What is going on, friends? Welcome to My Weekly
Mixtape, a show that takes the classic mixtape
approach to building a modern playlist. I'm your
host, Brian Colburn, and we are wrapping up 2025
by celebrating two of the biggest interviews
in My Weekly Mixtape history, both of which happened
earlier this year. However, because of the way
I approach interviews, They're still just as
relevant today as when they first aired. And
I am excited to revisit them because both guests
are from one of my favorite hard rock bands on
the planet, that being Shinedown. And I was blessed
enough to have both Barry Kirch and Eric Bass
on the program to talk all things Shinedown,
including the history of the band, what's going
on in their camp right now. Eric's first ever
solo album, I Had a Name, the graphic novel that
accompanies it, the songs they released in 2025,
including, just to name a few, Dance Kid Dance,
365 and The Killing Fields, and drop a lot of
hints, a lot of breadcrumbs for Shinedown 8,
which is coming your way sometime in 2026. And
we got the dirt on several brand new tracks.
during these sit -downs. So what better way to
get excited for 2026 than to run this as we lead
into 2026. Now, before we get to the main event,
if you like what you're hearing on My Weekly
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help other music fans find the show. And that
is the way an independent creator like myself
can build this program and take it to the next
level. I appreciate every bit of support that
you guys have shown this show throughout the
years. And I promise you guys in 2026, I'm going
to do my best to continue to up the ante each
and every week. Now, without further ado, let's
dive into the sound of Shinedown kicking off.
with my sit -down with the one and only Barry
Kirch, where I started off by asking him my favorite
first -time guest question. What does the word
mixtape mean to you? I guess, you know, I'm a
prodigy of the 70s and child of the 80s. For
me, mixtape was the thing. And to me, it's two
things. Either you're making the mixtape for
your girlfriend, the love of your life, and you're
getting all the songs you can to... prove to
her your love but for me more importantly it
was uh getting those songs that you heard on
the radio and sitting there in a bedroom with
your little cassette player going record okay
got it got that song oh that's a new song from
this because back in those days you couldn't
you know you had to listen to the radio to hear
that song and once you had it on that tape you
had that song so it's the it's the nostalgia
and joy of really having to dig deep to search
out music which you don't have to do anymore
That's part of the reason I do this show each
week is to try to bring back some of that joy
of finding that song. Because when you look for
things on Spotify, everything's so instantaneous
that the joy of discovering that new song, it's
almost watered down compared to the way it was
when we were growing up. I agree. And I guess
I'm a curmudgeon in that way because I don't
like the instant gratification of the Internet
these days and social media and all that kind
of stuff, though it's a wonderful tool. i get
frustrated sometimes because i do miss those
times of being introduced to a new band and it's
like oh my friend had this cd that he passed
me and i finally heard it and was like oh wow
what is this you know that's how i got introduced
to nine inch nails was i was a i'm an 80s metalhead
i'm playing tennis in high school i'm on a tennis
trip and my friend bow win he's pretty hate machine
cd And I didn't give it back to him. I kept listening
to it, listening to it. And that's, you know,
that's why I'm a diehard Nine Inch Nails fan,
because that was a pivotal moment in my life
that changed my taste in music. And it's those
happy accidents or those neat surprises that
make music so much fun and personal for yourselves.
And that it is. So let's now dive into the reason
we're here tonight. And that is to talk all things
Shinedown. And I'd like to kind of start from
the beginning, maybe a top level approach here.
Sure. Could you talk about the evolution of the
band's music that's taken place over the last
24 years and counting? Oh, wow. How much time
do we have? You know, it's grown. I look back
on it now. And when Shinedown started, I was
25 years old. And I played like a 25 year old
person, a 25 year old musician. I only had that
much experience getting in there. And the rest
of us as well. We were all around the same age.
Brent was a little younger. Jason at the time
and Brad at the time were a couple of years older.
So we were right within a year or two of each
other. And we were playing what we felt at the
time and what we grew up with. And the early
sound of Shinedown, I think, had. Quite a bit
more Southern influence that came from Jason
and Brad growing up in the Jacksonville area,
in the Northeast Florida area. I grew up in the
panhandle of Florida, but I'm a military brat,
so my exposure was different. They grew up deep
in that scene of Southern rock and Skinner and
stuff and all those things. And Brent being a
Tennessee boy who grew up primarily listening
not to Southern rock, though he's a Southern
rock fan, but he also listened to a lot of Motown
and things like that. He learned to sing by singing
Otis Redding. because his parents were very religious
and he would you know when they found his poison
cassette in the in his house they threw it out
and said you need to listen to this you know
so it wasn't allowed so what was cool about shine
down especially in those early days was the mix
of those things and the excitement of being new
to professional studios and and new to that side
of the craft that i think has been honed over
the years and then it grew you know the second
record was a total different journey it was more
trippy and things of that nature and it was kind
of more raw because we were doing it almost home
studio based because we didn't have a lot of
time to do it because the label's like okay first
record's done we need another one in six months
and you know we were having to write and get
it done and there was a lot of pressure because
though the first record did really well it didn't
do well enough to where they weren't worried
about us having a second record you know it was
like we got to get through this hump or we might
not be here And the band at the time was pretty
tumultuous. There was a lot of infighting. There
was a lot of things going on that made it difficult
to be, even though we were a band of brothers,
it was just a hard time. And then growing into
Sound of Madness is when I kind of everything
changed. And there was, you know, Dave Bassett
was brought in with Brent to write some stuff.
And, you know, the writing, I think, became more
sophisticated. Brent really focused more on his
lyrics in there. He had something to prove. All
of a sudden, this thing went off in his brain.
and there was more of something to prove like
you listen to sound of madness the song compared
to like 45 45 was like uh the world's looking
in at me santa madison's like i'm gonna be that
person and that's what really changed the trajectory
of our career and then you know also we had new
members coming in so when we got to like amaryllis
and threat and attention up through planet it
was really having the you know eric is a juggernaut
of a songwriter and player and engineer and producer
you know he's produced the last two and a half
records and he's produced this one that we're
working on now so that changed our sound but
i think for the better we became more open to
well if we want to put a keyboard on the song
or we want to put a drum machine on the song
why not you know we don't it's always going to
come down to vocals bass drums guitar but we
were willing to just throw caution to the wind
and go this is what the song needs i don't care
if it needs a mandolin and me clapping in the
background and that's the drum track that's the
drum track and i think we got better as songwriters
and better as players you i would hope anybody
who's in this industry continues to grow as a
player you know i still take lessons i still
work on my craft there's still a lifetime's worth
of things to learn on my drums and to learn in
the studio and how to make these things happen
you know every time i get with eric like dude
you're taking me to college every time i learn
a new technique and i learned this thing and
we learned so much early you know god rest his
soul but but doug the uh engineer on sound of
madness amaryllis and attention attention and
i think a song or two on a threat unfortunately
passed away and his knowledge was scary because
he's an la guy he grew up in those studios he
just knew how to engineer he'd be like what do
you mean you haven't tried this mic technique
where i take this crappy radio shack mic and
i put it against this wall and i'd you know blow
it up with a compressor but check out what it
does to the drums when you turn it up and you're
like god how did you think of that you know so
you learn over the years and you hone your craft
and you know in a very long i can be long -winded
but a very long story short i think we've just
become better at our personal instruments better
song crafters and a little bit less cautious
a little bit more of I don't give a shit this
is the song we're going to do this is the songs
that you're going to get from Shinedown and we
never you can never change Brent's voice right
and never leave Shinedown it still sounds like
Shinedown but I don't want to make leave a whisper
again I love that time period and I have nothing
but fond memories and I have no regrets over
our whole lexicon of music but I don't want to
make that again I got to make what we're feeling
right now and that's that's the most important
thing You brought up something about working
with Eric and what he's brought to you. And I
talked to him about his album that's being released
this week as well. But I'd like to talk about
your writing and approach to recording drums,
because one thing that I mentioned to Eric that
has always impressed me about what you bring
to the album is you're always willing to play
to the strength of the song, no matter what that
is, be it the timing changes in unity. to where
you kind of sit back in a song like A Symptom
of Being Human from Planet Zero. How do you decide?
Is it during the writing or the recording session
where you should be laying into a song and bringing
that metal background into play or sitting back
and letting kind of the song breathe and speak
for itself? It definitely becomes song dependent.
and it happens in the studio when it's time to
track the drums because a lot of times within
shine down i get presented a demo form and it's
going to have you know a finger drummed programmed
kind of placeholder that goes okay i see where
this is going and then it's up to me to form
what's going to happen in the fills and things
of that nature because i am unabashedly not apologetic
to say that i am not a songwriter i do not have
that ability i think in rhythms i don't think
in melody i just i am a proud drummer and that
being said you know early in your career as a
drummer if you are a drummer and they're taking
this you want to play all those cool things you
learned and look at me look at me look at me
look at this cool thing i did look at these stick
twirls all these things and there is a place
for someone and maybe certain bands that you're
in you know if you listen to like a rush mastodon
whatever you name it those drummers have a little
bit more freedom to go look at me look at me
and they play a little bit more wild stuff uh
that's not what shine down is and for me probably
when it goes back to even the last question you
asked about the evolution of Shinedown and their
songwriting, I've learned humility in my music
and in my playing. And I think that's the most
important thing a drummer can learn is humility
in your playing to play the song. You are not
the star. You are the drummer. You are the support.
And you should wear that as a badge of courage
and a badge of honor. That's something to be
proud of, to sit back and go, I'm going to hold
this band down and make that song feel as good
as that song should feel. Every single time.
So when I'm there live and I'm locked in and
everything's vibing, I can look at my guys who
could be a little bit crazier, maybe get off
a little bit on the guitar or, you know, something
falls apart. I'm not going to F up because I'm
holding it down for my band. I'm the support.
And when it comes to recording, that's when that
really happens. Like, what does this song need?
And we'll talk about it sometimes, especially
with Eric and I, we have such a good working
relationship at this point. that, you know, he's
not afraid to go, oh, Barry's going to get pissed
because I want to change this. It's like, no,
what's your idea? What do you hear? What are
you hearing that I'm not hearing? Or vice versa.
I go to him and go, hey, man, it'd be really
cool if we did a little clap in this area or
a tambourine here. What do you think about a
shaker tambourine mix? And he'll go, that's too
much because it's going to step on the vocals
here. Oh, you're right, because you already hear
the vocals and I haven't heard them yet. We're
doing the drum track. So it's those kind of conversations,
especially when you're starting from the ether
to go. Yeah, I think that's a good idea. But
that fill, as cool as it was, can you shorten
it a bar? Why? It was a cool fill. He's like,
yeah, it was. But the vocal is still going right
there and you're stepping all over it. Cool.
Let's do a shorter fill or a longer fill. Hey,
man, we need this to build into this chorus where
everything's just going to come in and hammer
you in the face. That's what I'm going to do.
And that's my job is to service the song. And
that's I pride myself on that. And my favorite
drummers are our groove drummers more so than
the show off drummers as much as I appreciate
their talents. I'd much rather listen to Charlie
Watts from the stones. God rest his soul. Just
lay it down or Steve Jordan, just laying it down.
That makes you feel something. Drums are supposed
to make you feel something and just nod your
head. And that's what I want to do. Oh, Steve
Jordan, man. I saw him this past summer with
the Rolling Stones. And as sad as I am that Charlie
wasn't back there, he holds down a groove like
no other. And he brought this swagger to the
Rolling Stones that I don't want to say that.
is better because it's not better. It's just
different. And there's something about his playing
that it's distinctly Steve Jordan. So I love
that. Yeah, I agree. And I think it brought his,
he brought. Not that he's a super young man,
but he brought youth back to the stones. You
know, I think there was an article. It was either
Jordan was talking or it was Mick Jagger. But
he was like, yeah, also we're playing the tempos
that we used to play back in the 60s. And we
hadn't done that in a while because, you know,
we're all getting older. And Steve Jordan's like,
no, this is the tempo you used to do it at. And
so it's pushing them, which is entertaining,
too. It's neat to see how those things happen,
you know? Oh, 100 percent. Yeah. You said something
before that I actually want to challenge you
on because you said that you're not a writer.
