INTERVIEW: The Union Underground is back, and as rebellious as ever
Image: The Union Underground is currently playing with SOiL, RA and Flaw on the Back to the 2000s tour. Image courtesy of the bands / Provided by O’Donnell Media Group with permission.
The Union Underground has teamed up with SOiL for a co-headlining tour that finds the two metal bands playing their seminal releases from nearly 25 years ago. They are joined on the March trek by RA and Flaw. Each band has selected an important album in its discography and will give audiences what they want: each and every classic tune.
For The Union Underground, that means fans will have the chance to hear the debut album An Education in Rebellion in its entirety, including songs “South Texas Deathride,” “Until You Crack” and “Killing the Fly.” Frontman Bryan Scott is quite excited for this round of gigs, which continues through March 23 and includes a New Jersey concert at Dingbatz on March 13.
This will not solely be a nostalgic tour, despite its nostalgia-sounding name, the Back to the 2000s tour. For TUU and Scott, this is an opportunity to test out new music and reintroduce the band to its dedicated fan base. There have been some quiet years from the nu-metal band since that debut album, so this is a chance to say hello again and prepare the way for new music, which should be coming before the end of 2024.
Recently Hollywood Soapbox talked with Scott about the tour and what fans can expect (you can also check out our interview with SOiL’s Tim King here). Here’s what Scott had to say …
On how the tour came about …
“Tim and I from SOiL had talked about wanting to do something together for the last few years. He pitched an idea to me recently about the theme of Back to the 2000s and everyone on the tour playing their first records and taking it back to that era where all of these guys began, so I thought it was a cool idea and just started putting it together. It came together pretty quickly. … People are super-excited about it, which is awesome, and the chatter online has been really amazing.”
On what fans can expect at the tour dates …
“We are going to play the entire record and also a song called ‘Across the Nation’ and a couple of songs that people have not heard yet. At least one of them will for sure be on the new record, so yeah there’ll be some stuff that people have not heard. So it’ll be a nice treat for everybody.”
On his memories of making An Education in Rebellion …
“It was 2000. It was amazing. Clearly I’m biased, but I think that record is fantastic. It’s so diverse, and there’s a lot of influences on it. It’s kind of an eclectic collection of songs, and it’s really stood up. It’s amazing. We played Blue Ridge Rock Fest last year, a festival in Virginia, and the response was amazing. It’s like we never had gone away at all. It’s just fantastic. People are really excited. … My vision is to reintroduce the world to Rebellion. Obviously, it’s a new generation, and people who bought our record the first time are now showing it to their kids. So the idea is to reintroduce the world to the band and that record and then move on to releasing new music, so what we’re going to do is we’ll do this run in March and then take the summer off to finish up new music. We’re also doing a UK run in November … so releasing the new record will be prior to that. It might just be an EP or even a single prior to that, not sure yet. That’s the idea, new music this year, and then in ‘25, we will do a full North American tour.”
On his friendship with Tim King …
“Me and Tim have known each other for years. We also have a bit of a side project called Into the Fire that we occasionally like to toy with. We did a lot of runs back in the day when SOiL first put their record out. We were rolling around the country together in 2001, so yeah we have a lot of history. It’s a huge benefit. Even though you’re out there doing a job, it’s nice to have your buddies around. Yeah, it’s a huge plus.”
On how the band got tagged with the label ‘nu metal’ …
“We definitely got lumped into the nu-metal label, and a lot of bands complained about that. I think any band that had any kind of aggressive or heavy rock sound just got that label. That was just the thing at the time. That was the genre at the time. To me, nu metal was more Korn, Limp Bizkit, some Linkin Park, that kind of thing, anything that had a rap-rock-metal sound, but any band that put out a heavy record at the time got lumped into that. It’s a little misleading for us because we clearly don’t fit into that category.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
The Union Underground and SOiL are currently on tour with RA and Flaw. They continue through March 23. Click here for more information and tickets.
