Ben: It's been a little over 3 years
BrakeOut.Net: How did you guys get the name?
Ben: What's the name about? It's, well, bassically, John Dillinger was a bank robber in the 1930's. He was very popular, it was almost like he was a celebrity for his time. We just thought the name was kinda cool, he had kinda like alot of escapes and this and that, he could never really be captured by the police. I think they started the FBI because of him accually, that was kinda who started it. But, we really don't have any infatuation with bank robbers or anything.
BrakeOut.Net: Hah
Ben: We just thought the name sounded cool.
BrakeOut.Net: It sounds pretty cool accually
Ben: We just thought it was weird, we just kinda, ya know? thought the name sounded cool, that's just about it really.
BrakeOut.Net: Adam was the one that got in the car crash right?
Ben: Yea
BrakeOut.Net: Is he doin alright?
Ben: He's doin alright, he's still in pretty bad shape, but mentally he's doing well
BrakeOut.Net: Was it hard to find a replacement for him?
Ben: Well, we were lucky, like I knew the guy Jeff who's playing with us now. I knew him for a long time, being from around the area where I lived from bands and stuff, he played in alot of bands and stuff like that so I knda just asked him and he was like "sure", he liked what we were doin. So that worked out pretty well.
BrakeOut.Net: I talked to a couple people that were wondering how you tune your guitar.
Ben: Just regular E
BrakeOut.Net: What influenced your guitar styles? Cause they're pretty different.
Ben: Well thanks, hehe... I guess growing up listening to alot of death metal and stuff like that and metal in general. And then after that, I got into alot of hardcore and stuff like that as well. Just the combination of the two got the aggression and I think it's like the hardcore punk side that got the honest energy, the death metal side just got the heavy and the somewhat more technical side of things. Also I've been more recently into some, like, Fusion and Jazz stuff.
BrakeOut.Net: There's alot of high notes and off timing rhythms and stuff like that
Ben: Well, we get a little bored by like the heavy chuga-chuga stuff ya know? We kinda try to just keep ourselves stimulated ya know? That's really what it's about just keepin ourselves into it.
BrakeOut.Net: Have you ever played outside the US besides Canada?
Ben: No, but we're going to Europe in November and also Japan, so, we'll see how that goes.
BrakeOut.Net: What music are you into right now?
Ben: Well, alot of the things I listen to probably right now, in the van stuff like that. Not much heavy stuff. Lemme think, some electronic things like Portishead, Aphex Twin.
BrakeOut.Net: They have some pretty weird videos
Ben: Yeah, I got both of them, they're awesome. I'm into stuff like, I'm really into stuff like Radiohead and some things like that. Some of the heavier bands that I grew up on, stuff like Carcas things like that.
BrakeOut.Net: Who started the band? Initiated it.
Ben: It's kinda weird cause it kinda formed, a little wacky, out of bounds. It's hard to say who really started it, but I guess the true original members would be myself, Dimitri our singer, Chris our drummer, and Adam, the guy in the accedent. We all started it together.
BrakeOut.Net: Why did you guys decide to do hardcore?
Ben: Well, hardcore was kinda the scene we were playin in at the time with other bands. And the reason why we got into the scene in general was, well, like i said when we first started playing music we saw these death metal bands, and there was this energy and aggression, and we were like "Oh, this is great". It kinda got a little dull, we got desensitized to it cause it all started to sound the same. Then we started getting into more underground, punk rock, hardcore stuff, and it was different but there was alot of energy, alot of honest energy, and we just started getting really into thier music. The thing we liked about it was the people who were playing the music and started putting out the music and the people who were doing the shows were the people who loved the music. It wasn't necesarily some club dude ya know? Who was like "arrhh arrhh." That was really cool, and so that kinda got us into the more hardcore side of things. But as far as the music we're playing, just kinda a mix of influences.
BrakeOut.Net: Why is there, on the album Calculating Infinity, why in there tracks with no vocals or anything
Ben: Well, for one thing, we're not used to recording that much music at one time and we had to do a 35 minute, atleast 35 minutes of music for it to be considered a full length by Relapse. One thing, we needed to fill up time, space. heh. Another thing, we just had alot of just stuff that we were doing at the time and we figured why not throw it on the album. we feel like the band is all about dynamics, and thats what we try to be all about, just dynamics of music. Having the lows, the mellows, just makes the heavier stuff just that much havier. So, I think you can't have dynamics, like up and downs, this and that, back and forth, so that kinda broke it up a little bit.
