REVERENCE – Our Interview With Guitarist BRYAN HOLLAND; New Album Out On May 31!

THE EDITOR MAY 30, 2012 1

Hello there THE MUSIC BORDER.COM TRESPASSERS!
It is with great honor that we launch our very own first INTERVIEW. For this new “endeavour”, we present to you REVERENCE, coming out of Chicago and playing a killer sound which reminded us some good vibes of HOUSE OF SPIRITS, SAVATAGE, QUEENSRYCHE… But most notably not looking like any of them. They do have their own personality and today we’ve spoken toBRYAN HOLLAND, the man responsible for putting it all together. We’ve talked about his background as a musician as well as the upcoming news and release of the new REVERENCE album “When Darkness Calls” due TOMORROW (MAY 31^st) viaRAZAR ICE RECORDS.

Enjoy and get ready for more TMB exclusives!  \m/

1) HELLO BRYAN AND THANK YOU FOR TAKING SOME TIME TO TALK TO THE MUSIC BORDER.COM!
TELL US AND THE READERS A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOURSELF…

 Sure thing, I appreciate your interest in myself and Reverence. Well to answer your first questions, I’m from South West Michigan, near a little town called Kalamazoo, made famous by a Glenn Miller song in 1942. Kalamazoo is nearly dead center between Chicago, IL and Detroit, MI. I played the local scene here for many years until I managed to get myself into the ‘big leagues’ haha!

My inner rocker was awakened at age 9 or 10 when like so many others ‘Kiss meets the Phantom of the Park’ aired on TV in the late 70′s, after seeing that, I knew exactly what I wanted to do! I’ve always been involved in some way with music over the years, either as a musician, a web designer for bands, to management or with my own indie music label.

2) WAS THE GUITAR THE FIRST INSTRUMENT YOU TOOK AN INTEREST IN? TELL US ABOUT YOUR EARLIER MUSIC INFLUENCES?

 No, actually I initially started on drums but quickly switched to guitar, my parents couldn’t stand the drums so my dad traded in my drums in favor of a guitar and amp which I still have.

I am for the most part 99.9% self taught, I took a couple of lessons from a local teacher in Kalamazoo named Jeremy Morris, basically to give me a little direction on chords and such. After that, I just would jam along with the radio and my favorite bands tapes trying to learn the licks by ear and wearing our a good many tape decks while learning. I can’t read a single note of sheet music but I can pick up songs pretty easily by ear.

Growing up in the late 70′s and early 80′s I feel I have a good cross over of classic rock and early metal influences, guys like Rik Emmett, Randy Rhoads and Criss Oliva, Michael Schenker, John Sykes and Wolf Hoffmann, those guys were my main guys for inspiration but I still liked bands like Thin Lizzy, The Sweet and ELO but really loved the twins guitars of Judas Priest, Ratt and even early Night Ranger.

3) HOW OLD WERE YOU WHEN YOU WERE IN YOUR FIRST BAND THAT YOU ACTUALLY PLAYED GIGS WITH? WHAT KIND OF MUSIC WAS IT? DID YOU HAVE LIKE A FAVORITE TUNE TO JAM OUT TO BACK THEN? LOL HOW ABOUT NOW?

I first picked up guitar at about 13-14 so my first real band gig would have been when I was about 16 or so, we were terrible! I remember playing at some company party or something and we played Tom Petty and other classic rock standards like Born to be Wild, Smoke on the Water and Paranoid, etc. We were a three-piece band with the drummer singing and me on backups too, truly horrible! Hahah, those were the days!

4) LET’S TALK “TOKYO BLADE” A LITTLE…  HOW DID YOU GET INVOLVED?

Well, I had been a fan of the band and decided to look up guitarist Andy Boulton online, I found he had some self made website and emailed him and we got to be good friends. We flew him over from England to stay with us a couple of times. With me already having my own indie label and being involved behind the scenes with so many bands and music, he asked me to re-release the old Tokyo Blade catalog, we made up and contract and did that very thing!

