Polluteme.com - Polluted Ezine

June Issue

POLLUTEME/POLLUTED EZINE/FLOODED - Flood Interview

written by: Jacob Robison

'I've passed this car at least twice so far. Which side did he say it was on?'. I'm supposed to meet Mark Slaughter and Jason Payne, two-thirds of Flood, at their apartment at five o'clock. I've spent the past five minutes driving up and down their road, and I haven't seen his truck anywhere. Another pass and I decide to find a payphone to give them a call, just to make sure I've got the right directions. Mark lets me know that I'm on the right track. I go back and finally find his apartment (it was on the left side of the road, up a hill), and I make my way to the door. Mark answers my knock, and invites me inside. The tall frontman offers me a beer; I declined due to having to play a softball game after the interview is over (Any other time and it's a different story). Jason's sitting in a chair in the living room playing Tony Hawk's Skateboarding on Playstation. Dressed in shorts, a shirt and shoes, he's really into the action in the video game. "Man, we're fiends in this house," Jason says with a grin. Mark's got his yellow Conneticut jersey on, with blue shorts and shoes. Both members of the band have short black hair and go tees (although Mark doesn't have the moustache). A couple minutes later and Jason's game finishes. He gets up to grab a beer, and I begin to get my questions in order. I don't like the way a couple of them are worded, so we collectively agree to wait a while before the interview begins. Jason and Mark take turns skateboarding while I work on some better questions. Ten minutes later, and I press the record button on my tape recorder.

******

First question is, how old is everybody?

MS: How old is everybody? Uh...25.
JP: You gonna answer that truthfully?
MS: 25.
JP: 25? I'm 26.
MS: And Taylor's...
JP: 24.
MS: 24.

How long have you been together?

MS: About three or four years as Flood. Either three or four.
JP: Nah, I'm figuring more like four, if not longer.
MS: I don't count when we were just piddlin'. Actually playing...
JP: Actually playing I'd say four years.
MS: Yeah, three or four.

What made you guys want to be in a band?

MS: Me personally, I've always wanted to be in a band since I was a kid. Just hearing music, seeing kiss when I was like three or four years old.
JP: Same way with me.

Who's music influenced you guys, both individually and the band itself.

MS: Me individually, um...old Metallica, Vision of Disorder, Helmet, Earth Crisis, Machine Head...stuff like that.
JP: I'd go with stuff like Anthrax, um...early thrash stuff. I used to get into that alot. Helmet, Quicksand...I can't really think of anymore.

Now what about the band?

MS: The band as a whole, probably Helmet...definitely Helmet, um...
JP: Quicksand, um...let's see. Who else?

So you guys pretty much have the same influences, more or less?

JP: Pretty much.
MS: I don't know about Taylor. He could probably think of some different ones he's personally influenced by. But other than that, we pretty much agree. We all like Helmet, we all like Quicksand, Tool...stuff like that. All the hard shit. Machine Head, Soulfly.

How did you guys settle on the name Flood?

MS: We had a show...we'd been playing for awhile, we just never had a name. Kinda threw some names out. We had our first show coming up, and we didn't have a name so...I'd been writing a...I worked on writing a comic book and the main character's name was Flood. I thought it was kinda a cool name, and I threw it out. Everybody liked it, so we stuck with it.

Do you guys function better as a three-piece or a four-piece?

MS: Actually, about the same. We were kinda nervous whenever the guitar player quit. But we said, 'Fuck it', we're going to go ahead and do the three-piece.
JP: I think we've become tighter as a three-piece.
MS: Yeah.
JP: Being able to figure out more what we wanted. Three of us there without the extra person. Just three people. There's less to go through, and it's easier just to work with our music.
MS: But we are going back to a four-piece as soon as we get out of the studio.

That was going to be my next question.

Speaking of the studio...how's it going with the new CD?

MS: Oh, it's awesome. It's real good. I think...I dunno...kinda like we're sitting on a time bomb. Feels like it's getting ready to explode. We're real happy with it.
JP: Wanna get it out.
MS: Yeah. So we can start playing it. We've been playing the old CD so long...we're ready to play the new stuff.
JP: We're playing three new songs off the CD now, but we want to save the rest for when it comes out.

