Prior to ALL THAT REMAINS's performance in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on April 3, vocalist Phil Labonte spoke with Cameron Buchholtz of the city's radio station 100.5 The KATT. The full conversation can be streamed below. A few excerpts follow (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET). On new guitarist Jason Richardson: Phil: "He's a phenomenal guitar player. When it comes to his ability to play the stuff, there's no question — he is one of the best guitar players that's going right now. I don't imagine that there's anything we've done historically that he can't play, and people are reacting to him really, really well. There's always a question when someone like Oli [Herbert, the band's late guitarist] either leaves or something happens, where they're no longer with the band, if the band can go on without such an integral member. That was a question we were struggling with ourselves for a little while, and then when Jason came to fill in and then ended up joining the band, it was pretty obvious very quickly that we didn't have to worry about whether or not we had someone that could do justice to the stuff that Oli had written and the performance that Oli would put on every night." On whether there's any unreleased ALL THAT REMAINS material featuring Herbert: Phil: "There's some other songs that didn't make it to 'Victim [Of The New Disease]', so it's possible that people will hear other stuff from the 'Victim' sessions. The label has them, so we'll see what they decide they want to do. We felt like the 10 songs that made it on to 'Victim', we were, like, 'These are the ones that make the most sense for us to put as a collection of songs.' There's no other, like, hidden riffs or anything like that, so anything that we write for the next record that we do, that will be something that I imagine will be heavily influenced [by] and there will be heavy contributions from Jason Richardson." On whether he's able to tell a difference between longtime and newer fans: Phil: "You can tell the people that have been into the band for a while. Newer fans, they usually tend to not be as familiar with songs like 'Six' off of 'The Fall Of Ideals'. The old fans, you can tell real quick — within the first couple seconds of 'Six' or 'Not Alone', you can see the eyes light up, so you can get an idea." On the band's ability to play with a diverse range of other metal groups: Phil: "ALL THAT REMAINS is a band that can go on tour with FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH and play a set where I don't really scream at all, or we could go on tour with an underground band and we could play a full set where I don't sing at all, or maybe just a few choruses. We've always been the kind of band that tries to make sure that what our songs on our records represent is the different stuff that we like. We like a lot of different things — we did a country cover on our last record — but we've always been able to really mix up what we do. And we want to tour with bands that don't sound just like us. Everyone that is a fan of ALL THAT REMAINS has heard KILLSWITCH ENGAGE, so for us to go out with bands like that — metalcore bands — all the time, to us, it doesn't really make sense. Not that we don't like going out with those guys — we love the guys in KILLSWITCH, and we're talking about some stuff later this year that might include other bands that are from our area [New England], that are in that metalcore scene. But it's not something that we try to do all the time. If you look at band like LACUNA COIL — we've toured together in the past, and they're a very, very different style of band. We've toured with VOLBEAT. We've toured with ALL SHALL PERISH. We can tailor our sets to fit with multiple different kinds of rock acts, and that's what we like to do." "Victim Of The New Disease" — the group's final album to feature Herbert, who died in October — was released on November 9 via Fearless in North America and Eleven Seven in Europe. ALL THAT REMAINS will kick off an American tour that also features UNEARTH, BIG STORY and THE 9TH PLANET OUT on May 30 in Amityville, New York.
Continue reading...
Continue reading...
