It’s Concert Season, Baby!
Jason Ziolo
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome, season two, episode 11 of Rock Fan Radio. Tonight in the room, have Parker, we have Travis, we have Dave, and we have a drunk Reid.
He's in a hotel room in Texas somewhere, right? And you've been warned.
Dave Cravotta
seven in for Steve.
Jason Ziolo
So yeah, we're missing Chris, missing Steve, we're missing AJ today. AJ is out on the road with Redd right now. He is doing his thing. Have you guys seen any of this yet? Have you seen the clips? Have you seen what they're saying about him?
Parker
Hahaha.
Dave Cravotta
yes the
comments are just super positive on the most part means some people are saying it's never the same but overall it seems like man he's being super well received I couldn't be happier for him that's a tough spot to jump into him so good for him you know
Jason Ziolo
I'm so-
So for our newer listeners, AJ is one of our hosts, AJ Reingart of Okaya. Also one of our buddies for a long time. He is now singing for Red out on the road and had his debut at Welcome to Rockville two weeks ago, week and a half ago, and he absolutely killed it. Absolutely destroyed it. And it's really cool to see the comments like you said, Dave. The Red fans are like, yep, he'll do.
Reed
As a hell, did, you know.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Jason Ziolo
It's okay. I think I've probably read hundreds of comments. I think I saw one negative comment against AJ. But it's cool. I've been talking to him on text and he said he's out there. He's having a blast. He said the guys and the fans and the people he's meeting have been life changing. And I'm so freaking happy for him. And we get to go see him. Us Chicago boys are going to see him next week ⁓ out in Juliet. So Red will be there. They're playing with Raw.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Reed
next week.
Okay.
Jason Ziolo
They're playing with something twisted. But it'd be pretty cool. Ra's a cool band, too, if you don't know anything about those guys.
Reed
you
Dave Cravotta
I two of their records in college,
grad school. I loved listening to Raw. I thought they were a cool band. That's a good pairing for Red. They do some pretty cool stuff.
Jason Ziolo
Yep. Yeah. Yeah, so I'm on we're going we're going to Juliet then Parker and I are going to head up to Racine, which is actually closer than Juliet for me. Reed, you should come up for that one. It's two days later. And then Parker and I are going out to ⁓ Michigan, Flint, Michigan, to the famous club that's out there. I've never been to the steel shop or something like that to go see him again. And then we are literally taking a ferry across Lake Michigan.
to see him back in Wisconsin this weekend. So next week, I get to see Red four times. I'm super excited. Super excited to hang out with AJ. And he owes me an interview, but he has not gotten confirmation yet to do it. But hopefully, that's coming soon.
Reed
That is awesome.
Parker
Yeah, very cool stuff. He's been sending some behind the scenes stuff and man, he's having a blast. Can't wait to see him.
Travis
That would be very cool.
Jason Ziolo
Very cool.
Reed
Yeah, me neither. We're gonna heckle him a little bit though.
Dave Cravotta
Have to.
Parker
You
Jason Ziolo
⁓
we're gonna... I mean, do we heckle them or do we be nice and be fans or do we be assholes?
Reed
How many
Dave Cravotta
both. All
the above.
Reed
of us are going to that show? Is it just the three of us, Parker, Jason, me?
Jason Ziolo
I gotta imagine we got a bigger crew going than that. I'm sure I'm gonna drag the wife. Joey's gonna come with us. Matt, I'm sure, is gonna be there. AJ's girlfriend will be there. We'll have a crew there for sure.
Reed
I would hope so.
I won't go.
I'm talking
about chest painting here. Okay, so like AJ rocks, like do we have enough people to get everybody that I'm talking about getting the shirts off getting in the pit.
Jason Ziolo
Actually, we just need two of us. I'll put A on my chest and you put a J on your chest and we'll just stand. Parker, you can get an
Dave Cravotta
Hahaha
Reed
That's what I'm saying. It doesn't. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
I love everything about this. Please video document and post it on our YouTube channel.
Reed
100%. Yeah.
Travis
100%.
Jason Ziolo
We shall do our best. And then coming back, Local H and the Toadies are at the Metro that Sunday night. ⁓ and Reed, we're going to see Thornhill on Sunday.
Dave Cravotta
Come on!
Reed
I am so excited about that show. So am I. And it's on a Sunday night going into Memorial Day, so there's there's no, no regrets there.
Jason Ziolo
I'm not going to bail on that one. I'm super excited about it.
Dave Cravotta
Damn it.
⁓
Their record last year was one of my top three of the year easily loved it
Jason Ziolo
We've got no real excuses.
Reed
Yep,
it was it was my runner up album of the year.
Dave Cravotta
Ooh, so what was your album of the year, Reed?
Jason Ziolo
They just released a
new version of it too.
Reed
Don't
ask that, on a different laptop. I don't have all of my album of the year stuff. it's at home right now, not in Dallas. That's a conversation for the next cast. We'll put it in the errors and omissions.
Jason Ziolo
you
They just released.
Reed
somewhere, wherever we put that.
Jason Ziolo
yeah, we have Arizona
missions on our website now. We've actually done a bunch of work on the website. Have you guys checked it out at all? ⁓
Reed
you
Have you? Rockfanradio.com,
bitches.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah, rockfanradio.com. There will be now a news section, and we are pushing out current news on the daily. So it's a great spot to go. Check out what's going on in the scene. We're also pushing it also out to our social medias. So go ahead. Please subscribe there. And if you do nothing else, please go to YouTube and subscribe. We're on a mission to get 1,000 subscribers. We've a long way to go, but it's getting there.
We're making certain progress. We're starting to get some new fans. And those of you guys that are new here today, thanks so much for joining us. Please subscribe and we're sorry for read.
Reed
Also, I'm sorry.
But yeah, hit that like button, subscribe below. Come on, get in the comments too. Let's... Dude, we had a great troller on our YouTube a couple of weeks ago. He just, had no idea. He had no idea what the subject was even about. He just wanted to tell us that we're horrible people and that loved him for it. It was great. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. They have nothing better to do than to just sit around and troll podcasts. It's awesome.
Dave Cravotta
Somebody's gotta be the drunk uncle of the show.
⁓ love a good troller. Wasn't he great?
Jason Ziolo
Those are my favorite people on the internet.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah
Travis
That's why I said, man, if the trolls are coming out, we're doing something right.
Jason Ziolo
We were talking.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Reed
That's
what I'm saying, man. We're hitting all the nerves.
Dave Cravotta
What kind of knots do you have to untie if that's how you get your jollies? Alright.
Parker
Hahaha!
Reed
Years of therapy.
Travis
That is the phrase
of the week.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
I'm done. I hit my quota. I will say nothing else clever than the rest of this cast.
Parker
There's so much to put in the intro now.
Dave Cravotta
Good luck, Okay. Yes.
Jason Ziolo
Guys, we gotta stop screwing around and get down to it, because we have a lot
Parker
The intro's gonna be the episode.
Jason Ziolo
to talk about today. We're not gonna get through all of it. I have a bunch of songs I wanna talk about. There's a ton of cool new releases out right now. Parker's got a bunch of cool new releases. Reid, you went and saw some live music. Dave, you went and saw a lot of live music. And then Travis and I wanna bitch about Live Nation for a while and Blue Dot Fever. So let's get into it.
Dave Cravotta
Man, it was a busy week. Can't wait to talk about it.
Yes.
Parker
We
got Wage War 2. Don't forget about those guys. I did. It was a surprise Tuesday.
Jason Ziolo
⁓ you went to Wage War, too? ⁓ Jesus. This is going to be a two-hour episode, but we can't let it be, so let's get into
Dave Cravotta
ARGH
Jason Ziolo
it. Where do we start, guys? Parker, let's get heavy.
Parker
Let's,
Dave Cravotta
Mm-hmm.
Parker
you want to skip news? Well, we can get heavy right away. Let's get heavy right away. Let's do it. Let's get heavy. All right. First on the agenda, StaticX canceled their show because of medical issues. Did they cancel the whole tour? I just saw the first few shows, I thought. The whole tour.
Jason Ziolo
That's, isn't that getting heavy?
Let's get happy!
Boo! The whole tour!
Reed
Yeah, home talk.
Dave Cravotta
All the holds for the work.
Jason Ziolo
No, the whole tour, all shows in
Dave Cravotta
Whoa. Blue dots,
Jason Ziolo
2026 got canceled.
Dave Cravotta
illness, all of the above.
Parker
They say medical issues. I'm not really sure. I read an article and they didn't really expand further than in quotes, medical issues. So I'm not sure what's going on there. It's kind of unfortunate because I mean, they are, mean, not the biggest fan here, but they are, they bring a crowd.
Travis
you
Reed
Plus,
they had one of the biggest medical issues of all time as a band.
Jason Ziolo
That's true.
Travis
Wow.
Jesus. God damn, that was savage.
Parker
You
Reed
it's gonna be, it's gonna be.
Dave Cravotta
⁓ we came to play, woke up and chose violence.
Parker
Dude, this is gonna be the best show. Our best show ever.
Dave Cravotta
Glad you're here, sir.
Reed
It's gonna be a... It's gonna be a cast. It's gonna be a cast.
Travis
Ha ha ha ha!
Dave Cravotta
That was.
Travis
Whom?
Jason Ziolo
Wayne
Static, our lead singer, unfortunately passed away several years ago. They put a robot on stage with red glowing eyes and the Wayne Static hair because he had this crazy haircut. And I was going to go see him this tour. I actually was, I've had my chance more than once. They were playing the Vixen way up north by me and it got canceled, which is sad.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Yeah.
Reed
Keep us awesome.
⁓ Jason,
you and I have seen static X together.
Jason Ziolo
No, I've never seen StaticX.
Reed
Do I have another brother-in-law with a beer?
Jason Ziolo
You have another brother-in-law, but not with a beard. When do we see static acts?
Reed
It's... No, he can't grow a beard.
We have. They opened for somebody. It was shortly after Wayne died. They were still a hell of a lot of fun, but that had to have been you. It had to have been you. Let's move on.
Jason Ziolo
Now, I don't remember, I don't think I've ever seen them. They were coming up here to the Vixen, I was definitely gonna go see them, but they've canceled seven months of shows. So all of 2026 down the tube, all they said is it's unavoidable and requires immediate attention. If you wanna read more, there's a whole article on Rockfan Radio about it. Go check it out.
Parker
Something exciting for all the Korn fans, I'm sure you've heard this one. They announced that they have 40 songs lined up for their LP. 40. Does that mean 40 all see the day alight? I don't know, but 40 songs is a lot of songs to announce.
Dave Cravotta
All right. Bring it, boys.
Travis
Well...
Reed
That's a double CD if I've ever saw one.
Jason Ziolo
CD.
Dave Cravotta
Progressive
double live album from Korn. We're gonna be lining up for that shit.
Reed
Man,
if only Steve had seen him, you know? It would be so good for Steve to finally get out of the corn bandwagon, you know?
Jason Ziolo
Okay.
Travis
I did not hear the quantity, but that's awesome.
Parker
I love that he gets heat.
I love that Steve gets heat and he's not even here still.
Jason Ziolo
What I understand Parker is like, don't most bands write a whole bunch of songs and then whittle them down to a small percentage of what they have. So is 40 really that much different than, you know, what most bands do?
Parker
I don't think it's that much different, but I think the difference is they're announcing 40 songs as if they're going to drop 40 songs, right? now some bands have totally done the double, double album thing and, and been close to that number for sure. But, and especially in this day and age, bands are dropping singles, right? We've talked about this a lot, to just announce like, yo, we've got 40 songs lined up for the next LP.
that are all going to be potentially featured seems crazy. Of course, of course bands are always writing in the background. I just find it crazy that you come out and say, we've got 40 songs ready to go.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah. Which makes sense why they're dropping random soundtrack songs, which is they just did a couple of weeks ago. Because they're probably, you know, they're getting stuff ready in the studio. They go, this one's not going to make the album, but we really like it. It doesn't fit. Let's kick it on over to this soundtrack.
Parker
Absolutely.
Yep, absolutely.
Travis
So if I
remember, Jonathan Davis has a full blown studio built into his tour bus. And those guys are always recording on the road.
Parker
I do remember hearing something about that, Which is awesome, that's fantastic.
Dave Cravotta
That's a good idea. They're living it and feeling it. ⁓
Parker
⁓
Jason Ziolo
Jonathan Davis does all his vocals alone, alone, completely alone. Like in the studio, he demands like no one's around him. He's like, my creative process is to be me and to experiment and to get it on tape or disc or whatever the hell you call it these days, but get it on tape without anyone bothering me and I'll show up with it done for you. Which is.
Reed
I'm
kind of hoping that he brings his EDM influence a little bit into this. I've been kind of waiting for Korn to go a little bit on the electric cowboy side.
Jason Ziolo
They already did the- they did it already. They did the whole- Transformer music with Transformer guy. Skrillex, yeah!
Travis
They already did that. It was... It was not good.
Parker
They... they... Skrillex. Skrillex. They teamed up with Skrillex for a
whole album. Yeah.
Reed
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's... that wasn't...
Travis
It was not good.
Reed
I forgot about that, and rightfully so.
Jason Ziolo
I didn't mind it.
thought it was kind of cool. ⁓ I would have minded it if they would have done like three albums of it, but that one album, I think it worked. I've seen Skrillex. I saw Skrillex with you, Reed. We saw him at Lollapalooza a couple years ago for a couple songs.
Parker
Rightfully so.
Reed
Yes!
Dave Cravotta
I
to see them. I think that dude's awesome.
Reed
Yes! It was so much fun!
Parker
Skrillex is
Dave Cravotta
differently.
