Chris Wiseman is not only the guitarist of CURRENTS, but also of SHADOW OF INTENT. Both bands are seen as one of the most promising acts in the Metal- and Deathcore-scene, while playing two very different styles. On the one hand there are the more progressive orientated CURRENTS, on the other hand the Black-Metal- and Symphonic-influenced SHADOW OF INTENT. While on tour with August Burns Red, we took the chance to have a talk with Chris Wiseman about the future of his bands, the differences in songwriting, his favourite album of 2019 and his personal view on the music industry.
Hey Chris. You’re on tour with CURRENTS on the August Burns Red Constellations Tour. How is it going so far?
It’s very good. You know, in the US August Burns Red is one of the biggest Metalcore-bands there is, so it’s cool to finally be with them on the road and getting to know them.
„Constellations“ has been released ten years ago. So, you’ve been 15 at the time, I think. How did it influence you as a musician?
I always heard about August Burns Red a lot and my friend from High School, the drummer who was in one of my first bands, always told me about the band and how August Burns Red is like, Matt Greiner is like his favourite drummer. I guess it was interesting, his style of drumming. I was more focused on blast beats and fast drums. So the drummers in the bands I was, really liked Matt Greiners playing, because he wasn’t really focused on being fast, but more about weird placements of rhythms. So I would say, they focused on trying to do things a little differently than other people and that would be the influence they had on me.
CURRENTS is one of your bands and it’s one of the biggest newcomers in the Metalcore-scene I would say, beside Polaris and Our Hollow, Our Home. What’s your opinion on what you do different or better than other bands with CURRENTS?
I guess the main goal I had is just to offer more variety. So for the listening experience, I don’t want people to listen to our album and think everything sounds the same. I want them to feel like there are songs that are more aggressive or soft, more driving. I guess that would be the main thing, trying to provide the different atmosphere that offers little more dynamic and variety than other bands.
You just released a new song, it’s called „Poverty Of Self“. I think it’s the next chapter of CURRENTS. So what can we expect from CURRENTS in 2020?
So CURRENTS will have another release coming out in 2020 including that song. That would be the heaviest, simplest song. I would say the other songs are a lot more intricate than that one. That one was very straight forward and simple. That’s really just one side of the record coming out and then there is a whole other spectrum of the record that people haven’t heard yet.
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So it’s more versatile, more melodic than „Poverty Of Self“?
Exactly.
So the next single will be completely different?
Yeah, there’s one song on the album that’s sort of like „Poverty Of Self“. It might be our next single. But that song will have singing and more melody as well, but still very fast and heavy.
You focused more on Brian’s (Author’s note: Wille, singer for CURRENTS) lows on „Poverty Of Self“. Is this something you wanted to do even more on the new record? When you look back at „The Place I Feel Safest“, they were there, but not that much…
I should know this… There are songs with lows on them, but I don’t think… Probably a little more than on „The Place I Feel Safest“ but not that much. But he definitly has been working more on them and wanted to include them more. So I would say you can definitly expect more lows.
And you stated on Facebook that „Poverty Of Self“ is a „stab at predatory enterprises taking advantage of the sick and broken for profit“. So the music industry sometimes seems like a predatory industry, when you look at Metallica, where promoters kept tickets back to sell them for a higher price later on. What is your opinion on the music industry as a musician?
The music industry, I find more and more, is really often a test on your own responsibility and your decisions. Would you rather make more money and have more responsibility and stress or would you rather pay more money to the other people involved, so your making less money but they do more things for you, which gives you less responsibility and less stress. And I find, if you can really play yourself in a position where you can take responsibility and learn how to do things in an efficient way, you can definitly make some good, you know, make more of a career out of it. But there is definitly a lot of people in the music industry that want a piece of you and want to take advantage of what you’re doing. Even if they don’t intent to. But especially Metal is pretty small in the grand scheme of the world as far as where all the money is, so you really just have to decide what you’re capable of doing, how much responsibility you can take on, while still doing a good job. Because at some point when you take on too much responsibility you start doing a bad job at the different things you try to do, because you’re focused on so many different things. And even the playing of the music, in an ideal world, that should be the musicians only responsibility. But then when your business grows you introduce managers and agents and labels and merch companies…
And everyone wants a part of the money?
Exactly and so you have to decide. In most people’s cases you can make a lot of money, but you’re paying everyone his pieces. You know, if you try to do it all yourself, then maybe your not playing music as much as you want to and your doing too much of the other business stuff. But it’s important. And so anyone who participates in the music industry just have to keep in mind, there is only so much money that exists at most levels. At the highest level, I would say where you make a little bit more money and make a good career, such as like Parkway Drive, they’re at a very good spot where they can do the things they like and be passionate about.
There is an interesting thing about CURRENTS and your second band SHADOW OF INTENT. CURRENTS is at a label and SHADOW OF INTENT is a Do-It-Yourself-Band. Where are the pros and cons of each of it?
