Alex Lee & Eli Santana - Holy Grail (15/02/2013)
Fresh off the release of their sophomore album, Ride The Void, we chat with Eli and Alex of Californian metal act, Holy Grail.
Hey, how's it going?
Eli: Hey, this is Eli (Santana, guitars) and Alex (Lee, guitars) from Holy Grail.
Thanks for talking to me today, guys. You must be pretty stoked to have just released your second full length album?
E: Yeah, it's our sophomore release. We're really excited to have it out and we're getting a pretty good response.
What was the recording process like for that one?
A: Basically we were just trying to put together songs when we weren't on tour and there were a few songs that we really wanted on the first album that didn't make it so they made it on this one after a little bit more work. We'd just gotten off tour with Valiant Thorr...
E: It was Toxic Holocaust.
A: Oh yeah, Toxic Holocaust and then we went straight into pre-production with Matt Hyde a few times a week and we spent a lot of time doing that. It was good to have practically every note figured out before we went into the studio because we had a lot of songs to record. We had 16 tracks to record for this album compared to only 11 for the first release but it was a lot of fun. Matt let us watch a lot of football and B-movies from the 70's so I dunno how much that ended up influencing us while we were writing but when we finally hit the studio we really hashed it out before going on tour with Dragonforce and then when we got back we recorded some vocals and were mixing and mastering for the rest of the summer.
E: We really tried to get all the tones right.
A: Yeah, absolutely. And then we were just listening to mixes of the songs when we were on tour with Valiant Thorr. I got that one right (laughs).
(Laughs) Where did the name Ride The Void come from?
A: Well we were working on the title track and Luna (vocalist James Paul Luna) just had this feeling that would be the title track and there's a line in the song that ended up becoming the name of the song and he thought he'd be a good name for the album. Basically it's supposed to be an unknown future, like a scary, dark abyss and just walking forward into that. I guess that's kinda complex for some people (laughs) me included.
I'm fairly new to you guys, how would you describe your sound?
A: I just say metal. For those that don't really know metal I reference (Iron) Maiden and (Judas) Priest just to move the conversation along but basically we try to be the best of all the metal from the seventies to now.
E: I always tell people that it's traditional metal but with a modern influence, bands like Lamb of God or In Flames. Basically it's clash of old and new but I always remind them that there is melodic vocals because most people associate metal with growling vocals and screaming, which I love, but we don't have.
How did the band form?
E: We came together from the band White Wizard. Our singer James Paul Luna, our drummer Tyler Meahl and guitar player at the time James LaRue wanted to move on from that band so they could get out from that one sub-genre of metal and have more crazy shreds of guitars and things like that so that's kinda where I came in and so did Blake Mount, who was a friend of ours, he came in on bass. Right before the release of Crisis in Utopia though James LaRue left and we ended up picking up Alex here from Bonded By Blood who we'd toured with on the Exodus tour and that completed the lineup we have now and will hopefully have for the rest of the bands career.
You were talking about influences before, who influenced you when you were growing up?
E: My father brought me up on classic rock like (Lynyrd) Skynyrd, The Doobie Brothers and things like that but eventually I wanted more. I wanted metal. So that led to the Big Four and then the shredder type bands and then into bands like Cannibal Corpse and Sepultura but overall I'd say the biggest influence is the new wave of British heavy metal like Diamond Head and Angel Witch.
A: My older cousin got me into Iron Maiden and Ozzy Osbourne and Metallica and a couple of my guitar playing buddies in high school got me into more the guitar virtuosos like Steve Vai, (Joe) Satriani and then I started to get into a lot of British and European metal because there were so many hardcore and emo bands around so bands like Children of Bodom, In Flames and Nightwish I really got into and then my friends helped expand my metal encyclopaedia.
Eli, you mentioned the Big Four before, you're about to go on tour with Anthrax as part of the Metal Alliance tour, you must be pretty stoked for that?
E: Absolutely! They are one of the bands I've always wanted to tour with. I'd love to go back and tell the 13 year old me that I'd one day get to tour with Anthrax. It'll be really great to meet those guys and hang out with Exodus again so hopefully Exodus will vouch for us being cool (laughs) if that's what they think.
(laughs) You guys played Soundwave Festival last year, what was that like?
A: It was awesome and unbelievable!
