photo by max michaels : industria

Razed In Black

M: When did you first start getting into music? Do you remember the first band that you got into?

R: I was classically trained as a pianist and then in 7th grade I picked up a guitar. My first guitar was an electric guitar. My first band was in high school and we did metal...and then I was introduced to Kraftwerk and Gary Numan. It's kind of a stereotypical story, cause a lot of bands in this genre start that way, but it's true to my life. I was a metalhead, but I was also a keyboardist...when I first heard Skinny Puppy and Front 242 and [other]bands that used keyboards with guitars, I was sold.

In college, I started a synth-pop [band], New Wave back then, and we did Depeche Mode covers. It kind of got old. I mean, Depeche Mode is still my #1 favorite band in the world, but playing other people's music just wasn't my thing.

I was writing my own shit and I started Lost Souls, which was Razed in Black, but when I signed to Cleopatra a year later, Lost Souls was too common of a name...

M: So when did Lost Souls/Razed in Black begin?
R: '94, I think.

M: How did you get in with Cleopatra? Did you send them a demo?
R: I sent them a demo and I did it all on a 4-track cassette. I did the traditional send two songs at a time and they liked it, then I sent them two more songs and sent them a couple of videos of Lost Souls.

Being in Hawaii, I think we are the only "that kind of band," so we were always asked to open for bands of that nature who come to town. So within a year of existence, we already did shows with Tool and Filter twice. It was weird though, because it was too fresh. It was hard to be tripped out about the whole thing because I had never really been off the island back then, so it was just how it was.

M: So how long from when you started the project to when you were signed?
R: Within a year.

M: Wow. It was a real quick...
R: It was quick. It was weird the way they asked me. They just called me and said, 'hey I like your stuff, wanna put it on a record? Call ya Monday?'

M: How long after that was your first release put out?
R: '95.

M: How many have you put out so far?
R: My next one would be my 5th one. Damaged is my 4th.

M: When are you going to end up doing the next release?
R: I think soon. I have ideas. I feel like Damaged is still new. We toured once, but we didn't hit the West Coast. The agency's always getting calls to come to Seattle and San Francisco...

M: So you've toured all over the country. Toured the world? Europe?
R: I'm talking to some guys out there actually. I think he had Skinny Puppy on their roster but it fell through.

M: When did you move out here? You're kind of based here and in Hawaii, right?
R: I'd been doing everything out of Hawaii and when we tour I have to fly everybody out and all the gear and rent a van or a truck. It's just way too expensive. Before I left Hawaii, I had eight trips to LA [in one year], and some for just a weekend or a day. It was ridiculous.

Then I figured out I'd just move, and when I got there it was a culture shock for me. I'd been there quite often to know but when you live there, it's overwhelming. We lived a block away from the president of the label and it was party, party, party all the time. [I] start[ed] running out of money, so I came here in Jacksonville for a little while. I have family here, come visit for a little while, take care of some bills, live rent-free with my sister, and next thing you know it's getting close to two years later. I guess we're residents now.

M: So, how's it been living here?
R: It's different. It's easier to get shit done because there aren't too many distractions. Being here is easier. It kind of has the same vibe, work-wise, as Hawaii.

M: When you do the albums, do you work with anybody else?
R: I've thought about it and I've tried it and I guess I always have a vision of what I want to do. You already see what you want to do, you already hear what you want it to sound like, and when you're involved with someone else it's not there or it's not what you see at the same time. My collaborations are usually...I'll get musicians or artists that I like...'you have free reign to an extent, but this is what I hear and I hear your voice singing it, can you do it?' That's the extent of my collaborations.

I'm not closed to it, but I think if I were to do a collaboration it would be a separate project from Razed in Black. Razed in Black has always been a personal thing. If you read the lyrics, it's always something in my personal life, and to have someone else help me write that is kind of weird.

M: How did you meet up with the group of live musicians that you tour with?
R: Well, Ivan the drummer is a friend of mine, we go back from high school and we've been in rock bands and garage bands. He's in a Broadway show called Stomp. During his downtime is when we schedule touring. He's an important part of the live act.

