PipemanRadio Interviews Major Moment at Louder Than Life 2023

0:04 Hey, you love than too, sus Sure, I'm for see why you wake up America. It's time for the Adventure. So pipe Man on W four cy dot com west pom Beats his number one internet radio station. Here's your host, the white Man, No Sence to Time. That's his pipe man here on the Inventure's pipe Man W four c Y Radio. And I'm here with Andre and Sasha for a major moments nice here at Louder than Life.

0:58 How does it feel to be at this amazing festival here in Louisville, Kentucky. It's great and we're super thankful for the opportunity. It's our second big festival and we're super excited to premier our brand new set that includes two brand new songs, unreleased songs for our new album Night And it was amazing to perform them live and showcase them to the audience for the first time and people loved it, and you know, we couldn't ask for more. I was a blast. So did you really expect that though, Like people come to a festival, especially playing early in the day, and they're like, yeah, I even like last couple last weekend I earn viewed Corey Feldman He's like, yeah, I didn't even expect three people out there, and they were like this massive crowns, Like holy shit, and he's somebody that should have a massive crowd. So, but isn't it wild to see how many people are supporting you so early? It is, and it's amazing feeling.

1:59 We did our share of work as well. You know, we promoted it as hard as we could, you know, and on social media, and we had our street team given out flyers over here. So we tried to invite people to our show and a lot of people came, which is which is great. All those efforts paid off. There you go, What makes you guys unique? Well, that's a good question, right, I would say we bring a lot to the table as far as like obviously if you couldn't tell from our accent, like we're not native English speakers, so myself and Sasha were originally from Russia, and so we we definitely try to blend our influences from early childhood that included both Western culture and our you know, native music. So we think blending those Eastern Western cultures together. We tried to also blend pop and metal, which is not the easiest thing to do.

3:00 Yeah, you know, and we try to play obviously hard metal festivals, right, and while having some melodies and having some lyrics that some people might consider soft or like two emotional for example. I love it, and I think we have a blend of also energetic songs and like more of a ballot, and we kind of keep that balance as well. We like to kill ourselves pop metal all right. And not to mention that we have two vocalists, male and female vocalists that are both singing on all songs, and we just switching parts, you know, depending on who's the leading vocalists, and then the other person takes kind of the back roll, you know, the back and vocalist role. I love that though, because I love I love maladays that you have, like it's almost like dueling vocalists totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and you have that different sound than it creates because somebody's a little less clean, somebody's a little more clean. And even when they play both roles, it's different, definitely, And even when we're in the studio, we're also kind of dueling, like for who's gonna sing this part, Like who's gonna get that higher note, you know, and all of that good stuff right like, and Sasha's been very jealous of me because I progressed on some extreme vocals and she I will catch up. Don't work.

4:30 She actually already did. We were in the studio. She's just liketing you think you're better. Yeah, exactly, exactly, it's just sneaky. So we were in the studio two weeks ago recording some brand new songs that are not even on that upcoming album. So for the LP two, Nice and Sasha did some extreme vocals on it. We were all surprised. Well, I do have to say that nowadays, I think the women in metal have way more badass extreme vocals the men, Oh for sure. Ginger, Yeah, you know Courtney yea, Like, when I watch Courtney, I'm like, holy fuck, because what she does with her mouth, you know, you can tell so change all the shapes all that. Yeah, it's like so wild. I just sit there, that's all I watch. This is extremely exciting, Yes, and that's that's the goal. To blend that sound into our songs as well's coming. So yeah, you're you're gonna be more in the background. That's all right, you know, I don't mind.

5:35 It's all It's all for the benefit of the band anyway. You know. Also, it's it's not a competition, that's right. Absolutely. How do you think this may be a tough question to answer, but how do you think the music industry or music scene has changed in your home country with all that's been going on in the past few years. Uh? Yeah, So that's all been very surprising to us, and it's all super sad and we're you know, ashamed of what's going on with our country. And we were actually trying to go and promote our debut EP back in twenty eighteen there and everything seemed to be kind of okay ish. I know that there were some conflicts happening, but nothing to that extent, and you know, I guess I didn't pay enough attention, which is you know, I'm ashamed to admit that, but now I definitely am. The music industry is kind of isolating itself there, you know, and the government is really trying to punish all those bands that's pick up, you know, and a lot of artists have to seek asylums and you know, seek their careers somewhere else, so they flee the country, while other artists who either believe in what the government I'm just doing honestly or just selling themselves out, whichever it is. There they seem to be doing just fine, you know, getting all play,

7:08 playing all those sold out stadiums that are mandatory to attend, by the way, so they're not really sold out, and all those puding speeches, all of that bullshit. I can't even believe. Like I'm from the eighties, I can't believe we're dealing with this nowadays. Like likewise, it's like we went through it before and it was stupid then, it's why bringing back. Yeah, this is very crushing. Do you see what's happening with your country? But also to the question, it's just another industry, like anything else, and like creative people can be a little bit more sensitive and more like asking questions. Yeah, so they're more vulnerable to that kind of stuff.