Parker
always that guy that has bridged the gap between like the metal community and the EDM community and like merged them together somehow. I don't remember one of the songs I was completely obsessed with when it dropped. was something like Dark Spirits and whatever. I can't remember the name but it... There it is! Yes. Yeah. I don't know. It was fun. It was fun.
Dave Cravotta
Gary sprites in nice spirits or something like that?
Yup, sprites.
Reed
There's, that's the reason.
Parker
Sprites, yes.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, because they can get kind of like heavy-ish. Like there's some big breakdowns and some huge... They slow it, he slows it way down, then speeds it back up. There's lots of dynamics which I think makes it musical even though it's a lot of noise. Musical noise?
Parker
Yeah, for sure.
Absolutely, there
were a lot ⁓ of heavy remixes, I believe too, with that one and a few of his other ones too. And obviously the corn stuff.
Reed
That's legit why
every year I still love to go to Lollapalooza, even if the light up is horrible. I can spend all day at the EDM stage and just have a blast.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah. I think EDM is awesome.
Jason Ziolo
I've spent more than a few hours at that stage with you, Reed. And let's
Reed
I know.
Jason Ziolo
just say it requires a certain mindset. And the alcohol helps for sure.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Yeah,
Travis
I
Dave Cravotta
yeah.
EDM is incredible for a silent DJ. Where you've got like three or four different channels, you can pick something and then like, all right, let's get on this one and just vibe out for a while. All right, I'm gonna switch over to Whitney Houston and vibe out for this one for a while. Silent DJ is incredible. Wish there was more of it.
Reed
Alright, I got a note from you guys speaking of new music and slightly heavy. What do you guys think of the new break breaking Ben song?
Dave Cravotta
Fuck, haven't listened to it yet. I gotta get on this.
Jason Ziolo
HCDC
Reed
What did we do?
Travis
I have not heard
Jason Ziolo
band
Travis
of it.
Reed
What did we do here? You shut the fuck up.
Parker
It is an ACDC.
Dave Cravotta
They
are, but their music's good, I think. I think they write the best bridges in music, period. They're incredible. I love how they bring the pretty standard intro verse, chorus verse, bridge verse, chorus, whatever format. But when they bring that into the bridge, it's like this whole soaring kind of thing or breakdown sort of thing. It's intense.
Reed
Yeah!
Parker
It is good.
Reed
You're
both right, but the last the last several releases of the last album have been kind of it I still love him because breaking Ben's one of those albums or one of those artists that I can just say Alexa play breaking bad and I'll just let it go But I'm kind of happy like this last song the ending especially got super heavy and Ben's been saying Yeah, absolutely and Ben's been saying that this is gonna be the heaviest record they've ever put out. So I'm a little giddy
Jason Ziolo
The outro is the best part of that song, without a doubt.
Dave Cravotta
yes I'm here for it what's the way we one of the guys from red help co-write was that record the one with cold red river on it escaping you know
Reed
⁓ yeah.
Jason Ziolo
That is my least favorite Breaking Benjamin song by the way. What is these like the whole time is it cold Red River or something Red River right? And he like screams it like a hundred times during the song. It's not good. yeah? Okay.
Reed
Cold Red River?
Dave Cravotta
I like it, but... ⁓ Ember.
Yeah, I think that's Ember, right? Yeah, we feed Red Cold River, feed the wolf, it's okay.
Travis
I think that song is incredible.
Reed
By the way, that
Dave Cravotta
Mm-hmm.
Reed
dude owns
Dave Cravotta
Yeah. Yes.
Reed
an audience, man. We saw him at Tinley Park and my wife was there and he came out in the audience and he was doing kind of like those slower acoustic songs, just kind of hanging out in the pit with us. And this one, like, must have been eight or nine girl, was like crying. And he went over to her and like, why are you crying? And he's like, you won't sing. ⁓ shit, I forget the name of the song. But he stopped the band.
Dave Cravotta
Hmm.
Reed
acoustically playing and just went right into this song and you saw every woman get pregnant immediately.
Dave Cravotta
Ugh.
Reed
It was... It was wild.
Parker
Ha ha ha ha ha!
Dave Cravotta
You know what, I'd been there, I would've gotten pregnant too.
Parker
I saw
Reed
I'm glad I had my tubes tied.
Parker
I saw
a Breaking Ben with Three Days Grace forever ago. My first concert ever, actually. Well, but my first heavy concert ever was Breaking Benjamin and Three Days Grace. And we went to the merch stand and my buddies are like, ⁓ gotta get the Three Days Grace stuff. Right back then Three Days Grace was on their trajectory and kind of was surpassing Breaking Benjamin. And then Breaking Benjamin comes out and...
Dave Cravotta
Yeah,
Travis
That's a good first show.
Parker
in my eyes, sort of stole the show. And by the end of it, my buddies were like, dude, I wish I bought, I wish I bought the Breaking Ben shirt. You know, back then we were using money that our parents gave us and I was the one with the Breaking Ben shirt. And I was like, yeah, that's right.
Reed
Dude, they're great. They're great. We were talking about this on the text chain though, like Ben's fully leaning into all of his phobias and I think they're getting kind of worse as he's getting older. So Breaking Ben's gonna go tour Europe and the band is all flying out to, why am I holding a pen? The band's all flying out to Europe and Ben is taking a Titanic-esque voyage across the Atlantic to get to Europe because he's afraid of flying.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah
Thanks for watching!
Jason Ziolo
read is fun
Dave Cravotta
I mean,
Jason Ziolo
on the podcast
Dave Cravotta
I mean, good for him if that's what he wants to do. That's fine. It's not hurting anybody. But it's like a two week trip or something. It's not. isn't whatever you got to do. And who does he does he contract somebody's he like get on a cargo ship and gets like, how does that work?
Parker
He is. Yeah, he's great.
Reed
I'm
I'm fine with it too man, go tour Europe man, you do your thing. Yes! Through icebergs, it's dangerous bro, like I have a phobia about-
Parker
At the same time...
Reed
Okay, that's my question.
How do you book a transatlantic cruise? Does he have to wear like a wool suit and top hat to get on a ship to go across the Atlantic? How does it work?
Jason Ziolo
Canoes, he canoes the whole way, actually.
Parker
He's rowin'. He's rowin'!
Dave Cravotta
God no.
Parker
My
thought was that maybe it's like a ⁓ cruise ship of some sort that he's gonna party for a week or whatever. But I don't know, mean like that's what I would do if I was like, I have to go on tour for forever and I hate planes, I'd take a cruise ship across the Atlantic. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Reed
100%. Yeah. It's
a great book.
Dave Cravotta
that he has the resources to be able to do that. Although we could probably do that too. We could find some boat that would take us across. It's but I don't. Yeah. Interesting choices.
Travis
you
Parker
For sure. It's weird, but whatever. At least he's going. At least he's going and he's not acting like that one guy who thinks the earth is flat or whatever that we talked about.
Dave Cravotta
Yep. Yep.
Jason Ziolo
You guys heard that?
Dave Cravotta
Yes. Hear, hear.
Reed
Yes.
Well, it's been how many I mean, they haven't they haven't toured Europe
Dave Cravotta
It's not?
Reed
and how long I mean, they said it's been eight to 10 years since they've been across the pond. So there's going to be a ⁓ super appetite to see breaking bed over there. Good for them.
Jason Ziolo
Anybody hear the new 9-point song?
Reed
hope. Is it playing? Is it playing right now on the podcast? It's playing. It is playing right now. There it is. It's up there.
Dave Cravotta
it from.
Jason Ziolo
Nobody really. Is it, hey, there it is. it?
Parker
It is playing right now on the podcast.
Jason Ziolo
Oh, I like it. It's pretty cool. It's different for them. It's almost like they have this intro that's kind of flat and non-dynamic. I don't know how to describe it. I think it's pianos. It feels very 80s.
Reed
Dude, I dig this song!
Dave Cravotta
I'm
Jason Ziolo
and then they do the nonpoint thing and then they come back and play this intro again and like totally reset the song. It's just different for them. It doesn't sound like anything that I've heard them do before. I dig it.
Parker
I'll have to listen to it. haven't given it a shot yet.
Jason Ziolo
It's no chaos and earthquakes,
but I dig it. And they just announced a tour too, which Travis, you were talking about. They're coming to Indy.
Travis
Dude, totally retro new metal tour man. Spine Shank, Head Planet Earth. Yeah, I'm there. 100%. That's gonna be great. I've never seen Head PE or Spine Shank. So, those I would love to see. Head PE I think has like seven guys. So I just wanna see like how they all get on the same stage. You know, that alone is like, when I saw Slipknot I was like, I just wanna see how they're gonna fit everybody on the same stage. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to that.
Jason Ziolo
I would go to that show.
Dave Cravotta
Thank
Reed
By the way,
it's head P E? Or did you say head P? Okay, because I've always
Jason Ziolo
Yeah. I never knew
Dave Cravotta
Yep.
Jason Ziolo
it was stood for... I never knew it was Planet Earth. That's interesting.
Travis
Planet Earth is what it stands for? Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
The P.E. stands for play it.
Reed
I didn't either.
Dave Cravotta
They got
some cool songs. I would love to see them. I bet they're a riot on stage.
Reed
Yeah. Yeah. And all you hear is bartender, right? Is the one that just gets played over and over again.
Dave Cravotta
They've got a couple singles, that's one. Where's another one? They have before that maybe?
Jason Ziolo
That's the only headpiece on I know.
Travis
Yeah, Blackout
is an, well Blackout was the record, that's an incredible track. That was the title track of one of their albums. That song is awesome. I love the drum beat at the outro. That is just very cool. yeah, Bartender is obviously the big one, but yeah, they didn't really break. They didn't really have a lot of success, but they're definitely different. So.
Parker
We got Anthrax returning. Did you guys see that? Anthrax drops, well, true, but they did drop a new single, which is awesome still that they're coming back and dropping a new single, maybe an album, maybe an EP, who knows? But it's called For the Kids, or It's For the Kids. Has anyone heard it?
Dave Cravotta
Yes! Although it stands John Boats, but still.
Jason Ziolo
That's pretty cool.
Dave Cravotta
⁓ huh.
Travis
I did, yeah, it good.
Dave Cravotta
No, but have you heard
the story behind it? Yeah, I haven't heard the song, there's a story behind it as well. Yeah, Travis, talk about the song.
Travis
I mean it's classic Anthrax, it really is. Full transparency, I did not like early Anthrax, I didn't like Joey Belladonna at all, Sound of White Noise, when John Bush joined is one of the best albums I have ever heard in my entire life. It was produced by Terry Date, who of course is a legendary producer. They tracked...
Dave Cravotta
You're here.
Travis
Scottie in guitars like a million times, but not days drums are in crime. It was just wall-to-wall guitars and drums ⁓ album was incredible Bush left of course Bella Donna came back when worship music came out. I became a fan of Bella Donna I was like wow they brought it worship music's really good for all Kings had some really good stuff and this new track is They still got it man like 40 years later. I mean, they're still making bangers so
Parker
Yeah, it's a good track. ⁓ Dave, I'm interested in that story behind it.
Dave Cravotta
So Scott Ian said something to the effect of the way the current political climate is is not being conducive to taking care of people, especially children. So he said this song is like a response to our culture not doing a good enough job of taking care of kids and specifically. So he I think he wrote the lyrics. I you may have written all the lyrics and said, here's this whole song to kind of in defense of children about what I think is what's going on now. I'm to put my voice out there in this way and props to him for doing that.
Jason Ziolo
Children.
Parker
Yeah, absolutely. I didn't know that. That's very cool. I'll run through a couple of these because they're not the biggest bands, but I love these bands. A band, Gideon, I'm not sure if you've heard of these guys, but Gideon is sort of heavy, bouncy, kind of just fun. They call them so, I think they've been referred to as country metal before. ⁓ They... Well...
Jason Ziolo
I'm out.
Parker
I mean, it doesn't sound like country, but you know, they're definitely a bunch of cowboys doing metal and it's just bouncy and fun. ⁓ Cowboy Corps, there you go.
Dave Cravotta
Hickcorp
Jason Ziolo
Yeah
Dave Cravotta
Cowboy Claw, even better.
Jason Ziolo
No cowboy corp, that's great! It's just what I want in my life.
Reed
Cowboy Corp.
Travis
⁓ there we go.
We got the new one of the week.
Parker
They dropped a... They dropped a new...
Dave Cravotta
You heard it here first. ⁓ now I have my quarter. Maybe I get to today. Lucky me. It's the beer talking. This is part of the podcast brought to you by Daredevil Brewing and Liftoff.
Parker
New single is called Four by Four. So obviously kind of playing on the cowboy stuff there a little bit. I included it here a little bit just as a silly thing. feel like, I don't know why this is, but I feel like songs that come out...
the titles like crossover cause wage war obviously dropped four by four in their EP. Now we got Gideon with another song called four by four. ⁓ this is
Jason Ziolo
and Hollywood and Dead
has a song called One by One out there. And Bring Me the Horizon has a song called, is it One by One or Four by Four with Nova Twins? Anyways.
Parker
Yeah, it's- it's-
Dave Cravotta
What is happening?
Parker
When,
when, Poppy dropped that Vi-Vi-Violent Na- What is that song? ⁓ Yeah, yeah, yeah. ⁓ Yeah, there were a bunch of bands that came out and dropped a song called Violent Nature right after that too. namely, No, shoot, now I can't, I can't remember the names. ⁓ I Prevail. I Prevail. It is, but it, you know, it's, it's very similar, right? It's just funny. Funny, funny.
Jason Ziolo
VAM.
