Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 972 - King Ultramega's Mark Menghi and Brann Dailor on Honoring Chris Cornell and the Dead Wishes Cover

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 972 - King Ultramega's Mark Menghi and Brann Dailor on Honoring Chris Cornell and the Dead Wishes Cover · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

• 0:00
  And when I got done with my stuff and I heard it back, I was
• 0:03
  like, I, I like that. And like, I was like, I think my
• 0:06
  mom would really love that. So I was definitely excited to
• 0:10
  send it over to Mark and see what they thought.
• 0:13
  He sent an iPhone video from the studio and I don't think he said
• 0:17
  anything. I think it was just a video and
• 0:19
  I played it and I remember I yelled like a four year old,
• 0:22
  like, yeah. We are not here talking about
• 0:32
  the NFL draft. What's up everybody?
• 0:34
  It's Kefi from ghostcultmag.com. Most people who work at Ghost
• 0:38
  Cult are not sports ball people, but Mark knows I am a little
• 0:42
  bit. What's up everybody?
• 0:43
  I'm here again, happily joined by Mark Menke of King Ultra Mega
• 0:48
  and Metal Allegiance, and of course Brian Daylor of Mastodon
• 0:52
  and Arcadia and a bunch of other things.
• 0:54
  How are you guys doing today? Doing great, doing good.
• 0:56
  Yeah, man. Yeah.
• 0:57
  So good to talk to you. We got this brand new King Ultra
• 1:01
  King Ultra mega single. I can't even talk.
• 1:03
  I'm on like 3 coffees, a shot of espresso and a Ritalin.
• 1:07
  So I am zooming. I have like the human edition of
• 1:10
  Zoomies with a Kitty. But yeah, I'm so pumped to talk
• 1:15
  about this new King Ultra mega single.
• 1:18
  Dead wishes it was a Cornell solo track.
• 1:20
  Beautiful song, so much to unpack.
• 1:22
  But just First off the bat, I think Bron, man, you sound
• 1:26
  incredible on this. I think obviously a lot of
• 1:29
  people used to seeing you sing from behind the drums, but
• 1:33
  really incredible take on this. Obviously no one else is Chris,
• 1:37
  but like you did a beautiful, beautiful service for the for
• 1:41
  the track. Thanks, I appreciate it.
• 1:43
  I tried. I tried my hardest.
• 1:44
  Well, you nailed it and it's not a easy song to sing.
• 1:47
  It's actually like, you know, like, no, most Cornell songs,
• 1:50
  nothing is actually what it seems.
• 1:52
  He's he's just so multifaceted as a singer, so hard to approach
• 1:57
  in all his different bands. And I think he was with his solo
• 2:01
  work, really trying to stretch out right?
• 2:03
  Like we saw that. For sure.
• 2:04
  Yeah. I mean the nuances and the, the
• 2:07
  phrasing and the placement, everything is just, it's like
• 2:10
  just perfection, you know? And you can, you can tell you're
• 2:13
  like this is probably 1 take for him.
• 2:15
  You know what I mean? And he just went in.
• 2:17
  He knew exactly what he needed to do.
• 2:19
  He knew exactly the, the where things needed to lay perfectly.
• 2:22
  And, and just, you know how this note trails off here, You know,
• 2:27
  the vibrato, the perfect correct vibrato to use in this section.
• 2:32
  The, the, the attention to detail with his singing and then
• 2:35
  just the emotion and the, the, the raw vulnerability that he
• 2:39
  was able to showcase as well with being poignant and being,
• 2:44
  you know, with his, with his lyrics really saying something
• 2:48
  and really saying something powerful and being transparent
• 2:52
  with and honest with his, with himself.
• 2:55
  So to try to like capture all that is like pretty daunting.
• 2:59
  But I did my best. I pulled from my own personal
• 3:03
  human experiences and and drag drudged up some stuff and I
• 3:08
  really said, you know, took the opportunity to sing it for my
• 3:11
  mom who passed a few months ago, who was a major Cornell fan and
• 3:15
  and just such a big Soundgarden fan, but really loved his solo
• 3:18
  stuff. And this the only other time I
• 3:20
  remember hearing this song was her jamming it at her apartment.
• 3:23
  So I knew that she would be smiling down love and every
• 3:27
  second of of me having the opportunity to cover a Chris
• 3:30
  song and can't thank Mark enough for asking me to participate.
