The Acacia Strain - Vincent Bennett
Posted on August 25, 2008 at 11:48 pm by admin
I happen to like The Acacia Strain, and I happen to know that their vocalist, Vincent Bennett is a funny guy, and in a very sarcastic way. I started off serious, but afterwards he went to town and we had tons o’ fun, and I actually learned even more about The Acacia Strain that I never would’ve asked!
Way Too Loud!: What made you choose the album title “Continent”?
Vincent Bennett: The whole album is about distancing yourself from all the things you think you love, and peers, humanity, and basically forming your own island, or “Continent” as you will. Being part of your own world as opposed to everybody else’s. It’s all about exile.
WTL: What did you want to achieve on “Continent” this time that you didn’t get to do on “The Dead Walk”?
Vincent: I wanted to prove my extreme hatred for every living creature. I’m pretty sure I came through. The album came out yesterday [at the time of this interview] and I’m getting a lot of feedback on it with people saying “Wow. Vincent is angry. Vincent isn’t really psyched about a lot of things.” The main focus is obviously humanity, but there’s a lot of little creatures here and there that I’m not fond of, so I figured I’d include them. I can’t just single out humanity, because a lot of bands have already expressed their hatred towards humanity, so I figured I’d open up the playing field a little bit.
The entire album is about one person destroying the entire world on a grand scale so he can be by himself, and trying to find your own personal loneliness.
WTL: Were there any specific groups of little creatures you didn’t like?
Vincent: Nothing specific, I mean, I don’t want to play favourites, but on a side note, I hate cats. Housecats more than anything on the face of the earth. If I could take anything out first, it’d probably be housecats.
WTL: When I saw you live and you took your break, you talked about how the desert was a great place to drop off dead bodies, and of course there’s the lyrical content. Do you have an interest in serial killers?
Vincent: Not as much as you’d think. When people think about serial killers, they usually just think about dudes that go around and murder everybody, but there’s a lot written into it, and there’s a lot of different levels of “serial killing”. A lot of it has to do with sexual needs and stalking. I’m not really into sexual deviance, and a lot of serial killers are. But even with all the killing, most of the stuff I write about is a metaphor for something else.
The ultimate destruction of humanity is the ultimate destruction of the world. Most of the “she” and “her” I’m talking about is the earth, so it’s not like I’m going out and finding girls to stab them in the face, it’s about a quest for loneliness is what the whole album is based on. It’s not so much about the violence as it is the hate.
WTL: Are you an angry guy?
Vincent: Uh…. yeah. I’m not gonna lie to you, I’m a very angry person. Sometimes I feel like my blood is made of acid, and it’s just boiling through my veins. But at the same time, I’m not going to walk around like an angry dude all day long and take it out on other people, because they’ll get theirs eventually. I’m kind of a laid back dude, I’m not a pacifist, but I’m not an aggressive person. If I see somebody doing something stupid, I’m gonna call ‘em out, but otherwise, I’m just gonna let it slide. I don’t really care.
I have the band as an outlet for all of my anger and hatred and aggression and rage. That’s why I think a lot of people who are angry, and have road rage, and beats their wives and kids, they don’t have an outlet for that anger and hatred, so they take it out on the wrong people. I don’t really condone misguided anger. If you’re angry at a certain person, you go up to them and say “I’m fucking angry at you! You’re a shithead, and I don’t like you because of these reasons”. You don’t go “Fuck that guy!” and then choke your five-year-old. That’s why it is great to have this band, because it is misguided aggression and misguided anger, but that’s what Sam Kinison did. Instead of beating his girlfriend, he went out on stage and took his anger out as laughs, and had a good time. So it’s one of those things where yes I’m very angry person, yes I hate everything and I hate everybody, but I’m gonna find a way to funnel that aggression into positivity.
WTL: The album art makes perfect sense with what your talking about! How do things operate when your working with Paul Romano?
Vincent: It was pretty involved! We had a lot of back-and-forth on the phone. I’d call him a lot and he’d call me a lot. I had about 300 different ideas for the actual album concept before I decided on the one, and I had a lot of ideas as far as artwork is concerned, so I told him every idea I had, and I sent him the lyrics, and he came up with what you see now. There was no “Maybe we should do this or that”, he just sent me the original, and I loved that. It was the same with the last record. I just told him ideas from what the lyrical standpoint was, and he came up with his graphic version of what he thought the lyrics meant.