M: How many people do you have on stage with you when you go out?
R: Right now? One other person is on stage, so it's just a trio, but when we go out it's five or six people...When we do shows in Hawaii, a good friend of mine, Ronnie, plays keyboards. Maybe I haven't searched hard enough, but I haven't found anyone as good as Ronnie to be able to play the parts.

Electronic music is hard to do live, all the 16th notes and filters. I like to perform. If somebody's gonna play an empty box, I'd rather they just not be there. I think when we first started I used to hide that a lot of stuff was not digital, but everybody knows.

I'm on guitar. The other guitar player is from Toronto. He's actually an ex-TV show host, so it was funny cause when we did Canada he was recognized whereever we went.

M: What kind of TV show was it?
R: It was a kid's show. He's an excellent guitar player. Crazy. I've been through so many guitar players... For somebody that's not primarily a guitar player, he's a TV personality first, for considering himself a guitar player second, he's great.

M: That's a strange duality isn't it? TV show host from a kid's show turned guitar player for an industrial goth/rock band?
R: I don't even want to go there. I like other people to define it.

M: We do a night that we call Dark Alternative. I think the word Industrial and the word Goth can kind of scare people away.
R: That's good. I like that. Maybe everyone can use it. But that's cool for them, the kids that are into that scene, that it's hard to define, and that's what actually appealed to me as an artist.

Cause if you're into rap music, it's rap. It is what it is. It's not that I don't like it, maybe I'm not exposed to enough of it, but with electronic music or Dark Alternative, as an artist you have so musch freedom to do what you want and still be embraced by the scene. If you wanted to throw in a drum n' bass beat behind something or you wanna sing it like a vampire, it'll still be accepted.

M: What part of the country do you think you saw the best scene? Size of the crowd?
R: Well we've only done Seattle once and it was such a good crowd...Ohio.

M: Really?
R: Yeah, Strange.

M: That's unexpected.
R: Yeah, we have so much fun there. A lot of people show up and in Colorado. I think the biggest cities are comforting, because more bands go through there.

The first time we played New York, the response--and supposedly this was good--but the we weren't expecting it. People were just standing there with their hands folded, there were a few people nodding their head, and we thought, 'aw fuck we sucked' but after the show, everyone was like 'oh that was great.'

This last tour, I would say Colorado, LA, Chicago... I don't know if we have a favorite...it always changes.

M: What's been your favorite band you played with?
R: Not to be politically correct, but we've had so much fun with everybody.

M: How is your relationship with Cleopatra? Are you signed to a certain amount of releases?
R: Damaged is actually my last album with them, so I'll be shopping or renegotiating. They've been great. I know there's a lot of rumors going around about the, label but they've always treated me fairly and checks come in on time.

M: I've heard it different from different people... it seems to be an artist by artist thing. I've been hearing better things as of late. I've had some problems getting stuff for promotion from them. We'd be on their list for awhile and then stop getting stuff..
R: I know what that is, there always going through staff changes. I think the last time I tried to count how many compilations I was on, I was already well over a hundred.

M: Is that pretty easy for you to do, remixes for albums?
R: Sometimes they just ask me if I want to do it. The nonstop mixes? They usually come to me for that. And it's flattering too, because they work with other labels too, so for them to come to me and feel like I have the kind of skills to do it...

M: How did you get into DJing?
R: In Hawaii, for a little while the Rave scene was huge. I was good friends with the promoters and they wanted to do a dark wave area, so a week before that I had to learn how to DJ.

I borrowed some turntables and a CD thing and my friend taught me how. I did the set and next thing I knew, I had other promoters come up and every other week or every month I was asked to co-headline. It was cool because I started doing the Rave scene cause I enjoyed the music, but when I started spinning, to see ravers with glowsticks doing their thing to that style of music...there was more acceptance.

M: On the Puppy album you hear a lot of drum n' bass.
R: Oh, check this out. I just discovered this by walking through Best Buy, there's a compilation called Euphoria, the hottest European trance artists. I look at the back...Razed in Black-- alongside Paul Van Dyke. First thing I though was, I gotta call the record label--what the fuck? My second reaction was, how cool is that?
 

more info at
www.razedinblack.net