Interview with Last of the Believers - Podcast 74

Hey, what's up? This is Chris. And this is Brett from Last of the Believers. And you're listening to Sound Scene Revolution.

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Hey, what's going on? Thanks for tuning in. We got a new episode this week with Chris and Brett of Last of the Believers. Maybe you know Chris used to play guitar for like two or three years, three or four years, in a band called Rise Against, and Brett plays bass in a band called Ignite. So the band of itself, Last of the Believers, if you haven't heard, is kind of a hybrid of a bunch of bands. And so they're pretty cool, pretty big band. And they got one album out, kind of a, it was an EP and they re-released it. And so it's kind of good. It's called Paper Ships Under a Burning Bridge. Now you can find it in stores and shit. They did like 2,000 of the original. And so now they did more of this one. And for this week, we are giving away two copies of that EP, if you happen to be lucky enough.

To listen to it, to the show. We'll be giving those away at the end. We'll tell you how to enter and all of that. Actually, this week we, I realized we have a contest we never wrapped up for the playing favorites. And maybe one more. But so check all our old contests. Because this will be the last week and we'll wrap them up next week. And we actually start caring about what we do again. But so listen to the interview. Check it out. Really good guys. And then listen at the end for copies of the album. And if you don't know what the album sounds like, we're going to play a track of it right now. This is, we're going to play, we'll play A Long Time Coming, which is a track that actually wasn't on the original EP, but is actually on the recently re-released version of Paper Ships Under a Burning Bridge.

So check that out and stay tuned for the rest of the interview.

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We are hanging out, out back of The Catalyst with a couple of the members of Last of the Believers. You guys say hello. Hello everybody. Hey everybody out there in the other end of this microphone world. That covers the broad spectrum. So if you guys just want to introduce yourselves so people know who is going to be talking, who we're with here. My name is Chris Chassie. I play guitar and sing here and there in the band. And I'm Brett Rasmussen. I play bass. Alright. So I guess the easiest place to start is if we can just get like a brief history of the band. I mean, how you guys formed, all of that. Whose version? Just kidding. There's many. We've actually only been around since June. Just the singer and I were long time friends and we basically said let's do a band for fun.

I still live in Chicago. And then the other four members of the band live in California. And I was kind of bored. He's like, let's do a band. So I got on a plane like the next week and went out there, started writing a few songs. I've known Brett for way too long. And I roped him into this world of music. I'm sorry. It's alright. And within two weeks we were in the studio recording our CD slash, I guess, what? I guess it's kind of a demo. Started as a demo. But again, like a professional demo that we self-released and all that stuff. And we played our first show November 2nd. Cool. I guess the one thing that a lot of people know is you guys come from a bunch of different bands that a lot of people recognize, know the names of.

And there's a lot of people, like certain bands, they tend to shy away from that. They're like, we don't want to talk about it. But you guys seem fairly okay with mentioning X, Rise, Against and all that. Is that just because, is there a reason for that or is it just kind of acknowledging that? Yeah, it's just acknowledgement and things like that. And it's kind of like the similar style as well. Like there's plenty of elements of Rise in here and Ignite and even the other band, like Sparkle Life. And like there's some of those elements as well. You know, like that's part of our influences and things along that lines. And, you know, a lot of people, well, not a lot, but like one out of every couple thousand of the shows recognize who we are too.

So, I mean, why don't you just get it out there in the open rather than people come up and say, hey, aren't you or weren't you at one time in that band? You know, just get it out there in the open. Makes sense. Is it at all where, I mean, you guys, we'll get into the fact that you re-released the CD EP, but do people compare it to any of your other work? Does that still come up where it's like, well, it kind of sounds. I always get asked, well, what does it sound like? And I would just say it's kind of in the same genre of the bands we were in and just with different guys so that you're going to have different elements. So, yeah, I mean, I usually use the X bands or, you know, other bands as just a reference point because it's basically who we are.

So it's kind of hard to get away from that, you know. Those were the bands we were in. They sounded a certain way. This is going to reflect somewhat what those bands sounded like. I mean, unless we went totally different, did like just acoustic or like joined some different, you know, style of band. But this is definitely just a reflection of like the kind of music we write. So, yeah, I don't know. If you come from those bands and that's what you like doing, it makes sense that, you know, it's going to be in a similar vein. Yes. So you guys, you self-released Paper Ships Under a Burning Bridge, correct? That's correct. And then recently you guys, you just actually this Tuesday, is that correct? That's correct again.