• 3:34
  Right on and thank you for sharing that and I'm very sorry
• 3:36
  for your loss. It's got to be very fresh for
• 3:39
  you, of course. And then Mark, you know, we've
• 3:41
  talked a lot about choosing these songs and I love the song
• 3:45
  choice here. Obviously, like people know the
• 3:48
  hits and they were evolved. You know, people's whole
• 3:50
  lifetimes are built around some of these iconic songs Chris has
• 3:53
  made and been part of. And I love this choice.
• 3:56
  This is a really nice touch. I don't I think we talked about
• 4:00
  this once before I got to interview Alan Johannes, who
• 4:03
  worked a lot with Cornell. Cornell was like a one take
• 4:05
  Chris guy, but I think that's also because he was like a super
• 4:09
  into pre pro person, right? And so, Mark, I love this choice
• 4:13
  of this song. Like really beautifully done,
• 4:15
  not obvious. I think in a lot of ways, like
• 4:17
  most of these tracks, obviously the big ones, everyone knows and
• 4:21
  that makes sense. But like these, this is really
• 4:23
  amazing. I appreciate that.
• 4:25
  You know, I tried. Really, I'm a huge Cornell fan,
• 4:29
  whether you know, Soundgarden, Audioswave, Temple, solo work.
• 4:33
  Above all, I'm a Cornell fan, and I really wanted to stay away
• 4:37
  from songs like Spoon Man or Black Hole Sun, you know, things
• 4:42
  of that nature simply because, yeah, those are those to me,
• 4:46
  sacred ground songs that, you know, I don't see myself doing
• 4:51
  anything differently or better with that.
• 4:53
  Nor did I want to get the disgruntled Cornell fan cursing
• 4:56
  me out somewhere. But, you know, I picked the
• 4:59
  songs that meant a lot to me, and every song was chosen for a
• 5:04
  specific reason. It wasn't just throwing shit on
• 5:06
  a wall and seeing what sticks. It was, you know, every song
• 5:10
  there's a reason. There's a personal reason.
• 5:12
  You know, this particular song, you know, I just spoke about it
• 5:15
  earlier, but it always brought me to a positive place for
• 5:18
  whatever. I know it's crazy and I know the
• 5:21
  lyrics don't represent that, but the song always brought
• 5:24
  positivity to me where, you know, if I was if I just needed
• 5:28
  to just fucking calm myself down or whatever it might be.
• 5:31
  I don't, you know, running and I post workout music or, or just a
• 5:36
  place where I needed to chill the fuck out for a minute.
• 5:39
  That was always the go to song for me.
• 5:41
  I don't know why it wasn't planned.
• 5:44
  It just always was there for years since it came out, since
• 5:46
  the record came out and since 2015, you know, Fast forward
• 5:50
  when being tasked to put together a track list, you know,
• 5:53
  this was always, always there just because that.
• 5:56
  And just like preaching the end of the world off of euphoria
• 5:58
  mourning, that was not the lead single.
• 6:01
  It wasn't the biggest hit on that record, but much to the
• 6:04
  same it's it, you know, always did something in here to me and
• 6:08
  just always, I don't know, there's always something behind
• 6:10
  it and Dead Wishes is no different.
• 6:12
  Probably would have been more so just because of again it brought
• 6:15
  me to a more mellow, calm down place.
• 6:21
  Right on, you know, there's some scientific basis that says sad
• 6:25
  music makes you actually calm and and happier.
• 6:29
  Like for some reason the most depressing music is probably the
• 6:32
  stuff that uplifts a lot of people, even if it's not a one
• 6:35
  to one obvious thing. My song for that is Seasons
• 6:38
  bought. The single soundtrack is always
• 6:39
  like one of my home bases as a song.
• 6:42
  And I love the production on the track.
• 6:45
  Not just bronze vocals are just, you know, perfectly sitting in
• 6:48
  the track. I love everything else.
• 6:50
  You help bring to it the whole group, Kenny, you know?
• 6:53
  It's just just chef's kiss, you know?
• 6:58
  Can I ask? Am I allowed to ask a question?
• 7:00
  Sure, I'd be the interviewer for a minute.
• 7:02
  You always. My, my question is for Bron
• 7:05
  Bronze, how was it? You know, no, being on a track
• 7:11
  with Kenny, knowing you weren't playing, I never asked you this,
• 7:14
  right? And I was just curious.
