Show & Tell - interview with Rob Arnold of Chimaira

ROB ARNOLD of CHIMAIRA
04.12.04

You’re touring in support of your critically lauded second full-length release, The Impossibility Of Reason. Scant weeks before heading to Europe for a headlining tour, your drummer tells you he’s quitting… via your manager. That’s like your girlfriend breaking up with your answering machine.

Do you panic? Cancel shows? Reschedule the tour?

Hell no… You jam with Soilwork drummer Ricky Evensand for two weeks and head right back out to kick some European ass.

Metal bands and drama go hand in hand… What would any self-respecting metal act be without it?

It’s how you handle the adversity that defines you.

Back in the States and out on Jagermeister’s Music Tour in support of Fear Factory and headliner Slipknot, we caught up with Chimaira guitarist Rob Arnold and chatted about adversity, losing a drummer and the Cleveland connection.

Rob: Hey man, thanks for taking me early. It’s a hectic day, you know, and we’re trying to do things as soon as we can – you know what I mean?

S&T: No, it’s not a problem. Oddly enough, a friend of mine just had a baby at 11 o’clock and I was just saying to my wife, “Today’s a crazy day, I have to get over to the hospital at 3 o’clock, I wish we could do the interview earlier, blah blah blah.” And then five minutes later I got the call asking if we could do this earlier, so it’s perfect. Sometimes stuff happens for a reason.

R: Yeah, perfect. Perfect.

S&T: So how’s it going?

R: It’s going good, man. We’re having the Slipknot tour now, of course, and things are just awesome. Every show’s been totally sick and everything’s so pro and we’re just having a great time and getting well-received and we’re happy to be out here doing it. Best tour we’ve ever done so far.

S&T: Really? Well now that’s a glowing endorsement.

R: Why’s that?

S&T: Well, it’s the best tour you’ve ever been out on…

R: Well, I mean, it’s just that everybody’s in good spirits. Usually there’s something about a tour like – now this is just spoiled stuff to say, but – the bus will suck, or there’s another band on the tour that’s creating problems. But this tour everybody’s way cool, everything’s so pro and taken care of. Anything you need is cool, you know. Just the little things, like parking. I don’t know.

S&T: Very cool. Well congratulations then, because that’s the first time I’ve ever heard anybody say that.

R: Well cool, cool.

S&T: Typically it’s like you said - one band just takes too long to soundcheck, their load-in guy’s an asshole, somebody hates how you have to put your stuff over here…

R: Yep, yep, totally. And even though we’re the small band on this tour, the other guys have given us a lot of respect and stuff, so we appreciate that everybody, you know.

S&T: You’ve toured with Fear Factory before, right?

R: Yup. Yeah, we did a Road on a Rage tour back in ’01 or something like that. It was us, Ill Niño, Fear Factory and Machine Head and that was really cool for us, but like back then we were a different band, we were still growing. But now we’ve got our show locked down and so we’re really making an impact.

S&T: Right. Now the thing kicked off on the 2nd, right, in Alabama? Was that the first show?

R: No, actually there were one or two shows before that in Florida. Yeah, it was two Florida shows that started it off, Orlando and West Palm Beach.

S&T: OK. Now you’ve had like one day off since then, right?

R: Yeah, I think either one or none. Right now we’re on a seventeen-straight show streak. We have to play on all the off-days to try and make as much money as we can, because everyday you’re not playing is still a day you have to pay for the bus and the crew and all that kind of stuff.

S&T: Oh. So a lot of those dates are off-days?

R: Yeah, well Fear Factory take a lot of off-days, so we book our own shows on all those days off, you know? Like we played last night, Easter Sunday, in a tiny little town in Connecticut and we thought it was going to be a terrible show but it ended up kicking ass.

S&T: Good crowd?

R: Yeah, it ended up being awesome. We were like, “Great. Who’s gonna come out on Easter Sunday?” But actually, we’ve played the last three years in a row on Easter Sunday.

S&T: Interesting. And you get a crowd?

R: Yeah.

S&T: That’s very cool. How does that kind of schedule affect you though? Across the board – performance, energy…

R: Well I’ll tell you, we’re still young and we’re gonna take advantage of the time we can while we still have our youth and energy and everything like that. Right before this tour we were in Europe and we did twenty-seven straight shows on that one. And honestly, by the end we were running out of steam. So you know, it’s tough, ‘cause we put on an extremely energetic show and everything and party every night and everything. You know, it kinda takes its toll but I’m certainly not complaining.

