Chad Bowar: How does the songwriting process work with you and Kirk in Kingdom Of Sorrow?
Jamey Jasta: This time around I did a little more of the pre-production and had more input on the arrangements. I was looking to do the record and was avidly writing throughout the end of 2008 and beginning of 2009. I gave Kirk a disc with 15 songs. Some had guitar on them, some bass, all of them had drums. Once he lived with that material and traded ideas back and forth, we did what I call the Kirkifying process. He'll take one of my riffs and change a tail or play it his way and switch something up.
Once we did all that, we got in there in the early part of January and pretty much had everything done. We just finished it with his vocals and guitar. I did a little more this time around, but it's still very much a partnership. We had 18 songs written, and 12 made the record.
Who writes the lyrics?
I do all the lyrics and write all the vocal melodies. I wouldn't take no for an answer this time. I try to get Kirk to sing. He doesn't want to sing as much as I want him to. He wants to be the guitar player, which I understand. When Crowbar works, he has to sing and play guitar, and it's a lot of work for him. But I love his voice and want it to be a vocal partnership. I got him to sing a good 45 percent of the record.
How would you compare Behind The Blackest Tears to your first KoS album?
It wasn't that we had to please all the Down fans and all the Hatebreed fans and the Crowbar fans. There was none of that worry this time around. We just let it grow naturally. When I gave him the songs I had been listening to bands like Pentagram and Trouble and Heaven And Hell. I like a lot of older, heavier bands like Celtic Frost and Carnivore. So there's that kind of influence in there.
Is it easier, harder or just different doing vocals for Kingdom Of Sorrow compared to Hatebreed?
It's just totally different, a different vibe. When we started the band and were coming up with names, we decided to name it after a place. That way there's no preconceived notion of the sound or the concepts or anything. It's a different place creatively. There are songs that aren't about us, and we're not used to that. With Crowbar everything is very personal. With Hatebreed it's me talking to myself or about my own life. It's nice to have an escape and talk about themes and stuff that's not necessarily related to our lives. There are songs that are very personal, but a lot of it is different.
You worked with Zeuss on the production of the album, and he's been part of many of your projects over the years. What is it about his style that meshes so well with you?
The mix is very easy. I don't have to go there and do it. I trust him. We have this language that's hard to describe. I can tell him I need the snare to sound more papery, and he knows what I'm talking about. Because I recorded in Connecticut at Dexter's Lab, it was nice to not drive an hour every day up to Massachusetts. We did our stuff here and sent it to him to mix. Some days we sent him a song a day. We were cranking them out.
You mentioned you had 18 songs, of which 12 made it to the record. Were the others fully recorded, or did you abandon them partway through the process?
We just didn't get to them. There was this beautiful instrumental that Kirk had that will probably end up being on a Crowbar record. There was another song on my hard drive that we had forgotten about. The day we were mastering I saw it. There were two that were faster and more thrashy that didn't really fit on the record. We already had two fast, thrashy songs on the record.
Will there be a third Kingdom Of Sorrow CD?
It would be nice. For a while there, I was involved in a lot of stuff and it was hard to give my full attention and focus to one thing. In the last 14 months Hatebreed had three releases come out. We had the DVD, the covers record and the studio album. Now we have this album and I'm working on another Hatebreed album. I have to space it out a little more and focus on each thing. I want to help Kirk get the Crowbar record out. It's going on five years. I've been pushing him to write and record, so hopefully that will come out at the end of the year. Crowbar is bigger now than they've ever been, so I hope he focuses on that. Then maybe later next year or early in 2012 if the world doesn't end we'll have another Kingdom Of Sorrow record. (laughs)
Have you shot, or are there plans to shoot any videos for this album?
We had a plan for Kirk to come up right after Down did a couple of shows. For whatever reasons the schedules didn't line up. Now we're thinking we'll wait until Hatebreed and Crowbar get back from Europe and do it then. We'll maybe have the fans vote on which song we should do the video for. I think we the did the videos for the wrong songs on the last record. It did great. I think it sold 40 thousand copies. Considering it's a side project and people were very skeptical about what it was going to be, I think we played it too safe with the songs we did the videos for. They were the heavier songs. I don't think that was a good idea. I'd rather wait with these and make the right choice.
Right now we're leaning toward “God's Law In The Devil's Land,” which is the first single we released. But there are jams on this record that people are going to be blown away by. Kirk is singing his ass off with melodies and three part harmonies that he's doing on “From Heroes To Dust.” There's another song “Monuments Of Ash” that's crushing, which people are going to freak out about. I think there are a bunch of good songs we could do a video for.
Since most people watch videos on the internet now instead of TV, does that change your approach to making them?
Totally. I'm all for putting nudity and gore and as much stuff as people want to see. The whole performance videos with dudes in a warehouse? Enough is enough, although usually that's only what the budget can handle. I talked with two different directors yesterday and asked if we could do special effects and gore, something that's going to want to make people click on a link and check it out. We got a ton of views on the old videos, but nothing earth shattering. I want something that people are really going to talk about, and maybe convert some new people to check them out.
And with today's technology it's much cheaper to do a good video.
I've been involved in videos where the budget has been really slim, and they came out really great. Relapse is a great company to work with, and they've done some really awesome videos in the past. Bands like Origin, Dying Fetus and Mastodons did videos with a small budget, but got a maximum push.
