by Morgan Y. Evans
LINKS:
New Hampshire's Trap Them had a lot of expectation to live up to with their second full-length. The riotous sounds of the group's Trash Art debut Sleepwell Deconstructor turned heads across the world at impossible angles and was a strong jolt of adrenaline, the likes of which is occasionally needed in the underground scene when it starts to wane in energy or attitude. Then, the 2007 Seance Prime EP that was their Deathwish debut was touted as their heaviest moment yet, which only stoked further the fires of anticipation for a second full-length record from the band. D-beat grindcore, crust punk influences and death metal collide in a war zone of concepts and catharsis that somehow isn't overdone or exhausting, even at the band's most fever pitched. It makes for a quite addicting experience that rattles windows and kicks down doors.
Now, everyone's heard of the dreaded "sophomore slump". It remains to music something akin to what "The Curse" used to be to baseball before the Yankees screwed up a few years ago and blew it with the pressure on. Although I still have theories that first baseman Tony Clark was a Red Sox plant/mole in the Yankees organization because he had previously been on Boston's payroll and seemed to fuck up nearly every time dudes were on base and it mattered for The Yankees in the 2004 ALCS against the Red Sox. John Olerud never would've done that if he hadn't gotten his fucking foot injured and been replaced by Clark. Then look at 2005 where Clark suddenly kicks more ass than ever before once he was playing for the Diamondbacks instead of the Yanks. Sigh. But I digress... It's too early in the article for this kind of conspiracy ranting and most of the bands you'll be reading about in this piece are from New England! But let me add quick, so that I don't get beat up if I go to the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival this April, I don't hate Boston as a city. I'm just a longtime New York Sports fan. My dad fished once with Boston's great Ted Williams back in the day when he worked for Sports Illustrated, suckers... and I gotta admit David Ortiz makes a mean salsa.
ANYWAY!!!... The difference between a curse and a slump is that "The Sophomore Slump" is an ailment that can strike any band or artist in the music business, whereas "The Curse" in baseball applied only to the Red Sox shitty karma for treating Babe Ruth badly back in the day. A curse in general is usually deserved. Most old Italian women giving the evil eye didn't just do it to curdle just anybody's milk! A sophomore slump is much easier to ward off or avoid than a full blown curse of the category mentioned above. An extreme example, sure, but if you mess up and put out a crappy second album, it can be just as bad of an albatross if not worse, uprooting many people's musical careers before they can plant themselves securely in the rock world's terra firma. The trick is to be smart and true to the band's spirit. (Think Nirvana's In Utero, though I guess that was technically their third album for the true fans who count Bleach as Nirvana's real debut.)
Trap Them are lucky in that not only have they avoided the feared sophomore slump, they've gone ahead and slaughtered all expectations! Their monumental new punk record, Seizures In Barren Praise, (on Jacob Bannon of the increasingly untouchable, *sigh*, Boston band Converge's Deathwish, Inc. label) is truly a moment for hardcore. These guys are punk devotees of the Black Flag variety, true warriors of noise, depth, attitude and especially work ethic. I hear lots and lots of heavy bands on a regular basis, and the noise level shock of most bands has long worn off. Still, every once in awhile a punk or metal band's spirit just cries out of the speakers and grabs you by the throat—like when I first heard "White Tar" by The Bronx or more recently,"The World Beyond" by Abigail Williams. Trap Them are that type of band, genuine and sincere in a way that shows. I dare you to say otherwise.
The members of Trap Them aren't green to music. Trap Them began as a side project for Ryan McKenney (singer of Backstabbers, Inc.) and Brian Izzi (guitarist of December Wolves) in 2001 while Izzi was beginning his stint as second guitarist for Backstabbers, Inc. Since those days the band has become a full blown force in it's own right, more than a side project and even giving life to a whole world of it's own in the form of the fictional town of Barren Praise that Trap Them's songs detail. Since "Day One: Insomiawesome" on Sleepwell Deconstructor, McKenney has hacked, slashed, revised and hinted at his tale in a cut-up fashion William S. Burroughs would be proud of. By all accounts, he doesn't allow any limitations on his lyrics, with songs constantly evolving live and even on paper, well past the point when many bands would consider them written in stone. More than post-modern, it's a method of living, breathing and growing with your art while still leaving the conceptual tale and the songs open enough for fans to include their own takes and perspectives on things. One thing is for sure though, the town of Barren Praise seems rife with struggle and bloody pathos.
