Trigger Point Interview

Pain is a Lesson

Trigger Point is a band from Los Angeles which formed in 2001 and were noted on the West Coast as a band who had a unique hardcore sound with a powerful, unforgettable live show. Within the last year the band hired a new bass player, Paul Kelly, inked a deal with Corporate Punishment Records and got together with producer Logan Mader [Machine Head, Soulfly] and made Silent Protest which was released in September.

Taylor Wallace, Trigger Point's vehemently vocal (and focal) frontman talks about Silent Protest, his band's unwavering commitment to its music and playing live.

The Gauntlet: Is this the same guy that I heard singing? On the record [Silent Protest] you sound so damn angry (laughs).

Taylor: (laughs)

The Gauntlet: This is your first record, right?

Taylor: Yeah, it's the first record.

The Gauntlet: How do you like being on the Corporate Punishment label?

Taylor: It's cool. You know with the state of the industry- we decided before we did the record that if we were going to sign with a label it was going to be a smaller label that had good distribution, because we wanted to really use the first record as just kind of an awareness record, so to speak. This record for us wasn't a record we went into the studio and said "Let's make an awesome album." It was "Let's just take the songs we have and throw them on a disk." We wanted to use it to garner some kind of credibility for ourselves and get people's heads turning in our direction so that when we're ready to really sit down and craft -- in our eyes-- a masterpiece or a record, that all eyes are on us. So that's kind of what we did. I mean, our original intention recording this record was really just to make a really long demo, and at the time we weren't really planning on releasing it because we wanted to just tour for a while and just see how things were, but when Corporate Punishment stepped in it seemed like the right way for us to go, with still achieving with what we were planning on achieving.

The Gauntlet: It seems like the album wasn't really contrived, it was just a compilation of songs. You almost make it sound like it was effortless, and I can only imagine what'll happen when you guys hole up somewhere and go through the writing process and you say "Now let's make a record" (laughs), you know what I mean?

Taylor: Yeah, exactly. Well the next record's gonna be intense �we've already been doing the writing for it. Some of the songs on Silent Protest are four years old. They're the songs that we wrote the first time we got to together as a band. We were all 19 or 20 years old when we wrote these songs. When we went to record it �when we met up with Logan [Mader] we even told him "We're not going in here to deconstruct our songs and rebuild and see where their weak points are and turn the weak points into strong points. We're just going to go in here and lay this down, flat." And we did drums in two days. We did guitar and bass in two days. We just recorded it straight up �just took it right out of the rehearsal room, straight into the studio and didn't change a thing. Now that the record's out in a bigger spectrum than what we had realized, we kind of wished we hadn't because we were hoping people didn't think that it was the best that we could do, because to us �some of it's old and we're thinking we can do way better than that.

The Gauntlet: Dude, right away, when I heard "Picking up the Pieces", I thought it had a real radio appeal. Do you know what I mean?

Taylor: I definitely think that it has a really huge radio appeal. We pretty much wrote that song as is one night just messing around, and we wrote it completely as is within a matter of 45 minutes. We thought it was a really cool sounding song. Then when we sat down and listened to it we said "Man, this sounds kind of like a hit song."

The Gauntlet: It's great and it's more high key and light in its mood unlike the other songs. The other songs are rather dark, and that one song where you say the "limp-dicked son of a bitch" bit. I forget which song that is (laughs).

Taylor: That's "Nowhere to Be" � that's one of those songs I wrote back when I was nineteen. To me, in my view of the record, it kind of goes on these ups and downs of, like "Silent Protest", "Picking up the Pieces", "Seven" �those three songs are the newest songs on the record. "Silent Protest" was the last song that we wrote. We wrote it a week before we went in to record. Those are the songs that more display the direction that we're moving in on a maturity level and on a musicianship standpoint. Those songs like "Nowhere to Be" and "Away" are the first two songs that we ever wrote, so there's a large gap in maturity, I think. At least it sticks out to us like a sore thumb because we've been doing it for so long. But the cool thing is that we view it that way, but there's still so many people that really enjoy it.

The Gauntlet: What also gives it oxygen is the piano and cello in "His Final Breath." There's also piano in "Seven."

Taylor: Yeah, the intro for "Seven."

The Gauntlet: Did you come up with that, or was that Logan's idea?