Reed
Van
Van
Dave Cravotta
Such a good song
Reed
Parker hates it.
Jason Ziolo
I prevail. I prevail. I prevail.
Dave Cravotta
and it's violence against nature. Yes it is, yes.
Parker
But I highly recommend checking that band out. They're definitely doing kind of the groovy type metal stuff and it's really fun. Then my favorite Thal band, I don't know if you guys ever have gotten into this realm, but I think everybody's favorite Thal band actually after you kind of dive into the realm. Marar dropped a new album and it's crazy. They take almost a classical approach.
in music and they just absolutely just melt your face off.
Dave Cravotta
⁓
Jason Ziolo
Parker, what did you
Dave Cravotta
That's cool.
Jason Ziolo
call them, a Saul band?
Parker
Thol. Thol.
Dave Cravotta
All.
E-H-A-L. Can you explain that, Parker? I can't.
Parker
T-H-A-L-L.
Jason Ziolo
I don't know what
that is, I've never heard that before.
Travis
That's new to me.
Dave Cravotta
Yep, I've heard it but I couldn't explain it. Go ahead, Parker.
Parker
Yeah. Yeah.
you know, fall takes the th a L L. Um, they, they basically take what drop tuning is and they say, I don't give a shit if you can understand the intervals and they drop the tuning to the ground. Um, they have a lot of
Jason Ziolo
So T-H-A-L.
Dave Cravotta
Drop Q.
Parker
A lot of thol is very, very, very automated, where you basically take your transpose and you crank it to negative 12, and then you crank it all the way to positive 12 when you get the scratchy, crazy noises. So it's basically taking like the gent idea, the modern prog metal idea, and just amplifying it by a hundred thousand.
Jason Ziolo
Drop Q. Yeah.
This sounds awful, I gotta be honest.
Parker
It's,
you know, it's not everybody's thing, but it does create some dynamic noises and very, very, very brutally heavy music.
Dave Cravotta
It's extremes, super low,
super high. Parker, is there a band that does thall that you think, this is the single that kind of is like accessible and people would get it and be like, okay, I want to learn more. It's the Ticket to Ride version of this.
Parker
Accessible
is not the word I would use with Thal ever, I don't think. However, I would start with Mirar because they do have that classical music feel. Mirar is kind of the one that is shining forward a little bit. However, if you're looking for something that's a little...
Jason Ziolo
you
Reed
You're not selling this at all.
Jason Ziolo
you're not selling
this for me, classical weirdness, brutal and extreme! i'm gonna go listen to chest pain instead!
Travis
Hahaha
Parker
Well, I'm not trying to...
Dave Cravotta
Take the box, put queue,
and do a lot of squealy stuff.
Reed
think I'd rather have chess.
Parker
Well,
Jason, you're not the person I'm trying to sell to. I'll- I'll- Let's- Let's be real.
Travis
Based on your description, I kind of went to Meshuggah. Are they kind of in that vein?
Parker
So
I would say they took what Meshuggah did and Periphery and all those bands and they kind of merged them all together and they said, how crazy can we make this sound by transposing all that? An accessible, accessible, thal-ish type song would be kind of like No Tomorrow by Fit for a King. I'm not sure if you've heard that song, but it has that like downtuned, down tempo.
Dave Cravotta
heard of Fitfork.
Parker
type like groove that Thal has, but it doesn't do it to the extremes that Marar or some of these other Thal bands would have. A lot of times Thal bands don't have vocals too.
Jason Ziolo
Man, you keep selling this for me, Parker.
Reed
I'm
Parker
Vito
Vito Lajara Villa Villa Vito Vito Vito Lajara is that how you say their name?
Reed
so
Dave Cravotta
No riffs, no vocals.
Jason Ziolo
Is it pit farting on a snare drum?
Reed
Can I tell it?
Dave Cravotta
I'm hearing a
lot of animals as leaders right now.
Parker
Animals as Leaders would be kind of like a in-between. There is a band called Vida Jar... It's frickin Swedish or something. But they have an album called Forte and it's probably more accessible than Marar. ⁓ If you want to start there...
Reed
Can I tell you guys what I'm
not listening to this next week?
Parker
You know, I don't know but but they're fantastic I played one of their tracks for Jason one time I and it's been labeled like the heaviest song ever to be produced and ⁓ It's Yeah, it's it's crazy. It's it's absolutely crazy. I love these guys They're not my like, you know, even I don't go to these guys and listen to them on the daily. They're not in my routine rotation, but You know, it's it's fun stuff
Jason Ziolo
And did I throw up in my mouth a little bit?
Dave Cravotta
There's
someone listening or several someones that will listen or watch this cast that will be like I'm interested I'm gonna go check it out So if that's interesting to you go check it out and come give us a review of what you think and tell Parker He's out of his mind
Parker
Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Jason Ziolo
If you are watching this cast
and you go listen to it and you think Parker should never be listened to again, put that in the comments because that's the kind of shit I want to see. Tell them how wrong he is.
Travis
⁓
Reed
Drop that shit hard. Yes.
Parker
⁓
Dave Cravotta
I did have
a buddy of mine that told me he's like, the bands you guys bring up, I never heard of any of those bands. I'm like, none of them? And like, no, I've never heard of any of them. I'm like, okay, well, exposed to new music. He's like, not interested. Okay, cool.
Parker
I'm trying to bring the heavy music to the masses,
Dave Cravotta
Yes,
it's fine. It's fine. And people, some will get into it and they'll be grateful. Your best friends are those that introduce you to new music. Full stop.
Reed
I had it. I had it.
I had a dude this week
in Texas that told me he'd never heard of Bring Me the Horizon. I'm like, you... Get out from the rock that you're
Dave Cravotta
Let's go!
Jason Ziolo
I have a good business friend who's into the more, what would you call rush into a progressive rock, the prog rock stuff. And he's into like dream theater and more of that kind of stuff. And I was talking to him there, I actually made him a list of songs we've covered of like the heavier stuff that I thought he'd like. He's like, I don't know half these bands. He didn't know who Bring Me the Horizon was. And I was like, hmm. Now granted he's a little bit older. He's like 60 years old, but still, come on.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, frog metal.
Reed
Yeah, douche rock. ⁓
I'm a Shrek.
Dave Cravotta
Good.
Reed
How is that possible? They're the biggest...
Dave Cravotta
But Bring Me the Horizon is not on the like terrestrial radio stuff. They're not on any kind. They've not like broken through that mainstream in that way. They're huge in what they do. But I don't know that there is, like my circle does not talk about them. They're just not that big. They're big in their own circles, but not, they haven't kind of expanded.
Parker
I- I-
Travis
I think they're right there. I really do. Like, yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Probably. Yeah.
Reed
I mean, they just threw down the greatest metal show of all time, so.
Dave Cravotta
I've never seen them and everything you guys have said is like, that sounds like a bucket list band, like I've gotta see this band.
Jason Ziolo
Before we get into you seeing Bring Me, because you saw them in the last week read, one more new song. Actually, I want to talk about two, but I'll skip one. I want to talk about Sinner Systems by Dead Poets Society, which is one of my favorite newer bands. Really good. Not much to say about it, except for it's just weird Dead Poets Society stuff. They've got such a unique, like, out there sound. I don't know how to describe it. I've never heard anything like them before.
Parker
I have a little bit more.
Reed
Yes! Yes!
I wish
that band would get more traction because not only do they make kind of unique music but that could still go for the masses, their live show is insanely good, the energy that they bring onto that stage. That band needs to be getting better traction somehow than what they've got.
Jason Ziolo
I think in the younger crowds, the high school crowds, I think it's one of those really bigger bands. I put them with the bad flower. The groups I'm on, I'm on a couple of bad flower groups, and that's kind of a younger crowd too. They're always talking about Dead Poets Society on that. So I just think maybe we're aged out of it. We're a little too vintage.
Reed
Really?
Really? Well, good.
Parker
Do they salt their food a lot?
Jason Ziolo
Salt is great. OK, but the one I really want to talk about, and then we're going to move on to live shows. Travis, want your opinion on, well, actually this. I'll segue. Hey, so you're talking about Bring Me the Horizon. Jordan Fish, you left Bring Me the Horizon, right? Now he's been producing for a lot of new bands. He just did the new Evanescence song. But probably what I want to talk about is he just produced the new Beartooth song.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Parker
⁓
Dave Cravotta
Hmm.
Yes.
Eugh.
What?
Reed
Did you really?
Jason Ziolo
Beartooth just announced a huge new album and we have had said some interesting things about Beartooth on this podcast before Travis was part of us. Travis, it's one of your favorite bands, homie. So I gotta hear what do you think of the new song?
Travis
⁓
Parker
than
Travis
They are.
It's okay. ⁓ I liked it better than Free. I wasn't really vibing with Free. ⁓ And not because of all of the reasons that everyone was just all over the video and Caleb's new image and you know whatever. I thought all of that was completely unnecessary. He's trying something new. He's obviously in a good place. We've seen that journey. I'm definitely excited for the new record.
Jason Ziolo
He neither.
Travis
⁓ I've seen them a few times, Dave and I have both seen them. I feel like they're... I saw them... It was the first Surface Tour, yeah. And it was actually a really great show because they're from Columbus, Ohio, which is just a few hours from where ⁓ I live. And his mom was in attendance, his dad was there, his wife, I think his brother-in-law, like...
Jason Ziolo
When's the last time you saw? What was the last tour you saw for them?
Travis
His whole family was there at the show. It was a big deal. I believe it was the last show of the tour, if I remember. It was just, yeah, was real emotional. He came out like where the sound guy was running the mix. And for about 10 minutes, he kind of talked about this whole journey and how this new album was really a culmination of him being sober and in a good place. And I've been on this journey. I remember seeing those guys when they had about
a hundred people in the basement of Old National Center and they went to headlining a sold out show in the upstairs Egyptian room. I mean it was just awesome. I've been a fan since Disgusting. I love that album. I'm a huge fan.
Dave Cravotta
you guys.
Yeah.
Parker
I think this new song is homage to old Beartooth, in my opinion.
Dave Cravotta
Right.
Travis
Yeah, I think so as well. Yeah.
Parker
And, and I, my, was also with the band since Disgusting. I saw them at festivals when they were on like the third, fourth, fifth stage. That's, you know, some of these bigger festivals had a tiny little crowd going on and, they killed it. Right. And they just kept blowing up and man, I did really love Beartooth for the whole time, but I could not take Caleb on stage crying.
doing all his stuff and it got to be for me too much, right? It got to be too much. With the recent show that we saw, he did this like almost 30 minutes of acoustic stuff. He came out on stage shirtless and just stood there with a spotlight with nothing going on. Only.
Jason Ziolo
Holding his belt buckle with no shirt on,
just looking at the crowd. mean, to be fair, I wish I could do that, because that's got to be a badass feeling, right?
Parker
I wish... Sure, absolutely.
Dave Cravotta
You can Jason, you totally can. Maybe you
Reed
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
do it right now. We're all here.
Parker
You
Reed
Take your shirt off.
Parker
So, you know, it, it, I love Beartooth, but then they diverged and then they came out. I don't remember the last album, but it was a little too, was a little too poppy, pop rock for me. This, yes. And then, you know, I saw him just recently at Sonic Temple. He did the same thing and it just got to be too much. And I stopped listening to Beartooth completely, just stopped completely.
Travis
God
Jason Ziolo
pink ones.
Dave Cravotta
The surface.
Travis
The service him.
Parker
And with this new song, I feel like there is hope for the original Beartooth fans that do feel the same way that I do. Because, you know, I mean, he's an uber talented guy, but for me and a lot of other people, it just got to be too much of the, I don't want to call it nonsense, but not about the music really on stage, right? It was more about the journey. And I understand that that means a lot to people.
Dave Cravotta
I'm
Yeah.
Mm.
Parker
⁓ But for original fans that are listening to this pop rock music now, know, he's a full rock star now, not really in the metal necessarily all the time now. I think it alienated a lot of fans.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Jason Ziolo
I'm ready to give him another chance. I would go to this live show. Don Broko's opening. There's been a bucket list ban for me. Travis, let's get some tickets and go, buddy.
Parker
I think I'm coming too. I think this new release, I'm ready to go see it again.
Jason Ziolo
I'm ready to give him another chance,
but I was pretty grossed out last time we saw him. He just was really in it.
Travis
I'm gonna try and make it happen.
Dave Cravotta
He's not gonna be boring.
You're not gonna be like you're not gonna be disappointed like he's gonna put on a hell of a show I'm sure maybe there's some little standing with the bell buckle But then there's gonna be some like getting all down in it tracks from discussing. That's gonna be awesome I had sent a text to try Travis texted me saying that bear tooth had a new record New bear tooth single today. It's okay. Nothing groundbreaking may like it more on a new listen new album 828 and I wrote back Fat tormented Caleb is greater than skinny mentally well Caleb
Parker
Absolutely.
100 % that has always been the joke however
Travis
hahahahah
Dave Cravotta
And that's harsh. And Caleb, if
Jason Ziolo
said it, man.
Dave Cravotta
you're listening to this, everybody has to have an evolution. I'm totally good with that. What I can tell you is, as I've said on this podcast before, I love my tormented art. I love when Trent Reznor is down in the dumps doing all the drugs and feeling awful about himself.
Jason Ziolo
And he's gone.
Travis
⁓ man, it was so good the universe didn't want us to hear it like
Dave Cravotta
Dang it!
Reed
Right?
