Now that the year is coming to a close, what are some of the best memories you have as a band for 2016?
Playing DTE Energy Music Theatre in Clarkston, Michigan with Disturbed and Breaking Benjamin. I went to every Ozzfest as a kid there every year. I always said, “Someday I will play this place,” and we finally did. So yeah, awesome!
The band has been taking a break from touring this year. What have you been working on in the interim?
Writing, writing and more writing. We also did a small headliner run that was a lot of fun, too. This summer we took it easy on the touring to concentrate on the bigger picture, you know? Also it was the first summer we have been home in, literally, years. So it was nice to spend time with the fam and friends for once.
Saint Ridley played some festivals earlier in the year. Does the band prefer to play festivals, be on tour, or play gigs at local venues? What are some of the pros/cons of each and how does the atmosphere influence the way the band performs?
We live to perform. As long as there is a good crowd, we don’t care if it’s a big fest, venue, tour, one off, or small dive – we love it all! We are just happy to watch the crowd get involved.
Last month, you gave your fans a teaser of the new material you’ve been working on by releasing “Blackened Sky” via Soundcloud. There is a noticeable change in the vocal stylings from your previously released albums. What brought about this change and what have you been doing to experiment with your vocals?
To be honest, I gained enough confidence to try new things by constantly being on the road and learning from other musicians. Dez, from Coal Chamber and DevilDriver, has given me a lot of pointers; Richard Patrick has given me a few, as well as Burton C. Bell from Fear Factory. Whenever I can learn from a seasoned vet, I take it in like a sponge.
Has the band done anything differently while working on the material for Saint Ridley’s next album? Have you altered the collaboration process in any way? Did you learn anything from writing and recording Fool or a King that has changed how you’re approaching your new material?
Fool or a King was a weird album to write. In fact, the only other original member is our guitar player, Phil, who was actually originally our drummer. Phil and I pretty much just drank a lot and jammed, just him and I. Nowadays, we have a more professional approach to things: we start out with a chorus, usually, and we stem out from there. Usually, I try to explain a feel of rhythm and Rich amazingly comes us with a killer drum line pretty quickly, followed by a bass line by Nathan, which is always well thought out. Then Phil and I bounce arrangement, layering off each other. From there we add little things like clever pauses or fills and it comes to life. We play the shit out off it until we feel confident and it becomes muscle memory.
The Cubs finally won the World Series. Does this mark a harbinger of doom for the American people, a sign of positive change, or merely prove that persistence pays off?
The sun even shines on a dog’s ass sometimes. I hate the cubs – Tigers all day! Sorry Chi-Town, haha, we still love yah though!
Song writing is a dynamic process that continuously evolves. How does the band determine when a song is finished? Does the band usually know before you ever perform it, or do you perform different versions live to gauge the crowd’s reaction before you record?
We know if a song is done or not by the crowd’s reaction. If they move, we have done our job. I actually have a bad habit of making the guys play new stuff by surprise, haha, and they hate me for it, lmao. If we have a new song we have been sitting on for a while and the crowd conditions are right, I usually say, “Screw it, here’s a new song,” and the guys look at me like they wanna kill me – but it always has turned out great, thank God!
How did Saint Ridley’s current line-up meet? How did you know that they would be the right musicians for the band?
I started SR with Phil in his basement. We had known each other forever already and had jammed in previous bands. Rich and I also have known each other since we were like 16-ish. Rich was this incredible drummer who had an energy that I always had wanted in Saint Ridley. It took me many months of harassment to get him to join. We finally got him when we kicked out our drummer during the Smile Empty Soul tour for drug and alcohol problems. Rich learned quickly and boom, he got the spot. As for Nathan, our bass player, it was our old guitar player David “Texas” Flynn, who vanished into thin fucking air without warning, who introduced us. He tried out and he got the job, which pays like shit, lol. We didn’t make him a full member until he finished his first tour though. You should have seen how scared he was at first, lol. His first show was in Flagstaff in front of a sold out crowd opening up for Coal Chamber. Nathan killed it every night on that tour and he has been a delight to work with ever since.
Paul has mentioned that he has a daughter. Do any of the other band members have children? Do they ever come see the band perform? Are the band’s kids the first ones in the mosh pit and surfing the crowd?
Not that we know of, haha. Paul has a ten year old step-daughter and a two year old daughter of his own, and that’s it for kids. His ten year old never misses a hometown show, that’s for sure.
Richard Simmons, the charismatic creator of Sweatin’ to the Oldies, is known as the Weight Saint. If the real Saint Ridley and the Weight Saint were to have a dance-off to the liturgical music popular during the early 1500s, who would win and what would the winning dance move be called?
Richard Simmons would win in the 7th round with the “Ike Turner Attitude Adjuster,” haha.
What is the band’s New Year’s Resolution for 2017?
Trust our manager, Shawn Barusch, of Music Gallery International. And get our asses back on the road to support our new album.