• 7:15
  You just hit me being on a track with Kenny, knowing with Kenny's
• 7:18
  history, where you didn't have to even think about the drums,
• 7:21
  you know, How was that for you, especially with Kenny?
• 7:23
  I actually loved it. I mean, first of all, Kenny's
• 7:26
  such a legend, you know what I mean?
• 7:28
  Awesome dude. And, and what a player.
• 7:30
  An incredible, incredible drummer.
• 7:33
  So, yeah, I knew it was going to be solid and the, the drum work
• 7:37
  is going to be amazing and I don't have to worry about it
• 7:40
  with Mastodon. I always have to have it in the
• 7:42
  back of my head. Like, OK, dude, you got to,
• 7:44
  you're going to have to play underneath this.
• 7:46
  So, you know, pick your, pick your moment wisely.
• 7:49
  And, you know, you might want to reel it in there.
• 7:52
  I mean, which I usually don't, but I, I, I try to be a little
• 7:56
  mindful of it. But yeah, just singing.
• 7:58
  And, you know, I really felt like it was an opportunity to
• 8:00
  spread out a little bit and, and not worry about having to hold
• 8:05
  it down back there while whilst doing so.
• 8:08
  Am I going to just be the singer?
• 8:09
  And I can try to dig into some of the subtle nuances that Chris
• 8:14
  is pulling off here, Of course, like my own little take on on
• 8:18
  those. But I just wanted to get that
• 8:19
  the feeling and the vibe correct, you know?
• 8:22
  So it really helped to not have to worry about the drums and to
• 8:26
  know that there's a legend sitting back there.
• 8:28
  So pretty, pretty great dude. We're.
• 8:30
  We're like fucking Genesis, man, You know?
• 8:33
  Phil Collins said. Fuck that, man.
• 8:34
  I'm done with these drums, man. I'm going to the mic.
• 8:37
  I mean, he always continued to play drums with Genesis live and
• 8:41
  on stage. I saw, I saw like a three hour
• 8:44
  Phil Collins show in 1990 for the Butt Seriously Tour where he
• 8:49
  was on the drums and piano as much as he was out front.
• 8:51
  So I mean, I'm drummer. He's a drummer first.
• 8:54
  He's a drummer first. Oh yeah, for sure.
• 8:57
  He'll be the first one to tell you that I'm a drummer.
• 8:59
  Right on. Bron, do you have any questions
• 9:01
  for Mark while we're here? Did you have any burning
• 9:03
  questions you need answered? Burning what?
• 9:06
  No, I'm good. Mark helping me with my Segway.
• 9:10
  But it is interesting, like I'm sure when you're tracking lead
• 9:13
  vocals from Mastodon or anything else you've done, obviously you
• 9:17
  know, you wrote it from you know, you wrote it within mind
• 9:20
  you, like you said, you'd be singing and what can you let fly
• 9:23
  and what do you have to rein in? And what do you have?
• 9:25
  You know, where do you need control while you're also
• 9:27
  playing? Which I can't walk and chew gum.
• 9:29
  I don't. I watch you and I don't know
• 9:30
  what what I'm looking at. It's like science.
• 9:34
  But what do you do? Like, do you do anything?
• 9:36
  Did you do anything differently this time around?
• 9:38
  Do you do anything differently vocally?
• 9:40
  Then you know obviously for live is a whole different animal.
• 9:43
  Well, I mean, it's just the the way that the the vocals in this
• 9:48
  particular song move around, there's some trills and some
• 9:52
  things that I can do because I mean, I've been singing along to
• 9:55
  Stevie Wonder for my whole life, you know?
• 9:58
  And so those kind of vocal movements I'm obviously familiar
• 10:01
  with, but I don't really whip those out with Mastodon, you
• 10:04
  know what I mean? It's a little straighter.
• 10:05
  It's a little more in that sort of proggy meets Queen's realm,
• 10:11
  you know what I mean? When I'm singing, so, you know,
• 10:15
  this particular song and the in the style of is not anything
• 10:20
  I've ever approached before, you know, it's almost kind of got a
• 10:23
  little bit of a like a bluegrass feel to it, you know.
• 10:26
  And and so I was like, wow, this is like, I, I wouldn't have
• 10:31
  picked this, you know, for me to, to sing, you know, So it was
• 10:34
  cool that Mark picked it, you know, and just was like here.
