Dude, what’s up? I’ve got an exciting episode for you is awesome. I’ve been waiting to do this interview for a long time, honestly, and today I have my friend on, josh tate from the band helitosis.
0:00:35 – Speaker 2
Josh, thanks for coming on today thank you so much for having me.
0:00:38 – Speaker 1
I appreciate it, john hey, it’s my pleasure and it’s. It is pronounced helitosis right, it’s like the. Is that like the? It’s not a gum disease, right, it’s like a right it’s like really, really bad breath.
Yeah, yeah, which is dude. Honestly, that’s a really cool name. It’s almost like in my opinion, it’s more it’s almost like a death metal name, like carcass, like kind of thing. You know what I’m saying? Nice, that’s’s. Where did you get that? Like what? Like how did you come up with that? Like it’s like really bad breath, like you’re just like raunchy sounding kind of band or whatever. Is that kind of the idea behind it?
0:01:14 – Speaker 2
yeah, I mean, I think so partially. It’s tongue in cheek because you know like we’re very silly natured in the band and I think that a lot of our topic matter is dark, so it kind of is tongue in cheek when it comes to, you know, that old style like typo negative, where they’re kind of you know it’s almost picking on metal like we’re so badass. But at the same time we’re named after a, you know, like you said, a gum disease.
It’s you know halitosis but it’s halitosis, sort of that element of like do it. And when I was I was leaving an old band of mine called the leftovers. That band was coming to an end and I was trying to come up with a new name and this name, helitosis, just out of nowhere, struck me and I was like that is the stupidest fucking name, excuse my french no problem and I’m like that that name is horrible, like I hate it.
But I also knew that it was like the name and I like I looked I hate it, but I also knew that it was like the name and I like I looked it up there’s nobody else running with that and it was just like I knew it was it.
0:02:11 – Speaker 1
I hear you, I’ve never Well, before we dive too deep into that, like so, how did you even first kind of get involved in music or like, or like guitar, like? How are we even drawn to that as an instrument, or music as like an expression for your kind of creative outlet?
0:02:28 – Speaker 2
I mean, I really as a young person, latched on to music in a way that I remember. A friend when I was in second grade was like you know, you’re more into music than anybody else our age and but I, you know, and I was in and out of bands in my younger years. In fact, you and I were at a show god in putnam back in the day in oh yeah, it was like 94 or 5 or something like that and I remember, like there’s all these bands locally playing and I wasn’t in one at the time and I was, you know.
I was like oh, this is so great, I wish I was, you know, in a band that was playing out. But I didn’t actually end up playing in a band, that kind of went out there and did anything until I was like 27 when I moved oh, no, kidding, yeah, and um, and I was singing in that band. That was the leftovers and it was punk. It was punk, you know.
0:03:12 – Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah.
0:03:13 – Speaker 2
Yeah and um, when I was kind of at a point with that band where I just didn’t know where it was going, I decided that I wanted to write my own music and start playing guitar more to it, so that I could get a chance to write music that I wanted to write. That would give me an opportunity to kind of mess with my vocals more.
0:03:32 – Speaker 1
So so you didn’t play guitar until, like you’re 28, 27 or whatever.
0:03:36 – Speaker 2
I mean I played it, but I messed around. I didn’t take it seriously until that age. Now interesting.
0:03:42 – Speaker 1
That’s really interesting. So that’s like a crazy late bloomer, if you think of someone kind of. I mean I mean you said you picked it up, it’s not like, but still like you actually like started you know sort of pursuing it. It sounded like in your late 20s so that’s kind of that’s interesting. That’s really cool because I I imagine you were playing, you know guitar. I just assumed you were playing kind of guitar when I was you know back when you’re teenagers or whatever not really like.
0:04:08 – Speaker 2
I had one and I messed around with it, but it was never anything like I didn’t. I didn’t write any songs you would write songs till.
0:04:13 – Speaker 1
I was probably like 25 you would have called yourself more of just a singer, then yeah, for sure yeah I see okay. So the one thing that I love that you do and and I sort of hope you do this with all of your releases, but that’s a ton of pressure. But you have the most interesting take on like album releases, because what you did is you tied a book along with like your album that you released. Like that’s freaking genius, like what made you come up with that idea.
