A Drummer at Heart
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An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen Copyright © Cris Cohen. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. Photos on pages 6, 12, 16 provided by Candlebox. Bands To Fans 2 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen Table of Contents Co-writing with Pete Cornell .................................................................................................................................... 4 Darkness in Enlightenment ...................................................................................................................................... 9 Persistence ............................................................................................................................................................ 11 A Drummer at Heart .............................................................................................................................................. 14 100% in the Game .................................................................................................................................................. 19 Making Bread ......................................................................................................................................................... 21 Afterword .............................................................................................................................................................. 22 Bands To Fans 3 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen Co-Writing with Pete Cornell Cris Cohen: With the new song, “Let Me Down Easy,” you co-wrote that one with Pete Cornell. What do you like about him as a songwriter that you sought him out to co-write? Kevin Martin: Well, I knew Pete obviously back in the eighties, when I moved to Seattle. I moved there in 1984. I met him a couple of times through shows and whatnot. Big fan of the band he had called Inflatable Soule. We had a ton of friends in common. We never played shows together, but I always admired him. I mean, he was so different than Chris (his brother). Being that he was a few years older, I think his songwriting was a little more of like the classic approach to songwriting. Whereas Chris just seemed to be so asymmetrical with his songwriting. Years and years go by. Candlebox blows up and does its thing. We get together in 2018 to play a couple of reunion shows in celebration of the 25th anniversary of the debut album. And Pete came to the show with his wife, Amy Decker, who is my manager. We just started chatting. I hadn't seen him in so long. I was like, “Man, first of all I am so sorry about the loss of Chris and the loss to your family. I can't imagine what you're going through.” He's like, “Life is tough, but you have to move on. You have to find your footing again and try and live.” It just got me thinking. I was like, “You know, I'm doing a new record. I would love to co-write with you on something. I was a huge fan back in the day. Maybe this is kind of serendipitous that we are meeting again, after some 20 odd years, and I'm about to make a record.” So, I told him the style of music that I was going for. I wanted something swampy, bluesy, dark. I even said to him, “Maybe I'm exorcising some demons that we both have.” He was like, “Let me think about it. I'll send you something.” Bands To Fans 4 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen And not long after, he sent me this track on acoustic (guitar). And I was just so struck by it immediately. It had the same kind of energy that it has now, when we recorded it. To me, that's always a sign of a great song is if you can play it on an acoustic and it feels like a recorded, full band version of a song. That always makes me kind of feel like you're on to something and you should probably stick with it. So, I called him up and I said, “Listen, man, I'm going to track this with the guys. I would love to have your input on it, because we wrote it and I don't want to push something out there without your approval.” We tracked it in preproduction. I sent it to him. He said, “Man, this is exactly what I was hearing. Let's go for it.” I wrote the lyrics to the track in the studio when I was recording the vocals, which was January of this year (2020). I didn't have lyrics for it, but I knew what I was going to be singing about. I knew what I wanted to talk about in the song. But I tend to do that. I don't really write lyrics until the music totally speaks to me. I'm not one of those guys who walks around with books and books of lyrics. I'm not that person. I'm more of an off-the-cuff kind of a guy. So, really, it just kind of stemmed from that meeting, reconnecting back in 2018 in Seattle. To be honest with you, I wasn't even ready to make a record. I was writing songs, but I just really wasn't in the mindset to do it. And this song, when he sent it to me, just kind of sparked something in me. It was really the catalyst of making the record. Cris Cohen: And how are you guys different as songwriters? How do you guys complement each other as songwriters? Where does he stop and you begin in this process? Kevin Martin: I don't really know, to be honest with you. I think when Pete sent me the song, he had a bit of a melody that he was singing, but he didn't have lyrics either. When I spoke to him, I said, “How do you write lyrically?” He said, “I usually let the song kind of dictate what to say.” Bands To Fans 5 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen And that's exactly how I do it. So, I think we're probably very similar, especially in this day and age, 20 to 30 years later. We don't really overthink it. Of course, you know, we're not writing “Sgt. Pepper’s” or anything like that. It's not like we have some enormous amount of pressure on us to produce something groundbreaking or reinventing the wheel. I think that our styles accent one another, much like ketchup to french fries. We’re not that different. Although, he's a far more prolific writer than I am. I know that he's been churning out songs for the last 30 years, two to three songs a week. I don't know what his catalog consists of. But I did say to him, “I love this song so much. I would like to write two or three more with you.” Bands To Fans 6 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen The record was supposed to come out this past August. I'm kind of happy now that it hasn't, because it might give me the opportunity to write one or two more with him, get them recorded, and throw them on the album. Because I like this song so much. It would be interesting to see if we can do that. Cris Cohen: That's one thing I was wondering. Because I thought you guys had finished the bulk of the recording as of January… Kevin Martin: Yeah. All done. Cris Cohen: And then, no one thought that the world could get stranger and yet, in 2020 it did. And you've pushed back the release of “Wolves.” I was wondering, how do you -- guys who tend to filter your thoughts and the atmosphere that you're dealing with through your music -- how do you not just keep writing through all of this insanity and then get the urge to expand to the album? Take advantage of… Kevin Martin: …the time off. Yeah. That's what we're doing and what we're not doing. We're doing these cover songs. We did “For What It's Worth” by Buffalo Springfield. Every single one of the songs that we're doing is kind of a reflection of the times, what we're dealing with. Not only the pandemic, but the disenchantment of the world and society in general, this lack of empathy that I think everybody has right now. So we're doing “One” by U2, “Running On Empty” by Jackson Browne, “Won’t Back Down” by Tom Petty, “Under Pressure” by Queen and David Bowie, “Ventilator Blues” by the Rolling Stones, which is killer. The thing is, that's kind of sidetracked writing more for the record. We have two guys that are on the East Coast and three guys that are on a West Coast. We're having to do it in our own individual studios. Not all of us are wizzes when it comes to recording. So, there's that learning curve. We tried to figure out how to make this work, perhaps for the benefit of not only ourselves and enjoying the songs, but for our fans. Because we want to release this 12-song compilation of cover songs as a gift with “Wolves.” We can't sell it, because we don't own the rights to the songs and there are mechanical (licenses) that go along with it. So, we would have to give it away. That’s really taken up a lot of our time right now, finishing these songs. Bands To Fans 7 An Interview with Kevin Martin Cris Cohen Although Pete did just text me last week and said he's got two tracks for me to sing to. Then I've got this other project I'm doing with Don Miggs, from Miggs, which we are tentatively calling “Future Trash,” which is an extension of our real influences and inspirations musically. So, I'm keeping myself busy with that. But you know, I think that if Pete sends me these two tracks, if they work correctly for the rest of the record, I'll get in the studio with Robin (Diaz – drummer) and Adam (Kurry – bass) and we'll track it.