Lilitu played their debut Texas show in March for the high profile South By Southwest festival in Austin. I have to admit though this being my second in person interview and after having spent the entire day with the guys I was a little nervous heading into the interview, I wanted this one to be the best they had done. Held in the back alley of the venue, The Backroom, I talked to the whole band about the ordeals and tribulations of being a young group on the rise.
From left to right Lilitu are: Jason Piona, (guitars) Corey Taylor, (drums) Jonah Weingarten, (keys) Derek Bonner, (vocals / guitars) and Noah Martin (bass).

 

Even though The Delores Lesion is your third album, this is your first widely available release and the only one that most people have been exposed to. Do you consider this the true debut of Lilitu?

Derek: Yes, I do. We’ve found our own sound and everybody’s the most happy with it.

Jason: It’s the most rewarding album we have done so far, it’s the start of things to come.

One of the things that I have noticed that has changed the most dramatically from Memorial to The Delores Lesion has been your clean vocals. They have moved from baritone to a more passionate, urgent style of singing. How did this come about?

Derek: I wanted to get away from all the gothic tags. Everybody had been dubbing us a gothic band and there’s nothing more annoying than being called gothic or emo.

Do you feel any pressure that even though you are an extreme metal band, you have what many would consider modern influences in your sound and that you might alienate “true metal” fans?

Jason: No there’s no pressure because at the end of the day we do what we want to do.

Derek: What are we gonna do, play for senior citizens or are we gonna play for the younger kids? It’s the younger kids that are getting into it. The young generation is going to shows and buying albums and the old farts are going to Prog Power. No offense you guys, but the kids are becoming more aware especially about this kind of music. Of course none of them are good but all these bands coming out now are trying to incorporate the whole Scandinavian, Swedish European Metal sound, it’s really popular right now.

Corey: It’s taken ten years for the US to catch up. (laughs)

Jason: I don’t think we alienate in any way, if anything we bring more people because we have so many influences, different genres and different people can get onto it.

Jonah: Maybe we can even open up some of those minds that are closed.

Derek: Absolutely. We have all different types of elements in our music. The next album is going to be everything from fucking Prog to whatever we want to do, whatever we feel inspired by.

What do you consider your magnum opus?

Jason: My favorite song on the album, and we can go around here, would be Even the Vultures Have Moved On. It encompasses everything Lilitu does and how we do it. The song flows so well and Corey’s drumming, it all takes it to another level, that’s what I would consider our magnum opus.

Corey: It would have to be The Delores Lesion, the title track. Something about that song gets me in a place I want to be every time I play it, it’s just a great song.

Derek: I’d say The Delores Lesion too. It’s so intense yet so straightforward, it has everything from power and emotion, the bridge, the riffing, the melodies, everything we do it’s there on that song.

Speaking of the title track, this song uses female vocals and I’m wondering if female vocals will be used in the future on your upcoming cds.

Jason: If it calls for them, yes. We don’t set out to do them but if it sounds like they would be appropriate for the song then yea we’ll use them.

Derek: I don’t think anything we’ve written thus far needs female vocals on them. I would actually like to have some different vocals like a guest appearance from someone in another band but I don’t really hear female vocals this time.

The lyrics on The Delores Lesion are very introspective and personal. Was there any particular catalyst in your life (Derek) that caused you to write such lyrics? Basically, is Even the Vultures Have Moved On from personal experience?

Derek: Somewhat yes, but its also part fiction. The way I write is that I try to put my own personal experiences in a kind of narrative way, that way the listener can view it as a story concept. It’s very hard to relate to someone personally about something, everyone relates to it in a different way. I try to make it where the listener can interpret the songs in many different ways.

Jason: It’s how they want to take it, we all do that with the bands we listen to.

I’ve heard that you recently did a video shoot, was it for a song off the album or a new song on the next cd?

Derek: Actually we haven’t shot the video yet. We’re going to shoot in May and it’s going to be for the title track. We have a lot of good ideas for it and hopefully The End will push it. We can also put it on a DVD in the summer or late fall.

Jason: No, its gonna be on TV biotch! It’s gonna be on TV, that’s the ticket.

Will it be a live performance video or a conceptual story video?

Jason: It’s going to be a performance shot, not live with people jamming but us playing mixed with conceptual design.

Jonah: There’s going to be hot chicks and lesbians.

Jason: (laughs) Some titties and everything, a made for TV video something we can get away with.