But I'm going to challenge that a little bit
because I have dents in my steering wheel from
the sound of madness and adrenaline that say
otherwise, because the drums really are a piece
of what makes those songs so massive and so emotional.
The opening drums in the sound of madness are
so thunderous that when that kicks. you feel
it in your bones. And I want to applaud that
contribution that you bring to the band. Thank
you. Because, you know, the drummer's got to
get some love every now and then. And as a bass
player, I look out for my rhythm section, man.
That's right. I'll take that love and I appreciate
it. I guess in the industry side of the things,
drums is not part of songwriting. How that happened
over the years, I have no idea. But in the industry,
the business side of things, doesn't matter what
I play, it's not part of the songwriting. It's
about the melody. And so maybe that's a small
point of contention with me because I think it
takes, all sums to make the song great. You know,
if a different drummer played on second chance,
it might've been a different fill there. And
that's one of my most recognized fills. It's
simple, super simple, but it sticks out. And
that's a part in the song that really makes that
song what it is. So poignant, absolutely poignant.
Now on the flip of the heavier side of things,
when you have a song, like a symptom of being
human, the first time I heard that song, the
hair on my arm stood up, not just from. the lyric
perspective, because it's a song that hits home
for a lot of people and it's made a lot of important
conversations happen. But musically, the fact
that you just sat back and kind of did this shuffle
beat made the song a hundred times more powerful
than had you brought the whole kid into the fold.
And I'd love to know the mindset behind that
because the song is perfect in its simplicity
almost. And I don't mean to make that sound as
a negative. No, no, no. I think some of the best
songs out there are perfect in their simplicity
because it's a tendency for all of us, especially
when producing and recording to throw the kitchen
sink at it. And then sometimes you just have
too much. I think for that song, I remember vividly
being in the studio with Eric and talking about
it because the demo was quite a bit different,
even maybe a little more sparse. We just had
it wasn't wasn't an afterthought. The vocals
were there and the melody was there. But the
music, the backing music really was just very
basic and rudimentary in a demo format. And in
talking about it, it's like we need the song
to grow because tempo wise, if it didn't grow,
it could fall flat easily, even though the lyrics
are so good. It needs to just constantly grow
as the song is going on to keep the interest
of the listener. And we looked at it as I remember
he and I talking and I don't know which one of
us said it first, but we're like, we need to
treat this like an orchestra. And so I turned
on my high school and college brain when I played
in the orchestras and stuff and went, we're going
to treat this like this. So I didn't even set
up a drum kit. All those ports were recorded.
as if it were a concert setting. Upright bass
drum, concert snare drum, cymbals were done afterwards.
It was absolutely done as if I were in a orchestra.
And that's, I think, what gave the lift to the
song. You listen to certain orchestra pieces
where when the drums finally come in, it's like,
oh, oh, it just hits you. That was the whole
premise behind Symptom. I know that you did not
have any part of the lyric writing in this one.
I know that that was between Eric and Brent,
Heavier subject, mental health, anxiety. It's
something a lot of people struggle with. I personally
struggle with it. And there's such a humble connection
in these lyrics to these songs. And I'm curious
to know if these songs are as meaningful to the
band as the fans that have really found hope
and purpose from these words. Yes and no. I think
it hits differently. For the fans, it's something
they can relate to and take as their own as a
hey, they're writing this about me and it's an
outlet for us. It's the therapy of getting those
feelings out because it's a true story about
us. You know, that's the one thing I love about
my band. The one thing I cherish about Shinedown
and always have is the lyrics are true stories,
every last one of them. And it's not about, you
know, just making something up. So that song
is about mental health because it's about Eric's
head. And Brent looking at him and them looking
at each other. And it's about dealing with that
and realizing that all of us have our issues
and the things we go through on any day. You
know, I'm kind of the rock of the band. I'm the
one that takes care of my boys. And I'm the one
that all the problems for my band and crew come
to me. They always come through me because I
get to talk to or something. But everybody, I'm
that person that I'm the vampire. They just dump
it all on me. And I'm there to support my guys
because, yes, I have my good days and bad days.
And the human as well. But I'm a little more
solid than they are. I don't deal with the same
things they do. You know, Brent with his past
addiction issues, Eric with his depression, that's
just ungodly. And even Zach, he's a very emotional
guy. And I think all artists really truly are
led by emotion more so than most. I think we
have to be to be creative. And I think, you know,
that's why Eric and Brent are so good at lyrics.
Because I think they're so emotionally damaged
that they can just get it out there and that's
their therapy. So I think, are these songs equally
as important to us? Yes, in that it is our therapy
and we're able to get it out there. But when
people outside of us, when the fans take ownership,
we have a different love with that song because
now we get to see it affect other people and
like, holy shit, we put that together and they
get to feel that. And when I look at the audience
and I see people crying or laughing or jumping
and that emotion. It's like a drug for me in
that we created this for you and you're able
to feel something and have an escape from your
everyday life for just a moment. Best thing ever.
What was the first Shinedown song for you personally
that made you realize that the band had something
special? 45. All the way back. Yeah. Because
I was given that in a demo form for my audition
for the band. I was given that and lacerated
off the first record because I was the, I think,
seventh drummer to try out. And so we go into
a practice space here in Jacksonville, Florida,
and they give me those two songs and learn these,
learned them, played them. I go, good, cool.
You know the songs. Tomorrow, we want you to
go in a studio here locally and just record a
demo with real drums on it. Because at that point,
it was just a demo without drums or whatever.
Great. So we're going to do 45. No problem. go
in there with my busted up kit old heads because
i wasn't prepared uh some crack cymbals but it
had a vibe and i went in there and i recorded
45. and it just felt good and it was great fast
forward we end up in la we you know finally get
the green light from atlantic records we're finally
found a name for ourselves we're in la recording
the first record and we record this massive version
of 45 and put an orchestra on it did all these
things and it was great Getting ready to release
the record, our A &R guy goes, man, there's something
special about the demo version of 45. And we
all agreed. And that's the one you hear on the
record. That's my audition. Wow. That's how I
got into this band was that recording that song
and that busted up kit. That's the original demo
version of 45 that changed everything. But we
all knew there was something in that song. And
that was the first time I knew this band has
something. Wow. That reminds me of. When I read
the story about Dimebag using the four track
demo for the opening riff to Cowboys from Hell
on the actual album, because they couldn't replicate
the sound that they got from that cassette in
the studio. Sometimes you just get handed a gift
and you just got to take it. Well, as the band
is building up to Shinedown 8, there are a ton
of songs from the catalog that have become staples.
So much so that you have. More songs than you
can play in any given night at a concert, unless
you did the three, four hours for a night. I
don't think Brent's voice would last three, four
hours. But there are some tracks that I think
are important to the band's legacy personally,
maybe, but Adrenaline, the opening track from
Amaryllis, or I Dare You from Us and Them that
haven't been broken out over the last few tour
cycles. How does the band make the difficult
decision over which songs get kind of shuffled
in and out when crafting that tour set list as
the catalog continues to grow? It's very difficult.
We fight like cats and dogs about it sometimes.
Zach is really good at putting a set list together.
And a lot of times he'll come up with like three
or four. And then we kind of talk about those
because Eric and I just you guys just tell us
what you want to play. Cause I'm tired of arguing
with you and the songs I want to hear, maybe
not the ones. And then we really have to look
at our fans and, and you can, you know, it's
one of the great things about the internet now
is you can look at the plays of songs. You can
look at the views of videos and you can go that,
you know, who would have thought that, you know,
the monsters video is one of our biggest watched
songs of all time. Well, we have to play that
song. But we want to play some of the new stuff.
And I'd love to play Adrenaline again. That's
a fun one for me to play live. Oh, it's a badass
trumpet. I'd love to play Black Cadillac. Black
Cadillac was a blast. And that actually was a
single in the UK. So when we go there, we can
play that song over here. People don't really
know it. It's a deep cut. Cyanide Sweet Tooth
off of Sound of Madness. Another fun one that
I love. It's just getting harder and harder.
And you can only fit so much in 90 minutes. And
there's curfews. So we can only go up to the
curfew. I'd love to play three more songs. All
right, so I have to follow up then. You're giving
full carte blanche. The band just says, you know
what, Barry? It's on you. Come up with a set
list tonight. Would the set list be similar to
what people see on any given night, or would
you be throwing out some personal curveballs?
It would definitely not be the norm. There would
be curveballs. I can tell you there's certain
songs I wouldn't play. I don't want to hear Simple
Man again. It's not even our song. I don't want
to hear it anymore. I know the fans love it.
I'm over it. I'm over not playing during that
five minute escapade of a Skinner song. That
one's gone. So it's easier to tell you what I
guess I would get rid of for a minute. 45, as
much as my heart loves that song, kind of overplaying
it. Let me put something else in. I would probably
play I Dare You Again. I would play Cyanide.
I get some deep cuts in there. One of Brent's
least favorite songs that we've ever recorded.
Better version off the first record. I actually
really enjoy playing because the drum parts on
there a lot of fun. So I'd make him sing that
again. And then. You know what I do is I do a,
I would probably do a poll on our socials and
go, what do you guys really want to hear that
are the deep cuts? I know you want to hear Second
Chance. I know you want to hear Symptom. I know
you want to hear Sound of Madness. And I get
it. We should play those songs. What are the
other ones? And I'd build a set list completely
off of that. And then I'd end on a big song.
I was going to say, I told Eric that one of the
songs that I have for the last four years wondered.
how it didn't make attention attention was a
new way to die. The song that ended up on the
Walmart exclusive download edition and Japan
got that track on the CD, but us in the US didn't.
That song is a, pardon the pun, an absolute monster.
That would be my vote. That would be fun because
we've never played that together as a band live
ever. Really? That was recorded. And then we
never looked at it again. I've never played that
song with my band members all in one room ever.
So that would actually be a lot of fun. Well,
on the flip side to the deeper cuts, are there
any Shinedown songs that you guys could never
skip for fear of the chaos that might ensue?
Second Chance, for sure. Symptom, I think at
this point, Monsters. Unfortunately, Simple Man,
because we tried that one. We dropped it once
and we got a lot of backlash. Enemies. especially
live. People love that song live. And it's a
fun one to play. I don't mind playing it. Unity.
And I don't enjoy playing Unity. I don't. Really?
I'm not going to lie. That surprises me because
there's something that's going on in the song.
I don't want to say it's necessarily the timing.
Yeah, I know what you're talking about. It kind
of does that shift, which sometimes I find distracting
for my own self when I'm playing because that's
one of those where I played for what the song
needed, but it wasn't exactly a natural motion
for me. What I wanted to play in my head was
more like coming to that compromise when we were
creating that song in the studio. Like we needed
to do this. Can you play this? Yeah, but I wouldn't
play it that way. Yeah, but we need you to play
that. Cool. Let me play that. So when you take
it to a live, I'm always going, this doesn't
feel natural to me. It's not what I would have
necessarily done. Not that it'd be very different,
but it's like writing with your opposite hand
for a second. I wouldn't have done that, but
that's what the song needs. So I'm going to have
to do that. So that's why Unity kind of gets
under my skin. But it's a crowd favorite that
and it's a great song and it should be played
and it's got a great message. All right. Well,
I want to turn the conversation to philanthropy
for a moment here. Last year, the band released
hot sauces that were in conjunction with the
Torchbearer company, and that included attention,
attention, mango habanero sauce. symptom chipotle
garlic and devour pineapple jerk with a portion
of the proceeds of these going to musicians on
call which is a non -profit that brings live
music to the bedsides of patients families and
caregivers and hospitals can you talk about the
band's mindset about giving back over the years
and why you guys do ventures such as this one
I think when you are lucky enough to put yourself
in a position to where you can give back, you
should. And the four of us being from the backgrounds
we come from, from being, you know, I guess,
you know, we grew up with good parents that taught
us values, you know, and taught us to give instead
of take as much as you possibly can, you know.
