Bury Your Dead Interview

Interview
Rich Casey
Bury Your Dead

Lineup:
Rich Casey – Bass
Mat Bruso – Vocals
Slim B. – Guitar
Mark Castillo – Drums
Eric Ellis – Guitar

ANOTHER TOUR FOR THE HOPELESS
Walls of Jericho

BURY YOUR DEAD

Premonitions Of War
2/26/05
Knights of Columbus VFW Hall
Interviewer: Karma E. Omowale

“I just want to go up to every kid at every show, line the kids up, and thank them personally... If I could do that every night, I would!”

Sexy, debonair, smart, aggressive, cool, fiery, fast paced, hard-hitting, clever, energetic, and well dressed are just some adjectives one could use when put to the test of describing Bury Your Dead. These Connecticut based lads have lain the groundwork for bridging fashion and hardcore together. Better known for the sharply tailored Zoot suits they handsomely brandish as opposed to bandaged latent zombies, an image your mind could quickly deduce from their name alone. However, beauty's only surface deep here folks! This group of young men appreciates the immense support they receive from every one of their fans, something you rarely hear these days! BYD are as passionate about their fans as they are fervent about their music.

Join in my conversation with Rich Casey, bassist for the hardcore fashionistas, Bury Your Dead as he talks about the things that bring joy to his existence: his fans, being on Ozzfest 2005, his career, the band's connection with Sevendust and much more. Prepare for the unexpected…

Karma: I am sure you must be sick of answering these questions about background info and the Tom Cruise references…

Karma: I have to ask some however; I will attempt to make this as painless as possible and promise to mix it up for you some.

Karma: You guys have a rather impressive band for one that started out as a joke!

Rich: Slim B. (a.k.a. Brendan MacDonald) & Mark were in Harmartia, myself at the time I was doing a band called Pictures Of Gabriel. We were all in bands even earlier than that, that’s how we met. I actually moved to Boston and stopped playing music for a bit to pursue a job basically. Then all of all of a sudden I kept hearing this name, [says in a gruff voice] “Bury Your Dead!” “Bury Your Dead!” I’m like, “Who’s in it?” They’re like, “Mark & Slim B. from Harmartia started it”.

Harmartia is coming from a technical background, as did all of our other bands. Then I’m like, “Well what’s it all about?” “They’re like why don’t you come down to Rhode Island and find out!” I show up in RI, I get up there, and these dudes are just serious, aggressive as possible on stage, doing mosh calls and stirring up the crowd. It was real heavy, in your face aggressive and basically after that they decided to ask me to come aboard to handle the business aspect of things and not have the band be a joke basically. First, I was like, “I don’t know because I’m doing this” [as in his daytime gig] “I’ll fill in for a bit and you can find somebody permanent” It just rolled ahead from there, I moved back to Connecticut and I opened a merch company, that’s how we did a lot of things on our own like print out merch and tour and things like that.

Rich: It's great because we are able to mosh and get our aggressions out that way!

Karma: How has Another Tour for the Hopeless [with Walls of Jericho] gone so far considering tonight wraps this leg up you?

Rich: The tour for us has been AMAZING! The support from the kids, it’s on a whole different level now. We’ve worked as a band to get where we are on our own; now that we have Victory working right there with us it’s making a lot things happen. Things we have wanted for the longest time as a band and touring fulltime, things that we needed to have in order to keep doing this.

The tour as far as draw like everywhere has been amazing. The markets that we’ve done well in we didn’t expect to do as well in we did. Oh, it’s been great! [voice heightens with excitement] I can't, I can’t put it into words.

Rich: [laughs] There’s no word to describe! [pauses] I just want to go up to every kid at every show, line the kids up and thank them personally! You know what I mean.

Rich: If I could do that every night, I would. With out them…I mean, I don’t think the kids and the promoters…some don’t realize that they are making this possible for us. It’s like a feeling that you can’t put into words.

Karma: It is so refreshing to hear an artist say this! To have that much passion for your fans is wonderful!

Rich: Well, I'm not the kind of person to say stuff that I don’t mean. I can truly say that and as I speak for the five of us that’s something we wish we could do as a band.

Rich: Kids coming up to us, and writing us emails. I personally get all of our emails. I don’t have someone answer them for me. It’s something I do on my own. I don’t care how many there are. It may take time to do it, but I do it. Kids writing us and kids coming up to us after the show, really just tells us that our band has changed a lot of things for them in a positive way. It just basically started to happen, at first it was an uncomfortable thing because you don’t expect it.