BrakeOut.Net: Pretty much everyone who I talk to, who is into hardcore, knows who you Dillinger Escape Plan is, they wanna know what's next for you guys.
Ben: What's next? That's a good question. We've just been trying to support Calculating Infinity alot and kinda milk it for as much as we can and just play off it for a while. We're writing some new songs for a 7" we're gonna put out on a European label. It'll probably also be released here on a US label, something like that, a hardcore label. And that'll have like maybe 2 or 3 songs, maybe a cover on it sometihng like that. Then, after that, who knows. We're gonna continute to play, eventually start writing for another full length, I just dont know when
BrakeOut.Net: How's the New Jersey hardcore scene?
Ben: Alot of people have been asking me that, and it used to be really good. It's weird, at different time periods it kinda starts to get different things. Sometimes more old school hardcore, sometimes a little more punk, sometimes a little more metal harcore goin on. It seems to go up and down to what kinda music's popular. There was a time a couple years ago where everything was just popular, all kinds of hardcore. You could go to a show, where there could be a show with a band like Lifetime that was doin punk, pop-punk kinda hardcore, then there'd be like an oldschool band, and like a metal harcore band like Dead Guy playing. And that was a really great time i thought, but, right now it seems to be a little dull, heh.
BrakeOut.Net: You guys play there that much?
Ben: New Jersey? No. Alot of people kinda critisize us for that in New Jersey. But, we don't really play there that much.
BrakeOut.Net: You don't like it?
Ben: Not really. Ya know, cause I mean it's kinda hard because, you play heavy music, you cater to kinda the larger crouds, the crounds that are gonna be able to mosh to it and things like that. And our music isn't that easy to kinda like dance to.
BrakeOut.Net: Yeah, it changes
Ben: Yeah, we play music writen for us, more than just the kids. Ya know what I mean? And it's like not all people would like what we would like, and some people do, that's why things are going well. But not everybody feel that way. New Jersey and New York and some of that part of the country caters to alot of the heavier, simplistic, kinda, ya know, type music.
BrakeOut.Net: There's alot of kid's that I've talked to that have never seen you guys before. Do you have much involvement on the web with your fans at all?
Ben: Like personally? Or do like alot of kids on the web...
BrakeOut.Net: Yeah, like do they e-mail you, whatever.
Ben: We do get alot of email which is cool. I kinda recieve all the email so I can see the results of what's going on. We're not the type of kids who go on and like, go on message boards and talk to people, and read that shit. we don't really read names or anytihng. We kinda got our lives, this is our life ya know?
BrakeOut.Net: Yeah, I'm sure it's hard to get on the net when you're o nthe road all the time.
Ben: Well, we're on the road and we also do other things, work, and go to school. So we're just really packed, we pack our lives. Plus our interest in it from the begining was not nessasrily to be a figure in a scene, it was more just to write music that we like. And before this band, we were kinda doin that, writing music for the scene, trying to get involved, do what we thought people wanted us to do. And right now we just kinda do what we wanna do with this band.
BrakeOut.Net: The rap/metal scene has kinda gotten pretty big, do you think hardcore will always be underground?
Ben: I don't know, I think that they're will always be music that's underground. Some of the bands that were considered underground may not be anymore, or, in more recent times they may have gotten more well known. But there will always be underground.
BrakeOut.Net: What about Napster and things like that. Do you think that supports you alot? Because I've gone on and seen your guys shit on there.
Ben: It definately affects us. Somebody signed out guestbook saying "Yo, we like you guys, atleast 7 of my friends got your album off of Napster" haha. Kinda sucks, especially for a band like us though, who really wont sell numbers like a band like Limp Bizkit or some shit like that. Those bands can afford it. It's hard to stay out on the road when you don't have a label seeing numbers being pulled. When they don't see your numbers selling, they don't support you. But everything's going cool for us so, it hasn't affected us too bad i guess.
BrakeOut.Net: I'm sure it brings kids to your shows.
Ben: Yeah, I mean, definately, there's a good side of it and there's a bad side of it.
BrakeOut.Net: Was there any lineup changes, other than Adam?
Ben: Yeah, accually, originally it was just myself on guitar, then we got another guitar player in the band who accually quit the band, then we brought in Brian. We have a 5 peice now.
BRAKEOUT.NET INTERVIEW w/ BEN
BrakeOut.Net: How long have you guys been together?