Alexei Rodruigez Interview – July 2009

Alexei Rodruigez interview by: Craig Sternberg

SDM: You recently just finished recording with Hail The Night, tell us about that band and how the drumming on this record compares to drumming of your past?

Alexei: HAIL THE NIGHT has been kicking around L.A. for just a little while,but due largely to problems with the original line-up was never able to do anything more than the original demo, and zero live performances. The vocalist, Thorn and his brother Luke, the main guitarist/riff-writer moved here originally from Georgia, and have had the concept kicking around for a while to do this black metal project, which is something I’d been talking with my ex-bandmates when I was still playing with 3 Inches of Blood. 3IOB pretty much stayed too busy, and my guitarist at the time ended up just re-forming his old, defunct black metal project when there finally was time to do it. It was just an ideal combination of taste and circumstance that after moving to L.A. and playing with one band, I ended up additionally meeting these guys and having the privelige to co-write 5 new songs with them for a new full-length. The other half of the record consists of 5 of the 6 original demo tracks re-visited, only now it sounds a bit less like an industrial band, as it’s actually a person playing the double bass this time, and not a sequencer. I had to get into the best drumming shape of my life to pull it off, and I’m SUPER-happy with the result. We don’t yet have management, booking agent or a label, but the caliber of music I think speaks for itself. It’d be nice to bring some credibility and more importantly, originality to the term "American Black Metal", and prove that you can live in a big, hot, shitty city and still create some intense, dark metal – living in a frozen wasteland doesn’t make you more genuine, talented OR original.

SDM: After 3 Inches of Blood, you joined up and coming metal band Death Pilot. How did you get asked to join the band? Tell us about Death Pilots involvement with Dirty Icon Productions.

Alexei: I heard of the band through word of mouth, as things tend to go in this industry. I heard they needed a drummer, and I had just healed from surgery. To make sure I was in playing condition again, I agreed to play on my friend’s hardcore record while I was still living in Seattle, a band called WAIT IN VAIN. The budget for the record was tiny, and yet I think we’re all pretty proud of the quality of the result. This gave them something to tour on, as soon as they could find a new drummer, and I set my sights on moving somewhere sunnier, where I didn’t wake up to rain every single day, which was making me want to blow my brains out. The timing of the Death Pilot thing, again, it just seemed right. What had really piqued my interest was the original notion that Logan Mader (ex-Machine Head, -Soulfly guitars,+ producer extraordinaire) was not only going to play producer/manager, but was actually within the ranks of the band, along with Tomo Milicevic from 30 Seconds To Mars, and Paul Perry, ex-bassist for Insolence, among others, and one-time fill-in guy for the likes of Possessed and Testament. Well, the perceived line-up turned out to be too good to be true, with Logan and Tomo choosing to remain behind the scenes along with co-producer/manager Lucas Banker (Junkie XL, Dommin, Divine Heresy). Paul and I clicked right away, both as a rhythm section and in terms of experience and personality, though, and a rock-solid line-up of mostly younger guys formed in record time. We’re still shopping the project to a few labels, though we’ve got booking, management and production squared away. And while the musical style is immensely different than Hail The Night, I have to reiterate that again the songwriting speaks for itself. In terms of metal, it’s catchier and more accessible than anything I personally listen to, but its appeal and the high level of songwriting skill and structure is irrefutable. I’ve proven to be flexible with working in different genres/sub-genres, but I wouldn’t be playing anything I couldn’t stand behind.

SDM: Give us your side of the story regarding the incident with Saxon’s Nigel Glockler at the Hard Rock Festival in England

Alexei: Hoo-boy, I knew this was coming eventually. I guess it’s OK, though, since I’ve done several interviews over the last 18 months and not one (until now) has addressed this. Honestly, I don’t remember much of the incident, and not at all ever coming into face-to-face contact with Mr.Glockler. However we were in touch several times after the whole debacle.It’s easy to sensationalize the story, but in a nutshell, I got wasted, went back to crash out but ended up in the wrong hotel room (Nigel’s) and when he asked me to leave I got belligerent and beat him down. It was stupid and uncalled for, and karma came back at me in the form of some English, redneck soccer-hooligans who I think enjoyed their bouncer jobs a little too much,as I ended up in the hospital with a broken olecranon (elbow). Nigel was able to play the next day, I was not. 3IOB chose to fire me, which I understood and hold no ill will for – though it would have been nice to hear it from their own lips instead of on blabbermouth. Upon returning to the US I emailed with Nigel, and he was super-cool about the whole thing. Apparently his bandmates were on the warpath afterwards (though I couldn’t really take that seriously at all), but his attitude was that while I did a dumb thing, 1) he didn’t get maimed, 2) he still played the show, 3) I more than paid for my mistake & my band over-reacted, 4) I was genuinely remorseful and apologetic, and 5) he’d seen a lot crazier shit in 20+ yearsof rock and roll. Not too long afterwards, he and his girlfriend emailed me and mine to invite us to their wedding. I’ve actually had more contact with him than 3IOB. They were pretty embarrassed at the whole thing, but I tend to think it’s infinitely more embarrassing to go through as many lie-up changes as the band has. No legitimate record label is going to take any band seriously that can’t keep a remotely steady line-up, no matter how talented the membership. Working out differences is part of being an adult, and part of being in a band together.