S&T: Well yeah. I know what a day is like, I know it’s not all just fun and games. I know you have to put in a lot of hard work and I know travel’s hard and getting ready. And sitting around waiting isn’t as easy as people think it is, plus all the press you have to do and blah blah blah. That just seems like a really heavy pace.

R: It is, it is, but it’s still fun at the same time. We’re enjoying every minute of it.

S&T: Well since you guys are playing seventeen days in a row, take me through a typical twenty-four hours. Does every twenty-four hours start to feel the same?

R: Well, maybe so, just a new city. But everybody in the band’s different. My typical day is I probably get up sometime between 11 and noon or something, depending on the night before. Get up, do paperwork from the day before because I handle all the accounting and stuff for the band. So I’ll work on paperwork for a while and wait for Jim (bassist Jim LaMarca) to get up and play some video games. Then we’ll go look around and get something to eat or something, then, I don’t know, maybe pop into the venue for a second to see what’s going on, see how the crew’s doing with load-in and everything like that. Then wait around eagerly for catering and um, that’s usually around 5:30 or 6, so we eat and then start getting ready for the show. And now on the Slipknot tour here we’re playing pretty early, we usually play maybe a quarter to 8 or something like that, so we’re done by 8:30, change and just hang out, you know. Every night’s different and we just see where the night takes you. You never know what you’re gonna run into or what party you’re gonna find or who you’re gonna meet.

S&T: Are you getting a soundcheck?

R: No, just a line check. Slipknot and Fear Factory do a soundcheck and then our crew just line checks. We got a good sound guy and everything, so we just kind of go on the fly.

S&T: Is it just the three of you, or are there local openers?

R: Well at each show there is, not necessarily a local band, but a Jägermeister band, like for instance, this four- or five-day stretch is Sworn Enemy and then I think Full Blown Chaos did a few of them, 40 Below Summer’s doing a few of them. So they have a band open up for four or five days in a row, and then somebody else gets to open up for a few days.

S&T: Right. Now this is your first time out with Slipknot?

R: Yes it is.

S&T: OK. How are those guys?

R: Everybody’s super cool, man, and a lot of them love our band and stuff, which is really cool too. They watch us every night and we’re just friends with everybody hanging out and stuff. It’s been real cool man, they’re great guys.

S&T: That’s gotta be cool, when you’re up there playing and there’s the guys from Slipknot checking you out.

R: Yep.

S&T: How’s their new stuff?

R: Awesome.

S&T: Is it?

R: It really is, yeah. They have this one song, I can’t remember what it’s called, but (Slipknot percussionists) Clown and Fehn come out and they’ve got these drum harnesses on, kind of like in a marching band where it’s just on there with the drum on their stomach, you know? And so they come out and they do this routine where they beat the drums and it kind of puts you in a trance. And the new material’s just sick. On some of the choruses, Corey’s voice is just unbelievable. I think everybody’s gonna be really stoked on this record. We’ve only heard like three or four songs, we haven’t actually heard the whole record yet, but we’re all looking forward to it. We’re all really big Slipknot fans.

S&T: Very cool. Well tell me about Ricky [Evensand, the band’s new drummer].

R: Ricky is fucking unbelievable. We saw him play with Soilwork when we were out with those guys and then we got the news that our drummer was quitting and everything, and uh, through the grapevine we found out that he was interested in coming to America [from Sweden] and he loved our band and everything, so we just kinda worked it out. He came to America in like the second week of January and we had about twelve days – he’d never played a Chimaira song in his life – and we had about twelve days for him to learn an entire hour-and-fifteen-minute headlining set. And then we shipped right back over to Europe and did that headlining tour with him and the first couple of days he was maybe a little nervous and getting into it, but now he’s just totally cool. And he’s great to watch – on the headlining shows he does a full seven- or eight-minute drum solo and that’s how we introduce him to the crowd, you know. “Check out our new drummer,” stuff like that, and he just blows people away. But on this tour we only have maybe a half-hour to play, so he does a little thirty second thing in the middle of one of our songs. But he’s loving it. He was just telling me last night that he’s finally found his place in life with Chimaira.

S&T: Oh that’s cool.

R: So he’s real happy and he’s adjusting just fine.

S&T: So he didn’t leave them to join you, he just happened to be leaving?

R: Well, it’s a combination of both. He was looking for an opportunity to maybe come to America and join a new band and stuff, but if that opportunity didn’t ever arise, he’d probably still be playing with Soilwork right now.

S&T: I got you. So what do you think is the biggest difference between having him back there and having Andy [Herrick] back there? And I’m not talking about Andy towards the end, ‘cause I’ve read stuff to the effect that maybe you thought his heart just wasn’t into it.

