Shadows Fall

24.03.2008 | Cam | 0 Comments

Thrash riffs, Grammy nominations and dreadlocks aren’t terms you’d usually find in the same sentence, but doing their own thing is something Shadows Fall have become particularly good at.

In the midst of their second Australian tour, SF front man Brian Fair was good enough to fit us in for an interview…

Interview w/ Brian Fair (Vocals) of Shadows Fall (USA)

By Cameron Chambers

Hey man, it’s Cam from Killyourstereo.

Hey man! How are you?

Really good mate, how was the show in Canberra last night?

Oh, it was great! It was a really good time and it was the first time we’ve played in that area so kids were going nuts from the beginning to the end. It was nuts!

And the rest of the tour’s been going well?

It’s been killer man. The two Soundwave shows were huge and then both of the sideshows with Killswitch Engage… Sydney was great and last night was sold out. The bill was all bands that we’ve known for ten years as well… From Autumn To Ashes, Killswitch Engage and Divine Heresy, so it was like a big family reunion.

Shadows are one of the few metal bands on the Soundwave line up, what have the crowds been like?

They’ve been killer. It’s a pretty heavy stage that we’re on, with Bleeding Through, ourselves and As I Lay Dying, and even though they are in the more hardcore vein it’s still all heavy, aggressive music.

If we were stuck on a stage with the Plain White Tee’s it may have been a bit more noticeable, ha ha, but on our stage it all fits together.

Any tour hi-jinks that you’d like to share with us? 

It’s all been pretty mellow so far but we’ve had some good drinking nights with the From Autumn To Ashes boys. Tonight we plan on hitting the town so hopefully something goes down, ha ha.

Now that you’ve had almost 12 months to digest “Threads Of Life” how do you think it compares to previous Shadows records?

From a production and song writing standpoint it’s our best effort. We just try and push everything forward on every album, you know? We’re always learning more as musicians so we just wanted to write a cohesive album, and it feels like we did that.

Seeing the live response is the final testing ground really, and we’ve been tour for a year now so we can see that the songs are really hitting it. The other great thing is seeing the songs evolve after a year… you know?  You throw in some cool new guitar tricks and stuff like that, ha ha.

Commercially the album’s been a great success, what’s the feedback from your fans been like?

Oh man it’s been great. It’s great just to see kids singing along and knocking each other down during the new songs, ha ha. We’ve still been playing a lot of older songs as well because we’ve been together for over ten years, so we have a lot of material to choose from.

A lot of bands feel obligated to undergo some massive stylistic change between records, whereas Shadows Fall has maintained a consistent sound while still improving the song writing from album to album. Do you guys sit down and discuss what kind of record you’re going to write or do you just let it flow?

We just let it happen man. We know what we do well and we go for it. We have such a wide variety of influences but once you put us all in a room together we are a metal band. We’ve always played thrash influenced metal so it’s not like we’re going to throw in calypso parts, ha ha. Still, we don’t want to write part two of every album either… we want there to be some progression.

We know what we do best when we form together. I always compare us to Voltran… we are 5 parts that form one machine! Ha ha

Awesome comparison, ha ha. Upon the album’s release you stated that it was simply time to write some metal and not worry about what other people are doing. Do you feel there are too many bands out there jumping from sub genre to sub genre to keep people happy?

It can definitely happen man. For bands like us, Killswitch Engage and Lamb Of God, when we first got together there was no agenda for success. If you were playing metal at that time that was basically a decision to not be successful, ha ha.

Too many bands see the potential to sell records and get on tours and that can motivate bands differently to try things that they maybe aren’t doing for the right reasons. If you’ve got a business plan before you’ve even written a record then you’re arse backwards!

We went through the hardships of releasing our own records and booking our own tours and now that things have got to the point where we are making a living off our music and that gives us so much appreciation for every little bit of success that we have.

Traditionally a band signs to a major and there’s a cry of sell out from their fans, yet you guys seemed to avoid that for the most part. Why do you think that is?

