Five Finger Death Punch Interview

Hello guys, thanks for talking with me today. You’re third album American Capitalist comes out on October 11th. You guys recorded the album in Las Vegas. Most of the band lives there right?
All of us live there now.

How do you like living there?
It’s sin city, we love it.

Are you bad boys?
(laughs from everyone)

Does the heat get to you?
There is air conditioning on the inside, so we stay in. It is dry heat and the real estate is great. You can buy ridiculous size houses.

How long were you in the studio with this last album?
Zoltan: It seemed like it was a long time, but it was about six months. We started it in January. If you give us two years to make a record then it will take two years. It's just how it is. We accomplished what we set out to accomplish, but at the end of the day the record has to be good. Ultimately it will take us as long as it takes until it is good enough.

Is there anything about this album that stands out from your previous ones?
Zoltan: Every record has a function. The first record is where your band comes out and you see what happens. Your second record, if you were successful with the first one, will determine if it was a fluke or if you really mean business. By your third record you have established your sound, you are here to stay and it may be a less stressful. You have known each other for a long enough time and it goes smoother because you pretty much know who is going to do what. When someone throws down an idea you can see what each member is going to do. If anything it is maybe more efficient while we work. It keeps the songwriting more in focus. It’s not like we are going to change our sound. It’s not like we are going to become a jazz fusion band.

That would surprise everyone wouldn’t it?
Jeremy: Yeah it would surprise me. It would be like “see you guys later!”

When I hear the title of the album it makes me feel that you are trying to say something. Is there a theme that runs through these songs?
Jason: Ivan is sort of the storyteller and Zoltan is very good at coming up with concepts. We always sort of huddle in the background of the bus. We sort of get the concept and say “This is great!” Then we splash it on Ivan and some of it sticks. As far as War Is The Answer, he got like three or four songs on that record that were right in line with the concept and the rest of it was his girlfriend break up or whatever his personal issue is at the time. With this record it was the same thing. We said what it was, we kind of nudged him into it and he nailed a portion of the lyrics that kind of fit with what the original concept was. He also likes to write stories about things that are happening to him and is personal to him at the moment. Conceptually I think we kind of understood what it was and then Ivan sort of takes it from there.

Zoltan: It’s not a concept record basically, but there is an underlying theme and with the title American Capitalist, what Jason is trying to say is that not every song will fall into the concept. There is an overall connecting, underlying thought. There is a reason why we call it American Capitalist. Today we live in this economy and in this day and age you know that we did something to call it American Capitalist for a reason. We are trying to point out something. Rock bands are supposed to be badass, they are supposed to be a rebel and attack the system. It is totally the opposite of that. It’s the idea that capitalism will not go away anytime soon. The way of living , society and economy will go through evolutions many times over. So now what are you going to do? You have very limited choices. There is the old saying “If you can’t beat them, join them.” You can have the voice that will not take you far or you can join the system and you can become powerful within the system. It gives you the shot. You can become a Bill Gates because the system allows you to. If you become Bill Gates, now you really have a voice and you really can change things. If that is your inclination, then that is the way. It’s the mentality of “Get up and fight one more round.” The capitalist system is what it is. It’s the closest thing we have to nature. We were born into this big fish eats the small fish kind of thing. Within the system, you just have to survive. You fight for a better job and a better living condition. You always fight for something. You don’t go out into the forest with a spear and kill a wild boar, you go to the grocery store and buy the food, but you have to earn the money to buy it. There is no way around it, it is what it is.

I think a lot of people have misconceptions about rock bands too. Some bands say that they have all this success, but no money.
Zoltan: That is just the state of the music industry right now. It can be argued that downloading and the internet is bad for the music industry, but we became successful because of the internet. We didn’t even have a record out and we had thousands of fans. All of a sudden we had a record and a lot of fans. Then the record labels came around and that is how we got signed. It is a grassroots story through the internet. You have the other side of it where yeah people are downloading the stuff. People will do that because if it is available for free, that beats the hell out of the price. Fifteen years ago, the success that we have now would be a huge difference obviously, but at the end of the day you have to go with the evolution. This is the evolution, this is what happens to bands right now. A band like us has a really strong fan base, but we keep in really good contact with our fans. We talk to our fans and we sign everything. The music industry is not going to go away.

You have a new bass player Chris Kael. Did he participate in any of the writing on American Capitalist?
Jeremy: No, he came on board right as the record was finishing. We really wanted to focus on getting the record done before we put out a search for the new bass player. It’s time consuming and it is distracting. He is not going to be on this record, but he will be next time.

How did it come about that he joined the band? Was he someone you knew?
Jeremy: He contacted Jason actually. He was at some show in Vegas I think and he had been trying for years to break through in his own bands like we all have. He was reaching some tough times and he was over it. He saw this band and a voice clicked in his head that said “Man, what are you doing? You need to go after that Death Punch gig.” He went home and emailed Jason on Facebook. He said “Hey man, I know you don’t know me, but I’d love to come down and have a shot at auditioning.” Jason was like “Cool, come on down!” It turned out that he was the best fit. It’s funny how that works.