He did about 5 paintings for the whole CD. One is the cover, and there’s maybe 3 inside, and then there’s one in the back, but he also has all these beautiful little illustrations that he did besides the paintings, so it’s chok full! He puts down on paper what I thought I could do vocally.
WTL: What made you go with Zuess this time instead of Adam D.?
Vincent: Adam was busy with Killswitch Engage and Underoath. Adam did our last two albums, and he was obviously our first choice for this one, but it was coming down to the wire and we hadn’t found a producer. Our label wanted us in the studio by February, but that didn’t happen, then they wanted us in April, and then we finally go in around April and May. We needed to pick a producer really fast, and Zuess was always there in the back of our mind, and it turned out for the better I think because Adam is an excellent producer, but Zuess was really good for this record. He let us do basically whatever we wanted. There were no constraints on musicianship or anything like that, and we got to experiment with our sound, and Adam tries to confine a certain sound in a certain song, where Zuess says “you do what you want, and I’ll make you sound like you.” We didn’t have any other ideas as far as producers, so we’re glad that Zuess took the chance to do it, and I think the record came out as good as it possibly could’ve.
WTL: I heard some tales of torture from the studio…
Vincent: Zuess cut off my bass players pinky because he missed a couple of notes. Other than that, if I screwed up on vocals, he’d make me run around the building 70 times, and then he’d hit me with a bamboo pole. He was a good sport about everything. He was easy to work with on everything because he’s a really easygoing guy. Before we came into the Zuess world, we were totally into the Adam world. Adam is a jokey guy, and he wants to watch the food network and tell jokes all day. He’s really energetic. People ask what Adam is like, and he’s exactly the way you’d think he would be, he’s always on, and Zuess is like “Do whatever you want to do. Just play your instruments and leave me alone.” He’s really easy to work with, because as long as you know that your in the studio to make a record, and not to dick around and say “Oh, I’ve got to go to the store.” It’s was easier than I thought it would be because a lot of the bands that recorded before us like Hatebreed and Shadows Fall said “Zuess is a fucking dick man! Wait to you work with Zuess, because he’s going to be on you all the time man!” But I think they were just trying to make it seem worse than it was just to get us kind of nervous, but it was easy.
WTL: Depending on how you count it, you’ve got 5 albums. When I saw you live, you focused a lot on “The Dead Walk”. Have you left a lot of your older material behind?
Vincent: We don’t even consider those first two releases albums. As far as I’m concerned, we have three CDs out. The first couple were like demos to us. We didn’t know what we were doing, we were all really young, we didn’t have any ideas, and we just wanted to get some music. Kids want to hear those songs, but we honestly don’t even remember how they go. I haven’t listened to those albums for years. It’s kind of leaving the past behind, and pretty much every band does it, unless your Metallica, then you have to play stuff off “Ride the Lightning”. We focused a lot on “The Dead Walk” obviously because it was our last record, but we do still play stuff off of “3750”, and that’s not going to change. The sets might get a little bit longer, and when we do have to cut down the set, it’s going to be pretty even from each record.
We’re playing some CD release shows this weekend, and we’re going to focus on the new record because it just came out, but further down the line, we’ll split the set between the other albums that we have.
WTL: When your playing live, do you find it difficult to keep going without taking any breaks between songs? When I saw you play, there were almost no breaks at all, and it was very intense.
Vincent: From a spectator standpoint I do go to shows, and I do watch bands, and I do like it better when bands just play music. Every now and then it’s nice to hear what a band has to say, like a little funny story from the road that happened a couple of days ago, but in the long run, fans are there because they want to hear the songs. They don’t really care that you slept in a basement with cockroaches, or who your voting for as president. The didn’t pay for the cock, they paid for the rock, and a lot of the bands that are talk heavy don’t seem like they have it all together.
We try to put the songs together in a way that they flow, so people say “The song just stopped, but holy shit, they’re playing this now?” It surprises kids to hear these songs that all flow together. I find it’s easier for me to remember what we’re playing next if I don’t have to stop and talk.
WTL: I’ve noticed that in the music, there’s barely any stops there either, so the energy keeps moving
Vincent: We try to keep it an energy high show, because once again kids paid good money, and they don’t want to see some dude lumbering around on stage like he’s bored. They want to see action and they want to see excitement, and energy and anger, and everything that The Acacia Strain is on CD, they want to see it manifested live. Playing for forty minutes a night with barely any stops is kind of hard, but it would be even harder if we did stop. When you’re a marathon runner, and your on your second or third mile, and you slow down to walk and pick up water, starting up again is way harder. When you get that momentum going, you don’t want to let that go, because as soon as you do, your body is used to being at rest, and it’s not as energy packed as it used to be.
