INTERVIEW: Corrosion of Conformity have no interest in conforming
Photo: Corrosion of Conformity’s latest album is called No Cross No Crown. Photo courtesy of Nathaniel Shannon / Provided by Earsplit PR with permission.
Metal legends Corrosion of Conformity, who are currently touring the United States, have been going strong for decades, and they continue to entice old fans and attract new fans to their sonically-charged sound. Their current roadshow, dubbed the A Quest to Believe, A Call to the Void II tour, sees the guys on stage with Crowbar, Lo-Pan and Quaker City Night Hawks, and they are bringing songs both classic (from Deliverance) and new (from No Cross No Crown) to their adoring fans.
They stop Aug. 24 at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, New Jersey, in addition to dates in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia.
“I think right now it’s kind of about bringing a bill that’s real strong from top to bottom in terms of opening bands and the other artists on the tour that are musically really strong,” said Mike Dean, bassist for Corrosion. “Without sounding too pretentious, we’re trying to curate something, so at the moment we’re out with Crowbar and a band called Quaker City Night Hawks, who are extremely musical, and a band called Lo-Pan from Columbus, Ohio, who are also amazing. It’s just a lineup that we’re real proud of, and that kind of continues into the next chapter that starts up in September where we have The Skull, which consists of members of one of our favorite bands growing up — Trouble from Chicago — and also a band from Portland called Witch Mountain, who are doing really awesome things. Pretty much just making a real strong evening of music, that’s kind of where we’re at right now.”
Dean is joined on stage by drummer Reed Mullin, guitarist Woodroe Weatherman and vocalist/guitarist Pepper Keenan, who returned to COC a few years ago. The band members’ latest recording effort, No Cross No Crown, won over listeners and critics last year, and they are still adding songs from the project into the set list. But it has been difficult to find room because of Corrosion’s 35+ years of metal dominance. Selecting the tunes for an evening becomes an impossible jigsaw puzzle.
“It’s always a discussion when you have a lot of records that you made,” Dean said. “This summertime we just came back from Europe, and there were people that were interested in us playing a lot of Deliverance … because it’s the 25th anniversary of the release of Deliverance, which is a hard thing for me to wrap my head around. That’s a lot of time. A lot of that has crept into the set list, but, yeah, we’re definitely playing a couple songs off No Cross No Crown though.”
Sometimes metal bands come alive on the stage in front of a pulsating crowd with devil horns, mosh pits and head bangs galore, and the recording part of the group is almost secondary. Not so for Corrosion of Conformity, who take great pride in their albums and how they capture the band’s unique energy.
“Well, I think the records are pretty successful at capturing a lot of it,” Dean said. “The live thing is a little bit more of an immediate communication, and also we’re at liberty to stretch out a little bit and improvise and weave some things together and put a few surprises in, some variations. A lot of times when we record the songs, they’re fairly new, and after you’ve gone through the experience of recording them and putting them on the stage live, they evolve a little bit and get a little more matured.”
Before the lights go out and Corrosion take the stage, Dean said he tries not to get too excited. He needs to be ready for 80 minutes of fire and brimstone, so his anticipation level needs to be even-keeled and kept in check. It’s almost like his zen moment, his Jedi power to breathe deep and be ready for the battle.
The bassist has learned his musical chops thanks to a life devoted to the metal art form. As a child, he searched through his brother’s record collection and found Black Sabbath’s Paranoid album. He still has fond memories of the wah-wah sound on “Electric Funeral.”
“[I was] going to school and listening to the teacher and rocking my fingers in and out of my ears, so it kind of sounded like a wah-wah,” he said with a laugh. “So the teacher kind of sounded like A Charlie Brown Christmas, which explains my stellar academic career.”
The changes in the music industry, which have been night and day since the early 1980s when Corrosion first kicked off their career, have not greatly impacted the band because from day one they have been extremely DIY.
“We just kind of found our place, with one foot inside it and one foot outside it, and that’s pretty comfortable,” Dean said. “I think it’s changed somewhat, just the whole digitization of everything, and miniaturization of everything and the personalization of everything. I don’t even own song files on my computer. I just stream off a network. I play records and things like that, too. I think that has changed the whole paradigm a lot, and they put an emphasis on live performance and merchandising as basically the economic basis for being able to make your way and play music.”
What has changed over the years is the musical maturity of the band.
“We were establishing an identity back then that we’ve grown into some more,” Dean said. “I think we’ve changed up some stuff. There’s quite a change from our earliest work when we were starting off in the hardcore-punk, super-DIY thing. We were the kids that were referencing a lot of the old heavy rock in our stuff, trying to do something super-unhip and trying to get people to talk about it. As far as the last 20 years, I think we found our identity, and we’re expanding sonically.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Corrosion of Conformity will play Aug. 24 at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, New Jersey. On the bill are Crowbar, Lo-Pan and Quaker City Night Hawks. Click here for more information and tickets.
