Kevin Lane

 

Keep up with Kevin here:

www.myspace.com/whitechapelmetal

www.myspace.com/elvisatthewheel

 

 

 

I first started playing drums when I was about nine years old and in the fourth grade, I became interested in drumming by my brother’s friend Graham Jones who drummed for their band. I would watch him play and just be amazed wishing I could do the same as him. So one day when I was about to leave for school I noticed he had left his drumkit in the basement of our house, so I started to play. at seven o’ clock in the morning. After that, I was hooked for good. I begged until I got my first drumkit later that year on Christmas, it was a black 5 piece SoundSource drumkit, probably the biggest piece of crap known to man. I played that kit to the ground for about 4 years, busting all of the heads and just hitting them as hard as I could thinking I knew what I was doing. Although they served as a good starter kit, I knew that I wanted to take it to the next level and keep moving forward with my drumming, so I found a used Pearl Export kit in my local paper and bought them. In the midst of owning my first kit and the Pearl kit I would basically just play covers of the bands I was listening to at the time with my friends in my bedroom. Just to name a few bands that we would cover were Korn, Limp Bizkit, Deftones, and System of a Down… pretty sad.

Finally after playing drums for quite some time I decided to start moving toward a metal direction going for a more extreme sound I guess you could say. Around this same time is when I started playing with a few friends and started up my first band Afternoon at the Autopsy when I was in my sophomore year of high school. Shortly after starting up that project I bought yet another kit, a 4 piece jazz setup from a custom drumshop company located out of Murfreesboro, TN called Donoho Drums. Eventually that band, as most do, fell apart. I went about 2 years without playing with another band or even trying to start another band because I was trying to concentrate mainly on school. I was then offered the position to play drums for a local band in my hometown of Kingsport, TN called Speak of the End. This project was fun but not short-lived. It lasted for about 4 months when I decided that I needed to concentrate once again solely on my schooling while being a freshman in college. So, I sold my kit and went back to being a full-time student and working. That routine lasted for a while and I decided that the only thing I would ever be happy doing was drumming, so I bought another kit to where I could at least play in my spare time. Lastly, I was asked to play for the band I?m currently in, Whitechapel. They had asked me to play for them for a few months and I had turned down the offer very reluctantly because I was so set on just going to school. A month or so went by and they decided to ask me one last time and I felt that I should at least give it a shot. So I made my travel down to Knoxville, TN and we jammed. We all knew that things seemed very promising and he we are now. This band has been nothing but good times for me and everyone in this band took me in like a family member, I’ve been very appreciative and love them all very much.

 

 

Kevin Lane Interview:

 

 

SD.com: You have been playing with Ion and are also playing with BTM, any plans for a full US tour?

Kevin: Yes, this summer in the month of June we?ll be hitting the road with our friends in With Blood Comes Cleansing going across the Eastern US to support the release of our upcoming full length album ?The Somatic Defilement? that will be in stores in spring/summer of 2007. After that we?ll be setting up another US tour for July and then from July 20th to August 12th we?ll be in Europe with our label-mates Knights of the Abyss and The Partisan Turbine.

 

 

SD.com: What is your least and most favorite thing about being on the road?

Kevin: The best part of being on the road is getting the opportunity to meet all of the new people whom I would?ve never had the chance to meet otherwise and also the other drummers out there that can always give great advice as well as useful tips to help make each other a stronger musician. As far as the cons to being on the road, well that?s probably just when we get to a stop in the road where we?re out of a place to stay or something or getting messed with while you?re asleep in the van always sucks ha, but other than that it?s great!

 

 

SD.com: When did you start playing drums?

Kevin: I started playing when I was about nine years old.

 

 

SD.com: Do you play in a school band or any drum corps?

Kevin: No, unfortunately I did not. I contemplated the thought quite a bit but in the end I didn?t, I can?t say that I don?t regret that due to the fact of allot of methods and rudiments I could have learned at a much younger age to help me my drumming today. So, to anyone out there, I would recommend it.

 

 

SD.com: Have you ever taken any lessons?

Kevin: I didn?t take lessons when I started playing, the most help I could get was from my brother?s friend who helped me in getting rhythm and some feet patterns down without going off-time, but then he let me loose and go my own way from there. He always told me that he did that to keep it to where I could try and build my own style of drumming instead of ending up playing basically exactly like him in the end, which was a good point that I realize now but didn?t at the time.

 

 

 

 

SD.com: Who are your top 5 influences?

Kevin:

1) Derek Roddy

2) Tony Royster Jr.

3) John Longstreth

4) Marco Pitruzzella

5) George Kollias

 

 

SD.com: Assuming that influences doesn’t mean favorites, who are your favorites?

Kevin: My influences pretty much are my favorites, but just to name another drummer that has good taste in my opinion is Carter Beauford from The Dave Matthews Band.

 

 

SD.com: Let us know 5 CD’s that are in your current rotation

Kevin:

Aborted  Slaughter and Apparatus: A Methodical Overture

Suffocation ?Souls to Deny

Ion Dissonance – Solace

My Bitter End – The Renovation

Jesu – Silver

 

 

 

 

SD.com: Do you practice any specific rudiments or combo’s regularly?

Kevin: I try to practice rolls quite a bit and playing single handed rolls on the snare to try and keep my speed up as much as possible. Because playing on the road with one day after another will get very tiring, and I want to be able to play every night as fast as the other and be able to put forth all of my effort each time.

 

 

SD.com: What is your favorite part of your drum kit?

Kevin: I would have to say my toms are my favorite things to play with on my kit. I?m always wanting to learn new roll combinations and so forth to try and add more life to songs in the midst instead of playing a solid beat for a long period of time. The more toms I have equals the happier I am.

 

 

SD.com: If you could give one piece of advice to younger drummers, it would be…

Kevin: Take drumming slow and be precise. That was a big mistake I made when I first started playing more extreme genres of metal, when I wanted to play fast I would just go with it and it was probably the sloppiest thing anyone had ever heard. But I?ve learned that taking things slow is the best route, and just build up in speed and endurance over time as tedious as that may sound.

 

 

SD.com: If you had to stop drumming, what else do you want to do with your life?

Kevin: I would probably continue in my schooling and go for something along the lines of architecture as a career, sounds boring but to me it seems like something I would be good at and am very interested in. I like to design and to do math, and about the only way I? can think of to make much money designing in today?s society with all of the competition, is going into something of this sort.