• 10:38
  And I'm like listening to it. I'm like, man, he's he's like
• 10:40
  all over the place on this thing.
• 10:41
  And he's really like towards the the third half of this, the
• 10:44
  third section of the song, he really just amps everything up
• 10:47
  and goes full Chris Cornell on full display.
• 10:51
  Like all the plumage is out on the Peacock.
• 10:54
  You know what I mean is like, whoa, I'm like, geez, you know,
• 10:57
  and even the, the guy that was engineering for me, he's like,
• 11:00
  man, he's like, it's full on. I'm like, I know, I'm like, I
• 11:04
  have to try to get close to it, you know, I'm like, let me just,
• 11:07
  OK, let me, you know, I really had to like gear up in the
• 11:10
  studio. I'm like, man, this is just a, a
• 11:12
  Tuesday afternoon for Chris, you know what I mean?
• 11:15
  For me, I'm like, I really got to work up to it.
• 11:17
  So, but I'm like, I kind of realized halfway through, I'm
• 11:20
  like, I, I, I, I feel like, like as I was singing it and hearing
• 11:25
  it back, I'm like, like, I'm not embarrassed by this, which is a
• 11:29
  surprise, you know, So I'm like, and I'm, I feel emotionally
• 11:32
  connected now to the song. I think so.
• 11:35
  So I'm comfortable like putting this out there with, with my
• 11:38
  name on it and, and you know, with all the guys involved and I
• 11:41
  feel really good, good about it. You know, if I hadn't, I just
• 11:44
  would have been like, dude, I just don't, I don't think I can,
• 11:47
  I don't feel comfortable. Like I'm not, I'm not getting
• 11:49
  close to it. And I don't know what to do to
• 11:50
  change that, you know what I mean?
• 11:52
  But as I started to dig into the track and first of all, you
• 11:55
  know, like the, the track that I was given to sing over is like,
• 11:59
  The thing is pristine, you know what I mean?
• 12:00
  Everybody's playing on it. It's a beautiful rendition.
• 12:04
  And this is before the, the strings even got added.
• 12:07
  You know, there was, it was just a raw, you know, cuz that's
• 12:10
  sometimes half the battle. You know what, what you're given
• 12:12
  to sing over something like, man, I don't know.
• 12:14
  This isn't, this isn't getting there.
• 12:16
  But it was perfect. So, so I knew I had to bring it,
• 12:18
  you know, and when I got done with my stuff and I heard it
• 12:22
  back, I was like, I, I like that.
• 12:23
  And like, I was like, I think my mom would really love that.
• 12:27
  So I was definitely excited to send it over to Mark and see
• 12:31
  what they thought. Yeah, he he, he sent me AI
• 12:34
  remember an iPhone video from the studio.
• 12:37
  And I don't think he said anything.
• 12:39
  I think it was just a video and I played it and I remember I
• 12:42
  yelled like a four year old. I was like, fuck, yeah.
• 12:45
  I was like, yeah, I was like, this is awesome.
• 12:49
  I was with my my younger son. I'm like, dude, listen to this,
• 12:52
  right? And he, you know, because he's a
• 12:54
  huge, huge Cornell fan, sound Garden fan, aspiring drummer.
• 12:59
  And he was like, this is dad. This is awesome.
• 13:01
  I was like, I know I was like, he's killing.
• 13:03
  He's going to kill this. And yeah.
• 13:05
  And I replied back, I think kind of around in text terms, yeah,
• 13:10
  excited. Just being excited.
• 13:12
  And yeah, yeah. So thanks.
• 13:15
  For yeah, dude, I don't know what the you know, again, I
• 13:18
  don't know what I think half the times I just heard it.
• 13:22
  I heard you, I heard stairway, I heard you.
• 13:25
  I knew I had this song. I was like fucking light bulb
• 13:27
  and yeah, man, it's just I'm very, you know, very happy with
• 13:32
  the song overall, vocally, instrumentally, you know, I love
• 13:36
  love the tones on this song. I love the acoustic tone that
• 13:40
  they got out of that that Angel got, I mean, everything across
• 13:43
  the board. So, you know, it's, it's, you
• 13:45
  know, again, it's, it's no easy feat trying to do a Cornell song
• 13:49
  justice. And knock on wood, I like to
• 13:51
  think I'm 6 for six now. Yeah, right on.
