• Hmmm...This interview is addressed to girls only! Hello girls!!! These fine gentlemen are single!
• Nooo, I am just joking! Seriously now, the interview is for all metal lovers, cause Burning Shadows are an example of open mindness, being able to listen to all kinds of metal. What I think distinguishes us (the metallers) from all the other listeners (pop,electro,etc.) is our profound love for music, our dedication. This is what makes the difference. This is what gets us going. Well, Tim, Greg, Brian and Vince got it all. What's left for you to do, is give them a chance by reading their interviews and listening to their cd's to prove what they are capable of... VISIT THEIR SITE http://www.burningshadows.com

1.WHICH ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT MOMENTS OF THE BAND'S HISTORY UP TO DATE? INTRODUCE THE BAND TO THE METALLERS.

• I think the most important part of our history was when Greg (Jones) and I met. It was a cold February night at a local club, Phantasmagoria Remotely (which is now closed), and we had both come to see Cannibal Corpse, Hate Eternal, and Diabolic. We just started talking about stupid stuff; it was the usual metalhead banter at a show. Well, anyway, I ran into him the next day at a guitar store, Atomic Music, so we got to talking some more and I asked him to join the band. Brian (Knesel) and I had been working on stuff together previously, but it wasn't until we got Greg that everything really came together. Greg definately knows what he's doing when it comes to metal. Brian happened to know Vince (Vinh) from his jazz band at school. Vince was never really into metal before us, and that really gave a unique twist on the songs drumwise. Jazz drummers are the way to go if you want to do progressive stuff.

• We had been through several band names, which were stuff that just sounded cool to us. There was Overcast, but we discovered that was taken; then Revenant, which was also taken; then Ad Noctum (stolen from the Borknagar song -- my idea), but half the band didn't really like the Latin; then one day Brian suggested Burning Shadows. He was thinking of the Iced Earth song "Burning Times" and he just thought Burning Shadows sounded cool. When he suggested the name to the rest of us, Greg and I were thinking "like the Emperor song?" It actually developed meaning with us. Brian and I were really into King Diamond, and it turns out to be a lyric in one of his songs. Greg and I both listen to Emperor, as I said, so Burning Shadows fit in there. Plus, it's repeated a few times in "Fallen" by Symphony X, and we all LOVE Symphony X. It's used in various areas of metal, and we like to think we're influenced by a wide variety of metal. Band names give someone who's never heard you something to expect. If you have Steel or Iron in your name, you're  probably power metal. If you have something like Satan Nunfuck, you're not a skiffle group. (Note to self: Start a skiffle group named Satan Nunfuck.)

• Well, other people have called us classic metal, power metal, powerprog, just plain heavy metal, thrash metal, etc.... We bill ourselves as classic/power metal though. We're pretty much all around metal, especially with the newer songs.

• We recorded it various times throughout 2002. We went in the studio one day in January, two days in February, one day in April, and two days in July, as I recall. We did it all at ChickenCoop Studios in Fulton, MD. (http://www.thechickencoop.net) We all chipped in money saved from our various jobs to afford it. That’s why we didn’t do it all in a week. In the studio we spent about 6 hours a day, not including setting up each time. You can do the math. At one point on the site, I had put up various facts about our time in the studio, such as how many times we ate at Ledo’s during the whole time there. Overall, we’re satisfied with the way it turned out, seeing as this was our first studio odyssey. I can’t get over some of the mistakes we make, though. For instance, at the beginning of “The Human in Me,” Greg flubbed a note. Oh, it kills me every time I listen to it. It would’ve taken 5 seconds to fix! Oh, well. There’s also a lost keyboard part for “Forest of the Dead” during the interlude that Scotty left out of the final mixing. I wasn’t there for the final mixdown ‘cause I had to go to work, which I was already an hour late for when I left the studio. In retrospect, I should’ve stayed at the studio.

• Our lyrics come from anywhere, but it depends who’s writing them, but they’re all fantasy. Greg tends to write about nebulous subjects, but we all favor his lyrics above any of our own. Brian is working on a series of songs (maybe even a concept album) in which it’s the second coming of Jesus, but he doesn’t like what’s going on on Earth or in Heaven, so he decides to kill everyone or something like that. That story is far down the road, though. It’s basically a story based off of the song “The Darkest Winter,” which he wrote the lyrics for. Brian and I used to both be into Lovecraft. He wrote “Forest of the Dead” which was actually written by Robert Bloch, but the story itself is very lovecraftian. He doesn’t read Lovecraft so much anymore, though. I’m the big “weird fiction” fan. I wrote “Sarnath” and “Haunter of the Dark” based on The Doom That Came To Sarnath and The Haunter of the Dark, which are two of my favorite stories by Lovecraft, along with The Outsider, The Shadows Over Innsmouth, and At The Mountains of Madness.