WTL: What do you attribute all the lineup changes to? Although this time, you didn’t add anyone to your lineup.
Vincent: The lineup changes have just been a lack of dedication. It’s never really a personality clash. The first person we kicked out of our band was our bass player, and she just wasn’t dedicated at all, and then a guitar player went. They lose the drive, and for how often that we’re touring and how energetic the music is, you have to be %100 head in the game and all about this band, or else it’s not going to work out. We’ve been through a lot of bass players that either weren’t into it, or had other ideas for other bands that they were in, and really just wanted to pursue those. Whatever it is, it’s never anything personal, because you can’t hold it against people. Our last guitar player Dan quit because he just wasn’t feeling it anymore. He said he was touring with us for five years and he didn’t want to do it anymore, it wasn’t any big deal, and we didn’t hold it against him. We’d rather have him quit the band and do something he wanted to do rather than stay in the band and be miserable and bring everything down. Now we’re about as solid as we’ve ever been. There’s not a lot of people cluttering up the airwaves with their own opinions. We all pretty much think the same way, and we’re all pretty tight knit. I think this lineup will continue for the remainder of the band. I hope at least.
WTL: Do you think you’ll remains as a four-piece from now on?
Vincent: I think so. It’s one of those ting where if need be, we’ll add another guitar player, and it’s only if we’re completely blown away by this one guy and he says “You know what? I really want to be in your band.” It’s like Hatebreed. They stayed as a four-piece forever until they found Frank “3 Guns” because he’s a phenomenal guitar player, and he meshed with the band so well. It’s like they were never a five-piece. We’re so tight together right now that if we added another person, it might muck everything up, or it might take longer to get used to. We’re so used to what we have, that unless someone comes along that we don’t even notice that it’s different, we’ll probably stay the same way. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a four-piece right now because it’s pretty consistent. We’re living up to our records, and the only thing that’s different is that we don’t have leads everywhere, but we really don’t do that anyway.
WTL: Who came up with the idea of “The Acacia Strain TV”?
Vincent: It was our manger that thought of that. We were on tour when they called us and said “We have a good idea! Let’s do some videos!” It was right after the studio update, because they said “We want to do more of this, because we want more of you guys being funny!” It wasn’t really that funny, but it was entertaining for the kids out there… I dunno really… I like to see bands that I’m into doing stuff that they normally wouldn’t do. You see a band, and then you see them on stage, and that’s it, so maybe a little peek into their everyday lives even just joking is a little funny. We also thought it’d be a good way to promote the record and keep people interested in what we have to say, kind of like a hobby.
WTL: I’ve pretty much asked the majority of my serious questions, and I know you can be pretty funny, so I’ve got some silly questions here…
Vincent: Do it!
WTL: I know you’ve been trying to achieve the brown note. Is it one of your goals to make people crap themselves at your show?
Vincent: I would love for this to happen! I watch “Mythbusters”, so I guess they busted the whole “brown note” thing, so it’s not real, which kind of bums me out. At the same time, I till think we can make some kid shit his pants during our set without even using the brown note. I see some of the shit that goes on during our shows, and I’m like “Wow, why aren’t any of these kids shitting?” I see kids with broken noses, gnashes in the heads, broken knees and fingernails gone. Why aren’t any of these kids shitting their pants? That’s all I wanna know. And to anyone reading this, the next time you come to an Acacia Strain show, fucking go to Taco Bell, load up on some triple bean burritos, eat ‘em all, and then drink a bunch of milk! Do it for me! I need to see this happen! I want to be that one band, where at every show people say “Look out! There’s going to be that one kid who shits his pants! At least!” I want it to happen!
WTL: Do you have an addictive problem to energy drinks? You’ve got one in your hand in every camera shot.
Vincent: It’s Monster! Man, it’s just good! It’s a tasty-ass drink! Have you ever tried Monster?
WTL: I actually haven’t tried an energy drink yet.
Vincent: Oh… you’re one of those guys….
WTL: I do have addictive problems though, to caffeine.
