Interviews: Pride Kills

Scene Point Blank: After living briefly in Texas, I noticed quite a few differences from the northern states. Namely, there seemed to be a larger portion of the population living below the poverty line.

Chris: Yeah we do have a large population of poor people, partly because of the large amounts of immigrants that come from Mexico and can't find jobs. Another reason is because we are such a large state; we have a huge population in general. Every corner we have homeless people with their signs, but it just makes you appreciate your job more and not take it for granted.

Scene Point Blank: Why doesn't the Alamo have a basement? If they did, the forces could have hidden there any not been slaughtered by the Mexican forces.

Chris: Dude, we don't have basements in the south because everything floods. If they did have a basement to hide in they wouldn't have had to worry about being slaughtered they would have more than likely drowned. And that's not hard at all! Die fighting!

Scene Point Blank: Split release 7 inches used to be all the rage, but in recent times they have fallen by the wayside. What is your favorite split release? What band would Pride Kills want to do a split with if you were to release one?

Chris: I'm not really into records or anything like that but the Terror/Ringworm split is nuts! As far as Pride Kills doing splits, we have 3 bands we are going to try and work with: My Luck, Under One Flag, and HoldXFast

Scene Point Blank: The full-length is going to have a number of guest vocalists, can you give some insight into their contributions?

Chris: Well we are all about friends and family, which I shared earlier so we just wanted everyone we care about on our shit. Ray from Full Blown Chaos was in town for a few weeks just hanging with us, so he came in and did some amazing vocals and a guest speaking part. I think it's the best song on the album. Rob from Will to Live was of course all over this because he's just such an amazing person in general so we definitely had to have him on it. He's been there since day one. There are a good amount of friends on this; hardcore is about the friendships made over time and we try and let that be known through our music.

Scene Point Blank: Hardcore was originally linked more directly with punk than metal, but as of late, and metal band that has a breakdown is being lumped into the hardcore genre, how do you feel about this?

Chris: I think that kids know the difference and it doesn't bother me too much because I like some of the mid 90's metalcore. It's when they start singing about girls and looking pretty that they lose me. Walls of Jericho and All Out War are prime examples of band doing metalcore right.

Scene Point Blank: What is one band that you would fear to meet in a dark alley? This can be a band of any genre.

Chris: That's hard because all bands you think people would fear we're cool with. So probably any fashion band because I wouldn't want them to try and rape us.

Scene Point Blank: Hardcore/metalcore has become increasingly more popular with Ozzfest, MTV's Headbanger's Ball, and Uranium among others putting the genres in the limelight. Do you think this will affect the genre in a positive way or adversely? Explain.

Chris: It's going to do a little of both. We have already seen it here in Texas. Hatebreed shows are always sold out and more than likely we always get into like 10 fights during the show because MTV kids don't understand the dancing or what hardcore is about. And it definitely isn't about football mosh! But I think it's going to help bring more kids into it that will turn out to be true to it where they might not ever been shown the true life without the TV.

Scene Point Blank: Late last year, the metal community lost one of the greatest guitarist of the last twenty years in Dimebag Darrell. Do you have any memories of him or Pantera that you'd like to share?

Chris: Man I could go on forever on this one. It still hits me so hard because most of my room is Pantera/Dimebag posters. The day after that shit happened I went and got a Dime tattoo. It's a shot glass overflowing with whiskey and it says "one for the road" with the 'Cowboys from Hell' logo. He was the reason I picked up a guitar. Listening to the sounds he created and the talent he had just amazed me. I never got to see Pantera because I don't really do big shows and since I haven't lived in Texas my whole life I missed out and now I'll never see them. It breaks my heart. The intro to 'Domination' with forever be the heaviest dance part ever.

Scene Point Blank: Any parting thoughts?

Chris: Well I'm really tired of typing cause I'm lazy but I'd like to thank you for being so interested in Pride Kills and for doing this interview. I'd like to say that the new album will be out May 5th and that we plan on destroying the U.S. Shout outs to GAMC and all the niggaz down. TXHC is the new New York. Get used to it, we aren't going anywhere!

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Interview & Layout by Michael.

Images courtesy of Thorp Records.