Soil

WE HAVE TIM KING THE BASSIST OF SOIL ON THE PHONE TODAY.

HI TIM, HOW ARE YOU?
Tim: Good, how are you doing today?

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: I'M DOING REALLY GOOD. I WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW THAT OUR LISTENERS VOTE FOR BAND OF THE MONTH ON OUR STATION AND YOU WON FOR THIS MONTH.
Tim: Awesome, thank you to everybody out there for voting for us, it means a lot. I thought you were going to say "Guess what? It wasn't you."

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: THAT WOULD BE SAD.
Tim: It would be kind of funny.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: KIND OF HUH?
Tim: Guess what we have band of the month and it wasn't you, how you doin?

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: IN OCTOBER, YOU RELEASED YOUR LATEST ALBUM TITLED PICTURE PERFECT. LET'S TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE ALBUM. YOU GUYS SPENT A LITTLE MORE TIME WRITING THIS ONE THAN YOU DID ON THE PREVIOUS ONE. HOW LONG DID YOU SPEND WRITING IT?
Tim: Actually, between writing it and recording it, we spent almost two years working on the record. That's the longest we've ever spent doing anything with this band. It was time for us to take a step back and ease back on the reins. We wanted to think about what we wanted to do, what kind of record we wanted to make and what direction we wanted to go. It really made for a well rounded record this time, I think.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: WHAT ELSE WOULD YOU SAY YOU DID DIFFERENTLY ON THIS ALBUM?
Tim: We used to come to the practice space and start throwing riffs at each other, work on songs and rehearse songs that we had previously written the day before or week before. We would constantly be practicing the catalog and drilling the songs that we had already written into our head while trying to write new ones. What we did differently this time is, we would show up at practice, crack open a few beers and just sit and talk for a little bit. We would never replay the songs that we had deemed as demo worthy and finished once we finished them. We didn't keep practicing them and drilling them in our heads. We would constantly keep writing new material and if something wasn't jelling for the day, we would just continue to drink a few more beers and go home. We didn't force anything. We kind of let it all come out and what was great about that is we went back and revisited some of the songs that we cataloged and thought "Wow! These are awesome." Before, when we were constantly practicing and drilling them into our head, we kind of had it to where this is the way the song is going to be. By not practicing it, when we did go back to it we were able to figure out more things to add to it. There were some songs that we thought were horrible so we would get rid of it and there were some songs that we thought were really cool. It was a really cool process that we had never tried before and that is part of the reason the album is so eclectic. We spanned it over such a long period of time so all the feelings and emotions that went into it wasn't written over a two month span. The album kind of takes you for a roller coaster ride.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: JOHNNY K PRODUCED IT, HE WORKED WITH DISTURBED RIGHT?
Tim: Yes, his first claim to fame was Disturbed's "The Sickness." Once that broke, he has done so many big records. He actually did our second and third record and then this one we returned to Johnny K. It was really cool to have not worked with him for a few years and then come back to a familiar face. He definitely brought a lot to the table that we had been missing on previous stuff. We had come back as better musicians and he came back as a more accomplished producer. He actually did our three song demo with the song "Halo" on it that actually got us signed and got a bidding war going with us. He was responsible for helping us put that song together. We owe a lot to Johnny K for sure. He always called us “The Nine Lives of Soil." Where most bands would have given up and thrown in the towel, he was like "I don't know what it is, but you guys keep popping back up."

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: YOU GUYS AREN'T QUITTERS.
Tim: I don't know what it is, either we are very determined and passionate, or just really stupid. One of the two. A band is definitely the closest thing that I can imagine to raising a kid. You put your all into it.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: YOU HAVE TO NURTURE IT AND WATCH IT GROW.
Tim: And beat it with a stick once in a while. (Laughing)