Rich: But after they go in to depth about how and why that’s an amazing thing and that’s happened to all of us on this tour. Take Mark [Castillo] for example, he's our drummer like someone coming to him and saying, "Hey man, you inspired me to play drums" or "I played before but I don't play as much because I get discouraged". Then someone will say, "I got your new record and Between The Buried And Me" because you know he played on that record too…

Rich: ...and then now, all of a sudden the kid is playing drums better than before. I mean, it's happened to me. Last night, actually, a kid came up to me and said that he had just started playing bass (it had been a year) and he asked me questions on how to string it. It's just awesome to have kids do that it’s a great feeling.

Karma: That is awesome indeed! So what’s in store for the BYD fan now that the tour’s up?

Rich: Well we’re taking all of March off, April we start a tour with The Red Chord, A Life Once Lost, and If Hope Dies. It’s 8 weeks long but we’re only going to do 6 of the 8. It will be 6 weeks on then we…

Rich: Yeah, that’s here in the States then we get home and have to prepare for Ozzfest.

Rich: Yeah, we actually just got the word yesterday! [hearing the excitement in his voice] That’s a whole ‘nother level of excitement there!

Karma: You went from being on Century Media with You Had Me At Hello; you disbanded then rose from the ashes with your new release, Cover Your Tracks on Chicago’s Victory Records. How did that all come about?

Rich: As far as Century Media, I never recall them having anything on the table, it was Metal Blade.

Rich: To me, personally, it’s not only a household label, you know what I mean? You know the logo and you know all of the bands on Victory, I don’t care who you are!

Rich: And it’s like when I first got in to hardcore, I was listening to Victory bands. I said to myself, “Wow! It would be cool to have the bulldog one day on the back of my CD!” [laughs]

Rich: [laughs] Yeah, yeah! I mean I take Tony [Brummel], and put him into a separate category compared to everybody because I see how he started it and how far he’s come. That shows me that his work ethic has been there for the whole run of the label. Since I dropped a salaried job with full benefits, 401(k) and everything, to really pursue music again. I mean it’s like my work ethic is what obviously sparked interest from Metal Blade and Victory and get on tours and tour as much as we do. Our work ethic as a band has been solid and still its like we work just as hard as we did before we had Victory backing us; that’s why I look at it [going with Victory] as a good decision, you know!

Karma: Understood, I can completely understand. Not unless you live under a rock, would you not know all of the song titles off Cover Your Tracks are the titles to Tom Cruise movies…

Karma: There are so many other movie titles done by Cruise you could have chosen, how did you come to use the songs titles chosen for the album?

Rich: We were into movies that we felt Tom Cruise played a strong…I mean don’t get me wrong, I think Tom Cruise is an amazing actor, he’s like an American sex icon!

Rich: We hoped that people would catch on to it and us saying, “Hey! We’re not going any where! And as long as you’re supporting us, we’re gonna be here!” And as far as choosing titles, it was just chosen at random.

Karma: As far as the cover art for Cover Your Tracks, what do you want the buyer to walk away with after viewing it?

Rich: Power, because of what we’re wearing and the suit, the tuxes, it’s got a very… Reservoir Dog-esque like feel… [all of sudden his cell phone breaks up due to incessant background noise, honking horns] Can you understand any of this? [laughs]

Rich: They are being fucking idiots right now! [we both laugh] Power and money! Reservoir Dog style, we get the job done! You know!!

Karma: I love that!! Well as a band, do you tend to write song titles before lyrics are written?

Karma: Do you know whether Tom Cruise has caught wind that your records are dedicated to his works? Not to mention the title, You Had Me At Hello, being yet another reference?

Rich: No, no wind of it, but we do hope. I’ll make sure a copy of the record gets to him!

Rich: We are! We definitely went into the situation pretty excited about and we’re pretty excited about the way it came out. We look forward to everything to come basically!

Karma: Awesome! Tell me how your songwriting how has it changed from You Had Me At Hello to Cover Your Tracks… do you think you will get heavier as it is a natural progression especially from You Had Me At Hello to CYT and beyond?