E: It was amazing. Most of us had never been to Australia before so that was huge on its own. It's an amazing country but on top of that the festival had all these bands that we'd looked up to just everywhere you look. I'd never really seen anything like that before, where a whole festival goes on tour. I think I saw Gojira like 5 times (laughs) we'd definitely love to do that again. I remember we did this chartered flight where it was just bands on the plane and a bunch of people snuck in full bottles of vodka and there was heaps of sing-alongs and people putting porn up on their laptops and there were these two poor female flight attendants but they were good sports. Basically it was like every class clown with a bunch of substitute teachers (laughs)
Sounds like it was a lot of fun. Are you guys planning an Aussie tour for this new album?
E: Hopefully. It all depends on what happens.
A: There is nothing locked in stone but it's definitely in the works for the future but we haven't heard anything yet. I really, really hope so though. I didn't meet a kangaroo last time so I don't feel I've officially been to Australia.
Oh when you come to Australia you've gotta see the kangaroos and koalas.
A: Yeah, definitely. I just drank with a bunch of Australians (laughs).
E: We did see a wombat.
What about a platypus?
E: No. We really didn't see much, did we? I've gotta put the pressure on to get us back out there.
Absolutely! What would you say is the best and worst thing about being in Holy Grail?
E: The best thing is getting to play music I really like. I know a lot of people who are in big bands but they just have to compromise if you get what I mean? But with us we get to go on stage and play metal that I'm proud of. I'd say the worst thing is....
A: We play a lot of shows?
E: Yeah we do play a lot of shows. I'd say the worst thing is the fact you have to sleep in a van but we still get to do what we want so it's ok.
We'll make this the last question. What do you like to get up to when you have some time off?
E: Well Alex has 2 yo-yo's in his hand so lots of yo-yoing for him (laughs).
A: Yeah lots of yo-yoing and guitar practise for sure!
E: I've taken up jacks so I've been playing that a lot (laughs) but basically I just exercise and see people and hang out and watch movies. I tried to sign up for the American Football League but we ended up getting the Hellyeah tour so I didn't get to do that. Well, it's only flag football. I'm not that tough (laughs).
(laughs) Sounds like a good replacement to me!
E: There was definitely some full contact drinking involved there (laughs).
A: Those guys definitely know their way around liquor (laughs).
We'll wrap it up there, thanks for your time guys.
E: Awesome, thank you.
Hopefully we'll see you down this way soon.
A: Hopefully, for sure, man.
Matt Barton
Hey, how's it going?
Eli: Hey, this is Eli (Santana, guitars) and Alex (Lee, guitars) from Holy Grail.
Thanks for talking to me today, guys. You must be pretty stoked to have just released your second full length album?
E: Yeah, it's our sophomore release. We're really excited to have it out and we're getting a pretty good response.
What was the recording process like for that one?
A: Basically we were just trying to put together songs when we weren't on tour and there were a few songs that we really wanted on the first album that didn't make it so they made it on this one after a little bit more work. We'd just gotten off tour with Valiant Thorr...
E: It was Toxic Holocaust.
A: Oh yeah, Toxic Holocaust and then we went straight into pre-production with Matt Hyde a few times a week and we spent a lot of time doing that. It was good to have practically every note figured out before we went into the studio because we had a lot of songs to record. We had 16 tracks to record for this album compared to only 11 for the first release but it was a lot of fun. Matt let us watch a lot of football and B-movies from the 70's so I dunno how much that ended up influencing us while we were writing but when we finally hit the studio we really hashed it out before going on tour with Dragonforce and then when we got back we recorded some vocals and were mixing and mastering for the rest of the summer.
E: We really tried to get all the tones right.
A: Yeah, absolutely. And then we were just listening to mixes of the songs when we were on tour with Valiant Thorr. I got that one right (laughs).
(Laughs) Where did the name Ride The Void come from?
A: Well we were working on the title track and Luna (vocalist James Paul Luna) just had this feeling that would be the title track and there's a line in the song that ended up becoming the name of the song and he thought he'd be a good name for the album. Basically it's supposed to be an unknown future, like a scary, dark abyss and just walking forward into that. I guess that's kinda complex for some people (laughs) me included.
I'm fairly new to you guys, how would you describe your sound?
A: I just say metal. For those that don't really know metal I reference (Iron) Maiden and (Judas) Priest just to move the conversation along but basically we try to be the best of all the metal from the seventies to now.
E: I always tell people that it's traditional metal but with a modern influence, bands like Lamb of God or In Flames. Basically it's clash of old and new but I always remind them that there is melodic vocals because most people associate metal with growling vocals and screaming, which I love, but we don't have.
