Trivium
June 17th, 2009 - Written by asher
While kicking off their cross Canada tour, I had the privilege to sit-down with Trivium guitarist, Corey Beaulieu, and speak about the band’s latest release titled ‘Shogun’, their tour and what’s to expect for years to come, from one of metal’s non-stop touring bands.
CONFRONT: Hey Corey!
COREY: Hey!
CONFRONT: so how do I pronounce your surname, Beaulieu, seeing as how you’re in Quebec now?
COREY: Ya ever since I got here everyone one has been pronouncing it the French way, but back home it’s [bowlyuu]. It’s been kind of weird being here and having a French accent thrown on it.
CONFRONT: Cool! So you’ve been touring for Shogun that was released last year. How has that been going?
COREY: It’s been a lot of fun. We’ve had a pretty fun time promoting it. We started with some headlining stuff and then headed over to Europe and toured with Slayer and then toured for a good amount of the year with Slipknot.
CONFRONT: Ya! I saw you kicked it off in Quebec City last night!
COREY: Ya! We did two months with them in the states and yesterday we started the Canadian part of the tour in Quebec City and we haven’t played Quebec in like three years and then since the new album haven’t played Montreal or Toronto.
CONFRONT: You guys really haven’t been here in awhile!
COREY: Ya it’s been a while but the record has been out a while and we haven’t hit here yet so we’re looking forward to playing the shows and then coming back in the fall for some headlining stuff so it’ll be good to be hitting it again.
CONFRONT: You should be hitting Foufounes Electriques; it’s probably the best metal bar in town.
COREY: Ya our past times in Montreal we have ventured out and have gone to some pretty cool places.
CONFRONT: Do you guys like doing that while on the road take the time to venture out and see the cities you’re in? Do you get time to do that?
COREY: We do if were up for it and if we’re not leaving so early and if there’s time to go out after we’re playing. Like I think last time we played Medley here in Montreal and it was near the downtown area so it was easy to venture out to a bar nearby. I’m not to sure where we are right now as in the city if were close by to anything.
CONFRONT: Ya your semi close by to few good things in the city.
COREY: Well it’s Travis’ birthday today, so we’re going to be venturing out tonight to something downtown.
CONFRONT: Speaking of places, got any that were the most interesting while on tour?
COREY: You know when we always got to Osaka, Japan. We always seem to go to this one bar. It’s one of those famous rock bars everyone goes to. And we all go there and get treated really, really well and it’s a lot of fun. And that’s like one of our place that’s mandatory when were in Japan.
CONFRONT: Cool! So my next question for you is a usual you ask artists. What were your influences when you were young; but also, I’m curious what is it as the guitar player of Trivium now that influences you. Like for example, you’re on the bus and maybe shooting the shit and say check out this wicked album I just picked up.
COREY: oh shit! Umm I kind of buy a lot music.
CONFRONT: Do you just listen to metal or do you have other influences like jazz or any of that stuff.
COREY: Nah more like little guitar stuff. Actually recently I picked up the new Buckethead album. I like a lot of his stuff, not so much back then, but liking more of the new stuff. I also really like the Suicidal Tendencies stuff. But currently, I don’t buy music to be influenced, more to be inspired. I really like the melodic stuff. And we work on a lot of mixing heavy and melodic stuff and that really gets me into the mind set.
CONFRONT: Do you find you cut yourself off from influences. Like for example, hear some band’s music and your like aw man I heard that song a million times already and you can hear their influences. Do you think artists should shut themselves off?
COREY: Well different artists have different ways. We’ll usually be rockin’ out all day. When we’re in the writing stage and playing every day, I kind of just wanna chill out. Even on the tour bus we won’t play so much music. Mostly, some party music like Dokken, Lynch Mobb, Scorpions.
CONFRONT: Here’s an off topic question for you. If you had another job, If you weren’t the guitar player for Trivium , where would Corey be?
COREY: Probably no doing a whole lot. (Laughs) Well I studied recording arts, that was kind of my fall back and if I didn’t have a band I wanted to be around that recording studios realm.
CONFRONT: Do you do that? Do you record other bands? Have you tried that realm yet?
COREY: Well I joined the band before I graduated so after that starting touring and stuff, so kind of what I learned faded away.
CONFRONT: Did you apply anything in studio?