• 13:54
  I agree. I would also say two other
• 13:56
  things really interesting. One Bron, I'm really glad you
• 13:59
  brought up like bluegrass because I thought about the
• 14:02
  minute I heard the arrangement basically the first time all the
• 14:05
  way through. For some reason I thought about
• 14:07
  Obladi by The Beatles like that Lil like that, that like jaunty
• 14:12
  folk thing, which it absolutely has.
• 14:15
  You can hear Chris, huge beetle guy, huge Harrison guy.
• 14:21
  Oh. Yeah, for sure.
• 14:22
  Huge George. And you could hear, you know, if
• 14:25
  you listen to Soundgardens down on the upside record, you could
• 14:28
  hear where he was going on that record and then you listen to
• 14:33
  Euphoria Morning. It's like this is a fucking if
• 14:35
  this is a Beatle record. I mean, you could just hear
• 14:37
  where he's going and where Chris was going.
• 14:40
  And then you enter this song and I I believe that's a great
• 14:43
  observation. You know, where you hearing
• 14:45
  these Beatle things? It's everywhere with Chris And
• 14:48
  I've, I've recently learned that through this process of how
• 14:51
  inspire, you know, especially with chords, you know, guitar
• 14:54
  chords and, and, and things he was laying in.
• 14:57
  It's just like, man, this is out of the George Martin playbook
• 15:00
  here. And I never, I never put the two
• 15:02
  and two together until I started dissecting this.
• 15:05
  But so I hate to cut. I'm sorry to cut you off, but
• 15:07
  that was awesome observation with that.
• 15:10
  Yeah. No, you're good.
• 15:11
  Thanks. And I would say for you a great
• 15:14
  call out to the Mastodon cover of Stairway.
• 15:17
  Obviously, again, equally heavy. You know, I got to meet Nick Jon
• 15:21
  once. He's incredible and the cover is
• 15:23
  unbelievable obviously under circumstances of grief and
• 15:26
  things like that. And I also immediately my ear
• 15:29
  went right back to that Stairway cover and, you know, again, Bron
• 15:34
  just knocked it out of the park. Even the high part, that is
• 15:36
  really hard. And, and I think there's, you
• 15:39
  know, I have a bit of a vocal background and I think it's
• 15:42
  interesting again, the fine line between, you know, kind of
• 15:47
  paying tribute and copying. And I think you did it your way
• 15:50
  in your style and it's beautiful and you hit all the notes, which
• 15:54
  is the hardest part anyway, at the beginning and the end of the
• 15:57
  day. I mean, we, you know, we had to
• 15:59
  do that live at Nick's funeral. Nick was there next to me in his
• 16:04
  casket. And it was one of the hardest
• 16:06
  things I ever had to do in my life.
• 16:07
  And they asked us to do it or like, can you guys play at the
• 16:10
  at the funeral? And I was like, OK, he would
• 16:12
  love it. Nick would love it if you did a
• 16:15
  Zeppelin song, you know, probably do Stairway.
• 16:18
  I'm like, fuck, they're going to, they want, they're going to
• 16:20
  want me to sing it, you know, And I was like, oh, God, you
• 16:25
  know, we, we, we pulled together, powered through.
• 16:28
  And to be honest, it was Brian Gosling's hair got me through
• 16:32
  the performance. He was sitting in the front row.
• 16:37
  I hate to laugh, but. Yeah, I know he was sitting in
• 16:40
  the front because he's with he's married to Eva Mendez, who and
• 16:45
  Nick never told us this, but I guess Eva Mendez and her whole
• 16:48
  family are very good friends with with Nick, Jon and his
• 16:51
  whole family that grew up on the same street.
• 16:53
  So we get to the funeral and even Mendez is there with Ryan
• 16:57
  Gosling. Like, OK, they were sitting in
• 16:59
  the front row, so right in front of us.
• 17:01
  And like, I'm just trying to hold myself together, you know?
• 17:05
  Because his whole family was upfront and Colleen, his wife
• 17:09
  and everybody was upfront. And they're just bawling.
• 17:11
  You know, we're starting to play Stairway to Heaven.
• 17:13
  I'm just like, I'm going to lose it.
• 17:15
  Like I Can't Sing this freaking song because I'm just
• 17:18
  devastated. First and foremost, just lost
• 17:21
  her best friend and his whole family is just like bawling in
• 17:24
  the front row. And and, you know, I don't think
• 17:27
  that Ryan really knew him, like had met him before, but you
• 17:30
  know, he's with Eva, their childhood friends.
