Questions about Destination and the band beginning

Q: So, how long have you guys been together?

A: With the current members, since about March 1998. Doug Perry joined the band in March of 98 after we had been searching and auditioning bass players for about 3 months. Jerry, Jon, Greg and me (Mark) have been together since about July 96 when we picked up Jerry and Greg. Jon and I go back to about 94 sometime. As you can see, this question doesn't have a simple answer. Don't ask me this question after a few drinks or I'll tell you to check our website.

Q: On the back of your CD it says Copyright 1989; what's up with that?

A: It's a mistake. And, without fail, nobody caught it until we had our shipment! It should say 1998.

Q: Who's this guy on the CD, I don't see him here?

A: That's Mike Gatrell our previous bass player.

Q: What happened to Mike?

A: Mike and Greg had quite a few disagreements. They were nothing that were major in my opinion. They did, however,  have a cumulative effect. Mike and Greg began to disagree on a regular basis and Mike decided to leave shortly after recording. In addition, Mike was under stress at work, pulling mandatory 12 hour shifts, 7 days a week. He had no time for the band or his family. Something had to give. He wasn't even able to attend the final mix of the CD. His schedule continued like this for months. We couldn't practice after getting out of the studio, which we needed to get back into clubs to pay for producing the CD's. At this point, you leave the studio with a few cassette tapes, your master reels, mastered DAT tape, and thousands of dollars poorer. For a while we searched for a sit-in bassist. None were willing to learn the material on a temporary basis. Mike threw in the towel and we started auditioning every bass player we could find. I still talk with Mike, so it's not like some big scandal or anything. Certain circumstances just happen and you have to deal with them and try not to piss everyone off in the process.

Q: What comments are you guys getting about the CD?

A: Before the CD came out, I wasn't sure what the reaction would be like. All we did was go in the studio and try to do the best job possible within our budget. Now that it's getting into peoples hands we're getting a lot of compliments. We've been getting a lot of comments about how well produced it is. I'm not sure what that really means actually? We looked at the commercial CD's on the market and tried to appear as professional as we could. Being and independent artist doesn't mean you have to go with a two color CD cover with a single page CD insert. What's that mentality all about anyway? Why would you want to appear to be cheap? You have to understand this business a little better than the garage band around the corner that's burning their own CD's and stuffing single page CD inserts printed on their laser printer. You're not just competing with garage bands. Your CD has to sit next to the latest CD by a major record labels CD in a record store. Put some time and effort into it. I happen to like cool artwork. Another comment we get is: You actually included the lyrics? Wow! Yea, it's true. I can't believe there are major labels that rook you on the lyrics. People do read them. I really can't believe that out of all the people so far that have heard the CD, nobody has said 'it bites'. Not that I want someone to, but it means that with a little marketing it could be commercially acceptable. The songs cover such a broad spectrum that everyone likes at least a couple tunes. Once again, we weren't shooting for commercial songs but success is the reason why anyone should do this in the first place.

Q: Why is there only eight songs on your CD? That's kind of short for a CD isn't it?

A: Yea, it is. Actually we intended to include a few more songs, but we didn't have the money to do all the songs. We really only wanted this to be a demo to send out to record companies to try to get signed. After listening to the final mix, we decided to go ahead and sell it. We thought people might buy it if it sounded good and looked professional. We would rather have 8 well done songs than 10 or 12 songs partially done and run out of money in the studio.

Q: How long were you in the studio?

A: If you include the mix down, about 74 hours (mixing took about 6-8 hours). Bill Korecky (Mars Recording) let us come in on the weekends and lay down a lot of tracks and Greg was really the only one that went in on weekdays to lay down vocal tracks.

Q: The CD artwork and layout looks pretty expensive?

