Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 891 - Sálezianos’ Nick Parkinson on Craft, Chaos and “The Great Silence”

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 891 - Sálezianos’ Nick Parkinson on Craft, Chaos and “The Great Silence” · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

• 0:00
  You know, there's pretty much influence from all kinds of
• 0:02
  music, including world music, classical music, metal, gothic,
• 0:06
  punk, even maybe hip hop. And this is how I started out.
• 0:09
  When I started drumming, I was playing a lot of hip hop.
• 0:12
  So that's always just been embedded in my style.
• 0:14
  We plan on doing, you know, whatever comes into our minds.
• 0:24
  What's up, everybody? It's Keithy ghostcultmag.com.
• 0:29
  I am super stoked to be joined by Nick.
• 0:31
  I hope I say this correctly, because if I don't, I'm going to
• 0:33
  kick myself. Is it Salazanos?
• 0:35
  Salazianos. Salazianos.
• 0:38
  Yeah. Kill me dead.
• 0:39
  I am so sorry. Should I ask that?
• 0:41
  Anyway, while I was pontificating before the
• 0:43
  recording, Nick, how are you? Good, Matt, I'm good.
• 0:47
  Just kicking along. Where are we?
• 0:49
  Is it a yesterday in the world or tomorrow?
• 0:51
  I don't remember how time travel works.
• 0:54
  It's Tuesday here. So it's Tuesday, Happy Tuesday
• 0:57
  to you. Monday afternoon for me in good
• 0:59
  old California. I I sincerely hope someday I get
• 1:03
  out to Australia. I know it's a very long flight,
• 1:05
  but I I have been daydreaming of Australia and New Zealand my
• 1:10
  whole adult life as a travel fan.
• 1:13
  So absolutely love you've released a series of absolute
• 1:17
  banger singles and a cover I want to talk about also.
• 1:19
  But just give our viewers who are getting to know you a little
• 1:24
  insight into how the band came about, you know, influences,
• 1:29
  where you come from, et cetera. OK, so originally I started a
• 1:34
  band down in up in Sydney probably around 2010 with an old
• 1:38
  friend of mine and some people we met down at audio school.
• 1:41
  So yeah, we released it. We recorded and released an AP
• 1:44
  and then that kind of dissolved. Then the whole, you know, I
• 1:47
  joined another band up in Sydney.
• 1:48
  Then the whole kind of scene up there, you know, went to shit.
• 1:52
  Basically. There was all these lockout laws
• 1:54
  that came into place and tons and tons of venues just closed
• 1:58
  down, and the nightlife just completely died.
• 2:00
  And then, you know, I was like sitting on this material that I
• 2:03
  thought was pretty good. And I just thought, you know,
• 2:06
  music is all I want to do. So I'll try my luck in Melbourne
• 2:10
  that, you know, I moved down here straight away.
• 2:12
  My goal was to, you know, start this band up and using the old
• 2:16
  material that I'd recorded and just kind of move on from there
• 2:19
  because I thought it was, you know, it's pretty solid
• 2:21
  foundation. So yeah, I've got a job at the
• 2:25
  airport with an airline and we started, I started, it took me 9
• 2:29
  months to get a line up together and then we started touring
• 2:32
  basically straight away. We did a, we're based in
• 2:35
  Melbourne. We did our first show in Hobart
• 2:36
  down in Tasmania and then we did a couple of shows around
• 2:41
  Melbourne, I think 1, and then we went to Perth and then we
• 2:44
  came back and played Melbourne one more time, which was
• 2:47
  literally a week before Covad. So yeah, yeah, we're actually,
• 2:54
  you know, we had, we had a Japan tour on the cards.
• 2:57
  You know, everything, you know, everything was just full steam.
• 2:59
  I heard pretty much straight away from when I came down to
• 3:01
  Melbourne. And then, you know, Covad kind
• 3:04
  of destroyed that. But you know, Daniel and I, the
• 3:06
  guitarist, you know, we've been, you know who, who was the first
• 3:10
  musician I played with when I came down here.
• 3:12
  All the other guys kind of, you know, during cover, they had
• 3:15
  their own issues and decided to leave.
