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Ahead
of their opening slot on the 2009 Taste of Chaos tour, I had a chance to
chat to Maylene guitarist Kelly Nunn backstage (quite literally behind
the stage!) at Manchester Academy.
MM:
So how’s the tour going so far?
KN: It’s been going great. Almost sold out every
night so each gig you’ve got a packed house of 2,000 – 3,000 people
a night. We’re still getting used to the cold weather, though and our
sleeping patterns are really screwed up at the moment. We’re going to
bed at like 5am and waking up at 2pm in the afternoon so I’m going to
have to go to bed a little earlier and make myself
get up earlier.
MM:
What have you got planned for 2010?
KN: We have some tours that we’ve submitted for. I
know we’re trying to get on with Atreyu when they headline in the US
and the same with Chimaira and also the Warped tour as well. We took a
fair amount of time off the road this year because of recording
commitments with the new record. We still did 5 or 6 months but last
year we did something like 9 ½. So it’s a little different to what we
normally do but we spent 3 months in the studio recording. In 2010
we’re just going to try and tour as much as possible.
MM:
How’s the response been to the new album since it was released?
KN: A little bit different really because it’s got
more of a southern-rock element to it than the first couple of albums
which were more metal-orientated. At first, we didn’t really know what
to expect. I think kids were wondering how the new line-up would affect
things and I think most of them think that it’s different but in a
good way. We didn’t try to be the old band and we just went in there
and did what we had to, to make it work. We couldn’t be happier with
it and it’s brought us a lot of success in the marketplace with the
single getting a lot of play on the radio too.
MM:
Do you ever find that the ‘backwoods’ theme ever hinders you when
you go to other countries? Like somehow, people may not get it?
KN: It’s a theme but the music speaks for itself
really so people either like the music or they don’t. People aren’t
going to like bands because of a theme, it’s down to whether or not
they’re a good band. We have people in the South that may relate to it
a little more than others but Maylene as a band definitely speaks for
itself.
MM:
How do you find the UK as a place to come and tour?
KN: We’ve been over a couple of times before. It’s
always cool because we’re travelling half-way across the world to a
different continent to play to people who have never seen us before but
they’re still singing the songs right back to you which is awesome. I
mean, we get to go to Germany and Sweden on this tour which we’ve
never been to before so that’s going to be cool.
MM:
How did you become involved with the Taste of Chaos tour?
KN: We were coming off the All That Remains tour and
our management submitted us for it and they approved it. It’s a little
different being the opener, having to get the crowd amped up for the
other bands. We’re not the kind of band that are going to have the
huge circle pits but I think we’re able to turn people’s heads and
get them ready to go for the rest of the night.
MM:
Who were the big bands for you when you were starting out?
KN: I started off on death metal. I was heavily into
Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Living Sacrifice, stuff like that. Then
the early hardcore stuff as well, the first band that made me want to
play guitar was a Christian hardcore band called Strong Arm. The sense
of melody was great and even today I don’t think there’s a better
hardcore band, for me anyway. They had elements of music that don’t
transcend into any other genre apart from that particular style.
MM:
For those who may not know about the Ma Barker story, can you tell us
what inspired you so much about that, that you took the band name from
it?
KN: Dallas (Vocalist) saw the re-enactments every year
where he lived so that influenced him a lot. Outlaws in general have a
lot of curiosity about them too. The lifestyle and that approach to life
is very appealing to almost everyone on some level from the Mafia to
bikers, etc. I know pastors who are really straight-laced guys but at
the same time love the Godfather
and Goodfellas and movies like that. There’s always that fascination
with it and a lot of the time, people don’t want to admit what they
really think and what really interests them. It’s fascinating to see
what made somebody have such disregard for human nature or authority.
MM:
With so much shit in the world, is it hard to keep your faith in
justice?
KN: I’ve seen a lot of traumatic things in my life
and justice in itself is a morbid thing because one person’s justice
isn’t necessarily another person’s justice. There’s societal
justice which states that if you do certain things then the law will
punish you but then there’s vigilante justice where people decide
what’s right and wrong for themselves without the guidance of the law.
And then there’s personal justice where people go after others who
have done them wrong so it’s hard. I used to be a very vindictive
person but around 5 years ago I re-evaluated things and decided I
didn’t want to be pissed off all the time because it doesn’t get me
anywhere and I can’t live like that.
MM:
When it comes to faith, what do you say to people who claim the rock and
metal world is incompatible with Christianity?
KN: Biblically speaking, there’s lots of talk of
faith and different justifications of things. When Paul wrote to the
Church of Corinthians, he talked about sin to some is not going to be
sin to all and he used an example of if I’m a vegetarian and you came
into my home and asked me for meat, that would be offensive to me but if
I came to your home and you served me meat, I couldn’t be offended
because that’s your home, you know? I have to work out my own
salvation and I have no doubt that God has put me here for a reason and
if people want to disagree then that’s fine but I have to work out my
own path. I believe that I’ve heard what God wants me to do with my
life and that’s Maylene. We’ve been doing this a long time and I
wouldn’t be doing it this long if I didn’t believe there was a
calling behind it.
MM:
Do you ever feel that not hiding your faith makes you an unnecessary
target for criticism? Like reviews of your albums will be tainted by the
reviewer’s views on your faith?
KN: Yeah but we do leave things open lyrically and we
want the band to speak for itself and it’s weird because a lot of the time I get e-mails from people who didn’t
know that we were a Christian band. And I prefer to speak through my
actions rather than being preachy. The New Testament talks about the 2
commandments that you have to adhere to is to have no other God and to
love your neighbour as yourself so as long as we do that then we are
following the true nature of Christianity.
MM:
Does it ever bother you if you’re asked to tour with an anti-religious
band?
KN: When I was in Underoath, we had a situation in
Canada in the French Quarter where an atheist band was speaking out
against us from the stage in French so we wouldn’t understand them.
But I don’t have a problem as long as there is mutual respect between
the bands because I don’t want to compromise who I am for the sake of
touring. And if I can change someone’s mind about who Christians are
as people then that’s a good thing because we don’t have a good name
in certain areas and I’d rather show them how non-judgemental
Christians can be.
MM:
Well changing the subject a little for the last question, how did you
become involved with your songs being used by the WWE (World Wrestling
Entertainment) company?
KN: Haha! We’ve got this question a lot recently! In
June we got approached to write a theme song for a couple of the
wrestlers and they heard ‘Step Up’ and they were interested in using
it for the video game and what happened was because the licensing
paperwork had already been done, they decided to use it for the TV
commercial. And then they wanted to use it as the theme song for their
monthly event in September so for about a month I was getting e-mails
and texts from friends and family saying that they’d seen a commercial
for our album on the WWE show and that was just awesome! We’re going
to try and work with them as much as possible. After that our single
downloads went from 20-30 a week to 300 a week so it definitely helped
us a lot.
MM:
Ok, well thanks a lot for doing this and good luck for tonight.
KN: No problem,
man. Thank you for talking to us.
Interview
by: Adam G
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