Let’s start with the band’s beginning, and work our way to the present.

It all works back to ’91.  I was playing guitar for a while, Kennedy had been playing guitar for a while.
I was coming out of Boy Scouts and my little brother was in Boy Scouts at the time, and my little brother and
this kid John were both in Boy Scouts together.  This kid’s older brother, John, was a mutual heavy metal fan,
so he was always the one always wearing the Iron Maiden jacket and everything.  I picked up on that when
I would go pick up my little brother, and I’d talk to him about heavy metal or whatever, and he said,
‘I’m playing bass right now with this other kid, Mike, if you want to come down and play with us, feel free.’
So I was like, ‘alright, no problem.’  I brought down my guitar to Mike Kennedy’s basement, and played Megadeth’s
“Into the Lungs of Hell” with them.
From that point on, Mike was like ‘I want to put together a band,
let’s see what we can do for fun.’  And he knew this drummer Mike DeFury, who was our original drummer.
He basically played out of his basement, he was a few years older than us, and for a while,
it was just Mike DeFury playing drums, me and Mike on guitar, this guy John on bass,
who eventually put down the bass and just did vocals.  And all we did was cover heavy metal songs,
y’know, your average Metallica cover band.
 

So it was that guy John on vocals?

 Yeah, John on vocals.
We weren’t even V.O.D. at that point, we were just a garage band.  From that point on, we told John basically
that we didn’t like the way he was singing, and to just stick to bass!  And he didn’t like that too much,
he decided he wasn’t going to be part of us anymore.  But it wasn’t a bad thing, we stayed friends and
Kennedy was best friends with the kid.  So we played as this metal 3-piece, still doing metal covers but
trying to write original music.  We were searching around Calhoun High School (in Merrick, NY) for a vocalist,
and there was always word of this kid Tim, who was crazy into The Doors.  He was known as ‘Door-man.’  He walked
around like Jim Morrison, acted like Jim Morrison, basically thought he WAS Jim Morrison!  Non-stop we heard that
he sang along to The Doors, and he sang with this other kid, Gus, in high school, so we were like, ‘OK, we’ll try
this kid.’  And we also tried out this Chinese kid the same day.  And the Chinese kid came down and did
Queensryche’s “Silent Lucidity,” and that didn’t work out that good!
And then Tim came down, and I think did Iron Maiden’s “The Trooper.” And is this ’91 still, or is it ’92?
This is ’92.  This is like mid to late ’92.  When we heard that kid do “Silent Lucidity,”
pretty much half the band…it was like them against me.  I was like, ‘Tim is much better, we can’t do heavier
stuff with this “Silent Lucidity” guy.  So Tim actually ends up being the singer.  And for the rest of that year,
we played with Tim doing covers and originals - - we did a ‘Battle of the Bands’ and a Talent Show.  And through that
whole middle period, we picked up a bass player, a slap bassist called ‘Brock Gibson.’  And he was actually a turning
point in our career, we realized that we just wanted to play heavy music when he got into the band because
he brought the ‘new funk element!’  And we definitely did not want to go in that direction.
That didn’t work out and he eventually wound up leaving to go to college or something.
It was mutual, we knew it wasn’t going to work out.  From that point on, we won the ‘Battle of the Bands,’
so that was the big thing,
and we were playing our own original music.  So at that point, we were like, ‘wow, cool.’
Were there any songs the band was playing at the time that went on to become ‘V.O.D.’ songs?
 Well, here’s the thing.  When we played the battle of the bands, we were ‘Vision of Disorder.’
That was actually the first show ever in 1992, that we were V.O.D., and we did have that slap bass player.
I remember the day in high school, it was the middle of 12th grade that Kennedy came home and is like,
‘I think I got a name of a band - - Vision of Disorder.’
He was like falling asleep in English class, and he looked up in one of those Greek Mythology books,
and it said ‘Vision of Disorder.’
He brought that home,
we kept the name from that point on and we got announced as Vision of Disorder at the Battle of the Bands.
It just stuck, just basically to have a name.  So from that point on we just kept on doing original music,
and after the Battle of the Bands for a few months, we tried playing newer music, and our drummer just wasn’t
able to keep up.  Like I said, he was older than us, and he was getting a lot of pressure to obtain money.
He was a rich kid, well, not a rich kid but well off, and an only son being supported by his parents.
And they were sorta like, ‘it’s all good that you’re playing in the band, but y’know, you got to make your
own money, you’re 20 years old or whatever.’  So he went off, and he said, ‘sorry guys, I’d like to stay,’
and we were like devastated, like ‘oh no, what are we gonna do?  We got to find a drummer.’  So we just stopped
being a band for a while.
 