You brought up the fact you’re planning a DVD for the summer?

Derek: The End Records is [putting together a compilation DVD]. The next record though along with the album we’re going to have a bonus DVD with the video and some live and backstage footage.

How has Jonah’s influence and creativity affected the band since he joined this past November?

Jason: As far his creativity, we haven’t written anything with him yet. The new songs we did write prior to him joining though he has added immensely to them, his creativity is definitely there but we haven’t actually written a song with him yet. There have been bits and pieces that we’ve worked on together which are turning out great. We’re going to move forward and keep on doing what we do and having Jonah in the band is going to be our actual first keyboardist that is in the band.

Derek: He feels like a brother and he totally motivates me. To have someone like him in the band who is on the same page as we are…

Jason: … it’s been a fucking breath of fresh air just to have someone who knows what he wants to understand that there’s things that we want and knows that he can be creative as well. It’s awesome I am totally psyched he’s in the band.

Jonah, you play in three bands now, Pyamaze, Avian and Lilitu. While Pyramaze and Avian are still different from each other stylistically, they can still be regarded as Power Metal. On the other hand Lilitu is something completely different and might be foreign to some listeners of your previous work. Do you feel that you might alienate your fans with your many different branches of musical genres that you play in?

Jonah: I don’t think so at all. I think that anyone who appreciates what the keyboard can contribute to music can follow any of the different bands or genres that I am a part of. To answer your question about me being a part of Lilitu, what really made me want to be in the band is that I felt and still feel that I have lots to contribute creatively. It’s very inspiring music and my cup of tea.

I’ve read this in other interviews and from the way you guys talk about this it seems as if you are all unhappy with the work that you did on The Earth Gods and Memorial. Are you truly unhappy with your performances or do you feel as if you’ve evolved beyond those albums?

Jason: It was a rough time in Derek and ours lives as far as the whole process. If you’d have experienced the things we did at the time you would think that we would have all these good memories but we’ve just evolved. Corey wasn’t even in the band.

Corey: I was in the studio watching the guys record Memorial and it was definitely an ordeal for them to do it (laughs), it was a stressful time for everyone. I kind of got to sit back, watch them suffer, and play drums, which is also kind of how it is still today.

Jason: Like you said, we have evolved. I can sit back and listen to them now and say about some parts, “Oh that’s cool,” but now we’re focused. When we wrote these songs for Delores Lesion we were focused. Corey was a member of the band, we worked on the songs as a complete band and the process was just so much easier. There wasn’t all the outside things that made it so horrible it was just great doing this record overall that’s why I think we are so much more fond of this than say Memorial.

Jonah: As a newcomer to the band when I listen to the other records this just seems like a natural progression, it feels natural.

Derek: I would say that we were very naïve at the time.

Corey: At the same time though, Memorial, some of that stuff you can’t really call naïve.

Derek: I mean mainly with Earth Gods. There’s some good songs on Memorial and there’s a lot of people that give so much praise to that album because its very progressive.

Jason: Earth Gods, yea we were naïve, we didn’t know what the hell we were doing (laughs).

You guys have suffered some pretty big hardships in your career from having your first record being released on a small crappy Finnish label to Memorial being self financed and not being available to everybody that wants it. Right now though with Delores Lesion you are on the verge of breaking out so to speak. You already have two new songs done but what are your thoughts going into the studio to record the followup, do you feel any added pressure or are you just going to go balls out for a new evolution in your sound?

Jason: Evolution man, it just continues and you keep growing…

Corey: …especially now that we are going to write with a keyboardist. It adds so much more writing the songs with the keyboardist rather than going in and adding the parts to the songs after they’ve been finished.

Derek: The ultimate goal for the future for us is to be one hundred percent completely band oriented because that is what great songs come from. I don’t think great songs come from individuals they come from good bands that work together, that bond with each other, to feel like you are good friends with everyone in the band. There’s so many bands out there that just play together but that’s it, my main goal is to have everyone in the band be in it one hundred percent and on the same level as everyone else.

Here’s a question that I used to ask a lot. Has there ever been a question that you have been waiting for journalists to ask in every single interview yet it just hasn’t come out yet?

Derek: There’s nothing that I have ever been dying for someone to ask… there’s a lot of dislikes though (laughs).

Jason: It could be something cool like what kind of gear you use, stuff like that.

