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Metal Electric With SCOTT KIRKLAND From THE CRYSTAL METHOD · HEAVY Music Interviews

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  Hey, this is Scott Kirkland from the Crystal Method. I'll be heading down
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  to Aukland on February twenty ninth and continuing on to Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide,
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  Melbourne in Perth just kick off March. So hope to see you all
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  out there, beautiful mate. Thanks for joining us today. Thank you for
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  having me. Oh is that just over a week away? Are you going
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  to be heading over this way? Mate? So? Are you the sort
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  of person if you're packed yet and you're ready to go, will you leave
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  it to the last minute mentally started packing? I basically that's another that's another
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  situation. I'm still going through, you know, new material, old material,
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  classic tracks, putting my set set together. I've got a a a
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  show here in the LA area on Saturday that can get myself, you know,
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  in line with some of the things that I want to be playing,
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  and then the packing that will I will definitely start washing up everything, making
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  sure I'm ready to go. But but yeah, everything should be Yeah,
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  everything should be done by the weekend for sure. Right now, you're only
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  here last in December of twenty twenty two, so what will have change?
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  Would you show by the time you come back, I definitely have added a
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  bunch of new tracks of revisiting some classic stuff that I didn't play the first
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  time around, some new mixes. Yeah, it's you know, it's I
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  don't do the same set twice in the row. You know, I like
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  to change things up a bit, even from night to night. So I'm
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  aware of what I was playing back then, and I definitely want to,
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  you know, I want to mix it up a bit, and you know,
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  just bring the energy and bring the fun and and you know, and
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  take care of the people who show up. Now, that troll must have
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  been pretty successful, Mike, because i's just our the twelve months lightly you're
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  coming back with you's a great efforts. Fans Iber obviously love you. I
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  uh well, I was. I was. I was delighted to receive the
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  offer to come back. Definitely had a good time when I was down there.
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  It'd have been way too long. There had been, you know,
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  obviously the delay from UH COVID UH. I think initially I was supposed to
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  come out and UH June or July of twenty twenty, and obviously things got
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  shifted around. So I think there was a lot of anticipation for my return
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  and and thankfully the shows came off pretty well and the tour is great and
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  I'm really excited to be able to come back. Yeah, so Restralian audience
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  is different. Lord about the parts of the world, would you find it's
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  pretty universal Wherevo, No, there's definitely something different. I you know,
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  I don't. It's I think that there is a genuine appreciation that you get.
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  You get that sense from communicating to them directly, the way the crowd
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  responds, the just a vibe. I mean, it's a mutual appreciation.
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  I definitely I love coming down there, you know. I love the environment,
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  love sightseeing, I love you know, getting a you know, opportunity
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  to taste new foods and definitely new beers. Really, beer culture has really
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  taken off down there since the time we first started coming down there, so
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  lots of micro breweries and and uh yeah, just I just get a I
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  definitely get a sense that there is appreciation for the artists. You know,
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  I've ever been ever since going down there for a big day out and you
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  know, and obviously that was on a much grander scale, but you you
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  know, you just you you know, you just get the vibe that there's
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  you know limited artists that you know make the journey. It's you know,
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  it's not the easiest leg to put in your tour for for many different reasons.
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  But but it is one that I've always appreciated and and definitely feel that
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  same sense of community and appreciation from when I go down there. What are
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  you doing? Bro? If you get a really tough crowd, Like,
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  you're up there by yourself, so you got no one fade up and I
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  want to, I want to sort of value at my bands can probably can
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  do a solo like whatever, but you're by yourself, man, Like,
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  how do you turn it around? Well? You know the thing is,
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  uh, I I as selfish as as sounds. I don't play. I
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  play music obviously for people, but I'm playing. I'm never gonna play something
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  that I don't thoroughly enjoy and love. So I'm never I'm not going to
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  drop something that that I think that would play to the crowd that I don't
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  love. So usually I'm the one that's having the most fun on stage.