• 17:33
  So they're all there. And so Ryan was just sort of,
• 17:35
  you know, sitting and and listening to the performance,
• 17:37
  but I'm like, I just need to lock in on something to get
• 17:40
  through this performance. And his I just looked at his
• 17:44
  hair, which wasn't moving. So I just locked in on his hair
• 17:48
  and sang Stairway to his Hair, and that's through the
• 17:51
  performance. Before we could be like, OK,
• 17:54
  we're done. Stairway to Ryan Gosling's hair.
• 17:58
  I love how wholesome that is because it could have went so
• 18:00
  many other ways. And that's the difference
• 18:03
  between why you're you're a rock star and I'm a journalist.
• 18:06
  But because my brain is corrupted already.
• 18:08
  But you know, I, if I were Eva Mendes and Ryan Gosling would be
• 18:13
  like, Oh my God, it's masted on. And all the other bands Nick
• 18:17
  worked with. But yeah, he was wonderful man.
• 18:19
  I had a really great interaction with him back in the day.
• 18:22
  That's good. Yeah.
• 18:24
  I love, love that dude. Yeah.
• 18:26
  I have I have a voicemail from Nick still saved in my phone.
• 18:29
  Oh, you do. Oh, that's crazy.
• 18:32
  I got a couple. Yeah, and he was, he was a great
• 18:34
  dude. And, and yeah, man, it's this
• 18:37
  fucking life and world we live in.
• 18:39
  It's, it's fucking surreal. The shit that the, the roller
• 18:43
  coaster of a ride you go on and you know, friends and, and, and
• 18:47
  bandmates and, and peers, colleagues, family members,
• 18:51
  etcetera. You know, you, you get the
• 18:53
  unexpected news. It's just like, well, how, how
• 18:56
  can you honor them? You know what, what can you do
• 18:59
  to, to try to find positivity in something so negative?
• 19:03
  Yeah. And you know, I know I can't
• 19:06
  speak for Braun or Mastodon, but I know that cover of Stairway,
• 19:10
  you know, and I, I know Troy. I'm super close to Troy, you
• 19:14
  know, and I remember talking to him.
• 19:16
  Go man, that's, that's, that's balls.
• 19:20
  That's that's that's balls, dude.
• 19:23
  Well, we would have never, we would have never done it if it
• 19:25
  wasn't for for Nick, obviously, you know what I mean?
• 19:27
  That's an that's an untouchable song.
• 19:29
  And and with if you, you're just not supposed to do that.
• 19:33
  Well, and that's why Braun was perfect for Kane, Ultra Mega and
• 19:37
  Dead Wishes be just because. Listen to what he did on that
• 19:42
  Fast forward, you know, all these years later, you know,
• 19:45
  here we are, you know, releasing Dead wishes, which is a similar
• 19:49
  style vocally, if you will, mellow and and whatnot.
• 19:53
  But yeah, man, I, I, I couldn't have been prouder of this song.
• 19:56
  And, and I wish the circumstances were different on
• 19:59
  it, but I, I couldn't, I couldn't be prouder of it.
• 20:02
  Right on as you should be really quick.
• 20:04
  Just a couple last couple of questions.
• 20:06
  Mark, I saw you earlier in the year at Metal Allegiance during
• 20:10
  Nam. Thank you again for hosting and
• 20:12
  and having us in for the you know, the sound check, which was
• 20:16
  like I couldn't I would kept pinching myself and my dreaming.
• 20:19
  It was amazing. I do have to say man, Troy and
• 20:23
  everybody killed it at the show and it was the first ever king
• 20:26
  ultra mega performance with Elisa doing day.
• 20:28
  I tried to live with she that. Was off the cuff man that that
• 20:31
  just came out of left fucking fields.
• 20:33
  Yeah, I watched you rehearse it. I know you were figuring it out.
• 20:36
  Portnoy was figuring it out on the spot, which of course he
• 20:39
  did. But I did want to say for Braun,
• 20:41
  I don't know how much you've ever had to stand in front of
• 20:43
  the stage and sing in a microphone.
• 20:45
  Troy Amazing. Vocally, he did not know what to
• 20:49
  do with his body without a base. I love the dude.
