Lawless Hearts is a rock and roll band that hails from Jacksonville, Florida and consists of lead vocalist and guitarist, Alex Marie, Michael Thomas on guitar and piano, Justus Sutherland on rhythm guitar, Rob Joseph on bass guitar and Corey Ahlquist on drums. Alex Marie and Michael Thomas are brother and sister and have been involved deeply in music their entire lives. They’ve put a band together that showcases the talent of each member to their fullest potential. Lawless Hearts has a tremendous amount of heart and a passion. Their desire is producing music that will inspire. Though they’ve played around with different styles throughout the years, they’ve found a home for their musical talent somewhere between the old school rock and roll that shaped the idea of the genre and the new sound of rock and roll that is quickly emerging from the depths of the refreshing souls of the younger generation. Yes, they are young but they are working their asses off to get their music out to everyone to appreciate. Do they have the determination it takes to persevere in this hard to break through market? Give em’ a listen. Big things come in small packages and Alex Marie’s pure tone and power will peak your interest. When you throw in the unmistakable musical talent of the band as they tear up the riffs and drum beats, you’ll know the answer to the question. Support the bands that are the new generation of rock and roll.
Interview with Alex Marie and Michael Thomas of Lawless Hearts
By Leslie Elder Rogers
Metal Exiles: So you guys have been around a little while, about six years right?
Michael: Well, really, me and my sister have been involved in music our whole lives. I got my first guitar when I was probably about six. My mom sings too and my dad plays guitar. He’s actually a chef too but, we started real young. We just absorbed music and it’s been a part of our family forever. We both went to an art school in town called Douglas Anderson. Alex actually went there for creative writing a couple of years before me and then I went there for guitar. We had other projects throughout the years. She had other bands. We both had different styles of music that we were into. She had a little more of a poppy music style at the time and I was into rock, but then somehow it just all came together with the lyrics that she writes and the music that I write; it created Lawless Hearts. This band has been going on about six or seven years and we’ve been trying to push it and get to this point.
Metal Exiles: It sounds like you come from a family of good food and good music. Hell, you can’t ask for more than that. So After being together for so long why did you decide to put out an EP and not a full length?
Michael: Exactly. We want people to enjoy our songs, that’s the main thing we want. Of course, you wanna be able to support yourself eventually, but we play music and do what we do because we love it. We haven’t really been able to support ourselves so far but that hasn’t discouraged us. We’re gonna keep doing it until we can, 100 percent. We’re just at the very beginning of big things, I believe. The feeling that I get, per say, is that lately I’ve been waking up and having this sensation I’ve never felt before. Say you have this rocket ship and the fire is just percolating and it hasn’t launched yet. It’s just sitting there and it’s all the anticipation, and all the parts are in the top, in the nest of it. There’s all these people hopping on board while it’s just warming up because they know this thing is about to go to somewhere from which they’re never gonna return but the place is just far better where they’re at. I haven’t felt that sensation before so I think we’re on the right track finally.
Alex Marie: Yeah, I mean, we’ve pretty much had the album already written for a while. Originally we were doing this idea to have it like a sonnet trilogy where we would do three EP’s or three smaller albums instead of one full length and they each would tell a kind of story, but now, since we have the label, we’re gonna actually just put it all in one. I think it’s gonna come together pretty well. It’s been a long time coming. We kept thinking maybe next year, and then, maybe next year, and now finally its happening and it’s kind of surreal because things are really happening and this is actually real.