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: "WASTED" WAS CO-WRITTEN BY JOHN 5 AND BOB MARLETTE AND "SURROUNDED" WAS CO-WRITTEN BY BRIAN HOWE. IT SOUNDS TO ME LIKE YOU HAD A LOT OF VERY TALENTED PEOPLE WORKING ON THIS ALBUM.
Tim: In our entire career, we have never co-written songs with anybody. It has always been the band writing, we then go to the producer and they work their magic. Like I said, with this record we were a lot more open-minded and took our time on it. Things just fell into place. The Brian Howe thing came into place from a friend of ours that said Brian had some songs that he was working on. He thought one would fit us really well. The John 5 thing came from a mutual friend that John and I have who got in contact with me, he had been following us for a long time and he saw that we were working on a new record. He said he would love to write a song with us. T o work with people like that was a great honor and something really cool to incorporate into the Soil sound. Each of those songs has even more of a personality to them because we took some outside people and brought them in.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: WOULD YOU SAY THIS ALBUM BEST REPRESENTS SOIL TO DATE?
Tim: Yeah, I mean, with every record it's sort of like a mini movie I guess you could say. It has its own story to tell, its own plot, its own ending and beginning. Picture Perfect definitely represents Soil as it is now. The state and feeling of the band and what we want to accomplish, as with any record it captures a moment in time. We couldn't go back and re-write the album Scars if we wanted to. It was a different moment in time and we were in a different frame of mind. We definitely made the album that we wanted to make on this one for sure.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: ARE YOU CONSTANTLY WRITING NEW SONGS, ESPECIALLY OUT ON THE ROAD?
Tim: A lot of the songs for our album Redefine were written when we were over in Europe for two months touring. We were sitting around bored all the time. We write the bulk of the material when we sit down and write a record, but we come up with a lot of riffs and ideas along the way. When you're touring you have a lot of down time when you're sitting there looking at each other and you can only watch the same movie so many times. I think I've seen the Star Wars Trilogy about a million times. What's really sad is when we are having movie night and watching together and every guy's reciting a line from a different movie. That's when you know they've seen one way too much.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: I'M GOING TO GO AHEAD AND ASK THIS FOR ALL THE DUDES OUT THERE. WHO IS THE BLONDE ON THE ALBUM COVER?
Tim: You know what, if I had a dollar for every time someone asked me that and asked for that person's phone number, I could have financed the record myself. Honestly, we came up with the concept and the graphic designer went and found the model for it. He did a casting call for it and that was the person that was picked. It's not very exciting, but it definitely served its purpose. We should have come up with some better story about going to the Playboy Mansion and having our pick.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: DID YOU MAKE ANY VIDEOS FOR THE SINGLES?
Tim: It's funny you say that because after I get done with this interview I have a conference call with our record label about making a video for the new single, which is called "The Lesser Man." The first song that was released for the record was "Like It Is" and it is kind of like a teaser track. After that we popped over to Europe with Shinedown and then went to Australia. We took a little break for the holidays. Now that we are back, we are kicking back in the United States with a new tour, a new single and we are going to work on doing a video for the new single.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: DO YOU HAVE A CONCEPT FOR IT YET?
Tim: That is something that we are throwing back and forth. It's always a committee when we are doing something because everyone has their own opinion. Hopefully, we will get the video done this year sometime. The song "The Lesser Man" is kind of a throw back to almost a 70's song. Johnny K actually played the Hammond Organ on it to give it almost like a Skynard southern rock vibe to it. No matter how we do it, I think it will come out with a cool little concept to it.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: TOWARD THE END OF MARCH YOU GUYS ARE GOING TO BE LEAVING ON A NATIONAL TOUR. YOU GUYS ARE GOING OUT WITH SMILE EMPTY SOUL.
Tim: Yeah, they are a great band. I'm actually a really big fan of their first record. We have met them a few times, so it would be really cool to do a proper tour with them.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: HAVE YOU PLAYED WITH THEM BEFORE?
We have actually played a bunch of radio festivals where they put together thirty or forty bands. We have played on a bunch of those together, but we have never actually properly toured together. I'll definitely be out there watching them every night; I love a lot of their stuff.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: ARE YOU HEADLINING?
Tim: They are headlining the tour. It's sort of a co-headlining tour, but they are going on last. They are bigger than we are.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: YOU OWN YOUR OWN LABEL CALLED MORTAL MUSIC RIGHT?
Tim: Yeah

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: TELL ME A LITTLE ABOUT THE LABEL. HOW MANY BANDS DO YOU HAVE?
Tim: To make a long story short about the label, my best friend growing up, Rob and I always wanted to do something together. He plays bass and so do I so it didn't pan out for us to start a band together. We decided to form a label. We came up with the concept of the label or moniker as "Artists Developing Artists." We wanted to pick up bands that needed that extra helping hand, that had the talent and business sense, but didn't quite have all the connections. It's kind of a way for us to give back all that we've learned and show these developing bands how to do it by taking them under our wing and protect them from the tough lessons we've learned over the years. We actually just had a release that came out by a band called Stygian and the album is called Fury Rising. We have about five bands on the label right now. We are starting off small and we have some distribution going on. It is more of a labor of love because anybody who starts a label now and thinks they are going to get rich off of it may as well check themselves into an insane asylum. It's about karma, you help somebody out, show them the way and you never know who is going to conquer the throne next. Maybe, they will give me a job later on.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: I KNOW A FEW PEOPLE WHO OWN LABELS AND IT'S TRUE. YOU ALSO RELY ON PEOPLE TO HELP YOU BECAUSE YOU JUST DON'T EVEN HAVE THE MONEY TO PAY PEOPLE SO YOU END UP DOING IT ALL YOURSELF.
Tim: Of course

