Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Darkly Triumphant With SAM MOORADIAN From FALLUJAH

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Darkly Triumphant With SAM MOORADIAN From FALLUJAH · HEAVY Music Interviews

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Speaker 1: My name is Sam Radi and I play guitar for
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Speaker 1: the band Fallujah and our new albums Xenotaph, comes out
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Speaker 1: on June thirteenth through Nuclear Blast Records. It's a concept album.
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Speaker 1: It's super dense with riffs and hooks and melodies and
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Speaker 1: guitar solos. We couldn't be prouder of it, and I
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Speaker 1: cannot wait for everybody to hear it.
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Speaker 2: Fantastic, Sam, thanks for joining us today.
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Speaker 1: Thanks for having me, man, this is cool.
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Speaker 2: My absolutely pleasure.
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Speaker 3: So as you study flush, I'll released your new album,
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Speaker 3: Xenotaph on June to thirteenth.
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Speaker 2: Bro, So how are you feeling personally about it? Mate?
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Speaker 2: You're excited or you're nervous the anxious.
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Speaker 1: I'm only excited that I very much could not be
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Speaker 1: more proud of this album and the work that we
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Speaker 1: all put into it. I think it's I think it's
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Speaker 1: it's it's special in a lot of ways, and I
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Speaker 1: think everybody who listens to it will kind of I
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Speaker 1: think maybe agree, I hope, I hope agree. Fallujah fans
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Speaker 1: out there, everybody who's heard the singles kind of seems
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Speaker 1: to be on that train already. So yeah, I don't know.
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Speaker 1: Just excited. I cannot wait for everybody to hear it
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Speaker 1: and start seeing what people think.
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Speaker 3: You know, so they touched on it's a little bit
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Speaker 3: in the intro bright, but can we go a bit
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Speaker 3: daper this one, like tell us about the album from
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Speaker 3: music foot.
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Speaker 2: Point of view and what you're actually going for with it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, you know this one, we wanted to kind of
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Speaker 1: pay homage to all these albums that have eight songs
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Speaker 1: on them, like these eight track death metal records that
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Speaker 1: we all love so much in the band. So one
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Speaker 1: record that comes to mind right off the bat Epitaph
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Speaker 1: Necrophagist Oko Dama from the Face List is another one.
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Speaker 1: A bunch of different cynic records like Traced and Error
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Speaker 1: is one. Man, those records just have a certain kind
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Speaker 1: of vibe to them. Planetary duality that's another one. You know,
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Speaker 1: these they're they're like and they're fast, and they're there's
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Speaker 1: no no time to not no time to breathe, But
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Speaker 1: I don't know, they just they come in and they
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Speaker 1: say what they need to say and then they're out
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Speaker 1: of there. And I think we wanted to do our
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Speaker 1: version of that, and so we definitely wanted eight songs
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Speaker 1: on this record, So that's what we did, and uh,
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Speaker 1: we also wanted it to feel dense like those other
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Speaker 1: records that we loved, so uh so there's a lot
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Speaker 1: of riffs and a lot of kind of twists and
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Speaker 1: changes and tempo changes, key changes. Uh, song structures are interesting,
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Speaker 1: and yeah, I don't know, it's just a very kind
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Speaker 1: of dense and diverse record that we're very happy with.
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Speaker 1: We're we really enjoy that kind of music and stuff
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Speaker 1: that keeps you interested and really honed in. So uh
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Speaker 1: you know, yeah, I think from that standpoint, it's going
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Speaker 1: to be an interesting one to listen to for sure.
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Speaker 2: Now you've mentioned the word dance three times now.
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Speaker 3: And some of them my selfie's got involved in the
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Speaker 3: writting process of an album, Like what do you actually
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Speaker 3: mean by dance?
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Speaker 1: You know, imagine like if you take a song with
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Speaker 1: like a verse chorus, verse chorus, bridge chorus structure, it's
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Speaker 1: not going to have the same density as a song
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Speaker 1: that has as many rips as these songs, you know,
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Speaker 1: Like these songs they just have so many different layers
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Speaker 1: and different things happening without sounding too crowded, of course,
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Speaker 1: but but yeah, it's it's just very layered and intricate stuff.