0:04:45 – Speaker 2
So it was kind of the I wanted to do something outside of the regular band. I wanted to kind of come at things with a different marketing aspect and I wanted to also be able to follow my two passions of writing and making music at the same time. So it kind of hit me that like, if I write a book and I write an album and they go together, then when I go to play shows I can sell my book at shows, and that’s something that most authors can’t do. So, and it’s also it stems from the fact that, like I like to read and listen to music at the same time, I was like, well, I’m just going to do something that will give me that opportunity.
0:05:24 – Speaker 1
Actually, I like that you brought that up, because I don’t remember what podcast it was. You put a link to it. It might have been a year ago now or something, but I listened to it and you sort of went a little bit deeper on this topic and I’d like to maybe go a little bit deeper too. You were saying, growing up, you’re like, oh, I was reading this book but I’d be playing like appetite for destruction in the background and I was like, wow, that’s interesting. Like I never thought, like even I mean, you know I’m totally blind, so like that for me isn’t an option, like you know, trying to take you to, you know what I’m saying.
But I was trying to remember me as a kid when I could see. I was like, wow, that’s an interesting concept. Like because it really, it really is. I heard you saying like you know, it’s kind of like you know a movie where you have the you know the music going on in the background. I was like that’s a really interesting concept. And I think you said you would kind of read all kinds of books and listen to different albums with different books, right, yeah, and it’s, I think, in the beginning of the first book.
0:06:24 – Speaker 2
I have literally horrible that. I mentioned like how those songs are really tied to those narratives. Now, if I read like a Ray Bradbury song, then there’s like Fleetwood Mac or Cinderella will pop up. Yeah, and vice versa too. I’ll hear the song and I’ll think of those stories.
0:06:43 – Speaker 1
Right, I love that magic connection absolutely, absolutely so, like walk us through, kind of like your like your storyline and kind of like maybe some of the songs, whatever you want to like. Because again, I think this is like it’s really a genius way, because you’re kind of you’re hitting the fan on two different I don’t want to say wavelengths, but I you’re coming at them with like the book side of things of the book content, but then you’re coming at them with the music tapping like another part of the brain. It’s a really, like I said, it’s a really interesting way of kind of getting your content through to someone.
0:07:18 – Speaker 2
Thank, you I, yeah, that’s, that’s what I aim to do. I didn’t want to. Um, you know I I love being both a writer and in a band and writing music, so it’s, it was a nice way to to, like you said, double, double impact. I’ll actually hold up the the CD, just because I’m going to do a shameless plug for obsessing the trench mouth. And then the book is called Literally Horrible. They’re based off of a serial killer that believes they’re supposed to bring about the apocalypse. Um, so when you were I’m not sure you were asking you said to kind of walk.
0:07:55 – Speaker 1
Yeah, like well, like as a kid growing up, like I don’t know, I don’t know many people I mean, I’m sure I mean other people must kind of do that same thing, but I literally can’t think of anyone that’s spoken about like, oh yeah, I love, like listening to this while I’m reading a book. You, you figure, usually people just dive into the book and disappear. You know what I mean. They, they don’t think of bringing that other element along with them. You know, inside their mind.
0:08:34 – Speaker 2
So, right, yeah, I think I don’t know I like it might go back to like my dad was was, you know, right, yeah, and we had we called it a library, but it was just, you know there’s a bedroom that had been converted into a room where we could kind of, you know, all the books were in there and my dad’s you know old school stereo was in there and you know it was just like he’d sit in there and have a record on or have a CD on and be reading, and that’s kind of how it all came about. And then I think one of the things that hit me was, um and I mentioned this in the first chapter of that book that, um, when I was I was reading Moby Dick and like that was. You know that’s a seminal book, it’s this big, you know like.
0:09:18 – Speaker 1
Oh, I read Moby.
0:09:18 – Speaker 2
Dick or whatever. But I had um Mastodon’s Leviathan and I was going through a breakup with my wife and, you know, we were on our way to a divorce and it was just, you know, I threw myself into the book and I’m listening to this album that has a lot of the same overtones, you know, and it just really it was one of those things where I’m like this is what I love doing and like it affirmed that that’s what I wanted to do was to. You know, I was already on the path of writing this book and creating this album, but it made me go like okay, you know, I’m on the right path, because this is what I love and you can never go wrong if you’re doing what you love you know, I hear you, dude.