And now that we have the ability to, why wouldn't
we? You know, it's I think you should. And I
think it. warms your heart probably more than
anything else you know it's it's just what you
should do if you have the opportunity you know
if you can drop a nickel in a bucket for somebody
that really needs it then just do it and don't
tell everybody that you do you know i don't go
out there and say hey i've done this and this
and this and this for charity we've done a lot
for different places we have it's not about the
attention you get from us just about doing it
and i've got the ability now And I want to bring
that up because back in 2019, I caught the band's
tour in Guilford, New Hampshire, when it was
Shine Down, Bad Flower, Dinosaur Pile Up and
Broken Hands. And on that tour, I'll never forget
this. Dinosaur Pile Up had the band's stage banner
draped over their amplifiers because it had broken.
And my wife and I talked about that. I said,
oh, my God, this poor band on the ride home.
They have this opportunity to. come from the
UK, share this tour of the States. They're introducing
their music to people all over the country. What
a shit thing to happen to them that it broke.
And not even a couple of days later, I see the
article that you guys went out and got them a
new backdrop for the rest of the tour. That's
unheard of. Usually the vibe is that it's kind
of a dog eat dog world on the rock scene, but
you guys are going against that grain and showing
that it's a community. And I know you won't applaud
the band for doing it, but I wanted to applaud
the band for doing something like that because
I'm a huge fan of Dinosaur Pile Up because of
Shinedown introducing me to them. Right. And
I can tell you why. One of the reasons we do
things like that. And all I can do is give thanks
to Three Doors Down. When we were a young band,
first record had just come out, Three Doors Down
took us out. And they ended up taking us out
for, I think, nine months total. on that was
the Beyond the Sun tour when they were at the
top of their game and they were the biggest thing
in rock at the time. And we were the dumbest
band in rock at the time. We were young kids
making all the mistakes, didn't know how to load
in properly, didn't know how to do it. And instead
of them, you know, berating us as some bands
do or some bands crews do, it's typically not
the band. It's the other band's crew that, you
know, treats the opening band like shit. They
went, hey, let me show you how you can do that
better. Let me show you how. how to wrap a cable
properly. All these things that you don't learn
as a baby band that you have to learn later in
life. Or, hey, I see you're running audio this
way. Let me help your audio guy because you guys
are taking way too much time getting on and off
the stage. Let's help you out. And they helped
us for nine months and taught us so much and
didn't ask for a thing aside from, hey, hope
you guys had a good time. And we took that to
heart, all of us, and especially Brent and myself
now that the lineup has changed. But I'll never
forget the grace of that band. And I'll tell
you this too. Out of all the bands we've toured
with, I can barely count on Three Fingers bands
I would never want to tour with again. The vast
majority of the bands out there, including the
huge ones like Kiss and Iron Maiden, even Van
Halen, there's a reason they stuck around for
a long time. And it's because of what they do.
They might not like each other, but their band
and their crew takes very good care of the opening
bands. And that, I think, shows why they stand
the test of time. And I want to stand the test
of time as well. And it's about helping those
around you. It is a community. We're all working
just as hard, especially a band like Dinosaur
Pileup. I know how expensive it is to cross the
pond, especially as a baby band. What's it going
to take out of us to throw a little bit of money
together and go, hey, man, get your name out
there? You know, that's simple. That's a non
-starter, non -question, really. Well, when I
bring my family to see a Shinedown show, I know
they're going to get some diversity in the music.
Sure. Just for the last few years, for example,
Papa Roach. Jelly Roll, Spirit Box, The Pretty
Reckless. And now this year, Bush, as well as
Morgan Wade, who was also a guest on this show
in the past, knowing her music, similar to Jelly
Roll, is like a country slash rock. You had mentioned
earlier in our conversation that you guys kind
of have those roots in the Southern rock backgrounds.
Is that why you kind of diversify the lineup
of the night, get a little bit of that Southern
rock with a little bit of the heavier side of
things? I think we just want to make it interesting
for the audience and for ourselves. You know,
we could do the same tour. And, you know, aside
from always somehow touring with Papa Roach because
we love those guys, you know, you want to mix
it up. Yes, Papa Roach is on the chart. Breaking
Benjamin's on the chart. You know, we could go
with all those bands that are our peers and on
the same charts as us and everything else. But
why not stir it up? You know, we were so lucky
enough to get Jelly Roll to open for us. And
the next thing you know, he's the biggest thing
in the world. I'm happy for him. That's great.
I'm glad we could even be a part of your ascension
to the top. And I hope the best for Morgan Way
too. And I like to see something different. And
I like to see a female crushing it in this industry,
especially in the alt rock countryside, because
it still is pretty hard for a female in this
industry, especially if you're going to lean
that rock side. Spiritbox is a great example
of that. Why not support our fellow friends and
females and people that are working this business?
So yeah, we want it to be different. We don't
want it to be the same thing. We don't want it
to be the greatest playlist of active rock radio.
We want it to be everywhere. Because if you're
a music fan, you listen to everything. You look
through what I've played in the past month. It's
all over the place. It doesn't make sense. But
that's how I was feeling that day. I was listening
to P -Funk the other day just because I love
P -Funk and I was in that mood. Tomorrow I could
be listening to Maiden again and whatever. Who
cares? I like the way you think, man, because
this show every week, it's a different topic
or a different genre. And some people have actually
reached out to me saying, man, you're all over
the place with music. And I, and I, in my brain,
my response is, is there any other way? Like,
I feel like if you love music, it's, it's just,
I want to consume all of it. I always tell people,
and I tell my daughter this a lot because she's,
she listens to music and she's got her own music
that she listens to. And I go, I don't care what
you listen to as long as it's. Makes you feel
something and you feel good. Obviously, I'm going
to monitor it because she's just 14. So, you
know, I don't want to listen to certain things.
But, you know, she's gotten she gets into the
Spotify's iTunes, those things, and she finds
her own lane. And she's more of a pop girl than
I thought she'd be, because initially when we
when she was coming up, we listened to Deftones
together and Slipknot. And she enjoyed that.
Now she's listening to Imagine Dragons and Benson
Boone. And that's her thing. And I'm like, to
make you feel good. Yeah. OK, great. Because
that's what I did as a kid. Amen. As a father
of two girls, I applaud that because my daughters
both listen to as much Taylor Swift as they do
The Interrupters. And because of me, I've taken
them to see bands like Lamb of God and Metallica
and John Fogerty and ZZ Top. I want them to go
off into the world, if nothing else, having a
musical education that comes from a little bit
of everything and let them kind of form their
own path. Absolutely. You have to. Because eventually
they will. They're not going to listen to your
music. But I listen to some of my parents' music.
You know, certain things that my parents listen
to, I love. Beach Boys, Allman Brothers, Bill
Collins and Genesis. Absolutely. My parents introduced
me to that. They wouldn't have introduced me
to Nine Inch Nails. You know, it's just the way
it goes. And nor would they listen to it. They'd
say it's a bunch of shit. But that's the fun
journey of music. And, you know, things hit everybody
differently. You know, there's bands out there
right now that people love. Then I'm like, why?
I don't get it. But somebody does because they're
huge. That's the love of music. Subjective. Absolutely
subjective. Absolutely. Now, when I spoke to
Eric, he explained that Shinedown 8 would, spoiler
alert, not be a concept album. So after back
-to -back concept albums, Inattention, Attention,
and Planet Zero, for you as the drummer. Do you
find it a disappointment or a relief not going
the concept album route? Thank God it's not a
concept record. You know, I had a great time
with Attention and Planet Zero. Attention was
purposely a concept record. Planet Zero just
happened to become one because of the time period
recording it during COVID. It just we were talking
about what's going on in the world. And shit,
we wrote another, you know, another concept record.
We purposely said, can we just get a collection
of songs together that are fun and put out a
record, like an old school rock and roll record?
And that's what this one will be. So can you
talk about how Dance Kid Dance came together
during the writing and recording sessions for
that one? That one came together really with
those guys. I didn't hear it until it was completely
done. Vocals are there. And even then I had to
go, I'm not sure what they're writing about initially.
And for me, I think it was kind of the tongue
in cheek dance kid dance. But then if you really
listen to the lyrics, you know, the pills will
make you dance. It's a lot darker. It's very
tongue in cheek and makes you want to rock out.
But if you listen to it, you're like, oh, wait
a minute. This is a little darker than what you
think. And I think it stems from the experience
that Brent had during his addiction days and
really knowing way too much about those things
and overcoming that and really kind of not making
a. Statement like watch out, but more of a this
is a statement. I know what you're going through.
I've seen this. Maybe you want to watch out.
Now, the band chose to drop two songs simultaneously.
Dance Kid Dance went to rock radio and 365 went
to pop radio. Can you talk about the thought
process behind that move? Because releasing simultaneous
singles to different formats is something you
don't hear a lot of in modern music. No, and
we've been fighting to do it for years, literally,
probably since the Amaryllis record. We've been
fighting like, why can't we service a song over
here and then service a song over here? And typically
you get shot down by management or the label.
Typically the label at the time would just be
like, well, we don't have the funding to push
both of these up the charts and we don't want
to, you know, take away from this one if we're
pushing this and it becomes a political quagmire
and nightmare. And you're like, yeah, but why
not? And you can never get a really straight
answer. And we were finally able to with, well,
I say we. Nobody says no to Brent Smith. And
he is a bulldog negotiator. And he's really grown
a lot in the past eight, nine years as far as
his shrewdness in business. And he basically
doesn't take no for an answer. And you can see
that in the climb of symptom being human. We
were told no a million times. It'll never do
anything at Odyssey. It'll never make it to top
40. No, it's a great rock song, but they don't
play that on Hot AC. They don't play rock. And
he's like, well, why not? Let's just try it.
And he was right. And it climbed the charts and
it did really well. It was a marathon, not a
sprint. It took a minute, but they got it. Riding
on the coattails of that, he could look at them
all and go, hey, I proved it last time. Let's
shoot for them all right out the gate. And that's
what we're doing. And it's exciting. It's exciting
for us after, you know, a 24 year career so far
of going, not only are we still relevant, but
we're still growing. And, you know, the debut
of these two songs, at least in the radio world,
are our best debuts we've had to date. The most
added, the most this, the most that, the most.
And we're like, all right, we're doing something
right. And that's important to us. So it was
really a fight for many years. And finally, we
got our way. We screamed, begged, pleaded, rolled
over on our back through temper tantrums and
finally got our way. And I think it's proof in
the pudding, you know, and it's also for us.
It's kind of like putting our flag in the ground
and going, look, rock isn't dead. And we're not
the only rock band out there that deserves to
be on these other places. And hopefully they
start paying attention. Well, I want to. follow
up on that because when you think about the last
run of singles which would be the poppier side
of shine down in get up a symptom of being human
and 365 yeah is there ever a pressure that the
label or anybody is putting on the band to maybe
steer it more towards the pop direction if they
came to us and said that it would be the biggest
middle finger we could ever give to them good
because that's not who we are That's not who
we are. We write the song. And if it happens
to be a pop song, it's a pop song. It happens
to be a rock song. It's rock. It's a punk song.
It's a punk song. We write for ourselves first.
And I will give credit to both management and
the label that we've been with the whole time,
Atlantic Records. They've never once tried. Never
once have they said, hey, we want you to try
to write a song like this or why can't you or
any of those things. Even in the early days,
they've been supportive. Maybe frustratingly
so for themselves, because it is a business,
it is a music business, but they've let us be
ourselves. But if you listen back to the albums
that we've put out there, just about every single
record, if not all the records, if I think about
it, have a little bit of everything on them.
They really do. That's just what we do. Well,
when Eric and I talked, I did my part as a podcaster
in my years in radio, and I asked what dirt he
had on Shinedown 8. And he alluded to a few songs
like Searchlight, The Killing Fields, and The
Pilot. Are 365 and Dance Kid Dance a strong representation
of the sound and style that fans can expect from
Shinedown 8? No, not at all. It's as eclectic
as we always do. There's going to be things that
you're going to be like, oh, I didn't expect
that. And there's going to be some that are like,
oh, that took my head off. You know, you mentioned
Killing Fields. I'm like, haha. you know no is
it a reflection of where we're at right now sure
but every song is its own little animal and that's
i think that's kind of the excitement of it yeah
there's i think there's going to be some fun
stuff that comes out that people are fans are
going to really glom on to and there's there's
certain ones i'm thinking of in the back of my
head they're like it's different that one's different
but i love it um and then there's some that oh
yeah that's just a straight ahead hit you over
the face shine down rock song you know and that
which i think dance kid is in a lot of ways Get
ready for a ride, just like we always do. Is
the working title just Eight, or do you guys
have something in mind? That's literally the
working title is Eight. We have no idea what
we're going to name it yet. Initially, there
was talks of Dance Kid Dance being the title
of it, because it kind of had that vibe in some
respects. With Planet Zero, and even with Attention
to Tension, they just quickly raised their hands.