Rich: It’s matured a lot, some people say too soon. Some people say that there should have been a record in between You Had Me At Hello and Cover Your Tracks but we beg to differ! I mean we didn’t stick to any set formula, we just wrote. We just wrote Cover Your Tracks and it was just…what came out. We didn’t say, didn’t be like, “This is the breakdown, the best part…” We’re like, “Whatever!” Some people think that’s what we do but…

Karma: I guess I never understood that logic. Other bands have progressed from a less aggressive debut album to an all out assault sophomore release like, Remembering Never for instance. They went from She Looks So Good In Red to Women And Children Die First!

Karma: Shifting gears a bit, I understand Sevendust and Crowbar are some of your biggest musical influences. Even though you are a hardcore band, I am sure that can account for your heavy sound.

Karma: Speaking of influences, I was reading an older interview of yours and Slim said that people were comparing Cover Your Tracks to the latest Sevendust album. Was that in reference to Seasons?

Karma: Oh, okay! [all of sudden a high shrilling noise comes out of nowhere and obviously breaks Rich’s attention]

Rich: Wait a minute hold on! [annoyed by the disruption, he quips at the perpetrator] “Are you serious…? Idiot!” Okay go ahead! [the mysterious noise begins again]

Karma: Speaking of influences, what are some of your non-musical influences that play a big role in your life? [the high pitch whistle kicks back up, then the horn goes off again, but somehow he heard me] [all of a sudden someone in the background speaks]

Karma: Going back a bit to the Tom Cruise thing and being a fashionably well-dressed quintet and all, sex appeal is very important to your image, how do you work that suave, debonair, & sexy image into the tough guy world of hardcore? Have you caught any flack for it?

Rich: Not as much as I would have expected. It’s more just people wondering why.

Karma: Speaking of clothing, tell me a little about your clothing line, Axis Fabrix, from silk screening to clothing? It’s pretty cool by the way.

Rich: Thank you. After I moved back, and when the band broke up first, I was definitely in search of something that I had interest in. I didn't want to go into another position where I wouldn't be a manager or something like that because I come from an extensive management background. Basically my partner and I were discussing that we'd like to go down to a sign shop which a friend of ours had owned for about 10 years or so and we actually went in there and started asking him questions about who does his t-shirt printing… We wanted to be his one stop; actually, he was like, "Okay! Where do you plan on doing it?" He let us sublet the space and we're still there. We print for bands and local businesses and then spawned Axis Fabrix, which is the clothing line from that. We sponsor some bands and we're working on getting into retail stores.

Karma: Who came up with the logos and stuff? I love the high quality of the stenciling of letters, colors etc.

Rich: We use a couple of different artist but a lot of the artwork my partner and I come up with ourselves.

Karma: It’s kinda brutal [depicts a woman in garters and thigh highs on her stomach on her hands raring up to show a knife in her chest with blood oozing out of the gaping wound] but it's very cool at the same time.

Rich: That series is to come out we're doing four dead four alive. The dead ones are going to go across the shirt as the Alana shirt that's up and the live ones are going to go along side of the shirt.

Rich: It's too conniving and backstabbing! It's a very relationship based business; I would like to not see it so behind the back but that's just my opinion.

Karma: And I think that is what's most important. Who are some of your favorite bands in the scene right now?

Rich: Comeback Kid, The Red Chord…I look forward to the new record a lot! I have a lot of non heavy favorites too! Taking Back Sunday, Mineral, other metal bands like Soilwork, In Flames. I'm just throwing some out there, to mix them up. I like Yellow Card, AFI, another great band!

Karma: Yes they are, yes they are!! Speaking of Soilwork, we will be interviewing the band in the next month, if you could ask them anything, what would you ask them?

Rich: Yeah, and that we look forward to playing with them at the end of the summer!

Karma: What's your favorite quote? [one of his bandmates chimes in overhearing the conversation]

Karma: [his phone starts to break up again then "Disease" by Sevendust starts to blast through the phone] If not music then what?

Karma: If you could commission a band to cover a BYD song, which song would you chose and who would cover it?

Karma: What is the first thing you think of when of when you awake in the morning?

Rich: Basically what I have to get done for the day and if my loved ones are okay.

Karma: If you were stranded on a desert island whom you would like to be marooned with?

Rich: I'd take Yellow Card, Slipknot Iowa, and probably Seasons or Animosity by Sevendust

I'd like to extend thanks to Rich for this wonderful interview and to Heather West at Victory Records for setting it up.