Black Tide Interview
Glasswerk's Mark Cooper stole a few moments with Miami Metal band Black tide at Liverpool's barfly, here's what happened…
Mark Cooper: Where was it last night?
Zachery Sandler: Birm-ing-ham.
Coop: Just got to get the accent right. The home of priest and Sabbath.
Gabriel Garcia: Yeah, but it sucked a bag of dicks, first night wasn’t so good, the next night was.
Coop: Same place?
Zach: Yeah, same place, two nights in a row.
Coop: Why was the second night better-crowd more into it?
Gabe: Yeah, bigger more excited a lot more people came back for night two. There was like ten people the first night.
Coop: Same set?
Gabe: Nah, we changed it up a bit.
Zach: We changed the order and some songs.
Coop: Where you going to do that before you went in or did some songs just not go down so well?
Zach: We actually liked the first set, but we wanted to change it up-for us.
Coop: Donnington was the last time you were here?
Gabe: We were here for Reading/Leeds, it was rad dude.
Coop: Do you think people get that kinda old school thing over here?
Zach: Oh definitely.
Coop: You went over to Tokyo-how was that?
Steven Spence: We had two shows there-Motley crue were headlining the show we were playing.
Zach: We were in Japan for the weekend.
Coop: What differs with the audiences?
Zach: I think the mosh pits are bigger, they tend to get a little hotter in the U.S.
Steve: The pits in America, just seem a bit more American-there just like more violent with each other-they push each other around more.
Zach: Here they are more courteous.
Gabe: It’s like ‘Oh I fell’, over there they might pick people up, or just go over them.
Steve: Weve had some cool crowds out here.
Coop: Your playing some gigs with Bleeding through, some with Bullet for my valentine…
Zach: Bullet for my valentine crowds are just bigger, that’s because Bullets just ridiculously huge over here.
Coop: How are Bullet going down in the states-is it kind of like the opposite of your situation?
Zach: Not really, they are huge over there as well.
Steve: Some of the fans can relate to our style of music to, so they enjoy it too.
Coop: Do you talk to them much, about where you are now, and what you want to do?
Steve: When ever we talk to Bullet, it’s never about business, they are really cool guys we’ve known them for a while now.
Coop: I’m thinking more of an advice thing?
Zach: They toured on their first album for two years.
Coop: Is that your plan?
Gabe: For shit yeah.
Coop: Are you still enjoying the songs, it can be tough night after night.
Zach: Well now were changing up the set it’s a little bit cooler.
Coop: I read someone’s first gig was Cheap trick and Meatloaf?
Zach: Yeah that was me, I was like three or four.
Coop: Someone took you to a gig when you were three?
Zach: My mom dude!
Coop: Couldn’t she get a babysitter?
Zach: No, I wanted to go!-Meatloaf is huge!
Steve: My first concert was Rod Stewart-I’m proud of it.
Gabe: I wanna say Priest.
Coop: Not to take anything away from Rod Stewart, the guys an icon, just surprising they were your first ones-have you met any of your icons, say at the Kerrang awards?
Gabe: Metallica…yeah we met Judas Priest a couple of times, played with Iron Maiden.
Coop: That must have been pretty special, there’s a lot of their stuff in what you do.
Zach: Oh yeah.
Coop: Were you star struck?
Zach: Not really.
Gabe: I got knocked down by the drummer of Judas priest though.
Coop: Scott Travis.
Zach: He’s a big dude!
Gabe: …and the drummer from Maiden, Nicko-we opened for them in Italy and I went up to him and asked him if it was cool if we played one of their songs.
Coop: What song?
Zach: Prowler.
Coop: How did you get introduced to metal?
Steve: The internet (Laughs.)
Gabe: My dad listened to a lot of Pearl jam, Metallica, stuff like that-he was really into hip hop, he gave me like a suicidal tendencies cassette. I was really young and I started listening to the heavy stuff. I just went backwards after ‘Black album’ and ‘Load/Reload’ I just went backwards I fell in love with ‘Kill em’ all‘, ‘Justice for all‘.
Coop: A lot of people get into someone and then go back and find out who influenced them.
Gabe: Exactly.
Zach: Going back to like Motorhead and Diamond head.
Coop: Do you get involved with the internet side of things?
Zach: Everything revolves around My space these days.
Coop: Do you get sick of the age thing?
Steve: Well you just brought it up! (Everyone laughs.)
Coop: I have to.
Steve: You make me sick to my stomach! (laughs.)
Coop: Rolling stone said you were the best ‘Rookies‘, is that a kind of back handed compliment?
Zach: Yeah, it’s like-”You guys are pretty good, for being like two years old”
Coop: “Your good” pat you on the head…
Gabe: I don’t think they meant it like that, they just meant we were a good new band.
Coop: ‘Rookie’s probably the wrong word.
Zach: Yeah ‘Rookies’ probably not the best word to use but-they were saying ‘Best new band’
Coop: You’ve played with lots of bands, Lamb of god, Static X-what did you get from them?
