Born Broken at Wacken: Canadian Metal, Festival Stories, and the Power of Community

0:04 Hi, you have done to censure. For see wow for you young. This is the pipe Man here on the Adventures pipe Man W four c Y Radio and I'm here with Mike from Bourn Broken, Michael from Bourn Broken. Nice here at Vakin. Boy. You and I came a long way for to get to the Holy Ground. We definitely did. Oh my god. My travel was like they booked my layovers like right next to each r. So first one was Atlanta, which is a huge airport, and the flight was on the other side airport. So I'm carrying this fifty pound backpack running through the airport to get to that one. Then I get to Amsterdam the second layover.

0:59 I go there all the time. I forgot how big of that airport is and that was a bitch. And literally I got there like with a minute to spare, and I was like running the whole way opposite end of the airport. Of course, twenty four hours no sleep. But it's worth it sounds familiar, right, It's worth it though, like here we are the Holy Ground. It it blew my mind, like I did a bunch of interviews when I first got here this morning, and then I ventured out like fuck this place is big. And I do a lot of festivals, like I do Healthfest every year, and I'm like, it can't be much bigger than hell Fest. And then I looked at him like maybe it can.

1:40 Yeah, well this is the this is the big daddy of them all right. Oh yeah, and thirty fifth anniversary and it started with something not bigger than this room. That's what blows my mind. That's just the way festivals go. The fact that it had its longevity and it's pushed through and it's done all that, it's it's just a testament to itself. Oh yeah, they really knew what they were doing, the founders, and they've created this community that people are so loyal to this and I'm sure in Canada the same, but in the States, everybody I know, they know this is the festival. If you're gonna pick one to go to. This is it. Yeah, And for us to be able to play it is absolutely mind blowing. So yeah, that's what I was gonna ask you about. What did it feel like being on a valking stage, Like, what does that feel like?

2:33 We're being on the ground here, you know, what does all that feel like? Okay, Well, when it really comes down to it. All the nerves or whatever else is quite beforehand. Yeah, because once you get on the stage, it kind of goes you go into automatic pilot and you just you just do it. Doing it for so long, it's just kind of like a rinse and repeat type of thing. It's a little bit differ friend, you're you're able to focus a bit more there on the crowd, look at the crowd more, or try to get the crowd more involved. So like that was really cool. You know. The size of the stage that we got to play on was great for us. You know, it was the Headbanger stage.

3:14 It was big. We're able to run around, jump around. I haven't been able to stomp around on a stage like that in such a long time, so I felt really good to be able to just let loose, you know, and just really stomp it. And so that was fun. It's a lot more freeing too, isn't it, Because like when you have a small stage that you can't do that, it almost cramps you're playing right Well. Yeah, for sure. I Mean there's a lot of times where when we play a small club or a small venue, you have to sacrifice certain parts of the show just due to the. Stage space right exactly, and you have to kind of you know. If you want to rock out and jump around, and you're like, well where, so I'm just gonna hop in one place.

3:54 Like That's why I see a lot of times the band member will come down on the floor, you know, and because and I look at them and it's like, yeah, they just want some more room. Yeah. And then sometimes you know, you're putting your drum kit in front of an already backline drum kit on a stage that's big enough for maybe one drum kit. Yeah, so you got to accommodate those situations. But whatever, man, we make it work, you know. And it's exactly as long as you bring the energy in the vibe. But the size doesn't matter. It's it's it's the vibe. And we do it a little old school like it's more about the attitude and the experience. We don't really do lasers and dragons and all the rest of it, you know, like it's more just go out there and kill you know.

4:36 Yep. It's so funny because that's exactly the word that was in my head before you said it, you know, because it's true. It's like you think about the old school days, like they didn't need any flash for real metal. Forget the other stuff. But the real metal is just you went out there and you killed it and people dug it like that's you know. I think that's a big reason why grunge got popular for a while, because people were sick of all the hair metal, you know, fashion show and this and that, and just want people that were going to get up there and play. Yeah, I think so too.

5:17 I don't really know much about the grunge thing with like that type of attitude, but yeah, with metal us growing up in the eighties and the nineties, Okay, I just dated ourselves there. But you went to go see a band not because of the way that they looked, but because of their music. Exaust What you had is you didn't have back then all the social media and all that. You had one picture on the back of a cassette deck on the back of a cassette tape that was so little and that's the only thing that you had. And then you had the liner notes, so you would memorize the lyrics while you listened to the cassette and you got four songs and then you had to flip it and listen to the other four songs, you.