That’s the part I was just getting into. So the pro for CURRENTS to have a label… CURRENTS was at a pretty small level, didn’t have any touring opportunities and didn’t really have fans. We had some fans on the internet and some locally, but when we got signed our Spotify grew like ten times in size very quickly, which was awesome. And they really helped grow. But cons are, a lot of the money that comes from the music will just go to them for many years of your career. But they take on the responsibility of marketing your music and making sure people can hear it and get you in different places, as well as they advance some money to you for the recordings and videos. You know, at all it comes out at cost.
But SHADOW OF INTENT as the DIY…
The pros of that is, there is a lot more money potential I would say. At least if you can handle the responsibility. Because your not really paying anyone, a high percentage of your music sales gets kept, which is awesome. The only con is that your entirely responsible for making sure that your relevant and people are hearing your music. And right now we’re doing a pretty good job on being a relevant band in that genre and having people know what we’re doing and getting offers for tours that we want to do. So I really enjoy doing it myself and I think SHADOW OF INTENT will continue to do it that way for a very long time.
With CURRENTS you had two tours in Europe, Never Say Die Tour last year as second band, today as the opener. Now there was a tour released for England with Polaris and Alpha Wolf. Will this tour also be in the rest of Europe?
Yeah, that’s the plan. I don’t think we would fly over for just a few shows. So yeah, we’ll be part of some more European shows around that. We will try to hit Germany a lot.
With the new album out then?
Yeah, exactly.
And with SHADOW OF INTENT you recently released „Melancholy“. How was the response so far?
It’s been definitly the best received album we’ve had so far. It’s our first album where we did real drums and real bass. You know, everything more organic sounding, more real sounding and I think a lot of people appreciate that and it has gotten us a lot more respect in the metal-community, just because it is just more of a natural sounding album.
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And you combine influences from many different metal-genres like Black Metal, Symphonic Metal, Death Metal, Hardcore… Where do you get your inspiration from for writing these riffs?
For really, everything I’ve ever heard in my life is an influence for SHADOW OF INTENT. And CURRENTS is something great, but with SHADOW OF INTENT I feel less restricted. Because for CURRENTS I’m going for a very specific vibe, but with SHADOW OF INTENT I really want to just compose the different types of metal. But what are the top influences? I think especially for this Dimmu Borgir was a very big one. We really liked Septicflesh, Fleshgod Apocalypse, The Black Dahlia Murder… Who else there is? The guy who mixed it, Christian Donaldson. He mixed this band called Ingested before and I always really liked how they sounded, so there’s definitly some influence of them as well. This Swedish band called Soreption, they’ve also been an influence. Those are just a few examples, but there are so many. Even like Trivium is another band or Machine Head, so all metal-genres.
SHADOW OF INTENT was a studio project or an online-band first. When did you decide to go on tour? Was it an option to stay an online-band for the rest of the career?
Yeah, my vocalist (Author’s note: Ben Duerr) and I disagreed about this for a long time. He thought we should play live and play shows and tours. And I was trying to make CURRENTS work and didn’t really think anyone would really enjoy SHADOW OF INTENT’s music or care about it. Until our first album was out, we had just an EP out. It was really small scale and no one really listened to it. And I feel like Black Metal isn’t really the cool thing people want to listen to, so I put it off for a long time. But eventually by the time our second album was out, „Reclaimer“, we filmed some music videos, because I thought music videos would be the way to promote the album. And then the music videos sort of created this expectation for people for us to play live. And the album was just received so well, that I finally caved and agreed that we should play one show. So we played one show at our local venue. We wanted to play three shows, all in the north-east, but it ended up being on different days. I wanted to do like a three-day-weekend at the north. So it ended up with shows in Connecticut, New York and Ohio. And then I got in the car from CURRENTS‘ agent at the time, named JJ, and he said, that he wanted SHADOW OF INTENT to tour and I told him, he was gonna be our agent then, that sounds like a great idea. So he offered us instantly in the car, he’s like: „I want to put you on tour with Carnifex and Oceano.“ That sounds like a great first tour. Two months later he texted me, like: „Yo, Whitechapel, The Black Dahlia Murder and Fleshgod Apocalypse are playing together a tour.“ And I was like: „Then we have to do that.“ So, we got offers I couldn’t really say no to. They are just literally, like, Whitechapel and The Black Dahlia Murder, Fleshgod Apocalyspe are all like the bands, the reason why we started making this music. So yeah, the decision to tour really went like that. Even if I didn’t wanted to at first, I felt like I had to.
But you did never regret to start touring with SHADOW OF INTENT?
Yeah, I think it was good decision.
And now you have your first European shows with SHADOW OF INTENT in summer on different festivals. What do you expect from the European festivals?
So before the festival we have gotten between five and ten European tour offers and we actually have been declining all of them, because I really wanted our first time in Europe to be on festivals like these. Me and the vocalist really want the band to not play too much during the year and just have special shows here and there. And it seems like these festivals are very special and were like a good fit for what we want the band to do.
And you also released a guitar-transcription with all tabs for „Melancholy“ in it. What was your intention on this?
