Through The Eyes Of The Dead - Justin Longshore
Posted on November 19, 2007 at 8:00 am by admin
I spoke with Justin Longshore once before, and as always, he was really cool to talk with, and soft a spoken guy, which may surprise some people considering how much he likes Morbid Angel and Cannibal Corpse. I got a chance to catch up with him on the recent events going on in Through The Eyes Of The Dead.
Way Too Loud: Can you elaborate on what happened with Chris Anderson?
Justin Longshore: We were about to go on a headlining tour, and he pretty much let us know that he was burnt out on touring. He’s been doing it for a couple of years now, and everyone knows this isn’t cut out for everyone, so I guess he preferred being at home. We’re still on good terms. There’s no real huge story about it! He just didn’t want to tour any more, and that was fine. We just got our original guitar player.
WTL: He’s just filling in right now?
Justin: We’ll see what happens, but as of right now, he’s just filling in.
WTL: We talked about Anthony before, and I read a recent interview where he was talking about Through The Eyes Of The Dead, and rather than being spiteful, eh said he never doubted the band.
Justin: He’s given me a call, and we’ve talked. That whole Decibel article, they didn’t let us know that they were going to contact him, and I didn’t want to put any bad words out about anyone, or anything like that. We’re just not that type of band.
He just had dedication problems, so that’s pretty much the reason, so that’s why he’s not with us any longer. It sucks because we were really good friends. We can still talk after the situation, and everything’s fine.
WTL: The North Carolina metalcore scene has been around for a long time. As far as modern metalcore goes, it could be considered the first place to really start doing that. Did it have a really big effect on you?
Justin: Yeah! It actually opened up a bunch of metal and hardcore combining. There was a huge scene growing up, and those were like the first shows I went to. When Prayer For Cleansing were around, and Undying. They were combining metal and hardcore, and it was a new fresh sound at the time. It’s obviously turned into some crazy stuff now. It influenced us personally, but as a band I don’t we’re influenced by it.
WTL: What was the scene like at the time? It sounds like just a few people into something different from what everybody else was doing.
Justin: Obviously, the shows started off small, it wasn’t a big thing at the time, but it’s definitely grown to a huge extent. The scene was growing, like North Carolina and South Carolina. All these kids just heard about it and started coming to those shows. It definitely impacted the scene that we’re in right now. A lot of things have evolved, and a lot of things have changed since then. MySpace wasn’t around back in the day, but nowadays it’s taken over the music world!
WTL: I’ve certainly heard a lot of bands lately talk about the good and the bad about MySpace.
Justin: Well, we wouldn’t be in the position that we’re in. It’s definitely the biggest promotion tool out there.
WTL: I’ve noticed that. It’s practically allowed death metal bands to have singles now.
Justin: It’s a part of extreme music now. The scene is picking up, and there’s so many kids coming to these shows. The internet has a lot to do with it, whereas Morbid Angel, they didn’t have anything like that. They had to go out and plays these shows to all these kids and build their own status. I don’t think we have to rely on it, although some bands rely [solely] on MySpace. There’s tons of bands coming out now, and it all sounds the same. They’ve heard some bands, and they’re doing the exact same thing the bands they listened to did, and they’ve got a ton of friends on MySpace. With us, I think we’ve proven ourselves along the years. We’ve done all the touring, and now we have the support from MySpace. There are a few bands, Job For A Cowboy have proven themselves. They kill every night. We actually saw them a few days ago in Phoenix with Behemoth. We’re friends with all those dudes, and we haven’t seen Job For A Cowboy since they became huge. On their first tour, they opened up for us in a basement in Phoenix.
We’ve been touring for years, so I think we can go out without the internet, you know what I’m saying? We were signed before that whole thing came about. We were pretty big on hxcmp3.com. That thing helped us out tremendously. Then prosthetic signed us, and we’ve been touring ever since. I want to get out of that whole… everyone talks about it, and I’m just kind of sick about it. I just want to get out and do the tours like in the old days, like some of my favorite bands, like Morbid Angel. Just go out and prove yourself.
WTL: There’s certainly a few bigger bands who’s fans are really receptive other kinds of heavy music when they get exposed to those new bands on tour.
Justin: Extreme music is definitely getting a lot bigger nowadays. In my eyes, I think we’re the most extreme band on this tour with As I Lay Dying [All That Remains and Haste The Day] right now. Kids are really digging it. We’re the only band on this tour that doesn’t sing at all! I think it’s cool that people are open minded to that. It just shows you that it’s getting bigger. I think the internet and MySpace has a lo to do with it, which is awesome, so I can’t really knock it.
There are some bands out there [though], and labels are going out, looking up these bands on MySpace and seeing how many friends they have, and signing them just on a whim.