How long was it not going on for?

 I think 3 to 4 months.
 
 

Where you still writing?

 We were still writing.  Me and Kennedy were getting together non-stop, with Tim.
We would actually sit down with Tim, hear his input and help him sing along, help him write some
vocal parts at that point.
And then pretty much through high school, it was the summer going to the college year, 12th grade was already over,
Tim was asking around Merrick basically,
‘does anyone know a drummer?’  And this kid Jaret Barone (a mutual friend of ours and Brendon Cohen),
he was like, ‘yo, I know a GREAT drummer.’  And we were like, ‘oh yeah, who is he?’  And he said,
‘my boy Brendon, from Bellmore.’
And were like, ‘alright, tell him we want him to try out.’  He called him up and said,
‘there’s a band looking for a drummer,’ and Brendon said ‘shit yeah, tell them to come down!’
I remember the day we brought all our equipment down to Brendon’s basement, and  I remember knocking on the door,
and being like, ‘who is this little dick?’  Y’know, ‘hey kid, where’s your older brother?’  And he’s like,
‘no, I’m Brendon.’  So we go downstairs and we see this dusty chrome kit, and we sit down and say ‘ok, what do you know?’
Talking about covers or whatever, and it turns out he knows “South of Heaven” (by Slayer),
a song that we used to play back in the ‘old drummer days.’
And pretty much when we played “South of Heaven” with him, he actually did the double bass perfectly.
And at that point, being the Pantera freaks that we were, just the fact that he could double bass that good…
he was in the band.  Like from the first second he played that song we knew he was in the band.
We asked him and he said he was cool with it.  But the weirdest thing about this whole thing was that 6 months later,
we did that ‘Formula For Failure’ demo, which is so drastically different than that Battle of the Bands thing.
If you could think of that Battle of the Bands thing to that demo, there’s only like 8 or 9 months in between.
 
 

And what songs were exactly on that demo?

 “Formula For Failure,” “Seven Thirteen,” uh…”Take Them Out,”
and a song called “Society.”
 

Did any of these tracks appear on your Roadrunner debut after
getting re-titled or changed around?

You know what it is,
they are the ones that were considered the ‘V.O.D. classics’ when they were putting out our first seven inch.
They were the songs that everyone would later want to hear.  That demo itself was what got us our fan base on Long Island.
When we started, we just about 200 copies of that demo, kept playing ‘Hammerheads,’
‘The Right Track Inn,’ and at this point everyone was going to Nassau (Community Colege).
We were just playing as a 4-piece, just non-stop playing and putting out that demo.
And we got introduced to this kid Brian Smith from Nassau Community College, who was into the hardcore scene.
And was like, ‘yo, I got this band called Loyal To None, why don’t we work something out together and do a split seven inch?
’  And from that demo we had built up a 200-300 person following, nothing huge,
but there were kids who were coming down to see us every time.
And Brian Smith told us that he had this independent guy who wants to start up his own label,
and at this point we didn’t know anything about hardcore, so we were like ‘yeah, cool!’
So we paid for the recording, put out 2 songs - - “D.T.O.” and “No Regrets,” on a split seven inch.
And that seven inch was pretty much the start of where V.O.D. is right now.
That’s the one that I think we wrote quality, good enough songs that people everywhere,
not just people in the Long Island hardcore scene, could get into.  We were starting to play out of state now,
in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and after that seven inch came out, we started to realize that we sounded a little thin,
compared to the other bands that had bass players.
 

So for how long did V.O.D. not have a bass player?
 

From ’92 until ’95.  We were believe it or not, at our highest point, we were doing shows for like 5-600 kids without a bass
player, that’ what’s really weird.
 

For those 3 years, was V.O.D. even looking for a bassist?
 