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Speaker 1: I mean it's it's just packed full of different musical ideas,
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Speaker 1: you know, all the way through. Like we have one song,
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Speaker 1: step Through the Portal and Breath. It's the most recent
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Speaker 1: single that we put out. It has three guitar solos.
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Speaker 1: I mean, that's about as dense as you can make it.
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Speaker 1: I think it's just it's just crazy stuff. I don't
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Speaker 1: know how else to put it.
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Speaker 2: I'll got a better idea.
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Speaker 3: You've measured the same well, So you've released a Step
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Speaker 3: through the Portland, Braid, laborat of Stone and kaleidoscopic waves
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Speaker 3: a lot.
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Speaker 2: That's all my soft the album. Brough want a night track?
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Speaker 3: See that's too bad? But I think it's sunny representation
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Speaker 3: of the album or is there a couple more lays
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Speaker 3: you may?
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Speaker 1: I think it is. However, I will say that this
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Speaker 1: album kind of evolves as you listen to it. It
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Speaker 1: starts out much brighter and yeah, I guess brighter is
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Speaker 1: the word for it kind of starts out brighter and
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Speaker 1: gets a bit darker towards the end. So the vibe
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Speaker 1: for sure is going to change as you listen on.
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Speaker 1: And I also say that I think every song on
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Speaker 1: this album has its own kind of thing going on
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Speaker 1: with it, you know, It's got its own sort of
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Speaker 1: feel to it, and they all work very well together,
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Speaker 1: but they're all sort of individually strong in their own ways.
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Speaker 1: So yeah, I think that these songs are the best
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Speaker 1: representation that we could possibly give the album without giving
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Speaker 1: you the entire album, for sure. But it's also there
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Speaker 1: are a lot of different surprises left for you to
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Speaker 1: check out when the album comes out.
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Speaker 3: So now, speaking of surprises, I'm already quite from Kyle
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Speaker 3: Is said, hopefully fans will be surprised and excited by
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Speaker 3: some of the new direction, Like what does it mean
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Speaker 3: by that?
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Speaker 2: What's the new direction?
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Speaker 1: You know? I think probably the biggest change is going
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Speaker 1: to be more in the vocals than anything else. You're
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Speaker 1: going to hear a lot more clean vocals and a
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Speaker 1: lot more hooks, but without sacrificing the same harsh vocal
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Speaker 1: style that you'll hear on previous Fallujah albums, especially Imperian,
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Speaker 1: which was Kyle's first album with Fallujah, Kyle being our
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Speaker 1: vocalist of course, but yeah, the sort of clean vocal
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Speaker 1: direction with something we all agreed on early on, was
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Speaker 1: something we wanted to do and it also is naturally
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Speaker 1: Kyle's writing style is to do big, kind of clean
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Speaker 1: hooks and courses and stuff, and so we just decided
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Speaker 1: that's what the direction wanted to try and go in,
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Speaker 1: and I think it turned out absolutely incredible. I also
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Speaker 1: thought when we released Kaleidoscopic Waves, which is arguably the
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Speaker 1: rightest and cleanest song on the album, I thought there
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Speaker 1: was gonna be a lot more pushback. I thought people
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Speaker 1: were going to be, you know, I don't know what
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Speaker 1: people were gonna say. I didn't really know what to expect,
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Speaker 1: but I for sure thought more people would be on
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Speaker 1: the fence, or at least be pointing out that there
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Speaker 1: are more cleans. People seem to really love them, so
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Speaker 1: that the music is being embraced, which is awesome. So
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Speaker 1: I'd say that that definitely is gonna That's a different
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Speaker 1: direction for the band, but it's one that I think
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Speaker 1: fits really well. And then another thing is that this
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Speaker 1: album is a concept album, so all the lyrics kind
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Speaker 1: of tell a story from beginning to end. Are you
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Speaker 1: a fan of concept albums? Dude?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm my concept. Yeah. It was good. I'd like
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Speaker 2: to get fully immersed in it one day. But it's
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Speaker 2: sounded good.
