Thrice at Louder Than Life: Creativity, Longevity, and the Joy of Making Music

0:04 Hey, you're listening to The Adventure of Spiderman on W4CY Radio. This is Spiderman here on The Adventure of Spiderman W4CY Radio, and I'm here with. Ed Breckenridge. And Riley Breckenridge from Thrice. Nice. You're at Louder Than Life, man. Yeah. They all swirl my head. I know you play a bunch of Wimmer festivals. Have you played Louder before? I don't know that we've done this one before. I know we've done Welcome to Rockville. We've done Aftershock. I feel like maybe one other one.

0:49 Probably Sonic Temple or Incarceration. Yeah. So have you had a chance to check things out here at Louder Than Life at all? Not really. We're kind of like parked over by our stage, which is the. I don't remember what it's called. It's a decibel. Yeah. Something like that. So we're kind of parked like in the boonies and we had to take a shuttle here. Um, I have a feeling I know where you're parked. Yeah. But I'm hoping as the day progresses to wander a little bit. Um, heat permitting. Oh yeah. Yeah. Which I've renamed the festival hotter than life.

1:32 Yeah. I agree. I agree. It's brutal. Right. Yeah. You're over at the reverb stage. Okay, cool. So yeah, that, that, that is definitely on the other side. So, um, But that says something, too. Like, you've done the Wimmer Festivals for years. Yeah. This place is massive, ain't it? Yeah, it's really cool to be a part of this. And, like, so many bands that we grew up listening to are newer bands that we're into. And it's rad to be just a part of it and amongst it and then just get to play a show ourselves. That's cool. And so you're the newer bands. Is there somebody set that you want to see today while you're here? Oh.

2:12 Not on the newer side. The band that I'm really psyched to see tonight, I hope it works out schedule-wise, is Gojira. I knew you were going to say that. I saw them at, like, Pukalpop or something in Belgium, I remember, years ago. And they blew my mind, and I've just never had a chance to see them since. And I'm a huge fan, so I'm stoked to see them. You know what blew my mind? When they headlined Hellfest. Oh, yeah. Like, in their own country. Because I do Hellfest 2 every year, and it blew my mind because the year before Metallica headline, Gojira had a bigger crowd. Oh, wow.

2:53 If you could imagine. That's awesome. And it was like, oh, my God. The crowd, of course, loves it because the French, they love their hometown boys, you know? That and then the opening ceremony thing they did for the Olympics. Right. That blew my mind, man. You know? Gojira opening the Olympics. Metal has come a long way, man. Yeah, it's pretty rad. Like, I was there from the very beginning when we didn't even want it playing on the radio, much less playing something like that. We don't want anybody to know about our music. Yeah, it's great. I also really wanted to see Mastodon, but they play at the same time as we do.

3:35 Oh, I hate when that happens, right? Yeah. So... What is it that first got you guys into this? Would you say Van Halen? Like metal or like heavier music in general? Music in general. And then maybe segue into the heavier. Music in general. Um, our dad was like a huge jazz head. So he was playing jazz all the time. Um, Beatles were on in the house a lot, Led Zeppelin, Stevie Wonder. So a pretty, like, wide array of musical styles. That's how it was when we were younger, right? Like, our parents influenced us, or other people, and my older brother, too. Like, all these different things, especially the beginning of metal, when there really wasn't the heavy, heavy stuff.

4:27 Yeah. You know, everything you mentioned was an influence of mine, too, you know? Yeah. Sure. Yeah, I remember going through our parents, because we're brothers, our parents' music collection and just picking out things with the. Coolest album covers. Yeah. And just testing it out, you know, seeing what it was. And, like, yeah, I remember, like, specifically, like, Led Zeppelin and, like, even, like, Cat Stevens or stuff like that. It was, like, really cool. And I loved Cat Stevens, too. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And then on the metal side... I feel like Metallica was the first one. Metallica, and then that opened the door to Sepultura, Pantera, Iron Maiden.

5:11 Iron Maiden is a big one. Big one for our band starting out. The Guitar Harmonies. And Steve Harris on bass. Oh my gosh, yeah. I remember being a kid and going, holy fuck, this guy is good. Yeah, he's so good. Right? Yeah. So then, what happened for you guys to decide to play together? You can tell that. Yeah, so the other two guys in the band, they were talking about starting in a band. And Riley, who's my older brother, he. Had been playing in punk bands before. And I was like, oh, I could borrow one of his bandmates' basses and try and figure it out and start out with you guys.

5:59 And we were looking for drummers, and I was like, my brother could play with us until we find somebody. And then he ended up just sticking with us. And he also writes a bunch of guitar parts, too. And that's kind of been how the band has functioned ever since. We all write kind of everything, and it's a really cool way to keep ideas fresh and I think that's the way it should be, right? Yeah, and we've been the same lineup for 27 years. 27 years, yeah. That's insane. Yeah. Right? Like, that rarely happens. I'm even, like, impressed that you guys are still together because I would not want to be in a band with any of my brothers.

