Intervju - Scott Middleton, Cancer Bats Musik från Kanada är man väl inte direkt bortskämd med, men nu har Cancer Bats intagit musikarenan och de vinner på knockout. De här slynglarna blandar friskt uppkäftiga punkkängor med stenhård hardcore och ett och annat sabbathriff. Det är omskakande och vitalt och får än en gång att hoppas på en ny generation musiker. Till vårt stora förtret missade vi dem när de spelade här i november, men förhoppningsvis är de snart tillbaka i lilla Svedala. Debuten heter "Birthing the giant" och eftersom vi här på Metal Shrine hela tiden söker svar på våra frågor skickade vi iväg några stycken på den elektroniska motorvägen och fick svar från gitarristen Scott Middleton, som visar sig ha en förkärlek till svensk musik. What are you guys currently up to? We're on tour in America with The number 12 looks like you, From a second story window and Speakerfire. Everyone on the tour is super rad and we're stoked to be playing in Denver, Colorado tonight. It's our first time to this city so we're stoked. What´s the story behind the name, Cancer Bats? Liam came up with the name at work one day by putting together diseases and animal names. There´s nothing really to it other than that we thought it was a great name for the band we wanted to start. Introduce the band and tell us how you got together. I'm Scott and I play guitar, Liam sings, Mike drums and Bailey plays bass. Liam used to live in Montreal which is about six hours away from Toronto where I live. We used to take the train to see eachother to write songs on weekends. When my old metal band went on hiatus we started taking Cancer Bats more serious. I recorded our first EP and we went on tour shortly after. Not too long after that we got signed and made the band a serious full time project. Since then we've put out a full length and been on tour ever since. Your debut album is out now. Tell us a bit about the recording process and any fun stories from the studio. Our band is very no frills, bass, drums, guitar and vocals...we spent about a month in the studio. Most of the time was spent on finding cool tones or making sure we were happy about arrangments and performances. It was a great time for myself, as I love producing and engineering, so I'm able to be very creative the whole time. But what's cool is because we're not musically complex or whatever, we're able to take a step back after everything´s recorded and see a clear picture of how things are going to be, and then see if we can then improve from there or add any other cool textures to make things interesting. How much did the producer Gavin Brown bring to your sound? Gavin was great. He has a wealth of great amps and cool outboard recording gear and tons of guitar pedals we could goof around with. We didnt go overboard on that stuff cuz we're pretty straight forward, but Gavin is a person that can realize what we're doing and make it that much better. He's great at encouranging us to make sure we have our best performances and that everyone´s in a good mood at the studio. He would give us advice on arrangements or ways we could make the songs more dynamic and breathe more. We certainly learned a lot from him and had a great time making a record together. The art work for the album is pretty cool. Who did it and was it made especially for the album? All the illustrations were done by a friend of ours named Alex Snelgrove. She's one of the most talented artists I know, and when we were talking about who would concieve our ideas for "Birthing the Giant" we knew she'd be the one to make it happen and do an amazing job. Her website is www.alexsnelgrove.ca The layout of the record was done by our former bassist Andrew and his company Doublenaut. www.doublenaut.com Who came up with the title "Birthing the giant" and what does it really mean? Liam came up with it at practice one day out of nowhere. Again the meaning wasn't about anything specific, but as an afterthought we realized that the title was very autobiographical for us. We'd spent nearly nine months touring, going through line up changes, writing songs, finding the right producer, and recording to come to where we are now; and this record was our baby, our giant of a baby, as it was the most important thing in our lives at that point in time. And we're very proud of what we've accomplished. What were your influences for the album and what stuff did you guys listen to growing up? I wouldn't say there was a specific influence for the record itself, but as a guitar player I grew up listening to bands such as Metallica, Megadeth, White Zombie, Sepultura, Entombed, Pantera, Black Sabbath, Testament and Corrosion of Conformity. I think elements of all these bands show their heads in my riffs and whatnot but I don't always think okay...here's where my Sepultura inspired song is going to fit into the album.....its not that calculated. The way we write songs is either Mike or Liam will lay down a drum beat, or I'll have a riff and we'll play off eachother untill we come into a string of parts that we can groove on and get some sort of arrangment from. The interesting part of our band comes from how