That’s the thing, at this point we were like, ‘y’know, fuck it, we don’t need one.’  Because these kids are coming anyway,
 maybe because we’re tuned down to D, maybe it’s heavy enough.  Not realizing that of course we do need a bass player.
There were points that we should try to get a bass player, usually Brendon brought it up.  And we were like, ‘OK, let’s try out some kids.’
And we tried out maybe 2 or 3 kids, and all of them sucked sooooo bad!
I think really at that point we were not only doing things from a heavy metal or hardcore standpoint,
and we were doing some stuff that was hard to play.  Not like insanely hard, it was a little more technical
than the average band, and some of the bass players who come down were just chumps.  They really didn’t have chops,
it just didn’t work out with those guys.  So we were still playing throughout our first college year, going onto our
second,
and I had met this kid Dave Ohliger at Nassau Community College,
and he knew Brian Smith (the kid who first introduced us to the hardcore scene).
They were both involved in the recording program at Nassau.  So one day I was sitting at a table with them at lunch,
and Dave’s like ‘yeah, I know a bass player, this kid from Baldwin.  He used to play in a band,
and he’s looking for a new one.’  And we actually had a studio in Baldwin at this time,
so we called him up and Mike said he was OK to come to down.  We gave him a listing of shows,
and he came down to see us at Club 21 in New Hyde Park, which was one of our better headlining shows,
there was probably like about 300 kids.  He came down, and he’s told us that he didn’t like it that much,
but that he could tell that we were able to play better than the other bands.  So he was at least willing to try out.
He had a copy of the seven inch, and when Mike came down to try out, there was no showing him a part.
It wasn’t like, ‘I wonder if this guy could do it?’  When we said,
‘OK, let’s play “D.T.O.”,’ he played “D.T.O.”  And it was the same exact feeling that we had with Brendon.
Y’know, when we heard Brendon play, we were like, ‘OK, he’s in.’ And the same thing happened with Mike.
He basically did his own thing, and added his own little flavor to the song.  Added little parts we wouldn’t expect on bass,
and pretty much after the first practice, we were whispering, ‘hey did you hear it, he’s good!’
Except for Tim, Tim was like, ‘I don’t hear the difference…’ and we were like,
‘Tim, listen, this is without bass, this is with bass!’
Mike probably thought at this point that Tim was like an idiot.
But pretty much once Mike came into the band, after a few practices, we were like ‘we like,
do you want to come in?’  And he said yes.  So in ’95, right before Mike came into the band,
we recorded something called ‘New York’s Hardest,’ with some of the newer material we were writing
in between that split seven inch and what we were playing live.  Besides “D.T.O.” and “No Regrets,”
we had 2 or 3 newer songs, we were playing “Choke,” “Deconstruct,” and “Suffer.”
 

And which ones turned up on the
‘New York’s Hardest’ compilation?

 “Suffer,” and the song “Deconstruct,” which we never actually played after that.
But the song “Suffer,” Rick from 25 Ta Life was like, ‘hey why don’t you put a song on this record,
it would be really good for you guys.’  And we were still ignorant to the world at this point.  So we’re like,
‘OK, no problem.’
We end up going to New Jersey, recording 2 songs, um, Mike Kennedy winds up playing bass again
(he played bass on every recording we did up until then).  And it turns out that “Suffer,”
turns out to be one of the better songs on that compilation.  And the people who did it liked it so much
that they put it first,
so that Hardcore compilation ends up becoming I think one of those  classic hardcore compilations - -
there’s one that always comes every 5 or 6 years.
That was the first release that got us known to the entire world, it was international, not just national.
Y’know, Japan had it, everyone had it.  Basically in general, that song and that comp in itself just showed
that we were from New York and it really opened up a lot of doors.  And because of that (and when we were
getting Mike F. in the band), I was talking to Kevin Gill from S.F.T. Records, and he was like,
‘yo, I’ll put out a seven inch, no problem.  What do you have?’  And at that point we a few new songs,
because Mike F. was in the band, we were working on them.  At that point, we had played out a song called
“Through My Eyes,” also “Choke,” “Beneath The Green,” and “Watch Out” which had been around for years.
So we showed them to Mike F., they sounded a lot better with bass, and the bass break in “Through My Eyes” was at
first a guitar break,
but that’s Mike Fleischmann adding his thing, he was putting his input into the new songs.
We recorded the ‘Still’ thing, and I think that’s what blew us up.  Once we released ‘Still,’
it really got us known as an up and coming hardcore band, almost
to the point that we played the Northport Pipeline with Fleisch, and that was his 2nd or 3rd show,
and 600 kids showed up.  After that we played PWAC [a now-defunct hardcore venue on Long Island] and 900 kids showed up.
Then we played PWAC again and 1,200 kids showed up.  And then as Roadrunner records starting showing interest,
we played PWAC one more time and almost 2,000 kids showed up.
 

And how exactly did Roadrunner get interested?
 