SDM: Was it a shock being kicked out of 3 inches of blood after that incident or did you expect it?

Alexei: It wasn’t a shock at all. I think Canadians in general are not too keen on confrontation, even if it’s justified, and my confrontation with Nigel was definitely NOT justified. I told them via our tour manager at the time – my cell phone was busted and none of them wanted anything to do with me – that I would understand no matter what course of action they decided on, and wished them luck either way. Their choice to announce their decision publicly before even a courtesy phone call I thought was in poor taste, however. I don’t take my actions that night lightly at all, and have put my partying ways behind me, but every band I’ve worked with since then has found the whole thing hilarious. I don’t encourage it at all, it’s a little weird, and I’d never care to repeat it, but I’ve gotten more pats on the back from the whole thing than I have been admonished for it.

SDM: What was it like working with Joey Jordison on 3 inches of blood album “Fire up the Blades” which he produced? Did Joey Jordison write or arrange any of that material?

Alexei: Joey did take an active part in the latter stages of writing – coming up with slight variations of the parts we already had in place in order to transition them more smoothely into the parts they connected with. The spirit of the songs was already there, but he definitely taught the band a thing or two about song form, which was refreshing. One thing that’s been a source of frustration for me in  a couple bands I worked with was the caveman approach of just stringing one riff together with another and another and calling it a song. Song form, dynamics, variations, key changes – so many things get overlooked by so many bands, especially heavy bands, who just think that being brutal and crazy is enough. Joey understands this and helped us mold our mostly-completed ideas into more exciting entities, though compared to most producers he took a very passive role in writing, letting us mostly do our own thing. At one point we were even accused of him playing drums on the recording instead of me, which I can only take as a compliment, but actually the only time Joey ever touched a drum throughout the whole session was when he and I were playing the marching snares side-by-side in the intro. He more took a role of cheerleader during the drum sessions – head-banging, throwing up horns, keeping me excited so I wouldn’t slack off. His ear for subtle guitar nuances I think came more into play than his drumming. All in all, Joey’s one of my favorite people in the industry, and I’d look forward to any opportunity to work with him again.

SDM: I assume he created some drum patterns? Is that true?

Alexei: Mostly not true. One exception is during the cover of Exodus’ "Piranha", he had me switch to double bass during the verses, which was different than the original. Another was, again, the marching snare intro – the intro itself was conceptually ours, but the snare pattern specifically was very much thanks to him. And generally, he had me simplify some of the fills and variations I was doing, so as to not de-emphasize the guitar work. As I said, he was very much hands-off with the drums (other than tones), which surprised me.

SDM: Did you work with Michael Grave’s formerly of “The Misfits” on “Summer End” debut?

Alexei: No. I was never involved with recording with that band, ever. Nor do I know how exactly they met that guy. Or why they’d want him on their record. I think his voice is awful, I think his era of "The Misfits" was not the real Misfits, and I think his political rants are complete garbage. I like to think that, seeing as how I’ve never met the guy, I’d give him and anyone the benefit of the doubt, but as an artist/public figure, I can’t help but perceive the guy as a bad joke.

SDM: Why did “Summers End” break up?

Alexei: I don’t know. I wasn’t around for that. Summer’s End was convenient for filling a 6-month gap in between playing for Walls of Jericho and 3 Inches of Blood, and I met a couple really nice dudes out of it. Not professional musicians, however, and the one guy in that band who is still trying to play regularly – besides me – decided to fire every single member within a span of one month, continuing on with the name and a brand-new line-up in a brand-new city, to go on to play very few shows and to write a few new songs that were never released.

SDM: How did you end up playing with hardcore/metal band “Walls of Jericho”? What was recording “All Hail the Dead” like?