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Speaker 1: Oh dude, sick. Thanks man. Yeah, I appreciated it.
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Speaker 3: So I hope I've read this swide in the press
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Speaker 3: race because if I didn't, it's going to be a
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Speaker 3: stupid question.
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Speaker 2: But Zanna ta Box the first album for yourself and
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Speaker 2: drummer Kevin Alexander, Is that correct? Yeah? As transition for
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Speaker 2: you into the.
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Speaker 1: Band, it was very easy, I think, not without its challenges.
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Speaker 1: You know. I I definitely had to try and write
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Speaker 1: music that would sort of fit in with Fallujah as
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Speaker 1: best as it could, while also trying to be myself
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Speaker 1: and be genuine through what I was writing. So that
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Speaker 1: was for sure probably the biggest challenge. But as far
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Speaker 1: as like working with the guys and making the album
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Speaker 1: happen super seamless, it felt totally natural. And that's really
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Speaker 1: credit to them for being you know, Scott and Kyle
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Speaker 1: are just like two of the best guys that you
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Speaker 1: could possibly write music with. In my opinion, written a
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Speaker 1: lot of music with a lot of different people, and
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Speaker 1: they are for sure two of the most open minded
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Speaker 1: and uh passionate people when it comes to music writing.
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Speaker 1: So it was pretty pretty seamless for that reason.
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Speaker 3: It's a pretty good point there, mate, Like, you're coming
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Speaker 3: into the band and you've got your own individual playing style,
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Speaker 3: but you're coming into an existing bed where people expect
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Speaker 3: him to sound a certain way. So is that difficult
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Speaker 3: for you sort of trying to try to blend those
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Speaker 3: two worlds together.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, at first it was more difficult than it is now.
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Speaker 1: For sure. It was something that I had not had
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Speaker 1: to do previously. In the past. I would pretty much
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Speaker 1: just write music for myself or whatever other band I
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Speaker 1: was a part of. But the creative freedom that I
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Speaker 1: had was untethered, you know, was just do whatever you
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Speaker 1: want kind of deal here. It was. It's untethered in
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Speaker 1: the sense that no idea is ever shut down, you know.
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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, for the for the most part,
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Speaker 1: right yeah. Yeah, But at the end of the day,
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Speaker 1: this is Fallusah, We're talking about, Yeah, we're going to
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Speaker 1: make a Fallujah record, you know. And but that was
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Speaker 1: a fun thing for me to try and do. It
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Speaker 1: was like, okay, well, I basically took all the tendencies
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Speaker 1: that I would, you know, was so familiar with from
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Speaker 1: playing all the music live, and I just tried to
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Speaker 1: figure out ways that they to weave them together in
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Speaker 1: a way that I felt was meaningful and interesting. So
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Speaker 1: the biggest tactic basically, I would take like chords and
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Speaker 1: chord progressions that were a big part of the Fallujah discography,
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Speaker 1: and I would just try to make them sound like
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Speaker 1: how I would like them to sound, or how I
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Speaker 1: think these chords go together. And I'm just like kind
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Speaker 1: of trying stuff. And in the end a handful of
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Speaker 1: those ideas became something and sparked some more ideas, and
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Speaker 1: then before I knew, we were writing the album, so
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Speaker 1: you know.
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Speaker 3: And the band was got quite a lot of self
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Speaker 3: sufficient writers in there, so on the surface that started
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Speaker 3: being great. But he could also post difficulties putting it,
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Speaker 3: like with so many different ideas coming into one, like
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Speaker 3: was there a process of bringing stuff to the table
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Speaker 3: lot that or is it just open the flatter?
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Speaker 1: You know. I think the process more than anything else
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Speaker 1: is that we all just kind of got together and
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Speaker 1: started working it working it out. You know. Scott is
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Speaker 1: incredible when it comes to writing. I mean, he'll basically
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Speaker 1: his process is different from mine in the sense that
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Speaker 1: he'll just hit record and start improvising riffs and then
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Speaker 1: get into his credit. One thing that he likes is
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Speaker 1: he likes to have people in the room with him
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Speaker 1: to point out the stuff that they like that he
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Speaker 1: just played, and then he saves those ideas and then
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Speaker 1: we flashed those ideas out, Whereas with me, what I do,
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Speaker 1: it's totally cool and it's not it's something that I've
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Speaker 1: never seen before. Him. He he's the guy who does that.