Vincent: I don’t think I’m addicted to them, because if you take them away, I’ll still be able to live. I’m not going to need to go into an energy drink clinic or anything like that. But its good! It wakes me up a little bit, and it’s there, so I might as well drink it. I just really enjoy the taste, and I’m sure that’s what alcoholics say too, but I could quit tomorrow man. I swear to god!
WTL: You mentioned in the video that a good person to buy your CD for might be a girl you met on the internet who you thought looked good, but when you met her in person, she was kind of fat. Have you had any experience with that yourself?
Vincent: You know? Well yeah. Uh… I don’t… well you see, I’m not one of those guys that picks up girls on the internet because I’m not a sad looser. I know for a fact that there’s dudes out there, and even girls out there that get their hopes up, that they met this great guy from Tennessee or whatever, and the girl is from fucking Maine, and “Oh my god, I’m going to fly out to Tennessee, and I’m going to meet this girl, and she’s gonna be so hot, and we’re gonna fall in love, and then she’ll move to Tennessee and have babies and we’ll have the perfect life.” Then she gets to Tennessee, 300 pounds, and she doesn’t look anything like her MySpace pictures, and the dude’s just bummed. And that’s what you get dude! That’s what you get for lurking the internet for a girlfriend instead of going to a show, or the mall, or meeting girls in real life. That is what you get! That’s all I have to say. And if you meet a girl like this, you might as well give her a record! As a nice parting gift, you can give her a record and say “You’re fat! See ya!” then she can fly back to Maine and meet some real people instead of doing World Of Warcraft, or MySpace.
WTL: Is there anywhere in the world you’d like to play?
Vincent: I would love to go to Japan. We haven’t been there yet, but we’re working on it. We’re going to Australia in December, which is one of the top three places. The top three places are Japan, Australia, and I want to play in Moscow. There’s so many of these bands doing world tours now, like HORSE The Band is doing that world tour, and Shipwreck A.D. is doing a world tour where they’re playing in South America and South Africa. I’m pretty sure it’s feasible, and we’re trying to work on it. We were just talking to some dudes in Brazil and Japan. I’m pretty excited. I don’t want to play in Antarctica, but I’d love to play in Hawaii, because that’s one of the two fifty states I’ve never been too. The other one is Alaska, but I never really want to go to Alaska because it’s fucking, who cares? And I’m sorry to anyone who’s reading this who’s from Alaska. We’ll make it there eventually. Don’t hold your breath though…
Tell 36 Crazyfists to bring us to Alaska, and we’ll go.
WTL: Darkest Hour actually has a couple of shows set up there.
Vincent: I saw that! They should bring us!
WTL: I’ve heard other crazy stuff, like bands playing in Greenland.
Vincent: Really?!
WTL: The way they do it, is they set up 24-hour layover where their flight stops in Greenland, and they’ll get a show planned all around that.
Vincent: Hatebreed played in Isreal!
WTL: Whoa!
Vincent: We were on tour with Hatebreed last year in England, and in between our UK tour and the US tour, Hatebreed flew to Israel to play in Tel Aviv, and I guess it was the scariest thing they’ve ever done. There’s fucking twelve-year-old kids with machine guns.
WTL: What’s the metal scene like in some of those middle eastern countries? I’ve heard if you talk about heavy metal in some of those paces, you’ll be in serious trouble.
Vincent: I have no idea, and I’m not in any hurry to find out. We’ve never been to Israel, but if we did, I would acquire some government issued bodyguard, because I’m not really down with any of the shit that’s going on over there. At all.
This is kind of a funny story, sort of off-kilter, but I saw message board thread where someone posted “I’m from Georgia, and I’ve heard that there’s some Russians around. Should I be worried?”, and someone else posted “Are you from the state of Georgia, or the country of Georgia?” and he said “I’m from Atlanta.” “No! The Georgia that’s under attack by Russia is on the other side of the world. You are an idiot.” I don’t think I’d ever want to play Georgia either.
WTL: Some of those European counties are pretty scary. Immolation told me a story about how they drove through the Ukraine, and Vader said you’re not supposed to do that, you’re supposed to just fly where you need to go in the Ukraine.
Vincent: I’m not in any hurry to play in an eastern European warzone. I don’t want to go to Turkey. We don’t need to go to Bosnia, ever. Any war torn country, we don’t need to be there.
We did play Slovakia, and that’s like central Europe, and we were like “Wow. This is where ‘Hostel’ was filmed. Not excited to be here.” but it was a good show, and we had a good time. We were just scared shitless the whole time that we were going to get kidnapped or murdered.