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: IT'S GETTING HARDER FOR BANDS TO TOUR THESE DAYS WITH THE ECONOMY. WHAT ADVICE DO YOU GIVE YOUR BANDS BEFORE THEY HIT THE ROAD?
Tim: You're definitely right about the economy and a lot of these clubs are going by the skin of their teeth to stay open. People are not coming out because they are more worried about putting food on the table or they don't have a job. It goes to show how the trickle effect, affects everything. Record labels aren't selling as many records as they used to so they can't give the tour support and the push that they used to be able to give bands. Bands don't have the tour support so they have to down scale everything they do in order to go out and play these shows. The clubs aren't paying as much money as they used to because of the economy. My best advice is to down scale as much as you can and get as many friends as you can that are just looking to go out for cheeseburgers and don't have a lot of responsibility to help you out. Even for a band like Soil, we've been pretty successful over the years and lucky for staying around as long as we have, but it doesn't come without its price. We have had to down scale to a cheaper bus and find cheaper road crew. All along we always got that from the beginning and we were always frugal with what we do. We always used to call our crew "The Internship Program." We have bred so many techs over the years. For instance, our old guitar tech is Dave Mustaine of Megadeth's right hand man, his lead tech. Our old sound man is now the sound man for Lamb of God. Our other tech is Shinedown's tech. We always started these people off by not being able to pay them a lot of money, but promising them good tours and steady work. They got really good at what they did and then we got them poached off to other people that could pay them a lot more money than we could. It's all about commitment too. I tell our bands "Guys, if you are going to do this, you have to do it 100%." You have to go out there and do what it takes because if you are not willing to do it and you don't have the fire and passion to put it on the line, there is always somebody that will. That person is going to succeed over you. I've missed a lot of weddings, funerals, and graduations over the times to do this for the band. It's a lot of sacrifice and to make it in this business, you have to do that. It's just the name of the game, it's tough out there. We've been up and we've been down. There are times when we've flown in to gigs and there would be a limo out there waiting to take us to the hotel and get ready for sound check. There have also been times when we have had to drive it ourselves in a Uhaul.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: THERE'S SNOW.
Tim: Oh yeah, there's snow, there's water, engines blowing up and tires flying off the trailer at 1:00 in the morning and everyone's thinking they are going to die. We have had many brushes with death as well. We call ourselves the "Land Pirates" because you are sailing into a different port everyday.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE A RECIPE PUBLISHED FOR THAI CHICKEN IN THE FIRST HEAVY METAL COOKBOOK EVER.
Tim: Yeah, it's actually kind of funny because this guy emailed me out of nowhere a couple years ago and asked if I'd be interested in submitting something for his Heavy Metal Cookbook. At first I was laughing and thought it was the coolest thing ever. I was making Thai chicken for dinner at the moment and so I said "Well, here is the recipe for what I'm making right now." Low and behold, he got a deal with Simon and Schuster and he is getting ready to release it. It is hysterical, again it could have been one of those things where I was thinking who is this joker, but you never know where someone is going to wind up. You have to be cool to everybody; it never hurts to reply to emails.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: WELL YOU HAVE A LOT GOING ON, DID I LEAVE ANYTHING OUT?
Tim: You touched on a lot more than most people do. You did your homework and you did a good job, so kudos to you.

SHAUNA O'DONNELL: OH, THANK YOU. I'D LIKE TO THANK YOU ALSO FOR THE INTERVIEW TIM. BEFORE I LET YOU GO, IS THERE ANYTHING YOU'D LIKE TO ADD OR SAY?
Tim: A shout out to the fans. Thank you for all your support over the years, through all the ups and downs. Thank you for the interview too.

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Tags:  Soil, Tim King , Tim King, interviews

SHAUNA O'DONNELL    February 22, 2010