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Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting, very very good at it. So for me,
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Speaker 1: what I do is, I'll come up with ideas and
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Speaker 1: I'll write them. I'll write them out like i'll transcribe them,
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Speaker 1: so I don't record them first. I transcribe them and
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Speaker 1: I set them aside, and I'll start to piece together
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Speaker 1: like demos and everything. But I'm just by myself at
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Speaker 1: this point. Then what I do is I'll take all
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Speaker 1: that material and I'll show everybody and then they will
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Speaker 1: tell me what they like or don't like, and we'll
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Speaker 1: start poning that in from there. So different processes, but
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Speaker 1: the whole album was written in a combination of those
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Speaker 1: ways basically. So yeah, it's that's that's pretty much what
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Speaker 1: it was like.
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Speaker 2: You know, wait, now you mentioned the sci fi concept.
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Speaker 3: Today I calls for me in a better position to
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Speaker 3: answer this question, But can you run it through.
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Speaker 2: What that concept is.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, the concept album for sure. So the story, without
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Speaker 1: giving like too much away, it's it's very abstract. It's
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Speaker 1: like a kind of a post death experience for a
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Speaker 1: character who is greeted by basically what's on the cover
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Speaker 1: of the album, right. We we kind of refer to
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Speaker 1: them as the guide, right, who guides them through sort
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Speaker 1: of their their past life that they had just stopped
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Speaker 1: living and sort of opens their mind to what else
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Speaker 1: is out there beyond human comprehension. I think Kyle does
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Speaker 1: a really good job of expressing and visualizing those things
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Speaker 1: in the lyrics. It's it's very interesting some of the
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Speaker 1: stuff that he came up with and did. But it,
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Speaker 1: you know, again without spoiling anything, you know, it takes
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Speaker 1: some turns throughout and you start to learn a little
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Speaker 1: bit more about what the character is going through and
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Speaker 1: what the guide's intentions are, and and it gets gets dark.
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Speaker 1: It's really kind of creepy, and the music reflects that,
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Speaker 1: which is something that was also intentional and we're we're
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Speaker 1: really happy with that how that turned out. And then, uh,
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Speaker 1: we all wanted to have a triumphant ending for the album,
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Speaker 1: both lyrically, but also musically, we didn't want it to
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Speaker 1: end on a dark note, necessarily a bright note, but
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Speaker 1: just more of like a triumphant note, like a positive
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Speaker 1: one in a sense, and we did that. But it's
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Speaker 1: like dark triumphant. It's it's it's pretty interesting. I think
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Speaker 1: it's it turned out cool. I think so so yeah. Again,
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Speaker 1: I don't want to I don't want to give away
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Speaker 1: the whole story I think this album is. There are
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Speaker 1: two ways to listen to it. The first way is
13:39
Speaker 1: by listening to the whole album. Uh, if you have
13:43
Speaker 1: the record, put it on your records player. If you
13:45
Speaker 1: have the if you're in your car, put it on
13:47
Speaker 1: your car, whatever it is. And the second way is
13:50
Speaker 1: to listen to it again from start to finish, but
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Speaker 1: have the lyrics out. Yeah, through as you go, get
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Speaker 1: the whole story. It's pretty interesting stuff. And again it's
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Speaker 1: it's all it's all Kyle's brainchild, So props.
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Speaker 2: Had edi.
