If you’re looking for trends, style, fashion, gimmicks, masks (think Slipknot…pause…now laugh), make-up, and other superficial nonsense that bands seemingly use to hide behind because their music isn’t good enough, please, look elsewhere. Minneapolis’ Devilinside is NOT for you. “We want the music to [speak] for us, not our costumes ‘cause we’re just regular dudes. It’s not like we’ve got the latest fashionable haircuts or anything like that. We’re just a bunch of dudes that love metal, and we just wanna play it,” expounds drummer Joel Andersen, one-fourth of Devilinside, which also includes guitarist Tony Byron, vocalist Jaime Gonzales, and bassist Mike Van Heel. “We don’t wanna rely on a mask or pyro or spitting blood. We want the music to stand on its own and to not have the circus.”
Another thing that separates Devilinside from other bands prevalent at the moment, according to Joel, is the bands they are influenced by, which he says, “don’t have anything really to do with the ‘hardcore’ and ‘metal’ scenes currently.” He name-checks Black Sabbath, Entombed, and old Sepultura. “We really wanna stand on our own,” he continues. In fact, the songs that didn’t make the cut onto their debut full-length ‘Volume One’ (Abacus) were dropped precisely because they sounded, perchance, a bit too much like something out there today. “We’re not trying to be something. We’re just trying to be Devilinside.” He hesitates for a moment, “That sounds kinda cheesy saying that out loud, but we’re just trying to do our own thing,” going so far as to say even if they didn’t obtain a record deal, they’d still be playing exactly what they’re playing. He says this may be selfish – playing music “just to please yourself,” but in my mind, that seems like the ONLY reason to create music and perform. Why do something in which you don’t full-heartedly believe?
And Devilinside claim to be doing just that: “The music we’re doing is music we wanna hear, and if nobody’s gonna do it, then we’ll do it. We wanna listen to it. Hopefully other people do too. That just makes it better, I guess.”
Both Joel and Tony had, prior to Devilinside, been in the much-respected metalcore band Disembodied in the ‘90s. I had to know if there were pros/cons to being considered a band with the “ex-members of…” tag. He believes it’s a double-edged sword in that yes, if seeing that some guys in Devilinside did time in Disembodied is impetus enough for some people to check out Devilinside, it’s cool. But, on the other hand, as the drummer explains, when the two were in Disembodied, they didn’t really take part in the creative process, they didn’t write songs. They were merely “hired guns basically,” he concedes. “We just played our parts that we were told to play.” As a result he feels Disembodied didn’t truly represent who they were in the band, so it’s understandable that they would rather not be compared to that band.
Actually, Devilinside came about in ’99 while Tony and Joel were on the last Disembodied tour, which they weren’t enjoying too much. Both “fed up,” they decided to just jam together after Disembodied practice. Shortly after, “Disembodied just kinda fizzled out…and me and Tony were like, ‘Cool!’” he laughs. “It just ended up working out.” They were excited because at that point they were able to do their own thing and write their own music.
“And here we are today, five years later and it’s still cool,” he reflects. Thinking about it for a moment, this achievement hits him: “Five years, that seems like so long. Shit!” And having to deal with a buttload of “bullshit” with record labels and touchy subjects that we shall not delve into here…, the fact that they’re still around, putting out their first full-length, is all the sweeter.
About this album, which was released September 7, ‘Volume One’, the title just sounds like a “best of” or career retrospective. Turns out in a way it is. Consisting of old and new songs, Joel likens it to a “greatest hits up to this point” because they’d dropped a bunch of songs that they’d written over the years, so what we get on the album is the crème de la crème of Devilinside’s material. The album is definitely heavy and aggressive for the most part, full of hardcore mosh parts and some metal technicality, though there are moments when the band stray from the bludgeoning norm, as they do with the various instrumental interludes that pepper the album, adding some atmospherics – and a different side of the band – to the mix. Even though these compositions can be seen as somewhat of a “break,” in all actuality, the record flows from track to track, making for some great continuity.
Since they incorporate elements of crushing hardcore and metal, one must wonder: live, are Devilinside better received amongst hardcore circles or the metal scene? Joel insists that in Minneapolis (at least) the people attending shows were hardcore kids, metalheads, guys into death metal and/or rock. So, “it’s a wide variety,” he , “I think we can kinda translate over everything ‘cause we have super-heavy parts and then just straight-ahead parts and kinda technical stuff. At least what I’m seeing, it’s sorta appealing to a lot of different people, and,” he adds logically, “that’s the way we want it. we want everybody to be able to get into it.”
The guys of Devilinside had been playing a lot locally at the time of our conversation, but now, according to their Website, they have some dates confirmed, including playing the CMJ Abacus/Level Plane Showcase October 15, at CBGB’s in NYC, part of the multi-day CMJ Music Marathon every October. Also listed is a November/December tour (doesn’t say which coast, or if it will be the entire U.S.) with E-Town Concrete, Twelve Tribes, and Diecast. Definitely keep checking the band’s Website for specific details and updates. In any case, Joel says Devilinside plans on touring “all the time.” They were just waiting for the record’s release and then they’d “be gone.” He laughs, “We’re tired of playing in Minneapolis.” Well, it certainly seems they won’t be confined there much longer, as they have a confirmed tour with Suffocation, Cattle Decapitation, and Behemoth slated for February/March 2005…