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  I'm jumping around and I'm you know, I get this adrenaline drop before I
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  go on that that that you know, propels me through the set and I'm
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  combustible and interactive, and and you know, I have a great deal of
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  fun. So I mean, I that same energy is there if I'm playing
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  for you know, one hundred people, uh and a night that got snowed
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  out, you know, you know, a couple of years ago, I
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  was doing New Year's Eve show and in uh in Colorado, and earlier that
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  day, like nine inches of snow came down and and and I was in
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  a kind of a I was in Boulder, which is, you know,
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  about thirty minutes outside of Denver. But when there's snow, it just made
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  it impossible for anybody to get out there. So what we were, you
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  know, thinking was going to be a sold out night came in, you
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  know, quite a bit less just because people couldn't make it out there.
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  But you know, it was you know, I always feel that it's it's
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  you know, no matter what, you can't worry about the people who aren't
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  there. You only take care of the people who are there. So I
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  get a you know, I'm I'm I'm not gonna have fun no matter what.
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  So so if everybody else wants to join along, then then then then
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  you know, hold on to something. Let's move let's get going. Yeah,
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  now you're you're an electronic dance music artist, it also appeals to the
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  heavier market might so can you explain how that works. I think it's just
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  that we always I mean, we grew up listening to rock and I was
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  a metal kid. So I I think it's just this you know, appreciation
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  of big drums, distortion, you know, riff like you know, rift
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  tracks and I and so definitely that came out and and what my partner and
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  I did for you know, the first twenty years, and and the things
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  that I've been doing over the last five years six years since he retired.
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  So I think that just it's ingrained in the DNA of the Crystal method.
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  You know, rock and you know, heavy music, big drums distortion.
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  So I think that you know, as a as it sort of it has
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  allowed those with similar tastes to find their way over the Crystal method. And
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  one of the things that that we've been been told over the years is that
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  we were sort of the the gateway drug, if you will, of for
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  for some for those that are you know, coming from more of a rock
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  or heavy background and finding their way. Oh yeah, I found you guys
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  and then I was like discovered this band and this and this band, and
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  now I'm you know, I'm a fan of it. So it's always something
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  that you know, I find that, you know, because there are those
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  bands that did that for me, Like Depeche Mode did that for me back
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  in the day when I was you know, you know all about Judas Priests
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  and a CDC and Metallica and you know, and I listened to Black Celebration
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  for the first time and that, you know, that took me off into
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  that journey. So it's just part of, you know, the what we
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  have always been been about. You know, that set heavier sound is just
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  part of the crystal of the DNA. I don't enview at all bright because
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  people listen to heavy metal are probably the most stubborn, narrow minded people you
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  can get when it comes to music. So you're trying to create something with
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  electronic dance music just kind of peel to them, like hats up to you,
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  bro, like you well, you know, I don't you know it
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  don't It doesn't always work. I mean we did. I remember years ago
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  we were doing this. There was this festival that this traveling festival uh tour
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  called Family Values and it was Corns olymp Biscuit, and we did a tour
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  where olymp Biscuit was a headliner. Filter was one of the headliners. I
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  think Stain did a couple of shows. You know, I also had met
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  The Man and Redman on that tour, and you know, we were,
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  you know, right in the middle of that lineup, and you know,
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  there were there were definitely nights that when you'd go out and you know,
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  you'd be playing to eight ten thousand people and you'd be you don't have a
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  couple of people, you know, flipping you off. And but then by
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  the end, by the end, the middle finger kind of came down a
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  little bit. We got some horns nice you know, you know, and
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  then afterward, you know, we you know, I've had you know,
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  we had kids come up to us with you know, corn you know,
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  lumbiscuit shirts on and we're like, hey man, I've never heard you guys
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  before, but that was pretty badass, you know, you know, just
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  a little you know, you don't it's not you know, we're not you
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  know, we're did we went up and did our thing. We didn't we
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  didn't try to cater to, you know, to any crowd we just you
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  know, our sound is our sound, and we feel that it plays well
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  and with others. And we've played radio festivals and other music festivals, and
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  you know with Green Day and Food Fighters and and Offspring and countless other more
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  traditional rock bands and and found that we play our audiences cross pretty well.