People have been asking for years for guitar-tabs for the other albums and you know, same thing with playing live: I didn’t think I really had enough demand overall, taking the time to do that. But at this point, I was like I had to. I was honoured by the fans for asking to make it, so I hope like I was able to satisfy everyone that has been asking for tabs, to finally have a tab-book.
Also SHADOW OF INTENT is a band that exists because of the video game „Halo“…
Yes, it sort of started because I had a bunch of music written and the vocalist said he really wanted to use his lyrics he made about the „Halo“-game. So we sort of combined our ideas. And I said: „You can name the band, you can write the lyrics, I just want to write the music.“ And we came together and he brought in the „Halo“-influences and I just brought the metal.
So your lyrical content is still only about „Halo“ or also different topics?
No, „Melancholy“ is not about „Halo“. It’s more about a personal spiritual journey. Some facts, mostly fiction. But it’s based on feelings, but really it’s just a story that Ben wrote.
So it’s a concept?
Yes, exactly.
You already said that your songwriting is different between SHADOW OF INTENT and CURRENTS. But how do you decide whether you do a CURRENTS-song or a SHADOW-OF-INTENT-song?
I love when people ask this, because the answer is actually surprisingly simple: CURRENTS uses a seven-string-guitar and SHADOW OF INTENT uses a six-string-guitar. So once I pick up the guitar I already know who I’m writing for.
With playing in two up and coming touring bands, is it stressful sometimes? How do you stay focused?
(laughs) Yes, it’s very stressful. Staying focused is also very difficult. I’ve definitly been having to read more books and podcasts about productivity and staying efficient, just so I can manage everything. Because I take on the managing-responsibility for SHADOW OF INTENT which also is stressfull itself. So, basically, sometimes I’ve been in positions like this past year, where I had to tour for 13 weeks straight, so I basically had to block off that entire part of my year and built my life around it. It’s difficult, but it takes a lot of advanced planning.
Like you said, with SHADOW OF INTENT and CURRENTS you put so much different influences in those bands, in CURRENTS also the more progressive side. But the metal-scene is often seen as a bunch of elitists that just listen to Black Metal or that anything else is garbage. What is your opinion on this, with so many different influences? How important is it to stay open minded to any kind of music?
I think it’s very important. I’m very far from an elitist. Well, I like to think so, maybe someone would disagree (laughs). I stay open minded, I think I become more open minded. When I first started writing CURRENTS‘ music I tried not to have too much symphonics, I tried to keep it mostly guitar-based. But the producer we’ve been working with at the time, added in a little bit of symphony anyway. This was on our EP „Life // Lost“, and then after that I pretty much just added more synth into our last album. I feel like that’s a little open minded, just getting to combine different types of music into the metal.
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Could you imagine a tour with both bands on the same line-up?
I can. It would be interesting to put together. I would love to do it though. But it’s also up to the other members in the bands and the people that work for CURRENTS have a saying on that as well. And so far no one has expressed a lot of interest for it to happen. But I think it could happen one day, just not yet.
So a few personal questions: What is your favourite record in 2019?
I think it will have to be, it’s a tough call, but I think „Alien“ by Northlane. It has one of my favourite songs of the year, „Bloodline“. It’s probably my favourite song that I listened to the most this whole year. So I would have to give it to that album.
The other side: What is your most disappointing album of 2019?
I can’t even think about that. I was disappointed that Drake didn’t release new music this year. He re-released old music, but up to now it seemed like he was putting out an album each year and this year he didn’t put out new music. So I guess I can’t say I was really disappointed by new albums that much, but I was disappointed that he didn’t put out new music. But sure he’s busy, maybe next year.
Beside CURRENTS and SHADOW OF INTENT, who is your favourite newcomer in the metal-scene?
I don’t know if you consider Silent Planet new, but they’re relatively new I would say. I think they’re doing something really cool and creative. So they would be up there for me. And I think Humanity’s Last Breath also has like developed a very perfect production-sound. So I would give it to those guys.
And thinking outside of metal, in which genre would you like to make music?
I guess I thought about making music like the trap-music that Travis Scott makes. But I haven’t dialed in, like the motivation to do it. And as I’ve been writing this next SHADOW OF INTENT-album I think more about video-game- or film-music with more orchestra. So two days ago I just bought a bunch of new orchestral software. So it’d probably be between those two, if I had to take a guess.
So we’re coming to an end. We have one tradition at Metal1. We do a little brainstorming in the end. So I give you a few words and you answer with the first that comes to your mind:
Marilyn Manson – Industrial
Quentin Tarantino – Movies
Albums Of Bikini Bottom – „Melancholy“
Violent Dancing – Slam
Call Of Duty – Modern Warfare
So thank you for the interview. I wish you the best of luck with CURRENTS and the new album and also with SHADOW OF INTENT and the first European tour. I would leave the last words to you:
Thank you to everyone who’s been listening to SHADOW OF INTENT and CURRENTS and I hope to see you at a show very soon.
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Dieses Interview wurde persönlich geführt.