Um, through playing out of state shows on ‘Still,’ we played with Shelter a few times in Pennsylvania.
Actually, we had played with Shelter 1 or 2 months before Mike F. had gotten in the band, it was us, Shelter, and Type O Negative.
Shelter’s Ray Cappo saw us at first and was like, ‘wow, you guy’s are a really good hardcore band.
I haven’t seen a really original hardcore band in a long time.’
And we were like, ‘alright, cool, Ray Cappo likes us.’  So we played with them a second time,
and this time we had Mike F., and of course the sound was completely different, and he ended up liking us.
Ray told us, ‘I got a new label coming out that’s going to be on Roadrunner, they’re going to let me do my own thing,
and I have a compilation coming out.  I’m going to do all up and coming bands and each one will have 2 songs.
I want you to come in, meet the guys, and record.’  We meet with Roadrunner, we talked about recording a couple of songs.
At this point we didn’t know if it was going to be for a compilation, a record contract, or whatever.
And it was just like, do the songs, and see what we think.
So we did a demo which was funded by Roadrunner that had the newer
songs that we were working on at the time - - “Element,” “Ways To Destroy One’s Ambition,” and “Divide.”
And that’s the demo that got us signed to Roadrunner.  So they liked the demo, we got signed, and the compilation
turned out not to happen at all.  They were like, ‘the compilation’s not happening, but we want to sign you anyway.’
We do the first record, and during that time we’re getting bigger and bigger on Long Island.
 
 

Didn’t V.O.D. play a show with Korn around this time?

 Yeah, at that time, right before
the record was coming out, we just kept getting the shows on Long Island.
Y’know, we played with Machine Head, and Korn was coming into town, and this was right when they were blowing up,
and it was just before they became huge on the 1st record.  Frank Carriola (a Long Island concert promoter)
was doing the Roxy at the time, and we were actually a band that was drawing 600 kids at the Roxy.
So he was told to get 1 local support, and we were the perfect band.  So we got to play with Korn,
and I think that was the show that opened us up to the metalheads on Long Island.  Like, our name was out,
but we never really had
‘the good’ metalhead show until that Korn show.  So besides the thousand kids we were doing at the
PWAC, now we’re also playing to this huge Korn crowd.  Also Type O Negative we played with, Life of Agony.
So you combine all that, when we’d play the PWAC, every hardcore and heavy metal kid knew about it.
It was just crazy.  So we put out the record [1996’s self-titled debut on Roadrunner].
 
 

From reading articles on V.O.D., the band wasn’t happy with the way the debut turned out.  Why?
 

The problem with that record is that the material that’s on it, spans from ’93 to late ’95,
and as opposed to sounding like a whole record, it’s like bits and pieces.
Very schizophrenic, it jumps around, and the one thing is the recording itself…we just performed horribly.
So no one’s happy with the performance, even if it had that production, and we performed the songs well - -
 we would be happy.  But the promotion for that record wasn’t that good, the production wasn’t that good,
and when you tie that all together, we just weren’t happy with that whole record.  As far as touring for it, whatever.
The thing about touring for a year and a half and knowing that your record isn’t what it should be…
I think it just really fueled us for ‘Imprint.’  It really brought us to that level.
Just knowing that we were touring on a bad record, it was like, ‘yeah, but see what we can do next time.’
For a year and a half, all we were telling people was, ‘watch what we can do next time.’
And it served as a big influence.
 
 

I could tell by V.O.D.’s August ’97 headlining show at NYC’s Irving Plaza that it sounded like a completely different band.

Yeah, right after Ozzfest, it was right after that we had that realization.  We were able to do something a lot more, I think that’s when we all realized, ‘OK, we’re all in this for good, let’s do it!’
 

You just mentioned Ozzfest, what touring did V.O.D. do before the Ozzfest for the debut?
 

We had done the hardcore tours, like Downset, Earth Crisis, Madball,
the only metal shows we had done were the shows we’d played at the Roxy.
And besides that, the only tour we did was the Sick Of It All tour in Europe.
Once we went on tour with Sick Of It All in Europe, which was our first real
touring experience, when we got back it was Ozzfest right away.
 

And how did the whole Ozzfest ’97 thing come about?
 

I think what Ozzfest does every year is they try and pick 2 or 3 bands that really
should not be on Ozzfest.  And they’re from the underground, and it’s Ozzfest showing
that they’re a supporter of underground music.
And at that point, I really think that us and Neurosis on the Ozzfest really stuck out like sore thumbs - -
being the people who really didn’t belong there.
I think it woke us up, just seeing a lot of bands doing really well, and we’re sitting
here struggling off of a bad record.  We’re doing well playing live, but when people
went to a record store, they didn’t see our record because we weren’t selling anything,
and I understand why they wouldn’t want to hear it, it’s not a good record!
The whole Ozzfest experience, what it did was it influenced us to just be able
to go back and write better music for our band, not really influencing with,
‘oh, we heard Machine Head and Pantera every night,’ but just by seeing bands doing really well.
I think it influenced us to strive harder.
 

