Interviewer: Hi I'm here with Jimmy Him, Davey Matlock, and Kit Saunders from progressive metal band The Nimrods! How are you guys?

Jimmy:We're tired as hell but otherwise we're great.

Interviewer: That's great now for some actual questions *laugh*. Ok first off, for those who haven't bought the album, how has your sound changed since the last record.

Davey:Well we've gotten a more progressive and experimental style. Some of the verses will start out with just me and kit playing while Jimmy is singing and maybe even a single sustained keyboard note, and then the guitars will come in near the end of the verse or something like that.

Jimmy: We've also added a lot more bridges and breakdowns which give Kit more room to throw in some tight grooves and things like that.The songs are also more riff oriented with lots of variation thrown in as well.I guess I changed my soloing style and made it more emotional, less of a jumble of notes and more of slowed down approached, but there's still good technicality.

Kit:My drumming focuses a lot on tom-tom grooves and less on blast beats, though I still use them in most of the songs, I use less of them.I guess we're out of our usual brutal zone and into a new more mature approach of some sort. I still use double bass a lot though, it's great for accenting my toms, Danny Carey does that a bunch.I use a ton of polyrhythms too, very difficult but it sounds great so I'm gonna keep using them. I guess to sum it up my drumming ha a bigger latin and jazz fusion influence now but with a good amount of metal to add too it. I guess it would be like 25 percent jazz fusion 30 percent latin/world music 25 percent metal and 20 percent rock.

Interviewer: So this album focuses more on the rhythm section and smooth melodies?

Jimmy:Yeah pretty much, a lot less straight forward too, some of our riffs are really thrashy and brutal with like palm muting and stuff but we have a lot of more melodic heavy riffs that are really smooth or a blend of smooth and heavy.We use a lot of clean stuff too we have 1 track that's just me,Davey, and Jaska playing on acoustics, no drums or keys.

Davey: I get to shine on bass a lot here too, I managed to get a really heavy but clean sound that's very percussive, I heard this sorta tone in Korn songs and even though I'm not a fan of them I love their bassist so I decided to emulate him a bit.I still play with only fingers too and I have a lot of bass breaks were I'll play a little bass solo right before a heavy riff comes in. The production is really good so my bass is perfectly audible which is good. I managed to stay nice and tight on the songs too and I'm in pretty good timing so you don't hear those crappy extra notes.

Interviewer: You guys have started a new wave of progressive metal or so it has been dubbed, what do you think about it?

Jimmy:It's cool, lots of good bands out there, that flatters me. But I think they focus too much on the solos and no the songs or structures, it's all good, I'm not trying to diss because the bands are great but they need to stop wanking around so much, we learned that the hard way.

Davey: I like how that bassists are getting more attention. I think it's great, I wanna just jam with them all one day because they're all really cool.I added a jazzy edge to my playing and I hear it a lot in some of these guys, I think they rock.

Interviewer: You guys just got off tour in Australia and New Zealand, how was it?

Jimmy:We've got a decent amount of fans there, we're gonna tour there more though because we really wanna build a fan base so we can move on to Asia and South America to tour. It's a nice area though, nice and warm with cool people and great bars, Kit went diving but me and Davey pussied out.

Davey:I'm not getting killed by a jellyfish, no thank you.

Interviewer: You guys have contemplated breaking up a lot, will there be another record?

Kit:Usually we say nobody knows but we're certain there will be another.We've written 2 songs and we'll be releasing a promo single soon, don't worry.

Interviewer: Can you tell us what the songs sound like?

Jimmy: Ok sure. Basically there's lots of middle eastern sounding riffs in them with lots of tom work but little snare or cymbals. Davey's bass gives of a jazzy feel and the keyboards are really creepy. The songs are very melodic and I guess my vocals are more operatic, a Serj Tankian sort of approach.

Interviewer: Speaking of vocals how are those on the album?


Jimmy: Versatile!I'm getting comfortable with my clean voice but my growling and screaming are my favorite vocal styles. I can do this weird thing with my voice that sounds like growling and screaming at the same time, it's pretty cool. I can also growl pretty fast but my voice hasn't changed much besides my clean style.

