by Morgan Y. Evans
LINKS:
This is a real band that is a live force, something no one can ever take away from them. They have proved time and again, to paraphrase a live Rollins Band album that “The Only Way to Know For Sure” in this digital day and age, whether a band is really that good or not is to see them live. That said, after more than a decade, these bastards have never released a live DVD. Talk about a band overdue!
Thankfully, September 2nd, 2008 sees the release of Live Dominance, a fucking DVD that has some of the hands down best fist-pumping, straight adrenaline shooting up, balls out hardcore/metal crowd whipped up to a frenzy of passion footage you will ever see. It also features a band at a plateau, not so much cresting as having reached a point where they encapsulate all they have been and are true battle scarred professionals. It is, in other words, a perfect time for them to release this DVD (out on Koch Records, home of OTEP, among others). To make it even better, the footage was shot at Harpo’s in Detroit, a several thousand capacity venue that has a layout ideal for capturing some of the most devoted band and crowd interaction ever captured on camera.
Always fan friendly, Hatebreed have been debuting preview footage one song at a time in the weeks leading up to the release on MTV, with clips like “This Is Now” and “Live For This” getting diehards salivating and doubtlessly even converting the few who somehow live in a box. In addition, they have even signed copy after copy of the DVD so that every single one sold on their DVD release-coinciding East Coast tour will be autographed by the band. (That’s a lot of fucking autographs!)
I talked to Hatebreed’s drummer Matt Byrne, a guy whose demeanor and playing style perfectly suit the band, about the task of releasing something that is a live document for viewers forever capturing a band most known for their (and I have to use this word because it is really 100% suitable, let’s face it) DOMINATING live presence and dedication. The excitement and honesty says it all.
MORGAN Y. EVANS: Congrats on the DVD. It’s really fucking sick. I feel lucky I got to chill with it before other people. [laughing]
MATT BYRNE: We are really excited about it. Thanks, man.
MYE: It must feel amazing to have it for the fans after all these years of them supporting you. Were you nervous at all? It’s a real document to be remembered by as evidence of the live show. There’s obviously other evidence over the years, but this is a big release. The confidence of the band is huge after touring all these years, but was it hard to pick songs? You want it to come out great.
Matt Byrne
MB: Um…yeah, I mean, we were nervous but we didn’t really mull it over much. We pretty much went out and did the set that we do every night and have been doing on the last record cycle. It wasn’t really “Oh yeah, we gotta be sure we do this song or this song.” We play almost every song we have anyway. We really just went out and did it and made it so it was just another day for us, y’know?
MYE: There’s a good range from all the albums anyway. Old favorites are on there but it’s cool ‘cuz even the “non-singles” from the band really mean something to fans. It’s just that type of a band.
MB: Yeah, especially, like, a lot of the older tunes off Satisfaction Is The Death Of Desire, a lot of newer cats don’t know the songs, so we try to do an even mix. We still switch our set up a little bit every night. Obviously we keep the heavy hitters in there and just make sure every night that we have a nice array.
MYE: Yeah, like “Empty Promises” and stuff. There’s a lot of songs on the DVD and usually on your albums, too. It is cool ‘cuz Hatebreed is not really a “filler” band. The songs are not super long but kind of do what they need to do and are a short punch.
MB: That’s exactly it. Every song is brutal and powerful. We don’t have those lull songs in our set, low points. We don’t have any fillers.
MYE: It’s funny. One thing I’ve noticed about Hatebreed is sometimes songs seem longer because of how much energy is in them, but then you look and think, “ Holy Shit! That was only two minutes and ten seconds!”
MB: Especially a lot of the older stuff ‘cuz it was written with the formula of fast part/breakdown/fast part/breakdown/over. As we’ve grown as a band and gotten better as players and stuff, we’ve become more metal, where the earlier stuff was straight hardcore. As we’ve grown as a band we’ve become more metal and tried more mid-tempo stuff, and y’know, it’s gotten a little more complicated. We’re not a band where you hear our songs and don’t know what’s going on or it’s hard to grasp.
MYE: It’s cool, and you still have stuff like “Hollow Ground”, which I think is one of the best parts of the DVD, which has the crazy held out feedback beginning and Jasta shouts the lyrics “From nothing we have risen and from nothing we still rise”. The lyric really fit the DVD, seeing this huge crowd in Detroit where there is economic hardship and knowing how far Hatebreed has come as a band to get to that stage.
