Ion Vein Interview

Interview
Chris Lotesto
Ion Vein

Chris Lotesto of Ion Vein (Photo: Erika Kristen Watt)

Lineup:
Brian Gordon - bass
Russ Klimczak - lead vocals
Chris Lotesto - guitar/keyboards/vocals
Chuck White - drums/percussion

Overkill
Trivium
Fatal Order

Cable
Ion Vein
Joe's on Weed Street
4/07/05
Interviewer: Karma E. Omowale
Photos: Erika Kristen Watt

“As A Musician, All I’ve Ever Wanted Is To Touch People. Write Songs That Get Through To People…”

Chicagoland metal masters, Ion Vein, have been shredding it in their current incarnation for nearly ten years. Unfortunately this band relatively remains a well-kept secret to the masses outside of the power/prog metal genres. I hope that this trend will end with the band’s upcoming and still untitled 2006 release. Chris Lotesto guitarist and founder of the band has forged a name for himself in the Industry since '89; he is also organizes the annual Chicago PowerFest, importing some of the genres best like Tad Morose, Evergrey, and Morgana Lefay just to name a few. In this interview I caught up with Chris when his band opened for the legendary death metal band Overkill as we discuss the band's future plans, his frustrations surrounding the release of their last album, Reigning Memories, etc.

Karma: Please give some background info on Ion Vein, how did you get started?

Chris: Well first of all, in a nutshell, I formed the band in 1989 but it wasn’t Ion Vein; it didn’t become Ion Vein until about 1995. The guys that are currently in the band, I hooked up with them in about ’96 / ‘97ish. So, Ion Vein really got started in 1997, that’s when we did our first gig as Ion Vein. We did our first album in 1999, Beyond Tomorrow, second album, Reigning Memories in 2003 and some personnel changes, but here we are today. [Smiles] Russ Klimczak on vocals and Brian Gordon on bass are both original members. Chuck White on drums has been in the band about a year and our other guitar player tonight is Andy Peredas who used to be in Talamaska. So, he’s just a guest musician until we find somebody permanent.

Chris: Um, well I’m going to date myself now [chuckles] about twenty years. I’ve been playing guitar for about twenty years and I’ve been playing keyboards, if you want to call it that for about… I can’t count, maybe eight, no five years something like that. I just do a little bit and I’m not even doing it anymore, we’re trying to be more heavy metal, just like the old days. [Laughs]

Karma: So, then what may you decide to play keyboards in the first place, especially since you are abandoning it for the old metal feel?

Chris: Well, it’s a very interesting instrument and piano is a very pretty instrument. We just wanted some textures on our first album and the ball kind of got dropped on me. [We] did a little more on the second album, with some piano and keyboard textures. Now we’re kind of moving away from it. So, now I really would like to be an accomplished pianist but I’m nowhere near, where I want to be on guitar so I’m focusing more on guitar. Plus, it’s just the way the band is evolving, we’re getting heavier, still melodic but heavy and maybe we’ll do some keyboards on the album but I dunno about live. Actually, the bottom line is it’s such a pain in the ass to lug all this gear around; I’m getting tired of it. [Laughs] So, that’s the truth!

Chris: Let’s see, our vocalist gets compared to Geoff Tate a lot. We’re trying to shake that just because it’s kind of a stigma just because if it’s attached to you today, right away people will say your 80’s ! Our music is melodic and we have a singer that sings clean most of the time and that’s kind of coming back too so maybe the 80’s stigma will hopefully leave us. Because when people see us live, you know, we’re an energetic band, we sound a lot heavier live, and I guess in a nutshell we’re just a powerful melodic metal band. I don’t know, that’s the best I can do I guess, I hate that question. [Laughs] As least you didn’t say tell me to say it in three words!

Karma: Nah, I was being nice, I allowed you to take as many as you needed. [Laughs]

Karma: Very much so. [Smiles] So, was this show local or are you actually going out with Overkill for the rest of the tour?

Chris: No, this is the only show we’re doing but it would be great. We’re still looking for a nice tour though. This is just one show.

Karma: Well, I’m sure you’re gonna hate this question too… Please define Prog metal, what is your definition?