Interviewer: What do you think of the music scene today?

Jimmy: Too much pop, I don't think the pop divas are bad it's just there are too many of them *laughs*. My girlfriend Bikki is one, there's that Aurora girl, Madison O Leary, Stephanie Fierce, Stephanie Ortiz, Angel Fierce, see there's 6 right there! I really like Failed Youth and PANIC and The Violent Pyromaniac enemies. I think music has become too superficial though, too glitz ad glam, not as much emotion even though there is a bit of emotion.Not enough metal though *laugh*. I guess the scene is ok but it could be better, that's just me though, I hope I don't get slag for this.

Interviewer: Yeah you might've offended a few people *laugh* anyway how's the work with Sisyphean going?

Jimmy:AMAZING! I love the guys, and I've got lots of ideas we've used so it's cool. I'm really enjoying it, we might win a birdie but I hope the Nimrods do most of all haha.

Interviewer: What was it like making the album?

Davey: A bit strenuous to be honest, we really had to put a lot of work into this because we don't usually work like this. we re-wrote a bunch and had to changed our entire thought process as a band for songwriting. A big influence for the writing was just listening to music together and picking up styles we liked.

Interviewer: What was it like working with Dan from the Black Gates

Jimmy: He's a great guy. Big influence too. He suggested some good ideas and even the ones that didn't work out we still tried because he never pressured us and we wanted to cooperate well. The sound was perfect so we're gonna keep using him until we quit or he wants to do other shit ya know?

Interviewer: Last question. What would you change on the album?

Jimmy:I'd add a little more aggression and we're doing that for the next album so it'll be PERFECT, so wait for us because part 2 will be the best we've ever done!

Stephanie Fierce: Don't really know who "The Nimrods" are but hey we all have our opinions, but what people forget is that opinions are just opinions so I am not offended. But I do feel as if Jimmy feels threatened by the Pop scene, otherwise he wouldn't bring up so many artist and list them. Also, I think Jimmy doesn't know that I write and produce most of my songs. Many artists take the easy route and have people to do for them. I try to put emotion to my songs and put raw lyrics without
caring what people might say. I put 110% in my tracks. If he or anyone else (cough Ryan) doesn't respect that, he doesn't respect music.
And Hey maybe there many pop artists out there but if metal bands are constantly winning Birdies they shouldn't be complaining.


I also feel that bands have become too cocky, so cocky they don't realize their work is generic. Why can't people just respect music, whether is Pop, Rock or Metal?

Edited by user 11 October 2009 10:15:07(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

OOC: Nope, its character.

Stephanie Fierce: Also the point here is that people assume that these artist have no emotion in their music just because they are listed under the Pop genre. I would actually like to know if Jimmy took his time to listen to each one of these artist's music to say what he said. and if he did what about it that doesn't emotion?, what about it that is generic? Elaborate please.

Stephanie Fierce: One, "The Diva" aspect is not part of the music itself, its part of a style, attitude, and cockiness. I don't consider myself a "Diva" but people would assume i am because of my music. No one sounds like Emma Blunt because no one is her. No one can sound like you because no one is you but yourself. I'm pretty sure you know that alreadybut I'm just saying. No one can sound like me but myself. The reason why I'm going at you is because my name is in the list and you still haven't answered the question. Did you actually take your time to listen to each of the artist's music to say what you said and if you did what about it has no emotion? That's all I want to know because my curiosity is killing me, I don't really care what you think or you because personally it does not harm me in no way.

Edited by user 11 October 2009 11:12:36(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Stephanie Fierce: And if you did what about it has no emotion? and M has only two albums out. Her third one hasn't been released yet unless, there was a leak....


OOC: LOl, sorry to put you on the spot.

Jimmy:I said MOST OF I wasn't trying to offended you, I even said a lot of the album tracks had emotion but not the leads, which really shouldn't anyway because they're supposed to be catchy or some shit.

Jimmy:I do like the new one, lots of unorthodox stuff on it, avante garde stuff

Jimmy:Just by the sound, I listen to a lot of experimental music