7:53 So that's really sad. We actually we're writing our new album right when the events were unfolding, so they impacted us obviously. Yeah, so a few songs of our new album are talking about the topics that are maybe not gonna be directly like in your face against the war, but they are related to the topics that uh and the events that led to this situation or maybe the outcomes of it and all of that. Like one of them is a song called What a Time. We just shot a music video two weeks ago as well. It's dealing, you know, it's talking about the consequences of what's happening right now on the possible one of possibility. One of the possible outcomes is that you know, some nuclear war and at the end of the world, and you know, it's super sad. Another song is talking about how everybody's having this weird nostalgia about the ussur days and like we're taught and not on board with that. And you know, whoever thinks those days were good, you know, they should stop living in the past. And uh we have we have that here too. But make America great, Yeah, exactly the great you want great? Right, So we just played that song called Victim at Louder than Life on Friday and that was a premier. Yeah.

9:26 Another song is talking about all the conspiracy theories about how the evil West is trying to you know, get everybody kind of you know, under their rain so to speak, right, and like how everybody's trying to like fight Russia and Russia is standing for good and all of that bullshit, so that that call that that song is called lunacy, because that's what it is for sure. This song resonated very good at the crowd, and I was so happy to see that happening well, because we have a lot of lunacy here too. Like it's like, I mean, I don't know. One of my bros who just passed, who best bro since like thirteen years old, he said, we just need to break it all and start over, because it is like pretty ridiculous nowadays. And you know, I remember before things were happening, everybody here in America at least was like, oh, we gotta go to Russia again and go visit and go visit Moscow. It's like one of the coolest places, and everybody talked so great about it. And now I feel sad that I didn't even go because I don't think it would be a good idea for me to go right now. Absolutely not. Yeah, And it's not a good idea for us to go back either, And you know, we're kind of scared for you know, our future in our lives because like we came to visit our parents, we can invite our parents over

10:56 right now. I actually haven't been home in like ten years, which is devastating, but that's okay. I mean, I'm willing to wait a little bit more and hopefully that conflict will resolve. I was thinking about that earlier. Like as far as bands go, you know, you're probably lucky you're playing at later in life because you're already here. But other Russian bands probably can't get these is to come here to play, can they, Right, it would be kind of challenging. Well, I know, slaughter to prevail guys. You know they're doing they're doing okay right now, but they're also you know, anti war, and like they also chose to flee the country because they're probably fearing the consequences of them speaking out. And you know, that's one of the reasons why we don't want to go back, because who knows. You know, they're like prosecuting people for protesting with a clean sheet of paper, you know, on the city city square, just pro posting on internet. This is like so random, that's what they're trying to do, like scare you, but that it can get to anyone. Yeah, you can get ten years in prison or fifteen years in prison, more than a murderer. You know more than a rapist, which is which is saying way you feel or not saying anything at all, because you know, blank peach paper, you're not saying anything. But that just shows right, And we definitely I have a character that you know that is kind of related to one of the stages called loudmouth. So yeah, I definitely am not the

12:28 one being quiet all the time. So I would definitely speak up. And we try to speak up as much as we can. We try to support Ukraine as much as we can. We work with we have a bunch of Ukrainian friends, and you know, we feel very sad with with what's happening, and we kind of feel responsible in a way as well, a second hand responsibility, which is which is you know, a different, different kind of feeling that I haven't felt before, but now I know how it feels. Yeah, hopefully music will help everyone to go through this hard time and make it for better. It is the best therapy and the great uniter, isn't it, Like, forget all these wars, just have a big music festival, That's what I say. But it's all in one festival and we'll work it all out at the end of the day. I think all cultures they have more in common than you know, the differences they have. It's the powers that being that want make us think we're different. Right. I experienced that myself, you know, growing up in this country at my age, who's like, Oh, don't go outside the US, it's scary out there. We're the only free country, blah blah blah. And I remember the first time I went to Europe, I was like, what were they talking about? Like, I was like confused. I felt just as free over there as I did here, you know. And it's like I think every culture does that. It's this like control thing, and you know,

13:58 you control people by fear and then they and then they become quote unquote patriotic, Like in this country mostly the most patriotic people have never been anywhere else. And I think you do. You have to go see other cultures, experience other cultures to really understand. Well, there's the difference between being a patriot in a way that you're you know, kind of proud of of your origins and like your accomplishments and like you're happy that your country is doing good, and then there are so called patriots that think like, oh, we're better than everybody else, you know, so yeah, you gotta be you gotta be smart about it. There are other people, There are other cultures, there are other countries, and actually being in the US helped us a lot to break away from that mentality because the US is such a melting pot of all cultures, you know, and like music festivals are kind of like that as well. You know, like we had Sleep Talking from Britain.