You re-released the like remastered or not. I don't know if it was remastered, but it has more songs on it now. Yeah, like we found a company that was willing to distribute the CD for us. Like we can only go so far with it. Like, you know, out of our own pockets we recorded it, impressed it, and we shipped 2,500 of them. And it gets to a point where like you can't get it in certain stores unless you have a name behind it. And we got in contact with this company called Adrenaline Music Group. And they're like, we're not going to own your music, but we'll get it everywhere for you. So, and it's like the dream come true, like for musicians. That's like a perfect marriage. We get to maintain all the rights and the ownership to all the songs and everything.

And these guys get it everywhere it needs to be. That's cool. Yeah. It's in Best Buy now. I could never have gotten it to Best Buy. No matter what we did or what we said, it would never happen. But they have that name behind them, and they got it out there. That's cool. And now I just kind of, it's going a little bit further now. We added a few more songs, different packaging with a layout, you know, just little things. And now a lot more people can find it. That's cool. Yeah, not a bunch of people got the first one. We only pressed a couple thousand of them. Yeah. So not too many people actually got it. So this is actually like kind of like the real release. That's cool. Now there's a couple of songs on the new one that weren't on the original.

I know there's an acoustic version of Throwing Matches. Is that correct? Yes. And then there's, hold on, I'm going to have to look for the name because I haven't picked it up yet. But it's, all right, where did I find it? A Long Time Coming. That's correct. Was there a reason? Now, obviously, I guess the acoustic version of Throwing Matches just kind of put something different on there, you know. Yes. Why did A Long Time Coming, why was it not on the original? We actually recently recorded that one. Like when we started talking to Adrenaline, like, you know what, you guys are going to put it out for us. And like, it doesn't, it didn't make much sense at the time. Like, oh, let's re-release the same five song.

If we're going to re-release and do it right, put more material on there. Yeah. We did the acoustic version right after we recorded the five song. So that was already ready to go. And then we got back into the studio to do this one more track, which we worked with one guy, JC, at Revolver Studios in Thousand Oaks. I think so. Yeah, sounds about right. Give or take. He helped us with the five song, and then the guys at the Blasting Room in Four Ponds, Colorado, helped us with vocals and mixed and mastered for it. So, I mean, it kind of flows with the CD still because it's all the same people working on it. Yeah. But they were, they were in both songs recorded after the five other songs. That's, I mean, that's really cool with the Adrenaline Group and all that.

But has it been, like, is it different starting with a band like this where you guys have a little bit of name recognition and backing as opposed to starting a band, you know, from, like, scratch where at this point you have a little bit of starting momentum almost? It's just, it's, it's a pain in the ass to get a band known at all. Yeah. I mean, we're lucky enough that we've, he's been doing this 14 plus years and I'm on 10 or so. So, like, people will pay a little bit more attention. Like, you started at the rock bottom, like, we're both in our 30s now. So, I mean, starting a new band without any background whatsoever, it takes eternity to get any form of momentum at all. Yeah. Like, we were lucky enough that some kids started paying attention and picked up kind of quick.

Like, and we're hoping once the CD gets everywhere, it'll pick up even more and maybe get on some bigger tours or more tours or whatever. Yeah, it's hard, though. Yeah. I mean. I was lucky enough in my other band, Ignite, when we started, like you said, like 14 years ago, we had ex-members. Yeah. Kind of the same situation, but ex-members from, like, you know, bands from, like, the late 80s, hardcore and punk scene. So, it was kind of, it's kind of the same thing for me. This band's kind of, it's going to follow along the same path as that, as, like, kind of getting that little bit of a head start. Yeah. As opposed to somebody, like, just who's never been in a band and never. So, I don't know. So, I'm kind of used to, like, this is how it's been.

Yeah. So, yeah, I can't imagine starting from, like, absolutely nothing and having no, I mean, so many of my friends try and do bands and it's so hard to do. There's so many bands out there. There's so many people trying to get their band heard and I don't know. It's just, it's a really competitive industry as far as, like, on the artist side. Yeah. Cool.