0:09:53 – Speaker 1
Yeah, especially if you have that itch inside you like because no, nobody else is gonna do what you want to do. You know what I mean. Like so if you don’t do it, no one else else is going to. Yeah, you know. And so then like with like literally horrible, how long did it take you Like, did you have like the whole story already thought out in your head, or did you just kind of have to work it through as you started writing it down? Kind of you know, or like, did you finish the book and then write the music, or were you writing the music? Like, how did all that work itself?
0:10:24 – Speaker 2
out. That’s a great question, john, honestly, and a fellow writer of mine recently asked me. He said are you an architect or are you an alchemist? I was like, oh that’s a good one.
Okay, right, so it’s like this book was definitely more of an alchemy. It took me a long time and it it really coincided with a lot of what I was going through on a very, um, personal basis of evolution. So I I had these, some songs kind of already affixed. Some had been hanging around for, you know, a decade or two and as I kind of went through it, I knew I wanted it to be roughly kind of about the serial killer, richard Ramirez. I didn’t know where it was going to go, I just knew that was going to be my topic and I had a friend that had passed away and I wanted something that was going to be kind of an ode to him at the same time. And I just started cobbling it together and the songs were kind of together no-transcript, but in the end it was definitely an alchemy thing.
And you know, it was kind of like. You know I’m like, oh, I wrote this chapter about this story, so now I got to write a song to fit it. You know, or I got to make this song that I kind of have already fit it and I knew what it was about. It’s basically almost like an autobiography. So I just wrote down all of my journal entries of five years and had already written a couple songs in the past that had gone. You know, like through this period of strife that I went through that you know, okay, I already have these and then I just had to write, you know, another, I don’t know five or six songs or whatever it was. So I’ve gone about it in both ways. But that first book and album are definitely alchemy. I, you know I had to hammer them into place.
0:12:30 – Speaker 1
That must have been a sense of relief when you finally finished that. Then you must have been just like you know, not that you have it hanging over your head, but I mean you just have a sense of completion at least, finally, when you know not that you have it hanging over your head, but yeah, I mean you just have a sense of completion at least, finally, when you know for 15 years I can’t imagine it was intense, like because there were so many points where I gave up.
0:12:52 – Speaker 2
You know I did, but then I go back to it and it really was a huge. You know, the day that we released um, the album and the book was my birthday and that was probably one of the greatest days of my life. In all honesty, I hear you so I’m glad you, I’m glad you. Can, you know, understand that?
0:13:10 – Speaker 1
yeah, no, dude, I couldn’t even that’s a long time, dude to have something kind of brewing inside of you, you know. So that, uh, that that show also shows just the uh, the tenacity of that. You’re just like I’m gonna, I’m gonna get it done, like it might take me 15 years, but you know, and honestly, like you know, part of the podcast too is to like I want people hearing your story to be like encouraged or whatever, so like that kind of leads into that a little bit. It’s like, you know, being a creator, like being a musician. It’s like, obviously, you know, you and I aren’t musicians because we want to be, you know, zillionaire, rocks, rock star. You know what I’m saying like obviously, that that that ship has gone and sailed right, but it’s like, but we still love this output, we still love, like the creation part of it and stuff like that. So, so it’s like you know to to be involved with with some I think you said it during this.
This interview is like if you love it, then it’s. You know, this passion here is then you just need to do it right, then it’s the right thing to do. So, like just get you know, and you started kind of later playing guitar again, which is an inspiration, knowing that because you know, even if you’re in your 40s, it’s not too late. You know, if you feel like you have songs or music you want to write, or like you know, the whole point isn’t to become rich or whatever. The point is to like create, you know Right. So, like we live in a we were kind of talking about this before the interview it’s like we live in a pretty crazy time where, like you know, instruments are cheap. I mean, if you can buy a computer, you got yourself a recording studio.
You know right and uh yeah, no, it’s, I mean this.