Chris: [Laughs heartily] Well, in our world of what we’re trying to do. The reason we’re classified as Prog power metal is we don’t get too crazy into left field like what most people think is Progressive. We just like to add some interesting elements to our music just so it’s a little bit more than just straight ahead metal. So, yeah maybe some odd time signatures or some key changes just enough to give it a little flavor.

Traditional Prog metal or Prog rock or whatever is kind of self-indulgent, wankie wankie kind of and that’s not what we’re about. Ever since the band started, we’ve been about song writing and that’s always been our main focus but we want to add a little extra. You know we had Iron Maiden, Metallica, and Fates Warning. We take our heavy metal and we add a little bit of flavor to it so that’s where we get the Prog tag, I think then the power metal and the big choruses or whatever, the clean singing so people associate us with power metal, so we kind of fall somewhere between. I would just like to be considered a kick ass metal band and that would be good enough for me.

Karma: There you go! So, is it limiting to you to have people try to classify you underneath that genre?

Chris: To some degree, I think for the average listener if they hear Prog anything they’re like oh forget it, guys are gonna be up there wankin their instruments and making no sense or whatever. I think maybe for some people it turns them off from the band or whatever but when we come out and play it kind of blows away those stigmas and preconceived notions away. Tags always limit you in some way, I guess over time you just keep pluggin’ away, and eventually you just kind of develop your own tag, I hope. [Laughs] As long as you guys don’t suck.

Karma: Exactly, because that would be bad. So, how did the Chicago Powerfest turn out?

Chris: Great. It was a successful show, about three hundred people each night. All the bands were great.

Chris: Yeah, Tad Morose, they were phenomenal, all the bands. It’s just a shame that…you guys know how Chicago is.

Chris: You know it’s so much to do here and it’s a very fickle town and for most bands, you can’t become successful here you have to become successful everywhere else and come back before you can get some respect. So people were complaining that twenty bucks was too much but they don’t understand what a show like this is. To see these bands in Chicago will never happen again. Tad Morose played for over two hours till about three in the morning, they played songs that they will probably never play again and Morgana played for over an hour and a half.

Chris: Exactly, it’s the first time they’ve been here. This was an unbelievable show with unbelievable bands and just the camaraderie, the environment, and the fans it was really great and it’s a shame that a lot of people missed it. You know we thought we were sold out well in advance and unfortunately we didn’t but everybody there had a great time, they loved it. So, you know although we didn’t break even it was still successful. [Laughs]

Karma: That’s good. Why do you think America is the last to attach to this type of music, dare I throw the prog tag on it but…?

Chris: Well, I was reading something on the internet, I can’t remember who posted it, it was on some forum. I think pretty much what happened was when the labels killed metal back in the early 90’s and the whole grunge thing took over it just completely killed it. It was not a lot of sustained availability for newer fans and so it just kind of died out whereas in Europe that never happened. Power metal or metal, whatever metal you want to talk about has always been there so the younger kids still had an opportunity to listen to it, still had an opportunity to appreciate it. Whereas here, it’s so media driven, no offense! [Laughs]

Chris: Like MTV and the papers are so influential on people and they’re so narrow-minded probably because the major labels are driving everything with their money that unfortunately a lot of great music goes unheard. I think that’s probably the biggest reason this kind of metal or any kind really for a long time was way underground, more underground than it had been since the early 80’s, you know that was a great time too. It’s starting to come back, you know some of these newer bands are incorporating old school elements like guitar solos and guitar harmonies and singing which is a wonderful concept. [Laughs] Even though I do love a lot of the attitude bands like Lamb Of God and of course Slayer. A lot of the elements are coming back that hopefully are going to turn kids on to bands like us or bands that are doing something a little bit more than what you hear on the radio. So, hopefully we’re on the right track.

Karma: Here’s to hoping! [Smiles] Through lineup changes etc, how do think it has affected your songwriting, if at all?

Chris: Well, I’ve always been the main writer but, it’s always been great to have other people to bounce ideas off of and we always arrange together as a band. In some ways it affected us better just to get new people in, there’s new blood, new chemistry, and new excitement you know instead there’s a lot of times it’s a better situation. Change is always good it’s what you make out of it. I think each time we’ve had a member change as unfortunate as it is at the time, we’ve grown as a group, we’ve grown as individuals and I think we look at it as a positive thing even if it’s very difficult at the time. So, I think it has improved the songwriting especially with the lineup we have now, we’re very much on the same page, we’re going in the same direction so it make things a lot easier.