Derek: Yeah, its always really cool when someone wants to know about your guitar and what amps you use. There’s not that many questions about what equipment we use, it’s always about “the sound” like “How do you get your sound?”

Corey: “Do you play with weights on your feet do get your double bass so fast?” (laughs) And the answer to that is no I do not!

Jonah: Actually, I’ve always wanted to be asked what my favorite video game is. I would have to say that it’s Halo 2, that is an awesome game.

The lyrics on Delores Lesion are very personal and introspective. Do you see yourself tackling world issues such as politics or religion at all?

Jason: World issues, politics, no. Not those issues at all. Obviously the world influences what music we put out. You could be driving down the road someday and see something disturbing or anything general in life, that comes into the music and also into Derek’s lyrics. As far as politics, never, you won’t be seeing us doing anything like that.

Jonah: I see religion and politics as a tired overused topic anyways.

Derek: I deal with a lot of things psychologically, really realistic lyrics. We don’t do anything that’s overboard like a lot of bands try to do like fantasies and stories…

Jonah: ... or sing about crystal balls.

Derek: As far as world issues no. But domestic issues that are a part of every day reality, yes we want to tackle. Even though we haven’t done much of that it is still something I would like to do on the next record.

Many people have confused the Delores Lesion for a concept album, have you ever thought about going ahead and making one in the future?

Derek: I wouldn’t be opposed to it but at the same time it’s typical. It’s whatever we feel like doing.

Jonah: I wouldn’t say that we rule anything out though.

Derek: That’s the great thing about this band we don’t have any boundaries. If we want to rock a fucking country riff we’ll do it.

Jonah: We’re all really on the same page and that helps create a close bond. The creativity that comes out of that, having the same interests and tastes is really cool.

What’s the wildest rock star story you have had while in this band?

Derek: A goddamn rock star story… you know, I don’t think we have any rock star stories.

Jason: We have stories of other people (laughs) but we’re not really rock stars.

Derek: Most of our more interesting stories come from other band members that were in the band once upon a time and all the characters that we’ve met and the bands we’ve played with.

Jason: I guess the most rock star moment, or even seeing a rock star moment would be hanging out with the Kovenant from Norway. They were living it up and that’s all I really have to say,

Looking around I notice that you guys are the cleanest, most professional looking band here tonight. Do you indulge an any of the excesses of the metal scene?

Derek: That’s not our style. It’s not like we’re fucking straight edge or anything but our focus is all on our music.

Jason: Five dudes making music and having fun.

Jonah: I would say we just take ourselves and our music very seriously.

Derek: At the same time we’re laid back unlike so many bands that are so serious all the time. We’re totally not like that even on stage we go with the flow.

Corey: We’re serious about our music but not serious about our persona to a certain extent.

Jason: We don’t have to have gimmicks…

Jonah: … but at the same time we take pride how we carry ourselves.

Jason: A lot of people, they know right off that we’re professionals which is good.

How have the new songs, Strike Another Promise and Watch it Burn and Another Session, been fitting on the setlist next to the songs off Delores Lesion?

Derek: It’s beautiful, they’ve been fitting in really well. They are more upbeat and showcase our style that you are going to hear on the next record. We’re kicking it up a notch.

Jason: I can tell you right now there is more playing, more guitars, more drums, more everything.

Derek: I would say that these songs are more accessible, not in a pop way but just more coherent.

Have you thought about releasing an acoustic EP or a cd with unreleased material?

Derek: That’s something I’ve been talking to Andreas about, doing an acoustic EP. Me and Jonah have been talking about reworking some of the songs off Delores Lesion as well. I don’t think it’s something we’ve talked about as a whole band but I don’t know if everyone would be interested in taking part in. I want to do it and it would be cool to release it as a seven inch or something.

Jason: Or we could just be like fucking Opeth and do a full album of all acoustic songs!

Derek: The End Records have been really cool with us. They’ve done what they can with us and I know that they are capable of a lot more. It is cool at the end of the day to be able to talk to them about business. I’m glad we’re friends with these guys and they are behind the band one hundred percent, believe in what we do and give us total freedom with what we want to do.

How far down the line do you see a new Lilitu record coming out?

Derek: If it was up to me man I would spend the entire year touring and not even think about recording until next year. I don’t think we’ll be recording til next year anyway other than maybe the acoustic EP we were talking about. It’ll probably be out sometime in 2006 but it will be worth the wait, it’s going to be a long album.