0:14:50 – Speaker 2
You know this is the time to, uh, you know to take chances or you know to, to put yourself out there, you know yeah, I think one of the things I always talk about that to me is a gift, I feel is is when you get older and you know I’m almost, I’m almost 50, I’m 48, um, you, you’re able to quantify life. You start to realize how much time you have left, that’s how quickly things go, and that is a gift, because it’s kind of like one of those okay time time to go get, get your shit together, like, what do you want to do? What are you going to do? What is this life about for you? And I think when you’re younger, you know I spent so many years going like, well, what do I want to be? What do I want to be, what do I want to be?
But the whole time I was being it, you know, I just realized you know like work a day job, something that you know you don’t hate, that you can kind of enjoy that you do well, that pays you enough to survive, and then live the rest of your time as as if you know you don’t get anything done at all, that you want to do, that you love to do.
0:16:08 – Speaker 1
Then the true regret sits upon your chest that’s a good way of putting that, for sure, absolutely like. Would you have any suggestions to like anyone listening it’s like I don’t want to use the word scared, it’s not the right word but like, I guess, nervous to start playing guitar or whatever it is, piano, or even singing whatever it is like. Would you have any kind of you know suggestions for something you know to just kind of get started, you know, other than just do it?
0:16:34 – Speaker 2
Yeah, I mean, I think, one to remember always that failure is important to the process, because if you don’t fail, you don’t know what. What you did wrong you don’t know, you know what you did right, and usually a failure is there’s a mixture of those two things. And also, I’d say, the other thing is that you mentioned, I think before we started, that you know, like I have a sound that I try to make a little bit different, but it I I can’t say that I try to make it different. I couldn’t make it different if I wanted to. I wish I sounded like gojira, you know, like no, no, you know what I’m glad you brought.
0:17:14 – Speaker 1
I’m glad that we found a way to bring this, because I did want to bring this up, like like I was. I was telling you before it was, before the interview. I was saying you know, josh, what I love about you is like with your guitar playing, and it’s funny knowing now like you’re, even though you’re a guitarist, you’re really a singer first. So it’s it’s really, you know, I mean not funny in this, but it’s just funny you knowing that. And so, like I could hear you know 50 different riffs, but in in those 50 there, there could be a Josh Tate riff and I’d be able to pick it out the second I heard it. Because you just have your own style, your own way of interpreting these notes that we’ve been given and you’re not afraid to just do what is inside of you. I think that’s what it is. I think that’s what I’m a little envious about. I guess, maybe, or that inspires me is, whatever you got in you, you just pull, you just pull it out, and you’re not, you’re not, you don’t apologize about it.
0:18:12 – Speaker 2
I appreciate that and you know it means a lot, especially I consider you a very good guitar, so it means a lot coming from you. And I think that speaks to the point of like what I would tell somebody is like I don’t know how to do anything different. It’s not, you know, like when I’m writing a riff I might go like well, what’s weird, you know, I might like kind of ask myself a question like that, but I’m not.
0:18:34 – Speaker 1
I’m not like I’m not purposely like I’m gonna fuck with this chord progression. You know what I mean. Like yeah, you’re not purposely like I’m going to fuck with this chord progression. You know what I mean. Like you’re not purposely like mindfully doing it. It’s just what you produce. Like that’s what I mean. Like you’re comfortable and unapologetic with what you do, right. And that’s important.
0:18:55 – Speaker 2
Yeah, they people need to not worry about failing. They need to worry about, like, making something that they’re happy with.
0:19:03 – Speaker 1
Absolutely Like if you’re sitting there writing a riff being like, oh man, that doesn’t sound like Kojira. Well, good Cause, you know we already got one and we don’t need. You know what I mean, like. So like it’s like, yeah, don’t, don’t worry about it, you don’t sound like them. You don’t sound like them. You don’t sound like whatever good, we don’t want that. We want you know you.
