By Andrew Bansal
Four years after the release of their third album ‘Tales From The Grave In Space’, an album which they toured very extensively on around the world, Irish thrashers Gama Bomb put out their newest studio effort ‘The Terror Tapes’ on May 7th in the US via AFM Records. They began the touring cycle for the new album with the ‘Speed Of Sound’ European run last month, and just before they departed for that, I caught up with vocalist Philly Byrne and bassist Joe McGuigan over Skype to talk about the album, the touring, what they went through in the past four year, and other topics. Check out the conversation below, along with some music off of the album, and visit the band online using the links at the bottom.
Your new album ‘The Terror Tapes’ came out a few weeks ago, but it’s been a long time since the previous album, which was in 2009. I believe you’ve faced some difficulties and changes through these four years. Would you like to talk about what went through?
Philly: Yeah, the album happened when it was supposed to happen, really. I’m not a big believer in being on a conveyor belt where we have to make an album every 18 months, you know. I think that’s the way a lot of bands end up making crap albums because it’s part of the business plan or something. For us, there were obstacles that just got in the way. We had business problems with our label, I had health problems mainly with my throat. Our guitarist Domo broke a tendon in his hand, and our other guitar player Luke left the band after being with us for ten years. So all of this kept us away from writing any new material, and also, we spent a lot of time touring for the Tales From The Grave In Space album. We played over 200 shows supporting that album, so that took a bit out of us as well. So I think the album happened when it needed to happen, and the way it was supposed to, so that’s the main thing about it.
Were the health problems mainly because of the excessive touring that you did, or was there something else that led to it?
Philly: Yeah, it happened because I guess my habits were bad. My techniques were bad in terms of singing and things like that, and the health of my voice took a beating with the stupid kind of ‘staying up all night shouting’ thing that I used to do all the time, which I do a little bit less now. So I think it was combination of things. It was me and the work we did, they kind of just teamed up to create a shit storm in my throat, really. It was a very difficult thing to recuperate from. At times it was scary as well, having to go get surgery, see a therapist and take a large knock to the ego and self-confidence. But it made me realize a couple of very important things. I had to rethink the way I was approaching my singing, in order to make it sustainable. I wanted to make sure I don’t fuck things up to the extent that I cannot fix them. So yeah, it was very informative, and very scary (laughs).
And right now, with all those problems behind you and the new album out, you must be ready and excited to tour again.
Philly: Yeah, we are relishing that. You can never be entirely ready, and you just have to jump in and work hard at it to make sure things are coming off properly.
Joe: As Philly said, on the last album we did 200 shows, so obviously the set was really tight after that. And since we’ve had pretty much a whole year off gigging, we’re going to start with 25 shows in Europe, and then things are going to pick up after that real soon.
Philly mentioned the new guitarist (John Roche). You haven’t toured in a while so I guess you would have had a chance to familiarize yourself with the guy. Did he actually record on the album?
Joe: Yeah, actually what happened was, as Philly was saying with the injuries and stuff, our guitar player Domo hurt his hand from wearing two types of trousers and broke a tendon in his finger. So basically we got John Roche to fill in for Domo for a winter tour, and then at the end of that tour our original guitar player Luke said that he had done enough with the band, that he had already gone to America and achieved all his goals. So he decided that he wanted to leave the band. It was really tough because me, Philly and Luke have always kind of been the original members of the band. But we gave him our blessings and he’s happy moving on. Anyway, John’s been a great addition to the band because we always wanted to have a kind of twin-guitar ala Agent Steel kind of thing. John can play lead guitar as well, so we can do that and we’re pretty happy with it. And yeah, John did play on the album. He’s been in the band now for a year and a bit.
In terms of the music itself, four years is a long time, so I guess it’s fair to say the previous album isn’t even fresh in the memory of your fans and listeners. So the new album is a completely fresh entity in that sense. Is that a good thing for you?
Joe: Yeah, it’s actually a good thing because with Tales From The Grave In Space coming out a year after Citizen Brain, they really kind of were brother-and-sister albums and to get a break and change our style a little bit, we needed that time off instead of having a conveyor belt kind of production.
You mentioned the American tour. I saw a couple of shows on that, and they were great. I’m sure it was fun for you guys as well. When are you planning to make a return to our shores?