MB: Yeah, I know. Even when we were writing that song we wanted to do a tune that had that feel of, y’know, Biohazard back in the day playing L’amour to a sold out crowd. This energy and power and anthem type of chant going. That’s how that song came about, so Biohazard being from New York City, you have Detroit, another huge metropolis, and to do that song there has the same effect.
MYE: It’s awesome. The DVD is overwhelming evidence, starting out with the drum risers and then seeing this, just…HUGE crowd..it’s like, “Oh, shiiiit!!!” I was gonna ask how you chose the club Harpo’s but the DVD proves it was a perfect location.
MB: It’s perfect. The set up of the club, it’s really cool, too. That club is one of the last clubs in America that has those dance floors that light up, the old disco dance floors that light different colors. You can’t really see it in the DVD ‘cuz there’s so many people there but, that just shows the layout of the place. It’s huge with the pit down in front and then there’s a level on top with a pit there and a bar area. It holds about 2,500 people and we had it completely sold out. We did a cheaper ticket so anyone and everyone could get in, no problem.
Chris Beattie
MB: It was maniacal, man. The DVD really starts out with a nice build up. It really builds the suspense with us coming out of the dressing room and then the pan over the stage. As we go into “This Is Now” it sets the tone for the whole thing. The crowd just explodes immediately and I think the DVD is a great representation of what a Hatebreed show is. Bare bones, that’s it, man. BOOM! Pure energy and chaos and it’s just really exciting.
MYE: It’s awesome. I’ve seen you guys a
number of times over the years and it is always a good show, but the DVD
is great evidence that hardcore is a viable force in people’s lives,
and also how you treat the fans and shit. You’ve debuted four live
clips from the DVD as teasers on MTV and had free downloads of audio from
the release for fans on your official Myspace site. The audio even sounds
killer with no visuals.
MB: Yeah, yeah. It’s a big thing for us. It’s such a big event in the band’s career, our first ever DVD, so we really wanted to make a huge deal of it and really offer the fans pieces of it to really get them psyched up for free. “Here! This is for you guys! This is why we do this!” There’s great fan footage on it ‘cuz we are all about our fans. Anyone who is a Hatebreed fan from the past or younger guys just getting into us can really see where we come from and what type of band we really are.
MYE: I love the crowd fist pumps on “To The Threshold”. That’s probably my favorite on the DVD, because of that shot of Jamey leaning over the crowd off a speaker is so sick as the song starts and then “Destroy Everything” too, all those fists going gives you goose bumps.
MB: Yeah, there’s a couple songs, obviously, but the entire place was singing the words and that is so cool. They were louder than the band.
MYE: Yeah, man. You guys are the new Beatles. Soon you’ll have young girls peeing in the aisles.
MB: [laughing] I’m waiting for that, man. That’ll be cool.
MYE: Dude, the “Doomsayer” pit is frightening. That was insane! I really think, and the DVD underscores this further that now that Pantera is over, you guys really have the craziest pits going. I can’t think of many that are up there with you besides like Lamb Of God, Slipknot and Slayer, that’s pretty much it…but I think you guys still take the cake these days.
MB: I’m pretty surprised at the energy we instill in the crowd. People get whipped up and it’s like they are almost hypnotized with rage, but it’s obviously also positive. I’m almost surprised, because as you are watching the DVD there is such a fury going on down in front but not one person got hurt that night.
MYE: Well, it’s cool because even with the wildest crowds, you come from a hardcore background and there’s a good message. It’s morale boosting and confidence boosting and about striving. You always have people go really nuts, but you hear Jasta say, “Oh, pick that guy up.” Or if people come see you they know parts of the pit are gonna be insane but this is how you’re supposed to act.
MB: All in all it has always been really self-regulating. We’ve found that obviously every club needs to have security and barricades and stuff. It’s an insane type of music, but we’ve found that some clubs, it gets bad when security gets involved. When they stay out of it, everyone in there mostly knows how to handle their business.
MYE: Yeah, if there is a real asshole other people take care of them pretty fast.
MB: Yeah, it happens all the time. You get that one dickhead or group of dickheads that are in there and punching people on purpose or flashing the nazi sign for some crazy reason. Confused people that don’t know what the show is about. The crowd takes care of them.
MYE: Yeah. In other live news, and speaking of Pantera, you guys worked with Vinnie Paul recently?