R: We saw that his heart wasn’t really into for totally the last full year, and maybe the last couple years. We knew it was inevitable that he was gonna tell us he just couldn’t do it anymore. Andols is a great drummer, super technical, played his parts perfectly and everything, but like, he didn’t love music the way we love music, and everything that’s involved – the touring, writing and recording. But Ricky does. As soon as he hopped behind the kit, the vibe was just insane for us. Like, I can’t wait to start writing new material with him and everything. He loves to play the drums and he loves everything about music the way I do and I’m a big writer in the band so I can’t wait to sit down and start belting out new material with him. And the listeners are gonna hear the difference in someone who loves to play drums as opposed to someone who didn’t love to play drums, and just did the parts.

S&T: So basically the difference is a guy who wants to be there and having just a technician back there who’s just playing his parts.

R: Right, right. God bless Andols. I wish him the best and everything, but yeah, we’re super blessed to have Ricky now.

S&T: It’s kind of weird though – you said that for a year or maybe even longer, you felt like his heart wasn’t in it. A band is like a family, so how do you handle that? Do you ignore it, address it, wait for it to come to its boiling point?

R: Well we just kinda…it was real disconcerting, especially for me, because I’ve been friends with Andols for a long time. I brought him into Chimaira, he and I had played in a bands before Chimaira when we were in high school and everything. When we first started the band, he was more excited about it and everything, and I’d describe the analogy as more like watching a friend slip away to heroin or something. You know what I mean? Where they’re bright-eyed and have color in their skin and everything’s cool when you know ‘em, and then all of a sudden over the years their interests die and they sort of start fading away. It was real disconcerting for me, and then when I finally heard the news we were in LA and Mark pulled me aside – Andols didn’t even tell us, he told our manager – he couldn’t tell us because he knew how disappointed we’d be and everything. But when he told me, like I said, although I knew it was inevitable I was still crushed. And we were all like, “Fuck. What are we gonna do?” And we knew we had to go on, that was just another wall we had to get over.

S&T: Yeah but again, a lot of times stuff happens for a reason.

R: Sure. That’s the way we gotta look at it, you know. And this whole thing’s just a breath of fresh air.

S&T: So now you guys grew up together, you and he?

R: Yeah, I met him in high school through a friend, and we started a band when we were like sixteen years old and played all through high school, just around town and stuff like that. And then that band kinda ended and he was away at college and I was working as a manager at Pizza Hut and so…I don’t know if this is too many details or not?

S&T: No, no, fire away. This stuff’s interesting.

R: I started a new band with some friends around town, where I was playing drums in the band. And then a guy named A.E. who played bass in that band, after that band stopped playing, he joined Chimaira. And I wasn’t doing anything, I was just working, and I remember being jealous that he had joined this new band with [Jason] Hager from Ascension and Mark [Hunter] from Skipline, which were two, like, big Cleveland bands. But those guys had both quit their bands and formed Chimaira, and I found out A.E. had joined them and I was kinda jealous, and then it just so happened a few weeks later I got a call from Mark, and he’s like, “Hey, we don’t know each other or anything, but our bands have played together in the past and we’re looking for another guitarist. Do you want to come down and rock?” I came down and joined the band that night. But the drummer they had at the time, I was like, “Man, this guy’s OK but I know this guy Andols who’d blow him away.” A week later Andols was in the band and that’s how that came about.

S&T: Now the Cleveland scene, that’s pretty tight right? Everybody seems to know everybody else over there?

R: Kinda, kinda, yeah. It was different back at that time. Hardcore was huge back in like, ’96 through ’99. You had a lot of Victory [Records] bands like One Life Crew and Integrity and stuff like that around and Mushroomhead was blowing up around then. Mushroomhead had, like, a different union of bands. A lot of bands like Mushroomhead would help out and everything and kind of build their union, but we never were part of that Mushroomhead thing – we just did everything on our own, we never played a show with Mushroomhead. I’ve lived in Cleveland for ten or twelve years now, and I’ve still never even seen Mushroomhead play.

S&T: Wow.

R: It’s kind of like a different scene and everything. I mean, we’re totally cool with all those guys, and because we’re the two big bands in Cleveland we’re planning on doing a show together one day. But every time things get talked about, things just fall through with politics and everything. But we’ll still do it one day. And Cleveland’s a great town, you know, all the kids come out and always support the shows and everything and we’re happy to be from there.

S&T: And you grabbed another local guy to produce the last album.

R: Yeah, Ben Schigel. He was in the band Switched, which I’m sure you’ve heard of.

S&T: Yeah, we know Ben.