The cover artwork for Seizures In Barren Praise, (provided by the always popular as a visual artist Jacob Bannon), really synchs up with the band’s near apocalyptic riffing. Bannon has crafted some of the best punk and metal covers in recent memory, from Poison The Well's new-school classic The Opposite Of December to As I Lay Dying's crushing Frail Words Collapse, but Bannon truly goes the extra mile for the bands on his Deathwish label. The bleak Trap Them cover, of cherubs struggling amidst wreckage around a ruined skull, speaks of strain and gravity. It also really fits Ryan's lyrics from Trap Them's "Fucking Viva" song where he hollers "The Commandments we sift throughout the ashened books are the empty scripts of those that will fuck us hard and fuck us well." Few of the holier-than-though types out there ever live up to the tenets they profess to care about. You can often find more family, morality and "golden rule" type behavior in some hardcore bands! At least in hardcore you know when the fists are flying at you. Deathwish, Inc. is a perfect home for Trap Them in that like most of the bands on the roster, they don't opt for the easy way out.
Have no doubts, this album burns. The addition of Mike Justian on drums (Unearth, Shai Hulud) is just plain brutal, and the stringed instruments are vicious. "Day Nineteen: Fucking Viva" opens the record with a vicious squall that picks up speed and roars the album's living pulse into the listener's ears. The low frequencies of the band's Entombed endebted "buzz-saw" guitar sound just demolishing everything in sight from the start. Trap Them share a quality with label mates Pulling Teeth in that songs can stand alone as brief examinations of anger but flow together in an album format really well, burying the listener deep into the ferocious territory explored. The ten songs on Barren Praise go by in a rapid whirlwind and before you know it you're halfway into the record again. It's a heavy trip but one you won't want to stop taking if you crave real rock and roll.
The following is my exchange with vocalist and whirling dervish Ryan J. McKenney.
MORGAN Y. EVANS: Ryan, I love the album title Seizures In
Barren Praise. Of course, Barren Praise is a fictional town and concept
in this continuing story you're telling musically. Could you tell us a
little more about it? The word "seizures" is so cool in the
title though. It evokes "quiet lives of desperation" or people
kind of fighting through life and convulsing their way through it trying
their best to fly, so to speak. I am obsessed with the idea of Ghost Towns
or even populated towns that under-cut their potential and fall into downward
spirals from either drugs or economic misery or whatever. I wrote a novel
with a fake city archetype somewhere in the U.S. and the city was called
"Desolate". That's a pretty obvious name but Barren Praise is
a great city name also, like false promises or empty words, it seems.
RYAN J. MCKENNEY: That was the attempt. Growing up in a smaller town in this country, I'm able to identify with the everyday lives that are lived in these places. They sort of exist everywhere, it's just a matter of taking bits and pieces of any situation and being able to infuse them into the story at hand. Barren Praise is my Oz, a place where whatever I want to happen can happen, and it can be explained with as much crypticism or honesty as I consider acceptable.
MYE: "Day Twenty Four: Gutterbomb Heaven On The Grid" is the real stand-out of the record for me as a listener. I kept repeating it over and over. I love the way the drums just loop into this slow bombardment the band just builds on. I think even more than some of the faster songs it adds this feeling of moody frustration.
RJM: I think we consider it more of a well-constructed interlude. It came together in the studio and was given some life so that there was another song with breathing room to map lyrics and vocals around. We haven't tried to play it in a live atmosphere yet, but I'm looking forward to it.
MYE: How do you manage to play this music on tour without just ripping yourselves in half? The band is so frenetic it seems like it must be exhausting. I also love that you have always had songs of varied lengths but always intense. My friend Vin Alfieri from The Smash Up first got me into you guys when you dropped Sleepwell Deconstructor and Vin was like "Morgan, you gotta check these guys out. It's crazy and short intense scream blasts." I guess you mixed it up more with the Seance Prime EP, which I still haven't heard, but Seizures really blends styles across the hardcore and metal map. "Day Thirty One: Misson Convincers" is so epic and has monster, head nodding riffs. It's cool because the "breakdown" type parts don't feel fucking generic at all.
RJM: The live show for us is cathartic, each and every time. Bones are sometimes broken, and there's usually a little bit of blood from one of us, but it's all welcomed with open arms. We love writing the way we do, and if that means a minute long grind influenced song followed by writing a seven minute dirge, that's fine by me. When we write now, we tend to make songs we enjoy playing in that live atmosphere, where they become a complete body of work and not just a song in a format.
MYE: Deathwish, Inc. is great as a label in that each band really seems to get shown in the perfect context. It's so respectful to all of the art of the groups on the roster. There's some more straight forward hardcore bands on there but also the label really seems founded in an artistic sensibility. I love more "artsy" heavier albums like Jesu's Conqueror (as a non-Deathwish related example) or whatever, and on Deathwish only an idiot would think Converge members projects or some of the stuff you and many of your peers are releasing is generic.
