Line Up:
Brian "Messiah" Langley - Vocals
Vinnie Lee Borden - Bass, Backing Vocals
Marco Banco - Guitars
Tom Lewko - Guitars
Matt Blood - Drums
With us today Tyrants Blood's vocalist Brian Langley, welcome on Aristocrazia Webzine, how are you? Good thanks.
Let's start with a short presentation of your band.
You release your second album "Crushing Onward Into Oblivion", which are the main differences with the previous release?
Crushing is the first album that I have been involved in. So when you change singers the sound of the the band is going to shift slightly. The song writting is more
complex, we are pushing ourselves even further as musicians. It's exciting to be pushing the boundaries of our own limitations. The production of this album is better than the last one.
It's the next step up the ladder.
I noticed the epic influnce flowing primarily in "Slaine: The Berzerker"."Deciever" and "Torn From The Sky" are for me the highlights of the disc.
Are you fully satisfied of your work?
We wouldn't put a song on our album if we weren't proud of it. We are very particular when it comes to the details of our songs.We take the time to make sure the songs are the best that we can create before we record them.
How do you write a song? Can you tell us something about the lyrics of your songs?
We have a couple of writting methods, Sometimes, Vince or Marco will come in to rehersal with an entire song mapped out for us. Other times, Matt will play a drum beat and the rest of us will try to write something to it. Then we'll move to the next section and Matt will have another idea that he'll pound out on the drum kit for us. For this album (COIO) The songs really just seemed to write themselves. The lyrics are mainly written by Marco and myself. For some songs Vince will tell me what he wants a song to be about, then I go read up on whatever his lyric theme was and start woodshedding away to get them finished.
How did you get in touch with Tyrants Blood?
The band is from my hometown, Marco had seen me perform with my other bands (Mecha Messiah and Infernal Majesty) and liked what he saw. A few years after seeing me later, things weren't working out with Tyrants Blood's singer at the time and I wasn't particularly happy with Infernal Majesty. I sort of knew Vince and Tom as well and word had gotten around that they were looking for a vocalist, so I called up Marco and told him I'd be leaving Infernal Majesty andthat I was interested. So we set up a try out for the following week and I nailed it. They've been stuck with me ever since!
The Canadian scene is among the most prosperous and consistent in quality. Do you have some bands to reccomend to our readers? Which are the bands you would like to have
beside you on an hypothetical ideal evening show?
War Command and Thy Flesh Consumed from Eastern Canada, Deadriver Wasteland, The Golers and Sinned from Vancouver are worth checking out too.
What do you think about the today extreme metal scene?
It's good but it could always be larger. Europe and South America are far superior in terms of metal scenes. The numbers are so much larger in those places.
What is your musical background and generally what do you listen when you are at home?
I started playing guitar when I was 7 years old. I'm a classically trained guitarist. I actually teach guitar lessons when life slows down enough to allow it. I've had no formal training for singing.
Any training that I might have had would have been from singing along to my favorite albums growing up.
Which are the three core band you listen to? And why this choice?
Death, Cannibal Corpse and Carcass. Chuck Schuldiner was such a good songwriter, I'm easily inspired from listening to his work with Death and Control Denied. Cannibal Corpse are like the AC/DC of death metal, you can't really go wrong with them. Carcass, is another band that easily inspires me.
What can you tell us about your life outside "Tyrants Blood"?
I have a day job, just like everyone else in the band. We work hard during the day and go work harder at band practice later that night. With Mecha Messiah and Infernal Majesty on the go I usually work and practice 5-6 days a week. Sometimes it gets to be a little too much and when that happens I take off up into the BC interior into the backwoods to my family's cabin/vacation spot. Shut the phone off for a week and go fishing.
How did you come in contact with Invictus and how is the actual relationship with the label?
Marco was shopping around for a label as our contract had run it's course with Morbid Moon and had heard some good things about Invictus so we got in contact with them and a deal was struck. There's been some techniqual issues causing delays to the album coming out but aside from that. Invictus has held up there end of the contract so we are happy. You can't really ask much more than that out of a label.
In a world of fast communication, how do you relate with such channels as MySpace, Facebook and social networking in general?
I'm constantly on the computer. Doing interviews and other promotional work. It's very time consuming.
How is your relationship with your fans?
It's great. We do our best to make sure that we are accessible to the fans. When we are playing shows we don't hide backstage before we go on. We all walk around in the venue and talk to the fans all the time. They enjoy it and so do we.
Would we ever see you live in Italy?
We were talking about doing something with Nefas, We just got back from a short tour of Brazil. So it is definately possible and I have heard so many good things about Italy's Metal scene. It is a place of interest for the band to play though for sure.
Thanks for the time you spent with us, the last message for our readers is up to you:
Keep supporting the globalization of metal. If you are interested in booking Tyrants Blood in your city, you can get directly in contact with band at www.myspace.com/tyrantsblood.