Yeah, I keep having to refer to my notes. I feel bad. Like, I don't. You have them. That's all I care. Yeah. I wrote these. I didn't want to come here and be like, so. Yeah. Scientology. You have microphones and you have questions. I'm psyched. Tell us a minute. What do you think about Heath Ledger? Met him. Nice guy. He was alive. Did you? Yeah. Wow. I don't want to sidetrack, but that's weird. No, we did Rise Against, we're in the Lords of Dogtown movie. Oh, that's right. He was on that set. Yeah, you guys were doing Black Flag. It's like, he was there in passing and so it was Emile Hirsch and all that stuff. But, like, we were all psyched to meet Alpha. Like, we were just sitting down with him. We're like, oh yeah, cool actors.

Good timer. Oh, look at this. So, I mean, like, it was so brief. Like, oh, there's that actor guy. Yeah. So. Hmm. Interesting.

All right. That was the first half of the interview with Chris and Brett. They're really good guys. And it was really cool because they had, like, an RV type deal, which was super nice because it was freezing fucking balls out in Santa Cruz. And we were, like, the only people without leather-studded jackets there to go watch The Circle Jerk. So, yeah. And by the way, it is really embarrassing if you go to the wrong club and you're like, we're here for The Circle Jerk. They just look at you really, really weird. So, if you are planning to go see that band, make sure you go to the right club because you've got to be able to run really quickly if you go to the wrong one because they will chase you down or try and jerk you off, which is, yeah, you've got to be ready for that.

All right. Enough cheap jack-off jokes. Like I said, we're going to be giving away two copies of their expanded EP Paper Ships under a burning bridge, which has two songs that weren't on the original one. Well, it has A Long Time Coming, which is a new song, and then it has an acoustic version of Throwing Matches, which is really good. But it's emotional. We'll probably play that at the end. What we're going to play right now is another track off of the album, and then we'll get back into the show thing. We're going to play the track Fists Up, and then we're going to go back in the interview, and then right at the end, we'll tell you how to enter the contest. So, stay tuned.

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You have a 7-inch coming out, right? Or is it? It's out, is it? Just about. It's almost there. We have a tour version with us right now, because the one that's officially being released through New Age is about to come out in about a week or so. Okay. But for the tour, they pressed us one just for the tour. It's like, oh, it's not ready yet, but we'll get this ready for you to give to people to come out to the show. They pressed 200. They're all hand-numbered and cool things like that. We've got like 198 of them left, if you're interested. Oh, dude. We started with 200. Dude, you have no idea. I'm just kidding. I'm that guy. Oh, yeah. I'm that guy, too. It's kind of weird, actually. Vinyl sales. The last few tours I've been on, more so than before, from my experience, vinyl seems to have picked up again.

It's definitely coming back. Yeah, because they can collect that when they can just get the CD copy from their friends or whatever. Well, that's the thing that you're finding out is more and more kids, they're downloading the record or they're getting it from somebody else, but people are still legitimately buying vinyl records. Yeah, it was surprising. If you follow eBay at all, you begin to notice that, which is, that's a little upsetting. I mean, I owe most of the records I want, but every once in a while, there's a few and you go on looking for them and they go for staggering prices. Yeah. That's the worst, is when you're like, especially the ones you've passed up where it was like $10 at one point, and you're like, oh, I'll get it later, and now it's on eBay for like $75.

Yeah, like you finally, they finally come up and you're all psyched and you're watching it, and then look at the end, it's like, oh, $152 for an $8 record. Yeah. Sweet. Yeah. What can you do? Yeah, well, that's, it's an unusual thing, because I mean, a lot of artists, I mean, are especially stoked that there's interest again in the format and an interest in musical format in general, where for the past so many years, it's been going more and more digital, but at the same time, it's got to be upset. I mean, I've talked to guys in bands who are just, they're thrilled that it's selling, but then they get so pissed when they see some guy who just bought a tour version of their LP and flips it on eBay, but I don't know, it's just one of those things.