15:00 We had a Baby Metal from Japan, right or yeah, right, and we haven'to Chicari from from UK as well. You know, we have Slaughter to Prevail that is originally from Russia, major moment that has vocalists and the basis from Russia. So you know, we kind of all hang out together and we find our similarities, you know, and like we enjoy each other's music, and you know, we see what other cultures have to bring to the table and like we think, oh it's different, but it's cool, it's it's interesting, you know, it's enjoyable. Yeah. I also have a background in tennis. I am an ex pro tennis player, so I used to travel a lot and that kind of helped me also to see my country in a way from the other side and if you don't travel, you don't get that experience. So I think traveling is very important. It is.

15:56 So are you better at music or tennis? Oh no, I wish I was as good of a vocalist as a tennis player. But I think I can get there. Time. There you go. I think I'll tell you, guys should do like a tour with Ginger. It's like the United Front Tour or something like that. Oh, that would be amazing, right, We would love to Obviously it would be a very humbling experience from many sides. But you know, we have we've been to their show. Actually when they played at Boston, they crushed it. It was an amazing show, you know, and we felt like, you know, they're they they they had a speech, you know, and the band that was opening for them, Space of Variations, they had they made a speech, an anti war speech, and even though we were two Russians in the crowd, we didn't feel like the speech was against us, you know, which is very important that like, like we people have to understand, you know, like what's happening right now, like all all countries like kind of seemilarly uniting against Russia. It's not against Russian people. It's against what fucking Russian government just doing to the country that did nothing wrong, you know, Like some people may still believing in those bullshit conspiracy theories and fables and whatnot. But at the end of the day, like when you're when you're sitting in your apartment

17:26 in Russia, like ask yourself, is everybody in Russia doing good? What do you think? Like is your government taking care of you? I don't think so. I don't think so. That's right. And I also will add to that that no matter what government it is, what country, we can't blame the people because the people, as even here where we think we have a say, the people don't ever say it's those powers that be to ever say, like Putin or any other world leader. That's right. Yeah, well, in a way I agree, and I disagree with you because you know, we as a singular entities, as like one person or two persons, you know, we might not have much to say, you know, but the powers and numbers, you know, like it's one person protesting today, then two people protestings tomorrow. Then you know, the band is given out a speech in front of five thousand people crowd, you know, and it's it's all about that. That's how Russian government is winning those minds is because they're doing they're doing their job well you know, they're as far as propaganda goes, you know, and like we have to fight against that.

18:37 Well, I agree with that. I'm more about the people that like blame your people for the war or blame Americans for stuff that happens, Like, well, we have our responsibilities. I feel. I feel like as Russians, we have our responsibility because at the end of the day, we allowed a citizens allowed this uh bullshit to be happy in our country. We didn't we didn't care enough, you know, like we didn't think enough. We weren't attentive enough to what's happening to all the little red flags that were here and there. Uh from from you know, back when Putting became the president, it was always like the policy was always like, hey, we don't touch you, and you don't get into politics. You know, politics is a dirty business. It's not for like an average Joe, you know, an iverage, average ivan, you know, like mind your business and like we're not gonna get you. You know. But now now the tables turned, you know, like they're they're they're getting into people's private slaves.

19:36 You know, they're making laws that prohibit people to love each other. You know, they're making laws that prohibit people to voice their opinions, you know, even even to question the official agenda, which is which is unthinkable to me as Russian. I didn't grow up in the best country in the world, but it wasn't the worst. And I think I think it's becoming right now. Yeah, and that makes me sad for sure, because listen, we're all just humans and we should all have a say. And like in my state where I live. I live in Florida, they're removing any books about LGBTQ, any books about black history, very anti Jewish right now.

20:30 And it's people are not only letting it happen, it's like they're cheering it on. And I don't fucking get it. To be bored, Yeah, I don't get it. Why do we hate each other so much? Like we don't have to We absolutely don't have to. You do you, I'll do me. They're not affecting my Like these people they make a big deal about something that doesn't even affect their life in any way. What do I care what somebody else does? If it doesn't affect mine life, if it makes them feel good, that's all that's important, period exactly. So thank god we have voices like you and your music, because music is I think the strongest voice we try, and we're gonna try harder. Is there anything else that they should know about you? Guys? If you want to listen to our music, you know where to find us. We're on all social media and streaming platforms. We're answering all messages on social media ourselves. We're trying to be friends with all our fans and trying to be as open of a band as we possibly can at this stage in our career, because you know, once you take off and you get into millions, it becomes much harder to answer every message. So we try to take time out of our day to respond to everybody personally. You know. We don't use any like chat bots and none of that stuff. So we try to make a difference in the world and in the music careers in the US industry, you know, one day at a time, writing songs that bring positive messages, positivity