Philly: Yeah, we’re coming back to US and Canada with Artillery, Fueled By Fire and Bonded By Blood this August and September. We’ve very excited. Going to America three years ago was a very pivotal thing for us, personally as well as for the band. That’s one of the things talked about very much outside of America. It’s a benchmark, a watershed kind of moment. Very few people where we come from get to do that, so it was a huge deal, and going back there has been one of the great hopes I’ve had for the band to be honest, to make that a habit rather than a fluke. That’s what we’re going to do when we come there in August. It’s exciting!
Coming back to the music on the new album, you guys have had a standard theme throughout. With thrash and with these kind of lyrics, are you worried that you will reach a limit some day and you would have to change the theme?
Joe: Well, it is sort of related to our imagination. The thing about is, we’ve always been into geeky, nerdy stuff. Gama Bomb has always been an honest thrash band, like we don’t want to have slow parts of convoluted parts in our songs or lyrics, so we try and do things honestly and the long-and-short of it is, Dio sang about dragons and Gama Bomb sings about zombies. It’s not that we write songs about hitting people in the faces with pies (laughs). We would consider it more of a sellout to try writing lyrics like Metallica or any of that preachy stuff. That would just be a joke to us, you know.
Talking of geeky, nerdy stuff that you guys are into, what’s the new thing you’re enjoying in that sense?
Joe: We’re not really big gamers in terms of modern games and stuff. We’re huge fans of old 80s games like Final Fight and Double Dragon. We’ve been watching lots of Bronx Warriors, Italian movies, that kind of thing. What about you, Philly?
Philly: I’ve been watching a strange combination of ridiculous Hollywood things like Oblivion and Iron Man 3, and also The Walking Dead. I don’t play a lot of games because I know that if I did, it would take up my whole life and I would end up just kind of becoming a hermit of some kind. But when I do play a game on tour, I do an entire play-through of it. When we were on tour the year before last, I played and completed all of Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo, one of my favorite games of all time. This time when we go on tour, I’m going to play something else. So yeah, it’s good fodder when there’s nothing to do, but generally I’m too busy to play computer games.
I guess you need an activity like this for tours. There’s so much of driving and nothingness associated with a North American tour.
Joe: Absolutely, man. It’s something that people out of bounds don’t really understand, being in a bus for 15-16 hours a day. That’s one of the things about going on a long America tour. All the drives were just insane. I think we did a drive of 27 hours at one point, with just three or four stops. Eventually everything runs out. You run out of battery power, you run out of books to read, so you’re just kind of sitting there looking at each other.
Philly: At times I don’t have anything to think about or any place to get away from everybody. It can be a difficult scenario. But if you’re lucky enough to have your own bunk, you’re a rich man.
Joe: Or a bottle of whiskey!
Excessive touring can definitely be a bad thing for any band, right?
Joe: Yes, there are bands like Destruction, Exodus and stuff, who are out there so much in the USA every single year, so it’s not really an event when they play in LA. Unless it’s a really cool bill of bands, people have already seen it the year before. So yeah, it can definitely hurt bands when they tour too much. I think all bands try to spread their wings as much as they can.
You said you did over 200 shows for the previous album. Do you aim to do lesser number of shows for this one?
Joe: Yeah, I think this time we’ll probably do 70 shows or something like that. That way we can really do a European tour, do a US tour, go back to South America, Asia, do a tour of the UK and we’ll probably try and get back into the studio again around Christmas time!
Links:
gamabomb.net
facebook.com/gamabomb
twitter.com/gamabombspeaks
Gama Bomb North American Tour Dates:
W 8/21 San Diego, CA Brick by Brick
Th 8/22 Los Angeles, CA The Vex
F 8/23 Modesto, CA Fat Cats Music Hall
S 8/24 Oakland, CA Oakland Metro
Su 8/25 Portland, OR Dante’s
M 8/26 Seattle, WA El Corazon
T 8/27 Vancouver, BC $800
W 8/28 Spokane, WA The Hooe
F 8/30 Denver, CO
S 8/31 Oklahoma City, OK
Su 9/1 Dallas, TX The Boiler
T 9/3 Columbus, OH Shrunken Head
W 9/4 Chicago, IL Reggies Live
Th 9/5 Lansing, MI Uli’s Haus of Rock
F 9/6 Toronto, ON The Rock Pile
S 9/7 Westland, MI Token Lounge
T 9/10 New Castle, PA Chances Nite Club
W 9/11 Buffalo, NY Forvm
Th 9/12 Brooklyn, NY Saint Vitus Bar
F 9/13 North Hampton, PA The Gin Mill Bar and Grille
S 9/14 Amityville, NY The Revolution