And I guess that part of that then is like you know, if we’re giving people advice or whatever it’s like I guess it kind of is just do it, because you know, if you the thing about music, it’s that universal language. Honestly, like we could, you could write a riff that someone in japan hears and they’re just gonna start jumping up and down and moshing in their bedroom when they hear one of your songs. Right, it’s this universal language that speaks to people. So, like, if you’ve got this thing tied up inside of you, regardless of if it’s music or not, it could be painting or whatever, but whatever, it is the person that you know and the creative thing that’s inside someone. Once you, you produce that, you’re going to connect with someone, someone. It’s good to speak to somebody else out there, Right? So like I think that’s the thing that should encourage people. Is someone out there is going to like it? You’re going to speak to other people.
0:20:13 – Speaker 2
Most definitely, most definitely. I don’t think I don’t think there’s anything wrong with with that idea. Either I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that idea, either it’s.
0:20:38 – Speaker 1
You know, no matter how weird or twisted or, you know, overly emotional. Whatever your statement is, it will connect with somebody else, because we’re all humans and there’s always some fucking weirdo that has the same feelings as you. Right’s always gonna get the joke. Yeah, no, totally like, absolutely like. Yeah, I, I man, I just lost a question. I was gonna ask too uh, oh, do you know what like the stats are for like your listenership like? Do you have like? Do you know what like countries people have like listen your listenership Like? Do you have like? Do you know what like countries people have like listened to your stuff in Like? Is that is that cool to see? Like for like your stats on like Spotify or whatever?
0:21:08 – Speaker 2
Yeah, I posted, I think, something on Facebook recently because I was like, oh, we got like a listener and I can’t even remember the name of the Like the country or whatever. It was in India, but it was like hot. It started with an h, it was like half a sauce or something oh, okay, okay.
0:21:24 – Speaker 1
Oh. So it even points down to like kind of the cities and stuff.
0:21:28 – Speaker 2
Yeah, oh, wow, I didn’t realize that you can tell, like, where your listeners are by city, and I’m, you know, I mean I guess I’m sure there’s some places that aren’t necessarily cities or you know, I don’t know. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, it’s pretty cool and I, you know there’s we get a lot of europe. I think europe is, you know, more of an area that is accepting, because I think, if you, if you make steadway, you know, in a place like india or um, in a muslim-centered country, there’s such a smaller listenership, but I mean, if you get that, like you said, into their ears, that’s a huge, that’s huge.
0:22:10 – Speaker 1
Just in general On Spotify. Do they know that there’s an accompanying kind of book along with the album? Is that like? Are you able to express that on Spotifyify in any way?
0:22:22 – Speaker 2
I think in the bio there might be something like um, because setting it all up was was hard and like, I’m continually trying to find a almost like a publisher that will do both, because right now I can only, you know, use like cd baby to put things on streaming platforms and then book baby. That will, oh right, and I’ve tried to talk to them both and be like hey, can you guys collaborate, can we do something? But they’re not, yeah, they’re like no not.
Yeah, they’re like that’s not my lane, right yeah but I think, you know, usually you can put like some kind of a bio up and I, you know, I always try to mention it in that like, hey, you know this, this is supposed to be perceived as a, you know, a double, not a double entendre, but you know, yeah, yeah yeah um, so, with the like, how Like is it a song per chapter?
0:23:22 – Speaker 1
Like, did you work it out? So like, if you listen to the whole album, like you would read the book. Is that like how it is tried to be lined up as bolded? Um, so all of the lyrics are from the chapters and, um, oh, that’s cool. So in the book, the lyrics of the songs are bolded within the chapter.
0:23:50 – Speaker 2
That’s freaking cool yeah, and there’s like I put little samples of the book in the album too. That’s cool too some of the songs have like reading from the chapter and so in the those are bolded with italicism. Oh, wow, and you know, I know that you don’t have access to the book in a visual sense, but I do have a really crappy audio book version that I recorded for a couple friends that I would love to send over to you if you’re interested. Oh yeah, dude, Totally, Absolutely.
0:24:20 – Speaker 1
Just me reading away with a couple of uh, yeah, no, absolutely I would love to listen to it. 100. Like I said, I the the idea of releasing things this way is genius and I honestly think, uh, other bands 100 could like adopt this idea. I think it would be genius. You know what I mean. Like, have you ever heard of the band exhumed? Oh, yeah, I’ve heard of them. I’m not dude. Yeah, I freaking.