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  Hm. You're known as one of the pioneers of electronic dance music, So
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  do you recall when you were first attracted to that style of music and then
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  why? Uh? Yeah, I mean it definitely like you know, in
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  the mid eighties, you know, bands like New Order and Depeche Mode.
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  Those bands had that electronic sound and used samples and use synthesizers, and although
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  they were more traditional you know, you know, singers, songwriter vocals,
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  it wasn't until in the late eighties that this sort of house scene started rising
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  up out of Chicago, and then this that Detroit techno scene, uh start
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  followed, and then you had the UK bands sort of UK artists, Orbital
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  and the Chem's and Prodigy sort of building on that. So there were definitely
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  leftfield is another one. There's definitely those moments when you know, when Ken
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  and I got into the studio and were inspired by all those things that came
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  before us that that we found our way and find sort of you know,
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  kind of come up with our own sound. And again that sound, you
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  know, you know, was led by you know, heavier, big drums
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  and samples and different things like that. It's kind of the stuff that you
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  know, hip hop bands like Public Enemy and Beastie Boys were doing at the
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  time. So there were it was definitely just a progress process. You know,
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  we just we we just loved going to raves and you know, and
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  we were punters and the crowd listening to you know, various different versions of
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  rave music at the time, and you know, just got inspired and then
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  you know what was to come was the sort of rise of at the time,
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  it was called electronic electronica in the mid to late nineties, and and
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  then that you know, you know, took off from there and ebb and
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  flows of all the different variations that led us to where ed M if you
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  will is you know, know is is uh, you know, kind of
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  a cultural thing and people enjoy it in practically every country on this planet.
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  So it's you know, it's been one of those gradual rises that that we
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  were there, you know, in the early stages. But of course,
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  you know, bands like craft Work and you know depeche Mode and and Nights
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  Are EBB, and the various versions of industrial music and and electronic music kind
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  of all come together to create what's I think is a pretty vibrant scene that's
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  pretty eclectic and full of you know, great artists producing great music. How
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  would you actually describe what you do to someone like myself that hasn't really got
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  a clue what it is that you do. I I'm kind of a producer,
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  you know, I work. You know, I could pick up a
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  guitar and I could play you know, chords and riffs. I'm not a
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  trained guitarist. I'm not someone that reads music or could you know, play
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  Stairway in Heaven or or or any you know, any of those traditional tracks.
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  I can also pick up the bass and you know, noodle around on
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  that. I have the same sort of skills when it comes to playing you
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  know, piano, and you know, noodling around on synthesizers and and through
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  air drumming, uh, you know, to you know, Metallica records growing
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  up. I have a pretty good sense of timing and so, you know,
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  all those things come together and I'm you know, when Ken and I
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  were working in studio, we would sample, we would would make noises,
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  and then we would arrange the the tracks, you know, via using samples
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  and MIDI and and and bill tracks out that had a more traditional form.
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  Lots of stuff is pretty you know, nowadays it's pretty cookie cutter. Not
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  I don't mean that in a negative way. It's just sort of what a
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  dance floor or a particular type of track requires an intro, a drop,
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  you know, a build, another drop, and those sort of things that
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  that audiences and clubgoers or sort of traditionally understands as you know, sort of
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  modername E. D M. But but we always understood that you could make
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  songs without a singer. We do have songs with singers, but it was
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  just, you know, we just were creatures of the studio. We we
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  you know, we come up with sounds and you know, play around with
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  plugged synthesizers in the guitar pedals, and what comes out of that is is
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  somehow combined together to make what some people, not all people, but some
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  people call music. Very good answer mate, I've got a lot better understanding
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  of it now, thank you. Yeah, it was a nice coupled.
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  Thanks very much for good time made. The Crystal Method are over this side
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  of the world, stopping in New Zealand on the twenty ninth of February for
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  a few shows and you make it or one show and you make it over
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  here to Australia on March first in Sydney and go from there. So have
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  yourself a good trip, mate,