It was like, oh, yeah, that's got to be the album
title. That just fits. um this one also not being
a concept and just being a collection of songs
that one thing hasn't raised his hand yet and
each one of us because the shine down is a democracy
we're all 25 percenters but we're all very opinionated
25 percenters so sometimes we'll see what happens
um and you know i'll give brent the 26 because
it's definitely you have to have a leader and
he is the leader of shine down proudly and should
be um he's got the vision more so than anybody
So what you're saying is the enemies video is
true to form. That's not, that wasn't acting.
No, that's our personalities. Except there's
no way in hell Zach could kick my ass. So that
whole scene. Now, normally this is where I would
start wrapping things up for the evening, but
tonight folks, we're just getting warmed up.
If you like what you're hearing on tonight's
episode and you want to dive a little deeper,
I've embedded a full shine down playlist featuring
all the songs we've discussed this evening. as
well as some video clips and photos from their
debut performance this past summer at Madison
Square Garden. You can find all of those on the
episode page at myweeklymixtape .com. All right,
let's keep this sound of Shinedown's celebration
moving right along and roll into my interview
featuring the one and only Eric Bass as he answers
my first -timer guest question. What does the
word mixtape mean to you? Freedom. Freedom, man.
I think about just a different time, a different
time in my life. I think about discovery. I think
about sitting in front of a radio listening to
Rick Dees or Casey Kasem or somebody like that
trying to record songs as they went by on the
radio. Just a whole other time, man, of sharing
music with people. Like there was something magical
about your friend handing you a tape and just
saying, listen to this. And you would because
you didn't have anything else going on. It was
like there wasn't music flying at you from 10
,000 different places. It was like that mixtape
got your whole attention. I'm sitting here right
now because a buddy of mine handed me a long
play tape with Back in Black on one side and
Van Halen 5150 on the other side. And that was
like... one of my, I mean, I'd heard other rock
music before that, but I'd had, you know, I'd
had other mixtapes and stuff, but like that tape
for some reason, man, I know it's not really
a mixtape, but it's sort of a mixtape. Oh, mixtapes
came in all shapes and sizes and colors. Long
play mixtape, you know, but, but I mean, but
I did, I digested those things because I didn't
have any other choice. You know, you, you hung
onto those tapes like they were a diamond ring
and they were. You know, it's like, where's my
tape with this on it? And that I'm, I can, I
remember distinctly running into my sister's
rooms and asking them about certain tapes. Like,
where's my, where's my pink tape with this thing
on it? You know, my Memorex with, it says this
on it, you know, and they would have it or they
wouldn't know where it was. And I'd be in a panic
because you couldn't find your music. That is
awesome. Well, tonight we are here to talk about
your debut solo album. I had a name, but before
we get into the album, I'd like to talk a little
bit about. How we got here as you joined Shinedown
in 2008 around the Sound of Madness cycle. And
from there, you started taking on a role of writing
and then producing with the band, starting on
2010's Diamond Eyes and then continuing through
several of my personal favorite Shinedown songs,
such as Unity, I'll Follow You and Cut the Chord.
Can you talk about the transition from joining
Shinedown to becoming a songwriter within the
group and how they. embraced your contributions
from the jump. Actually, well, interesting. I'll
give you a little backstory on that. I was a
record producer studio rat around the time that
I joined Shinedown. I'd come into that role of
loving the recording studio. It was something
that was always ingrained in me, but I'd been
producing and engineering my own stuff, very
self -taught, probably for five, six, seven years
prior to joining Shinedown. through that process
of writing and producing other artists, a lot
of upstart artists, a lot of young bands. I didn't
really like working with established bands. I
still don't like working with established bands.
I'd much rather work with a band who's hungry,
who's trying to break out than a band who's already
doing it. But through that process, I met a gentleman
named Steve O. Robertson, and he was VP of A
&R at Atlantic Records, and he had signed Shinedown.
And he called me one day and he said, hey, have
you ever heard of this band Shinedown? And I
said, no. I have not heard of this band, Shinedown.
Not because I hadn't heard of the band, because
a lot of people had. I was buried in a recording
studio. I actually didn't hear a lot of new music
at the time, whether on purpose or just as a
result of doing what I do. But he said, oh, well,
they did that cover of Simple Man. I was like,
oh, yeah, I've heard that. And then he mentioned
Save Me. And I was like, oh, I've heard that
song too. So I knew who the band was. And he
said, well, hey, Brent, the singer, is writing
for their next record. you know, would love to
send him to write with you and record some demos
and whatnot. So Brent came to Charleston at some
point in 2007. That's when I first met him, early
2007. And I rolled up to get him at his hotel.
This dude comes rolling out of the hotel, pink
hair, the whole nine. we got in my car we went
to a show i forget what the show was went to
the music farm here in charleston south carolina
and we went to a show and we proceeded to get
annihilated on the egermeister like i mean done
i had to call my wife i had to call my wife to
come get us i was like i can't like you have
to come get us so that was my first introduction
to brent we partied pretty hard that night and
then we wrote uh we wrote the next day we worked
the next day We wrote for two or three days,
and then I had this idea. I'm like, hey, I really
love producing bands. These songs are starting
to come together. What do you think about bringing
the band in? Let's record these songs properly.
I didn't do finger drums, in -the -box drums
and stuff back then. I worked with bands. What
do you think about bringing the band in? He's
like, well, I can have the drummer here probably
tomorrow or the next day, and the guitar player
after that. We don't have a bass player right
now. Our bass player has left the band. I was
like, that'll work. So Barry came to town. I
met Barry. He and I hit it off instantaneously.
So Brent and Barry and I were very, not close,
but we really gelled together very quickly. I
think, and, you know, fast forward this many
years, I know exactly why. We all kind of similar
moral backgrounds and whatever else, you know.
But Jason Todd, who was the guitar player in
the band at the time, the original guitar player
in the band, showed up two days after Barry.
Barry'd recorded some drums, I think, already
at that point. And as soon as Jason showed up,
man, everything went out the window, went to
shit. He and Brent had a pretty codependent,
toxic drug habit relationship with each other.
And so as soon as Jason showed up, the drug started
and then just nothing happened after that. Oh,
wow. Like the whole thing shut down. The whole
thing went out the window, the whole writing
session. And so we left, they left without, we
didn't complete anything. We didn't really complete
songs. We had the songs were like working, but
like we never completed them. And interestingly,
enough, Brent left right from me. He went and
worked with Rick Beato, and Rick had produced
some songs on Leave a Whisper, the first Shinedown
record. Interestingly enough, before Brent came
to work with me, actually, I called Rick. Rick
and I were managed by the same person, and we
were friends. I wouldn't say colleagues or anything,
but we were definitely friends. I called Rick
and was like, this is pre -YouTube Rick Beato.
Great producer, man. Great producer. Obviously
a super talented guy. I mean, everybody sees
him. I was going to say, I love his videos, man.
Genius individual. Genius gets thrown around
a lot in our business, but he absolutely is.
I don't know if he would accept that or not,
but he's just highly intelligent on many different
levels, but extremely intelligent musically.
Anyway, I called him. I was like, hey man, tell
me about this Brent Smith character. And he kind
of told me, he's like, he's super intense, you
know, and he kind of gave me some kind of a heads
up about Brent. Just nothing bad, just that he
was intense and kind of what his work. how he
worked best but anyway uh yeah so that whole
thing fell apart and they left but but steve
-o robertson hit me up after that he was like
well man we didn't get anything and i kind of
told him why he goes well hey you know they're
looking for a bass player you know i know you
play i was like well i play studio bass i really
was traditionally a guitar player but i play
bass a lot in the studio he's like he's like
you know what do you think about maybe coming
and they like you a lot you know maybe joining
the band and i'm like man after that after seeing
that dysfunction i was like i you know built
this recording studio. My wife and I have a lot
invested in this. I've got this whole career.
I can't see leaving it for that. And it was,
you know, it sucked. I mean, it was kind of like
this, like I had to make an adult decision about
it at that point, you know? Hate it when that
happens. Well, fast forward to early 2008. Or
was it late? No, it was late 2007. I get another
call from Steve and he's like, hey man, look,
that guitar player that was there, Jason, and
Jason's a fine person. This is not me casting
any sort of... i i have no opinions one way or
the other but jason's not in the band anymore
and brent's really trying to clean up we've got
a new guitar player named zach and they would
love it if you would come you know audition for
the for the band and i i don't know man i don't
know what it was in that moment is the fact that
i was being asked twice by someone i respect
a lot i respect steve robertson an awful lot
and i still do even after all these years uh
he's no longer with atlantic but he's just such
just one of my close favorite people in the business
but maybe it's the fact he's asking me twice
and i said okay you know send me the song so
he said we'll learn this song in this song and
they sent me i think second chance and sound
of madness and devour i think were the three
new songs they sent then i went down to orlando
and played my audition and then that night you
know got offered the job and again man we were
all just getting along so well you know it's
like it's one thing to play music with people
it's another thing to just feel like you just
i know these people already And interestingly
enough, there's a picture of that very afternoon.
Somebody, the guy next door in the warehouse
space next door wanted a picture with the band
for some reason. And I hadn't even been offered
the position or whatever, you know, at the time.
And they're like, you want a picture with the
band? I kind of stood over the side and Brent's
like, come on in, man. You know, so like I'm
already taking pictures with the band at that
point. But there's a picture from that day, which
is of the four of us, which is interesting. So
again, I guess that's just my way of saying our
relationship started in the studio. Our relationship
started in producing and writing. Now, as far
as getting the trust of everybody, I mean, look,
I got dropped into one of the most insane records
in rock history, first of all, that I would love
to take credit for, but I had nothing to do with.
Chris Chaney played bass on the record. Not a
slouch. No, not at all. So Diamond Eyes happened
because Sylvester Stallone called the band and
he said, hey, I'm looking for a band to write
a song for this movie that I'm making called
The Expendables. And here's a little bit about
it. Here's what I want it to be. And he sent
over this poem, and I forget the name of the
poem, but the beats at the end of every verse
would say, boom, lay, boom, lay, boom. And he's
like, the only thing I want in the song is boom,
lay, boom, lay, boom. That's how the boom, lay,
boom, lay, boom thing happened in Diamond Eyes.
It wasn't us. It was Sylvester Stallone. His
idea. He wanted that from that poem. That poem
ties into the movie. So I just took it. I was
like, challenge accepted. I didn't even ask any
questions. I was like, we're going to write this
song. This is going to happen. And so we're on
tour. And I recorded this music, demo music on
tour. And then Brent took the demo music to his
hotel room, wrote a couple things. He and I got
up together. We wrote. Well, Zach came up with
a guitar lick, by the way. Let me specify that.
Zach came up with a guitar lick on stage at a
soundcheck. Zach came up with that. I took all
that stuff, put it into a demo form. Brent took
the music, wrote the lyrics. We had them figured
out. I took the band back to Charleston on a
break. We recorded all the music at my studio.
