The Conflux Collective is Genre Bending Progressive Technical Death Metal In The Wake of Saturn

0:04 Hi, you live done to the censure? Wow, pray you. This is the pipe Man here on the Adventures pipe Man W four c Y Radio, and I have a very cool guest coming on because their music is pretty badass. So let's welcome to the show, Tommy from the Complex Collective. Hey, pipe Man, everybody, how are you? I gotta tell you. As I was saying it, I was thinking myself, tell somebody to say that ten times fast.

0:47 It's not that. No, it isn't like. As I say that, I'm like, don't fuck it up. Don't fuck it up in my head. So tell us a little bit about how this resurrection happened to create this in the wake of Saturn. I love the name of that. I just love that title. Nice, thank you. Yeah, I did quite a bit of research to come up with that. So well, I'll start from the beginning the resurrection. It was a very simple process, but you know, as things are sometimes simples, they're not easy necessarily. Yeah, basically I had tracks already pre recorded on the hard drive that was sitting there. I moved across the country and all kinds of things happened in the last ten years, and I was it was getting on my nerves. I was like, dude, those tracks are a killer and nobody's ever going to hear them unless I do something about it. So I contacted. I got I managed to get in touch with Chase, our guitar player who's been ghosting me for a number of years, and I took over the socials and the band cap and all that, and I was like, all right, let's let's get this done, because now I have a home studio and all that. I know what I'm doing. I can play guitar, so whatever our challenge was, we can find a bass player of the level we needed to

2:19 commit to actually track. So I thought, you know what, I have a pretty good bass. I'll set it up and drug by and I'll just record it. So that that's how I all started. I did the bass, I did the drums, I wrote the lyrics, I made the patterns, and then once I had everything ready, I sent that out to the vocalists and I had a couple of rejections, mostly because dudes were just way busy, like I was hitting guys that were a tour like and half families and or half families and all that. But I'm happy with the lineup that we finally were to gather. They're all they're amazing, Like they all blew me out of the water in terms of commitment and turn around time and performance nice.

3:11 Yeah, and you're right, man, it is so hard. I think after COVID, like everybody's working so hard, Like even me, I go on tour and I do media coverage at music festivals, and this year I was like, man, I need to do a few lessons here because like last year was one weekend after another from like February till November, which is longer than usually the festival season is, and it's just everybody's been trying to make up for that lost two years that we had. Yeah, broke a lot of stuff. They broke everybody right, exactly, And so I think artists have to work harder than ever now to try to play catch up.

3:53 You know, you have to be definitely smarter than ever and more and you know that the scene has changed so much and also the business has changed, but it's almost unrecognizable, you know, in terms of I mean there's there's a lot of opening opportunities and also there's a lot of things that are way more complicated than they used to be. So yeah, you have to navigate that, and it's if you don't have management, especially you got to be pretty clever. Yeah, no doubt. Like it's funny while you were saying that, I was thinking back to, you know, the days of the beginning of death metal, like when I used to see Possessed back in the day in the eighties, and you know, what they had to do compared to what a band like you has to do today is so drastically different.

4:48 Like you, you have so many jobs, not just a musician. Yeah, I was tired once I finished all that, and I'm still doing it. I'm still editing some videos right now, and you know, creating reels and and just and interviews, you know, which I'm grateful for. But all of that I saw him doing it all. So it's it's pretty tough. But like I mean, like the the hard part is done now the album's out. I've got John Asher helping me out with pr He's doing a great job plugging the A in and and helping me follow up, helping me navigate all that. But yeah, especially for a ben it doesn't tour and we like we had a little bit of history, but it was it was dormant for so long, it's it's a bit of a challenge to to bring everything up to speed for sure.

5:40 Well, I think it's also a good time for you to do it too, because I think the world needs your music more than ever now, and not just because of the music, because of the message. Well, I appreciate that. Man, That's that's pretty cool if you think that. I it's definitely a deep album in the wake of Saturn. I mean, I put I put my heart and soul into that thing, and so I really wanted to do something that's in the progressive matter of being reflective and being forcing people to think and maybe to meditate a bit. You know, no doubt, and you know, to me, music is the great uniter and the great greatest therapy there is.