It's the way it goes. Yeah. So, I want to ask a couple of specific questions for each of you. First one, Chris, you do a couple of lead vocals on the EP, is that correct? Yeah, in throwing matches and a long time coming, I sing the choruses. In the throwing matches, I sing the break as well. So, it's pretty distinctive in the songs, who's who, like Steve's voice is very raspy and punk or hardcore, whatever you want to call it, and mine's a lot cleaner sounding and melodic, or at least I try to make it that way. That's the goal. That's the goal, at least. That's kind of, it's kind of your first time doing that kind of stuff, isn't it? Yeah, I've been doing backing vocals for years, and we got to the point where we're recording the throwing matches song, we kind of like hit a wall, and we were already going to the blasting room to mix and master it, and I was just like, you know what, just leave it, and I think, I'll figure something out.

And so, by the time I went there, I had an idea, and that's how it all began. Like, I didn't, the band didn't start intentionally with me singing anything at all. Yeah. And then once we did that, and then the next song came along, I was like, you know what, let's try it again. Cool. And it's the same thing. Is it nerve-wracking at all to, like, do that stuff live? If I don't have monitors, yeah. Because you can't hear your voice at all, so I'm like, I don't know what I'm singing, I don't know what it sounds, but if they're, if I have any of my voice in my ears, I'm fine. You know, like, some of these kids are like, oh, you guys are emo, or like, our first show they call us Fall Out Boy, and I was like, we're all like, wait, are you kidding?

Yeah. Do you have any clue what's going on right now? I was like, I wish. I know, I was like, yeah, we're rolling cash right now. God, if we made that kind of money. Awesome.

You guys did a tour with Ignite, actually, through the West Coast. Did you pull double duty on that? What do you mean? Did you play, now, do you play with both bands, or? Yeah, we have, like, Ignite takes up the bulk amount of my time, and we. Thanks a lot. We, you know, whenever we have downtime, like, we've taken January and February completely off, so we have time to tour. But actually, we had a show, an Ignite show, the second day of this tour, that was already booked, so we, last of the Believers, played an LA show, and then on a Friday night, then the Saturday night, we had an Ignite show in Long Beach, and then we left for tour, like, oh, we did a video shoot the next day, and left for tour the next day.

So, yeah, Ignite's kind of got some downtime right now, so, yeah, it'd be pretty impossible to try and, like, do two things at one time, you know, unless we were on the same tour somehow. What's it? Like, at the end of every night, we're just like, God, it's fucking, like, counting the days down, and you're like, fuck, one more day. That's funny. Oh, very cool. Um, let me make sure I got all these questions out here. Is there anything that I haven't asked? Is there anything you'd like to add that I haven't asked, in case I'm missing something? Well, you already mentioned, the CD came out Tuesday, 22nd. Mm-hmm. You can find it in Best Buys and Hot Topics, things like that, usually under miscellaneous L, because nobody knows us yet.

Right. Uh, we're finishing up the video, which will be posted soon via MySpace or YouTube or who knows what. Our website, every, yeah. Yeah, everything you're going to mention. Everywhere you can get it. Anywhere we can service it. Um, right now, no more shows are booked as of yet. Okay. Um, hopefully, maybe in March area. And that's basically where we're at right now. This tour's almost over. Been fun with the Circle Jerks, things like that. Any plans for a future recording? I mean, I know you guys just, I mean. Well, I mean, I, I would love to get in the studio as soon as possible. Yeah, the goal is to, I mean, we put this out as a demo quite a few months ago, even though it just came out, like, really on the 22nd.

Yeah. Where, like, the whole goal is to do, like, a full length. If, you know, when and whatever the circumstances are. But that's the goal, is to, like, do a full length. Yeah, the next step is get some form of label interest, because, you know, why put out a full length on your own again? Yeah, right. I mean, that's what, that's what the purpose of this was. Like, here, this is what we can do. Help us out or invest in this band. Yeah, I mean, in our mind, this is still just a demo, even though it's actually released as an EP now. So, we, this was all just prepping for a full length. So, to get to the point to put a full length out. But it's been cool. This tour's been great. There's been, it's a different, kind of, crowd comes out, kind of some Krusty Punkers that come out to see the Circle Jerks.

So, it's been a challenge. And it's been cool. A lot of kids have embraced it and have been really, like, you know, we've had a lot of positive response, which has been really cool. So, and like, I always appreciate that because, I mean, in the other bands that I've done and, I mean, anywhere you go in the world, it's like, it's cool just to have people appreciate your music. And it's, I mean, we get to play music and, I mean, it's the best thing in the world to get to write, record, play music in concerts, in venues around the world. It's like, I couldn't ask for, you know, a better job. We're having, it's just so much fun. You know, we, we love being on the road. So, it's what we do. As long as you enjoy it.