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Speaker 3: I write for somebody, like I'm not writing myself. But
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Speaker 3: if you're writing just a normal song, you know, the
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Speaker 3: possibility is rendless. But if you're writing for a song
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Speaker 3: that's got a character in mind, and there's certain moges
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Speaker 3: of stuff gone through that, Surely it'd be a lot
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Speaker 3: more difficultouln't that.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. You know what's interesting too, is I think the
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Speaker 1: music influenced the story quite a bit as well, So
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Speaker 1: that would I would have to have Kyle confirm that
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Speaker 1: for sure. But the music really came first. It was
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Speaker 1: the music was written. It was a lot of riffs
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Speaker 1: and arranging and demoing, and then it was after we
14:40
Speaker 1: had all had the demos to a certain point, then
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Speaker 1: Kyle started working on the lyrics and the vocals. But
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Speaker 1: he had he had the story kind of in his mind.
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Speaker 1: But I think it really took shape once we had
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Speaker 1: the music demoed out and he could start putt lyrics
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Speaker 1: and vocals where he felt they needed to go. And
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Speaker 1: and in that sense, it was it was definitely like
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Speaker 1: a back and forth between the music and the story.
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Speaker 1: I kind of feel like it's all in a way,
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Speaker 1: it's just like one big thing that we sort of
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Speaker 1: crafted all at the same time.
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Speaker 3: So yeah, So essentially each song represents the chapter or
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Speaker 3: section of the whole narrative. So when it comes to
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Speaker 3: playing them live, like can you find the songs out
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Speaker 3: of phnological order?
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Speaker 2: So it makes sense. So you have to stick to
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Speaker 2: ella on the album.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, you know, I think they could be
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Speaker 1: played out of order, but I have a feeling we
15:36
Speaker 1: won't play them out of order. It's just a gut
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Speaker 1: something tells me that we'll probably play them in the
15:43
Speaker 1: order that they are on the album. I could be
15:47
Speaker 1: totally wrong about that. I haven't talked about this at all.
15:51
Speaker 1: I think the only thing that we've talked about is
15:54
Speaker 1: how we're going to close the set, the news set,
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Speaker 1: So we haven't gone that far yet. Really, I guess
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Speaker 1: we'll all find out together. Yeah, I mean, ultimately, for me,
16:09
Speaker 1: what a what a cool set list is all about
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Speaker 1: the energy that is brought. So if you know, if
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Speaker 1: if the lyrics that tell the story are a little
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Speaker 1: out of order because the energy is better live in
16:24
Speaker 1: a certain way, then you know, it is what it is,
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Speaker 1: you know. But I have a feeling it'll probably wind
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Speaker 1: up being in order. Something tells me it will.
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Speaker 3: No, I'm gonna trust you. I got on this one mate. Now,
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Speaker 3: speaking of live things, you do plan to hit the
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Speaker 3: right following the release of the album side what if
16:41
Speaker 3: you go booked in sci Fi?
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Speaker 1: Well, you know, we have a European tour that's booked
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Speaker 1: for February of next year, which is pretty far away.
16:50
Speaker 1: But we also have uh some tours that are lining
16:55
Speaker 1: up right now that are I can't really talk too
16:57
Speaker 1: much about, but we'll for sure be back on the
17:00
Speaker 1: road pretty soon here and I think we're going to
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Speaker 1: go to some new places too. I can't again, I
17:06
Speaker 1: can't talk about it too much, but we've had a
17:09
Speaker 1: bunch of we've had some good talks about doing some
17:12
Speaker 1: cool stuff in the coming couple of couple of months
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Speaker 1: and coming year, and we're very excited for that. So yeah,
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Speaker 1: keep your eyes peeled anybody who's wanting to catch us
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Speaker 1: in the States and abroad, we will be all over
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Speaker 1: the place. But the EU tour is February and March
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Speaker 1: next year. We're direct support for Omnium Gatherum and In
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Speaker 1: Morning is going to be opening that tour, and there
17:38
Speaker 1: are two bands that were both excuse me, there are
17:41
Speaker 1: two bands that were fans of in Fallujah, so we're
17:45
Speaker 1: really excited to be on the road with those guys.
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Speaker 2: Fantastic Samiel, Thanks very much for you talk, Broh. It's
17:49
Speaker 2: been a pleasure speaking with you. Xena taps out during
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Speaker 2: fight and she's a crack of an album mix, so good.
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Speaker 1: Luck, thank you man, appreciate your time and this was fun. Dude.
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Speaker 2: The