6:24 And I think this is what this album brings to our community. For sure. I appreciate that. It's awesome. So how do you feel it's different for you creating this music or even updating it, because some of it was stuff you did a while ago, but you updated it to today. How do you feel it's different now compared to back when. Well, I mean, I'm I'm definitely a better musician even than back Dan in terms of like I could compose, I can harmonize, I can please strings, you know, record and edit all stuff that When we recorded the EP, we had a sound guy, you know, and then we got a mix engineer, and so I did some stuff obviously, but my jump is mostly get the drums together and you know, get the car to drive the gear where it's supposed to be going. And now, like this thing, I took over the whole entire production. Jean Artist like she helped me out with the mix because my my original I did two mixes before sending her something, and yeah, when I really listened to it, it's like it's it's a pancake, you know. So she's like she took PD of me and she's like, why don't you just let me handle this? But in terms of production and also like kind of project manager getting at the whole thing together,

7:54 I did all of it. So for me that that's a new level and it's part of the reason why I really wanted to get this thing done as part of a bit of a schooling if you will, you know, or learning process. Think for me, it's easier to learn if I have something to aim towards. So I thought, you know what, I have all these tracks. So Chas's guitars were final. We didn't I didn't have d I's uh, so we had to go with the tone from his camper profile that he had down. Luckily, I hadd and B and I had all of the or I mean left right, and I have all the guitar solos. Everything was there. Uh, but I only had five tracks. So that's why I decided to write three more. And so that was my first time writing whole songs that made it onto records. Before, with the access and stuff, I only wrote riffs, you know that I would be writing stuff, and then when Rob started running out of riffs, he'd come to me and be like, hey, do you have any thing I can Yeah? So that that was that.

9:03 That was that. So like it's basically a big step up in all matter of it's kind of also kind of my first experience as alleged band leader, you know, not just sort of like the second. Yeah, that's cool. And I think one of the other cooler things, like if we're going to talk about the cooler things about being a musician today is as an artist, you have way more control nowadays. Oh yeah, crazy. Yeah. Yeah, as long as you master the tools, you basically the sky's the limit, right, Like the limit is getting it to the audience. That's that's where the big the big challenges is navigating the social media because everybody is in for themselves, right, so they'll they'll try to cap you. They'll try to sell your advertisement, yeah you know they advertisement doesn't always translate into sales either, So it's you have to just sort of play the game and play it slick.

10:04 You know, no doubt. You have to be a lot smarter, I think too, because you don't do live shows. So that's a tough one. Yeah right, you got you gotta be creative and what you do to get the get it out there for sure. Yeah yeah, the conflicts, I mean, I would love to get a like we'd have to get a live lineup, you know, but it'd be kind of hard because Chase doesn't really play guitar anymore, he told me, and so I'd have to get somebody to learn all this stuff, and it's not easy. It took me eight months to track the bass because I didn't have tabs right, so I had to lift everything basically note for note by looping the looping the doll, you know, right, and it was pretty crazy, man Like, it was a lot of work.

10:51 So yeah, so and and and this kind of band too. It's it's kind of hard to say, oh yeah, we're gonna play like five thousand people a night, I don't think so, right, We're going to start playing like bars and coffee shops and clubs, like tiny clubs. So yeah, it's kind of a big undertaking for for for that, you know, I'm I'm sort of aiming towards a different kind of project next. And then if I go back on the road, I wanted to do something a little bit more, a little bit less blast beauty and a little bit more easy on the body. Not because I'm lazy or anything. It's just I'm getting old and I have something I can sustain and maybe build a brand this time instead of just doing one off albums, you know, maybe build a brand that I you know, I could get some momentum, get signed and all that.

11:48 Great point too, because I think about that often. I look at drummers that have been doing it for a long time, and an extreme metal like, I'm like kind of still able to do it. You know, you look at most people at certain stages of life. They can barely walk much less you know, play brutal right exactly, but like it is tougher. I think, you know, it's easy when you're a teenager to like have you know, everything it takes to make them play brutal drums. And I say drums specifically because I look at drummers like I played drums for nine years when I.

12:29 Was a kid. I sucked, but you know, but uh, you know, I think that's why I think about it that way, because I'm like, holy shit, when I be doing that at this age, you know, and it's like, you really it takes being fit to be a drummer. Especially death metal memo and and and stuff that that like conflex is lots of intricate season and they're not easy to to play, right. So one thing is, you know, for me, I'm just going into the studio, I always have to be peak shape, right, So I and then I got injured recently because I got a training injury, so I haven't been really able to practice as much or anything. So I'm sort of getting back into it now.

13:21 So my next thing is I want to focus more on independence, you know, like four way independence and grooving like that. That's where I feel like at forty three, now, that's where I feel like I can get another thirty years out of that, you know, like just pushing the boundaries that way instead of pushing the boundaries at the speed and intensity oh that kind of intensity anyways, you know what. Yeah, So I just it kind of pushed me. That injury thing kind of pushed me to re evaluate my style and all that stuff. And then Conflux. I really wanted to get it done because it was already kind of half done and it's just sitting there and I was like, oh man, this is sad. So I wanted to finish it up and really like you know, put it to rest in in a brilliant way.