COREY: Well there was so much to do and playing that the time to apply wasn’t there and all the advance stuff that I really never learned to much about other studio stuff and it’s always go-go-go plus time constraints. Mostly we were so concentrated on writing that the recording you leave to the recording guys. Like I did help with the pre-production on Pro-Tools but nothing super advanced; mostly basic stuff for demo purposes, so you don’t forget stuff.
CONFRONT: What’s the best experience you’ve learned from being in Trivium?
COREY: Well being in a band is not all sex, drugs and rock and roll. It’s a lot business. There’s a lot of people we employ and realize how many different aspects there are to make a band run it’s a real eye opener.
CONFRONT: So for the readers, what would you say are the trials and tribulations of Trivium or the learning experiences of a touring band?
COREY: It’s a lot of hard work, touring in a van, eating shitty food.
CONFRONT: Do the grind!
COREY: It’s a lot of work! It’s not just: get record deal and you’re good to go. Lots more to it.
CONFRONT: I noticed you were playing the Metal Hammer Metal God Wars I think it’s called.
COREY: Ya it’s pretty cool. It’s like the Grammy’s for Metal I guess. But we’re performing so that should be a really great show.
CONFRONT: Sounds like a wicked show to check out.
COREY: Yea last time we opened and this year we’re playing with a lot of great bands: Devil Driver, Anvil…
CONFRONT: Oh have you seen the Anvil movie yet?
COREY: Nope not yet!
CONFRONT: What do you think of this Metal movie movement? A lot of metal documentaries are coming out.
COREY: It’s pretty cool, I really wanna check out the Iron Maiden one, but I’d also like to check out the Anvil one cause it brings out the history of the band, the trials, the work and sacrifice and how hard it is to make it. Tells the story pretty well. Everyone who wants to be in a band should check it from what I hear. But it’s great ’cause it’s open them to a new majority of people who’ve never heard of them.
CONFRONT: Yea it’s a pretty good deal. So I guess to round this interview up I wanted to ask you what is coming after this Canadian tour, and how do you feel about Canadian fans.
COREY: Well we love Canada, Canada has been great to us.
CONFRONT: And what do you try to do to surprise Canadian fans.
COREY: Well we try to do a fun metal show, a good vibe, not like someone trying to punch you in the pit.
CONFRONT: Have you ever seen the hardcore guys mosh? It’s being called the new way of moshing.
COREY: Yea I remember seeing that back in the day and what the fuck is that? ”I’m going to break that kid”… but now it seems to be the accept.
CONFRONT: You ever feel like jumping into the pit when you’re doing your set.
COREY: Yea once in awhile, I did it once it Copenhagen, and we had a gig only 20 minutes away the next day so we would get crazy in this small club and just let loose with some booze and not give a fuck.
(laughs)
CONFRONT: So last thing I got for you is a question on your music video. Where did you get your concept from and how do you differentiate yourself from everyone else and do you find you need to be different to keep videos alive as they’re moving from TV to mostly to online?
COREY: Well I find most of our videos are viral and are just online and not really needed to be on TV and find that now it’s all On Demand. But ya, we just come up with a concept with the director who has worked with us before.
CONFRONT: Who was the director for the vid?
CONFRONT: It’s our buddy Ramone, our little Asian hooker (laughs). We just sat down with him and discussed what kind of ideas and storylines, back and forth bouncing off each other to see what can be come up with.
CONFRONT: So to round it up again for the fans. Let’s plug the album SHOGUN! Where did you get the idea and how’s this album different from the rest.
COREY: Well it came from when we were in Japan. We were just looking for something with strong meaning and how the album felt to us. And SHOGUN was one of first to come from stories we heard in Japan and we thought it be cool for a song and then from the vibe of the music we felt it would fit the meaning of the album.
CONFRONT: Cool anything you like to add for the fans!
COREY: Yup we’ll be back in the fall, I know we’re doing Mayhem Fest but not sure if there’s Canadian dates.
CONFRONT: Umm ya it should be hitting Toronto.
COREY: So I guess then we’ll be back in the summer and from there we’ll be doing a headlining tour but not sure when that will be announced, but it will have a cool line up that I think everyone will dig and it’ll be our first big headlining North American tour in three years so it should be great.
CONFRONT: When can Trivium fans expect a new album?
COREY: Well we already began writing some songs; but touring I think until March and after that I think really working on some material in the studio after all that and recording and putting it out online maybe. We’ll see how it goes to keep the fans attention.
CONFRONT: Well Corey thanks for your time and have great show! I’ll catch you next time your in town.
http://www.myspace.com/trivium
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