How did the band form?
E: We came together from the band White Wizard. Our singer James Paul Luna, our drummer Tyler Meahl and guitar player at the time James LaRue wanted to move on from that band so they could get out from that one sub-genre of metal and have more crazy shreds of guitars and things like that so that's kinda where I came in and so did Blake Mount, who was a friend of ours, he came in on bass. Right before the release of Crisis in Utopia though James LaRue left and we ended up picking up Alex here from Bonded By Blood who we'd toured with on the Exodus tour and that completed the lineup we have now and will hopefully have for the rest of the bands career.
You were talking about influences before, who influenced you when you were growing up?
E: My father brought me up on classic rock like (Lynyrd) Skynyrd, The Doobie Brothers and things like that but eventually I wanted more. I wanted metal. So that led to the Big Four and then the shredder type bands and then into bands like Cannibal Corpse and Sepultura but overall I'd say the biggest influence is the new wave of British heavy metal like Diamond Head and Angel Witch.
A: My older cousin got me into Iron Maiden and Ozzy Osbourne and Metallica and a couple of my guitar playing buddies in high school got me into more the guitar virtuosos like Steve Vai, (Joe) Satriani and then I started to get into a lot of British and European metal because there were so many hardcore and emo bands around so bands like Children of Bodom, In Flames and Nightwish I really got into and then my friends helped expand my metal encyclopaedia.
Eli, you mentioned the Big Four before, you're about to go on tour with Anthrax as part of the Metal Alliance tour, you must be pretty stoked for that?
E: Absolutely! They are one of the bands I've always wanted to tour with. I'd love to go back and tell the 13 year old me that I'd one day get to tour with Anthrax. It'll be really great to meet those guys and hang out with Exodus again so hopefully Exodus will vouch for us being cool (laughs) if that's what they think.
(laughs) You guys played Soundwave Festival last year, what was that like?
A: It was awesome and unbelievable!
E: It was amazing. Most of us had never been to Australia before so that was huge on its own. It's an amazing country but on top of that the festival had all these bands that we'd looked up to just everywhere you look. I'd never really seen anything like that before, where a whole festival goes on tour. I think I saw Gojira like 5 times (laughs) we'd definitely love to do that again. I remember we did this chartered flight where it was just bands on the plane and a bunch of people snuck in full bottles of vodka and there was heaps of sing-alongs and people putting porn up on their laptops and there were these two poor female flight attendants but they were good sports. Basically it was like every class clown with a bunch of substitute teachers (laughs)
Sounds like it was a lot of fun. Are you guys planning an Aussie tour for this new album?
E: Hopefully. It all depends on what happens.
A: There is nothing locked in stone but it's definitely in the works for the future but we haven't heard anything yet. I really, really hope so though. I didn't meet a kangaroo last time so I don't feel I've officially been to Australia.
Oh when you come to Australia you've gotta see the kangaroos and koalas.
A: Yeah, definitely. I just drank with a bunch of Australians (laughs).
E: We did see a wombat.
What about a platypus?
E: No. We really didn't see much, did we? I've gotta put the pressure on to get us back out there.
Absolutely! What would you say is the best and worst thing about being in Holy Grail?
E: The best thing is getting to play music I really like. I know a lot of people who are in big bands but they just have to compromise if you get what I mean? But with us we get to go on stage and play metal that I'm proud of. I'd say the worst thing is....
A: We play a lot of shows?
E: Yeah we do play a lot of shows. I'd say the worst thing is the fact you have to sleep in a van but we still get to do what we want so it's ok.
We'll make this the last question. What do you like to get up to when you have some time off?
E: Well Alex has 2 yo-yo's in his hand so lots of yo-yoing for him (laughs).
A: Yeah lots of yo-yoing and guitar practise for sure!
E: I've taken up jacks so I've been playing that a lot (laughs) but basically I just exercise and see people and hang out and watch movies. I tried to sign up for the American Football League but we ended up getting the Hellyeah tour so I didn't get to do that. Well, it's only flag football. I'm not that tough (laughs).
(laughs) Sounds like a good replacement to me!
E: There was definitely some full contact drinking involved there (laughs).
A: Those guys definitely know their way around liquor (laughs).
We'll wrap it up there, thanks for your time guys.
E: Awesome, thank you.
Hopefully we'll see you down this way soon.
A: Hopefully, for sure, man.
Matt Barton