And then Brent couldn't make it for that session.
we were back out on tour we actually went to
uh johnny k the producer johnny k who's produced
you know disturbed and seven dust and i think
chevelle and a bunch of other people uh we were
in chicago we went to his studio and he he produced
the vocal he he recorded the vocals for that
so uh we got the studio with him and did the
vocals and sent it to uh chris lord algae to
mix and diamond eyes was born and i think from
there man it was just like Look, man, this is
what I was born to do. I was born to create in
a studio. If I was born to do one thing, for
better or worse, for painful or not painful,
this is what I was made to do. And then it was
just, you talk about the trust thing. There's
a lot of trust in a writing relationship, in
a songwriting relationship. And it takes a while
to develop. You have to get in a room with somebody
and really see what makes each other tick and
see how the process works. for the two of you
together or the three of you together or the
four of you together in some insane cases. That's
insanity to me, four people in a room writing
a song, but three at the most usually, but two
preferably. But Brent and I had to get in a room
and sort of figure that stuff out. And so when
it came time to start writing for Amaryllis,
I had a lot to learn about songwriting. I was
used to being a big fish, small pond kind of
thing, I guess. I was used to making decisions
that I thought were great. songwriting decisions,
production decisions. And by the way, by this
time, I mean, the band, we toured so much on
Sound of Madness record. I believe it's not actually
in the Guinness Book of World Records, but it
is a record for the most shows played on one
record cycle, I believe. It's like 400 and something
shows we played on that record cycle, I believe.
High 300s, low 400s, but it's a lot. And so by
this time we were all super close. I mean, there
was no, you know. There's no way we didn't know
each other by this point. But knowing each other
in that way, even though we'd done Diamond Eyes,
it was like, okay, was that a fluke? This number
one song that had this slow burn at radio, and
it went on the extended edition, re -released
edition of the Sound of Madness record is what
that's on. So I got in a room with Brent and
Dave Bassett first, and we wrote some together,
and that went well. And then Brent and I wrote
two or three songs with just the two of us. one
of those songs was i'll follow you although dave
ended up adding some some we added a bridge to
that song when we got in the studio the whole
lyrical bridge wasn't in the original demo so
dave got dave's a writer on that song that dave
dave wrote the bridge but the song was pretty
much in its other than that was in its finished
form but i had a lot to learn because it was
like i'm getting all this pushback on things
i'm getting pushed back on lyrics i'm getting
pushed back on music and all this stuff and i'm
just not used to that and it became very difficult
for me i'm i'm uh um I don't talk too often about
my neurodivergence, but I've got ADHD, executive
dysfunction, and autism, and just different aspects
of those things. But I'm extremely rejection
sensitive, right? And so it feels painful to
me. Rejection is painful. It's like it's this
physical thing. It's been that way my whole life.
I just never knew what to call it until I was,
you know, sort of diagnosed more recently with
this stuff. man, that was just really super painful
for me. So that began the beginnings of me really
getting thick skin. I realized very quickly with
songwriting, because I wasn't... Here's another
thing I was very used to. I was very used to
every single thing that I worked on, every single
thing that I wrote was precious and mattered
and all of this stuff. And then you get into
a writing session and you realize maybe this
song isn't happening and people want to abandon
it, that it's not like you're throwing your child
away. It's like, no, we just need to move on.
But it had this visceral effect on me. But that
record writing process was a good process for
Brent and my relationship as well as creators
and learning how to create together. And then
the band got really healthy. You know, Brent
was able to get clean and we all got super healthy.
Seemed healthy anyway on that touring cycle for
Amaryllis. And then when we came off of that
tour, Brent just hit a wall and crashed back
into addiction. And my depression kicked in and
I got a pill habit. out of that i started taking
a lot of hydrocodone and just to feel better
you know it made me feel invincible and and so
we fell into this really bad place all of us
in that writing cycle for threat to survival
and i didn't do a lot of writing on that record
i wrote two songs on that record one of them
was cut the cord which i produced as well and
uh the other one was black cadillac yep the other
song but then starting into that touring cycle
we all had a very very big wake -up call and
actually got healthy. Right in the beginning
of that touring cycle. The spirit of this band
really emerged during that time, I would say.
The current spirit of this band anyway. What
I would pin is our identity. That really enabled
me to be way more creative in the band and to
ultimately co -write most of Attention, Attention.
There's some songs that I didn't write on that
album. I love every song on that album, and I
produced and mixed that album as well, and then
into Planet Zero, the last record, and now into
this new Shinedown record that we're currently
working on, the same thing. Interestingly enough,
this new Shinedown record, the eighth Shinedown
record, I'm actually more hands -off than I've
been since over the last two, namely because
of this record of my own. So, you know, Zach
and Brent have been writing an awful lot on this
record. I've written... quite a few songs i mean
it's not like a not not not existent or something
but by way of comparison if i think about the
the 24 songs that were written for planet zero
that i wrote every single uh there's a writer
on every single one of those songs i think on
you know so far on this record i'm i'm on like
nine ten songs something like that you know so
far uh we have some more writing to do but i've
just been it's been it actually pretty painful
to kind of not be able to do two things at once
i wish i wish my brain worked like that but i
have to be creatively i have to be doing one
thing at a time for that thing to be great whatever
that is if i'm doing a shiny record that's all
i'm doing if i'm doing an eric bass record and
videos that's all i'm doing because something's
going to suffer and so i've had to be in this
like video making promo land of rolling this
record out of i had a name record but again no
back seat's been taken the the interesting thing
is man is those relationships that have been
forged in our band in in chaos and in love and
in everything else like that stuff is never going
to go away shine down would make the most boring
reality show of all time we all love each other
we all get along uh we all support each other
i mean the i had a name record is out because
my band encouraged me to put it out because i
i've been sitting on it for a while and i just
wasn't sure i was going to release it and and
just out of, out of, uh, insecurities and everything
else, you know? And, and, um, and I made it for
myself. It reckoned it purely for myself and
I didn't, you know, I just love the fact that
it existed. So, but they were like, man, you
gotta, you have to put this thing out. So yeah,
I know maybe that's more than what you were asking
about in the initial question. I kind of went
through the timeline there, but yeah, I, I, my,
my relationship with Shinedown was founded in
the studio. Not really on stage. And it continues
to be where I'm more comfortable. My role in
the studio with this band, I'm way more comfortable
with than my role on stage, for sure. And that's
something that you hear when you listen to the
albums, Attention, Attention and Planet Zero,
as you took on the full producer role on both
of those albums. However, I Have a Name was actually
written during the Attention, Attention tour
as a graphic novel. Care to explain a little
bit about how the graphic novel became a solo
album? Yeah, because I'm sadistic, that's how.
Because I don't know how to just do one hard
thing. I got to do 12 hard things. Yeah, I was
the first European tour for Attention, Attention,
hotel room in Milan, Italy. I just got done with
a workout. I had listened to Biohazard's State
of the World Address. Nice. A record that I...
love from back in the day that i hadn't listened
to a hell yeah love that record man such i just
loved love love love that record talk about a
record that like puts me in a place the state
of the world address puts me instantly in like
1996 playing in hardcore bands and touring in
vans like that's where my that's where my brain
goes i still have the orange cd jewel case embedded
in my brain yeah dude that was the thing man
like that record you know looked and sounded
chaotic i love it still love it but i hadn't
listened to it in a while when I did that workout.
And I don't know if that has anything to do with
this story, but I always preface it with that
because maybe there's some, you know, maybe there
was something to that. But I just got done listening
to that, did a workout in the room, and I had
a voice. And I think a lot of people experience
this, a voice in your head that maybe isn't yours
that guides you occasionally. And that voice
said, you might want to write this down. And
so I picked up my journal that I write all my
lyrics in and stories in and started writing
this story idea down for a comic book. And I've
never been a comic book guy. That's the other
interesting thing about it. In fact, the next
day I called Eric Rickert, who is my, one of
my best friends in the world. And it's always
been my help here at the studio, my assistant
engineer here at the studio or main engineer,
depending on the day. But he's a comic book fanatic,
like still gets, you know, every month gets deliveries
to the house and reads, reads them, knows all
the storylines and everything. And I was like,
I just started grilling him about comics because
I like graphic novels. I was like, what do I
need to read graphic novel wise? Because like
I, for some reason. I was told to write this
idea down that I'm supposed to make this graphic
novel. I know that sounds woo -woo to people
who don't understand it, but anybody who's ever
had, you know, something from beyond tell them
something, you know, that's just what it was.
It was like, okay, I'm supposed to do this thing.
And so I called him like, you know, what should
I read? What should I get into? And he gave me
some, cause I was obsessed with, I'm obsessed
with story. I wanted the story to be good. I
wanted to see what, what do you think are some
of the best graphic novel stories out there?
And he mentioned Saga. Saga was one of them.
And I read Saga and it's excellent. But I just
like to know what world am I getting ready to
play in? What is this about? Not the story. What
is this whole thing about? What's going on right
now? Why a graphic novel? Why is that what it's
supposed to be? But instantaneously, man, I saw
visuals. Instantly. I just saw characters and
visuals and scenes. And interestingly enough,
what I wrote down ended up being sort of the
prequel story to the story I'm telling. in this
i will be telling in the graphic novel and i
tell them on the record because as i started
developing characters i started seeing these
side characters that were like they're more interesting
to me and i picked those characters up that's
why it took a long time because i started working
on this kind of first part of the story and then
these other two characters in particular just
raised their hand and and were like we're super
interesting and so then i kind of started from
scratch with them and started writing this graphic
novel and and it's well on its way i mean act
one is completely written act two and three are
there just not finished and then somewhere along
the way with that i had these pieces of music
that i was toying around with just on tour on
that attention attention cycle and i remember
going to brent and i said hey man are you in
any headspace to start working on a new shinedown
record and he said absolutely not because he
does not like to write on tour but i had to ask
him i said i said i said well i've got these
pieces of music that they're pretty different
they would either make the most different shinedown
record of all time or I need to use them for
this thing. I've got an idea for them. And he's
like, go do your thing. He's like, I won't be
ready to write for another year. So that's kind
of where the genesis of the record started. And
I started writing these lyrics about these characters
and these stories about these characters in song
form. And what the record is, what I had a name
is, it's chronological in nature. I mean, it's
going from the beginning of the story to the
end of the story. But it's just scenes from.
It's not really telling. you exactly what's happening
is i was pulling out the same thing i do when
i'm writing other songs like you know if i have
something in my head a scene that i feel like
is interesting something i saw or experienced
that i want to write about that's what i do and
so i just did the same thing with these fictitious
stories and characters and i found it very very
easy to write lyrically very easy to write All
of these songs were very easy to write. I mean,
I'm not saying there weren't moments of like
you have with every song or, you know, where
you have to sit and kind of figure out, like,
I need an I rhyme and I can't figure out what
it is. And maybe the I rhyme isn't there. So
you have to change the word before it to an E
rhyme so you can say the E word here, you know,
that kind of stuff. I'm not talking about the,
you know, that sort of logistical part of songwriting.
I'm talking about just the sub, just everything
pouring out was happening very naturally. at
some point i was listening back to one of the
songs uh a song called good night good night
it's the fifth track on the record and it's very
personal to me it's a very pro probably one of
the more personal songs on the record and i realized
you ever have one of those moments where you
you have a shocking thought or shocking revelation
about something and you get ice through your
veins that shocking thing and i had that happen
i was like oh my god you know i've written the
most autobiographical record of my career or
I am writing the most autobiographical record
of my career through these characters. You're
not just talking about these characters, you're
talking about yourself. Every single one of these
songs is from you, from your childhood, from
your current life, from your depression, from
whatever. What that really did for me is that
enriched the record because it made... Now I
just didn't have characters anymore. I had characters
that were representative of... pieces of me and
pieces of and and i realized that in a lot of
cases when writers are writing they are they're
doing that everything that you make is a piece
of you but this was a lot more literal like where
um i could look at a character like davarin who
is the dictator who has taken over this world
he's the uh the main character in mind the mind
controlled song and video first single and you
know he represents all the chaos and depression
and everything that crept in and took over my
brain If you take this world that we're living
in as my brain, then he's the thing that came
in and took over. There's another character named
Jeff, and Jeff is this ancient Titan protector.
He's one of the former protectors of this world.
He's actually the main character in the prequel
stories. He was my first character, my first
Genesis character that I had for this. And he
was what's called a dark eater, and the dark
eaters ate all of the darkness in this world.
And here you go. I'm writing this story not even
thinking about depression at all, but here I
am writing this whole thing about it. You know,
even that far back, these Titans called dark
eaters, and they would consume all of the darkness
of this world and filter it out. And Devarin
came along and killed all of the dark eaters.