They’re afraid they’re playing a show. It’s something I can’t go to it, but, um, they, they would. I could see them releasing like a comic book alongside of one of their albums because they kind of like some of their stage show they’ll have like chainsaws on stage and like they have. They have this guy that he’s they call, he’s in the band but he’s like his name’s like dr filth and like, and he like brings some shots up on stage and like they like will cut people and get blood all over. You know what I mean. Like they kind of you know it’s gory stuff like that, but like so that I could totally see them with like a comic book or something like that they release them with their album or you know something like that, like I could you know again, other bands kind of doing that like I don’t know.
I think it’s just. It’s a really cool idea, especially for the people. You know, the fans that love like the, uh, the tangible stuff. You, you know the one, the people that want to buy like the CD, or they want the book in their hand. You know, like, your stuff is like perfect for that.
0:25:48 – Speaker 2
I think Kirk Hemet actually started a. He did a book and an album together. Oh really yeah, Cause I know he did.
0:25:56 – Speaker 1
I know he did like the I forget what he calls like the track, like a soundtrack of my life, kind of thing like that, like a completely instrumental album. I know he released that like six months ago or something like that.
0:26:10 – Speaker 2
I think he released, because I remember like when I, soon after I released mine or right around that time, he did the same thing and I was like man, you’re biting me yeah right, it’s like damn it.
0:26:24 – Speaker 1
I did it first.
0:26:25 – Speaker 2
Yeah, right, dude, yeah you know, well, it’s funny. We used to cover, um uh, the song the, the pina colada song, it’s called escape by. Oh yeah, he’s actually. He wrote a book and an album that went together and you had to listen to the album to find the clues to solve the mystery in the book. Dude, that is cool, isn’t that?
0:26:45 – Speaker 1
that’s brilliant, right that’s a cool idea too. I mean, you know, it’s even like, even like I feel like there’s another story, like another book, like maybe 10 years ago or so, but they like created a website and, like you, had to like read the book and interact with the website and even like kind of like interact with the internet. They would kind of like utilize other websites, sort of unknowingly, you know, you know, with the book. It was really fascinating what they did. Yeah, yeah, no, it was really now what we were talking earlier. You said you said you’re gonna have a show, uh, coming up, like it was going to be only streaming on YouTube, though. Is that right? Like people couldn’t actually physically go to it, can they if they’re in the area?
0:27:27 – Speaker 2
Yeah, I think, I think it’s it’s at the Salem Like it’s in Salem there’s a like a TV studio that they they run this show out of New Hampshire, massachusetts, okay, and it it’s um, it’s ken mcintyre is the one that runs it. He’s, uh, that name’s familiar, yeah, sleaze grinder. He goes by. He’s a music he writes for, I think, metal hammer magazine and he’s always had like a running show and it’s changed names. It’s done a you know a couple different iterations, but you know one was heavy leather, topless dance party or something, and now he’s doing this heavy, heavy leather metal show and he had this, um, I think he’s on his fourth or fifth episode, so we’re supposed to be on there in august. Okay, super excited because it’s know we’ve done a couple of music videos or something. But you know this is a kind of a new, a new medium for us, so I’m excited for that yeah no, totally, I’ll put a.
0:28:32 – Speaker 1
I’ll put a link to that in the show notes If you do have one or whatever, or you know, but I’ll update it at some point, so that way people also link to you on spotify and all that stuff, of course too. But, um, as a, I totally forgot to ask you this too, though, as a guitar player, like, what do you have for a guitar? Like, do you have any favorite guitars? You have a guitar you wish you had anything like that.
0:28:54 – Speaker 2
uh, my favorite is the one I play like probably 90% of the time. Uh, her name is tawny, she, she’s a Dean flying V, oh perfect. I drilled a hole in it and put my pentagram belt buckle in there and I just that like $300 cheap guitar, but just has always been kind of like my favorite and I have a Warlock BC. Rich just bought a Gretsch, a rat rod, gretsch, oh wow.
Last year that the next, next album is going to be written on that and see, I have like a cheap SG, I would love like a really nice SG, and then I want to get one of those soon actually. Oh, are you? Yeah, yeah, so nice.