• 3:18
  So yeah, it's just been me and Daniel for the last two or three
• 3:21
  years. And then we hooked up with Henry
• 3:23
  over in LA just via a website which I saw, I don't remember
• 3:27
  what it's called, but he, he was advertising on a website and you
• 3:31
  know, we started sending him our demos.
• 3:33
  When was that? Like a year and a half, two
• 3:35
  years ago. So yeah, something like 2 years
• 3:38
  I think. And then we, luckily enough, he
• 3:41
  was happy to keep working with us on the next few songs.
• 3:43
  So we've recorded 4 songs with him now.
• 3:45
  Nice, So hard to keep a band together.
• 3:47
  And again, we the global plague, we we're due for another one the
• 3:51
  way our government is going over here.
• 3:54
  But like ready to mismanage another crisis.
• 3:58
  Get ready. But you know, super, you know, I
• 4:01
  don't think Americans understand that Australia specifically is
• 4:06
  very spread out. The major cities are very long.
• 4:09
  You know Western Europe, an hour to every place.
• 4:13
  America. Yeah, America, the Northeast,
• 4:16
  the Midwest, the South, everything is a couple of hours
• 4:19
  or a four or five hour drive and the West Coast a little more
• 4:21
  spread out where I'm at now. But like, it's not an easy thing
• 4:26
  to tour Australia and when our bands or European bands come
• 4:30
  over there, it's not often. And they try to hit all the
• 4:34
  cities like 5 of the 8 whenever possible.
• 4:37
  And New Zealand has worked in there.
• 4:38
  No, Metallica has got, they're kicking off a big Australia, New
• 4:41
  Zealand, Asia tour, right? Very soon.
• 4:44
  And for them, they're gonna hit every big city because they're
• 4:46
  Metallica, right? They can do it, but it's a
• 4:48
  strain to go like hey, I got to drive 8 hours to the to NSW.
• 4:53
  I went over this recently with King Parrot, who are, you know,
• 4:56
  phenomenal doing big, blowing up, happy and proud of them.
• 4:59
  And there's a lot of great bands.
• 5:00
  It's funny, Melbourne does seem to be a very hotbed of extreme
• 5:05
  music right now. So I'm really happy to meet you
• 5:08
  and hear all about that and I'll pick your brain a little bit
• 5:11
  more about that later. So we have this series of
• 5:14
  singles that came out over the summer and I'm excited to hear
• 5:17
  what else you have coming on. I know what I think the band
• 5:20
  sounds like, but just If you were introducing a new fan to
• 5:23
  the band today, how would you describe the range of influences
• 5:27
  and what the sound of the band is?
• 5:29
  I'd say, you know, there's pretty much influence from all
• 5:32
  kinds of music, including world music, classical music, you
• 5:35
  know, metal, gothic, punk, even maybe hip hop.
• 5:39
  And I started out when I started drumming, I was playing a lot of
• 5:43
  hip hop. So that's always just been
• 5:44
  embedded in my style. We, we, we, we plan on doing,
• 5:47
  you know, whatever comes into our minds.
• 5:51
  So, you know, so far we've done, you know, just a few heavy
• 5:55
  tracks. Even the next track is even a
• 5:57
  bit more definitely evolved and then we've got, you know, that
• 6:01
  acoustic cover. So we're kind of trying to take,
• 6:04
  you know, anything that just comes along as we, you know,
• 6:07
  pour out our ideas. Yes.
• 6:09
  And then Daniel and I both, you know, grew up with a lot of
• 6:13
  similar influences. We're very close to the same
• 6:15
  age. So, you know, that helps.
• 6:16
  We kind of just blend this style that we have, which comes from a
• 6:20
  very similar background. But then I don't know, we're
• 6:22
  just came to be bit different and try be original.
• 6:25
  Yeah. So I'm, I'm very tired and he
• 6:28
  just woke up. No.
• 6:28
  Yeah. It's all good.
• 6:29
  It's slow right now too. That's why, again, this thing,
• 6:33
  this thing is what makes it go. I can't.