Karma: That’s great to hear, I am sure it does make life easier. Well with the release of Reigning Memories, first off, what is your favorite song off the album?

Chris: Oh boy, you just have them all going, don’t you! [Laughs] I like the title track, “Reigning Memories” because it has a lot of different elements, a lot of different sides of us all wrapped up into one so from a Prog kind of standpoint that’s my favorite. “Power You” is kind of a straight ahead in your face rocker, so from kind of a mainstream point of view, that’s my favorite and I’m doing a good job of avoiding the question. [Laughs]

Chris: [Laughs] Just musically the opener “Another Life”, I just really, like the dynamics of the song musically there’s a lot of cool duel guitar stuff and breakdowns. I like them all but those are three different elements of the album that I could really point out.

Karma: So here’s the second half of the question, really what the hell has Ion Vein been doing since the release of Reigning Memories?

Chris: [Guffaws] We’ve been trying to get ahead. We’ve been playing some great shows, we opened for Metal Church, we did a mini tour with Seven Witches, and we did the BWBK fest last year, which was great. Powerfest the last two years, well we organized it so it’s kinda hard not to play in it.

Chris: No, we did the first one but we haven’t been invited back. [Chuckles] So, we’ve been playing, writing, and trying to get ourselves in position properly for the next album and we signed a deal with Now and Then last May and they dragged us out in England and we signed a European agent and they just dragged their feet. So, we signed the deal in May of 2004 and they just released the album, allegedly, I hope anyway in February of 2005. So almost a year passed where we really couldn’t, I mean we’re still moving ahead here but as far as Europe goes, our hands are tied. We’re waiting to make our grand album; this will be our Black album I hope. [Laughs]

Chris: Not bad. Like I said, we signed a deal over there, I don’t know what’s going on. I can’t really get into it. They were good, we released it ourselves in Europe first and they were pretty good considering the label was supposed to carry it to the next level, I don’t know what’s going on. Here it’s not bad; it’s just that it’s been two years almost. So, we don’t sell as many now I we haven’t been able to really tour so we really didn’t have that big push behind it. We did a radio push and we got added to a lot of stations, which is great, but if you can’t tour you can’t sell a corresponding amount of albums. It’s been a little bit of a let down but the Industry in music general, sales wise has been down for the last three or four years. Such is life.

Karma: Just out of idle curiosity, why has it historically been a longer process between releases, like Beyond Tomorrow being released in '99 to Reigning Memories in '03? Did it all boil down to an overabundance of circumstances…?

Chris: It’s a lot of circumstances; we didn’t plan on four years between Beyond Tomorrow and Reigning Memories. Our bass player Brian [Gordon] was back in the band, left the band and that kind of threw a wrench in the works. At the time we really weren't in the position, I guess if that would've happened now we would make allotted adjustments just to do the record whereas back then it was kind of a big blow and we waited to find the right guy to finish the writing, you know. We waited too long to support Beyond Tomorrow before we stared writing and that was part of it. Brian left and we got a new bass player; we had to get him up to speed and then by that time two years went by. Then when we actually did the album, we had a lot of technical problems, and we just had this black cloud that I hope is finally gone but I hope we have an umbrella just in case it starts raining. [Laughter ensues]

Chris: That's good. So, it was just a lot of circumstances. We were hoping that the new album would be out in the fall but I don't see that happening. So, early 2006. We would certainly love to be in a position to put out a record every year and a half or so but it's kind of hard when you do it on your own.

Chris: When you work a full time job, it's really hard to get behind a record, do the things you do, write on top of it, and play shows. So, hopefully someone will pick up this new one.

Chris: It's going to be called the green album. [Laughs] To match the furniture.