6:02 Know what I mean. And yeah, so you it was the music that drove you to like the band, not the persona of the people. Exactly, because like during the eighties, I lived in la and you know, like in nineteen eighty I was twelve and my dad said, pack your bags, We're moving to California in three days. I was very pissed about. Little did I know how great a move that would be. I wouldn't be sitting with you right now. But that was the thing, is like, what was that Slayers first show ever? Metallica's first show ever, and you know, they didn't do anything flashy. They just came out and fucking were brutal. And then when they left us, me and my bro would hitchhike up to the Bay Area and then we saw what it was really all about in metal and here we are.

6:51 Yeah, that's that's kind of like like what the metal scene started out back then, Like we had like Voivod. Oh yeah, bands like DBC, stuff like that. You know, who are some of the other bands that started out way back then. Ninety one was Kryptopsy and Cataclysm. So this is going more extreme, you know, but yeah, but the but the bands that Okay, we also had Razor and Anvil, Exciter and. Oh you know, I'm a huge Exciter fan, huge huge, like I love Exciter. We also had Brian Adams there you go. You also have uh, Sania Twain, Triumph, Triumph, you know what try Yeah, that's that's that. There is a great well. Of course we could go down that rabbit hole too with Rush and all these bands and whatever else, you know what I mean, April Wine, et cetera.

7:41 But now I just I just covered an April Wine show with Triumph. Wow. I just interviewed Rick Emmett was amazing. Oh yeah, he's still it. Yeah. I just interviewed Voivod at Hell's Heroes, okay, and they killed it there. You know, I always wonder why so much great music comes out of Canada, and then I think about it and I'm like, well, fuck, it's so cold up there. Just to say that, I was just about saying it's so fucking cold, you know exactly. It's like either you're gonna play music or you're gonna play hockey. Right, we're both. We're both I like both.

8:21 Yeah, me too, you know, yeah, so yeah, I know exact. You're exactly right, man, And there's a lot of Canadian bands that don't get the recognition that they deserved. Yeah, whether it's metal rock, whatever, you go down all kinds of rabbit holes and stuff. By the way, I just saw Triumph in April Wine. That was a great show. It was greatly, really good. But check this out. I saw a Triumph at the US Festival on Heavy Metal Day nineteen eighty three. Wow, I was And the fact that they were on heavy Metal Day, yeah, see I dated, but I dated myself right there. Okay, I'm gonna throw your one back. My uncle played on the S Festival. Whoa so Mahogany Rush? Oh really, Frank Marino?

9:09 Yeah yeah, well uncle, that's so fucking cool. So he was actually on the S Festival. He played it nice. So another Canadian band that like never really got I mean, they got globally big, but actually Canada never really embraced them the way the rest of the world did. Really, it's kind of interesting. That's kind of weird because usually Canada you're like really about your bands, like can't Canadians are Rush fanatics a lot they. Are, But I'll tell you what it is and I've said this in other interviews, and Mike's gonna gonna agree with me on this. Canada has this thing where if you come from Canada, you have to make it everywhere else and then they'll jump on board and say you're one of ours. It's not to say that I like, I love our fans. I love Canada the fan base.

9:52 I love my country. But classically with especially bands that are a little bit more on the edgy side and heavier side, I feel like it's other world markets that catch on first and then they're kind of last to the game. Yeah, but maybe that's changing now is that might be more of a thing that happened in the past. But it's uh, you know, there's a lot of great bends that come out of Canada and they just don't get the credit they deserve. We could drop a pretty good list if we actually took the time. Absolutely, because everybody we've named I think are great bands. And you know, it's interesting. We were talking about the US festival because I flashed back to the US Festival to day because this is my first time doing Vodking. I do festivals everywhere, his first time doing Vodking, and I was out there taking video and pictures when they were letting people in the infield and what. I don't know if you saw what goes on, but basically they have them at the gate and as soon as it's time to go in, security just opens the gate and they're just all rushing to the stage. And that's exactly what I did at the US Festival. It was like we waited at the gate, they opened it and I ran full speed to get to front. I was like fourth row of General, you know, fourth from the stage.

11:10 There was no rose, you know, and there were three hundred thousand people, but like there was a stampede. And I saw that today and I was like, huh, that's fun memories, exactly right. I'll tell you a funny story too about the US Festival. So Van Hamleen they headlined Okay, and they were playing at talking about love and Eddie's playing and looks over at Dave because Dave's not singing, and Dave looks at the crowd of three hundred thousand people and says, I fucking forgot the words. And the whole crowd cheered like it was the best thing it ever happened. Except one dude and one dude heckled him and he turned to him and he goes, I will fuck your girlfriend. Any probably did.