Jason Ziolo
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, so I I want people to be mentally well But I am in the camp Neil Brennan comedian who wrote for the Chappelle show talked about we want our entertainers to be a little nuts Michael Jordan was so great because he was fucking crazy He's if you've seen the last dance. You're like this dude is nuts I feel very similar about music and I maybe that makes me an awful person. I don't know, but I love it when my art is
Tormented it comes from that place because that's where great art comes from if you're feeling good and everything's good in your life man It just doesn't hit the same but if things are awful like then that's sort of relatable when you're having a bad moment You can put on disgusting you're like yes, I feel disgusting But when you're feeling good and put on free you're like no this ain't hitting with me I don't know so I yes, I love the tormented stuff. I'm right there with you guys
Parker
That's always been the joke that Fat Caleb writes better songs than Skinny Caleb, but my buddy texted me with this new release and made an off-color joke. know, technically he's in a protected class again with his coming out. And so he was saying, he might be going back into the vein of tortured music because it's it.
Dave Cravotta
That's terrible.
that is terrible i want to hear
Reed
you
Dave Cravotta
you guys have made me you're convinced me i want to hear this new single this is it sounds like it's a bit of getting back to discussing and though that era in those first three records are awesome
Parker
It.
Reed
Thank you so much.
Jason Ziolo
Okay, Reid just got up from his seat so we can talk shit about him, but I don't want to, but we could. He said he was gonna order room service. Yes, there it is. Wait, did you invite the guy in to be in the podcast?
Parker
I... Yes!
Reed
No, you can't because I'm just getting my
Dave Cravotta
I
Travis
⁓ yeah!
Dave Cravotta
hey!
Reed
He didn't speak English. I was going to. He handed me my... He handed me my bag of beer and ran away.
Jason Ziolo
Aww, because we were gonna try to get the room service guy on the podcast.
Dave Cravotta
Did you speak any of the language back to him?
Travis
We're gonna have a meal unboxing with Reid on this.
Dave Cravotta
Ugh.
Reed
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
Parker
Beer only. have a couple... God.
Dave Cravotta
I you were in Texas.
Jason Ziolo
Guys, I think it's time we get to these Conti show reviews because Parker's got more to talk about Caleb.
Parker
I have... All right, whatever. There's a
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Parker
big one we talked about that we haven't even gotten to yet. First, do you know the meme band, our last night?
Jason Ziolo
Okay?
Dave Cravotta
Two minutes, go.
Reed
Yes, yes you do. You guys all know them.
Parker
They just dropped an- Yeah, you do. They're all
over the internet. They cover every single pop song you know. They just dropped a new single that's covering an Avril Lavigne song, I'm With You. Yeah, it doesn't hit very hard. My girlfriend listened to it. She's a huge Avril fan. man, she had some choice words to say about that. But the big one-
Reed
No, this can't be good.
Parker
is there's a new periphery album that dropped. A huge periphery album.
Reed
Yes, there is.
Dave Cravotta
Yes. Yes. I heard this.
And it's kind of, I've heard it's a little divisive. Some people love it. They love the shorter songs and catchier tunes. And some people don't. like, there's no seven minute songs, there's no real heavy stuff. What are we doing here? So I haven't listened to it yet. One of the buddies I went to a show with on Friday said he loves it. He's into bit more proggy kind of stuff, so maybe it's gone that way. I'm interested to hear it. I haven't heard it yet.
Parker
It's
interesting because it is a little less heavy. It features Spencer a lot more doing cleans. Now, some people like Spencer. Reid doesn't like Spencer. ⁓ I'm joking. I'm joking. I'm joking. ⁓
Reed
Don't you put words in my mouth. Don't you? Because we
went back and forth on the text message. And there was two songs where he held a certain note for too long. he can't, like it got a little pitchy for me, dog, if I'm going Randy Jackson from American Idol. But I thought, actually, I really enjoyed the new Periphery album. I thought it was awesome. I think they finally, like I didn't.
Parker
Yes.
Dave Cravotta
Mm-hmm.
Reed
I've always loved periphery, but sometimes I got a little too screamy for me. And I thought that like, this was a really good balance between the cleans that he can do really well other than those two songs. I thought it was a great album.
Parker
Yeah, I'm messing with you, of course, but I agree. It's a good album. Of course, I like the heavier stuff from them. All that old periphery stuff holds a very dear place in my heart, especially getting into this kind of gentier, crazy metal. Misha's awesome.
Dave Cravotta
You
They literally have a record
called Gent Is Not a Genre. Like they're at the forefront of all that.
Parker
Yes. Yup.
But it's more accessible. It's definitely more accessible for everyone to listen to. And you get a lot of gatekeepers in the metal community. There's about five million sub-genres of metal now. And because of that, Cowboy Koi is the newest one. 501. ⁓
Jason Ziolo
including Cowboy Corp.
You
Parker
But you get those gatekeepers, right? And the gatekeepers are always going to gatekeep. And it doesn't matter what you like. get bands like Sleep Token, which I personally don't like, but you get bands like Sleep Token. And all those sub genres start to kind of manifest, and you're always going to have gatekeepers. I think, I mean, a lot of genres have that. You're not ever going to get away from that. these bands are putting out great albums. It's great music.
Reed
And then finally to round this all out, there was the, this is gonna be a sleeper album for me guys. I still don't even know how to pronounce the band, but I was busting all of y'all's balls on the text chain and I don't think any of you listened to it. Did anybody listen to the Say 6 album?
Jason Ziolo
No, I was supposed to, I said I was going to.
Reed
It's
Dave Cravotta
Maybe tomorrow!
I'm on a road trip tomorrow, maybe tomorrow.
Reed
It's awesome. And they're opening for some band I've never heard of in the House of Blues, and I'm gonna go see them live. it's, this is their first major release, like full EP. LP, whatever, shut up. And it's awesome. It reminded me of when ⁓ Bad Omens released that album that they've been touring on for 14 years now. Like it's got the same, yeah, it's got the same kind of like, kind of grimy
Dave Cravotta
Day six.
Jason Ziolo
The red one
Reed
vibe to it it's phenomenal it's a great album and y'all need to check it out say six yes s a c e and then a six i think it's say six but i might be wrong maybe it's
Parker
Are you able to spell the name for the viewers?
Dave Cravotta
Need a track? You have a favorite track?
Jason Ziolo
I just looked up
Safe Six, like you're safe, not that dangerous, but safe. And Safe Six is a band that looks like a boy band with women with three monthly listeners and one song. Safe Six, it's Safe Six.
Parker
Stay six.
Reed
I will be checking them out later tonight.
Dave Cravotta
other moms.
Parker
Check
Travis
Four now, four after today, yeah.
Dave Cravotta
What?
Reed
S-A-C-E-6.
Dave Cravotta
man let's pop those numbers
up power social media we got a track that you'd recommend me yes please
Reed
Guys, I'm telling you.
Parker
Everybody go pound that band and then post a review of it in the comments.
Reed
I would love to hear it because
it's weird. look, for you Parker fans that like love the super metal, they get real heavy at the end of the album, but at the beginning, it's very melodic. It's very kind of just this creepy dark journey kind of thing, which Dave would love. And then in the middle, it's like an AJ album, right? So it's like, it's got a little bit of everything and it's awesome and y'all need to check it out. All day.
Dave Cravotta
Cool. I'm totally into that.
Okay.
Jason Ziolo
Are you coming up here this weekend Reed? All right, well then I won't listen to you with this this weekend. Me and Parker will listen to together this weekend. Parker and I, Parker and me.
Reed
No.
Well, maybe I'll show up.
Parker
I have
to bring up real quick, because Reid loves this guy, MGK.
Dave Cravotta
⁓
Reed
I will crawl, I will crawl for why? Why are we talking?
Jason Ziolo
Aw, here we go again, Jesus.
Travis
Is this the ⁓ Is this the
Dave Cravotta
God. I yelled at my 16
Parker
There's
Dave Cravotta
year old for talking about MGK.
Travis
whole ye-
Parker
a little bit of breaking, a little bit of breaking here, but Youngblood replied to him. Yeah, Youngblood replied to him. I gotta read this quote, man. I have to read this quote. He just, man. You canceled a tour because you couldn't sell tickets. You then blamed it on mental health and got paparazzied the next day. And your actual tour tickets are still the same price as every other artist.
Travis
Is this the whole Youngblood thing?
Jason Ziolo
Yeah, they're going at it, man.
Dave Cravotta
Boy
I need another beer
Parker
Shut the fuck up, you silver spoon preachy wanker.
Reed
This is, is, wow, okay, you finished it for me. So that's Young Blood to NGK with the wanker that kind of gave it away.
Parker
That's YoungBud to MGK. So the feud continues.
I just am happy that the feud continues and I get to bring up MGK and piss off Reed.
Reed
But, guy, it's the only way that this guy ever gets brought up are feuds. It's him feuding with Eminem, it's him feuding with Youngblood, it's him feuding with... Megan Fox, I would love to-
Jason Ziolo
Yeah.
Parker
Yeah. Yeah. Correct.
Jason Ziolo
What do we got here Dave? Something Reaper. Three Floyds. Alright, that's looks good.
Reed
Turbo Reaper?
Dave Cravotta
who
Travis
⁓ Turbo Reaper, that's a good one. That's a good one.
Dave Cravotta
this beer this this brewer bridges the gap between us indy folks in the chicago folks conveniently located in hammond i think
Jason Ziolo
Beautiful Hammond in the end. You know,
Travis
Monster.
Jason Ziolo
there's a venue in Hammond that's in between the two of all of us that we should go to more shows to and meet you there.
Dave Cravotta
⁓
Hard Rock. Yes, it's a Hard
Rock, think. Lamb of God, think, was there. Mmm, maybe last year?
Reed
Yeah, they were.
Jason Ziolo
Yes.
Parker
Mmm,
nice.
Reed
Yeah, it's 15 minutes from my house.
Jason Ziolo
It's two hours for both of us. We should just go to more shows and meet there and podcast. Yeah, perfect.
Dave Cravotta
And
Reed
And it's 15 minutes for me, so I'm down.
Dave Cravotta
if you're watching and listening and you live within a few hours of Hammond, Indiana in the region, please come join us and subscribe.
Reed
First I'll smash that like button.
Jason Ziolo
Guys, we got a lot to talk about. Let's get to these shows. There's no way we're going to talk about Blue Dot Fever today, ⁓ because we've got so many shows to talk about. Who wants to start? Reid, I kind of want to make fun of you for your Bring Me the Horizon stuff, even though, so let's go. Let's start there. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Reed
Now there's done.
mentions.
Wait, make fun of me for it. All right, fine. First off, look.
Dave Cravotta
Yep.
Reed
My two youngest kids, I only have two kids, Yeah, my two middle-aged kids really wanted to go see Bring Me the Horizon, because they're up-and-coming metal fans, and we've.
Jason Ziolo
You're too old as kids as well.
How old are
they? They're what, like 11 and eight?
Reed
Close 12 and 9 and way to go uncle Jason And bring me the horizon was touring out on all ages show. So of course we were gonna go and of course, we're gonna get tickets so Little did I know that this was a highly anticipated show and there was nothing on the inventory market until the day of of course because people you know bail at the last second, so I was all over stuff of a ticket master and cash or trade dot-com
Jason Ziolo
Great site.
Reed
Is it a great site? We'll find out later. It is a great site. It needs a little bit more publicity and marketing. So we ended up getting face value tickets off of StubHub. Especially, I will not.
Jason Ziolo
It is.
laughter
Dave Cravotta
Bye.
Jason Ziolo
Hey, we're open to sponsorships. Just saying, just saying if anyone wants to sponsor us.
Dave Cravotta
It's gotta be the right ones. We're not gonna fool ourselves out for anybody.
Jason Ziolo
We're not whores,
but we'll do just about anything for money.
Reed
That's that's fair. I'm still never going to we're never gonna advertise for Ticketmaster Although if they got the money we will But cash for trade.com Hashtag shameless Anyways, we got we got floor tickets And Cory and I went up early that's my oldest and then my wife and my youngest met up with us later and it's so we got because I wanted to go see all the bands because Amira Alfaki
Jason Ziolo
you
Dave Cravotta
That is also true.
Jason Ziolo
what's tru-
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, it's hard. Streamless! Yes.
Reed
And then I've never seen her and Plot in Us, Plot in You, Plot in Parker was next up and then Motionless and White, it was my oldest favorite band and then Breaking the Night Horizon. So I mean, it was chock full. And actually every band was really, really good. I felt so bad for Amira Alfki because when she was playing for, she had six songs on her set because she was the opener, opener.
Parker
Platinum.
Dave Cravotta
Mmm, yep.
Parker
Don't flatten
you.
Reed
And her snare drum was really the opening because the levels at Allstate Arena were horrible and all you heard for the first two songs was snare and This poor girl was singing and my oldest was like I can't is she mumbling I'm like now this is what levels means so I turned them around and I showed him the board and everybody all the sound engineers I'm like they're gonna adjust it but all yours And it was horrible, but actually she she was phenomenal she has this
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah.
Reed
very weird stage presence because she's kind of just, you know, if you guys have not heard her music, she's very like soulful evanescence, kind of just creeping along the stage and very like there's a lot of drama to it, but there was a lot of lights and stuff going on with it. She was really, really good once they got the sound levels. And then Platten, you came out and blew everybody off the stage. That band was awesome. I honestly had never heard of them.
So I text Parker, of course, to try to get the low down. They came out and just destroyed everybody. And then Motionless came out and they have been on a hiatus. Like I was trying to tell Parker in the last podcast that like Motionless hasn't really been doing a lot lately.
Jason Ziolo
Dude, hold on,
Parker
you
Jason Ziolo
time out, time out. Reed, Parker destroyed you on the last podcast with his editing skills. And I even showed your sister it and she laughed her ass off.