• 6:37
  Yeah. Well, my, you know, I, I think
• 6:40
  there's some made-up holiday today, National Coffee Day.
• 6:43
  So I was like, oh, I'm out of coffee.
• 6:45
  Let me make a pot. That's that's how I do.
• 6:47
  And then a cup of tea at night sometimes.
• 6:50
  So not as much beer as I used to, unfortunately, because I
• 6:53
  didn't take care of this. Your body's a temple.
• 6:55
  I didn't take care of mine. It's in ruins.
• 6:58
  I love the kitchen sink approach.
• 6:59
  Like in in absorb everything and see what sticks when you let it
• 7:03
  out. I was told by one of my favorite
• 7:05
  drummers that if you can play hip hop and old school funk you
• 7:09
  can actually play anything in metal.
• 7:10
  Which is like wild but really applies.
• 7:13
  And I think a lot of fans don't realize that, like, metal,
• 7:16
  especially the 90s and late 80s metal bands from thrash and all
• 7:21
  the new metal borrowed heavily from the hardcore, American
• 7:25
  hardcore. And that borrowed express lastly
• 7:28
  from early hip hop and rap. So like, maybe in denial about
• 7:33
  how much influence rap has actually had on metal,
• 7:36
  including, like, you know, my friend used to ask me if I
• 7:38
  thought, like, Pantera used to listen to rap.
• 7:40
  And I was like, well, they do like, whatever's current.
• 7:43
  But like, yeah, of course, if you hear Vinnie Paul's drumming,
• 7:46
  you hear a lot of hardcore like Chromags and Agnostic Front.
• 7:49
  And those guys love rap. And their drummers played hip
• 7:53
  hop the halftime, you know, obviously it comes from there's
• 7:56
  a classical music movement that comes from, as you mentioned
• 7:59
  classical earlier. There's classical music stuff
• 8:01
  that does halftime bring it back, but slower.
• 8:04
  That's also like a huge thing in hip hop and it became a thing in
• 8:06
  hit hardcore. And then it became a thing in
• 8:08
  metal and blue metal heads minds.
• 8:10
  Oh my God, it's the same RIP slower.
• 8:12
  This is wild. No, that's actually from rap guy
• 8:15
  in hardcore. So, you know, drummers are
• 8:19
  always your people in bands that take in the most varied music.
• 8:23
  That's my experience as an artist also.
• 8:25
  Is that the drummers, the guy that listens to the most way
• 8:28
  out? Shit, David from Korn used to
• 8:30
  play disco stuff all the time, and then Korn got some disco
• 8:33
  song. Disco beated new metal songs and
• 8:36
  rock songs. So that's just what happens,
• 8:38
  man. It's just we all.
• 8:39
  We're all libraries, right? Of music and history.
• 8:43
  Fun stuff. When did you start playing
• 8:44
  drums? Basically, since I can remember
• 8:47
  it, man, I was just setting up paint cans in the backyard,
• 8:51
  hitting them with wooden spoons. I think there's photos of me
• 8:53
  when I was about two or three, if you call that drumming.
• 8:55
  But I got my hands on a kit in high school in music class, the
• 9:00
  first time I ever played a real kit when I was about 12 years
• 9:03
  old. And then I just basically
• 9:05
  instantly picked it up and luckily enough my parents got me
• 9:08
  a drum kit when I was 13. Then I was on stage at 13 just
• 9:12
  playing up at the local pub in Katoomba with a bunch of
• 9:15
  middle-aged Blues musicians. They then started, you know,
• 9:18
  German with my mates playing in band workshops.
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  And then what? I would have started gigging
• 9:24
  when I was 18. You know, actual proper gigs.
• 9:27
  Right on. Who is your who's your favorite?
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  Like early drummers that made you want to pick, you know, pick
• 9:31
  up the sticks. It'll be, you know, Nico Mcburn,
• 9:35
  Mine Maiden and Phil Rudd, obviously, and those were, you
• 9:39
  know, pretty much the first things I got into.
• 9:41
  Actually, funnily enough, the first album, like anyone ever
• 9:44
  gave me, was Injustice For All. So I guess I'd have to say last.
