LIVE ‘N LOUD MEETS KILLSWITCH ENGAGE
I met with Killswitch Engage’s drummer, Justin Foley on Saturday afternoon of Heavy MTL. The most pleasant of gentlemen, Justin spoke with me about their tour, touring with Unearth, and how their former singer, Jesse Leech, is with the band again
Erin: So you guys are just coming off the end of a pretty big tour, right?
Justin: Well, we’re kind of in the middle of it. This is sort of… I don’t know… It’s kind of put in the middle of the tour. I think we have about two and a half weeks to go on that tour with Five Finger Death Punch.
Erin: How has that been going?
Justin: It’s been going great! Yeah, going really, really well.
Erin: I can imagine it’s been pretty busy and hectic. Did you get to hang out around any of the places that you were touring?
Justin: We have a couple of days off and they just turn into unbelievable rage days… we go at it a lot harder than we normally do on the show days. But it’s been a lot of fun.
Erin: What were some highlights of your tour?
Justin: Baseball games!
Erin: Baseball games?
Justin: Yeah! We’ve had three baseball games on days off so far.
Erin: Awesome!
Justin: Yeah, and we have like three more to go, too! If it works out, it will be pretty awesome.
Erin: Summer fun! Any plans once you finish up your tour? I hear you’re working on a new album…?
Justin: Exactly. As soon as we’re done, we need to get home and finish up the record. Priority number one. We can’t have anything get in the way of that, we want to get it done and get it out, hopefully by the beginning of next year. So yeah, that.
Erin: Fabulous! Anything that we can expect on the next album?
Justin: Well… um… our old singer, Jesse, is back. So that’s kind of a big deal. So we’re really looking forward to all of that.
Erin: That’s really exciting!
Justin: Yeah, we’re looking forward to doing that and writing with him, and put some more stuff out with him involved, it’s really cool. Aside from that, everyone’s just really excited to work again, so I think our music’s moved a lot faster than it ever has before because we’re all just really excited for it.
Erin: Yeah, I’d say! Have you been giving your fans a taste of anything to expect on the new album?
Justin: There is one new song that we have in our set… so yeah. I don’t think people go to shows and really want to hear a lot of new stuff, they usually want to hear something they know a little more, so one song is pushin’ it. But it’s gone over pretty well so far, I think.
Erin: Is there anything that you all have been doing differently for this record, or have you been maintaining a similar process?
Justin: Yeah, pretty much the same thing. Adam’s going to produce the record. Um… we track the drums in the same place we always track drums, doing all the guitars and everything else at Adam’s house now, pretty much just the same stuff we’re comfortable with.
Erin: You’ve been playing with Unearth lately, haven’t you?
Justin: Yeah, that was actually just last year, I did their record… or well they asked me to track drums on their record last winter, and I toured with them last summer, for a little bit, but that’s just filling in, really.
Erin: Oh, okay. Did you guys had any crossovers on that tour, did that get crazy at all?
Justin: Not really, Killswitch Engage didn’t really do anything at all last year, so I had the time to do that. It was so much fun, Unearth, those guys are really, really fun. We’ve been friends for a long time, so it’s been a great time.
Erin: Killswitch has undergone a couple of lineup changes over the past few years, how does that process work for you?
Justin: A couple of them were early, I mean obviously when Jesse left, it was pretty early on in the whole process, and almost right after that, I joined, so it’s been about seven years with mostly the same guys. But then, once Howard was gone, Jesse came back, so it sort of made sense. Everyone’s been in as good a spirit right now as I can ever remember so, that’s really good.
Erin: That’s awesome, it’s really good to hear that. So, are there any acts you plan on checking out while you’re here at Heavy MTL?
Justin: Definitely. Between the Buried and Me. They’re one of my favorites. I think Cannibal Corpse are playing right before us and Deftones are playing right after us… so it will make sense to check out all of that.
Erin: Yeah, not a bad lineup this year!
Justin: Yeah, it’s a great fest. I played it with Unearth last year, it was a lot of fun.
Erin: This is my first time here, so I’m excited to see what everything’s going to be like, but definitely loving it already.
Justin: It is kind of new, isn’t it?
Erin: I think so.
Justin: I don’t think Killswitch has played this festival anyway, so that’s cool.
Erin: Yeah! So that’s basically all the questions I have… any words of wisdom?
Justin: No, I have no wisdom at all!
Erin: No wisdom at all?!
Justin: None! Actually no, I just want to thank all our fans because they’ve been so awesome for so many years. It’s incredible when we get to do this.
Erin: Sweet. Thanks for taking the time to speak with us today!
Justin: No worries, thank you.
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Category: Interviews