Alexei: I had played a number of shows with a Detroit band called Earthmover in the 90’s when I was in Catharsis, who then re-grouped with a line-up change to form Walls Of Jericho. We played several shows with them as well, before they broke up in 2000. When Catharsis broke up in 2002, and I was trying to figure out my next move, I got an email out of left field from Chris (WOJ guitarist) talking about wanting to start a brand-new project with Candace (vocals) and myself. The idea appealed to me, so we began talking on the phone regularly, fleshing it out. At some point along the way, the other WOJ guitarist and the bassist heard I was moving up there, and though they had previously sworn off playing in a full-time band ever again, pulled a 180 and wanted in. It was at that point that, at the urging of the label we began debating the pros and cons of keeping the old name, Walls of Jericho, since all of a sudden I was the only difference in membership. Recording "All Hail The Dead" was fun in some ways – I always enjoy the studio – but the writing process was really rushed, the recording was too, and the results I felt were less than adequate. While I still get occasional compliments from that record, it’s one of my achievements that I’m LEAST proud of. Using most of our recording budget for a van and trailer and keeping all the production in-house were two things that were very detrimental to the quality of the final product. Making production decisions "democratically" in the studio doesn’t really work when one guy’s  opinion counts several times more than everyone else’s, regardless of actual experience. Fortunately for their current line-up, they learned from those mistakes, and are putting out much more audiophile-friendly material now. Other than their first full-length with Wes on drums, the record immediately after me is my favorite of theirs, and Cory from Slipknot has definitely turned out a cool, new, melodic side of the band.

SDM: In 1999, you recorded "Are These Our Lives?" with the band Trial! Why did you go under the name, Jesus L. Pecador?

Alexei: Two reasons. While my primary reason for making music to this day is for the sheer passion for the art form, in those times it was my ONLY reason. I never cared about getting proper credit. I still have ZERO desire to be "famous". Using pseudonyms initially was my way of mocking the whole concept of trying to be recognized for making art that I feel in its purest form belongs to the world. Unfortunately, the reality is that to continue playing music at the level I strive for requires full-time attention, which means pursuing other careers simultaneously is extremely difficult to arrange, and the only way to at least get your gear taken care of, if not actually make money doing this is to make your name a household name. So in other words, fame and recognition are a necessary means to an end. Personally, I think fame would be really weird, and after that brief taste of notoriety following the Saxon incident, I really had a new perspective on all the Britney Spears’ of the world, for whom I had zero sympathy previously as they went through their own personal trials and tribulations with every eye in the world watching. The thought of living like that makes me nauseous – thank god I play metal! Hahaha…

The other reason I became more diligent about sticking to pseudonyms was less an ideological stance, and more a practical one. While I was in Catharsis  friend of ours from the band Gehenna (not the black metal one) was accused of a serious but trumped-up violent felony charge while we were on tour. Within 3 days the FBI had not only connected him to us, but contacted our vocalist’s parents on the opposite coast in an attempt to track him down through us, and had them panicked, convinced that somehow we also had something to do with the whole debacle, lying and using scare tactics on an unassuming suburban family in their attempt to extract information. From that point, I was instantly regretful of the one or two times that I actually HAD used my real name, and we all decided to try and keep things a lot more discreet and underground by ALL committing to using pseudonyms. It’s something I carried over into the TRIAL record, even though those guys weren’t exactly on the same page.

The reason for the exact choice of names there (there have been many others) was simple. It was my mockery of Christianity, as the word "Pecador" in Spanish means "sinner". Pretty elementary.

SDM: Having played in Catharsis, what was it like playing that style of music compared to other bands you’ve been in?

Alexei: Catharsis to this day is the project I’m most proud of. It’s not the best possible recording quality, not my best playing, and by no means my best-selling. But from an honest artistic perspective, nothing comes close to being as dangerous or intense. We were sometimes associated with "hardcore", other times "crust punk", and other times too "metal" for either of those two crowds. In any case, we musically went more out on a limb than most bands from those scenes (e.g., including 15-minute live improvs in most sets), and while in two very differing ways, both the live show and the studio product both reflected that intensity. On a technical level, anything I played back then would be fairly easy for me to play now, but playing as hard as we did, as passionately as we did was enough already to set it apart from most. Nowadays I’m aware of the importance of pacing oneself, but then it was 110% every second, to where I wanted to puke my brains out after every set. It’s why, to this day, if I walk off the stage NOT drenched in sweat, I feel I haven’t properly done my job.