When I put together some promo about the re-releases, I quickly got interest in the band playing out, except there was no band, the band had been long dead since the mid 90′s. So I asked Andy what he wanted to do and he instantly asked me, “You play guitar don’t ya?” I replied, “Yes!” and he said “Well, why don’t you just be the second guitar player!?”, I accepted on the spot…of course that also meant reforming the band from scratch too as he didn’t want to work with any of the old TB guys so I began the hunt for new members and found some great musicians not far from me in Detroit, viola, Tokyo Blade was reborn!

5) SO YOU PLAYED GUITAR WITH “T.B.” AND TOURED… WERE YOU INVOLVED WITH THE WRITING PROCESS AT ALL? HOW LONG WERE YOU IN THE BAND?

Yes, we did several tours and we also recorded a live album and dvd, overall I was with the band for approx 4-5 years. We toyed with a few ideas that Andy had but honestly, the material he gave us was pretty guitar 101, generic, beginner kinda riffs which we were honestly surprised to be getting from him, so we attempted to work on it but you can only polish a turd so much, Chris Gillen and I had several writing sessions with some very cool classic TB style riffs and song structures. It’s a shame too I think we could have made a much better album than what they just put out. It definitely would have been more metal, and a lot heavier, more old school, especially with Chris Gillen singing, cross that with some of those classic Blade riff we had and I think it could have been and great comeback album, but alas it was not to be…things happen for reasons you know.

6) WHAT WAS THE TOURING PERIOD LIKE? ANYTHING YOU’D LIKE TO SHARE FROM THE “ON THE ROAD” STORIES?

 I love touring, I loved doing that album and DVD hence the real reason Reverence was born, getting music out and touring the world is a passion for me! But touring with TB was a lot of fun, a lot of hard work and yes, some ego clashes, mainly due to Mr. Boulton himself and his girlfriend who was also on the tour with us.

Without tossing a lot of mud around, I’ll just say this, if you’ve ever seen the movie ‘Spinal Tap’ then you’re aware of the mess create within the band by David St. Hubbins girlfriend ‘Janine’, amplify that by 100 and put Andy in place of David but with a colossal ego and a lot of narcissistic bullshit. Imagine that if you can and you’ll have the small glimpse of what it was like to tour with Tokyo Blade, haha!! But all in all, it was a lot of fun too.

7) WHY DID YOU LEAVE THAT BAND? AND AFTER LEAVING DID YOU PLAY FOR ANYONE ELSE?

The band basically ended after the last European tour we did in the fall of ’09, it was a great tour, very well received, we played all over in some good sized venues and festivals the band finally started making some money after getting the machine rolling again after the band being gone for close to 15 years but we simply couldn’t tolerate the lying ass egomaniac Englishman anymore. It’s really too bad, even Andy has stated publicly that we were the “Best and Heaviest line-up the band had ever had!” Just listen to our live CD/DVD for a testament to that fact. Deep down though, I believe in stepping stones and without a doubt that whole thing has led me to creating and even better band with Reverence.

I had a couple of offers but no, I wanted to do my own thing. So I took a little time off to clear my head over the holidays and immediately got into building Reverence. It’s definitely taken a little longer than we all wanted but it’s all coming together now and the wait is worth it. All the management and booking agents stuck with me from Tokyo Blade so we have all of the business side of it still intact which makes it a lot of easier for us to get back out there touring again.

9) IT’S TIME TO TALK ABOUT THE PRESENT… ABOUT REVERENCE, HOW DID YOU ALL COME TOGETHER?

I found Todd Michael Hall by searching on MySpace on New Year’s Eve 2010, my management company contacted him the next day and coincidentally he lives only a couple hours away from me, so we agreed to partner up and began writing for a new album. After demoing a few songs I contacted Frank Kruckel, my bassist and bandmate in Tokyo Blade and played him the new demos, he signed on immediately.

As for Doc Killdrums, I have known Doc for well over 15 years and had played with him many times before. Doc and I had always wanted to play together and this was the perfect opportunity and fit Doc’s style exactly. With the music we were writing we knew we would be needing a second guitarist, so Doc suggested Pete Rossi from Pittsburg’s Sanxtion.

10) TELL US ABOUT THE INSPIRATION BEHIND REVERENCE. WERE YOU THE ONE WHO GOT THIS ALL STARTED?