Taylor: That was our idea. We have a really good friend �his name's Owen Smith. He's actually a really popular stand-up comedian, and he's been brilliantly and classically trained on the piano his whole life. There's nothing on the piano that he can't play flawlessly. And he pretty much knows everything. When we were doing the record we decided we wanted an interlude song in between each song�trying to make this one, continuous track with different things, and we did that in between "Silent Protest" and "My Time" and then there's a little bit more stuff. We didn't really go too in-depth, but "His Final Breath" was something that I really wanted to do. We brought Owen in the last night we were doing the drums�we just played him the song for "The Color of Real", and we just had him get the chord progression in his head. We were recording in a really nice studio and we had a huge grand piano, and we just said "Okay, now you have the chord progression." I told him what the song was about, what it was behind �he had recently lost one of his best friend's and I told him I just want you to write something along those emotional lines. We just took that and we made a two-and-a-half minute song out of it after we edited it, and then I called my buddy Constantine, who's a tattoo artist from Russia-- who's in LA, and he happens to be classically trained in cello over in Russia�and I just said "Do you want to come in and throw some cello on this?" And he definitely wanted to do it. "His Final Breath" is one of my favorite things to listen to. Sometimes I put that on repeat when I'm falling asleep, because it's just a really moving little piece. The same night with the piano we wanted to see how it sounds to do a quick little piano intro to "Seven", and I can't imagine the song without it.

The Gauntlet: Now you're out on a tour with your labelmates Rikets and Allele.

Taylor: Yeah. We've been touring for a while now and people in every town know who we are, but we're still not the point where there's like hundreds of people showing up, but it's a small start. We're definitely going a hundred-percent balls to the walls, grass roots, you know? It's just the four of us and our tour manager driving around in a van with a trailer, playing anywhere they'll let us play. Sometimes it's really awesome and sometimes it's not that great, but it keeps getting better so that's the cool thing. The record hits stores today, which is cool. We're going to try and fine a record store and see what that looks like.

The Gauntlet: I got a copy two weeks ago. Who composes all the music?

Taylor: Musically it's about a 60/40 split. 60 percent being Mike, our guitarist, and then 40 percent being the drums [Dave Gentry]. Mike is constantly writing. He writes all day long, all week long and all month long. He has his guitar in his hands at least six hours a day. Even when we're on the road he sits in the back of the van, writing. You know, he'll write riffs all day long and he'll play them for me, and then I'll say "I'm really feeling that" or "Let's keep that one in the bank" -- it's just kind of a group effort. Or sometimes Dave will come in say "I got this drum beat, check this out", and we'll write something to that. And then me and Paul �our job when we're writing is just coming up with things, changing the note composition up � stuff like that. Once we get a song on the table then the four of us really start picking on it. But normally Mike brings a riff to the table and then we all start to dissect it.

The Gauntlet: Are the lyrics a split?

Taylor: The lyrics are all me. I do all the lyrics and the melody riff. Paul helped me a little bit with the lyrics for "Seven" on the record, but everything else is a hundred percent me.

The Gauntlet: Are these songs fictionalized accounts? It seems like a lot of this is true life stuff.

Taylor: Well, yeah �most of it's true life, like "Silent Protest", which I wrote when we were doing pre-production. I was dating a girl and we were kind of falling in love �and I told her I was going to be going on the road for the next year. She wasn't willing to do that�to be in a relationship with somebody that wasn't going to be around. I really was not happy about that, but really �at the same time there was nothing I could say about it, because I can't really blame her because if I were in her shoes I would probably want a girlfriend that I could spend time with as well.

The Gauntlet: Pretty despairing lyrics �

Taylor: It definitely hurt, because it was like � I'm taking a big step in what I had been trying to do my entire life and I was kind of being punished for it. That sucked. "The Color Real" I wrote about the people in my life that inspired me to be an individual and try to keep me from conforming and falling in line and being another sheep. Those people are just so much themselves that you can't help but be affected by them, and they show you that it really doesn't pay off to just to what you're told and try and act like everyone else, even though you don't want to.

The Gauntlet: Yeah �you seem like a free thinker.

Taylor: I definitely am a free thinker�sometimes it gets in my way.

The Gauntlet: Gets you thrown in the slam once in a while (laughs).

Taylor: It helps out a lot, though. I'm glad I think this way and I'm glad that I had those people in my life around me that think that way �questioning things is one of the greatest things a human being can do. It really makes me sad, especially on a political standpoint that a lot people aren't questioning the people around them and the people that are telling them to do things. It just leads to crap, eventually.

The Gauntlet: There are so many aimless sheep, even in terms of music.

Taylor: Especially in terms of music.

The Gauntlet: For you and the other guys in Trigger Point -- you've sacrificed a lot, haven't you?