Michael: The main thing is that we have big faith, I mean we’re not a Christian rock band, but we do believe that everything has a place and a time and a reason. When we were younger, of course we had the rock edge and we were different still but the times in the market wasn’t right. If you look back at years ago when we first started this thing, I mean, the stars have to align and there’s a time and place for that. Our songs, for instance, they’ve evolved into something far greater than what they originated as. They have a commercial appeal but we’re not taking away from the sound of Lawless Hearts. We’re not just creating songs to put on the radio. We’re still writing what Lawless Hearts was founded in but we’re able to bridge the gap of commercial appeal for the regular listener to appreciate it but it’s also something new and different and fresh that a bunch of young players can be encouraged by so they can go and pick up a guitar and learn the instrument and write songs and tell stories. That’s’ what we are. We’re just story tellers. Now, I feel the market more than ever. For instance, we have that game rock band, and also guitar hero and all these kids, I mean, they’re my age and I’m 22, but when they were younger, before they could drive, they were playing this video game and they were not hearing these new songs that were on the radio. They were hearing things like AC/DC, Guns & Roses, Thin Lizzy, and KISS. Now they have cars and they have girlfriends and they’re driving around and turning on the radio, they’re like, “wait a minute, what is this”? I believe the young kids are urging for their band. I mean, they love their parents’ bands but they want their band now. I’m not saying that’s just us. I want to start a market, a movement. I wanna be a part of the whole resurgence of actual talent because there’s a lot out there and I want to encourage that.
Metal Exiles: Alex, since you went for the creative writing side, do you write all of the lyrics for the music or is it a collaboration between the four of you?
Alex Marie: Yeah, I’m pretty much the sole writer of the band but there’s a couple of songs that Michael has written. Our new bass player, Robert, is pretty good at writing. We haven’t used any of his stuff yet, but we have plenty of time to get with everybody, but yeah, as of right now, I pretty much write everything.
Metal Exiles: The EP is a great mix of influences, notably 80’s hard rock. You’re pretty young, what moved you guys to dip back into that genre?
Alex Marie: Honestly, our parents, well, our dad would always have Led Zeppelin and Rush and Pink Floyd playing. That was his thing but really we picked up on the music ourselves from just wanting to learn the instruments. I guess we just kind of found it on our own.
Michael: For me, my dad worked a lot of different jobs as a chef where everywhere he went, I would go. When he worked in Atlanta, I lived with him there, and then in Orlando. All of the concerts we’d go to were all rock and roll. That influenced me a lot and I gained an affection for that. I don’t know if my parents installed it in me, but I remember as I was getting older I thought, “Let me get a football and go down that road”, but I would still go home and practice the guitar a lot more than I would football. It wasn’t until I went to art school that I was just like “Fuck it, I’m putting the jewelry on and tight jeans because this is who I am”. As a man, I went to my coach and told him I loved sports but who I am is this. I recently spoke with him not too long ago and he’s been seeing everything that’s been going and he was glad that I really pushed through because I knew what I wanted. I guess he respected that. A lot of my guitar styles, I have the 80’s hard rock heavy hitters, obviously, in my books but a lot of my influences come from jazz horn players. I don’t know, I put that technique to the guitar and it makes this big huge sound the way the transitions are in jazz when you put it to rock. I love it. I’ve kind of counteracted to do both sports and music because I love fitness and bodybuilding. My uncle is a personal trainer so I wanted to acquire that. I’m into health and fitness so I’ll have the best of both worlds. I can go up on stage looking good and not all whacked out and play the guitar and can put that together in a package and sell that.
Alex Marie: Our parents never forced us into music lessons. We asked to take lessons and they encouraged us so if it wasn’t for them paying for all of that, we wouldn’t have even done it.
Michael: My dad was always asking me why I didn’t grow my hair out. He was a tanker before a chef. I don’t remember this but my mom said that when I was younger, if my hair touched my ears, I’d flip and now I have woman hair. During this process of trying to make it, it can be so stressful at times. You can get testy because you’re in close quarters and all but I give it all to my parents for all their support. Sometimes I sit back and think “man, why the hell was I an asshole just because I’m in this rut of trying to make it”? When it comes down to it, if it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t have been anywhere near where we are right now. I’ve had a lot of friends that I’ve known throughout my years that have nice cars that their parents bought them, or their parents give them plenty of money to go out with their friends, and I had one friend tell me that he would give up everything and ride a bike everywhere if his parents would just appreciate what it was that he wanted to do. They’re pushing him to medical school and all that standard shit; going to be a nurse or whatever, but he doesn’t want to do that. When he told me that, it hit me pretty hard.
Metal Exiles: Most of the bands I’ve spoken to recently talk about rock not being supported now like it used to be or like it should be or that rock and roll seems to have become underground, how do you feel about that?