RJM: Yeah, you pretty much said it. They are a label firmly rooted in punk values and ethics. They take very good care of the bands they decide to work with and hold their label to a higher standard of quality, which is commendable. A lot of bands that would have fallen under the radar to the majority of the punk and hardcore community are given life to those unattentive ears. They've made a lot of efforts to help us attain the goals we've set for ourselves, and for that we're extremely thankful we were given the opportunity to work with them.
MYE: I was wondering, Barren Praise as a town/concept really seems to tackle and revolve around issues of poverty and manipulation. Could you expand on this more? What do you think is the essential relationship between hardcore music and poverty? I mean, it is obviously a class war thing, as the music originally came about, or as a means of expression for underdogs. You guys, Blacklisted, Modern Life Is War's Witness record or even a few years back to the American Nightmare/Give Up The Ghost’s albums really explore this "dead town" stuff so well, though. It really helps as inspiration on the most frustrating days when bills are behind or whatever.
RJM: I really don't want to break down the instances I write about in Barren Praise. It has nothing to do with any of the ideas being "secret" or "mysterious" or anything like that. What it comes down to is that I want any reader or listener that comes across these records to be influenced by first read or listen, and from there, be able to create their own personal image of what's being said. My days of being a blunt lyricist are far behind me. If I wanted people to know what I was talking about exactly, I'd make it that way.
MYE: Fair
enough. I was recently reading an advice column by Mike Schleibaum of
the band Darkest Hour and he said something really profound but so basic
to someone who was discouraged about becoming older and not having "made
it" yet. He told the guy it was all about perspective, as even writing
a song can be a victory. What's your take on that topic? Also, what has
kept you guys up and running in the scene during this band or before or
whatever, despite maybe discouraging times?
RJM: I do this band because it's something important
to me. I have two lives—on one hand, I'm married, I have a dog and
we have a nice apartment together. I've built a home life that I love.
On the other hand, I have a restless mind that is always in need of creation
and expression. In that aspect, this band is a necessity, at least for
the time being. Brian and I are older guys that have done this for a while.
This band is the first time we've been given the opportunity of doing
a lot of things, and it's something we'll continue to do until we've had
enough. "Making it" doesn't exist for me. All I care about is
"doing it".
MYE: The band name Trap Them reminds me a little of torture porn movies, I must admit...but on an economic level it makes me think of people feeling trapped in their shitty jobs and not daring to risk looking for something that might make them happier for fear of failure. I guess it comes back to "perspective", but also the hard realities and choices we have to make of what to sacrifice sometimes. It certainly sucks when average people work at Wal-Mart and can only afford to shop there and get roped into that whole lifestyle without ever realizing there are ways to eat healthier and be more culturally savvy or socially aware without breaking the bank. It's like talking in a bubble, no air gets in.
RJM: We all do what we can to get by. Some hustle and some struggle. It's the way it's always been and the way it will always be, so I've come to accept that I'll continue to spit on routine and have it fly right back in my face.
MYE: Well said. Tell me a bit about the album cover Jacob Bannon designed for you guys. Parts of it look like his patented skull-type art but I love the sort of splayed-out religious statues or devils and workers thrown around the packaging. It is very Grapes Of Wrath in some ways or like the figures on the front, the religious ones, could be peoples' hopes and dreams sort of storm-tossed and crashing into the metaphorical rocks of life.
RJM: I think Jake did an outstanding job with the artwork. When we first started working with Deathwish, I had discussed the importance of visuals in this band. When it came time to do the artwork for Seizures, I sent Jake the written lyrics about four months before we were heading into the studio so that he could know where I was coming from. He took the lyrics and the very few suggestions I gave and dove headfirst. When I finally had the chance to see the final product, I was beyond floored. He really did tap into each and every one of the days and created something I'm infinitely proud to be a part of.
MYE: What can you tell us about the lyrical approach to the record and how it builds on the band's pedigree?
RJM: The lyrics are just lyrics. I hate to downplay it like that, but it's true. I've never felt very comfortable writing songs in a verse / chorus way. In fact, I don't really like considering one piece of writing to be given barriers of only one song. I took everything I've ever wanted to do to expand on the lyric writing formulas, and threw it in a blender. My position in this band involves working with words and creating a theme that represents us well, and right now I'm happy with how it's coming out.
MYE: How was it doing a split with the almighty Extreme Noise Terror? And lastly, what are you most looking forward to about 2009?
RJM: ENT is, plain and simple, an iconic band that many of today's extreme groups owe a lot to. We were honored to have the opportunity to share both a record and a tour with them. They are fantastic guys with their punk values and love still intact. In ‘09, I'm looking forward to touring, recording more records and the welcome home brigade that my dog and my wife provide. Basically, I'm looking forward to living the life I'm living.