12:02 That's day for you, right, Yeah, But what a different time back then. A I'm telling the rules of the world were a little bit different. There's bands that never would be around today. No, Like I was talking about with my buddies from Armin Saint, who I've been buddies with since like I'm thirteen. I was their original merch company at fifteen, their first show I. Saw them at. They came out with hoods like the mentors. Do you remember the mentors? Yeah? So the mentors were these really misogynistic like their songs were all anti women, calling them names and this. They would never be a band today ever in a million years. Like uh, And there's so much that went on, Like think of skid Row.

12:53 She was only seventeen and you know what. I mean, winger Yeah, yeah, you know, yeah, I'm still yeah, but you guys are badass, thank you? And how does fucking thing happen? Anyway? Well, we actually did the contest in twenty at nineteen, and we got to the We got to the Eastern finals. Of course, because the contest was a little bit different. They didn't do different finals in each kind of category or each province or stuff. This time they did an Eastern and a Western final, and then they had two bands each. Move on. Anyways, we did the Eastern finals and just wasn't our time, I guess, right, And then, of course, you know what happened after twenty at nineteen, the world basically shut down.

13:46 So it took a while. And this year, just with the way everything was going and the momentum that we were having the good push with the album Am I Invisible, we were asked to do it again, and to tell you the truth, we just said let's let's just do it, and you know what I mean. But again we were like, whatever happens, happens. We had no expectations, we had no nothing. We were just going out there and like it should be ourselves, say it should be that way, be ourselves. And we just played and we won the first round and it was like, oh okay, all right. So then and we had lots of extra internal drama with with the with the band, like having cross gigs and stuff. So we figured it out and played the second round and we won the second round. So now we're like Okay, now we're in the finals. Luckily for us, the finals were in Montreal. Oh there you go, So it was we had the hometown crowd whatever else. But still, you know what I mean, all four bands were amazing that came out from out west Calgary, Toronto, great, great, great bands, and we won, and it just really was like, this is a little bit surreal that we're gonna get to play Vakkan.

15:08 It's probably still surreal, right, yeah. You know what, it's still surreal that I'm sitting here in front of you talking to you. We're six thousand miles away and we're both from North America, you know, so like here's here's where we met. I know, the thought pattern doesn't quite mix, but it does because we're here at the holy Ground. We're here in the mecha of metal, so it's it's it's very cool. That's why I believe that if we want to solve all the world's problems, we need one metal music festival that the whole world is required to attend. And political leaders they don't get a wristband, so security is instructed that they're not allowed there, and we just all go into the marsh pit and work all this shit out.

15:56 That's yeah, that would be a hell of a marsh pit, right, yeah, that. Would be crazy. But you know you're probably onto something. I think a lot of stuff could be worked out. You know, it's unfortunate. Because think about it, we're metal ads. Everybody thinks we're scary, and oh we go in a smash kiting pit and beat the shit out each other. Blulah. Now we pick people up at the end of the pit. We hug each other. And that's why I think it would work. That's actually one of the things I said before our last song. I was like, look at your brother, besides you look at your sister. Besides, you give them a hug, shake their hand. If you don't know them, make a new friend. We're all here from all other places around the world. We're all coming here together. Why to become a community? You know, the world is shit now, you know what I mean. There's no such a lack of empathy.

16:45 There's such a lot a lot of people are into themselves, very selfish and stuff. We're all indulged there in our phones. We're closed minded there whatever, and it's it's I basically said, you know what I mean, We're here together, and that's basically like one of our songs, that's what it's about. It's called Age of Anger Nice and that's so that's that's the feelings. So yeah, it was good to be able to direct that to the crowd and say, you know what I mean, look at your brother, look at your sister, give them a hug. You know what I mean. We're one community, because that's what metal heads are. We're like a community, doesn't matter where we're from. You see somebody, it's like those memes, are those commercials where you see like two metal heads and like the grocery aisle and they see them wearing each other's shirt and they just nod.