Zach: I think we learned a lot after each tour, especially in the beginning when we did Ozzfest-that tour was so tightly run, we just become much more professional after that.
Coop: Going back to the beginning, what were the first songs you guys played together-what was in the first set?
Steven: Yeah we played covers-we played ‘Sweet child o mine‘. (Hums opening riff.) We had like a four song set, and four originals.
Coop: Did any of those make it to the album?
Gabe: Two of em-’Shout’ & ‘live fast’.
Coop: They’ve been around for some time then?
Gabe: 4-5 years.
Coop: Have they changed much?
Zach: We changed up a bit of ‘Black abyss’ live…
Gabe: …and a little of ‘Warriors of time.’
Coop: Any plans to do a headlining tour.
Steven: Were just trying to scoop up the fans at the moment, after we’ve scooped up enough, maybe after that.
Coop: The album came out March 9th,whats been the reaction?
Steven: Kids usually love it, they tell us after the show how good the record is-which is pretty cool.
Coop: You now have Austin as the new guitarist, so what was the deal, with him joining the band and Alex Nunez leaving?
Zach: Basically creative differences.
Coop: It was incredibly mature what you issued as a statement, doing it now when you were just growing. You see other bands keep going with unhappy members, like Metallica.
Zach: Like Jason Newstead was in the band five years longer than he wanted to be, we didn’t want any of that.
Coop: Austin comes into the band-what changes?
Gabe: Feel like were stronger than ever.
Coop: You were saying you picked up the songs in like a few days.
Austin Diaz: Yeah, just a few days, my first practice was basically my first show-on mayhem opening night-it went pretty well.
Coop: Was that the moment you thought ‘Right decision’?
Gabe: Yeah.
Zach: Definitely.
Gabe: Soon as I saw that hair I knew it was the right decision. (Laughs.)
Steven: We’ve known Austin for a while-me and him go way back.
Coop: So the songs were not that unfamiliar?
Austin: I’d heard the songs before, but never kinda played them-but there’s definitely some riffs I figured out myself. When we were on the road I got showed a few riffs-’Black abyss’ was one of the first songs I learned. Then we were in an rv on the way to Seattle, and Gabe showed me the songs.
Gabe: We had like the full amplifiers in the back (Laughs.)
Steven: Instead of a headboard we had half stacks! (Laughs.)
Coop: Were you in a band before?
Austin: Yeah, I played in a band called ‘The panics’-that was just like thrash, punk rock.
Coop: What’s it like reading and then appearing in ‘Guitar world’?
Gabe: Awesome.
Zach: I still have my subscription.
Coop: Are we totally over the ‘No solo’s thing?
Zach: Oh yeah.
Gabe: That whole nu-metal thing, were it was just uncool to play guitar solos.
Steven: Were not talking about drum solos? (Laughs.)
Coop: Maybe in the seventies (Laughs.)
Zach: That whole eras done, I think Metallica was that big turning point, because when Metallica were saying ‘Were not going to play solos‘, it was like ‘Right there’s something fucking wrong here.’
Coop: Clearly your big Metallica fans-What do you think of the new album?
Gabe: It’s fucking great.
Zach: It’s well better than the other one.
Gabe: I’m still going to always be a fan of the first four albums,
Coop: Did you guys always want the twin guitar thing?
Gabe: For sure on the next record there’s going to be more of that. With one guitar you can be limited.
Coop: Do you feel as though your improving as musicians still?
Gabe: Oh yeah.
Coop: I know people always mention the ‘Hit the light’s' cover.
Steven: Or the Iron maiden one.
Coop: Are there any covers tonight?
Zach: Do you want there to be one?-we’ll try it. We wanna do Madonna-’Like a virgin’, I think we should do a new version of that. I think it would be awesome. (Everyone laughs.)
Coop: So how much of the songs are worked out before you go into the studio?
Steven: Some of them are totally written in the studio. Everything else was wrote over a five year period.
Coop: Johnny K worked with Disturbed and that, what did he bring to the table?
Steven: Direction.
Zach: Song structure.
Coop: Did you take stuff into the studio-as reference points?
Zach: Yeah, he’d be kind of ‘What records have you been listening to?’
Coop: Did you have a vision.
Zach: Just to make it sound good.
Steven: Hammered out the songs and put em on a disc.
Coop: Can you look at the album objectively now, did some parts work and others didn’t?
Gabe: Yeah, like if we re-recorded it would be better, we’ve been playing it for over a year now.
Coop: it gets tighter.
Gabe; You think up a few things, a few fills here and there and your like ‘Damn I wish that was on the record.
Coop: All those songs-coming out live, what’s going down well?
Collectively: ‘Warriors of time’
Coop: What do you open with?
Steven: Your just gonna have to wait and find out!
Coop: What’s the plan for Christmas?
Steven; Home for the holidays.
Zach: Back here in January.
Steven: Back here for the Kerrang tour.