Written off by some as Pantera clones, Dez Fafara and his band DevilDriver ignore the kneejerk generalizations and continue to churn out albums of raw power and intensity. On August 27th they’re set to release Winter Kills, the band’s sixth full length, and their first with Napalm Records. Kicking off a tour schedule that puts most bands to shame, Dez Fafara has little time for the niceties of interviews, though he was kind enough to break off a few minutes for CraveOnline.
CRAVEONLINE: Hey Dez. What’s up?
DEZ FAFARA: Nothing man chilling at home. Rehearsing. In two weeks we go overseas to start festivals.
CO: When you say we, do you mean Devil Driver or Coal Chamber?
DF: Coal Chamber is all done. We did a few tours, ten days in Australia and South America. A month in the states and some dates overseas in Europe. That was it.
CO: So is Coal Chamber all done? No new music from the band?
DF: No, it’s done. My focus has to be on DevilDriver right now. It’s fun to revisit that stuff for a minute, but I’m on one of the best records DevilDriver has ever done with Winter Kills, and we have a lot of touring coming up.
CO: The band started recording Winter Kills in 2012, and didn’t end until 2013. You also recorded music one place, and vocals another. Why?
DF: I started writing songs at home, then we went out on tour, and after the show I’d go back to the lounge and write for two or three hours a day. The guys brought me demos, and it just seemed to flow. It was a killer. I’d actually love to repeat that experience. Mark Lewis (producer), is very comfortable recording in Florida at Audio Hammer, and it’s a great studio. The guys wanted to record there.
For twenty years I’ve recorded away from home. You’d think that displacing yourself, giving yourself that uncomfortable edge would add to the art. I actually found that it was taking away from me. I was also tired of searching studios for a vibe, the correct vibe. I wanted the vibe I wanted. Black walls, orange couches, some place cool to hang out in. So I built a home studio. I’m also very unsocial, I’m a loner and a hermit. Having a lot of people dropping by, other bands recording, it just loses it for me.
CO: How do you handle being a rock star?
DF: Isolation. Isolation. Isolation. I’m not the guy at strip clubs, I’m not the guy backstage. I don’t want to get caught up in the whole thing that is being a frontman. You sit me in a bar with 150 people trying to get my attention, and I’m outta there. I just played the UK Golden Gods, and when the show was over I went straight to my bus and put on a movie, while everybody else went to the bar. It’s just not my thing.
CO: I’ve heard there’s a concept behind Winter Kills, something having to do with rebirth and death.
DF: I love rebirth. I love to plant a seed and watch it grow. I had no problem leaving Coal Chamber and starting a new band. I love writing new songs and seeing them thrive. In wintertime, you get that desolate feeling, and then in Spring & Summer everything is kind of reborn. We wrote the track in the winter, and I said if we want an album title, this is it. The track also fits with the record cover and we just decided to do it. There isn’t an overall concept for the album outside of that.
CO: You call Winter Kills a “hook driven record”. How does that differ from something like Beast or Pray For Villains?
DF: We’ve grown as musicians. Every record seems to clarify, and get better. There are two kinds of bands. Bands that release their first two records, then try to repeat themselves, and a band that keeps growing. DevilDriver records all have a signature sound, but are all very different. Beast was a visceral, kind of punk rock record, Pray For Villains was a very melodic, arrangements driven record. Winter Kills is a more cohesive record, it was really well thought out by the musicians and myself. All the vocals are first takes. We didn’t spend four hours on a song. It has a live feel.
CO: But your songs are really built around hooks.
DF: I shouldn’t have said hook driven, I should have said groove driven. Beast was kind of an out-there record us, we were experimenting with different things. The biggest compliment you can pay me is to say “That record doesn’t sound like the new record, or this record doesn’t sound like my favorite record”.
CO: Winter Kills is your first album on Napalm Records. Why leave Roadrunner after a decade?
DF: I know what Roadrunner can do, and what they didn’t do. I know when they have passion, and when they don’t. After awhile, people got dropped from that label, people who signed me, people who worked with me. They didn’t really have passion for the last two records, they just kind of put them out there. After losing the passion, and losing the people, I started losing the feeling. It was just time to leave.
CO: How did the Napalm thing happen?
DF: As soon as I met Max from Napalm (Markus Reidler, founder of the label–IR), that was it for me. The guy loves metal, he loves music, and he said ‘We want this record and we want to get behind it.’ Napalm needs a flagship band, and I’m willing to hoist the cannons and go fight for them, if they’re going to fight for me. Passion. It’s the bottom line of why I went with Napalm Records.
CO: Most bands the size of DevilDriver would go to the next biggest thing they could find.
DF: What’s the next biggest thing? Is Napalm bigger than Century Media? Is Century Media bigger than Metal Blade? Right now everybody is on the same level, unless you’re Warner Brothers or Universal. I was told multiple times that Napalm wasn’t tried, but I felt their passion, and they came with the kind of deal we needed to make the record. I go where my heart tells me to go. A year from now, talk to me and I’ll tell you if I’m still enjoying the process or not.
What Napalm are getting from me is the hardest touring band out there. They give us a home base. I would love to hit them up, between this record and the next one, to do a live record because I think DevilDriver needs one. There’s going to be a double record in Devildriver’s future. If I bring that to Max, he’ll back it.
CO: On the topic of new things. You have a new bassist, Chris Towning, is he on Winter Kills?
DF: No. Chris is not on this record. You’ve never heard me say, after five Devil Driver records, that this is our best record. Now, on our sixth, I’m saying that. Part of the reason is that on the next record, I get to work with Chris Towning. He’s an amazing writer, an amazing player, he understands punk rock and all of that. On the next album he gets to write with us. On each DevilDriver record somebody new takes the lead. An album like Pray For Villains, a lot of it was written by John Miller (former Bassist). Winter Kills, a lot of it was written by Mike Spreitzer (guitar) and John Boecklin (drums), with salt and pepper by Jeff Kendrick (guitar). Next album I’ll use my secret weapon, Chris Towning.
CO: You do a cover on the new album with an interesting backstory.
DF: Yeah. It’s called “Sail,” by a band named Awolnation. DevilDriver likes to record obscure songs. My youngest Simon, who’s fifteen, was playing the song. I heard it, I liked it, I immediately played it for my band, and they hit me up like five minutes later saying we should do it. It hit me in the gut when I heard the lyrics. The word sail, I’ve been on the road for twenty years, so it’s perfect. The band is an underground band, they haven’t hit major radio or anything, so it was perfect for us.
CO: Does the band like the cover?
DF: I believe they do. I’m not going to quote it, but I think the singer released a statement saying he liked it.
CO: Do you ever get tired of working?
DF: I come from a blue-collar, working class, construction background. I moved to LA at a young age, lived under bridges, and stole food. I scratched for everything I have. When money came along, all it did was provide security for my wife and my kids. I’m still scratching. Why? It’s art. It’s about making music.
I got to work on the new Soulfly record with Max Cavalera. I guested on the new Cancer Bats album. I create art, that’s why I scratch. I’m working on Born Of The Storm with Mike Morton from Lamb Of God. I’m getting ready to do a High Desert Moon record. I love art, I love to create. That’s what’s going on with me now.
CO: Alright man. Thanks for the time. See you on tour.
DF: Yeah man. Come back to the bus and have a glass of wine with me.
Check out more on Devildriver:
www.devildriver.com
https://www.facebook.com/DevilDriverOfficial1