0:29:38 – Speaker 1
Just the style is so quintessential rock music, metal music, oh, and it’s like Frank Zappa’s favorite guitar, so I have to get one. Ah, yeah, yeah, he’s by far my favorite guitarist slash musician he’s awesome. Yeah, no, totally Absolutely. Do you have any like guitars that got away? Do you have any like that you traded or sold?
0:30:05 – Speaker 2
And you’re like that got away, do you like? Do you have any like that? You traded or sold like, why did I do that? That’s a great question. Um, I did have an like my, my second guitar, when I was really young, my grandmother bought me like an ibanez x series way more than I really knew what to do with. I just kept doing like dives on it. That was a great guitar but I pawned it for rent when I was older, you know I was like I hear you, yeah, yeah, I hear you.
0:30:23 – Speaker 1
Man, I got a few guitars like that where it’s like man, why did I sell that? It’s like I should have just lived on the street. I could have like used my case as a pillow or something.
0:30:34 – Speaker 2
Yeah, I’ll sell feet pics, I don’t care, I gotta throw this out there just because he’s my buddy, because he does these great things. But when it comes to guitars, I have a CRC being built right now. It’s a friend of mine, corey Reynolds, and he makes these his own custom guitars from scratch. I mean, he doesn’t make the pickups, but you know all the hardware he buys. But as far as like the, the bodies and everything it’s it’s from scratch, is like the, the bodies and everything it’s it’s from scratch, he does it basically out of his basement and, um, he, he does these beautiful, beautiful pieces. And he recently was like you know, when are we going to do it? When are we going to do it? And I was like, all right, pull the trigger. So he’s going to make a v, he’s nice.
0:31:15 – Speaker 1
So that’s what, well, I’m gonna have to have him on then too. Then, uh, I’d love to talk to him about baking guitars. That’s awesome.
0:31:23 – Speaker 2
Yeah, he’s awesome. He’s such a great dude too, like one of the funniest guys I know and just genuine human being.
0:31:29 – Speaker 1
Those are my by far my favorite guitars are Flying Vs too. I have two actually left-handed Dave Mustaine Deans. So I totally am right there with you on the left hand on the Flying V Deans. Right, they’re just. The action is great. Oh yeah, no, absolutely, that’s one of the ones I miss. I had a BC Rich flying V. It looks exactly like the Deans, it’s just a BC Rich one. But, oh my God, I miss that one too. But yeah, so like a few guitars got away. Yeah, yeah, what do you?
0:32:02 – Speaker 2
use for like an amp and stuff. Uh, I have a marshall. Uh, jcm, it’s a 50 watt, which is is kind of funny because I always thought it was 100 watt, and then, like finally a tube blew on it and I was like, oh you’re like oh, it’s not working at all so, um, I use that with, like, I actually have a cabinet of of 10 inch, uh, the marshall cab.
That’s cool, um, which I guess you know, for, like stage volume. It kind of works better for pa people, I think, because I can kind of push it, but it’s not quite as loud right, yeah, you can.
0:32:36 – Speaker 1
You can crank it up a little bit to get those tubes going.
0:32:39 – Speaker 2
Right, yeah, I mean, I’m definitely, you know, not a rich person and I have always kind of just kind of I play what I get, you know, I hear you.
0:32:49 – Speaker 1
Well, it also kind of shapes your sound. You know what I mean. Like you know, your equipment and stuff molds and shapes your sound too.
0:32:56 – Speaker 2
Yeah, yeah, and you know, just to throw out, like some, since we’re kind of talking about um sound and like with recording, um, one of the things that I like to do when we’re recording is I put a shit ton of microphones on the amps, on the speakers, because as long as you’re not phasing and you make sure your distance of your microphone from your amp is the same, then you can, you know, use these different microphones to get different kinds of tones.
Oh no, totally. That album was mixed by a friend of ours uh, weird beard but you know the the capture was all done in-house, at our own. We have a little studio and, um, that was one of the things is when I brought it to him, like, you know, maybe you could use one of these mics if they’re all trapped, and he, you know, and he played, you know what. We brought him all together and he’s like are you kidding me? This sounds huge. And I right, there was like, oh well, that’s the key for me. You know, microphone the heck out of it, cause you get all the tones you get.