• 20:51
  He's a hero of mine. But like, hilarious.
• 20:54
  Like, hilariously awkward. In my base, I'm like, dude, I
• 20:59
  saw you. Yeah, I tried to.
• 21:02
  No, I'm not going to deal with it.
• 21:04
  Yeah, no, he was great. He killed it on those, you know,
• 21:07
  he killed it. He's great.
• 21:08
  Live especially, but like so awkward.
• 21:10
  So my advice is if you ever get to stand in front of a stage and
• 21:14
  be a front man for a second, plan your stage moves first.
• 21:17
  I hate to say it that way, but I'll just you can give Troy some
• 21:20
  business. I'll just wear like a drum
• 21:22
  necklace or I'll have like one of those marching, you know,
• 21:26
  where you get like a bunch of Toms or something just to just
• 21:29
  to feel more at home. Right on.
• 21:32
  Right on. And then just generally, Mark,
• 21:35
  what's coming up next? The singles gonna drop after
• 21:38
  this interview. We'll run after.
• 21:40
  You know, I know you're working toward a whole release.
• 21:43
  We've been talking about this for a while.
• 21:46
  Is everything still in progress? What's what's this?
• 21:48
  Yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is song
• 21:50
  number six in the series. A few more to go and trudging
• 21:56
  again, it's it's I'm being highly critical and picky on
• 22:00
  this process. It's not like writing a tune or
• 22:04
  writing your own original song. It's just, you know, there's a
• 22:06
  lot of pressure I put on myself to do it right.
• 22:09
  So, you know, the last song came out in February.
• 22:11
  Here we are in May. You know, this song was supposed
• 22:13
  to come out earlier. But again, it's just, it's can't
• 22:16
  rush it. It's got to be done right.
• 22:18
  It's got to be done on other people's time as well.
• 22:21
  And I'm in no rush, right? I mean, zero, the zero.
• 22:24
  The only pressure that's on is is the pressure I put on myself
• 22:28
  in throughout the recording process.
• 22:30
  But I'm not getting any pressure from anywhere.
• 22:32
  It's, you know, we'll release them as we feel good and
• 22:35
  comfortable with them. There's a bunch of songs in in
• 22:38
  the can right now that are recorded by some amazing
• 22:41
  musicians, which I'm again, just humbled and honored that, you
• 22:45
  know, that partaking with this. So that's that's brewing, that's
• 22:48
  coming along, you know, metal allegiance, where where, believe
• 22:52
  it or not, we're going to go right again.
• 22:53
  We're going to go write a record.
• 22:55
  We have those dates booked, you know which we're we're going to
• 22:58
  Camp Portnoy's house in Pennsylvania very, very soon and
• 23:02
  we're going to begin writing new music for whatever the hell
• 23:05
  happens there. So now it's kind of put down the
• 23:08
  production and and Cornell world for a minute now have to turn it
• 23:12
  on kind of thrash creatively, if you will.
• 23:15
  So yeah, there's a lot of things going on right now.
• 23:18
  And I'm also working with this other project right now too,
• 23:21
  that recording. I'm only playing bass on
• 23:23
  literally I have nothing else to do besides just play my bass,
• 23:26
  which is which is super cool to just just have to play bass.
• 23:29
  So yeah, there's a lot, a lot going on right now.
• 23:31
  Amazing thrash creatively. Needs to be on a T-shirt.
• 23:34
  Maybe I'll make that happen. Super cool, you know.
• 23:37
  Shout out, shout out to Ian Thornley.
• 23:40
  A big wreck for that last track. That last track in February.
• 23:42
  Incredible, really underrated band and singer and a shout out
• 23:46
  to Raining Phoenix music, especially Gerardo and the whole
• 23:49
  team there and the PR team and C ^2 for working with us and and
• 23:52
  supporting you with this project.
• 23:54
  This is an amazing project. It's been wonderful to watch
• 23:57
  just as an observer and a fan, but also on the journalistic
• 24:00
  side has just been a delight. Thank you so much, Mark, as
• 24:03
  usual, Thank you, Bron. Terrific catching up with you
• 24:05
  guys today about King Ultra mega dead wishes out now as you watch
• 24:09
  this and hail Cornell forever. Thank you, fellas.
• 24:13
  Thank you man. Appreciate it.
• 24:14
  See you soon. Thanks.
• 24:15
  Thanks man. Leader.