• 9:48
  He gets too much disrespect, man.
• 9:50
  Put some put some respect on Lawrence's name.
• 9:53
  There was a time back in 1988 when Injustice for All came out,
• 9:56
  Lars could have said he was the best in metal or the best in the
• 9:59
  world and you would have had have been like, you know what?
• 10:02
  Sure. And and obviously you see the
• 10:04
  maiden behind me there. So yeah, man, like Lars gets
• 10:08
  it's it's very in now to shit on Metallica and shit on Lars.
• 10:13
  And I get that every young generation shits on the guys
• 10:16
  before them on. I've been living proof of this.
• 10:18
  But yeah, God put some respect on Lars as an 8 man.
• 10:22
  He did so much early. And if he hasn't, you know, you
• 10:26
  know, he had a like just even play on tour Metallica now,
• 10:30
  whatever you want to say. His quality is he changed his
• 10:33
  entire lifestyle, like went vegan, eats the same meal
• 10:37
  morning, noon and night, works out eight hours a day before a
• 10:41
  show to just be able to barely do the show, you know, with
• 10:45
  respect, because 60 something years old, yo, I wish I could do
• 10:48
  the things I could do when I was 25.
• 10:50
  I can't. I'm 53.
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  So like, yo, respect. Just yeah.
• 10:54
  My Injustice for All is a masterpiece of drumming.
• 10:57
  Yeah, well, they're definitely, you know, the biggest metal man
• 11:00
  in the world. Yeah.
• 11:01
  Black Album 2, actually. Actually, Black Album's great on
• 11:04
  their drums. Like, I know they were caught.
• 11:06
  I know they got Bob Rock because they like Doctor Feel Good and
• 11:09
  Tommy Lee's drumming. That was like the whole reason
• 11:11
  they picked Bob Rock, nothing else.
• 11:12
  And and you know, yeah, he's incredible, man.
• 11:16
  I'm glad. I'm glad he was an influence.
• 11:18
  I'm glad you liked him. That's good.
• 11:20
  It's good. Building blocks, man.
• 11:21
  If you think he sucks now, you know, you got to give respect.
• 11:25
  You can't just be. Fuck that guy.
• 11:28
  I don't know, I get that they've made a lot of, you know, as big
• 11:31
  as Bayos. Led Zeppelin made mistakes,
• 11:33
  Blacks, you know, Black Sabbath made many mistakes.
• 11:35
  Metallica made many mistakes. The the leaders always go 1st
• 11:39
  and they fuck it up into success.
• 11:41
  They fuck up on their way to winning.
• 11:44
  Right. Like that's the curve of
• 11:46
  business and success. Yeah, man.
• 11:51
  So you have these killer singles and I, you know, obviously the
• 11:55
  it's it's super fun to talk about the Alice In Chains cover
• 11:58
  because it's definitely a left turn from the other tracks and
• 12:01
  and probably what the main sound of the band is.
• 12:03
  But I love that you like felt able to do it.
• 12:06
  And I'm a humongous Alice In Chains man.
• 12:09
  And I love the sappy Pi think it's kind of unrate underrated.
• 12:13
  It's so super cool to pull that one off.
• 12:16
  And and the vocals, yeah. Yeah, I've never recorded myself
• 12:20
  singing before, so pretty happy with how it turned out.
• 12:23
  Yeah, right on, huh? It's like Dave Grohl become
• 12:27
  become a singing drummer. You never know.
• 12:29
  Yeah, yeah, I can't growl, but I can do backups I guess.
• 12:33
  Yeah, hey, whatever you can do to add it to the mix.
• 12:36
  And then you saw you, I believe you said you have more new music
• 12:39
  coming. That's right, yeah.
• 12:41
  We just mixed and mastered another song with Henry on
• 12:44
  vocals and we actually got, yeah, McKinnon in to do some
• 12:48
  flute, which is pretty cool. We actually played a show with
• 12:51
  him before COVID and yeah, it's really cool of him to jump on
• 12:55
  board for the next song. And then we've got one more that
• 12:59
  we still have to add a few finishing touches to before it's
• 13:01
  mixed and mastered. That's what we've also got the
• 13:03
  vocals from Henry for that. And then from there, we're just,
• 13:06
  you know, we're trying to write more material to, you know,
• 13:09
  hopefully get a whole albums worth.