SDM: In Umlaut you played on "Havok Wreakers"(2001) and EP, "Finland"(1999), and "Total Disfuckincography" (2005) an album with unreleased tracks, under the name (Baron Burri Von Blixen)? What was it like playing with this band and why the alias name?

Alexei: Catharsis was certainly known for taking ourselves very seriously from an artistic, a political, and a philosophical perspective, so we decided to switch it up a bit. We started a joke band, wrote all short songs, ranging from a split-second to one that was an "epic" 2.5 minutes, ripped off bands (S.O.D.), made fun of bands (Metallica), "covered" pieces of songs "D.R.I., Bad Brains", wrote out long-winded pseudo-political explanations for songs about having hiccups, did fake interviews, wrote lyrics in intentionally bad English to back up our story that we were nomadic biker crust-punks from Finland (is there any such thing?)…Hence the goofy pseudonyms again. We released the first EP exclusively as a FIVE inch vinyl record. We even had a song called "Fuck You, Catharsis" that ripped off a Catharsis riff and talked shit about ourselves. When at the ONE Umlaut show we ever did, I accidentally hit myself in the face with a drumstick during our frenzied, six-minute, fully masked set and ended up with a black eye, we told everyone that it was from running into the guys from Umlaut and the really drunk drummer punched me in the face. Anyone close to us knew the truth, but a lot of people bought it – it was a lot of fun.

SDM: What made you do back up and leading vocals for Endstand on two tracks?

Alexei: I was old friends with those guys from playing with them in Catharsis, staying with them on tour and such. Catharsis’ final tour was a totally DIY, 6-month insane adventure, and we had made a point to schedule a week off once we hit Scandinavia. We had some friends in Sweden there living in a collective (including the ex-drummer for The Refused) with whom we were staying, and we even played a jam-packed show in their basement showspace; I’m sure all the neighbors there in that suburb of Stockholm were less than thrilled. 3 days in and some personal drama made me anxious to get the hell out of the house, but I couldn’t afford to be out on the town in that expensive city every day, so 4 days ahead of my bandmates I hopped the 12-hour ferry to Finland on the other side of the water, where I would stay with Janne, the singer for Endstand and co-president of Fire Inside Music (f.k.a. Combat Rock Industry). Endstand was in the middle of recording for a split CD, and Janne said I was gonna have a verse in the studio if they got to the vocals while I was still there. He had heard my voice on the Umlaut discs, but still I thought he was joking until he handed me a paper and said, "Here, these are your lines". It was all pretty organic and short-notice, and came out beautifully punk as fuck. I also ended up joining in the back-ups with the rest of the band on a Negative Approach cover. Totally fun.

SDM: You recorded material under the name “The Great white void” based out of Berlin, Germany? What brought this on?

Alexei: The two main brains behind this project are friends from Berlin, Matthias Dabrowski and Robin Staps. Robin is the main genius behind critically acclaimed Metal Blade band, The Ocean (not to be confused with Ocean or Oceano – Robin was there first!). Matthias has been in a couple bands, the latest of which I was a big fan, Mönster, and he and I have long been dreaming of getting a project together, though initially we saw it more as a Swedish-style metal band, until that horse was beaten to death. The two of them collaborated and began writing songs with a much more melodic, melancholy vibe, but with surprisingly busy, Mastodon-esque drumming. They couldn’t think of anyone they knew who could pull it off, and then my name got tossed around. They’re both great dudes and great musicians, so because our schedules just happened to fit perfectly, I agreed. The two of them flew to Vancouver, and immediately after completing my 3 Inches Of Blood drum tracks up there at the Armoury, I commenced drum tracks with them at another studio, engineered by an old friend, Blair Calibaba, who’s not only the touring soundguy for No Means No, but also recorded TRIAL and is recording BETWEEN EARTH & SKY. Robin’s very precise when it comes to knowing exactly what he wants, and was very particular about a lot of the drum programming he did on the original practice demos, but at the same time I got my chances to flow and add a slightly improvisational vibe to tone down the mathematical nature a bit, too. Unfortunately for the project’s current status, The OCEAN got super-busy shortly afterward with the release of their amazing new record and the subsequent touring, so guitar tracks are far from finished, last I heard. Also, We haven’t nailed down a particular singer yet. I really like the vocals on the demos we did, but nothing’s set in stone. Keith Caputo (Life of Agony) turned it down, and Thomas Lindberg (At The Gates/Disfear) has been approached, but we were picturing a more melodic approach, at least initially.