R: Sure. And Jim, our bass player, played with Ben in a band before Chimaira and he played with Mark in Skipline before that, so Chimaira’s kind of a supergroup of the local heroes. Know what I mean?

S&T: Right. Now how did Ben get involved?

R: That’s what helps out the Cleveland scene so much, because since I was like fourteen years old, I’ve been recording in his studio. Him and his brothers had a studio in their garage in our hometown, Strongsville [Ohio], and so they were pumping out great recordings of local bands and everything, and that was really helping out the scene. So we were real comfortable with Ben, you know, we’d been recording and doing demos with him for years and stuff. So we did the first record with a big producer and everything like that. You know, we’d just gotten a big record deal with Roadrunner, and we’re gonna go with a big producer, Mudrock, he’s done Godsmack and this and that and everything, and we weren’t really happy with the way Pass Out of Existence turned out. So we were like, let’s do it our own way this time. We had all our friends do everything, from the artwork to the photos to the recording – everything was totally homegrown. And The Impossibility of Reason came out great, so we’re real stoked on that formula.

S&T: Now it’s almost a year that’s been out. Are you guys playing around with new material?

R: Just riffs here and there. We haven’t sat down and really tried anything because we’ve been touring so extensively and Ricky’s still learning songs and stuff. We really haven’t had time, but we plan to do some writing this summer and I’m really looking forward to that.

S&T: Great. So now where do you pick up after this tour?

R: This ends somewhere around May 15th or something like that, then we have a couple weeks off and it’s back to Europe on June 1st to do six or seven weeks with Killswitch [Engage] and God Forbid and Shadow’s Fall. That’s gonna be like the New Wave of American Heavy Metal Tour.

S&T: Right.

R: It’s gonna be huge, because we just went over there and headlined and it was only our third time over there and 75% of the shows were sold out and the other ones were just jam-packed. So now with Killswitch on there and these other bands, it’s gonna be fucking unbelievable.

S&T: Have you heard the new Killswitch?

R: Uh, yeah I have.

S&T: What do you think?

R: I’ve heard a few songs. It’s kind of like, I loved the first record and this one is kind of like…I’m sure this happens with a lot of people for a lot of bands, but this one I was kind of like, “Hmm.” But I guarantee you that it’s gonna grow on me and I know I’m gonna love it.

S&T: That’s what I’m thinking. I’ve only given it a couple of listens and maybe it’s that Howard’s melodies aren’t the same as Jesse’s…

R: Right. And that’s the thing, ‘cause Jesse’s were so great, you know what I mean? He’s a great singer. But I still love Howard and everything and he’s great on stage, so it just takes some getting used to, but I know I’m gonna love it.

S&T: Tell me about this Death tribute disc.

R: That’s kind of an interesting story. James Murphy from Death flew into Cleveland and we were doing the stuff in Spider – you know, Ben’s studio – and he came in. Ricky and I had to learn “Symbolic,” which is an extremely technical death metal song, and we had just one day to learn it because we had three days off in between tours and we were like, “Alright, well, three days off – let’s do it. Let’s do the song.” So the night w e started practicing the song, Ricky came down with a horrible case of the flu. The next day he couldn’t even get out of bed, so we couldn’t record the song. So Mark ended up doing vocals on another song, which I’m not actually sure what it is, but we weren’t able to do “Symbolic” but we’re hoping to reschedule it for a later date at some time.

S&T: OK. What’s the rest of the day like? It’s 2:30 now, you’re playing Roseland Ballroom tonight?

R: Yep, playing Roseland. It should be a sick show, it’s sold out. I’ve got a few more interviews and stuff, gonna mosey around, see what’s going on. Jim and I were just over at Sirius satellite radio to do an interview.

S&T: How did that go?

R: Oh, it was awesome. We always have a great time over there with Jose and Cal. It was our fourth time being there. We did a live studio performance like last time we were through here.

S&T: Oh really?

R: Yeah.

S&T: So what’s the set-up over there?

R: It’s fucking cool man. It’s one of these huge New York buildings, you walk up and there’s all this security and everything and then like the waiting room, it’s not even the waiting room, it’s like the main lobby, there’s these glass doors and you see this gigantic – it looks like NASA – like, satellite set-up and stuff with all this huge screens and there’s all sorts of shit and stuff. And then other than that it’s just like a studio. You go in and it’s just like being at a radio station sort of thing. And we did an interview and that’s it. We did an hour of like music that we wanted to hear, kind of like DJed and everything like that. So it was real cool.

S&T: That’s cool. Thanks for your time, Rob.

R: Thank you.

interview by scott sisti