What comparisons to certain other bands do you feel are limiting to your compositions? Such as “Boy howdy you sure do sound like Dark Tranquillity!”

Jason: That doesn’t bother us that part but the whole doom thing does. We still get these tags of being doom, being gothic. That right there puts us in this category of a little group and that’s not cool I don’t like that. The comparisons to the whole Swedish thing, that’s cool, whatever.

Corey: Well, I don’t like being compared to Linkin Park (laughs). I don’t really think that quite fits.

Jonah: The thing that really bothers me is the hardcore tag. We don’t have anything to do with hardcore at all.

Jason: We keep getting these hardcore tags and I think it’s… (looks to Corey) go ahead and say it man.

Corey: What it is is that all these new bands coming out have little bits of Swedish influence and so people automatically lump us in with those bands.

Jason: Yep, and then people accuse us of jumping on the bandwagon. The songs on Delores Lesion were written a year and a half ago, longer than that even. We’ve had all these songs before those bands even started playing music like that. We’ve been playing like this, me and Derek have always been playing music like this, we will continue to do so and evolve but still the worst fucking thing is being called “hardcore.”

Derek: The worst thing for me is being labeled emo. I listen to some emo but emo now isn’t a genre of music anymore it’s a style, the way people dress. It’s that goddamn haircut, that fucking emo haircut that we’ve seen all day. Some of my favorite bands that were considered emo like Sunny Day Real Estate, they really influenced my guitar playing and even the way I sing but I just hate the emo tag altogether.

Jason: Also when people hear clean vocals that have any emotion they consider you emo and I’m just wondering what the fuck?

Jonah: Emo means emotional so any music that has emotion in it would be called emo. So I guess that would range from what, country to R and B music as well?

You were talking about the new scene of bands that are basically mall core with some half assed Iron Maiden type melodies thrown in, do you feel that this scene might actually bring you in some fringe listeners that happen to be confused and think Atreyu is actually a good band?

Corey: It can't hurt. Its opening up a lot of kids to the more melodic stuff so therefore we’ve become more accessible to them as opposed to bands like Earth Crisis or Vision of Disorder who are more straight up hardcore acts. These new bands have been moving along the progression of hardcore which might lead them to us cos of the melodies.

Derek: A lot of listeners are ignorant and will listen to whatever is given to them, whatever the media will feed them. I think that out of all those bands there is a handful of good bands that will come along and change people’s minds. I think we are one of those bands because we have our own sound and are converting these kids to us. I think the same kids that like all those other bands, we could really appeal to them. It’s a good thing I think even if they do listen to a lot of crappy music.

Jason: Besides, we’re sellouts anyway.

You’re very open to the fact that you actually want to be able to live off your music.

Jason: Why not? Why do you go to school? Do you go to not be successful? You can only be underground so long.

Corey: We want to do what we enjoy and be able to make an actual living off of it.

Jonah: I’m gonna start playing the turntables on the next record along with my keyboards man.

Derek: Here’s the plan, this is what we’re going to do for the next record, it’s the divine plan. We’ll write this complete pop album and the next one we’ll record on a four track in the woods and we’ll call it the most fucking outlandish black metal from Georgia you’ve ever heard. Actually it’s gonna be called the most extreme Norwegian black metal from Norway that you’ve ever heard. Remember though this is after we record our pop record that sells millions.

Jason: It’s going to have Britney Spears on ten of the tracks…

Jonah: ... and we’re going to get the Neptunes to produce it.

You’ve never done an actual tour before mainly gigging around, but in fantasy land what would be the ideal tour package for you? Would it be a diversification type tour with say three drastically different groups or would you want one which would be similar bands that would appeal more directly to your audience like if Pyramaze toured with Lanfear?

Derek: I think it’d be awesome if we did a tour with Pyramaze because they are a more progressive band than they are all out Power Metal. I think musicians with those types of fans have a great respect and love for playing. Any band that writes good songs I’d like to play with. Stylistically, the only thing I wouldn’t do would be to play with an all out death metal band, that just wouldn’t work.

Looking back over your career so far are there any instances where you feel that you said yes instead of no, or no instead of yes that you wish you could change?

The studio we went to record Memorial at that’s a decision I wish I could have changed. Also playing with certain people, giving them a job and letting them into our circle and having them fall through as well. I think though all in all, we’re moving forward and we always will have some issues but right now we have a stable lineup and that is what’s most important.