At least he thought that Jeff is the one that's
left. And he, Jeff represents that former protection
that you used to have, like in childhood. Like
it's at some point I was a blissfully ignorant,
happy child. you know and didn't had didn't deal
with these thoughts and you know room i didn't
ruminate on my my mental state so much you know
and and at some point that thing came in and
took it over and and so i have a character named
azalea and azalea she basically fights against
the fact that she was she's supposed to be this
religious figure and she's supposed to be this
spiritual religious figure but she's taken on
the role of this assassin and so you know if
i look at her and what i'm writing about with
her it's this journey of faith and and you know
my journey back to faith from not having it to
rediscovering it and so there's all this depth
to this record that i that again it was kind
of shocking for me to realize what i was writing
about uh when i'm writing in in the song azalea
and i'm singing in the bridge of this song it
gets quiet and i'm i'm supposed to be her maybe
her conscience or something talking to her or
singing to her and i'm just telling her not to
give up you know you can't give up you got you
gotta like even when you know not till there's
no more breath in your lungs when all is lost
even past all is lost until until there's no
other option left you don't give up and you know
you realize that like that's that thing in my
brain that keeps me going too and so it's just
been you know starting with this graphic novel
idea into this record then having that realization
made the writing of the rest of the graphic novel
not that and again nowhere in this graphic novel
or in this record does it talk about depression
or does it talk about darkness or rather rather
internal darkness or neurodivergence or any of
these things, they're representative of those
things, unintentionally representative of those
things. But what it did was when I went back
into the book writing and into the graphic novel
writing, it just gave me so much more insight
into the characters and it made the writing of
the story so much more rich and enriching for
me as well. Well, you've always been open about
your struggles with depression and it's come
out through the band's music. And it's something
that I personally admire of you as well as the
band, because there are songs like Get Up or
A Symptom of Being Human. These are songs that
speak to me. I'm someone who myself has been
dealing with anxiety and battling that monster
for years and maybe decades. I use for strength
and comfort. When I get in my head, they bring
me balance and they keep me grounded because
sometimes with my struggles, I feel like I'm
alone on an Island. And these are songs that
when I hear lyrics like that, they speak to me
as a fan. And I know that, you know what? We
don't know each other personally, but through
this song, I know I'm not alone. And from the
first lyrics in, in a world unseen. You announce
in here, we're all a little bent. We're all a
little twisted and we're all a little broken
right from the jump in this situation. I feel
like even though you're saying that the album's
not about mental health, it spoke to me that
way. And when I listened to the album, I actually
felt that presence in these songs. Was that something
that you were looking to achieve with that? no
that that's why i'm so astonished when i said
i had that moment of like realization where it
shocked me was that when i wrote those lyrics
in here we're all a little bit we're all twisted
we're all a little broken or when i'm inviting
people in a world unseen welcome to a world unseen
where i'm told the sky moves under me like it's
upside down you know a place where reason has
no sound and i swear that god's gone underground
i was writing about this world right all those
lyrics were written prior to that realization
and then I'm listening to Good Night, Good Night.
And what Good Night, Good Night is about is about
leaving that child that you were. Because I do.
I don't long to be a child again. But I'm enamored
that I had this moment in my life when depression
wasn't a part of it. Like, what happened? What
took place that brought this in? Because if I
could pick that piece of my brain out and throw
it away forever... I always said I would. Creatively,
it's something that makes me tick, so I don't
know if I would throw it away. Look, when I'm
down in it, I want to pull that piece of my brain
out and just eject it and get rid of it because
it is beating me about the head. It will not
leave me alone. So I think back to what happened
to that child, what happened to that young guy
that didn't have to deal with this. And so Good
Night, Good Night, in essence, again, This was,
this was the realization as I'm writing about
this characters, the hook at the end of the chorus
says, I hope you're standing arm and arm with
the things that did you harm. And I hope that
you have a good night, meaning just, you know,
I hope that you're still happy, you know, and,
and even, even the things that harmed you, you're
still okay with, but then realizing that like,
no, I'm talking about myself. So having that
realization after the fact of like, no, I didn't
intend to write that down as, as meaning in here,
we're all a little bent, we're all twisted, we're
all a little broken, but. Now I can't hear it
any other way. I still see the characters. It's
still about the characters. It's still about
the story. But realizing that this world that
I've created, that these characters live on,
this world called PAR, P -A -R, is, and look,
I wish I could come up with better names, but
sometimes when the universe speaks to you and
says, your world is called PAR, you just go with
it, you know? But that is my brain at the end
of the day. Like I'm writing about this world
that is my brain. and my soul and my heart and
and uh it's not just brain it's it's way more
than that but it was all completely unintentional
and it's why when i'm doing and again i'm the
world's worst business person i'm i'm a creative
through and through and when it comes to the
business side of things how to market i'm horrible
i'm just terrible at i can make the donuts but
i don't really know how to sell the donuts so
i'm terrible at selling the donuts so when we
were talking about when I was filling in the
team, my management team and the people at 1RPM
who are the distribution company and I'm publicist
about the record, they all latched onto the depression,
neurodivergent, you know, this record was written
about, and I had to stop and say, no, it was
not written about that. Like, that's why I don't
lead with that normally because it's like, I
don't want people to think that, oh, I set out
to write this record and I just put it, made
them characters. No, that's not what happened.
I'm writing about these characters. These characters
are genuine. They're real. The story exists.
It is what it is. It's just that, I was writing
so honestly about the subject matter and I didn't
realize how much of myself I was pouring into
this thing. And then when it was finished, it's
like, oh, wow, man, you've just bared it all
out here through these characters. And here's
the interesting thing about that is some people
will listen to it and maybe not get that wholly.
They won't understand, well, in this song, what
is this about? What does this mean? That's good.
I don't want it to be a distraction when people
are listening to the record. I don't want them
thinking, oh, this is Eric having a sad dad moment.
He just wrote this record about being depressed.
No, man, it's not at all. Ultimately, the story...
this record and this book are just the first
of four books that are going to be written and
told i don't know if i'll do a record for every
single one but ultimately at the end of that
story there's triumph down the road but you got
to start somewhere you know and right now we're
in the you know you got to start in the darkness
to get to the light but yeah man i and i i hope
that people listen to it and can pull something
from it that will be helpful to them because
at the end of the day i realize as i've gotten
older that you know my job on earth isn't to
be a musician my job is to help people and it's
really something i'm passionate about and i only
really know one way to do that to help people
and that's just through the silly little things
that i make you know whatever that is whether
it's a song or a video or a album or and and
some people won't say it's silly but i like calling
them my silly little things you know because
it is it's playtime man it's it's frivolous you
know it's it's insane that a 50 year old man
can make a living making songs but that's You
know, that's what we do. So I would be dishonest
if I didn't talk about those things. Because
part of me, look, at one point I was like, maybe
I shouldn't even bring this up about, because
I don't want it to distract from the story or
from the record. But I realized how important
these things are. And there's not enough hope
in the world. There's a lot of hope, but there's
not enough of it. And so if someone can listen
to a song like A World Unseen or All Good Children
or Good Night, Good Night or Can't Go Home. If
they can listen to those things and pull something,
mind control, if they can pull something out
of it that helps them with what they're going
through, then that's what matters. And so that's
why I thought that it was probably pretty important
to talk about, maybe not to lead with it, but
to talk about it for sure. Now, I've always wondered
about the mindset of a single from within a concept
album, because while I love hearing individual
songs, let's use Planet Zero or Dead Don't Die
from Planet Zero or... devil or the human radio
from attention to tension. As much as I love
listening to them when they come on shuffle,
I feel like they hit harder when you listen to
the album as a whole. Maybe I'm, that's just
me getting the quote unquote full experience
of the song from the artist's vision. But with
that said, was it a challenge for you to decide
which of these songs would be the best representation
of the album in the months leading up to this
release? Months, try days. There was no single
written for this record. So this has been its
own dark comedy in and of itself, this single
picking business for this record. Because unlike
a Shinedown record, I can listen to the songs
that we have written before we've ever recorded
them for a Shinedown record and go, that's a
single, that's a single, that's a single, that's
a single, that's a single, for sure. Sometimes
all of them have potential to be singles if we've
been blessed, right? But... With this record,
I intentionally just said, I'm not worried about
time. I'm not worried about don't Boris get to
the chorus. I'm not worried about any of that
stuff. I'm just going to write these pieces of
music that maybe take a left turn here and come
back. Maybe they take a right turn and never
come back. I'm just going to write these songs
and they're just going to be what they are. I
want to make pieces of art. I just want to make
music. That's all I want to do. And so that's
how I went about this whole record. Then when
I finally decided to release the record, which
actually wasn't that long ago, I said days, not
months. It was only a few months ago that I decided
that I was really going to go at this in earnest.
I'd say probably, honestly, probably July. But
the record was finished, so that's a big part
of it now. But then the question of single came
up, and I was like, you know, I've never thought
about it. I never thought about this going to
radio. I never thought about this having to be
on playlists. Yeah, I just thought about people
listening to the record beginning to end. That's
what it's about. I couldn't pick it. I thought
maybe a song called Azalea would be the single,
but it's a little long for a single for certain
people that you have to placate. But I'm not
going to edit it. I don't want to edit any of
these songs. I don't want to pull anything out
of it. If I were to pull the middle of Azalea
out, it's just another rock song. I love the
fact that it has this piano interlude thing in
the middle, and it's what makes the song itself.
So I sent the record around to a bunch of friends
and other business, I say business people, that's
a terrible way to put them, people in our camp.
who I'm very close to, and just said, hey, let
me know what you think the single is. And everybody
came back with a different answer. I mean, Brent
thought a song called New Graves was the single.
I thought Azalea was the single. Some other people
thought Goodnight Goodnight was a single. All
Good Children got thrown out there and Mind Control.
And like, it's just like it ultimately everyone's
saying there were a couple of songs that were
outliers that no one talked about. But so then
we had to have a call. And it's like, what are
we what are we doing? Like, this is I don't I
don't know. I. I was almost like, take this out
of my hands because I don't know what the single
is. Like, I've told you that from the beginning.
Like, I love all of these songs. Let's just find
one. And everyone thought that it came down to
a failure of mind control. And everyone thought
mind control was a lot more straightforward.
You know, the song starts immediately with the
lyric and it's high energy. And so that's how
it happened, man. I mean, I wish there was some
sexy way to put it, but it's like I've had just
as much trouble figuring this out as anybody
else. i was in the midst of making the videos
too and i had to stop and and uh yeah i'm directing
the videos and editing the videos and everything
so i had to make the mind control video and i
think it confused people because again one thing
you learn in the record business is like there
is no perfect plan there is no you just do it
just put something out like don't think about
it too much don't try to be too calculated if
you're too calculated it'll all fall apart so
this whole rolling out mind control while not
perfect in my mind it's like okay That's what
we're doing. We're rolling out mind control.
Well, the WAL and Legion, which is like the two
entities that make up the government in my world,
their logo is that purple diamond looking thing.
And so that DeVarn's video is purple. Like that's
every character's video has a color. And so I
was like, man, we're rolling right back out with
the. Planet Zero colors. You know, it's like
people are going to think like, A, they're going
to be confused, or B, they're going to think
that we're not that creative or I'm not that
creative. But that's why purple again. So again,
not in a perfect world, not what I would have
done. But through this record making process
and just trying to make the right decisions,
I talked earlier about coming back into my faith.
And this is my father passed away. picked back
up the bible and and got back into my faith and
one thing i did with with this record was i just
said ask for god's help with it i was like because
i didn't know what to do i didn't know how to
how to do it i was like hey i'll do the work
please you know of course i'm gonna do the work
but i'm putting this in your hands you just leave
me leave me around and so when mind control is
just supposed to be the first single that's what
it is i'm not questioning anything at all there's
a lot of peace in that man there's a lot of peace
and not questioning and just doing and so uh
because believe me man this especially the video
making process has tried to fall apart a couple
of times, you know, like pretty hard. And it's
just like, I just pivot to something else and
pivot back to something else. And there's a lot
of peace in that of just knowing that I put this
in a higher power's hands and that there's no
wrong answers. It's just doing the thing. I'll
give you a perfect example. The mind control
video, I didn't realize until three days ago
when I put headphones on, was in mono. How about
that? Everybody's been listening to the video
in mono and I didn't know it. And... That would
have spun me out before. Like a couple of years
ago, I would be like, ah, you know, this is in
mono. Oh my God, we got to fix this. I just very
calmly went in and found, it was my mistake,
found out what had happened. It wasn't my mistake.