And when would you say that the new line-up with Mike F. really solidified
and became a true unit?

 I’d say it was right in the middle of Ozzfest, we all got together and said,
‘yo, what’s going on here?  What are we doing?  Are we going to do this, or are we going to play around like chumps?’
I think Ozzfest was really just like a huge sit-down meeting for V.O.D., saying ‘let’s do this for real,
let’s make this a career.’  Like I said, that’s what influenced us for ‘Imprint.’
That kind of a tour can do nothing for a younger band but open up your eyes to the whole world of music.
Playing the sidestage, and then you walk over 300 yards or whatever, and you see Ozzy Osbourne playing to 30,000 people,
you’re actually like, ‘wow, there’s obviously people out there who want to hear music.’
It just influences you to the fact that you know you can be better.
 

It must also make you open your eyes and see a
broader audience…

 Yeah, a broader audience, but not to conform your style.  We’re always going to have the same
formula, but we always change with the times.
 

Who were some of the other bands V.O.D. got to become friends with on the
Ozzfest?

 For us, it was all Machine Head, Downset, Neurosis, and Phil (Anselmo) from Pantera.
 

What about Coal Chamber?

 No...I mean, we saw them, we’d hang out with them if they were there, but certain types of people we just click with.
  And for me I think that’s the people who are from the underground thing.  It seems like bands like Coal Chamber and Powerman 5000 (who were on Ozzfest also), even Marilyn Manson - -
there were 2 types of attitudes,
there was the very professional ‘industry’ attitude and then there was the very professional
‘underground’ attitude.  We just hung out, had a great time, every day everyone basically played their sets,
got together drinking on someone’s bus…it was basically a party every night and then to celebrate everyone went
and saw Black Sabbath.  It was definitely cool.
 

Any specific stories about hanging out with Phil of Pantera?
 

Y’know, my favorite time of hanging out with Phil was, he really like Neurosis,
and at the time when Ozzfest wasn’t happening on our side days [days the Ozzfest had off], we were doing shows with Machine Head, Downset, and Neurosis.  We were the opening band on that bill, and Phil pretty much came on the road for like 2 or 3 days in a row.  It was our first time really meeting him, and all I remember is just being in the backroom, everyone’s hanging out, and just drinking non-stop with him!  And just when you think that all the beer’s gone, he like, summons me from the corner, and says [in a low, growling voice] ‘GET OVER HERE!’  And he hands me a $100 bill, and says ‘GO BUY MORE BEER!’  And he’d make sure I’d get the ‘top of the line’ beer, we’d drink the rest of it, and it was our first bonding moment I guess.  I was like, ‘wow $100 for beer!’  I was blown away.  I guess it doesn’t take much to blow me away…
 

What about with Machine Head?

 Yeah, well just in general we had heard that Machine Head had liked our band a lot.  But another thing with Pantera is, as time went on, the more and more we got along with Phil and Tim was going out and singing with them.  Every day was just like a new thing with Pantera.
 

What song would Tim sing with Pantera?

 He did “Walk” a couple of times, and one time he actually did the lead vocal on
“Fucking Hostile.”  Y’know for Tim, that was probably like a life-long dream.  That’s like me playing with Sepultura.
He went out, Phil have him the mic, and at one point, Phil give Tim the mic for “Hostile,” and
for the big fucking “Hostile” scream Phil actually lifted him up!
It looked like a big brother lifted up his little brother.
But Machine Head we had heard (when we were in Europe with Sick Of It All,
Machine Head was there with Coal Chamber), that in every interview in the metal mags
over there they were talking about Vision of Disorder, and we said, ‘that’s cool as hell.
They’re promoting our band, they’re a way bigger band.’
Rob Flynn especially was a big voice for us, so when we went on Ozzfest,
I got to meet him, we found out we were doing the side dates.
So when we met him we said, ‘not only thanks for the side dates, but thanks for actually helping us out spreading the word.’
And we had actually played with Machine Head once on Long Island a long time ago.
At that point we were like, ‘who the fuck’s Machine Head?’  And they were like, ‘who the fuck’s V.O.D.?’
So we hung out with them and after those side dates, we actually wound up going out with Machine Head for ¾ of a month out on
the West Coast and working our way back.  And through that whole time we really started clicking with them and got to know them really well.
Just every night was a different party, they shared the same attitude towards partying as we did, we just had a great time every night.
It ended up at the end of the tour being like the closest band we ever went on tour with.
 