Reed
Yes, he did. Yes, he did. He really did.
Dave Cravotta
They were amazing. I enjoyed
that as well.
Reed
The Pirates of the Caribbean cut was probably my most favorite one so far. Other than of course the tool cut, which I'm sure we just got.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
And
the office, the office cuts were also incredible.
Parker
I... Thank
Reed
Very good, very great, yeah.
Parker
you. The tool cuts are a standard now, just so you know, anytime we say dick or penis or balls or whatever.
Reed
Was that like multiple ones back to back? You're such a dick. ⁓
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, there will be tomorrow.
Jason Ziolo
There it was.
Parker
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
I'm here for it.
Reed
Yeah, no,
yeah, A plus trolling. Here's the thing though with Chris, motionless, lead singer motionless at white. If you didn't put that together, you're a dick.
They, you guys have all kind of like ripped on Motionless and White over the past couple of years or so. Phenomenal live band. Like I enjoyed their entire set. They played one song that was more ballad and I'm like, we can leave this alone. But like, first off, I've never seen a happier, other than maybe Caleb lately, I've never seen a happier metal lead singer in my life. Like Chris Motionless actually was smiling the entire time, which is really weird in between.
Dave Cravotta
Hmm.
Jason Ziolo
That's cool.
Reed
But like they were having so much fun and the crowd was into it. I've never also seen a crowd at an arena show up so early. So we got there 30 minutes in after the doors open because again, I wanted to see Amir Elfki and it was probably half full in the arena for when she took the stage, which is wild. It's awesome. And as I've said before in this podcast,
Jason Ziolo
Wow.
Reed
If you're going to go to a show, you need to go see the openers because they're the next up in comics. And people like really turned out to see her and it was really, really cool. And then Bring Me to the Horizon probably put on the best metal show I've ever seen. Like the production was crazy. The pyro was amazing.
Jason Ziolo
This is...
Dave Cravotta
High praise.
Jason Ziolo
Reed, I have a story to tell about this.
Reed
Please do.
Jason Ziolo
First time I ever saw Bring Me the Horizon was with you for the Amo Tour. Amo, Amo, whatever. It's love in French and Spanish and all that stuff. My favorite Bring Me the album, even though people tend to disagree with me on that. We walked out of there and there's a full time, first time we both saw Bring Me and we both went meh.
Reed
I'm bored. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, that was people.
Jason Ziolo
Right? We did. We were like, eh. And then you kind of warmed up to it over a couple days afterwards. Like, you know, I keep thinking about it. It's better than I thought. And I was like, meh, meh, meh. Then you went to Lala, and they headlined Lala, right? And they blew the fucking stage off the joint. And it was, you did not let me forget about the show I missed and how great it was. Because I made fun of you for going to Lala Palooza.
Reed
It was a good show. Yeah. Yep. Yeah.
Chuck's out.
Jason Ziolo
So this is where I get my revenge, because you're talking about how this is the best metal show you've ever seen. I've seen the show like three or four times already of Bring Me the Horizon. And I find it very weird that you haven't seen it yet. Chris and I saw this two nights in a row. In my last podcast, we were talking about Sick New World. We saw them in this small club do that whole thing with the church and the lights and the demon breaking through and all like.
Reed
Yes! Yes! Yeah!
Jason Ziolo
the like messenger robots saying that we were all gonna die. Then we saw the same show the next time and then we saw it again for some reason. And then there's like a, there's a bad ass full show on YouTube of that show too, like that same scene that you should go watch. And I just find it odd that it's been like three or four years that I'm touring with this exact same show and you're just seeing it.
Reed
Yes. And we're all pussies and yeah.
and haven't seen
it. Yeah, that is very strange.
Jason Ziolo
I guess I
said that was going to be a burn, but I don't see the burn in there. I just find it odd.
Reed
It's fine. But do you not agree though that that whole production is amazing. Like with the breaking in of the church and the snow like covered everything for that one song and Ali's just like healthy looking and like enjoying touring again. Like I don't know man. The whole thing was just awesome. Like okay, it's not like your quintessential metal show, right? Because like I saw Lamb of God last year and that was like, Jesus, mean it's Randy Blythe but
Dave Cravotta
Hmm.
Reed
The whole thing of the production with the church and the aliens and the snowfall and the pyrotechnics and the confetti with the hearts and like Ollie just being happy again and healthy. I don't know, man. Maybe it just struck a chord. It was just awesome.
Jason Ziolo
Well, I'm happy for you. They just released this, the movie, right? They had the movie theater showing with this show. And hopefully we get a DVD release soon and we'll go sit by your pool and crank it up and watch it and it'll be an amazing night.
Reed
love it. Hey, I also just for errors and omissions.
Nope, that out. Moving on.
Jason Ziolo
story bro.
Dave Cravotta
Hahaha
⁓ I am ready. Yeah. All right. So I saw we're gonna call it four shows in the span of eight days. The last one is a different kind of show, but we're gonna start with the first one. I had a buddy of mine named Brian Peterson. He listens to the podcast. Thank you for listening, Brian. Appreciate that. Yep.
Parker
Did you?
Jason Ziolo
Dave, it's your turn.
Ryan, thank you so much. Appreciate it. It's been a
while. I haven't seen you in a while. Looking forward to catching up.
Reed
You're my favorite listener.
Dave Cravotta
he texted
me and said I got free tickets to go see the Satch Vi band at White River amphitheater in downtown Indianapolis. Yes it was he had tickets in the pavilion we were maybe 20 rows back or so. Right so Satch Vi is Joe Satriani and Steve Vi to guitar instrumentalists who most most of most of their records are Sands vocals so just
Jason Ziolo
I forgot you saw that show too. You've seen everything this year.
What is Tatch Vi for our listeners who might not know that side of the music world?
Dave Cravotta
guitar playing they are Steve I got his claim to fame by. Crit transcribing Frank Zappa's music sending it to Zappa and then end up being a guitarist that went on to have a lot of success with different bands including. White snake. ⁓ Yes thank you and then to have a solo career Joe Sattori was Steve wise guitar teachers Joe Sattori also famously taught Kirk Hammett a Metallica hot.
Travis
David Lee Roth.
Jason Ziolo
I didn't know that. That's cool.
Dave Cravotta
Satch started releasing records in the 1980s and then buy solo stuff in 1990s. When I was in college, 97 to 2002, I got to enjoy a fifth year. In the middle of that, I joined a band and said, I wanna play lead guitar. Yes, I know. I'll throw this out for my wife too. We both have master's degrees. My wife likes to make fun of me because it only took five years for her to get hers. It took eight years for me to get mine. Whatever. Anyhow.
Jason Ziolo
You guys, Steve isn't here. He had like seven years of college, so.
Reed
That's an acceptable
amount of time, by
Parker
Ha
Dave Cravotta
I mean I just really enjoyed school so there was one it was winter of 98 winter break and I went home and I listened to a ton of sachin vibe records just learning to play lead guitar and so I thought about going to the show and I heard about I was like it was even on a Saturday Steve would have been and I was like I don't know I've seen them both before I've seen him with the fans blowing their hair back like I've been here done that I don't know I don't really care for the White River amphitheater
for other reasons but I was like you know and then I had the free ticket offer like I have to go to this and I loved it purely from a I forgot how much these guys influenced my playing as a guitar player and how big a part of my life they were at a pretty impressionable time so just to see them up there playing songs that I loved literally 25 years ago I was like man I am totally enjoying this they play new stuff
They played their old stuff, but then they would play off of each other. So Vi would play one of his songs and Satch would come in and do his take on it. Satch would play one of his and Vi would come in and do his take on it. I loved it. They played all their like big hits. It was super fun environment. We sat almost the entire time. It was definitely a seated crowd despite the show going on, which everybody has their thing, I suppose. But a lot of folks there where I was on the younger side of things.
but I absolutely love the show super fun animals as leaders opened up the toast and a bossy who's an incredible guitar player talk about an AC DC band though I after the first song was like okay cool and then they played like eight more and I yeah I couldn't really tell at one point hosting had me funny steps of my goes up this is love song and they launched into some instrumental thing no bass player in animals of leader animals leaders which is a theme throughout my shows throughout the week
Jason Ziolo
They played it like 10 more times.
My band doesn't have a bass player either, so hell yeah. And either does my favorite band, so bass player's overrated.
Reed
Joe.
Joe Satriani is one of my like more, cause he heavily leans into blues music, which I am a humongous fan of blues music, right? And Satch, I forget the collab that he did. I want to say that it was with Joe Bonamassa, but Satriani, just insane guitarist, ⁓ but Satriani.
Dave Cravotta
Well, it's... interesting.
Parker
They don't need
one.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Yes. Yes.
who's another incredible guitar player? Yeah. Yes.
Reed
As always, I've loved him for forever just because of the blues music he has made and collaborated with. He's a phenomenal guitarist.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah. Yes.
Super melody driven like you can hum along with all of his songs and solos and stuff But then he does some crazy wild like pick tapping and stuff like that That's just you totally geek out on a pure guitar player So it was a whole hour and a half of pure wankery and I loved it. I was there for it was great
Reed
Joe Satriani
Travis
Yeah,
Jason Ziolo
Hahaha
Travis
Dave basically texted his... Go ahead.
Reed
introduced me.
I was just, Satriani is the one that introduced me to Jimmy Reed from like the old school blues guitarist type of mode, the guys that like Stephen Ray Vaughan learned off of. Just, I just love his, like his homage to that realm of guitar work in the blues side of life. Sorry, Travis.
Dave Cravotta
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Yes. Yep. Each of them played
up six different guitars that night too, which was fun for us. Travis, yeah, you were saying.
Reed
Yeah, that's awesome.
Parker
Jason describes
Jason Ziolo
Steve Vai is the one who's
Parker
the music.
Jason Ziolo
got the grip on his guitar, right? Like it's a six pack of beer, can carry it around. What is the point of that? What's the point of the monkey grip?
Dave Cravotta
Yes, it's called a... Yes, I own the gem.
Travis
The jam, yeah.
Dave Cravotta
It's just a place to hold your guitar. It doesn't really have anything to do with the tone or anything like that. I owned a gem for years and played with it in the band for years. There are multiple different models. His universe model is a seven string. More of the gems are the six string.
He, it's got a, I don't know how nerdy you want to get on this, but lots of pickup configurations to get all different kinds of sounds. He's got an offset neck on the guitar too, so it's just built for pure speed, however you want to do it. He is a unique guitar player. You hear his playing and you're like, yep, that's Steve Vai. There's, there's, and he's just remarkable like that. Yes, trap.
Jason Ziolo
Steve Vai when I
saw him this had to be 20 years ago his bass player stole the show. Did he have the woman bass player who was just could slap like crazy and totally stole the show when I saw him.
Dave Cravotta
Was it? No.
I've seen a couple
of his bass players probably Billy Sheehan I saw him play with Billy Sheehan there was you want to talk about a sausage fest man I've never been to one like the G3 I went to in like 2001 my then girlfriend now wife no even better bought tickets for me to go see John Petrucci from Dream Theater Joe Satriani and Steve Vai they are like they are my Mount Rushmore of I want to learn to play lead guitar like these guys never quite got to that point
Jason Ziolo
Who's out there, Johnson?
Dave Cravotta
Probably not even half that way, that's who I learned to play like and wanted to be like. So there was maybe 2,000 dudes and three girls in the whole crowd.
So much wankery. What really gets weird is when they play each other's guitars. Like Billy Sheehan at one point grabs Steve Vai's Wavy Bar and is kind of jerking it off and like, this is getting a little weird. I don't know about this one. And Vian Satch is at that a little bit too. There's one point where Vai goes over and he's like touching the fretboard on Satch's guitar. Doesn't change any sounds. He's just touching a part that's already being fretted. like, oh that's okay. Cool. I'm here for that. Whatever. Play your big dick.
Reed
Jason,
are you thinking of Tal Welkinfield? Welkinfield? The bassist for, she was, she was Jeff Becks, Jeff Becks bassist for the longest time. And she came up to fame at like,
Dave Cravotta
⁓ I know you're talking about... Hockenfell?
Mm.
Jason Ziolo
you're exactly
right, i'm thinking of jeff beck and not steve vie and jeff beck has left us from this earth which is sad i'm totally thinking of jeff beck dammit, gah! how did you pickpick pull that out?
Reed
Yes, he has, he was the one that yeah, and he brought up towel because
I was at the show with you at Crossroads when we were talking about her and I might I might be a couple of these guys in but like she tell and I forget her last name, but I think it's like Weckenfield or welcome like she came up Jeff Beck brought her up when she was like 18 or 19 and she's just an incredible blues bassist, but I'm also a geek for blues.
Dave Cravotta
That's impressive.
Jason Ziolo
you were there
with me, that's right, yep.
Dave Cravotta
Hahaha!
Yeah.
Reed
So like that's kind of why that stuff resonated so
Dave Cravotta
And if you
like bluesy stuff, Satch is awesome. And if you want to get a little bit weirder and a little bit more whammier than Vi is that guy. We'll put a couple of songs on the playlist that are accessible to kind of get you started. Man, I just spent months, maybe years, listening to those guys. And honestly, after watching that show, I wanted to email them and just be like, you guys meant so much to me growing up as a guitar player. I loved it so much. Thank you so much. Steve Vi, actually, Karen.
Reed
basically.
Dave Cravotta
What would you call it? My wife, she got a cameo from Steve Vai for my birthday one year. Yes, tell the story Travis. Yes.
Travis
I was gonna, I was gonna bring this up.
