RAGINPIT MAGAZINE

In a time when Metalcore bands are a dime a dozen, Bury Your Dead, one of the most prominent genre defining bands have switched gears and broadened their horizons. The 2009 release, It’s Nothing Personal, brings forth elements of melodic hooks, crushing breakdowns, and unforgettable precision drumming all together in one album. It’s Nothing Personal is one of the best albums I have heard in over a decade. Comparable to early Slipknot, Korn, Sevendust and Killswitch Engage releases, it is a candidate for album of the year, that’s for sure. The following is an interview with the new vocalist Myke Terry who recently joined the band in late 2007.

Bury Your Dead has been around since 2001 and was started as a side project before becoming one of the top touring bands in the country. In 2007 you joined the band. Can you tell me the circumstances in which you are able to take over lead vocals?

Myke Terry: I have been friends with the guys in Bury Your Dead since they first started the band. We have always joked about being in a band together. Their old singer Mat Bruso left the band in pursuit of a normal life. Mat recently married and wanted to start a family. Mark called me and was like “Yo, man we really want you to play for us” and I was like, “ok, let’s do it!”

Before you joined the band, Micheal Crafter of I Killed the Prom Queen fame was doing the vocals for Bury Your Dead. What happened with that?

Myke Terry: He got homesick, I mean if you're thousands of miles from your friends and family and you don’t know when you are going to see them again, obviously that’s going to start to wear on you. He just didn’t want to do it anymore. When he started out he thought that it would be cool, but it turned out that it wasn’t. So he wanted to go home; go back to being an Australian.

The first album that you guys recorded together after you joined the band was the self titled album Bury Your Dead in 2008. Usually when a band puts out a self titled album it means some kind of re-birth. Was that the case with you guys?

Myke Terry: Oh yeah, I definitely would say so. We wanted to name it a bunch of different things, but in the end we wanted the record to speak for itself because it’s a new band. Everything has changed; with that being said, let the music and the record speak for itself.

To tell you the truth, when I listened to the 2008 self titled album it sounded a lot like Mat Bruso’s style of vocals. I actually didn’t realize that there was a switch in singers. Was the album already written when you joined the band or did you just want to keep the same sound as the previous Bury Your Dead records?

Myke Terry: Honestly, I didn’t really try to do anything. Everything that came out was pretty much first take for that whole record. That’s just the way it sounded, I didn’t really try to experiment with anything too new.

Were you in a band prior to Bury Your Dead?

Myke Terry: Yeah, I have been in a few bands. I was in a band called Cassius and I filled in for a bunch of bands before Bury Your Dead actually picked me up.

Anything on Itunes I can pick up of your previous work?

Myke Terry: Yeah, definitely. The last record I put out was with Cassius and the record name was called I Am Jim Jones. It came out on Life Force Records so you can check it out on there as well.

Earlier this year you recorded an album called It’s Nothing Personal which redefined the typical Bury Your Dead sound. There are a lot of melodies in this album, what made you guys decide to go this route?

Myke Terry: It just happened honestly, it;s not like we sat down and said, “let's do a record like this.” As a result of everything we had gone through in 2008 with all of the changes, It’s Nothing Personal was the result. We wanted this album to represent what we had been through in the last year prior; that record is the result of how we felt. It is very dynamic because we had been through so much stuff in 2008, it just logically follows that would be the kind of record that would come out.

It seems like you guys play with a lot of Nu-Metal bands such as The Family Value Tour with Korn and the more recent tour with Mudvayne and Static-X. When I first heard the It’s Nothing Personal album, it reminded me of the music that was coming out in the late 90’s. The album is very heavy, powerful, and yet melodic. Are you guys inspired by these bands?

Myke Terry: Yeah, you know we grew up listening to these bands. I think that we have taken things from all of our influences. This band listens to everything from Spice Girls, Britney Spears, to Cannibal Corpse. It's not necessarily like we said, “let’s write a Nu-Metal record.” Even when the band was just writing straight Hardcore albums they were on tour with Ozzy Osbourne. It’s just heavy music and you’re going to stick with bands that play heavy music whether that be Nu-Metal, Death Metal, or just Hardcore. You can take from each style of music and have a good time and that’s what we wanted to incorporate.

How often are you guys touring out of the year?

Myke Terry: Anywhere from 10 to 11 months out of the year. We have been around for a long time.

That’s amazing! Did your previous band Cassius tour like that? If not, how are you adjusting? Do you like to tour that much?

Myke Terry: I love it! Even before I joined this band my other band would tour heavily anywhere from 6-7 months out of the year. I look at it like I could be at home doing nothing, working a job or I could be out doing something that I feel is productive furthering my career in music. If you sit at home enough people will forget about you and when your out touring everyday in everyone’s face it’s not long and people will start paying attention to what your doing.

Is their a band that you haven’t toured with that you really want too?

Myke Terry: The Deftones! I really, really, really want to tour with that band.

Deftones are an amazing band. Have you seen them this year?

Myke Terry: I have never seen them.

They look and sound absolutely fantastic!

Myke Terry: The only thing I have ever watched is their YouTube videos and I’m their watching videos every other day at least. (Laughs)

Have you guys started working on a new album?

Myke Terry: We are always working on new material. We have a bunch of music that we are working on, but I don’t think that we will be putting out a new record for at least another year. We are just going to tour for It's Nothing Personal, get some more singles and videos out there and see what happens.

How has your new record doing?

Myke Terry: It’s been going really well, we have been getting a lot of awesome sponsors. It definitely opened the door for us to play a different demographic which is cool to us because it's like we played specifically for the hardcore kids when we started. The point to me in music is communication. I would much rather be able to communicate to people who work construction or work at a Jiffy Lube instead of a kid who is 16 and spoiled that doesn’t really care for your music because when he turns 21 his taste in music is going to change anyways. I would rather play for people who are seasoned and know what they already like.

I don’t know if you can answer this, but the 2003 Bury Your Dead release Cover Your Tracks had a Tom Cruise movie for every song title. How did that come about and does it have anything to do with Scientology?

Myke Terry: (Laughs) They were having trouble coming up with names for the songs and somebody brought up the idea of naming all the songs after Tom Cruise movies and it was such a joke that it became serious.

Final Thoughts?

Myke Terry: Practice your instrument like a million times a day and try to pick up other instruments. That is the one thing if I could go back and change I would. You never know what kind of music that you’re going to be into and sometimes it’s hard to find band members. Try to learn as much as you can honestly.

www.myspace.com/morbidmiller
www.myspace.com/buryyourdead