What else did Ozzfest ’97 do for the band?
 

You know what it did though even though we weren’t happy with the record?  It opened up our name to the whole entire nation.
That was something that even if you didn’t like metal, you still knew about Ozzfest.  I mean, Howard Stern was announcing our name, that type of shit was happening throughout the entire country.
Every magazine that we weren’t in was now listing our name.  So just the publicity in itself helped out to spread the word.  And I think what it did was, people knew who we were, but they didn’t really know what we sounded like, and I think right now people are finding out what we sound like.
They’re like, ‘oh, I remember that band, they were on this.’  And now they’ll put on ‘Imprint,’ and they’re starting to like it.  So just in general it helps, the advertising alone.
 

So that leads up to ‘Imprint.’

 After Ozzfest, we did some tours.  We did the whole country headlining,
we felt that at that point we could do a hardcore tour.  That tour was actually one of our best.
 

And who was playing with you on that tour?

 That was us, Bloodlet, One King Down, dayinthelife, and Fahrenheit 451.  It was good because it opened up the entire country to the other bands, for dayinthelife it was their first tour.  It was very successful.  After that we went to Japan, we ended up the whole entire first record with Japan.  That was also a very successful tour as well.  So when we came back, we were like, ‘let’s take a little time off, and then we’re going to start writing a new record.’  So when we finally got back, we started talking about what we wanted the record to be and how we wanted it to be.  We all agreed that it should be heavier, but at the same time more organized.  And when writing it, it really just fell into place.  Everyone had the same type of mindset, and it was the first time in our history as a whole band that we wrote songs.  It wasn’t just me coming in with a whole song and being like, ‘this is how it goes.’  It wasn’t Kennedy writing a few riffs and saying, ‘this is how it goes.’  There were certain songs on this record that from day 1 to the day before the record we were still talking about.  It was the first time also that Mike Fleischmann was actually involved in writing a record.  With the last record, he was involved in writing maybe like, 3 or 4 songs, and those songs really weren’t formed because we were rushed.  This time we said, ‘y’know what?  We’re taking out time, we’re going to do what we want to do, and just write how we want to write.’  The first song we wrote for the record was
“Imprint,” and that I think just set the standard for the whole record.  It was just a
real ‘in your face’ type of song, but we were a lot more basic than our older songs.
Arrangement-wise, even playing-wise, it was just easier to hear upon first listen.
And just as the songs progressed we kept writing more and more, we were starting to
notice that as far as the record as a whole, it started to have this one unique sound.  And once songs like
“Colorblind” came in, “Up In You,” there were certain songs that really were standing out.  Like once
“What You Are” came in, which is the 1st song on the new record, we really realized that we had a good
new record coming out.  Right in the middle, we were at a point where it was sorta dry and we didn’t
know what we had, and then once “What You Are” came in, we were like, ‘OK, this really is going to be a
good record.’  It sort of re-influenced us to keep going and then we wrote the 2nd half of the record.
Actually up until the last day, we still were writing “Jada Bloom,” and it was like the closure of the record.
It was the last song written, so it really set the standard for the end of the record.  Right before “Jada Bloom,”
the whole ‘Phil’ thing happened.  We were almost done writing, we had like 9 songs, and we knew we were either
going to do 11 or 12 songs, we’re not the type of band that can write 20 songs.  It would take us too long and
it would be too intense.  So basically, we knew him and he and Tim still stayed in touch.
He went down to his [Phil’s] house a few times, became good friends with the guy.  We were like, ‘OK, if we’re going to
do it, we may as well ask him and see what happens!’  So Tim calls him up and it was as simple as,
‘yo, do you want to do a song with us?’  ‘Yeah, sure!’  ‘OK, so what have you been up to lately?’
Just going into different topics.  Once we found out that he wanted to do the song,
it was like sort of a challenge to be able to write a song that would was up to par with someone of his stature,
sorta thing.  It sounds weird, but, if Phil Anselmo from Pantera’s going to be on a song, it does have to be a
little bit different than the rest of the songs.  So we had like 2 or 3 drafts of that song, and they all SUCKED.

Lyrically or musically?