Is there a target date for the release yet?

MS: We'd like to really get it out in July. But it's going to be July or August. I'm not for sure of exactly what date it is, but hopefully the end of the summer.

After the CD...what other plans do you have for next year?

MS: This year, or next year? Both.
JP + MS: Touring.
MS: This summer we're playing St. Louis, hopefully Cincinnatti...obviously the places we're setting up. We're gonna take off this summer. Play everywhere that we can.

Who takes care of booking your shows?

MS: We have a couple different people that help. Personally, I book a lot of our shows myself, but we've got a few other people...I guess you could call them booking agents...that are actually booking a lot of shows for us here lately. It doesn't bother me to do it myself, but it's always nice when someone else calls and says, 'Hey, I got ya'll a show.'

When you write your songs, is it a collective effort, or do you bring different pieces to the table and see what fits?

MS: Musically, or lyrically?
Musically.
MS: Musically...um, usually I'll just come up with a riff when we're at practice or something, then he'll put a beat behind it. Taylor will do his thing and come out with the bass line behind it.
JP: Alot of the times we'll go in with nothing and jam around for a couple hours. Then...say just one of us hits something that one other likes, and we'll stop and play it again. Alot of the times they'll come out of that.

So it's a definite collective effort?

MS: Oh yeah.
Flood

What do you think of the level of musical ability in Middle Tennessee? Do you think that it's competitive with the better known areas?

MS: Oh, definitely. There are bands around here that are just as good as any signed band, if not better than a lot of them, you know? It could be a lot better of a scene than what it is, but there's a lot of good bands out there right now that aren't signed. The location we're in is not known really for the hard music, but there's a lot of good bands out there.

What would you like to see more of in the local music scene?

JP: All ages clubs.
MS: Yeah, definitely.
JP: Definitely more all ages clubs. They get one started, and then for some reason or another it fizzles out in a couple months, to a year at the longest.
MS: The bands sticking together and helping each other more. There's a lot of bands that try to do their own thing, and they don't want to help other bands out, but you know...We'd get a lot more notice if all the bands would stick together. We'd get a lot more of a scene built up.

If you had to choose one show that would exemplify Flood as a band, what would it be and why?

MS: The Rotary Park one was a good one. That's was live. That's the way that we like it. All up in your face, you know?
JP: People running on stage.
MS: We played with Static X last year. That was a good show.
JP: That was probably one of the best shows we've ever played. We played with All Out War...
MS: All Out War, Buried Alive...they played a good show. I had rather personally...that's the kind of show that really exemplifies Flood, as far as...that's what we're all about. There's a lot of shows like that, but there's a lot that sucked, too. Any place were people can't mosh or can't dance or do anything but sit there and like...
JP: That's one thing about Clarksville. It seems like all the clubs around here, the owners get scared thinking somebody's gonna hurt somebody, or something's gonna get tore up. And if it does get tore up, than they blame it on the band.
MS: Yup.

What other hobbies do you get into besides the band?

MS: Me, I collect toys. If you've ever see my room, you'd see how many toys
I've got. I collect comic books; I like to write. Uh...that's about it.
JP: I'm doing my hobby right. Playstation...
MS: Playstation, drinking beer.
JP: Drinking beer.

That's about all that I've got. Can you think of anything that you would like to add?

MS: Yeah. The bands need to stick together more and try to build up a scene here in Clarksville, just the locals. Us, Lowboy, Reflex, FSN...that's four good, hard bands coming up, you know?
JP: I think personally, the city needs to support the kids. All together, no matter if it's music, skateboarding, whatever it is that they like to do. I know a lot of parents will, but the city is another story. You've got a lot of kids out there wanting to do a lot of stuff, but they can't. They've got nowhere to do it.
MS: We've always got people saying, 'when are you playing next?', and blah, blah, blah...It's like damn, I want to go see a good show but I can't. There's four good bands: Lowboy, Flood, Reflex, and FSN. You can't go wrong with that.

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