MB: Yeah, after the last Jagermeister tour where we toured with Type O Negative back in May-July, we recorded a live album in Dallas at the Palladium. He’s in the process now of mixing that whole thing and it’ll be out some time next year. Not sure of the title yet. Probably just Live In Dallas. We’re really psyched about it and have known him a while and are all obviously fans of Pantera, and it was a pleasure to tour with Vinnie and Dimebag when they were in Damageplan. We’ve built up a real friendship with him, and it just seemed like a great idea to have him be part of another milestone in the Hatebreed career. What a great guy and great player and great name in music to have involved in that type of project for us, you know?
MYE: Hell yeah. Definitely. Is the set significantly different from the DVD?
MB: Yeah. A lot of the same songs are on there, and it is a different order, but we throw in a newer song on that set. I’m sure there’s a few songs that aren’t on the DVD, but for the most part our heavy hitters, what we call heavy hitters, are our staples, and they are all on there.
MB: We haven’t really dug in on a new album yet.
This year, we’ve had the DVD thing going and have been busy with
projects. We split with Roadrunner Records, so right now we’re kind
of doing our own thing. We signed this three project deal with Koch Records
and that’s been taking up a lot of time. We only did a couple of
tours this year so people could focus on other things, be it writing with
other guys or doing whatever, you know? Kind of getting out of Hatebreed
mode. We haven’t really started charging ahead on a new album. “Pollution
Of The Soul” was a track we wrote during the Supremacy
sessions that didn’t make it. I think it was a B-side, maybe in
Japan or something. We didn’t really do anything with it and that’s
definitely going to be on the new record. It’s been two years since
Supremacy and we needed to put something out. It’s time
for something new, so we gave it to the fans. It was a fitting song. It’s
great but didn’t make the last record. We knew the fans would dig
it and there’s been a great response. We did it live at a show in
Europe and fans are digging it.
Jamey Jasta
MYE: You have a covers record planned coming up, though, as well, sooner than a full length. It’s called For The Lions, right?
MB: Yep. That’s part of the Koch deal. The DVD, Live album and covers album, For The Lions will be out Oct. 28th.
MYE: I heard you’re doing a Misfits song. C’mon, is it “Hatebreeders” or what?
MB: [laughing] Well, I won’t spoil anything. The cover album was something we did for fun during preproduction for Supremacy. We did a cover for fun and that rolled into doing twenty. It was two weeks messing around in a small studio and next thing you know we had twenty covers done and it was like, “Wow! What are we doing?!” It was just fun for us and sure enough we put it together. I’m not sure how many will make the album, but the public will get to hear it. It’s our take on some old school New York City hardcore songs and other stuff.
MYE: I heard you have Judge on there and Agnostic Front.
MB: Cromags, Negative Approach and some metal, too. Stuff we looked up to and respected growing up and were fans of overall. It’s our tribute to them from the stuff we loved back in the day. It’s a nice treat for the fans.
MYE: It’s fun, and even when Guns’N’Roses did it they still taught some people about the Misfits, even if it wasn’t the best G’N’R album. [laughing]
MB: Yeah, yeah.
MYE: I’m sure your Misfits version will be better than that. [laughing]
MB: Yeah, yeah. [laughing]
MYE: Back me up on this. After Danzig left the Misfits, why did they write a song called “I Wanna Be A New York Ranger”? First off, they are from New Jersey, home of the Devils. Wouldn’t a Devil be more appropriate for the Misfits thematically than a Ranger anyway? Danzig must’ve been pissed. Shit, I was pissed!
MB: You’d think, right? [laughing]
MYE: How much did you have to pay the camera guys to get down in the pit at the Harpo’s show for the DVD?
MB: We didn’t have to tip anybody out. They were just psyched to do it. I think there was at least one guy, maybe two, who did all that in the pit footage, and he’s credited as the “Pit Cam”. I don’t even remember what he looks like, but I saw him and said “Good luck buddy”. [laughing]
Sean Martin
MB: My fingers are crossed for ya.
MYE: You guys autographed every copy of this DVD to
be sold on tour. Did you really autograph them all? You guys
didn’t pay your girlfriends to sign some of them?
MB: No, man. We just finished autographing them on Friday.
It was for real. I did my part and signed every one of those damn things.
It was legit. Nothing is forged.
MYE: If you aren’t going to get arthritis from drumming you might as well from signing.
MB: It’s all for the kids, man. [laughing]
MYE: Well, it’s an awesome fucking DVD, and I hope you guys hit number one with it.
MB: Thanks, man. We have a lot of fans who’ve been waiting a long time for this, and I think it’s gonna do really well. I am excited for everyone to see it.
MYE: It’s got the road karma for all to see.
MB: It really does capture the experience.