I've got a great metal and rock background musically, and Liam and Mike have strong roots in Punk and Hardcore so we end up meeting somewhere in the middle and Cancer Bats is the result. Any fun stories from the road? Any Spinal Tap moments? When we played in Gothenburg on our last tour I was taking a shower before the show and got some soap in my eye, it was the kind with little exfoliating beads in it, and it stung like a motherfucker...such intense pain and anyways one of the beads was stuck in my eye and it stung so much I had to play with only one eye open for our whole set, and of course Liam had to elbow me in that same eye during the set, ha ha ha. I thought I was going to die. The next day my eye was so swollen I couldn't even open it. It was shitty, ha ha ha. Apparently you´re into Refused. Any other Swedish acts that you think rocks? Dude! Sweden is like the Mecca of music for me, Entombed, Meshuggah, At the Gates, Dismember, Misery Loves Co., Raised Fist, Final Exit, The Hellacopters, The Crown, the Haunted and even the Cardigans...so many of my favorite bands are Swedish. It's amazing how much Swedish music has influenced my life all the way in Canada. On our last European tour our shows in Sweden were among the best we've ever played. Tell us a bit about the Canadian rock scene. The only other bands that comes to mind are just Rush, Neil Young, Bryan Adams and BTO, so far. There's so many amazing bands from Canada right now. There's amazing metal like 3 Inches of Blood, Ion Disonnance or The End. Amazing rock bands like Alexisonfire, The Constantines , Attack In Black and incredible hardcore like Comeback Kid or the Gorgeous. I'm super proud of how far Canada's come in the music scene. I truely believe some of the best music in the world is coming from there right now. Name five favorite albums and why those five. Cave In - Jupiter Its one of the best records I've ever heard. It has so many cool textures and guitar sounds, not to mention for a Hardcore band to do basically a 180 and alienate their fanbase in such a stubborn scene, was such a bold move and incredible inspiration for me. Not to mention I love the production and who knew Brodsky had that amazing of a voice and such great lyrics. Corrosion of Conformity - Deliverance Another record that was a big change in style for a band. Pepper Keenan assumes lead vocals for the whole record, they belt out the best Sabbath influenced rock riffs and super catchy songs throughout. This record has never ever lost replay value for me. It's a timeless classic for me. White Zombie - La Sexorcisto This was the first Compact Disc I ever bought. I remember thinkin´ the artwork was so fuckin´ cool, and I put it in and was blown away. Amazing riffs are everywhere, not to mention this record had such a cool unique sound thanks to Andy Wallace. This is basically what I still think of as the "coolest" band of all time. No one is like them, no one was ever as wild. White Zombie was the first and best concert I've ever been to. Metallica - Load The record that everyone in the metal world loves to hate. They cut their hair short and even dabbled in country songs. When this came out I'll admit I hated it, but going back to this a few years ago, I realized how cool and dark this album is. It's very apparent the turmoil the band was going through with addiction and personal problems on this and "Reload". But really I think some of the coolest shit they've done is on here. Sure "Master of Puppets" and "Ride the lightning" are amazing Thrash records, but this has some serious fucking balls to it. Massive riffs, cool tones and epic songs. I swear I can listen to the song "Outlaw torn" on repeat and never get tired of it. I listen to this record all the time and love it. In fact I wish I could make a record as cool and dynamic as this one. It was just such a "punk rock do whatever we feel like" period for the band, and as a musician it's something I can totally appreciate. Tegan and Sara - So Jealous So you may or may not know these two Canadian girls in Sweden, but they put out this record in 2004 that blew my mind. They're the complete opposite of all the metal and everything I grew up listening to. They write quirky indie rock pop songs that never seem to be able to leave my mind. The production and instrumentation is so simple yet mindblowingly effective in capturing every nuance of how good each perfomance is. I listen to this record all the time and have since become a massive fan of Tegan and Sara. When are you coming back to Sweden? We're not too sure at the moment, our next European tour brings us to Germany and Amsterdam but sadly no dates in Sweden. We loved playing there and can't wait to go back, so be sure that we'll make it back at some point in the future. Any messages for those who haven´t discovered Cancer Bats yet. Whether you like metal, punk , rock or hardcore, everyone seems to be able to rock the fuck out to us live and on our record. We're four Canadian dudes lookin´ to have the best time of our lives, so come fuckin´ party with us. Cancer Bats - Official website
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