SDM: How are the drum tracks for “Beneath earth and sky” doing?

Alexei: I’m really stoked about how the drum tracks for BEAS turned out, but Blair has been on tour as of late, so nothing beyond scratch tracks has been laid out at all, in terms of guitars and bass, and I have yet to have an inkling what Greg’s vocals are going to sound like, but regardless of sales, I have no doubt that this will turn out to be an epic work of art. It’s a lot less predictable than hardcore, the beats have generally slowed down a lot, at times reminding me of Isis, with hard-hitting, slow Bonham-esque grooves. The drum sounds are huge, too, which I miss a lot in metal, since you can’t really get away with a giant, roomy sound when you’re playing lots of double-bass, busy fills or blasts.

SDM: You appear on Trial Reunion/Retrospective double DVD out now featuring 3 reunion shows in 2005 in Seattle, London and Budapest! What did you learn from this experience?

Alexei: Interesting question…I don’t think I learned anything new, but the experience was awesome. It brought me back to a time when it was all about creating an amazing energy with amazing people, not showing off, acting a fool, playing "rock star", making demands, or playing music AT people, but actually in conjunction with the energy of each and every person in the audience. Every single person that was there was there because they wouldn’t have missed it for the world. Not because they idolize or look up to us, but because we all share a common experience together that can’t be matched. From a technical perspective, it’s hard for me to watch that DVD. We had ONE single, full band practice for a couple of hours, our first in 6 years, and then we played a sold-out hometown crowd. I let the pressure get to me a bit, and played every single song WAY too fast at the Seattle show, and it had every potential to be a total train-wreck. But you watch the dvd and the energy is unmistakeable.

SDM: How did you hook up with “Wait in Vain” and record a album in 2008?

Alexei: Wait In Vain is the current band of TRIAL alum, Timm McIntosh, hence the similarity in musical styles. In the 2.5 months I was in Seattle after the Saxon incident I was going through physical therapy to get my elbow back into playing condition, and Timm needed a new drummer to record. The timing happened to coincide with both the end of my rehabilitation sessions and just barely preclude my departure to L.A., so I decided it would be both a favor for an old friend and a good way to gauge where my arm was at. I had 4 rehearsals, and 4 days of recording, and 2 days later I was in a U-Haul on my way south. Just recently they lost another drummer, so I did double-duty, playing for both TRIAL and WIV up in Seattle a couple weeks ago and at a huge benefit in Chicago for "Burning Fight", a new book documenting 90’s hardcore.

SDM: What exactly did you do in the band “Otis Reem”?

Alexei: Wow, NOW you’re digging deep. That was a band of a completely different sort, from the archives of my ancient history, and also one of the more fun projects I’ve ever done. At one point we were an eleven-piece band, which included a four-piece horn section, two vocalists (myself being one), drums, auxiliary percussion, bass, guitar, and keyboards, and even a couple like-dressed dancers to round out the posse. It started as basically a third-wave ska band, which got boring to us fairly quickly, and evolved steadily into a harder-to-define entity that borrowed elements of reggae, hardcore, jazz, and just about anything else you can think of. It was never a professional project; just a bunch of college students having an awesome time. We went on the road a couple times, but it was nothing too serious in the end. By the time I quit, more and more of us were seeking different lives, and we were a six-piece at that time. When our original drummer quit I had an epiphany that I HATED being a frontman, and was more than happy to take over drum duties, which also ensured that the poor soul who replaced the guy wouldn’t have me breathing down his neck constantly to play shit right!

SDM: What projects aside from Death Pilot do you have planned in the near future?

Alexei: I wish I could tell you, but it’s all hush-hush. I’m talking to one Metal Blade band about recording some power metal with them this summer, a thrash band on Century Media, an unsigned band working with Christian Olde Wolbers, some other friends with some less defined ideas that are starting to take shape…I just had some great Trial and Wait In Vain shows over the last two weeks, and we’re discussing possible Trial tour plans for Europe, Australia, South America, but with NO plans to become full-time again. I’m still looking forward to Hail The Night, Great White Void and Between Earth & Sky recordings to finally being finished and shopping those around. I’ve also re-established contact with a majority of my ex-bandmates from Catharsis, following the hugely positive experience with Trial last weekend, so who can say? I don’t foresee a Catharsis reunion, per se, but maybe some kind of spin-off, one day..? Other than that, I’m leaving myself open to giving lessons, and hopefully getting hired for some sweet studio gigs.