A: In a way, it was free. We sat down as a band and decided what we wanted the cover to look like and I did it all on the computer. We wanted something with a lot of detail. The rest of the band was kind of skeptical about how it would look because I couldn't actually print the graphics in high enough resolution and show it to them. When you're dealing with computer graphics, you have to consider what DPI (Dots Per Inch) it's actually going to be printed at. I've seen some graphics that you can see the pixel blocks because it was created on a computer screen and enlarged. This is very bad to do. Make the graphic so large that it needs reduced and you'll get much better results. You end up with huge files, but in the end it's worth it.

Q: What's the main message behind the CD?

A: Lyrically there are a lot of different messages on a song by song basis. Those are pretty obvious. A Place Called Heaven (The Lost Angel) and Gateway to Heaven could possibly be interpreted as religous in nature. What those two songs and the artwork of the CD pertain to is actually space travel of our ancestors and spirituality. Beliefs of some people are traditional. We don't intend to sway opinion, we're only saying that other possibilities exist. What Comes Around Goes Around deals with karma and treating others like you want to be treated. Kiana is a love song. Bitch From Hell is a very bad relationship. Hell To Pay is about taking responsability for your own actions. Nights Off is about going out for a night on the town to get away from being a working class stiff. Rock is about the release of energy through music.

Q: There seems to be a lot of symbology associated with the CD artwork. What's that about?

A: There's a mixture of symbology and subliminal aspects with the art. I wanted to create art that has more than just face value. If you look more closely, you'll find some things that you don't see in a quick glance.

Q: Ok, let's look at the cover. What's there that may not be obvious?

A: First off, the three saucer shaped craft coming out of the 'g' in the logo. These symbolize that the logo is really a mother ship. The perspective of the logo symbolizes travel in the direction of the yellow/orange cluster of objects just below the comet. The cluster is meant to be the center of the galaxy. The title 'DESTINATION' also contains a subliminal message.

Q: I see, certain letters are darker. D,S,I are darker than the others. What's DSI?

A: It's the remaining letters that are important. But most people see the DSI before they see the other letters.

Q: You're right. Most people wouldn't notice that. What about the symbols on the lyric sheet?

A: All those symbols are actually crop circle designs. I tried to find the most complex designs I could find. I would look at the picture and try to duplicate it in an overhead view. Surprisingly, I was not able to faithfully duplicate some. I was able to get them close. I couldn't believe how long it took me to create some of those when equipped with a paint program on the computer. Some took the better part of an hour to do. You tell me how some of these pop onto fields in minutes or seconds?

Q: Hoaxters equipped with the right tools?

A: Some are clearly hoaxes. Clearly some are not. The real ones have changes to the stalks at a molecular level. Guys tromping though fields with sticks can't cause a molecular level change.

Q: There's a symbol on your CD shaped like the number 3. What's that symbol?

A: That symbol has been described by some as a symbol seen inside alien craft. It's the galactic federation symbol. The lines indicate travel and trade routes between star systems. I think we have to start looking at becoming part of this federation to survive beyond our planet. There's so much that we don't know about. We don't even know about our true history because our written history keeps disappearing every so many thousands of years.

Q: What about the bible? Doesn't that have our history?

A: The bible is a good book. The problem with the bible is that the terms and descriptions it contains are from a vantage point thousands of years in the past. Some of the things described in it would be explained much differently in todays terms. People couldn't fully understand what was happening. They had to describe things that defy description by relating them to concepts they understood at the time. There is a lot of truth in the bible, but it's a lot of symbologial truth. People shouldn't make the mistake of litterally interpreting the bible. One other aspect to consider is that the bible is not complete. Many religous groups have had a hand in modifying the bible to suit their particular purpose. This is clearly imorral. I think the way of life is much more simple. Love one another and treat others like you wish to be treated.

Q: Anything else not obvious about the artwork?

A: The artwork under the CD has a hidden 3D image. You know, the cross your eyes and pull the image away from your forehead type.

Q: You mean the black & white marble type artwork?