⁓ Yeah, so a few years back, Dave's wife, of course I've known Dave and Karen for a long time, she hit me up and she was like, hey, I want to do something for Dave's birthday. I was thinking about this whole Cameo thing. For those of you don't know, Cameo is a famous site where you can pay famous people to record these messages or videos. And she was like, they got a bunch of musicians on here, who do you think he would like? John Petrucci was the first guy that I thought about. He was not on there.
Now Portnoy was, and I was like, well, he does love Dream Theater. I was like, but he's a guitar player. Steve Vai was on cameo and I said, that's your guy.
Dave Cravotta
Yep. I still have it saved
to this day. It's awesome. It's like one of my favorite birthday presents ever. And I love that like one of my best friends and my wife collaborated to have this happen. She texted me the video on my birthday and I watched it like, are you kidding me? Steve Vai is saying, Dave, happy birthday. It was awesome. Like definitely one of the top five dudes I would love to sit down and have a beer or meal with and like just shoot the shit and hear all about them. So, yep.
Reed
What was it?
So it was just him talking or was he like laying down some shit?
Just him talking.
Dave Cravotta
Nope,
just talking, just talking about getting older and having a happy birthday and being a good dude. Yeah.
Reed
and you just gooned all over it.
Jason Ziolo
So, Reed and I have a friend, Weir, Eric Weir, and Weir sent me, you know Weir, and I know Parker knows Weir, Travis, what the hell, dude? And Reed, Weir's your best friend, so we'll go there. Weir bought me a cameo once, and it was Gary Holt of Slayer. And he got on there, and I have this joke with the old lead singer of the band I used to play in with, his name is Carlson, my name is Jason Ziolo.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, I met him.
Mm-hmm. He needs more Chicago trips. Northside Chicago.
Travis
Nice.
Jason Ziolo
So Zarlson is the name of our fake band we are always making jokes about. And Gary Holt got on here and just talked about how excited he was for the new Zarlson Ruins. And it was absolutely perfect and hilarious. And he had no idea it was a joke. But I'm dying laughing and well done, Eric Weir.
Dave Cravotta
the audible.
That's awesome. Yeah. So I love that Satchvai thing. I know, three more to go. So the next one, that was on a Saturday. Next one was on a Thursday. Went and saw In Flames as the headliner. So totally different vibe from Satchvai now to one of my favorite venues in Indianapolis, the Egyptian Room at the Murat, as we call it, or Old National Center. It wasn't a very full show. I want to say the very half full, maybe like 500 people or so.
Parker
I'm so jealous.
Jason Ziolo
Dave, that's one out
of four shows. We got three more to go.
Dave Cravotta
not a ton there. In Flames is a metal band so that kind of tracks Swedish metal band on top of that but they've been playing they've been writing songs and playing for 30 years In Flames has been doing this for a long time sometimes since the 90s I think there was a band that opened up I missed the opener because I to come from baseball so I didn't see that and there was one after them called Throne didn't know anything about them Throne is another Swedish metal band reminded me a lot of like Hollywood Undead but even more
like intense like their grooves were awesome and never heard him before and me and a buddy of mine went Corey Hart and he he also enjoys the show- fact he reached out to me and said we need to go see some shows together to be like same kind of music. To me went to the show together and throne was they were good I was impressed there is lots of like ⁓ cool groovy kind of stuff- lead singer was engaging he was all over the place they were throwing down. To seven and eight string guitar players no bass player.
Reed
Yeah. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
so to shows to openers no base players once again they're they're dying for you looks like
Parker
Go check out
Split, we dropped that single on two episodes ago from Throne. It's phenomenal. That band is crazy.
Dave Cravotta
yes yes they are they they can throw down
yeah after them in flames came out and they were there there there are a little long in the tooth so they were not as energetic on stage I think some of the younger bands are but I still really enjoyed the show they played lots of big hits they played for about an hour and 15 hour and 30 minutes I think great stuff the mosh pit was incredible I stayed away from that because you know
Heart says pit, knee say bop. Yes. Yes. So super fun show, enjoyed that. Yes, any In Flames fans out there? I really like, they're like, I don't know if you'd call them mellow death metal, like melodic death metal, but I love the last couple of albums.
Jason Ziolo
Because knees and hips.
Parker
They-
Jason Ziolo
I
get weary of any band name that's a preposition. No, I'm serious. It's like there's so all the new modern metal bands are prepositions and I can't keep them all straight. In Flames is a
Parker
Here!
Dave Cravotta
glad I did.
of all other things.
Parker
In Flames, I have an interesting relationship with this band because they've kind of, because they've been around so long, know, it's kind of like the Metallica thing. They've gone through ups and downs, right? And a couple of their albums that I saw, you know, with them in the 2010s through 2015s was a little bit more, I guess, less energetic. ⁓ Yeah. But their earlier stuff slammed and then
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, I didn't care for like that middle stuff too. I like early and later stuff.
Parker
I didn't know, but like you said, their recent stuff is kind of slammy again as well. So it's interesting for me. But I do like Inflames. I like a lot of their stuff. I think it's that classic metalcore. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
I the mask is awesome. They
closed with ⁓ or that was next to last song was I am above and like the people just lit up and that's an awesome song. They played a bunch in their most recent record for gone. It's just state of slow decay kind of songs like it is pretty grimy but man I was there for it and the people loved it and we had a good time.
Parker
Sure. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yes, third show, the one I was most excited about for the of the four. Holy Water opened for architects. ⁓ I never heard of them until that day. So this is a cool story. So Corey also joined me for this show, college buddy of mine. But two years ago, a buddy of mine from grade school that I haven't seen in over 30 years had moved from upstate New York where we grew up to Cincinnati.
Reed
you
Jason Ziolo
Like holy
water.
Dave Cravotta
His name's Matt Finden. Matt texted me and said, hey, I just moved to Sinsey. I know you live in Indy. We should go to a show together sometime. Like, cool, let's do it. We didn't get that chance until Architects. So here I'm seeing this guy that I grew up with that I hadn't seen in over 30 years. So that was a really cool moment. So we saw Holy Water and then Architects. I'm super stoked. Architects, the sky and earth and all between last year's record was probably in my number one record of 2025. Absolutely loved that album. I've listened to it a ton.
Super stoked for this band. earlier in the day, Matt was doing a ton of driving. So he texted Corey and me and said, hey, you guys got to check out this opener, Holy Water. They're pretty awesome. They're like architects, but a little bit different. Totally fits the bill. Like, OK, so I listen to a few songs like. It's really good. I'm totally digging this. It's singing, but still heavy at times, but good dynamics in them. Awesome songwriting. is the project of their lead singer.
Patrick last name escapes me but his it's his thing they're from LA highly recommend you guys check them out he has a song white nail polish I think it's called is great intro to their kind of stuff they just released a new record a few weeks ago everybody dies sounds very happy song is an awesome song in there that's another great one to check out and to get introduced to the band totally dynamic on stage also to seven eight string guitar players
yeah
Reed
It is weird.
Jason Ziolo
Like what's the point of that? Like
Parker
It's a thing.
Jason Ziolo
I need to joke about no bass players are cool, but that's because I play in a like a practically a lounge band that plays breweries and then local ages just two people. But like for these big metal bands, you want that low end, you want that bass player.
Dave Cravotta
I know it. Yeah.
Parker
I feel like, now this is the thing that I'm starting to see a lot more with these more modern, you could call them new, new metal bands, right? Like they're not new metal, like you would think from the 90s, but they are going that way a little bit again. However, for me, these types of bands are like metal boy bands in a way. know, like they don't...
Reed
You
Dave Cravotta
⁓
Jason Ziolo
Here we go with the metal boy pants
again, Parker.
Dave Cravotta
Wow, tell me more! I haven't heard this before!
Parker
It's same with Bring Me, same with Bring Me.
Same with Bring Me. And this is kind of foreshadowing, because I'm gonna drop this with the show I saw, they don't have a full band because they're heavily relying on backing tracks, and they're heavily relying on electronic drops. And because they have the eight string, they don't really need it if they're going to be funneling all these backing tracks through...
Dave Cravotta
Mmm.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah, yeah.
Parker
through whatever and the reason they're able to do that is because almost every single band now uses digital amps, right? Like Fractal or things of that nature. They're funneling it through there and they're funneling it into the live mix with a backing track that simulates big drops with that would be a basis normally. That's my opinion of it. It's yeah, and like Holywater
Jason Ziolo
Backing tracks, I think, is the answer here, and that disgusts me.
Parker
They're probably not the worst of these types of bands, but they are... I don't know. They are very, very, very... I don't even want to classify them as metal. I feel like everybody says alternative metal these days. They've changed it from hard rock, right? Even Disturbed, I think, is like alternative metal now. Right? Yeah. Yeah. So, like the hard rock...
Jason Ziolo
I reach it, he's losing his shit. ⁓
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
here
it is. Dave Draven.
Parker
The hard rock genre is almost dead because everybody just calls themselves alternative metal, alternative this.
Dave Cravotta
Mmm.
Jason Ziolo
Bullshit, you know, I had a revelation this week that I'm sick of metalcore. I'm sick of it
Dave Cravotta
we need. We need to talk about that I'm I think you're right Parker I would love to hear more about that I feel like the hard rock thing is. It's not phased out but it's taking the back seat and I think we totally need to talk about that. Right yes the whole adjacent
Parker
I mean, but, okay. Okay.
Right. Yes.
Jason Ziolo
And I'm not OK with that,
Parker
Yeah, I don't want to take up too much time
Reed
Do you guys know that,
do you know that like my number one like bucket list I need to see banned is architects and we're just filling my before the review of how was architects?
Jason Ziolo
Okay.
Dave Cravotta
So right, yes, so they came out with Elegy, which is the lead track of their most recent album. This is still number three, yes, so Holy Water was great. I know, honestly, of the four shows that I went to, Holy Water's the one I recommend you go check out most. Their singer is incredible, awesome range, amazing live. My favorite moment of the night, here's your segue, was when the lead singer from Holy Water, Patrick, came out with Architects and joined him.
Jason Ziolo
Is this show number three now Dave or is this in flames still? We're on to show number three. You've been busy dude.
Dave Cravotta
Which will play in the background here, and you're probably listening to right now Awesome, so such a cool moment. They're both doing like clean stuff than heavy stuff the pits going nuts It was such a cool moment I love when the other artists jump on stage to do the thing with them even if they're basically just copying the lead singer I don't care. It was awesome such a cool visual dynamic so architects open with elegy and that place just lit the hell up like it exploded like a headliner should
They were so engaging, so fun. They got six members in that band. Three different guitar players, lead singer, drummer, and bass player. That wall of sound just filled the room right from the start. Did a couple of older songs, mostly songs from the latest record, which is what I know mostly and really enjoyed. Fantastic show. Man, they brought the energy the whole time. Sam was talking to us between a bunch of the tracks. That was the last night of the tour. So...
Reed
That's awesome.
Dave Cravotta
I went to the merch stand to go like, wanna support these guys, especially Holy Water, I was totally in on them. And they's like, yeah, we basically got sizes extra large left last night of the tour. Like, ⁓ I'm a little dude. I wear medium or schmedium everything. XL, I'm gonna swim in.
Reed
You didn't text me. I would have taken an
XL. I'm a fat boy.
Jason Ziolo
I haven't worn a medium since like the fourth grade Dave.
Dave Cravotta
So what what Corey tried You're welcome, it's
Travis
you
Dave Cravotta
Delta So we went on the website to go check it out. Nope all sold out like geez alright So they only have a thousand followers on Amazon music, which is my streaming platform of choice I'm sure there it will be more just as they continue to grow Architects was awesome loved it
Reed
I didn't realize
you got the last night of the tour there. That's even better.
Dave Cravotta
Yep,
I didn't either until they were telling us and they were talking about it on stage like this is the last night of the show we're gonna go home which architects if those who don't know they're from Britain so they get they got a long way to go back home. Holy water's from LA so they got there a bit of a drive or travel as well. The man it was when I was watching that show especially architects I was thinking this is why we go to live music. You go to be in a room with a few hundred few thousand people
and you all just vibe on the same thing. doesn't, in all shapes, sizes, colors, all kinds of people. I saw all kinds of shirts. There were people with metal shirts, with pop shirts, women, men. There were kids as young as like eight and 10 years old and people that had been retired for a few years. And everything in between, and we're all there for one reason. And there are so few opportunities for us to do that. And live music is one of them.
It was like I couldn't wait honestly to talk about this I'm getting chills just talking about it like I love being in that environment and Just vibing with everybody else Right you look around everybody's singing everybody's jumping everybody's into it 10 out of 10 I recommend Yes, that's why we do
Jason Ziolo
Hallelujah! Absolutely!
Parker
Breach! Breach!
Reed
Can I get an amen?
Parker
⁓ feel the Holy Spirit up in here!
Travis
mean we basically saw this in real time when Dave was at the Satch Vi Show. He was basically real time texting his goonsesh.
Dave Cravotta
yes
i was i was having so much fun and i didn't care if any of you gave a fuck i was having a great time guys now they're playing serving with the alien circa 1986 and crickets like i don't care
Jason Ziolo
He was!
Parker
You know what?
I may have been under the influence this week at the show, but I was thinking the exact same thing you just said, Travis. Like being here is like gooning for musicians. It's so true. It's so true. It is.
Dave Cravotta
Was totally you know, but that's what we do right you go to these shows
and you get into it and I get it's maybe not for Everybody all the time and for architect for inflames We were pretty far back by the soundboard cuz like if it sounds good to him, it's gonna sound good to us But architects like no, let's get up there I want to be in on the magic and stuff and it's just such an awesome experience to be with that crowd doing the same things
It's my favorite venue to see a band. It's all general admission. Like you can go pay for the VIP balcony shit, whatever. But get me down in the grimy, sweaty, rubbing elbows and butts with everybody. I am there. I love. Yeah.