• Differences are easier to think about. The new stuff is faster and longer. We noticed we had been using too many clean intros. “Force of Fire” used to have a clean intro, too, but we got rid of it the day we recorded it. So, there are fewer clean parts; “Supernatural Warfare” and “Sarnath” go their entire courses without any clean guitar. You can tell I was listening to a lot more Opeth and Iced Earth a lot more if you think about the new stuff I wrote. Also we tend to throw in weirder time signatures, exemplified in “Haunter of the Dark,” as well as the main riff in “Sarnath.” As well as getting faster and heavier, we’ve gotten more melodic in places. Our instrumental and “Supernatural Warfare” herald that fact.

• It’s extremely important to play live. That’s how you get people to listen to you. If they’re stuck in a club with NO REENTRY written everywhere, and they’re there to see someone else, they’re going to have to listen to you. It’s also a great way to make connections. We met Tormention and Season of Fear by playing with them, and we have been in touch ever since. We trade information about where to send demos and where to get CDs made. As for me, I love going to shows. You get to talk to various people who share your interests, and it exposes you to new bands, and it gives the bands a chance to prove themselves. Some bands have horrible live shows, and after seeing them suck onstage, I tend to stop listening to the CDs. Our best show was probably the night we opened for Mortician (whose van exploded and cancelled). We were all on fire that night. Plus, there was a crowd this time. People were starting to get to know us. Seeing people singing the lyrics to a song you wrote is just one of the greatest feelings. Our upcoming show with Origin will be great, because we got the best time slot, right before the touring bands, and we will be debuting some material for the first time in the club scene. After that, I know our show with Division and Critical Path will rule; it’s an all powerprog night! I would see Division all the time in local clubs, and now we’re actually going to get to play with them. It’s also going to be at the ThunderDome, which will be the biggest place we will have played. The worst show was probably this Exposure thing they had at Nation in DC. It was for local bands to get their name out. First of all, not many people wanted to come to southeast DC, so we ended up buying many of our own tickets. Second of all, the band that went on before us played 10 minutes too long ‘cause they’re fucking stagehogging assholes, so we had to cut one of our songs. Then, tuning was a problem onstage because being in such a rush, I didn’t transpose the keyboard, and we tuned the bass to it, but the guitars were already tuned to a different note. I hated that show.

• We are waiting for the next shipment of EPs to come in (with the new cover). Then they are going out to some labels. We don’t want to rush into anything. I’ve heard nothing but good things about our CD from everyone. I don’t know if it’s just because they’re lying to me or what, but every review we’ve gotten has been good, everyone I’ve talked to loves the CD, especially “Whisper Suffering.” Not even my dad believed the CD was us when I showed it to him.

• That would be touring with our (or, rather, my) idols. I would kill for a Blind Guardian, Symphony X, Iced Earth, Opeth, HammerFall, Burning Shadows Tour. Falling short of that, I would love to do this kind of thing for a living. I’m sure we all would. Being world renowned would be great, too. I’d better not get ahead of myself.

• Well, right now I am studying physics at UMBC. I must say, it’s not fun, but it’ll pay well. I’ve always had a knack for math and science. Maybe a job with NASA would be nice. I don’t know.

• Wow, that’s a tough question. After thinking about it for a while, I can’t come up with any decision. There would be the early 80s to see some of my favorite bands before money changed them so drastically, there would be the mid seventies to check out Sabbath and Deep Purple, the sixties to be a part of civil rights movements, the first half of the 1900s to see what the world wars, the depression, and that kind of stuff were all about, the renaissance, the dark ages, ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt…. It all interests me. I can’t decide. I’m sure I’m going to think of another place later. If I could go back in time and would have to live the rest of my life starting in that point. It would be the 1980s so I could see classic metal’s heyday, see all my favorite movies in the theater, and invest in Microsoft.

• On what day did you create metal, and why does it rule so much??  No, I’d ask him what the fate of all those who are killing for religion. I hope it’s eternal pain of some kind.

• Money. Lots of money. I see it everywhere. It’s the main reason I cheated in Sim City all the time.

• An interview of steel! or Whisper Interview or The Darkest Interview, Supernatural Interview, The Interview in Me…. I’m out of good ones now.

• We’re all single, ladies!