Yes, I am the one to blame, haha! I decided I wanted to create a band that was heavier and a more power metal in style than Tokyo Blade. The most important element to me was finding the right frontman with a great voice who can write and doesn’t have a severe case of LSD (Lead Singer Disease) without those things it doesn’t matter how great the music is if the guy delivering it sucks or the melodies aren’t there.

So I believe I found in Todd, exactly what I was looking for, a vocalist that could give write great melodic soaring vocal choruses over my riffs, the combo I was looking for was akin to that classic metal sound I loved growing up like Judas Priest, Savatage, Helloween and Queensryche but also with a hint of modern feel, I feel confident we’ve captured just that!

11) HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE REVERENCE’S MUSIC?

Pete Rossi (Reverence’s, 2nd guitarist) and I are worshipers of the late Criss Oliva and Randy Rhoads and I feel without a doubt those influences shine through on our songs. Todd’s vocal style gives a distinct vintage Queensryche style, so with that being said I think we really have a firm grip on some elements from vintage Savatage, Ozzy and Queensryche with some classic Judas Priest but with a lot of of our own flare too.

I think having your influences is great but you still need your own identity and I really believe we have both on this record. I really think as we get into the second album which I’ve already started writing for , we’ll develop and even strong identity of what Reverence really is and sounds like.

12) THE NEW CD IS DROPPING THIS WEEK, TELL US ABOUT THE WRITING PROCESS FOR THIS AND HOW LONG DID IT TAKE?

Todd and I are the primary writers, we started writing in the late winter/spring of 2010, we spend the next year writing and really took our time and actually tossed out several songs along the way. Once Pete joined in the winter of 2011 he added a lot of dimension and textures to the material. Pete’s attributes come from having a big music theory background which has given him a great ear for adding a lot of harmony textures, which really fit well with our style or writing and helps make the music more interesting, instead of just chunking on bar chords.

So, we tossed the music back and forth to each other via the internet, which worked well finalizing the demos before heading into pre-production rehearsals and then into studio. Ultimately we demoed 15 songs of which only 13 were recorded for the album. We’re not sure if all 13 will make it or not, it will come down to the final mixes which we are getting this week. So we are very near the end of the process and all the fun can really begin.

These are are the final song titles, in no particular order and are not the final track listing for the album. When Darkness Calls, Vengeance Is Mine, Too Late, Bleed For Me, Monster, Gatekeeper, Twist Of Fate, Phantom Road, Price You Pay, Lost Generation, Devil In Disguise, Revolution Rising and After the Leaves Have Fallen.

13) DOES IT HAVE A MAIN THEME OR IS IT A CONCEPT ALBUM? WHAT CAN YOU SAY ABOUT SOME OF THE SONG ON THIS ALBUM AND WHAT PEOPLE CAN EXPECT FROM IT?

Not really, Todd and I both agreed when we began writing that we wouldn’t pursue any kind of typical power metal cliché’s with dungeons and dragons, Vikings or wizards, we’ll leave that to some other bands.

We just draw from our own frustrations within the business and life in general. The album is titled “When Darkness Calls” because there are a lot of heavy dark topics, frustrations with our governments, which is the topic of the song ‘Revolution Rising‘, ‘Vengeance Is Mine‘ is directly about my time in Tokyo Blade, “Lost Generation‘ is about society, ‘Bleed For Me‘ is about obsession, ‘Price you Pay‘ is about karma. We used these songs as outlets for those feelings which is really cathartic.

Again, some of our favorite albums like Diary of a Madman, Hall of the Mt. King and The Warning didn’t have themes, those bands wrote what they felt, we tried to the same thing here.

 

14) AND HOW ABOUT THE ALBUM ART? WHAT CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THE BEAUTIFUL ARTWORK DEVELOPED?