• 13:11
  And we've still got, you know, a whole bunch of stuff in the
• 13:13
  vault. And we've, you know, got ideas
• 13:16
  that we've been coming up with, you know, all the time as well.
• 13:18
  So shouldn't take us long to come up with a few more songs.
• 13:21
  There you go. Guitar players always have that
• 13:23
  like, extra riff they never used, right?
• 13:25
  There's always an extra riff somewhere.
• 13:27
  Hey, you got a riff for this part?
• 13:29
  I do like every guitar player ever, bar Mckennon, formerly of
• 13:34
  Mr. Bungle. We just interviewed.
• 13:36
  You can check that out on our social.
• 13:38
  I saw that actually. Our man Tom Osman, who's my
• 13:41
  managing editor of the reviews team from the UK, Matt
• 13:46
  interviewed him. He's also a phenomenal
• 13:48
  interviewer, right? And he has his own podcast and
• 13:50
  does other things too. And I was really thrilled to get
• 13:53
  that because, you know, obviously with the sort of a
• 13:56
  reactivated Mr. Bungle being the main Mike Patton project now
• 14:00
  everybody is kind of focusing on the current lineup of Mr.
• 14:03
  Bungle, but doesn't appreciate that.
• 14:05
  Like, you know, beside the one guy that's a murderer, they had
• 14:08
  a whole life as a band that was excellent, you know, and and
• 14:12
  worthy and really worth like they influence so many people.
• 14:16
  I think it's kind of actually super interesting, like the take
• 14:19
  that Mister Bungle is either like thrash metal, hardcore,
• 14:23
  yacht rock, and there's not any in between anymore.
• 14:27
  Like Bungle had a lot of in between and and particularly I
• 14:30
  was a huge fan of disco Volante and and California and stuff.
• 14:34
  So yeah, bars great. I'm, I'm looking forward to
• 14:36
  that. And yeah, man, I love to always
• 14:40
  ask artists like, you know, it's such a tough and again, like I
• 14:46
  don't know about the challenges with the global world right now
• 14:50
  with trade and tariffs and things.
• 14:52
  But like, you know, I imagine at the by the time you are ready
• 14:55
  for a full release, do you envision having physical merch
• 14:59
  and, and you know, or an EP or something first, if you think
• 15:03
  that's a possibility. I know how expensive these
• 15:06
  things are around the world. There's not a as many pressing
• 15:09
  plants as there are people to buy records.
• 15:11
  That's right. I will.
• 15:13
  I've always wanted to have, you know, something on vinyl.
• 15:16
  That's always been a goal of mine, which, you know, I've
• 15:18
  never managed to achieve that. Yeah, I'd love to even a small
• 15:21
  pressing just to start. I'd love to, even if it's, you
• 15:25
  know, we might start off maybe with an AP, maybe press 2 EPS or
• 15:30
  maybe wait for a full album. We don't know, constantly, you
• 15:33
  know, coming up with different ideas of what we want to do.
• 15:36
  But yeah, man, I'd love to get some physical merch done just to
• 15:40
  take, you know, the shows at least.
• 15:41
  And, you know, if we can end up, you know, one day, end up, you
• 15:45
  know, trying to sell it in stores, then, you know, that's
• 15:48
  another thing that'll be good. So yeah, As for now, basically
• 15:51
  we've just been digital, but we might, you know, maybe even
• 15:54
  print up our own 4 song demo just physically and send that
• 15:59
  around and yeah we'll just go from there, man.
• 16:01
  Like never know as like you said, like the climate now, like
• 16:04
  who knows what's going to happen?
• 16:05
  I. Will I will qualify what I said
• 16:07
  that with the tariffs and things is that so far it seems like the
• 16:13
  cost of physical media, at least from Europe to the US is not
• 16:17
  getting extra, you know, extra monetized against the fan, maybe
• 16:22
  costing more to the to the printer, to the presser, to the
• 16:25
  labels, distributors, merch companies.
