MACHINE HEAD Drummer: People Are Gonna Be Blown Away By 'The Blackening'

Amanda Chamberlin of In Utah This Week recently conducted an interview with MACHINE HEAD drummer Dave McClain. An excerpt from the chat follows:

In Utah This Week: It seems like MACHINE HEAD prefers to avoid any genre classifications, so how would you describe the type of music that's on your [new] album, "The Blackening"?

McClain: "This is a pretty epic album; we took a lot of time letting these songs take on a life of their own, whether it was adding more parts or making things just more complicated to play. We had a lot of fun writing this album, and I think people are gonna be blown away when they hear it!"

In Utah This Week: MACHINE HEAD keeps it pretty consistent as far as sound goes, with your albums always having elements of brutality, unique rhythmic patterns, as well as frequent experimental elements. Did you guys try anything new on "The Blackening" that you haven't done on past albums?

McClain: "We're writing music for the part of us that is still that kid we were that was running to the front row at the IRON MAIDEN show. And also the musician part of us that wants to be challenged! It's killer to be able to be in that mind frame and not have to worry about if a certain song is too long or too heavy for a certain radio station."

In Utah This Week: What is your No. 1 priority when you're recording an album? In other words, do you put your utmost focus on musicianship, having a good time, expressing your feelings, or other?

McClain: "I think all that is important, especially in this day and age of recording with ProTools. I think too many bands use technology like that to a disadvantage, making every little thing perfect and taking out any kind of human feel. We're not a band that records with a click track or puts the drum tracks through a program that makes everything perfect. We're pretty good at making our mistakes sound like we meant to do them."

In Utah This Week: If any, which audience(s) do you keep in mind while writing music?

McClain: "Well, we always hope our fans are gonna love what we do, and I think we (us and our fans) are on a similar wavelength, so when we're writing for ourselves, in the end it's something that we're both gonna be happy with."

In Utah This Week: If any, what kind of theme(s) or atmosphere(s) do you keep in mind while writing music?

McClain: "There are a lot of influences that end up in our songs. One influence that we've had lately is the band RUSH — one of my favorite bands of all time and a great musical influence. And they always had a great attitude about being commercially accepted."

Read the entire interview at In Utah This Week.