Zoltan: He was local and his story is interesting because he came from Kentucky. He was coming to L.A. to get his shot and his car broke down in Vegas ten years ago and he just stayed there. He never made it to L.A. and we just all happened to move to Las Vegas. We auditioned a few good guys, but he was everything that we wanted.

That is a great story. Do you have any guest spots on the album?
Zoltan: No, not on this one.

Is that something you would like to do?
Zoltan: We had some ideas and we wanted to do it, but we had some scheduling issues. It just did not come together, but we may do it on the next record. We will see.

I love the lyrics to the song “Under and Over It.”
Zoltan: The video will piss off even more people. It has all the cliché’s that you can imagine of a big rock video, we were like “Let’s shove all that in there.” We have the cars, the chicks, the pool and the booty shakers. In our last video that we did, it was like “Oh My God! Industrial fans were blowing dirt on us and we were spitting pebbles and dirt for weeks.” We were in a 140 degree warehouse for two days. Right then we were saying that we will never shoot a fucking video again unless the video is of us laying in a hammock in Hawaii and people are serving us drinks. If that’s not the concept then don’t even fucking call us. It started like that and actually this was an inside joke for a long time. When the time came to do the video, we were like “Let’s just enforce that!” It became more of a party than anything. We actually forgot we were shooting a video.

Jeremy: We didn’t want to stop. They were going to have to kick us out.

The video goes along with the album cover too.
Zoltan: Yeah, it’s like why not, we’ll just push that button one more time. The red button in the middle of the table.

This fall you are heading out in support of the new album on the ‘Share the Welt’ tour with All That Remains, Hatebreed and Rev Theory.
Jason: I can’t wait. I think it is going to be awesome.

Zoltan: It’s a massive tour, it goes for two and a half months. It is a long, long tour. We will probably kill each other by then. If you think about it, you are living with theses guys.

It’s like a five person marriage.
Zoltan: Without the sex though.

Well hopefully. I would have a hard time on tour because of the smell of the tour bus.
Jeremy: You would love it if you came on our bus.

Zoltan: Our bus is clean. We are on different buses, but I’m on the bus with Jason and we enforce the rules there.

Jason: We try to control it. It is a rolling petri dish.

You guys go out on separate busses?
Jeremy: Yeah, we have a couple different busses.

Jason: Physically there are too many bodies now. It’s not just the band now, we have a large crew also. It’s good to split up otherwise it’s like living in a U boat.

Do you prefer going out with bands you know?
Jason: We prefer going out with bands that sell tickets. (Laughs)

That’s a good point.
Zoltan: To tell you the truth, Hatebreed and All That Remains is going to be a good tour because we know each other and we are going to get along. If you go out with a prima donna band it can ruin a tour. If it is a band that we don’t know, then we ask around. It is important because we will spend two and a half months together.

You want to make sure that they don’t hide in the bus and not socialize.
Jason: We have been accused of that actually. We toured with Seether and halfway through the tour they came knocking on the bus and said “Are you guys ever going to come out and hang out with us?”

Zoltan: There is etiquette to that too. That tour was originally our tour and then we wanted to bump it to bigger areas and bigger venues. Seether was placed on this tour as a headliner basically. There is an etiquette, now we became the direct support. I can’t go over and knock on there door, that is not proper etiquette. I can’t go over there and say “Hey guys let’s party. Let’s be friends.” They can come over to our door and knock because they are the headliners. If the headliner doesn’t come over, then we are not going to go over.

Do you have any USO shows coming up?
We do have some stuff that is not on the regular schedule, so the people can’t see. We always go to different army bases even if we don’t play them, we visit hospitals and whatnot. Those are things that are for the military, it’s not a pr thing. We do it because we want to do it.

You do a lot of festivals, which one is your favorite to perform at?
Jeremy: The Download Festival certainly. It’s 90,000 people and they are cheering our name before the intro roles. That is pretty impressive.

Is playing in front of 90,000 people the highlight of your career so far?
Jeremy: I don’t know, this interview is up there.

Zoltan: Getting gold certified on both records is a highlight. I look at it as milestones I guess.

You are also on radio, which to me is definitely a highlight. Did you ever imagine the band would be this successful in radio?
Jeremy: No, we have been real fortunate. I mean it’s rare. Even if it’s not us, having someone be successful in radio that is heavy opens a door for others, so I think it is positive.

Thank you so much for the interview. It was a lot of fun talking with you.

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Tags:  Five Finger Death Punch, 5FDP , Zoltan Bathory, Jason Hook, Jeremy Spencer, interviews

Shauna O'Donnell    September 01, 2011