6:40 I'd probably kill them. I mean, we're like family. Like, we have our differences, but we've kind of figured out over the years how to, like... Let it talk it out or let it slide, you know. See, that's great because, you know, when you're in a band together, I think it's like taking growing up together and multiplying it times 20. Because you're spending 24-7, a lot of stress, a lot of shit goes on. And so it's kind of hard to stay close under those circumstances. There's so many things that have to line up. Like everybody's commitment level, uh, like life, you know, choices, all that stuff. Um, finances, you know, just everything has to line up. And like, I feel really lucky to be with other people that are willing to be as committed.

7:36 And, uh, yeah. And just finding the balance to like being able to like, uh, give up some things that you might want, maybe touring more or doing whatever. And then, uh, Yeah, it just makes it difficult, but it also makes it so you can last. You just have to be willing to compromise in some places and not compromise in other places. I think another important thing is we all share the same goal with this project, which is to be creative and to push ourselves as artists. There isn't one guy in the band that's like, I want to be famous.

8:16 Or somebody else that's like, oh, we've got to write records for the radio and. This and that. It's like. We all just want to make stuff that sounds cool to us, and if that works out and people dig it, then that's awesome. And if they don't, then that's also awesome. I think so, because when you do it like that, first of all, you're real. So to the real people that are really into this music, we can see that. But also, if you're not having fun up there, which you wouldn't be if you weren't playing your own music, we're not having fun either. So... make your music for you, and then you'll attract your tribe.

8:57 For sure. We have to give it to our fans, too, because our records have changed quite a bit just because we feel really free to just do whatever we want to do. And thanks to the people that support us, we've been able to do that and keep it functioning. And that's the way it should be, too. Like, to me, a musician or an artist shouldn't have rules or a box. It's like, it's what you feel. And we have different vibes at different times. So maybe one day you have this vibe that writes a song one way, and then another day you have a vibe that writes it a totally different way. Yeah.

9:38 Having the freedom to explore what you want to is really nice. And not being worried about not fitting into the box that people want to put you in. It's very freeing. And they keep making those boxes smaller and smaller. Right, right. I think we need to just go back to it's rock music, it's metal, and that's it. Stop there. Yeah, we don't need to compartmentalize everything. Exactly. If it's good, it's good. Like even talking about Metallica, talk about the big four of thrash, which I was there for the very beginning of all that. Nice. The four of them didn't sound anything alike. There were some commonalities, but You could tell the difference. You could tell Slayer from Metallica from Megadeth from Anthrax. Now I see some sub-genres that are so finite and they use this formula. I can't tell what band is which.

10:40 Everybody's using the same guitar plugins and the same drum samples. The same producer. To me, that's not what music's about. I remember when I was trying to learn how to play guitar and I just was experimenting with it. I didn't know how to do shit, so I just wanted to see what noise I could make out of it. And my dad would yell from the other room, you should give that up, you suck. And maybe I did, but that's the key. That's how you find that riff that lasts forever, not from a formula. It's because you're experimenting and you're like, holy fuck, look at Tony Iommi. if he didn't have what happened to him happen and have to figure a different way to do things, maybe we wouldn't be sitting here right now. You know? So I'm glad that you followed that, because that's important. Is there anything you want to talk about that's coming up that we haven't discussed?

11:49 We are kind of at the beginning of a tour with Taking Back Sunday and Saves the. Day right now. Nice. We did a show in Nashville like. Five days ago or something, and then all the bands split off to do a bunch of festivals. We did Riot Fest and a headline show and then doing this. But then we joined back up with them, I think, Tuesday. And we're hitting a lot of the U.S. Over the next month. So if people want to go see that, come out and see us. And I'm very jealous because normally I do Riot Fest every year. And they've switched Louder Than Life to be the same weekend. So I had to make a choice.

12:32 And I just want to know, did you get to see Captain James T. Kirk of the Enterprise and his new metal band? We didn't. I looked at the list of when the bands were playing and I didn't see it. I don't know if I missed something. Right? I didn't see it. But it also... It rained out the day that we were there. So maybe they. Like shortened everybody's set list. And it was, I wonder if they cut. Yeah. I think tool went on at like seven o'clock. Wow. It's like, yeah, yeah. That's insane. Daytime tool show was interesting. I don't think I've seen them so many times. I don't think I've ever seen a daytime. Show, but it was raining. So like their light show and the lasers and whatnot, it still looked awesome with the rain coming through it.

13:17 Yeah. It was, it was cool. Does that blow your mind, 95 years old, Captain Kirk starting a metal band? I know. I can't believe it. I can't believe it. It's cool. I'm like, what world are we living in? Because it's both of my worlds. I lived through college through Captain Kirk. Yeah. You know? So I was like, fuck, I'm going to miss that. Yeah. I love that he's going for it. That's sick. I know. It gives us all hope, right? You know? Like, imagine being 95 and playing a metal band. I hope I'm 95 and I'm in a mosh pit. I'm 59. I'm alive at 95. I'm 59. I was in Chad Gray's mosh pit the other night. Nice. You know? Oh, that's great. That's what it's about, man. It's the best therapy there is.

13:59 Oh, it's for sure. You know? And I'm glad that you're part of that therapy. Thank you. Yeah, we're glad to be a part of it, too. Well, you guys are badass, and thanks for being on The Adventures of Pipeman. Thank you for your time. Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having us. Thank you for listening to The Adventures of Pipeman. On W4CY Radio.