Reed
So plot in you,
Parker
Architects.
Reed
they did their heaviest of heavy sets, right? But the lead singer was like, we're gonna play, we're gonna slow it down here. And the only reason we're doing that is because I wanna see as many surfers as we can get. And I was pleading with my oldest kid. I'm like, please, I will get you up into that. You've gotta experience crowd surfing. You got to. And then Bring Me came on and I'm like, all right, so there's a difference between a mosh pit, a circle pit.
Dave Cravotta
Yes!
Yes.
At least once. Yeah.
Parker
It's great.
Reed
and a wall of death. You're gonna see all of them tonight. And I actually filmed the wall of death and death, death, hello?
Dave Cravotta
Yes. Yes.
Jason Ziolo
Hahaha
Dave Cravotta
Wait wait,
so Bring Me the Ryzen has a wall of death? I feel like that's super heavy thing to do.
Reed
it was amazing. And it was.
It is and. I don't know, but it was like right next to us. So I'm like, I'm going to film this because now we're going to show it right now. And like it was it was a violent wall of death. And I'm like, this is amazing. And if I weren't for you guys, I would probably have taken that.
Jason Ziolo
What song did they do that for?
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Jason Ziolo
All right, good story.
Dave Cravotta
us.
Parker
It's right there.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah
Parker
I don't think it matters. Electric Callboy had a wall of death as well. ⁓
Dave Cravotta
Hmm. Okay,
Reed
Yeah, but they
when they when they when they met in the middle, they started to like hacky sack and dance a little bit. To bring me the horizon. Yeah, right.
Dave Cravotta
but I can see that.
Travis
you
Parker
Yeah. Fair enough.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, there was part of the circle pit in architects. Everybody's doing
push-ups. I'm like, there are a bunch of middle-aged white dudes doing push-ups in the middle of the mirror. What, what, what, what about this? What about black mirror says push-ups guys? I know and only dudes of course.
Parker
Yeah, yeah, Yes.
Reed
Right? Yeah. So I was trying to tell my oldest, I'm like,
Parker
The hell?
Reed
when the next circle pit opens up, let's just go in there. It'll be fun. Like if you get knocked down, I'll get you back up. Like you're going to be fine. There's no violence in the circle pit. We won't mosh. We won't wall of death, but like, let's, let's go experience some of this stuff. It's fun.
Dave Cravotta
Yes. Yeah.
Yeah. Right.
Yeah, because you lose a little control when you go in there. You're like a subject to the movement. And it just helps you bonded because I've shown that to my family and they're like, what the hell? Why are they doing this? They're literally running in a circle like right. But it's like you just let the control go. And we're gosh, we're like for the last however many years, we're so focused on controlling so many things. How many times you get involved in something where you're having this.
Reed
Exactly!
Hivevine.
Dave Cravotta
awesome environment experience and you get to just let go and not think about anything, not do anything. You are so in the moment. It is the most fight club of fight club moments right there. Like let's just experience this right here. Yeah.
Reed
So.
I am so amped up right now. I'm going to go down in the hotel
lobby and just start a fight.
Jason Ziolo
Just
stop running into people.
Parker
Do it, start the circle pit and the whole, if you do
Dave Cravotta
Please video that please video that put it on YouTube. I gotta see that
Parker
that, you gotta film it. A Rockfan Radio exclusive read going down to the lobby and starting a circle pit.
Travis
So, ⁓
Reed
You
Re-
Jason Ziolo
actually reed
you need to like selfie this shit and just go down there and start running into people
Travis
Hahaha
Dave Cravotta
my god, yes.
Travis
Do you get extra
Reed
Reed being arrested.
Dave Cravotta
Facebook Live.
Travis
points on your rewards if you do a wall of death? I gotta ask, am I totally lame? I have never voluntarily been part of a mosh pit. I've always worn glasses, so that's always been my big fear that they get broken and then I'm fucked.
Reed
They should
Parker
You
Jason Ziolo
You are lame, Travis. That's what it means.
Reed
You have to do it. Yes. Yes, you're late. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
It depends on the band,
depends on the night. It's worth getting into at least once. I've been sucked into one or two and it's like intense and awesome and then like, okay, I gotta stop or I'm gonna break a rib. But it's also like a very, it's a caring kind of place. You fall down, they pick you back up. I saw it over and over again.
Reed
Yes.
I pulled Jason the last time it is. Yeah.
Travis
Scott cop
Parker
It was very fun.
It is.
Jason Ziolo
remember your
Travis
yeah,
Jason Ziolo
first
Travis
I mean...
Jason Ziolo
mosh pit? When was your first mosh pit? Yep.
Dave Cravotta
mine 96 tool in atlanta it came out of nowhere they came behind me i was like why am i getting throttled like this in thrash over in a mosh pit okay well i'll just do the thing all right now i gotta like oh my god i'm gonna get my run over
Reed
my god. You were at a tool concert and getting
Parker
Yeah,
Reed
thrashed from behind? That wasn't a mosh pit Dave. That was...
Parker
now you love it. No, no. Hey, there could be a tool drop right here.
Jason Ziolo
Dave, no. These were tool fans too, Dave.
Dave Cravotta
I am just reporting
what happened, my experience.
Reed
He's in therapy to this day.
Travis
Yeah, I almost died at a slayer
Jason Ziolo
My first mod pit,
I think, was the Smash Tour Offspring.
Travis
show.
Dave Cravotta
my God, totally everything.
offspring would be great.
Jason Ziolo
Offspring
Smash to a probably 1995-96.
Dave Cravotta
Yup, yup. It's a young person's event, but a circle pit is like, ehh, you can kinda get in on that. Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty tame. Yeah, yup.
Reed
Circle pit's fun. That's nice little dip the toe into that
Parker
Circle pits are fun.
Reed
culture.
Parker
The
craziest wall of death I've ever been a part of was Chelsea Grin, actually. And it was at the bottom lounge. And if you've been to the bottom lounge, you know how tiny that is. Plus there's four metal pillars in between. ⁓ No, it was crazy. It was packed. It was absolutely packed. the people, you know, like those, the two pillars on each side, the metal pillars, they, I don't know how we did, but we
Dave Cravotta
Cool.
Reed
Yeah, there's not enough room for a wall of death there.
Dave Cravotta
It's a little bit intense wall.
Jason Ziolo
You
Reed
Psst!
Dave Cravotta
Thank you.
Thanks
Parker
pushed everybody to those pillars. And so there was like a ton of space and it just clashed. was, it was electric. Absolutely nuts. My friend definitely got like almost murdered, but it's fine. It's not a big deal. He's fine.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah
Reed
We didn't like him anyways.
Jason Ziolo
Dave, number
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, one more
show and then it'll be brief. Number four. So this is different from the other ones because the live act was different. I went to Banana Ball on Saturday. And if you're like, how is that a show? It was basically like a concert with a baseball game. And I will also say I've got three kids right there, eight, 14 and 16. And the last time the five of us, my wife included, had that much fun at an event.
Jason Ziolo
four.
Parker
You got
one more.
Dave Cravotta
was probably when we were on vacation. don't even know the last, I mean may not even be it. It was such a fun experience. It was basically like 30 seconds of walk up songs for every batter that was up playing music the whole time. We had an absolute blast. Like the players were singing and dancing and doing all kinds of crazy stuff. It's if you're a baseball purist, may not be your thing. But my 16 year old who loves all the club songs, she probably had more fun than anybody else. She loved it. Our youngest eight year old is into it.
Reed
This is the Savannah bananas.
Dave Cravotta
it was the game was the Indianapolis Clowns hosted the party animals which are two teams in the banana ball league so so. Yeah the clouds are new party animals have been around for a bit the clowns are really the clowns are were originally a Negro League baseball team in Indianapolis Hank Aaron played for the clowns such a page rate that play for the class. Yeah I didn't know any of this stuff and they talked a lot about the history of the game which was super cool and so they do all this class of the party animals come out and they're like.
Jason Ziolo
They're the new teams, right? Because they made a whole league out of it.
cool.
Travis
So did Satchel Page. Yep.
Dave Cravotta
They're the most fun, loving, sexiest baseball players in the league. Like totally different vibe. And of course my 16 year old's rocking the party animals shirt and she had like hiked into a crop top and tied tight and all that like, and got her picture taken with one of the party animals players who had his shirt off the whole time. Like do your thing girl, like enjoy yourself. But we had so much fun. So I recommend to anybody, you've got to be on their email list and you can join their kid club and then you get access to tickets and stuff.
totally worth doing as a family event. was totally shocked that then the music really was what kind of brought it all together. Like everybody was having fun singing different songs and they have different acts and stuff. At one point we're all singing with Houston. Another point we're all just singing different songs. It was a blast. Loved it.
Jason Ziolo
then you all
broke down and sang some thal together
Parker
Marar rounded out the show.
Dave Cravotta
And that's
when my family left and I was rocking out to thal, exactly. Right? But orchestral and like cerebral and like, yeah, let's vibe on this and do a wall of death of the five of us. And they're like, now I'm out. Wall of death, you lost me.
Jason Ziolo
But family, it's so brutal and extreme. Don't you love this?
Parker
It is, it is, it it is, I love it. I love it, I love it.
Travis
The universe just loves Dave apparently because I was not fortunate enough to... You gotta put your name into a lottery to even buy these tickets. ⁓ I was so jealous. I was like, ahhh! Dave's wife posted the photos and I saw ESPN did a little package about it or whatever and talked about the history of the clowns or whatever and I was like, ahhh! Super jealous. Yeah, it looked like a lot of fun. I watch the Banana Ball games a lot on YouTube and they're just a blast.
Parker
man.
Reed
you
Jason Ziolo
I didn't get tickets either, Travis, so I'm with you.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Yep.
Jason Ziolo
Yeah, I'm jealous. That sounds awesome.
Dave Cravotta
They are. It's a really
fun thing. They'll be back next year. They're playing in Tacoma, Washington this weekend, so it's a touring sort of thing. The Bananas are playing the Clowns in Cincinnati in a few weeks, I think. Yeah, totally worth trying to get in the lottery and do that thing for anybody who's listening who even remotely... You don't even have to like baseball, but you do have to like music. It was very music-centric. That was the core of what they were doing. And I loved that part of it. It was great.
Parker
It looks pretty wild.
Jason Ziolo
Steve, our other host, actually
brought my kids to Banana Ball last year. It took my kids, my daughter and Steve's daughter are like best friends too. So they spend a lot of time together.
Dave Cravotta
Okay.
Parker
Supposedly Chicago's getting the team. And... Did we already? I mean, it looks crazy. It's like baseball with, like, the stilts and it looks insane. I do like the YouTube videos. It's fun.
Dave Cravotta
Yes?
Jason Ziolo
Chicago did get a team, yeah. Yes.
Dave Cravotta
Yep, totally goofy stuff. Absolutely
Reed
It's fun baseball.
Dave Cravotta
worth it. They had a relief pitcher come out who did a whole routine to stay alive by the Bee Gees, which I can't see in the Bee Gees, but it was kind of fun. Then he got tagged for seven runs. But it was yeah, we had a really good time. It's like I don't know how to describe it. Almost as if the greatest showman was put to a baseball game. That's kind of what I thought of like tons of music and dancing and antics and stuff and goofy stuff. The arms get into it.
Parker
You
Dave Cravotta
Our favorite was this first base up for most they switched around but he was doing he was twerking at one point the umpire was twerking guys. It was awesome
Jason Ziolo
Hahaha!
Travis
Now we know why Dave went.
Parker
You
Dave Cravotta
That is it! I wanted to watch the Yelp twerking right in front of me. Right down the front. Yes.
Parker
That's tool-centric.
Jason Ziolo
This is a perfect segue. Since we're talking
Travis
You
Jason Ziolo
about twerking, Parker, tell us about Wage War.
Parker
I was gonna say the the twerking
Jason Ziolo
Ha
Dave Cravotta
That's why he's the
host ladies and gentlemen.
Parker
I was going to say the twerking... The twerking does make sense from a tool fan to want to go and see. I will just say that. Anyway. ⁓
Jason Ziolo
It's coughing up his beard.
Reed
This is my work laptop.
Dave Cravotta
You
Jason Ziolo
Dave, sounds
like a killer weekend. I'm super jealous, man.
Dave Cravotta
Dude, it was
Parker
It
does sound amazing. I'm so jealous that you saw Animals as leaders and with Steve Vai, like that's absolutely crazy. Tosin Abasi is unreal. Jason describes this music as guitar masturbation and it is what I, I dude, I'll goon to it all day. I don't care. It's so good.
Dave Cravotta
awesome. I had a blast.
Reed
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
years.
I would agree with that.
Yep, I'm into it. Love it. Yes. Wank away,
fellas. Give me all the wankery. It was awesome.
Parker
I randomly ended up at ⁓ House of Blues on a Tuesday night because my buddy hit me up and he's like, hey, look, I had a kid and you haven't met my kid yet, so come visit my kid. Also, yes, right, yes, and he's like, by the way, well, no, we went to his apartment for, he lives like 10 minutes from the House of Blues. But.
Jason Ziolo
so clearly come to the metal show and let's bond with my children!
Reed
You had a newborn
at House of Blues?
Parker
It was funny cause he's like, come meet my kid. by the way, incentive to beat my kid, as if that's not enough. I bought you tickets to go see a wage war with me. and I was like, all right. Yeah. I don't care Tuesday, whatever. I, whatever. I don't care. So I, I, we ended up at house of blues and, the, the first two bands that opened, was Orthodox and never tell. I didn't really know much about either of these bands, but Orthodox is
Dave Cravotta
hell yes. That's a good friend.