WTL: I’ve heard that most labels won’t sign a band just because they sound good. They have to prove themselves in other aspects.
Justin: Yeah, the live show and all that. There are some labels now though that are just signing bands off MySpace. I’m actually working on a label which is an imprint off Prosthetic.
WTL: Have you signed anyone yet, or are you looking to sign anyone?
Justin: There’s a couple of bands I’m looking at. I’m going to re-release the first two Through The Eyes Of The Dead releases, the split we did with The Knife Trade, and the EP on one disc, re-mixed, remastered and all new artwork, and help get that out there. There’s also this death metal band in Tennessee.
WTL: What’s the name of the imprint?
Justin: Heretic Music.
WTL: You mentioned Prayer For Cleaning, Undying and Bloodjinn, and it’s fairly easy to find information on them.
Justin: A lot of tribunal bands, like Severe The Fall and From Here On, I think Tommy from Between The Buried And Me was in that band. There’s a ton of bands like that. Severe The Fall did a split with Acidia or someone like that? I think it was a Tribunal record. Matt from Tribunal is in Killwhiteneydead now. I’m sure their website has all that stuff going on there! Heartscarved too!
WTL: What was it really about back in the day? Of course forgetting the kind of abuse that’s going on today from labels, bands and fans.
Justin: Back then it was an original thing. As metalcore evolved, it kind of got watered down in the whole scene, that’s why I think the North Carolina scene dwindled out. Back then it was metal music with hardcore ethics. I think that’s the whole thing, is the ethic part. There’s some metal bands that have these rock star attitudes, that was just about the whole DIY thing.
WTL: So you think those North Carolina bands have lost interest in it? I know someone made a joke when they heard Between The Buried And Me’s new album, saying it sounds they really don’t want to be called metalcore.
Justin: Yeah! I mean listen to their new record, it’s not metalcore whatsoever. Everything has just changed so much from that point in time. It was just so different.
WTL: I read a lot of reviews about “Bloodlust” claiming it was derivative, while “Malice” seems to have pushed forward, leaving a lot of bands in the dust.
Justin: We’ve always wanted to do something different than what everyone else is doing. I don’t think there are bands that we actually sound like. I’m not saying we’re totally originally, we have parts that sound like other bands I guess. I think as a whole we have a fresh sound in the metal. We don’t sound like all these deathcore bands which everyone is talking about, which I’m so sick of. People call us that just because we have death metal with heavier parts. We’re not influenced by any deathcore whatsoever.
WTL: You come right from from the old-school.
Justin: Exactly! We wanted to come out with a fresher sound, but now the thing is so big. So many bands are trying to mix hardcore with death metal.
For “Bloodlust”, we were really rushed on that to be honest with you. We didn’t have much time. We actually had to use two old songs, and we didn’t have much time to write the record. We just got on Prosthetic, and we just wanted a record for touring. “Malice” is really influenced by us being on the road constantly, and learning from bands, and learning from the crowd. We had a lot more time to work with it. I think it breathes a little air into the scene now. It’s something that we really wanted to record, and I think it came out awesome!
WTL: Do you think we’ll see bands leaving single note breakdowns and other metal cliches behind?
Justin: That’s what we try and do, because the single note breakdown has been done for so long. I don’t think there’s one on our new record to be honest with you. You can still be heavy without just playing one note, you know?
WTL: Actually, I think the effect came off heavier than using a single note breakdown.
Justin: Exactly! There’s more to it. There’s no feeling in just chugging on your low string. You can do it, but there’s so much other stuff musically. We really feel rhythmically what we do. We stand behind it, instead of just writing something for someone else. We’ve had open breakdowns here and there, we’ve obviously had them in the past. On this record we just wanted to focus more on feel, and something that we want to hear. There’s tons of ways to be heavy. You can be in any tuning. There’s bands tuning down insanely low, and they think they’re heavier than everyone else because they’re so low. You can be in a standard turning, and sound heavier. It’s all in the way that you incorporate your instrument, and how you showcase it.
WTL: When I saw you live last, because you’re using different breakdowns, you were able to stack one behind another. Is that something new that you’re trying out now?
Justin: We don’t try and focus on that kind of stuff. We go by feel. If it feels right, then we should do it in the song. With this record, we really wanted to focus in on song structure, and what feels right in the song. It’s not like we’re going to write a heavy part, and then another heavy part after it. We just write what sounds good for us.
WTL: So it just ended up happening that way?
Justin: Yeah. It’s not like it’s planned. We just pretty much write songs that we like, and that’s pretty much it!
The Official Through The Eyes Of The Dead Website
Through The Eyes Of The Dead at MySpace
Through The Eyes Of The Dead at Prosthetic
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