Taylor: I think we all realized that we all had to take a really big chance if we really wanted to make it and set ourselves apart, because the business is so shoddy. We sat down and decided to do one of two things here: we're going to sacrifice everything that we have, we're going to sell everything we have, we're going to get rid of our apartments, we're going to tell our girlfriends that we're leaving, and if they can't deal with that then we're going to have to get rid of our girlfriends, and we're going to have to go and play anywhere we can � because the only other option is that we're going to have full-time jobs and we're going to play in our rehearsal room once or twice a week, and we may play a local show once every month or two. And if we keep doing that -- we're going to become less and less professional and less and less motivated towards our goal. So it was really just kind of a sink or swim, because we'd seen so many bands that had chances before take Option B. They'll think "We'll just sit here and keep recording and playing local shows once in a while until somebody comes and offers us a big check and an awesome tour and a tourbus. That's not gonna happen�unless you are really an amazing band that turns everybody's heads. It doesn't happen like that anymore. It's the bands that hit the road and just eat Ramen noodles for six months and live off CD sales and t-shirt sales.

The Gauntlet: Or rich women on the tour (laughs).

Taylor: Yeah, exactly!

The Gauntlet: You gotta stay out there for two years. That seems to be the rule on an album.

Taylor: Exactly. We're doing a lot of writing and we know what direction we're going with the next record. We're doing it right. We're going to use Logan again�and this time we're going to let him come in on the producer angle and not just the engineer angle. We're just going to lock ourselves away for four months and we're going to come out with something that nobody's heard in a long time, if ever. It's going to be awesome. It's pretty much the main thing that everyone in this band that everyone in this band is keeping their eyes on right now--is just waiting for the time that we really get to do that next record because we've got it in us and we got a lot of stuff to get out and put into that next record, so it's going to be really fun.

The Gauntlet: When do you expect that record to be released?

Taylor: Depending on how this record does �we're not expecting this record to do anything crazy. Depending on how the single "Picking up the Pieces" goes�there's a chance it could pop�but we're considering that we'll probably on the road until March or May, and then depending if we get on any Warped Tour dates or any other kind of summer festivals, we'll probably take the summer to start writing. Then we'll start recording it in the fall and hopefully have it out next January or so.

The Gauntlet: Beyond this tour, do you have any dates lined up with any big acts? Any stadium bands?

Taylor: We're playing one festival in October with Motorhead, Meshuggah, Hatebreed, Otep and Devil Driver and some other bands. That's going to be our first time top play with big bands, and it's the only one that's lined up right now. We've been trying really hard to find the right booking agent to start getting us on some good, well-promoted tours with other big bands. But everything in this industry right now takes time, because it it's a suffering industry, so everybody checks and double checks and triple checks a band before they decide to sign on with them. They want to make sure that if they're going to get associated with a band that the band is willing to do whatever it takes. I know there are a lot of people watching us right now and we just got to keep doing what we're doing and wait until the right moment happens. Hopefully this record does good and it achieves the goal that we set for it, which is that it gets a lot of people in the business and other bigger bands and a lot of fans saying "Who is this Trigger Point?" and it really gets their ears perked up and ready for when we're ready to really hit everybody with what we can do.

The Gauntlet: Tell me about the next record.

Taylor: On the next record you're going to see a lot more parts, a lot more changes and more dynamics �a lot more going completely balls to the wall, and then dropping down into some really awesome stuff. The next record's going to be a little bit more politically charged, I think. There's one political song on our record right now. I've already written one for the next record. I don't like to force myself to go into a political direction, but at this point in this time�in the way that the world is going�I feel like it's my job to. Because I am highly opinionated when it comes to that. I am known to debate people about it and I just feel like that's who I am �and I like getting in people's faces about it and trying to raise awareness for certain things. I always told myself I'd never do it because eif I wasn't as amazingly versed as, like, the guy in System of a Down [Serj Tankian] or Zack de la Rocha. I mean, these guys can find a million things to back up what they're talking about, but I always felt like I couldn't do it unless I was that smart, and then I figured that not everybody in the country is that smart �I just want to take the emotion I have towards all these situations�the President and the current government state and all that stuff and I'm just going to put it in there how I see it and hopefully that'll latch on with some people.

The Gauntlet: Do you have anything that you hang your hat on, as far as your live shows?

Taylor: Live shows are really what we do this for. We love playing live �we've always been known for being an awesome live band. We really just go crazy. I've been known to break microphones in half onstage, jump off into the crowd. We go until our lungs are sore in every song. Dave plays so hard that he usually throws up � we throw our guitars around �my legs are usually covered with bruises. It's a sport for us. We're definitely not getting up there and nickel and diming it, you know, we put a hundred percent into our live shows. Usually something crazy happens. That's what we do: sounding exactly like the record and absolute mayhem are our two main goals live, and that's pretty much what we accomplish every time. The crazier the crowd is, the crazier we are. On the right night and in front of the right crowd you're going to see one of the craziest shows you've ever seen.

www.triggerpointmusic.com