A: Yea. Some people can see the image and some people can't. It's no reflection on anyone, but it's funny. There's actually an interesting story to go along with the graphic. When we were having the CD art proofs done, we didn't tell anyone about the image. We wanted it to be a total surprise later, just like it probably is now. In our proofs, the image would be cut off. I had to tell the people at Discmakers about the image so they could get the image centered properly. When I told them they were kind of skeptical about an image being there. Then the next day they called and said they finally found one of their layout people that could actually see it. It was funny because they were so excited about it.

Q: Why are you telling us all this stuff now?

A: I want people to realize how easy it is to overlook things that may not be obvious.

Q: How many original songs do you have that are the quality of those on Destination?

A: There were two songs that we had to hold back as far as Destination goes (Never Turn Away and Pictures). We planned on doing them in the studio, but they would have forced us to over spend our budget. We held those back until the end of recording to see if we could work them in, but the songs were not going to be easy to record. Jerry has four new songs and Greg has plenty of lyrics but we haven't really taken time off to Lost Angelize the material yet.

Q: How often does the band write new music?

A: Jon and I usually do a free form jam session weekly where we just jump on a groove and let inspiration take us where it will. Sometimes Doug will fill in with some bass. Jerry actively writes on his own and Greg has lyrics stashed away and pulls them out when we go into full writing mode.

Q: Do you have a fixed process for writing?

A: Not in a defineable sense. Jon and Doug, and I are jammers at heart, and Greg and Jerry are more structural and have their material organized as songs go. Jerry and Greg will present us with a framework and sometimes it's all up in the air and the pieces land and we build bridges. A lot of times Jerry will tell Jon and I that we should have been recording our jam sessions because we do a lot of neat riffs and changes. He's probably right, but I tell him there's no shortage and I'll make more up later anyway. Sometimes Greg will hear us jamming on something and say 'I have some lyrics that we can use for that.', and creation of the song can start that way. Greg tends to modify the stucture of the songs until it's considered finished, but he has been known to change the song at any time until it's recorded.

Q: How many original songs do you play live?

A: Normally about 3, but that depends on how long we're playing. If we open for a large act (one 45 minute set), we will play all of our originals. If we play all night by ourselves, or have an opening act in front of us, we will play anywhere from 2-4 originals. The crowd has a lot to do with how many originals we play too.

Q: What are some of the covers that you play live?

A: That changes a lot.

Q: How old are you guys?

A: Jon is in his mid twenties. Doug is in his mid thirties. I'm in my mid thirties. Greg is in his early fourties. Jerry is in his early thirties.

Q: Do you have wives and/or kids?

A: Ok, I'm only talking about biologicaI children here. I have a wife and 2 children. Greg is divorced and has 3 children. Jerry is single and has a son. Jon has a wife but no children. Doug has a wife and has 2 children from a previous relationship.

Q: Do you guys have any other strong interests besides music and ET/paranormal?

A: I'm into computers, internet, programming, games, and technology. Jon is mechanically inclined. Doug is into arrow head collecting. Jerry likes to go camping and see his son on weekends. Greg just wants to have fun.

Q: The songs on Destination have double-tracked and background vocals that you would not expect in a live setting. How did these come about?

A: Greg is in charge of vocals and voicings. Greg also helps with double guitar parts by suggesting voicings. In the studio we have the attitude that it's not right to stifle any member of the bands creative ability. We feel that the end result is much more sincere than with a single member dictating what's done as a band. The band is based more on majority vote rules.

Q: Were the songs written with the studio in mind? Did they take on a new dimension when you had a studio at your disposal?

A: The songs weren't specifically marked as written for the studio. It's hard to plan that far in advance to know that a particular song will be on the CD. We have played some of the songs for a year working things out. So, the songs we actually simplified in the studio. Almost all the lead guitar solos on the CD were done on the spot. It's more natural that way.

Q: How does the way you play them live differ from the way they sound on the CD?

A: When we play them live, they tend to have a harder edge to them. We've been told that the CD doesn't compare to us live, which is the way it should be. How many one-hit wonders fail to go on in their careers because they don't perform well live? Probably quite a few.