It was something that had happened in an import
that I didn't catch. I hate it when that happens.
Somehow it had imported, instead of importing
a left channel and a right channel, it imported
two left channels. Oh, wow. Yeah, very, very
strange. So left and left, which is better than
left and right down the middle. But, you know,
left and left. So probably why it still sounded
pretty good. It's probably why I didn't notice
it. There's nothing phasey about it coming through
my speakers. I didn't, you know, think about
it. But I just very calmly went in, rebounced
another audio file and called the team like,
hey, can we can we get YouTube to let us upload,
you know, another. But just something like that,
man, just being more at peace with with things
maybe not going the way that I think they should
go, because you realize that that. again i feel
like i'm here to help people and so whatever
i have to do to make that happen there is no
fire to get to there's no reason to get angry
about things like that i mean i get frustrated
of course i'm a human but i'm not a monk you
know but uh it's been very calming to kind of
release a record this way and just sort of not
have it have to have all of this gravity around
it like that's what tends to happen when you're
releasing records and big projects is it's all
this gravity and seriousness to it and It's like,
I'm very serious about this. I spent a lot of
time and a lot of, a lot of effort on it. I spent
a lot of money, you know, to put this thing out,
but it doesn't feel like that. It feels like
it's just, this is what it's supposed to be.
It feels, it's very calming. It's almost off
-putting for me in a way, like personally to
feel this way. Cause it's like, this isn't how
it's supposed to be. It's supposed to be chaotic.
And you know, it's just, it just hasn't been
that, but that sort of calming stuff started
with the single. It was like, yeah, man, there
is no wrong answer. Like, cool. Mind Control
is the single. I wish I had a sexy answer. I
was like, I knew from the beginning that was
a single. No, man, I didn't know from the beginning.
I'm still not sure. I don't even know if it's
the best song on the record, but it's there.
All right. You've talked about it before, so
I have to bring it up again. Azalea. Yep. To
me, what stands out about this song is the dynamics
in it. There are several different musical tones
throughout this four minutes and 20 second runtime.
The open almost feels like this whimsical, swirling
dream sequence. The chorus is fucking pummeling.
Pardon my language there, but it is. And then
you have the melodic bridge you talked about
earlier. But it all feels perfectly at home together.
And I think the reason for that, and this is
something I would love to ask you as you're a
producer as well as a musician, there's actual
dynamics in this song. The loudness wars aren't
happening here. When you're quiet with just your
voice and a piano, the song is quieter. It's
not as loud as when the entire band is playing
and it's a heavy, mountainous, thunderous part
of the song. There's actual dynamics in the music.
As a producer, I'd love to know your thoughts
on is that something that you were looking to
do? Because I know in modern rock music, everybody's
trying to push towards louder is better because
of earbuds. But there are people out there that
genuinely care about dynamics and sound. And
as a producer, I'd love to know your thoughts
on that. Yeah. I mean, for me, emotion has always
been in the dynamics. Even in a loud song, I
want the chorus to be a little louder than the
verses. And I've developed a sense for that stuff
over the years. And I've developed a technical
way of making it happen in a mix that if anyone
is curious about it, if they... ever want to
ask me i'm happy to divulge i don't have any
secrets um but uh it just involves and i'm sure
that i'm sure i'm not i know i'm not the only
person that does this but it involves working
the master fader on the output of a song you
know when it's like i want that chorus to move
a great example of that is is black soul on attention
attention like the way that chorus hits you know
that course rips your head off when it kicks
in i love that man it's just you know and azalea
does that too and i'm glad you i'm glad you could
feel that and i appreciate that Thank you to
Ted Jensen, the legendary Ted Jensen, mastering
engineer at Sterling Sound, because he masters
all of Shinedown's records and all of my records
and anything I work on, I have him master, because
he appreciates that stuff too. And believe me,
man, it's something I have to come to terms with
when I listen back to a mastered record that
I've made, which is, this is not going to be
as loud as everybody else's record, probably,
like comparatively. It's just not. there's a
volume knob there. And if you turn it up three
clicks, three dB, whatever that is, then it will
be as loud as everybody else's record and it'll
have dynamics. And so that is a conscious thing
I do. I realized that I have to give up some
loudness shock value in that. Everybody wants
a loud record, man. I want a loud record. I want
a really loud record. I want the loudest record
out there. Everybody does. But you can't have
it both ways. And so... Yeah, man, it's a conscious
thing. I definitely make those decisions. I'd
much rather, I want something to breathe. I want
it to move. I want it to, you know, for me, it
just makes the exciting parts more exciting,
you know? And that's what I'm after. I'm after
that, you know, I want the hair on my arm to
stand up. And I know when I'm working on a mix
when that happens. Like, I'm like, that's it.
That's the one. And there's something to learning
how to play a mixing board like an instrument.
I mean, even in my mixes. So even aside from
working the master fader in the mix, itself you
know where their drum fills i'm turning the whole
drum kit up and down on drum fills and then when
the chorus hits the drums are coming up a db
maybe a db and a half on the chorus and then
back down and then maybe some of that guitar
is coming in a little bit louder on the chorus
and you know you just sort of i want this thing
to breathe and be open like like there's a tendency
not everybody i'm it's not a broad stroke i'm
painting here i'm not saying every mixer does
this or every and i'm also not saying that i
know what i'm doing You know, I just end up with
a result that I like. But there's a tendency
to just compress, compress, compress, compress,
compress until you don't have to move any faders,
especially with vocals. Like just compress the
vocal till it just sits on top of everything
all the time. You don't have to move anything.
I've always been a fan of compress less and automate
more. So automating, like I'll listen through
the vocal and I'll mouth the vocal with my eyes
closed. And if there's any lyric in there that
I feel, or any syllable that I feel like gets
lost, there's a T in there that gets lost or
an S or a, the end of this word gets lost. I'm
going to automate that up. And if you look at
my, if you look at my automation on my, uh, my
sessions, my drums, my vocals mainly are just
up and down and up and down and up and down and
up. And there's just dots everywhere all over
the screen where that vocal is getting automated.
Uh, and then my master bus is, is kind of, is
the same way. My master bus, my master fader
is going to be the same way. what's interesting
is when i sometimes i mix out to my master fader
on the analog console and so then i'm actually
doing it in real time too you know so it just
depends on what the it's a lot easier if you
keep the master fader in the box to do it but
in the computer but yeah man that's just uh why
record anything quiet if you don't want it quiet
yeah i don't want it to disappear completely
but you get the idea Oh, 100%. When I listen
to A Symptom of Being Human in the album listen
of Planet Zero, that's taking down in a moment
on the album. And I think because of how you
thought about dynamics is why that song really
took off the way it did. I truly feel the music
in that song. Obviously, the message is what
resonated with so many people, but the music
that sits underneath this message. is so calming,
but then it builds. And the way the drums come
in, Barry's not doing some like progressive rock
opus. He's playing to the song, but it's so big
because of the way the song has such dynamics.
Where in other songs, if it was just a loud overall
mix, you'd have to almost play more to try to
fight the loudness wars. Yep. Yeah, and it's
not just dynamics with that either. You talk
about the last chorus of Symptom of Being Human.
Something interesting happens there too with
the drums. And musicians are going to get this.
I'm not getting too inside baseball. But all
of the chord changes at that last chorus, once
it builds in, they all take place on the and
and not on the beat. So it causes the last chorus
to hop and kind of move differently. If we had
just left, shout out to Barry Kirsch, if we had
left... the kick drums just right on the beat.
Sometimes I'm in a club where I boom, clack,
boom, and it's just boom, boom, clack like that.
That'll end move right there at the end, lifts
that song a ton. It's unbelievable how much that
changed everything when that happened. Things
like that are the flourish on the end of the
painting, like we're painting on air. If you've
ever watched someone paint, I get to watch my
buddy Rob Pryor paint. Rob is doing all of the
artwork for my graphic novel. He did all the
artwork in the album cover. He's a phenomenal
artist. P -R -I -O -R, Rob Pryor. Pryor2art is
his Instagram. You should check it out. But I
get to watch him paint. And there's always some
flourish at the end of the painting. You'll think
the painting's done and you're sitting there
looking at it and then he'll do like one more
thing to it. and that's it and you realize that
one last thing is the thing that's like it's
like the sign off the signature you know it's
not the signature and it makes the painting that
one little thing is what gives it its flavor
that you didn't know it needed and so there are
little things like that like the last chorus
on symptom where where you just change the kind
of causal hop where the bass notes are changing
on the ands instead of on the uh on the ones
or there's a pickup on the end i guess is a better
way of putting the chords aren't changing on
that but That's that little flourish, man, that
you didn't know you needed, that makes the song
live and makes it breathe. And that along with
the dynamics, you know, it just, I don't know,
man. It's funny you say that we're talking about
this because I think about some of the music
that I love. There's other stuff, man, that has
no dynamics in it whatsoever that I just absolutely
love. Sometimes I love being pummeled. Oh, of
course. If I'm listening to a metal album, dynamics
be damned at that point. I don't want any dynamics
in that at all. If I'm listening to System of
a Down or something like that, man, I want to
be annihilated. Slipknot or something. Yeah.
Lamb of God for me, but you know, Totally. Same
thing, man. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't want
dynamics. What are you talking about? So I have
to, if you don't mind, this has been such an
amazing conversation, but I have a couple of,
I will kick myself if I don't ask short shine
down questions for you that are going to come
from a fan perspective, my personal shine down
fandom. Sure. And the first one is I'm a huge
fan of cover songs and no, I'm not talking about
simple man. The Warner sound live room EP that
you guys put out, you covered. I feel the earth
move from Carol King. Yeah. I'd love to know
whose idea that was and how that came into the
band because you guys frigging slayed that cover.
I love the gender flip on it. I love everything
about it. Cool. Thanks, man. Glad you noticed
that too. Yeah. So the gist of that was we recorded
in Henson studios in Los Angeles. And so it was.
they wanted each artist that came in and did
that. So there were multiple artists that went
in and did the end live room. And it was a live
recording. Like there's no, there's no overdubs.
Well, on I Feel the Earth Moving on, on I'll
Follow You, I did overdub the bass because I
couldn't play the piano and the bass. Wait, wait,
wait, you can't? No, come on. But technically
it's all live in the room. So the piano and the
guitar and the drums and the vocals were all
done live. and no punch -ins either like it's
like you're just going to do this song this is
what you're going to do uh do these songs you
i think there were four of your own songs that
you wanted to do and then one song that had been
recorded in henson studios and so the list was
long of stuff that we could do i mean the black
album was done in henson studios appetite for
destruction was done at henson studios and this
list goes on and on but you know we wanted i
just always want to do something unique you know
it's like what are people not going to expect
And Brent and I had thrown around multiple ideas
and he called me and he's like, hey man, what
about Carole King? And I'm like, I had not thought
of that. Like that's not even one that came up
in conversation at all. And he's like, yeah,
I feel the earth move and you make me feel like
a woman. All those songs were done in Henson.
And I'm like, oh man, awesome. So I got to work
on it, man. I was like, let me throw something
together. Let me throw an arrangement together.
and so uh this we put you make me feel as the
bridge to the song basically so to speak i had
to find a way to get down there but we we threw
that hook in there at the end of the guitar solo
but i uh i threw together an arrangement sent
it out to the guys everybody loved it and that
was the first time we played it together was
in that session i think wow yeah we'd all rehearsed
it on our own but we hadn't we hadn't rehearsed
it as a band we literally i think we all showed
up at los angeles the day before that and just
went in and did it The interesting thing about
that version, man, is that's the same piano that
she recorded that song on. So if you listen to
my intro and her intro, it's obviously the same
instrument. That gives me chills to this day.
