SOiL serve brand of metal for masses with time-honoured attitude

During the SOiL/Adema shared tour of Europe recently, the Chicago lot, although a support as reported in the onsite review, had a better reception… in London, at least. Their brand of rock bridges all the way back to the more basic, slower and quieter days before intensity was the major ingredient on the ‘planet metal’. ‘Scars’ is SOiL’s album that got international release and it is thus considered to be the debut disc.

SOiL’s fronted by our interviewee, Ryan McCombs, a native of Indiana actually who nearly shares a hairdo with the other (sometime) famous rocker from that state, one Axl W. Rose of Guns N’Roses. Still, his vocal style owes more to the grunge-stars like Chris Cornell (former Soundgarden and Rage Against The Machine 2 singer) and Layne Staley (the late Alice In Chains’ vocalist).

“It is great to be in this band, touring is such a joy, playing to people who really are digging our music! So, business is fine but I’m the one guy in the band who has a wife and a child back home and it is a bit hard on the emotional side. Some days are harder than others but the moment we get on stage, everything is forgotten.”

“Music is what keeps me sane. When I get in an emotional state I play music, write lyrics, or simply store my energy for the night’s show. Music is such a great release and can help me overcome many a problem you may face.”

Shape of a cycle

Although inspired and influenced by the metal’s greatest, Black Sabbath and early Metallica, this is not a nostalgia trip, SOiL embrace elements of cyber-metal and industrial-ism on ‘Scars’. The five from Illinois have dusted off the old formula with large strokes of current vibes that was missing on the real debut album, produced by the legendary Steve Albini.

The members decided to step away from rap- and nu-metal, that is obviously profitable, to create music that is more related to the old-skool of hard rocking.

“All band members used to be in much heavier, death-metal kinda bands and the whole reason they started playing music that is now SOiL’s is to get back to the roots, to the feel that sparked their wish to play metal they used to listen as children. Which is Black Sabbath, Ozzy’s solo stuff, Aerosmith, AC/DC… When we started out people were telling us what we should do… Rap-rock was taking off in the States, Limp Bizkit were breaking but we refused it because that wasn’t the reason we were doing it.”

“We all had our baby-bands, had done all that stuff and were doing what we all really loved. Plug guitar in the amp and go. We really questioned what we were doing from time to time but it never really wavered our resolve to be true to our beliefs.”

Moshing across America

Who knows where SOiL would be if it weren’t for an eager-eared radio programmer in Orlando, Florida, who noticed ‘Halo’ and played it until the other stations across the States took notice. That led to a massive interest from all the major labels but the band decided to sign with an R’n’B-orientated J Records because the head-honcho, Clive Davis, is the man who had signed Aerosmith to CBS Records way back in the 1970s.

‘Scars’ has been out for a while and has not only survived the road testing but also improved in the process that will reflect in the future recordings; right now, no uncut songs are featured in the show.

“The songs are really great to play live and the more we play them the better response we get. There are always a couple of guitars on the bus and we play with different ideas. When we get a song we record it quickly and get on with it. When we had a day off in New York three months ago, we popped into a studio and recorded few new songs.”

“We are touring America with Sevendust for five weeks, then coming back to Europe in June and then touring America with the OzzFest. As you noticed I’ve not mentioned any studio time because there is not even a talk of recording the next one, we really gotta work ‘Scars’. We’ll only have eight days off until September when I’m taking a ‘maternity leave’, my wife is expecting.”

Tour dates:

02 June - Garage, Glasgow
03 June - Leadmill, Sheffield
04 June - Rock City, Nottingham
05 June - TJs, Newport
23 June - Zodiac, Oxford
24 June - Concorde, Brighton
25 June - Waterfront, Norwich
26 June - University, Manchester
27 June - Mean Fiddler, London