17:28 You know, they're best friends already, don't know each other, but we just we just we just. Are And a lot of people don't understand, Like like people talk about so I go on tour and do coverage all these festivals and they're like, well, you're not gonna have a friend or blah blah. I'm like, man, all my friends are there. It's when I get home. I don't want to deal with any of these assholes, you know, when I get home. Yes, that's why I live on an island get away from them, you know. And when I even it, it was so so funny. As I'm walking in this morning from the parking lot, I saw these girls that I'm friendly with, that I was hanging with that download that live in there in Italy, and they're like, hey, what's up. That doesn't happen anywhere else but metal yep. And so that's why I'm glad you're here at Vodking because Voking is a community, and I hope we see a lot more of you. Tell everybody how they can reach out to you buy your merch because they can't fucking listen to my show. And let's say, buy your merch.

18:35 Well, we're on pretty much every social platform Instagram, Facebook, TikTok. I think we even have a Twitter page. I call it Twitter still too. I can't call it x okay, it's stupid. We also got we're on all the major platforms like Spotify, We're on Apple Music, Amazon Music, so on and so forth. And then in terms of merger, okay, yeah, because I'm the one who makes the merch and stuff. That And I have to say, before you say a thing, he's wearing one of their shirts and I noticed it right away, very Canadian. I fucking love it. It's very color in it. Yeah, it's a zombies. It's a zombie mounting. It's a zombie mounty riding on a zombie moose. And they're having the Canadian flag with all the dead maple leaves and on the back it's a part of our national lanth and the true North, strong and free. So that's you know, and it's it's so we're we're here at Vadkan representing Canada for the Vacuum Metal Banttle shut out to them there for that, and JJ and stuff are helping us get here. And yeah, so if you want to get our merch, you can go to loud tracks dot com.

19:46 And if we have extra of these shirts, because this was a pre sale, like a one time thing to try to get us here, But if we do have some extras after we get back, then you can get some of those. If not, you can get our regular merch there. But all of our albums you could buy on band camp or whatever else or even just dm us. And you know, we're small enough I guess to say to throw an album there in the mail, you know what I mean. It's it's not beyond us. That's what we are. You know, I love it. Back then, what did you do? You You signed a cassette tape, you wrapped it up in a piece of a newspaper. Yeah, I stuck a sticker on it and you threw it in the mail, you know, And that's it. That's that's the way that I've missed those tape tracks.

20:30 I still have the Metallica demo tape that was probably recorded over fifty times. You can even tell what it says on it. Yeah, but still it was badass. Like I think kids are missing out today. I hate to say it like that, but with this track track track mentality, albums were experience it I did. Yeah, okay, that's totally it. It's totally unexperienced. People ask, well, do you still like what's the way you put your songs together? Well, we still put our songs together. Yeah, they're like an experience. Every track leads into the next for a reason. There's there's an emotional roller coaster that has to go when you listen to albums, when you listen to cassettes.

21:11 Okay, with see these, you start to be able to skip tracks. We didn't. We still would listen to the whole album, because that's the era that we came from. But yes, now it's very simple. It's very easy to just put out a single click click, click and miss half the album. Like we got like our streams and we see it our our singles and that or whatever else have tens of thousands of hits there whatever else. Our other ones have like fifteen twenty. And it just to put in like a perspective. So it just goes to show you that not everyone is just listening to the whole album. You got your favorite and that's it. And the problem is that sometimes you know, the best song is the first song on the B side.

21:54 Right, you gotta immerse yourself too, man, Like that's just look at disposable heroes there you go, you know, and like, okay, they don't let it. They only give it like ten seconds. Some of my favorite songs kids wouldn't listen to today because they wouldn't wait long enough, like battery, like fast as a shark, you know, like, you know, there's so many songs I can mention that they start off and then all of a sudden it. Gets brutal, just like leper Messiah too, like like that. So we give a little homage at the end because we grew up there with that stuff. To like, it's like Metallica and stuff all before Black.

22:34 Of course, that's fun. You should say that because as one of the original Metallica attendees and my twenty five friends when the Black album came out were like fucking posers, sellouts. We understand why. Okay the thing was, but yeah, but yeah, So we like to give little homages on our albums and sometimes to show our influences and. What it is. So if you can find them and pick them out and you know what I mean, hit us up say hey, I found this. I found that, you know what I mean. If you could find it whatever else and we think it's cool, I'll send you some free merch nice. I love it and listen, you guys are true musicians, true metal heads. Thank you, and I think you guys fucking deserve to be on the main stage of Vadkin next year. I'm just putting it out there, putting it out exactly exactly.

23:33 You know. Yeah, that's it, that's it. Would you'd be glad to come back, that's for sure. Well you enjoy the rest of Vadking and thanks for being on the adventures of pipe Man. Thank you so much, man my pleasure. Thank you for listening to the adventures of Pipelin. I'm w for CUI Radio.