By James Wright

With an explosive debut that captured the attention of the heavy music scene Spineshank emerged from California to spread their own brand of hurt. After many months of touring to support "Strictly Diesel", Spineshank called it a day and headed home to write and record their sophomore effort. The product of those recording sessions is "The Height Of Callousness" a more mature, dynamic and all round better record than the debut. The mastermind behind Spineshank's madness, Tommy Decker, caught up with The Fang to discuss the new record, touring and why he can't be against Napster.

Shoutweb: I was just reading your press clippings and read a description of you guys and thought it had to be the worst description I've ever heard to describe your music.

Tommy: Which one is that?

Shoutweb: It was a newspaper article that said you're blending nu-metal, goth rock and hip-hop! (Laughs)

Tommy: Oh yeah! (Laughs)

Shoutweb: What is the worst description someone has used to describe Spineshank that you've heard?

Tommy: Oh fuck! (Thinks) They called us "Spooky Core" once which is I guess what Coal Chamber calls their music, and we were just like "there is nothing spooky about it to tell ya the truth!" On the first record we also got a lot of comparisons to Deftones, Fear Factory etc., so that got really tiresome. Have you had a chance to hear the new stuff?

Shoutweb: Yeah it's pretty amazing! This new record shows some incredible progression from the first one.

Tommy: Definitely!

Shoutweb: Was it a conscious decision when writing to change it up and use more clarity in the vocals and melody within the music?

Tommy: We got compared to a lot of other bands with the first record and we definitely wanted to lose that with this record. It's also that we've grown a lot as song writers and learned a lot in the last year. "Strictly Diesel" is a cool record but it's very middle-of-the-road so to speak and didn't take many chances. With this record we wanted to be more extreme on either end whether it's "The Height of Callousness" which is just screaming all the way through or if it's something like "Negative Space" or "New Disease" which are both very melodic and a lot hookier. All the kids that listen to Spineshank did not wanna hear the same record again because that would just be boring so we just wanted to do some experimenting.

Shoutweb: What was it like working with GGGarth? He seems to have fine tuned the Spineshank sound and I think he totally brought out the best performances from you guys.

Tommy: It was great! He was crazy! The first day we went into the studio he said "Ok what kind of record do you want to make?" and we just talked for three days without touching our instruments. He really wanted to know what kind of record we wanted to make and in the end I saw that he totally understood our vision. He basically let us go in and make our record, but he would push us the extra little bit that we needed and helped out with some of the arrangements. GGGarth is a really cool guy and it was a fun process to work with him! He's done so many different things and everything that guy does sounds different. Chili Peppers doesn't sound like rage, doesn't sound like Spineshank, doesn't sound like Kittie. We were glad he could help us find our own sound sonically.

Shoutweb: Can you give us the whole concept behind the name of the record and title track "The Height Of Callousness"?

Tommy: Musically the album just sums up what we felt for the past year, just really pissed off and angry. Basically the lyrics on the record are about just being fed up with everything and getting to a point where you just can't take it anymore, so you don't. We got fed up with everything around us and the year we had with all our bad luck and we just said "Fuck it" and put it into our music. We finally figured out how to put our emotions into our music and it felt real. It also kinda helped by going into the studio and putting it so much of your emotion into a song.

Shoutweb: There are definitely some possibilities of singles here especially with "New Disease". Johnny has a fuckin' amazing singing voice. What is that song about?

Tommy: A lot of the lyrics like I said are just personal feelings and emotions. With "New Disease" there was a lot of depression involved and at one point I didn't like who I was and was just kinda doubting my decisions in life and wondering if everything up to that point was a mistake. The majority of the songs are about that or just being pissed off or angry.

Shoutweb: I'm interested to know what "Asthmatic" is about since it's my favourite track.

Tommy: "Asthmatic" is kinda the opposite 'cause there was just this thing that was keeping me down and that was just me trying to get rid of it. I just had to get rid of this thing that was keeping me down and depressing me so I could keep striving to do what I wanted to do. Everything on this record was really therapeutic.

Shoutweb: So it was kinda like an exorcism to get it all out and onto tape?

Tommy: Definitely! We spent a along time just writing this record and we were in a dirty little studio with no windows and it was just really bad. When we were writing it was cool but the overall feeling when looking back at that period of my life was just an overall grey depressing time. As soon as the record with all the artwork and everything was done everybodies attitude changed and we were all happy again. It totally engulfed our lives for a while and when it was done people went back to being happy again.

Shoutweb: A lot people were kinda pissed at your decision to drop off of the Tattoo The Earth tour... Was that due to the bill's disorganization and the fact that you were added only three days prior to the first date of the tour?

Tommy: That contributed to it but I think they just had too many bands on that tour and we could have continued to follow the tour around and spent $30,000, but everywhere we went we weren't able to play! So whether or not we dropped off or stayed on I don't think anyone would have had the chance to see us play. We definitely were worried that if we dropped off that there would be people that haven't seen us or haven't seen us in a long time but the reality of it all was that we weren't playing anyways. We drove all the way from LA to New York and everywhere in between and we played one show for twelve minutes at 11:00 in the morning! It would have killed us financially and it was just the fact that we weren't able to play.