WTL: How do people treat shows like that over there? Did the audience know who you were?
Vincent: No, it’s one of those things where we were the second American band ever to play that venue, so kids were like “What? An American band playing this show? I’ll go see it even though I don’t know who the fuck this is.” and what’s cool about kids out there as opposed to kids out here, is that hardcore kids and metal kids will stay at a show the entire time, even though they haven’t heard of the headlining band, because lo and behold, they’ll probably like the headlining bands. Kids around here are like “Who? I’ve never heard of that fucking band. I’m leaving. I just came for one band! I paid fifteen bucks for thirty minutes and a t-shirt, and I’m out.” instead of sticking around the entire show and having a good time, and maybe listening to some new music that they’d probably like, they’re going to take off and be ignorant. In Europe, everyone stays for the whole thing. They get there before doors, and they stay until after doors, which is cool. The European tour was definitely good for us because we played a lot of places where we were the second or third American band to play in that area, so people are like “Oh cool! There’s actually music happening here?” then they come in and say “Youguysweresofuckingawesomethatimbuyingyourcdandatshirt!”
We’re at the point right now where we can take some time off from America and Canada and tell our booking agent “Hey! How about since we have this down time, let’s play… fucking… Iceland! Let’s play India!” so he’ll check and see if he knows anyone in India, and lo and behold! But it’s getting to the point where we need to branch out, because we’ve played America so many fucking times. It’s not that kids are getting sick of seeing us, we’re just getting sick of seeing the same places over and over again. We’ll always tour America, but we won’t always be able to play in paces like Chile or Uganda. I love to see the world. It’s one of the perks of being a band, where you can legitimately say “I’m going to Saudi Arabia!” “Why, are you in the army?” “No! I’m in a band, and I’m going to play in front of three kids that give a shit!”, but it’s those three kids that’ll tell three friends and they’ll tell three friends, and then later on on, people will say “We love you! You have a huge following in Saudi Arabia! Kudos!”
The future is wide, and music is international, and it’s not like there’s guidelines, unless you’re in Cuba, or communist China, but in most places, there’s no guidelines to what you can or cannot listen. With the internet the way it is, kids can go on the computer on MySpace and type in “asshole” and find seventeen bands that they love. I’m pretty sure music will be the international language of “Hey! Let’s hang out!”
WTL:Who would you like to tour with who’s both feasible but not obvious?
Vincent: Hmm… that’s a good question. So you’re talking about a genre bending tour basically? I want to tour with a band that’s the exact opposite of what we are. I want to tour with a band that’s like fucking poppy with choruses, and happy, singing about flowers. If Blink 182 did a reunion tour, I would be psyched to do that tour! Even though we would go over like a bag of dicks! Everybody would be like “What the fuck?! Get this band off the stage!” We’d play for only fifteen minutes a day, we’d sell no merch and only make $100 a day, but I wouldn’t even care, because I know there’d be one kid in the crowd thinking “Why am I listening to Blink 182? There’s actually music out there that’s original and saying something?” instead of “Oh man! I’m 14 and I just broke up with my girlfriend! I’m so bummed I’m so bummed that I’m gonna put lipstick on!” I’d love to tour with a band that sings about ridiculous shit in a poppy way.
My girlfriend listens to some of the worst music I’ve ever heard. She likes good music, but she also likes terrible music, and I found out through her, that the singer of Metro Station, who is the son of Billy Ray Cyrus, who is Hanna Montannas brother is into The Acacia Strain! He was wearing our t-shirt in People magazine, in all these pictures! When I heard about that, I said “What the fuck is Metro Station, and who the fuck is Hanna Monatana? What the hell is going on?” and my girlfriend shows me because she has those “Now!” compilation CDs.