Jason Ziolo
never tell!
How are they?
Reed
Never tell.
Yeah.
Parker
I will get to that. But Orthodox, Orthodox killed it. They are not even, you know, they're rising in the ranks here, but they're under a hundred thousand listeners on Spotify. So everyone listening, tell your friends, go blast the shit out of this band because they almost stole the show from Wage War. It was so good. And I listened to them on the way up with my buddy and like, it was good, but man,
Reed
Really?
Dave Cravotta
Ooh!
Parker
playing live was insane. They had just released a new album, which they did play. And one of the last songs that they closed with, they were like, we need to have 25 crowd surfers for this song. And you're like, okay, like, first of all, it's House of Blues. Reed gave the thumbs down already. Like we've talked about this venue before and
Dave Cravotta
man.
Parker
It's not a good venue. So I'm like, you're like, it's, it's small. there's like this, you know, you got the pit area and then there's stairs and then there's like a bar and you can't really get through very easily. So I'm like, there's, there's no way that these guys can get, 25 crowd surfers, dude, they got 25 crowd surfers in 30 seconds when they played this song. ⁓ the new song, sacred place.
Reed
It used to be so good. It used to be amazing.
Jason Ziolo
Hahaha
Parker
absolutely killed it. Bouncy, groovy, heavy, everything that you want from one of these types of bands. Like I said, the new, new metal, as I call it, is coming with a punch. These guys are incredible. They, in fact, I went to the merch and I kind of wanted to get a Wage War thing, but I ended up buying an Orthodox hat because it was so, I mean, they brought the house down. It was unexpected. It was kind of like the Des Rocks moments for me in a way.
They absolutely just killed it. And then we'll get to Never Tell.
Jason Ziolo
You're boring
people Parker, they're dropping like flies. David Reed both walked away.
Parker
I know, I guess I am. I don't know what I'm doing. I
feel like that show hype... Well, I don't know. Maybe it's me. I probably smell. ⁓ Then we get to Never Tell. And... ⁓ man. I'm gonna... After this, I'm never gonna tell anyone about Never Tell again. You like that? ⁓
Jason Ziolo
we could smell through the cast.
You hate and never tell. I know you hate and never tell.
I see what you did there.
Parker
I wish Dave was here right now. It is, is boy band metal to the maximum, right? Like
Jason Ziolo
What
do you see? You always say this Parker, boy band metal. What is boy band metal when you say that?
Parker
Boy
band metal to me is when you rely heavily on electronics and supporting tracks and it's not live music. It's pop. It's pop music with a couple heavy guitars in the background. They have two lead singers. They both are doing rap pop the whole time. They have one guitarist and he is not even on stage half the time and they have a drummer.
but the drums are overshadowed by the electronics. The drums are overshadowed by pretty much all of the backing tracks that you like, there's no reason for them to have these guys on stage. Actually. it's, it's, it's, it's not, they're not playing it live really. mean, like, sure. The singers are singing, but like everything else is like, it's like in sync. There's no, there's no musicians on stage that need to be there because everything's
going through a backing track. ⁓
Dave Cravotta
you
Travis
Would
from ashes to new be a good example of boy band metal?
Parker
Yeah, in a way. mean, they're very much like, ⁓ sleep theory. don't know if you guys have ever heard or seen sleep theory, but they're
Travis
Yeah,
Jason Ziolo
You hate
Travis
I think sleep theory is great.
Jason Ziolo
sleep theory. I do too.
Parker
They're, they're like, for me, they're fully electronic, right? I mean, like, that's just how I feel. They're, they're a generic band that kind of just plays pop music with eight strings or seven or eight string guitars. Yeah. If you like it, you like it, but that's just my opinion. Right? Like, like honestly, and
Dave Cravotta
you
Travis
I love the R &B influence. You don't really hear that. Like, I think their singer's great.
Dave Cravotta
you
Parker
Bring Me has gone this way too. Like I don't feel like they need a band on stage. They could just have all these psychs there in the backing tracks and everything would be the same. It's that kind of thing to me.
Dave Cravotta
Okay.
Jason Ziolo
I don't like
the sentiment you're going with, but I kind of agree with you, Parker. It's gotten a little ridiculous. We made a joke over text today about how Ronnie Redkia, falling in reverse, lost his laptop, and they couldn't play the show that night because they didn't have their backing tracks, which is insanely stupid to me.
Parker
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Mmm.
Yeah, that's stocking. Yes,
Parker
Exactly.
Dave Cravotta
is. I agree.
Parker
Yeah.
Yeah. That's, that's ridiculous that one, Ronnie Radke is gatekeeping his entire music on his laptop. and, more so like the backing, like just the backing tracks and the electronics that overshadow every live instrument you have on stage is just getting out of control for me. And, and absolutely, absolutely.
Jason Ziolo
That's a whole episode we're gonna have soon. And it's gonna be a
throwdown episode where we're gonna argue out these backing tracks. When we do our escape and go out to, we're gonna do a retreat, that's gonna be the backing track episode is gonna be that weekend. And it's gonna be like a five hour episode.
Dave Cravotta
after the blue death fever.
Yes. Yes.
Parker
Absolutely.
I don't know if you heard it Dave, but my joke was, after tonight I'm never gonna tell about Never Tell again. Pretty bad joke. No it wasn't. Anyway, Never Tell.
Jason Ziolo
It wasn't worth repeating, Parker.
Dave Cravotta
but he did. I gotta add that to the playlist. Never tell. That was the one you were saying
was like, you gotta check these guys out. That was your
Jason Ziolo
I actually like
Never Tell, so don't listen to Park.
Reed
I did too.
Parker
Jason
likes Never Tell, but they are a boy band metal band. They are, they only have one guitarist on stage and everything is overshadowed by electronics. Even the drums, like they didn't even really need the drums because half the time it was a drum machine. had two vocalists come out that were doing the in sync style, like Backstreet Boys type stuff. And it was like, it's. Yes. And, and it's like, you know, it's like sleep token. It's like the sleep token really need the eight string guitar up there.
Reed
boycott.
Dave Cravotta
and off.
No they were not. Are you serious? ⁓ jeez.
Parker
Probably not, because they don't use any other string except for the bottom string, so...
Jason Ziolo
Does anyone need an H-Train guitar is the question. ⁓ I still can't find reasons that people need these guitars. Get a bass player. Right? We talked about
Dave Cravotta
now.
Parker
absolutely you need an 8 string guitar.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
not only
does sleep token play 8 string guitars their 8th string is tuned down to a drop E they're a full octave down from standard drop E yes yep
Parker
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Jason Ziolo
No, I dropped a whole octave. It's stupid.
Reed
Travis,
Parker
⁓
Reed
say this out loud, man, because I'm about to agree with you. Hit it.
Travis
I try not to interrupt the groove, but Parker mentioned Sleep Theory. I'd never even heard of those guys. They opened up for Beartooth. They killed it. I thought they were incredible. I've been a fan ever since.
Reed
Although, didn't he say sleep token?
Parker
Well, sleep theory was mentioned earlier too.
Jason Ziolo
You said about sleep
Reed
⁓
Jason Ziolo
theory before that.
Travis
Sleep therapy
Reed
okay.
Travis
was mentioned earlier.
Reed
Maybe there's we need to maybe stop all the sleeps.
Dave Cravotta
And yeah, yeah, I'm with you.
Jason Ziolo
So
I googled this just because you brought it up, Reed. Here's my random thought for the cast. We were talking about bands with prepositions as names and how they annoy the shit out of me. In this moment, inflamed, within temptation, from ashes to new, from autumn to ashes, between the buried and me, beyond the black, after the burial, among the fallen, or upon a burning body of mice and men.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah, who else you got besides ZenFlames?
Parker
Yeah, there it is.
Dave Cravotta
but after the burial, fucking rips.
Parker
Aw, dude.
Jason Ziolo
Among the Fallen. There's too many of them. It's out of control. Anyways, rant's over. Yes. Yes. Yeah, the band's not called Under. It's, yeah, anyways.
Dave Cravotta
Hmm.
So they're prepositional phrases, not just like prep, they're right, yes. From your local, English teacher.
Reed
We're going to have to chop
this podcast off and we're at two hours and it's still just there's no end in sight.
Jason Ziolo
No, we're not, because I started
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Jason Ziolo
recording like 25 minutes and I was babbling. We're going to finish up WageWare here and then probably call it.
Dave Cravotta
That's a good idea.
Parker
Wage War.
Wage War. I love Wage War. And, you know, they got a little soft and whatnot in between, I... I... Dude, they always put on a fantastic show. And so I came in expecting them to put on a fantastic show. Well, they put on an even better show than I expected them to put on.
Reed
Ways for-
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Reed
Yes.
Parker
So in between, you know, they're tearing down sets and whatnot. Well, Wage War, it took a little bit longer and we're all like, what the fuck is going on? These guys built a swamp on stage. They brought in plants. They brought, they, they put, they brought in, yeah, they put in, they, they had the whole, the whole, like every, every like arm that they had to hold something on stage was covered in like swamp leaves. It was nuts. They built.
Dave Cravotta
⁓ for swaps, so good.
Reed
Awesome.
Parker
a fricking wooden, like, and not just like a facade. It was a house that they didn't use, but it was a, a, a fishing, like, like bait store that they built on stage and they just built it on stage. was nuts. It was crazy. And we're, and then, you know, the other bands, were kind of, it was like the electric call boy thing where like the stage was like shorter for the other bands. we're like, well, this, we know the house of blues is like deep. They reveal this.
Reed
Awesome. That's awesome.
Parker
drum riser that is taller than most of the members in the band. So the drum is like, it was, it was nuts. And so then they come out and of course they open with four by four. They opened with four by four and you know, they do everyone's cheering and they do that little intro and then they drop into it. Dude, we were, we were on the ground at, or we were in the pit at that point and we turn around. You could see.
the, the second and third levels moving, it just blew the whole place up and no one, no one stopped jumping. No one stopped doing the pit stuff the entire time. And they played through all of these songs and even, even the, the lighter songs that they've come out with, you know, there's that really poppy song that they have that that's their huge, big, I don't remember what it's called, but they have this huge, big.
Reed
Amazing.
Parker
more like mainstream song and I don't know if they changed the tone from 4x4 for it because it just like it hit really hard live. It was insane. It was great. And then of course they closed with Swamp Song and just brought, mean it was it was the it was House of Blues and I hate House of Blues and it was the best Waged War show I've seen and I've seen these guys a lot. I've seen them at festivals. I've seen them all over the place.
Jason Ziolo
Closer.
Reed
Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Wow.
Parker
And somehow this just happened to be the best show I've ever seen from these guys. literally, Wage War is a top five live performing band for me.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.
Reed
That is awesome.
Jason Ziolo
Nope, in.
Parker
They're so good. I was gonna text you that you made the biggest mistake of your life.
Jason Ziolo
I just skipped them for bring me the horizon at sick new world. Shame on me.
Reed
You
Jason Ziolo
I think you did text me that.
Dave Cravotta
Oh, I mean that's
bold. But you are, but you're a big bring me fan like you gotta do that. Earlier today I was listening to Holy Water and then their record ended and it just went into something else on my playlist and all of sudden I like, much heavier. was like, oh yeah, I'm vibing on this. What is it? Wage war. Like can't wait to tell Parker. Yeah.
Parker
I probably did.
For sure, for sure.
Yeah, it's, crazy. And, and they played
four of the five from the EP in the, in the whole thing, which was really cool. Cause it's fresh in your mind. but I have to say, I don't think there's a better vocalist in the heavy scene than wage wars vocalist. And I'm not talking about harsh is I'm talking about cleans. This guy did not miss a single note. He was up on the mic the whole night when he needed to be he.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Old statement.
Parker
was perfectly in pitch. Everything sounded amazing. I mean, you can funnel some, like correction through the microphones, but to be that spot on, there's no way that that's purely correction. He might be the best vocalist in the heavy scene. It was nuts how good his cleans were. I mean, spot on every single thing.
Dave Cravotta
OOOOH!
Jason Ziolo
Nice. I love,
I love when the musicians shine, man. We need more of that music these days. We need less, less tone correction or voice cracker, auto tune. That's what they call it. We need less backing tracks. We need, we need people like Satch and Vi who can sing and play guitar and throw down and have dedicated their life to it. That's what's missing. And that's why I'm placed at the metal course metal course scene right now. And this would be a perfect topic for our next podcast.
Reed
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Parker
Yeah,
absolutely.
Dave Cravotta
Yes.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yep. Yep. Authenticity. You're here.
Yeah.
Reed
I really want to know, hit the comments below, who's the best lead singer nationally that you've seen on stage? Also, another conversation we had, what's the most fucked up show you've seen? What was the wall of death or the mosh pit that you were in that was the most insane that you guys have ever experienced? This is the kind of crap that we want to hear in the comments and get that feel for it.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah?
Okay.
Jason Ziolo
Let's do that. Next show, we're going to talk about insane moments. OK? Until then, we're going to call it here because we've been rambling forever. Next time, too, we're also going to talk all about Red because we're going to see all these Red shows. We all got a bunch of shows. It's concert season, boys. It's fucking great. And so we got all summer. This is probably how the cast is going to go all summer, let's be honest, is we're just going to brag about the shows we went to. And I'm here for it.
Dave Cravotta
Yes, love it.
Reed
It's
Yeah, baby. Yeah. Yeah.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah it is. is.
Yep, same.
Jason Ziolo
So guys, thanks a lot for joining me. Thanks for listening. See you on the floor.
Dave Cravotta
Yeah.