22:06 into people's lives, that share our experiences with everybody. We don't you know, we don't hate anybody. And you know, if somebody is not very friendly with us, hey that's okay. You know, we still don't hate you. We're just trying to make this for a little a little better place, right And if you guys want to support us, we're doing a very interesting release strategy this time with this new album that's called The Pain That Makes Us Grow. We're going to release every single on streaming platforms. But if you want to pre order our vinyl that which is did for the first time nice with amazing artwork, you can purchase it on our website and we're going to ship it this year, so you're gonna get it much earlier than on streaming platforms. And I love artwork. I think kids today are missing the whole experience of an album, right. We try to make it exactly what he said and experience. So we have like a beautiful gatefold edition with two vinyl discs. One has etching design on it. We have like all colored layout, all custom photography, custom design, everything. Nothing is like stock imagery and none of that. We worked with the best designers in the industry because we wanted to give our fans the best and we wanted to make it an experience, and you know, one of our goals as a band is to inspire other artists. Are emerging artists looking at us like we're coming from

23:40 literally nowhere, like Sasha's coming from another career. I'm coming from you know, the city that few people know in Russia, and you know, now we're here playing one of the biggest festivals in the world. We're so thankful for the opportunity. And we think, you guys, emerging artists out there listening to this, you guys can do this. You guys can can be in our shoes here next year or the year after that. Just work hard, do your best, you know, make art and make the music you want to listen to first and foremost. And you know, don't listen to naysayers and haters and gatekeepers. It's all gonna happen if you work hard.

24:25 So true. And the band I interviewed before you, this is their first ever gig. Can you imagine that, your first ever gig? It's louder than life and they're like, sixteen seventeen eighteen, where are you going from here? I know, right, other headline in the main stage too, I know, right, Oh my god, so yeah, I mean that's the beauty of the Danny Weimer festivals too, because he does promote emerging artists and developed artists and I've seen a lot of that. There's a band that played here at Laren Life called Silly Goose. Oh we all of them, Oh for sure we got out there, yep, exactly and I would hear when it happened. Uh and that was just so old school punk rock too.

25:14 Yeah, and we'll we'll love that band for that, you know. I think guys were doing such a great job but like self promoting everything and like crushing all the festivals, like camping parties and like playing after shows like on the on the top of the bus or whatever. It's so unique and like you don't see such drive nowadays, and like this was definitely attention grabbing for sure, and like I'm I'm I wish nothing but the best of the guys, Like I instantly want everything. Like the story with the subway and what not took off. I instantly subscribed, Like I was like gotta follow those guys, Like they're they know what they're doing, They're so smart, they're amazing, and they're they're legit as well. They are genuine you know, it's not like they're doing it as a marketing trick. You know, they just want they just want to play and they want to have fun.

26:03 And you know, if they're not on a bill, hey we'll play parking lot. Hey we can't be on the parking lot. We play parking lot next to that parking lot. You know, well, we'll play in McDonald's parking lot across the street. You know, you'll you'll hear us. Right, that's the way it should be. But everyone has their own journey, so just say yourself, do whatever you like, and I think with hard work, you're gonna get there. That's right. Tell everybody your socials, your website, how they buy your merch all that good stuff. We're on every single social platform, Instagram, Major dot Moment, Major Moment on Facebook. Our website is major Moment, band dot com. We have a bunch of new merge there, so feel free to grab some and the support us if you'd like, and no pressure. We know, like not everybody can you know, afford to support bands like that. But even if you're listening to us on this podcast, if you're listening to us on streaming platforms for free, if you're pirrating our songs off of whatever torrents. You know, you're still supporting us, You still like us, and we still like you as well. Wait, great attitude too, because it is kind of true, even if they steal the music, they're supporting you because they're listening.

27:17 They think it's badass, and they're telling everybody else to steal it too, right, you know exactly, Well, you guys rock and you guys definitely made a major moment. You're actually the longest interview of the festival. But because you have a lot to say and it's good shit, and you know it's very important, and I love that you're playing out there that we just all need to love each other and forget all the crap and stop letting the government trick us and playing this game of divide and conquer like I don't understand that is the oldest trick in the book and we're still falling. I mean, come on, you know, so let's just have the great uniter and that's music. We all love each other, all under one roof, nobody's an outsider, and that is a major moment. Totally Goodn't say it any better, and thank you for being on the Adventures of pipe Man. Thank you, guys, Thank you for listening to Thank of heaven Us, Thank you for listening to the Adventures of Pipe Man on W four CUI Radio.