I mean, that's the main thing. As long as it's not like, well, I guess we'll do some shows. Oh, no, we want more. Yeah. We're kind of bummed by going home already. This is a short one. Yeah. Yeah, you guys weren't out for that long. It was like 15 shows. Yeah. That's nothing. It could, I've seen bands do less. I've done less. But yeah, no, like both of us, all the guys involved seem to really enjoy touring and stuff and, you know, getting out there and that's the best way to, especially now and nowadays, like it's really hard to get your CD in stores, no matter like from like a fledgling band to even like a intermediate band. So like really the best way to do it, get on a big tour, get out there, hand the CD to the kid.

All right. Here it is for 10 bucks, you know, don't spend $16 on them and you can't find it in the store normally anyway. Like we went into the Best Buy the other day, there was one copy and it was in central California somewhere. So if one kid buys that, how long does it take? It's going to take like another two weeks at least to get it. You got a tour, you have to get your music out that way. You have to make it available at your merchandise table and that's the best way to get music in people's hands. And then if you can perform live and impress the kids at the show, then you're way, way ahead of the game. So. Well, hopefully whoever listened to this, someone does actually, I found. And, uh, they'll try and get you guys on a tour.

So everyone who's listening, you know, my mom and everyone's mom, she'll get you on a tour. Don't worry. She knows people. All right. Um, so I want to thank you guys so much for taking the time and, um, best of luck with the rest of the tour and all things coming up. Thank you. Thank you, man. All right. That wraps up our interview for this week. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we enjoyed making it and talking to those guys. Um, they're really, really cool when they do a really, really good live show. So if you get the chance, check them out. Actually, you may want to email them anyway, cause they had tour editions of their seven inch, which if you're a huge vinyl nerd, like me, there were only 200 of them made ever.

And they were actually made by miss, well, not by mistake, but because the record label didn't get all of their seven inches ready. So they like threw some shitty ones out and they're like, here, call these tour editions and they hand numbered them. So I got one and email the band and ask them what's up. We'll sell you one for like 40 bucks. I'm sure. Enjoy that. Like I said, we have two copies of their album, paper ships under a burning bridge out to give away to lucky listeners. Um, how are you going to enter? You're going to email us. That sounds, I haven't done one of these in a long time. I really don't know. I was like, maybe just mail us a fucking stone tablet. Come to my house. First people to show up at my house, get one.

Um, email us at soundscenerevolution at gmail.com. Uh, put. They're going to come to your house and be like, is this where the circle jerk is? Is this, is this your, this circle jerk right here? No. Oh God. I'm in bed. Well, do you want to just, I mean, I know it's kind of impromptu, but, um, so email us at soundscenerevolution at gmail.com. Include last of the believers in the subject line. Um, and, uh, you know, I really don't know what to do for this one because they're kind of a super group in a way because they're made up of a lot of bands, but I don't, we did a super group question already. So what I'm going to do is just to prove you were listening, pick one of the guys who's been in another band like ignite or rise against.

They've been in tons of fucking bands and list the band name and then list your favorite song by that band. Because if you don't like a song by one of their previous bands, chances are you don't want this fucking album because it sounds kind of like their previous stuff. So do that. Email it to us at soundscenerevolution at gmail.com. Include your name and address and we'll show up for the circle jerk at your house or we'll mail it to you either way. But that's that. Uh, three of us would be like a triangle. If we, we can, how God, that's, uh, we can't, I can't look at you right now. I can't make eye contact. I'm too, I'm too ashamed, but, uh, we're going to wrap this up. We're going to do, uh, uh, I'll do the regular version of throwing matches.

I like the acoustic one, but I think the regular gives you more of a feel for the rest of their music. So this is throwing matches off paper ships under a burning bridge. Enjoy it. Hopefully we'll be back next week. Uh, and we'll, we'll, we'll keep them. Masturbatory jokes, uh, to a minimum. We're sorry. So sorry. Uh, have a good one and we'll see y'all next week.

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How many times can you read brother? All right. Um.