Talking bollox with Honey For Christ

HONEY FOR CHRIST

SOMETIMES AN INTERVIEW BECOMES INTERESTING NOT BECAUSE OF THE UNUSUAL QUESTIONS IT HAS,BUT FROM THE STRANGE ANSWER YOU GET TO USUAL QUESTIONS. HONEY FOR CHRIST REALLY MANAGED TO TRANSMIT A LITTLE BIT OF THEIR WEIRD PERSONALITY IN THIS INTERVIEW. AFTER ALL IRELAND IS A COUNTRY OF STRONG PERSONALITIES...

1.FIRST OF ALL, POINT OUT THE MOST IMPORTANT MOMENTS OF THE BAND AND INTRODUCE THE MEMBERS.

ANDY: GUITAR
JASON: VOCALS
PAUL: BASS
CHRIS: DRUMS

ANDY: Many important moments, our first gig and our last gig! Actually recording a CD and finally getting our own T-shirts! First time we played outside Ireland was cool as well, we played a festival in England which was a fantastic experience, for 3 days we didn’t have day jobs, we were on tour! Love playing live, it’s what we’re best at, nothing else comes in when we’re together, it’s all band driven. I imagine that’s what it would be like to be signed and do the band full time…some day!

2.WEIRD NAME FOR A BAND. DON'T YOU THINK? WHY DID YOU SELECT THIS? WHAT DO YOU WANT TO SUGGEST?

JASON: Blasphemy!
ANDY: Something different that would confuse and not be used by anyone else, so far it’s worked perfectly. Different people look at it different ways and I like that, personally I can’t give a real meaning behind it. Only problem is sometimes people think we’re a white metal band which we’r not! Good to clear that up sometimes.

3. YOU SAY IN YOUR BIO THAT ALL CATEGORIES OF METAL WERE FORGOTTEN WHEN YOU DECIDED TO FORM YOUR OWN BAND. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE? COULD YOU GIVE US A CLUE REGARDING YOUR SOUND? NAME SOME OF YOUR INFLUENCES.

JASON: when we started we didn’t know what we would sound like. We didn’t decide to start a certain thread of metal. It was only when we got together we just played what we liked ourselves, there are many different influences. Our sound is what you hear on disc, to me its just got every aspect of what I love about heavy metal, emotion, strength, speed, conviction and just power. Inlfluences are different for each of us, the only band we all agree on is Slayer and Iron Maiden!

4.HOW MANY RELEASES DO YOU HAVE? TELL US A FEW THINGS ABOUT THEM. ARE YOU SATISFIED WITH THEM OR IS THERE ANYTHING YOU'D LIKE TO CHANGE?

CHRIS: 3 so far. Our first “Long Way Down & Rising” is shit in terms of production, but it’s a demo so that was all it was. The second “The Art of Self Abuse & Soul Erosion” was slightly better with production in a semi-professional studio with better songs, a lot of progression from the first. Our latest, “Forging Iron Will” is the best to date, with a proper studio production and stronger more mature songs. The only thing I would change would be the production of the drums, but the songs are good they always have been – although the guitarist on the 1st one was bad!! J But the new one was recored all in one day which was an experience, so I think in future we’ll save up and spend more time getting the sounds sorted before we start mixing. It’s a steep learning curve in the studio.

5.WHICH THEMES INTRIGUE YOU AND MAKE YOU WRITE LYRICS FOR? DO YOU PREFER REAL LIFE SITUATIONS, FANTASY STORIES OR SOMETHING IN BETWEEN?

JASON: Real life things, real life situations. That’s it really. No fantasy, no dragons, no rainbows, no demons, no trying to be black, just real life as I see it.

6.YOU'VE DONE QUITE MANY LIVE SHOWS. DO YOU REMEMBER THE WAY YOU FELT THE FIRST TIME YOU GOT ON STAGE? WHICH OF THE KNOWN BANDS WAS THE FRIENDLIEST TO YOU?