These guys are like, if Good Charlotte shoved cotton candy up their asses or something, that’s the kind of band Metro Station is. So for some reason, my manager got it into her head it would be a great idea for me and her and my girlfriend to go to a Metro Station show with Good Charlotte and Boys Like Girls and fucking meet the guitar player Trace Cyrus! The son of Billy Ray Cyrus! I don’t know if you know this, but Billy Ray Cyrus wrote “Achy Breaky Heart”, and that’s fucking disgusting! And he has a son in a band that’s worse than “Achy Breaky Heart”! So they got it into their brain to go meet this guy, and I met him, and he’s like 19, and he’s a good kid and whatever. I’m not sure if he likes bands for the right reasons… but I have to be proud that there’s people like him doing so much for us, because he’s been in People, and who cares… They’re the worst band I’ve ever seen! I actually wanted to leave the show, and I got in for free! I didn’t want to see that band, I didn’t want to be there, I’d rather be home watching TV, I don’t want to meet this guy, and I’m so pissed off. I was mad at my girlfriend and my manager, and I was mad at anybody that was there at this sold out show in an arena. Thousands and thousands and thousands of these pre-teen girls screaming at the top of their lungs. I felt like I was in Beatle mania or something. I wanted to die! So, maybe we’ll tour with Metro Station! Maybe we’ll be the sleeper hit of the summer! Metro Station and The Acacia Strain on tour!
The only reason I would do that is so I can spit in little girls faces who are thinking “Oh my god! I can’t wait to see Metro Station!”, and then these four fucking ugly dudes get on stage in all black screaming about god-knows-what, with a singer who looks like Adam Sandler, who jumps over the barricade and spits in a little girls face, and she’s bummed out, and her life is ruined because she doesn’t get to meet Trace Cyrus. Maybe he has AIDS. Who knows! That’s what I want to do! I want to ruin someones fucking life on that tour! And I would do it every single night, and I’d be happy. I would give a shit if zero people out of ten thousand like us. If our fans are bummed that we’re touring with Metro Station, they’ll read this interview, and they’ll understand why The Acacia Strain is touring with a shitty band, and our fans would pay thirty bucks to watch me, Vincent ruin somebodies life.
WTL: Would Trace laugh this interview off if he reads it?
Vincent: Most definitely! I don’t think he even gives a shit honestly. His dad is Billy Ray Cyrus dude! His sister is Hanna Montana! He has it made! Who cares if some peasant singer from some shitty band who’s t-shirt he found in a bargain bin in Hot Topic, who cares what I think? I don’t care what I think! If he takes this interview seriously, if he reads this and says “Damn, that guys a dick!” he is wrong! I am a nice guy! This I funny shit I’m saying right now! And I think Metro Station should take us on tour!
WTL: I know you’re going to go to town on this one - have you ever lied to anyone about what your band name means?
Vincent: Oh my god! If you ask me what my band name means, I will never talk to you again!
WTL: I already know what it means!
Vincent: That’s because you use your resources! I’ve answered that question so many times, and there’s got to be something somewhere that these people can go and find out what The Acacia Strain means. So I just lie now. I either say there’s no way in hell that I’m answering that question, or I tell them the biggest fucking lie, like the Acacia family circus had a big act, which was the high-flying flaming trapeze, and one of them died, and now there’s a curse on all circuses, and that’s the “strain”. It’s such a feasible story, and I tell it with such unguarded accuracy that people will believe it. As long as I don’t hesitate, who cares?
Somebody asked me if we were a Christian band, because apparently somebody said that Jesus Christ was crowned with a crown of thorns from the acacia tree. You think that I’m that fucking smart that I can leaf through the bible? It probably doesn’t even say that in the bible! It’s probably made up, like everything else in the bible.
The internet is an amazing tool. Some people use it for the wrong reasons, like trying to find girls, or midget porn - well, midget porn IS awesome. You have this tool, this infinite tool of vast knowledge at your fingertips, and you’re annoying me with the same question that fifteen million other people are annoying me with, “What does your band name mean?”
I dunno if “Ask Jesus” still exists, but if it does, ask him “What does The Acacia Strain mean?” and about seventy interviews will probably come up with me explaining it. Use your resources! There’s probably an encyclopedia that tells you what an acacia is, and you can probably figure out what the word “strain” means, so it’s not that hard. Use your resources people!
WTL: Have you ever lied about who you are?
Vincent: All the time! We’ve learned that if we tell the truth, people won’t believe us, because they go “What? I’ve never heard of you guys.” so we tell people we’re Killswitch Engage, and that our black singer is in the van! We use Hatebreed more than anything because people go “I think I’ve heard of you guys before.” Sometimes I’ll use band names that aren’t even real, like “beach ball”, because everybody knows what a beach ball is, but everybody goes “What? Huh? Beach what?”, then I’ll repeat it, and they’ll say “Ok, cool.” Sometimes we just lie because we want to get people off our backs and not have a conversation about the pronunciation of our band name. Even with the word ”beach ball” people ask “What the fuck did you say?”
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