Because when I hear her version of it, it's like,
I know that piano, man. But yeah, man, we just
wanted to just do something people didn't expect,
I guess. If there's one thing that makes us tick
as a band, that's what it is. Because a lot of
people second guess us a lot. And it's caused
us to walk around with a little chip on our shoulder.
So just to kind of make the chip bigger, sometimes
we want to do things that people don't expect
as well. All right. Second question. Attention,
Attention album. A New Way to Die was a bonus
track that you can only get if you purchase the
album at Walmart and you had to download it and
it was only an MP3. So being such a huge fan
of this one, I have to ask, and it's a small
minor gripe of all the years I've been a Shinedown
fan. How did A New Way to Die not make the original
Attention, Attention album? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I don't remember why that's not on the record.
And honestly, you just brought up a song that
I had not thought about in a lot of years. I
hadn't thought about that song in a minute. Wow,
man. I remember recording that song for sure.
Zach played bass on that. Oh, really? Yeah, on
that song. I played guitar on that song. He played
bass on that song. We do that a lot. We switch.
If you write the riff in Shine Down, you... generally
going to play the song on the record. Like there's
no, or a song like dead, don't die. The intro
is Zach. The intro and verses is Zach. Cause
he wrote the, he wrote that. And then it gets
to the chorus and I wrote the chorus riff. So
I played the choruses on that song. So there's,
there's, there's a lot of like flip -flops switching
around, you know, kind of stuff that happens
on our records like that. Zach played bass on
a new way to die. I don't, I don't know. I don't
have an answer for you. I don't know why that's
not on the record. Here's the thing. Obviously
at the end of the day, we decided. The word committee
sounds awful. Everything happens by committee,
meaning the four band members decide what do
we think the record is. And at some point, that
was decided that didn't belong on the record
for whatever reason. So that's the best answer
I have for you. I wish I had something more woo
-woo than that, but that's it. Okay, so then
for this third question, I wouldn't be doing
my part as a podcaster if I didn't ask if there
was any dirt that you'd be willing to share on
Shinedown 8 with the My Weekly Mixtape listeners.
Oh, dirt about it. Trying to think of dirt at
this point. Man, I don't know why this is the
first thing that popped in my head, and I apologize
if this is not what you're looking for. The first
set of songs that we wrote for the record, it
was me, Brent, and Dave Bassett wrote. I was
not well. I was not mentally well the whole time.
And there's a song called The Killing Fields,
which is a song that I love very much. Dance
Kids Dance is another one that we wrote. Searchlight
is another song we wrote. But there's one in
particular called The Pilot that is... It's one
of the sweetest things. I don't know if anyone's
ever given me a sweeter gift than this. And I
wish I could take credit for the writing of the
song, but it wasn't me. There's a song called
The Pilot that's going to be on the record that...
i had a moment man where i just like kind of
unloaded and vented to dave and to brent because
we're all great friends it was just one of those
things about how like man i'm not in a good place
and not you know i don't know what's happening
with my brain and and you know not sure i want
to be here and all of that stuff you know it
helps to talk about those things with people
i encourage everyone to talk about those things
like even the stuff you don't want to say like
when i say i don't want to be here like that's
a heavy heavy heavy heavy heavy heavy thing to
say but sometimes man you have to make your friends
your therapist and sometimes you have to just
they don't have to have the answers but it just
helps for you to articulate those things to somebody
but i got done articulating these things to him
and the next day we got back to writing and it
wasn't going well and brent looked at dave and
said do you want to play it for me i said what
are you talking about and uh evidently brent
had gone by dave's hotel room that night after
we got finished and dave was working on this
song and he played it for brent and brent's like
i mean you got to play that for eric and dave's
like i don't know man he's like that's super
personal like i don't know And I think Dave thought
maybe I'd be mad or something. I was like, that
was nothing of the sort. And he played me this
song called the pilot that he wrote about me
and about what I was going through from my perspective.
And dude, it's like, I can't wait for everybody
to hear it. It's again, I wish I could claim
songwriting on it. I don't have any songwriting
on it whatsoever. I played the acoustic guitar
on it and recorded it, but it's a very different
place for Brent's voice too, because it's soft.
You know, there's no trying to overpower the
song at all ever once in the song. He's basically
singing in a speaking voice the whole song and
it's, I don't know, just probably the, I don't
know, when I think about gifts that people have
given me over the years, that's just one that,
you know, and I probably don't tell him enough,
I probably don't tell Dave enough about it either.
But yeah, there you go. There's some, sorry,
this kind of solemn dirt, but it's dirt nonetheless.
Either it's dirt or not, but it's just something
that, that's the first inside scoop on the record
anybody's had. How about that? All right. Well,
the one thing I will follow it up with then,
attention, attention, concept album. I have a
name, concept album. Planet Zero, concept album.
Shinedown 8? Not a concept album. All right.
Not a concept album. Back to more of what Threat
to Survival was, what Sound of Madness was, which
is just a collection of songs. And definitely
all from a real place. Nothing's changed in that
department. It's just, that was sort of something
agreed upon before we even started writing. It's
like, let's just, you know. And again, it's like,
I think everyone's gaze kind of shoots at me
when they say concept record, because it's like,
I've been responsible for those three records
and they're all three concept records. But all
of those were unintentional, other than my record.
My record was not an unintentional concept record,
but the rest of them were pretty unintentional.
They ended up just being what they are. So this
time we're like, let's just try to spread the
subject matter around a little more this time
and see if we can't come up with some interesting
things. But wait. There's more. However, if you
like what you're hearing, be sure to visit the
episode page at myweeklymixtape .com, where you
can check out a full playlist featuring all the
songs we've discussed in this episode, as well
as some video and photos from the band's 2025
debut at Madison Square Garden. You can find
that over on the episode page at myweeklymixtape
.com. Now, normally, this is the point I would
start wrapping things up. However, Eric and I
continue talking long after the episode recording
was done, and he was kind enough to allow me
to run some of this. So I'm going to play some
bonus content for you guys right now here where
he's talking about some of his experiences being
on the road with Iron Maiden and the first time
that he met Wolfgang Van Halen of Mammoth. Well,
dude, like two interesting stories is Nico's
like the most awesome dude. And he would have
his dressing room was next to our room every
day. And he'd just get to listen to him warm
up every day. It was like, we'd be coming off
stage and he'd be warming up. And it's just like,
oh, but he'd pop in every day. It's just the
most affable, genuine person. Their whole crew
is, man. Everybody out there is like that. Same
thing happened with Kiss too, man. Kiss was like,
they were just so, one of the great lessons our
band learned from those two tours, not that we
didn't already know this, is. how to treat other
bands, how to treat the opening acts. A lot of
bands treat the opening acts like shit. It's
like this power move or something. And both of
those bands just treated us with so much respect.
And there was no fart sniffing or anything like
that. These guys and girls were just so amazing.
But the other thing is that Bruce, when we finally
got into the UK on that tour, that he'd be rolling
in late to every show, every single show, because...
He just took the trains everywhere. He's like,
ah, I'm good. Like when we were in London, he
was taking the tube. He was taking the underground,
then got on a surface train out to O2 Arena or
whatever, just traveling like that. Like just,
he's like, hey, I need somebody to come pick
me up from the train station. You know, it's
not like, and again, it's like, it's a reminder
of like. And I think it's just something that's
ingrained in us too as a band. It's like, I get
paid to be a rock star for two hours a night.
And then once I get off stage, man, drop the
rock star thing. You have to do that on stage
to a point, to do the thing, to put on the show,
to do the moves, to do all this stuff. You have
to feel somewhat larger than life to do that.
But when that show's over with, man, just go
back to... Just be yourself. And I love that
about Bruce Dickinson, man. He's like, yeah,
I'm just taking the train around. And another
great thing about him too, dude, his son Austin,
his band, they opened for us on a tour. And Austin
is such a good kid. He's not a kid, he's a man,
but I'm old. And I can say the same thing about
Wolfgang Van Halen too, because I met Wolfgang
Van Halen when he was young. I met Wolfgang at
17. And my first thought was like, your parents
are really good parents. Like, that's the first
thing I thought about with Wolfgang. And it's
the first thing I thought about with Austin.
Because I know so many shithead kids who have
famous parents. And the parents just allow the
kids to do whatever the fuck they want to do
and don't give them any guidance in life. And
you can tell with Austin Dickinson that, and
again with Wolfgang as well, but with Austin
that he had, his parents are awesome. Because
he's just way too... sweet and normal and caring
and loves his dad. Like, dude, his dad came to
the shows to watch his son play and would just
deflect every bit of attention away from himself
onto his son. And it's just, you can tell, man,
that he has a loving family. Bruce Dickinson
is a loving father, which is a really good thing
to know. The interesting thing is I have not
spoken to Wolfgang Van Halen since then. Really?
I just haven't had like a, we've done one festival
with him one time. and i wasn't able to to say
anything or get around i just you know again
we have never been in each other's sphere it
was at a uh it was a nickelback show we were
opening for nickelback in 2008 i think or nine
and wolfgang he he was uh i was standing up on
this up on the front of house on the riser at
front of house behind the soundboard watching
the nickelback show and i happened to notice
in between one of the songs this kid was trying
to get up on the riser and he had his girlfriend
with him obviously and The security guard was
like, he's looking at his pass and the security
guard was like, no, I'm sorry. And the kid's
like, and so I just went down and I was like,
hey, he can come up here, you know? So the kid
gets up on the thing. And by the way, Van Halen
was my seminal band when I was a kid. Van Hagar
first, because that's just what I fell into.
We're going to talk about the 5150 tape that
I got. Yes. And then I worked backward into the
rest of it. So I was in the throes of Van Halen
obsession when Born Lawful Carnal Knowledge came
out. Anyone who's a Van Halen fan understands
that that record, Wolfgang being born, Eddie
Van Halen talked about his son incessantly as
he should when he was doing press for that record,
so all the fans knew about Wolfgang. But I hadn't
seen a picture of the kid since he was super
young, whatever, I didn't know. But anyway, this
17 -year -old teenager kid comes up on the drum
riser. or no, the drummer, the riser in front
of the house. And I said, hey, man, I said, what's
going on? He said, oh, they were, you know, they
said I had the wrong pass. And he's like, I was
just going to go back and get another one and
blah, blah, blah. And he was so sweet. I was
like, oh, dude, you know, I got you, man. No
problem. I said, what's up? My man's Eric. He
goes, hi, I'm Wolfgang. And I just instantly,
it clicked. I'm like, oh, this kid's got backstage
passes. Who else is named Wolfgang? And then
the kid looked just like Valerie Bertinelli.
I was like, oh. dude like hey what's up man nice
to meet you you know and like so for me it was
like almost like a fanboy thing in a weird way
because it was like like dude i've been following
you since you were an infant you know but the
thing that stuck with me about him in that moment
was like any other kid whose dad's in a famous
band much less eddie van halen's and bertinelli's
son would have given the security guard shit.
Would have been like, what do you mean? This
is my line. Started raising hell, you know? And
I was just watching this kid be super respectful.
That's why I brought him up. He was like, oh.
I could hear him say, oh, okay. Well, let me
go back and see if I can get this. And he told
his girlfriend, he's like, you wait here. Who's
his now wife, I believe. Like, you wait here
and I'll go, you know. And I was like, that's
what I'm talking about. You have to have good
parents at that point. Like, you're like, you
know, you were not raised by. Parents who weren't
teaching you respect, you know, and how to respect
people. So anyway, there you go. Those are two
inside stories. I think it's safe to say there's
no shortage of amazing things going on in the
Shinedown camp. As you're listening to this episode
right now, 2026 is going to be a massive year
for the band. Shinedown 8 is on the way, and
I can't wait to hear what the band has in store
for us in the new year. I hope you guys have
enjoyed this Sound of Shinedown celebration.
If you have, please subscribe at Apple Podcasts,
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Drop a five -star review. Follow me on social
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My Weekly Mixtape episodes over at myweeklymixtape
.com. Once again, my name is Brian Colburn. This
has been My Weekly Mixtape, and I appreciate
you all tuning in, especially if you've made
it this deep into the episode. Thank you. Thank
you. Thank you. And we will see you next week.
Actually, we'll see you next year. Happy New
Year, everybody.