 Musically.  Because every song we write we write musically first.
It sucked so bad that pretty much at this point we already had 9 songs, really dry.  Like, ‘what do you have?’
‘I got nothing.’  ‘Oh no, what’s going to happen?’  And just non-stop talking about how we had nothing.
I went home one day, and just wrote the main riff to the song, came back, and just from having a new riff,
if formed a new song.  I think what it takes sometimes is just to have one thing.  So everyone was like,
‘OK, that’s good.’  And Fleisch is like, ‘now I got this…’  Non-stop we put together this song, and it ends up being one of
 the most original sounding songs on the record.  And this is maybe 2 to 3 weeks before we go in to record, so we’re like,
‘OK, let’s record it, and send it down to Phil just so that he knows what’s going on.’  And at this point, nobody in the band
even knew what the vocal was going to be like, Tim’s the only one who knew.  So we record the whole entire record except
for the vocal of the Phil song and Tim flies down there, ends up coming back with a copy a few days later, and everyone is
just blown away.  As far as the whole record, everyone was just blown away.  Everybody in the band, once we finished,
we were like, ‘yep, we did it!’  It was a challenge to us just ‘cause going in we knew we had 19 days, so when you’re
on that type of schedule, there’s a discipline that you have to have.  Having the right producer I think has a lot to
do with it, Dave Sardy turned out to be a godsend.
 

So how did you hook up with Dave Sardy.  Was the band admirers of
his work (Chilli Peppers, Slayer, Skeleton Key, etc.) or did somebody recommend him?

 It was both.  Everyone knew his
work because my friend Kris Fleischmann [bassist for dayinthelife] was just like, ‘DUDE…D. Sardy, next record…DUDE!’
Just non-stop.  I had heard about this guy D. Sardy, but when we were working out budgets for the new record and
seeing who we could work with, our A&R guy Mike Gitter was like,
‘how about D. Sardy?’  So he was just another person mentioning him.  And when looking into our choices, the only
person who stuck out as an original producer, I’m not saying that we wouldn’t have went with anyway, but he’s the
only one who stuck out as someone who had their own niche.  He really does his thing, his own way.  And every other
producer, their record’s just sounded like everyone else’s records.  That’s the last thing we wanted to do, was have
a record that sounded like everyone else’s.  So we gathered together everything of Sardy’s, heard all his stuff, liked
it a lot.  Called him up, and we were just like, ‘we have this demo, do you want to hear it?’
We recorded a demo of new songs, mailed it to Sardy, and he ended up liking it and wanted to do the project.
So we’re like, ‘woo-hoo, let’s do this with Dave Sardy!’  We ended up going to the studio, he came down a couple of
times to our rehearsal studio, talked to us basically about our songs, how they’re structured, and we didn’t end
changing really anything, except we took in his input.  And like I said, up until the last day, “Jada Bloom” was
still being worked on.  We listened to him a little here and there, he actually helped us structure “Jada Bloom.”
And then from that point on, we just went in the studio, and he made it so relaxed I’ve never ever recorded like that.
It was seriously 100% live, everyone playing at the same time, Tim singing at the same time, and I would say 60% of the
vocals is live.  I’m not talking about the singing vocals, I’m talking about screaming.  But for the first time ever,
we actually understood what was going on while we were recording, and we found our guy.
So what he did which was different
from our first record, was that he would take us in the studio, like, ‘OK, do a song.’
Say it didn’t work out on 1 part…OK, move on.  It was so relaxed that at the end of it,
we had about 4 or 5 good takes of each song, just in like 3 or 4 days, ‘cause we just kept
switching songs.  He made it feel like such a band practice.  Y’know when we would practice at the time,
we were just going through the whole entire set, we would do every new song, and just do that twice a day.
And then at the end, we didn’t even know we were done with the record, he was just like, ‘you’re done.’
 
 

You said that was all done in 19 days, right?

 Yeah.  Drums were done in 2 days, and the rest of the stuff
was done in like another 3 days.
 

That was probably the key of the 2nd album being so much better than the debut,
it took less time…

 Yeah, the first one took about a month and a half.
 

A lot of great records have been recorded
in a short span of time.

 You go in to do your job.  And I think that set the standard for what our records in the
future will be like, the only thing that I would like different would be longer time on sound.
I want to go back to Dave Sardy, it’s just whether he wants to work with us.  I mean, not saying that we didn’t get along,
we got along great, it’s just time and schedules.  What he did was make us understand that we are a live band, and that
we should be recorded this way.  Going into the record even like a few days before, we were like,
‘Dave, should we double our guitars?’  And he said, ‘no, this is the way it goes.’
We were like, ‘what about Soundgarden?  What do they do?’  He’s like, that’s one guitar!’
He taught us a lot about recording and different stuff.  Pretty much from now own,
we’ll be doing it by the same method.  From now on we’re just planning on touring.
 
 

How was the Sepultura tour that just wrapped up?