ANDY: Clearly, we were very nervous, me and Chris had played once before but the others not all, but we did fine, actually in hind sight it was probably one of our better ones!! The friendliest was probably HANGNAIL. The singer Harry was amazing, he just came over to us even though we had only really started out. He chatted away and even thanked us during their set, well cool bloke!
CHRIS: Nile were great, the road crew were well cool to us, me especially! I ripped my hand open during the first song and their roadie came out and checked I could still play, nice touch I thought.
JASON: :Lacuna Coil’s road crew were fucking wankers, wouldn’t let us on stage till about 5 mins before the doors opened! Created unnecessry presure for us, it was hard enough at the time cause it was our first gig with only one guitarist. Bit of a nightmare.

7.WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO A METALLER TO CONVINCE HIM BUY YOUR RELEASE INSTEAD OF ANOTHER ONE?

JASON: Threaten him!
ANDY: I think our music is kind of a learning experience, a good introduction to metal. Jason’s vocals have a great melody to them which a lot of folks cling to when they first get into a band, there’s intense riffing and punding drums and great tempo changes, to me it seems a great collaboration of all types of metal, so why buy one genre specific album when you can get ours which has everything from melody to blast beats!

8.WHICH WAS THE BEST AND WHICH WAS THE WORST REVIEW YOU RECEIVED? ARE YOU GENERALLY SATISFIED BY THE FEEDBACK?

ANDY: We haven’t ever had a really bad review, we usually just get slagged cause of the production job, but we kinda fixed that on the new CD. Overall the feedback has been very positive about the actual songs. Along the way each member of the band has received praise for their job which is good as it’s not only one element of HFC that is the best – we’re all about average!!!

9.HAVE YOU SENT YOUR DEMO TO ANY LABELS? WHICH WERE THEIR REACTIONS?

ANDY: Not for a year or so. Century Media got the last one and they liked it, but it wasn’t for them, others have been the same old story. We haven’t sent the new Cd to labels yet, but we will soon. So we’ll have to wait and see I guess.

10.WHICH IS THE BIGGEST DREAM YOU WANT TO MAKE TRUE THROUGH YOUR MUSIC?

CHRIS: Being absolutely loaded and buying me own castle with indoor swimming pool. Somewhere I can hide from the other 3!
ANDY: World domination of metal – and we lead the way…

11.IF SUDDENLY ELECTRICITY CEASED TO EXIST, WHAT DO YOU THINK WOULD HAPPEN TO HEAVY METAL MUSIC? WOULD IT BE FORGOTTEN OR REFORMED?

JASON: Can’t have any metal without electricity.
CHRIS: I’d be grand!
ANDY: I can’t imagine metal exisitng without power, it should be electrified, overdriven to the max, that’s the way the great bands did it – everything to 10.

12.WHICH IS MAN'S BIGGEST TEMPTATION?

CHRIS: Drink
JASON: Drink
ANDY: Drink and women, the cause of so much heartache and bad memories!

13.IF YOU WERE GRANTED ONE WISH, WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO CHANGE IN THE WORLD?

CHRIS: Andy
JASON: Andy
ANDY: Them two! And our lack of label situation.

14.IF YOUR MUSIC WAS AN EMOTION, WHAT WOULD IT BE?

JASON: dunno actually…
CHRIS: Anger.
ANDY: Misery. There’s a lot of emotion in our music, and it’s usually driven by the environment the band is in at the time. If something isn’t going someone’s way it usually gets incorporated into the music. That’s were my melodic type guitar lines come from in the slower sections of the songs.

15.IF YOU HAD THE CHANCE TO MEET THE CREATURE THAT CREATED THE UNIVERSE, WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO ASK HIM?

JASON: Who created you?
ANDY: How profound…

16.WHAT TITLE WOULD YOU LIKE THIS INTERVIEW TO HAVE?

JASON: Talking bollox with Honey For Christ

17.THANK YOU! HAVE I FORGOTTEN TO ASK YOU ANYTHING AND YOU'D LIKE TO MENTION?

ANDY: Tell everyone to go the website were you can check out “Forging Iron Will” the title track from our latest CD. * plug, plug *
JASON: Thanks for the interview! AND stay metal!!!!
CHRIS: nope, just thanks, and stay in touch.

NIKOS "William_Kidd" PARASTATIDIS

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