Karma: I was blown away when I read that you self-financed the new project, getting Neil Kernon [Queensrÿche, Nevermore] to produce, and Mattias Norén for your cover art… I mean talk about wanting things to be done right in addition to a hefty chunk being taken from the pocketbook! [Winces]

Chris: Absolutely! That's because MasterCard loves me. [Laughs] It was cool, we really thought this record would have kicked it up a notch but due to various circumstances the timing was bad and we thought for sure that somebody like Century Media or Inside/Out would pick it up but they weren't interested. So we were like well whatever, we got the deal overseas but it hasn't quite panned out like we would hope and there was a big delay there. So, we kind of put a lot into it, you know and tried to get a lot of people that we really respected like Mattias and Neil and try to put the best record out we could which we felt we did at the time. Yeah, certainly it was a big test.

Chris: My all time favorite band is Iron Maiden along with Judas Priest, Metallica, Anthrax, and Slayer. Then, I got into Fates Warning and that kind of changed my life.

Chris: [Smiles] Yeah! That kind of helped me see a lot more of the prog side of things. Then I got into Dream Theatre and Queensrÿche. So, Maiden, Priest, and Metallica were the big three for me, and Anthrax was kind of it for me.

Karma: This should have been rather interesting since Neil worked with Anthrax as well.

Chris: Exactly! [Beams] When I found out he lived in Chicago, we have a mutual friend that plays such music, Ken Goldman and I talked to Ken and he was like, “Why don’t you just send him an email?”. I did, we hit it off, so… He was like, “I’m here in Chicago, so let’s do it”!

Chris: Cable, [as in the band that was on stage during the interview] and they’re really loud, no, I’m kidding! [Hysterical laughter ensues]

Chris: I love Lamb of God and Killswitch…who else Evergrey. I liked their last album [Inner Circle] a lot, they’re friends of ours. Slipknot, I just got into them last year, Volume III was great!

Chris: I heard it was a really good album and I always wanted to check it out. I had been wanting to get into the heavier, more modern kind of things, just to check it out. I got it and I was like, “Wow, this is awesome”! Then I saw them live and I was blown away! Trying to think of what else I’m getting into…hmmm, that’s a stumper. [Smiles] The new Judas Priest album [Angel of Retribution] is awesome I love that one. Opeth, I mean I pretty much keep an open mind when it comes to music. I like a lot of pop music too; I’m not just a metalhead.

Karma: It’s always good to be well rounded. Now if you could collaborate with anyone, whom would, you choose?

Chris: Wow! I was going to say Alanis Morrissette, but no! That would be cool actually. You know Bruce Dickinson would be cool, I never actually thought until now. [Seeing the wheels turning in his head] It would be awesome to work with him; I like what he does on his solo stuff. With the huge Maiden fan I am, and Steve Harris. I love his stuff. I really like what Bruce is doing, or even [Rob] Halford. That would be cool too! [Plays scenario out], “Here’s a kick ass song Rob”… or at least I think so. I would just love to hear what he could do with it.

Chris: Well we’re trying to get the album finished, we’re six songs in. We are doing the Louder Harder Festival in Pennsylvania in June with Trouble, well it was Flotsam and Jetsam, but I think they broke up, Obituary, God Forbid and a bunch of other bands. I think after that, we’re just gonna take time writing. Hopefully we can get into pre-production by the summer and in the studio in the fall.

Karma: Yes, keeping our fingers crossed! Now if you could commission a band to cover an Ion Vein song, who would do it and which song would they cover?

Chris: Oh, you’re really digging deep with these questions! I sure couldn’t have prepared for this one! [Laughs]

Chris: [Smiles] How ‘bout Slayer! They’d probably laugh if they heard one of our songs but it sure would be a whole hell of a lot of fun to hear them do it!

Chris: What the name Ion Vein means is positive energy flowing through your body, and we hope when our fans come to see us, they get a charge; they feel good, they feel energized, and have a great time. That’s the kind of feeling we’d like to leave with people. Have them leaving with the feeling after listening to the album or after a show better than when they listened to or saw the show, or whatever. All I’ve ever wanted as a musician is to touch people; write songs that get through to people. Maybe when you hear this song, it means something special to you. I think that’s the great thing about music.

Chris: I would just like to thank everybody who reads thank you for your support, we really appreciate it. We really appreciate our fans, check out www.ionvein.com, and buy our stuff. If you hate it, give it to somebody else! [Laughs]

Karma: Well thank you very much Chris, I appreciate it! Best of luck to you in your future endeavors!

I'd like to thank Chris for interviewing with me; best of luck with everything in your future endeavors!