 That was like a once in a lifetime experience.
That’s one of the bands that when we were younger we were like, ‘shit, Sepultura!’
In that Battle of the Bands thing Kennedy’s wearing a Sepultura shirt!
It’s like we’ve been listening to them for so long that to play one show with them let alone tour with them is amazing.
What’s perfect about a Sepultura tour is the fact that like a Slayer tour, those people just want to hear heavy music.
And that’s really the first tour for us that didn’t have the alternative or rock type of feel to it, sorta hip-hop thing.
It was just straight heavy, heavy metal music.  And it actually turned out to be the best tour we’d ever done.
It was our first tour ever being main support.  And I think what that tour did was made us a main support band.
We grew as a band on that tour.  Hopefully it’s the bridge that will bring us to headlining.
 
 

The rock magazines over in Europe (Kerrang!, Metal Hammer, etc.) really seem to be going wild over V.O.D. presently.
Why do you think Europe embraces heavy music so much?

It doesn’t have to do with that, it has to do with…they’ve always been into heavy music.
But the heavy metal scene compared to the hardcore scene, there’s no comparison.
The heavy metal scene is like 20 billion times bigger.  And our problem with our first record when we went over there with
Sick Of It All, was that it was an old school hardcore crowd.  And every record that we saw in the stores over there had a
N.Y.H.C. label on it.  We came out of hardcore, we have hardcore roots, but we do also have our metal roots.
And the combination of the 2, the old school hardcore crowd didn’t really like.  And the metal crowd, when they see
‘hardcore’ over there, they don’t even bother giving it a listen.  So this time we made sure, we told European Roadrunner,
‘we’re not this, we’re not that.  Put it out, just say what we are which is a heavy band.’
And I think people are picking up on it.  Also stuff like Phil Anselmo being on the record, p
eople are saying, ‘oh, Phil is on this…why would he be on it?’  And they’ll check it out.
But people over there are opening up to that we’re a heavy band, not just the average run of the mill hardcore band.

So when your were growing up, V.O.D. was into both hardcore and heavy metal?

There was a point when we were just being hardcore kids.
Like around that time right before Fleisch got in the band, ’94 to ’95,
we were one of the bands that actually stopped listening to heavy metal and really got into Sick Of It All,
Biohazard, those 2 bands mainly, Life Of Agony even, followed by Madball.
Once Madball came on, we were heavily into hardcore.
Influencing us to the point that it made us try to create our own sound with the heavy metal,
the hardcore, even alternative music at the time, like Alice In Chains, Soundgarden,
Faith No More, all those bands were influencing us at the same time.
That’s what really made us form our own sound.  I think that’s what a lot of bands don’t realize,
is that you should be open to all things.
 

Are there any upcoming projects V.O.D. is involved in?
You’re going to be on a Bad Brains tribute album, right?

 Yes.  We’re going to be putting a song out,
“Soul Craft,” which I think in itself is the ultimate Bad Brains song.
So we already recorded it once [for the ‘Resurrecting Reality’ seven inch],
but we’re going back in to re-record it with the guys who did our last record.
Not Dave Sardy, but Greg Gordon the engineer.  We’re going to re-due it just because
if it’s going to be a Bad Brains compilation, and we have that song, I know a lot of bands probably want that song,
so we have to do an extra special job on it.  I think it’s going to be out in ’99.
 

Who else is going to be on it with you?

I think as of right now it is V.O.D., Sepultura, and the Deftones.  That’s the only people I know as of right now.
So…it should be good.  Actually Will Haven, also.
 

What about upcoming tours?
 

November 18th we go to Japan we go to Japan for 2 weeks, Australia for a week,
New Zealand for a week, back to Australia for a week, then Hawaii for 3 days.
So we’re going to be overseas in the Pacific for like, I guess a month starting in November.
After that, we’re off for Christmas, and then hopefully in January we’re trying to land a spot on the Fear Factory tour.
And even if Fear Factory doesn’t pan out, we’re going to try and do a headlining tour.  Nonetheless,
we’re going to be touring.
 

Describe the band member’s personalities…
 

Michael Fleischmann seems very standoffish and quite at first, but once you
get to know him it turns out that he’s the jokester.
Brendon Cohen is the backbone of V.O.D., Tim Williams is like the persona,
Kennedy is like the party, and I’m like the business!
And together, we form V.O.D.!
 

And finally, what were some albums that were important to you and that you would recommend
to others?
 

Metallica- Master of Puppets, Faith No More- Angel Dust, Bad Brains- Quickness, Soundgarden- Badmotorfinger, and Sepultura- Roots.