuck in a rut. This new album is just ridiculous, no matter how many times I hear it, as soon as I put it in, like if I put that album in and turn it up and it's loud I'm like, 'holy shit this is heavy', every single time.
Have you seen them play the new material live yet? No, but we're getting ready to play some shows with them in Europe. Right after we do Australia we're going to go over to Europe and do all the festivals over there, and in-between the festivals we're going to play shows with Meshuggah and Between The Buried And Me. So I'm excited about that because it's impossible to play with Meshuggah. They're very difficult just to get on tour. They're almost as bad as Neurosis. They're hard to pin down and they seem to never want to go on tour. Just the fact that we are actually going to play together with them is pretty awesome, considering they are a band that if they hadn't existed we probably wouldn't exist.
Dillinger Escape Plan play The Arena, Brisbane on May 19
'Ire Works' is out now through Relapse Records/Riot.
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