• 16:28
  But so far in my experiment, limited experience buying.
• 16:32
  I also have a vinyl podcast, so that's a thing too, but it seems
• 16:36
  like it's not getting passed on to us yet.
• 16:39
  And I know, and again, I know Australia shipping to, you know,
• 16:43
  to have a store in Europe or the US is the goal.
• 16:45
  But like, you know, there's plenty of good partner companies
• 16:49
  out there when the time comes if you're ready.
• 16:51
  Super cool. And I'm rooting for you.
• 16:53
  I love to end these interviews with a wild card question.
• 16:56
  And so I have a fun one for you, which is if you could invite any
• 17:00
  five people to dinner, live, living or dead, who would you
• 17:03
  invite and what would you serve them?
• 17:05
  Gee, yeah, I'd say I've got a drum head here with Jane
• 17:09
  Hoagland. So I'll say Jane Hoagland.
• 17:12
  And who else living like dead? My daughter and I have been
• 17:16
  listening to a lot of Nirvana. So I'd say Kurt Cobain.
• 17:19
  He was a massive. He was another, you know,
• 17:21
  Nirvana was a big part of my childhood too.
• 17:23
  Sorry, man, my brain's not on. Maybe someone else living.
• 17:29
  Mike Patten for sure. Not a Dagboy.
• 17:32
  How about Vinny Paul Zappa? Hell yeah.
• 17:36
  Oh, that's a that's a good list right there.
• 17:39
  Especially like Patton and Zappa and Cobain.
• 17:42
  And then Gene and Vinny can like go in the corner and talk with
• 17:45
  you about drums and what would you serve?
• 17:48
  Like what? What's your favorite meal or
• 17:49
  what would you serve your guests?
• 17:52
  No, I'm mostly cooking. It'd probably be a barbecue and,
• 17:55
  you know, a ton of beer. A ton of beer.
• 17:58
  I love it a ton. I love it.
• 18:00
  Yeah. Good stuff.
• 18:01
  We just interviewed Gene, also one of the wonderfulest people.
• 18:04
  Yeah, we've done many interviews with Gene, including like 3 in
• 18:08
  the last year, because he just very.
• 18:10
  We did like a one, my partner did one giant one with him for
• 18:13
  like 3 hours and we cut it into two.
• 18:15
  And then he just came out with the new Death Angel album, which
• 18:17
  he's on tour with right now and then he's going into death to
• 18:20
  all again. So like they wanted to like
• 18:23
  catch up with us again. I feel very lucky.
• 18:26
  I met Gene and he was wonderful in person and then like he's the
• 18:29
  same guy year every year. So nice.
• 18:32
  And so I. Met him in Sydney very briefly.
• 18:37
  He was in a funny mood because apparently he's one of his best
• 18:39
  friends that just died. Oh God, yeah.
• 18:42
  But yeah, no, it was cool to meet him very briefly, but.
• 18:45
  So, yeah, he's so nice. He's he's like a he's like a
• 18:48
  gentle. He's a tall, gentle giant.
• 18:50
  And not to mention, that's like the the number one thing you
• 18:53
  drummers can learn from Gene Hoagland.
• 18:55
  Practice double bass drumming with weights on your ankles.
• 18:58
  That's how he built up his speed and his accuracy.
• 19:01
  It's crazy. Yeah.
• 19:01
  I. Used to study his his drum
• 19:03
  videos. Atomic clock.
• 19:06
  Yeah, yeah, that's what I was doing for years, man.
• 19:08
  I was using the weights. That's it.
• 19:09
  That's it. Nick, super cool to meet you,
• 19:11
  man. Thank you for your patience and
• 19:13
  getting a message from you set up.
• 19:14
  Shout out to Raquel Figlo for Raquel Figlo, thank you for
• 19:18
  putting us together. And yeah, man, we're looking,
• 19:21
  looking forward to what you're going to do next, man.
• 19:23
  I'm really excited about this band.
• 19:24
  Thank you so much man, appreciate your time.