Well, I had worked with Jobert Mello from Sledgehammer Graphix during my time in Tokyo Blade, I believe he did a tour shirt design that was stellar. So when we were to the point of needing an artist with Reverence, he was the only logical choice. Jobert is an incredible artist, he managed to bring to life the current cover art from a simple black and white design I presented him with. He added in all the small environmental elements which really bring it to life, the final product far surpassed my expectations! So many people over promise and under deliver, but in Jobert’s case he just simply delivered an amazing cover that I believe will be very memorable even years from now when he’s still doing album covers for us, hahha! In reality album covers are a huge face of a band so its very important to capture what the band is and I truly believe Jobert did that very thing for us, we couldn’t be happier.

15) IS IT ALL ON YOUR OWN EXPENSES? RELEASING, PRODUCING, ETC?

So far we are, we may shop it to a few labels but honestly, the need for labels is diminishing by each passing day. Labels no longer want to put any money into the recording or promotional ends of it, they’re more and more trying to get their hooks into the bands for merchandising and show percentages.

We don’t need to work hard writing, recording, arranging, all the artwork and promoting just to give the music away to them so they can make all the money back and not the band. With the way the internet is now and is constantly evolving, it gets easier and easier to not need a label.

If no other labels bite, it’s ok with us, we’ll just release it through my indie label, getting it out to the digital downloads is not a problem, we’re already promoting it more than most labels would or do anyways. We may try to do some licensing deals to allow us to get into any brick & mortars which may still be out there, there aren’t many left. We’re not going to just give away all our hard work for peanuts.

16) WHEN WILL THE ALBUM BE AVAILABLE TO EVERYONE?

The album is scheduled for this Thursday, May 31^st (TMB: THAT’S TOMORROW!). It will first be available on the bands website: ReverenceMetal.com and it will also be released via Razar Ice Records and on iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Rhapsody, Sptify and many others. Fans can ‘Follow Us’ on Twitter, ‘Like’ our facebook, become a ‘Fan’ on Reverbnation or just get our new FREE phone app.

http://www.reverbnation.com/mobile-app/6375/reverenceofficial

17) HOW ABOUT TOURING… ARE YOU PLAYING SOME OF THE SUMMER FESTIVALS?

We’ve already begun booking for a UK and European tour, we have confirmed dates in Belgium, The Netherland and Switzerland so far. There’s still lots of time for booking and with the buzz the band has been generating, booking shouldn’t be a difficult task, we’re really looking forward to going back over to rip it up with our friends in Europe and the UK!

18) SO HOW IS THE ALBUM PROMO DOING SO FAR?

Well the press machine is rolling along pretty well so far, we’ve been doing a lot of interviews and the reviews will be coming in shortly. We’re planning a few different version of the new album, a regular Jewel case, Digi-pak and a Limited Vinyl Edition with bonus tracks. We’re also planning on releasing a single for the song ‘Too Late’, the video for which will be our release on the same day as the album, then off on the tour in the fall. So it looks like we’ll be pretty busy for the rest of the year and next year’s festival circuit.

19) THIS IS A GOOD TIME TO LET EVERYONE KNOW HOW THEY CAN FOLLOW THE BAND AND THE PROGRESS OF THE CD AND GET MERCH AND ALL THAT GOOD STUFF…

Well, if you love power metal with soaring vocals ala classic Queensryche and Helloween, twin guitar harmonies and blazing solos…and geez, don’t forget DOC KILLDRUMS slamming it! We think you’ll Love the new Reverence album “When Darkness Calls“!!

For the folks with smart phones we have just released a new FREE Reverence iPhone/Android App. so you can get that here. The app and mailing list will get fans registered to win prizes, merchandise, show passes, etc.  Grab it Now, its FREE!

http://www.reverbnation.com/mobile-app/6375/reverenceofficial

Please check out our various links below, ‘Friend’, ‘Like’ and ‘Follow’ us for all the latest info.

Reverbnation: reverbnation.com/reverenceofficial
Facebook: facebook.com/reverencemetal
Youtube: youtube.com/reverenceOfficial
Website: reverencemetal.com
Twitter: @ReverenceMetal

20) AGAIN WE’D LIKE TO THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE COOL TALK! WE WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT REVERENCE SO STAY IN TOUCH! 

Its my pleasure, many thanks for the opportunity to spread the word about REVERENCE!!
~ Bryan Holland, Reverence Guitarist
KEEP IT LOUD!!