I think it’s because we never listen to those people to begin with, ha ha. On our first demo we had melodic singing and kids were like “fuck you, you sold out”! It’s like “what the fuck”!? We just did a demo in our basement, how have we sold out!? Ha ha.

It never crept into our minds. We just established ourselves as a band that stuck to our guns and didn’t compromise.

Kids are too underground for anything these days. If it’s not on limited colour vinyl and you can buy it in more than one store in the whole world then it’s not cool enough, ha ha. If you think about other people’s thoughts then you start to second guess yourself and hold back… and we’re too selfish and bitter to do that, ha ha.

Have you started throwing around any ideas for your next release?

We’ll be finishing this touring cycle in summer and then we can think about writing again. There may have been a riff here or there that we recorded really quickly but we’ve been in full tour mode. Once that finished this summer we can buckle down and write.

December of last year marked the second time Shadows Fall has been nominated for a Grammy. I know Tim from As I Lay Dying had a lot to say about the validity of the awards and how un-important they were to him, but what are your thoughts on being nominated?

It was cool to be nominated honestly. I didn’t put a lot of stock in it but it was cool nonetheless. I’ve never really watched them before but it’s cool to have the industry recognizing actual metal. I remember the first year Jethro Tull beat Metallica! Now to see King Diamond nominated it’s actual metal… so it’s really cool.

At the end of the day I got a free trip to LA and got to party with some friends. Machine Head were all there and As I Lay Dying was there except for Tim. I was more thinking it was a good party with some hot celebrities and some free drinks, ha ha… bring it on! I didn’t expect us to win so I was just like “where’s the buffet”!? ha ha

What touring plans have you got once you’re finished in Australia?

We have a one off headlining date in Korea and then we’re hitting Japan with Arch Enemy and then we’re going to the Philippines for the first time. After that we’re setting up some shows in the US which is focusing on the cities that we haven’t been to this year… the smaller towns I guess. They are usually the most fun anyway because the kids are starved for live music.

It’s usually insane! Canberra was like that last night! Kids were just going off! So we’re putting together a bill for that and then we’ll hit Europe for some festivals and decide whether or not to do another tour or hit the studio.

Any idea of when we’ll be seeing another headlining run down here so we can hear some longer Shadows sets?

Hopefully soon but I doubt we’ll have time to do it on this album. We’ll finish the next record I think and then do a headlining tour. Festivals are great but you’ve got to trim it down… ten years of material into thirty five minutes is hard, although it’s better than the twenty minute sets we get at Ozzfest, ha ha.

Hopefully next year though. This has been our second time here and it’s been great so we can’t wait to get back again!

Having spent most of 2007 on the road are there any new bands that you heard or saw that think people should be checking out? 

This one band, The Showdown from Tennessee! They are heavy, grooved out metal and they’re really cool. We also did some shows with Skeleton Witch who are this blackened, old school thrash band. They are two that stood out this year.

We toured with a lot of bands that people probably already know. Divine Heresy is another band who is getting their name out there now but we took them on their first tour.

If you could assemble you’re dream tour, with any bands (dead or alive), who would you have on it and why?

I’d want to tour with Zeppelin if Bonham could get behind the kit. We’d stand out but I don’t care, ha ha.

The only big thrash band that we’ve never played with is Metallica. We’ve played with Megadeth, Testament, Anthrax, Death Angel but not Metallica! We played a festival with them but we were three stages away so it doesn’t really count, ha ha. If James is out there and listening then please make it happen! Ha ha

We’ll spread the word man, ha ha.

Awesome! Make it happen! Ha ha

That’s all we’ve got time for Brian, is there anything else you’d to say?

We’re just stoked to be back here and once the new record is done we’ll be back for a headlining tour!

Thanks to everyone for their support and for making this happen and thank you for your time man and for spreading the word!

For more information on all things Shadows Fall head to www.shadowsfall.com or www.myspace.com/shadowsfall.