0:33:53 – Speaker 1
Yeah, no, totally Totally. I know there’s other guys now, like you know that I lean a little more towards the digital and modeling stuff. But there’s guys now that are like have to completely, not completely different guitar tones, but they’ll kind of they won’t make each of them be the perfect sound, but they set it up in a way where they each complement each other and it just makes the tone way bigger, right, right. So they just do interesting stuff. Interesting stuff that way, you know that’s it yeah, I know I can’t.
I’m getting the itch to start recording myself, so hopefully that’ll happen sooner than later, so right now. I think you said you were working on another book and album. Then right, yep yes, so how, like how? Where are you at with that like when you, when do you think you could possibly be done?
0:34:43 – Speaker 2
um, I mean, I would love to be done by the end of this year, but I’m not sure it takes a while, to kind of put everything, I believe it yeah, um, the album is probably 80 percent recorded.
I need to still do like a second layer of guitars and vocals, which won’t take me too long if I can just, you know, sit down and kind of get it done. But I I try to pace things because I don’t want that to be done like six months or a year before the book is, because then it’s just sitting there and that kind of torment.
0:35:12 – Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I get that.
0:35:16 – Speaker 2
Cause, then you’re like man, I got this music that I can’t release because I gotta get this book done right, right it’s, it’s kind of it can be a huge tease, so, but the book is probably I don’t know maybe 50 there oh, is that why I saw you on facebook?
0:35:31 – Speaker 1
I think you saw a post recently. You’re like I wrote whatever, like thousands of like words or whatever I’m like. Oh, I can’t do that it’s not easy.
0:35:41 – Speaker 2
But you know, the main thing is finding the time. I actually took off like two days from work this week, so that’s no kidding, or straight days of just writing, so that was cool. It was really nice to kind of bang some stuff out.
0:35:52 – Speaker 1
I guess that puts pressure on you too, like, oh man, I’m taking off work to do this, I better get some shit done right, yeah, buckle down mofo exactly that’s cool. Well, josh, is there anything else you want to like? Go over anything I didn’t cover or anything you want to touch on, or no, I appreciate you taking the time today to talk to me.
0:36:13 – Speaker 2
Like you know, it does take a lot of work to do this and it’s a joy when anybody shows interest, because you know crickets is probably the worst thing for musicians. No, totally.
0:36:25 – Speaker 1
Well, like I said, I wanted to have you on too because I just I love your approach and I want the point of the interview is to encourage other people, like it’s an interesting idea. Maybe you’re listening. You have some idea that you know like, ah, people wouldn’t think that’s cool, but I’m telling you you got to just do it, like Nike. I guess you know I kind of hate saying that, but you know, like like Josh was saying, you got, if you love it, you got to do it, and then you know you just got to keep following it.
0:36:50 – Speaker 2
I think that’s one of the most fascinating things about humans is, you know, we’re these curious kind of you know curious monkeys. In a way, george is like we’re always pushing the envelope and you know, sometimes it’s dangerous, you know whether you’re making an atom bomb or you know, yeah, becoming transgendered and I don’t mean that in any sort of.
you know they’re not correlated at all, but in general, like I think that that’s the human mind, is that we always want to, like, look further, climb higher. You know, that’s that’s who we are and that’s why we’ve survived as a species, because we adapt to new situations and and that’s beautiful. You know, like, we may not be here forever, but you know, while we’re here, I think it’s that whole. You know, explore as much as you can and don’t be afraid of failure.
0:37:36 – Speaker 1
Yeah, there was this saying that I saw recently and I was like man, I have to memorize that and I didn’t. I’m going to butcher it, but the punchline I do remember it. It’s kind of saying, like you know, oh, this is good, this is great, but art is for eternity. Yes, you know, like you’re like, once you want you know, once Josh is gone, this Helitosis book and albums that you released are going to be here forever.
Mm hmm, you know, and so that that’s the interesting thing about it all. Heck, yeah, man, you know so well. Josh dude, thanks for coming on. I really appreciate it. I had a great time with you coming on. When the when the album comes out, I’ll have you back on and we can. You for listening. Thank you for downloading and don’t forget to embrace your storm.