14:16 Well, I mean, you did an amazing jobs. It is brutal, but it's also like so technically good, and I think that is the difference a lot of times, Like you know, once you really learn your craft, then you can create like death metal that is musicianship opposed to just you know, brutal, but it's brutal with musicianship. Yeah, I mean that the uh, the groundwork was already there because Jason's guitar playing at the time, like was so brilliant and advanced, so that the five tunes he wrote, I mean they're they're unbelievab like the amount of string skipping and all that, and it's not just that too, that gets sketchy, you know.

15:05 Yeah, and then I just. Finished the arrangement, which result always for me sort of my secondary duty in any band, right, like, besides drumming, and back in the days when we didn't use the program anything, you know, we just dabbed so like developing arrangements and so so I really focused too, Like I I got inspired a lot by catchy bands, you know, like Depth and Gogira let's say, you know, or old school debt metal bands kind of you know, Morbid Angel Death, let's say. Okay, I want these to sound like songs, you know, not studies. I want them to sound like songs. So I really really worked hard on the lyrics to find the right words in the right spot. The singer totally caught win of that, and they totally ran with it and made it like life, you know, like really nice.

16:02 I think that I'm really happy with the results, to be honest, I could be happy. Well, definitely, everybody has to check it out. Well, I don't you tell everybody how they can connect to you on socials, how they can check the new album out and everything else. Woll very easy, uh for for those who use big streaming services like Spotify, Apple, Title all that stuff, Uh, it's super easy to find. Uh. And I'd say just just google the title. In the wake of Saturn, it's unique. Uh, there's a couple of complexes out there, but if you search by category or if you search by title, you're going to find it right away. Uh, conflex collective in the wake of Saturn. But on Spotify it's just complex because the CDBB my uh digital distributor, didn't allow me to use collective because the logo said complex. Anyways, it's in the I thing, I guess. Uh, so yeah, complex in the way of Saturn. It's on all major platforms through CD baby and then for higher end if you want to listen in waves, go on band camp. Is that that's the four point one sixteen bit format that's on there, so it sounds better than m P three's and YouTube music and all that. So bandcam and you can purchase the digital for this time around, I wanted to have vinyls. I did remaster the recording for vinyl

17:34 and I also produced a CD which is also has the bonus tracks, the first EPs bonus track on the CD and the artworks inside. So you can check that out at elasticstage dot Com, Complex Collective Official Music. It's they'll do. They'll print vinyls, high quality vinyls and CDs on demand when you purchase them. So that's what I went for this time around. And then we've got merch on fort Wall. We got our merg store on fort Wall. So if you guys check out either Comflexes YouTube or Facebook page or Instagram page, conflux Co is the Instagram handle you can find all the links to all of that, so yeah, that's it. Our band cap, the band cap has all the links as well. That is my favorite.

18:34 By the way, they are really helping the artists out by offering that direct salet portal and everything. That's that's really really cool. See I love hearing that because there's so many of these services that are screwing over artists. I'm always happy to hear when one is treating them right. Yeah, Well, you know it's that the business model of the big streamers like is is really built on volume, and it's built towards advertisers, volume and shareholders. Right, so the artist really is sort of the left in the lurch, if you will, you know, they're left. Yeah, Like so what they paid people really is flaffable. Like I saw post the other day somebody had a million some stream I think they made like two hundred bucks out of that.

19:28 I know, it's ridiculous, right, it's absurd. I mean it's absurd. It's it's horrible. So like the streaming really, the streaming revenues, I mean it's it's non existent, right, so uh what what what I find it's a great alternative to that. If when people really want to encourage a van and they love the band, uh necessarily, maybe they have a small apartment, maybe they don't have a turntable, whatever they wanted in their phone, go and buy by the digital album. You get the artwork, you get the lyrics, you get if you don't have to listen to advertisement, you know, and it's not very expensive. You can carry it with you, you can copy it, and it sounds great because it's the actual format in which it's meant to be listened to, with all the depth and all the details that's there, So bancap is great for that.

20:19 You can buy the wave files and stream them on the app as well, and it's it's very good for that, so. I encourage definitely. Yeah, so that's cool. Everybody check it out. And do you have a final words for our listeners. Well, and everybody that's taking the time to check out the Complex Collective in the week of Saturn album, thank you so much. Like I said, I pulled, I poured my heart and soul into that and it was a pretty challenging album to make. So check it out, have a listen, share it, and I hope you you head bang and it it suits your mood. There's there's a little bit of everything on there. And then it's good to see you again. Pipe man. We talked last time about Derelict. Derelict's coming up with a new album. Uh, that's gonna probably be out next year or something. We're going at the mixing towards the end of this year, so I'm working on the apps right now. Yeah, I fromout that sounds good. Well you'll hear from us again and yeah, that's it, man, stay heavy and thanks for the thanks for the invitation.

21:38 Yeah, and thank you for being on the adventures of pipe Man, my pleasure. Thank you for listening to the Adventures of pipe Man. I'm w for c u I Radio