ION INDIE MAGAZINE April 2015, Volume 11 | Page 75

RL: Well, it’s a smart business idea. We’re trying to make it as a band these days. I mean, we have a great music scene but it’s
not so thriving to where you can put trust in other people to build successful shows for you. These days, as much as you love
doing what you want to do for free, I mean, you gotta make something to be able to give something without going broke, it not
like we’re making triple figures so…we just have a good strategy from all of us doing it for years. We went with it and it’s working
out great for us.
ION: What is your ultimate goal?
TB: I would say the ultimate goal is to take it as far as we can take it and I think we’ll be happy with whatever that winds up
being. We’re having a great time. I think we’re putting out high quality music that people want to hear. As long as people keep
wanting to hear it, we’ll probably keep doing it.
RL: My view on it is, in five or ten years, as long as we've gone as far as we've can and know we've put the effort into
it, it doesn't matter where we are as long as we know we've tried our best. That’s all that really matters.
TB: Yeah.
RL: Obviously, just even small accomplishments. Like Robby wants to open for MEGADETH…that would be a massive thing for
him. Even doing a two week run down the east coast would be cool, but we have responsibilities here. The music industry doesn't pay enough to live a stable life while you’re doing it, unless you don’t want to be home at all.
ION: Right.
RL: So the ultimate goal is, we’d love to make it, but we’d have to do it on our terms to be successful with it.
TB: I think no matter how big we get we’d have to probably stay DIY.
SK: It’s not to say bands that go that route aren’t successful or can’t make a living. Bands like CLUTCH, for instance, they've been doing it DIY from the get go--they’ve been doing it for twenty five years. They run their own record label
now, they put out their own music, they book their own tours. Clutch may not be a household name, but your run of the mill
Rock and Roll fan will know who Clutch is. They've been playing these shows at for the last two decades--whether you were
there to see them or not. That’s just the kind of band that they are. They go, they play, they make their money playing, they put
it right back into the machine. They sign new bands, they're
putting music out themselves. For me, if I can travel, get the
band out of the area, which is the right direction for me. If we
can sustain it long enough to where it's its own running machine, which I think we have a good start with these shows.
We’re able to pay the bands and we’re able to establish a rapport with the clubs we’re working with to make these shows
successful. I think that's a step in the right direction to be a
sustainable band.
RL: It comes back to--you have to treat it like a business if you
want to stay alive.
Robby Warren (guitar): We're all about staying alive.
ION: What is your idea of the perfect show?
TB: If it's a show we’re doing, pretty much every show we’ve done so far. I mean we’ve hand-picked high quality Metal bands
from our area and the surrounding areas to come and play and when we put a show together we’re putting it together for our
crowd specifically. People that are going to get into us are going to like these other bands we bring in--and I mean every show