Shoutweb: Why were the sidestage bands only playing for twelve to fifteen minutes!? I think that's the biggest bunch of bullshit because there was a huge wealth of talent on the sidestage!

Tommy: Well I don't know what happened but I know sets were supposed to be a half hour and there was just a lot of bands on that tour. I don't particularly like festivals anyways because I'd rather see a band in a small club where it's dark and you get a better vibe.

Shoutweb: We all heard the rumor of you guys getting blacklisted from the New Jersey show when Metallica played at Tattoo The Earth along with a few other bands, but what really happened? I heard that you guys weren't allowed to watch the show and if you wanted to see the show you had to buy tickets?

Tommy: Well as far as I know none of the sidestage bands were allowed into the venue where Metallica was playing, which is fine by me because I hate Metallica and think they're horrible! I know a lot of bands were pissed off at the treatment though because a lot of the bands were just Metallica fans who wanted to go see the show and they were treated really badly. After that happened there was some chaos and a few bands decided to break some stuff! (Laughs)

Shoutweb: Well I know there are a lot of us Canadian fans that wanna know why you can't get into Canada! I was really disappointed and I know a lot of others were too when you guys were missing from the Fear Factory shows up here.

Tommy: We had problems for so long stemming from like stupid things we did when we were kids and they just wouldn't let us in! Any time any of the tours we were on went to Canada we would be stuck at the border just kicking it at the mall for like three days! We finally got in though 'cause we recorded the record in Vancouver.

Shoutweb: That's wicked.

Tommy: Yeah! Any tour we're on now we can definitely get in Canada! We're there for good! We basically had to write letters to the government kissing ass and had all kinds of people vouching for our credibility along with a whole bunch of money. Any time other bands would come back from Canada they wouldn't wanna tell us and they'd be like "It was alright." then they'd be like "Who am I kidding? It was great! I can't lie to you!" And we always would be bummed out 'cause we couldn't make it.

Shoutweb: You guys recently shot a scene for a movie with Lou Diamond Phillips called "Knight Club". What was that like?

Tommy: That was cool but it was basically just a lot of standing around. That was the first time I had actually seen how they make movies and it's basically just a lot of standing around waiting! We waited all day and all night and we played for maybe an hour or two just playing parts of the song. It was cool though and we got to meet Lou who was a cool guy. We just really wanted to get out there and play. We also did our video recently.

Shoutweb: That video was for "Synthetic" right?

Tommy: Yeah. Lyric-wise the song is about being something you didn't want to be and the video is us playing in a room with a real futuristic look to it. We all have these wires strapped to us in the video with a computer taking information from us and it makes like a "Synthetic" person who is just a mix of all our personalities. Its kinda based after the guy on the cover to the record and he's been around and realizes he's a synthetic person. It's really hard to describe 'cause you gotta see it for yourself but it's a really cool video. It's different from every other video you see today.

Shoutweb: Are you guys kinda hoping or expecting anything from radio or MTV at this point?

Tommy: MTV, probably not. Radio it's starting to get better out here at least with bands like (hed)p.e., Slipknot, and Static-X, starting to get airplay which hopefully opens the doors for bands like us who are along the same lines. It would always be nice ya know? Maybe my Mom can hear me on the radio! (Laughs) Then maybe you'd get a little feeling of accomplishment but if it happens it happens because it's not a big deal to us. The only way to build a following is to go out there and play shows because those are the only kids that care about you anyways. You get those kids that are twelve or thirteen years old and they like the one song they heard on the radio and they forget about you really quick! Then you have those die-hard fans who spend all their money on CD's, tickets and T-shirts and those are the ones we really care about.

Shoutweb: One of my best friends is like that with you guys! (Laughs)

Tommy: That's cool! If he wanted to spend so much money tell him we got some cool new merch coming out and that we'll hook him up with some cool shit for all he's done.

Shoutweb: That's cool I'm sure he'll be thrilled with that.

Tommy: Yeah.

Shoutweb: A lot of people on the Internet have the album already through programs like Napster... Does that bother you that people have the record before it comes out October 10th?

Tommy: No not really. A lot of people had me worried that it could hurt record sales which could kill a band, but I talked to a lot of kids that bought our record after they got it off of Napster. If they're really a fan they'll go out and buy the record 'cause they want the artwork and all the stuff that comes with the record. I think kids know and they try and support bands too because even I go and get stuff off of Napster so I can't say I'm totally against it. I think it helps spread the word and help the band get bigger.

Shoutweb: What does the future hold for Spineshank?

Tommy: Touring and more touring. We go out with (hed)p.e. in a week or so which is like the funnest band I ever had the chance to tour with 'cause they like to party and so do we.

Shoutweb: Anything you'd like to fans to fans out there?

Tommy: Just thanks for supporting us and we'll see you soon.

Shoutweb: Well thanks for talking to me Tommy!

Tommy: No prob. Thank you.