Michael: The thing is that I feel like history repeats itself. I may be wrong and all, but that’s what I feel. I am a firm believer in that. We had the punk phase and disco and all that shit come out and when disco was at its highest but as soon as Metal Health by Quiet Riot hit, it seemed like the day after that everyone hated disco. It was crazy. Then you had all the hair bands (and I’m a hair band fan) and in the late 90’s, it kind of got Campbell soupy. As soon as it got very, very replicated and they were taking people and trying to make bands just to make some money, it went down. The reason that Nirvana was so big was because there was nothing like it. It was raw. It was natural. It was real. They were out in the 80’s and no label would sign them, with that grungy, stinky dude, and then all of a sudden they saw that potential. People are real and it’s all about the people. The people have the last say. It don’t matter how much money you put into something. I mean, you could have a million dollar signing bonus and it don’t mean a damn person is gonna buy your shit. It doesn’t mean anything. I have a feeling that things are about to change. Not just for us, but there’s a lot of bands that deserve it. I’m glad Pavement is giving us a chance and this is only the beginning by far.
Metal Exiles: What have you guys done to build up your name in such a tough climate to break as a band?
Michael: Well we had a couple of these interviews in the past where I wrote about whether it was hard to get a record deal since we’re from Jacksonville because there was Lynyrd Skynyrd and Molly Hatchet and Shinedown and all those bands from Jacksonville, and that kind of falls in the same line of building up our name. It’s really just sticking to our guns and not changing at all and just rolling with the punches. When we first decided what our sound was and it came together, it was all like the heavy, hard core rock and roll. Not just rock and roll but heavy, like screaming and all, or Emo like.
Alex Marie: And we even tried a Paramore style. We tried to change it a bit and tried to go a little poppy because we thought that’s what people wanted. We called every single label and we would get “you’re not ready”. We were like “How do they know when we’re ready”?
Michael: Just sticking to what we knew in our hearts was the sound of this band and it is what is on that EP. The album is ready but we’re taking our time to release that later in the year to start slowly drawing attention and letting the fans know that it’s ok to like a band like us. There are so many kids out there that are young man, and they are aching to get that guitar. It’s a larger than life scenario what this life brings.
Metal Exiles: Creatures Of Habit touches that 80s notion with its classic riffs, where did this come from? Do you write about your own personal experiences?
Alex Marie: Michael’s is the music part but most of our songs are about overcoming struggle and we’re all creatures of habit and we’re all dealing with things. Creatures of Habit is about trying to decide what’s right and what’s real and what being a good person really is. I get inspired by everything from relationships to being angry about the manager that we had that was a total nutcase to something I read in a book. I could be sitting in a coffee shop or something like even right now, I’m with a friend of mine at Target and we’re sitting in these little bitty chairs…
Michael: It’s the truth man, about how our songs come together. I timed myself and was trying to be competitive before this interview. I was 13 miles away from my little river spot where I ride my bike to and think and shit and I was like “I’m gonna call her right when I stop at the river”. It was about to pour down rain, which it is right now and I made it with to right under the little cover way just as I was calling you. Ok, so as far as the lyrics and the riffs go, I just pick up a guitar and I’ll play it. Basically what it comes to is this. When I was living in Atlanta a couple years back, I rode this trail called “The Silver Comet Trail”. It was like a 60 mile bike trail with old railroad tracks. I’d just gotten out of high school and our apartment complex was just right around the corner. My dad worked at the Braves stadium and everything and I would go to that trail that was just a couple of miles up the road. I rode the whole thing multiple times. One time I went off down to this little river down at the bottom…this is a true story and don’t know how you believe but this older, black guy comes down walking with his cane. I’m a very clear conscious person but I know what I believe in so I can’t be swayed. So he asks me how I’m doing and we sat down and talked about everything, every topic, politics, religion, life and in the end (to make a long story short, because I’m very detail oriented and will go off on an ADD tangent) he said, in politics it takes something gigantic to really make a mark in history and change the world, but you write one great song and you’ll be remembered forever. Just one great song. That’s’ what he told me. I’d never told him I was a musician. I have long hair and stuff but that don’t mean anything. He never said “oh yeah, you’re a musician”. He just said that. So we were walking up the hill because it was getting late and he was telling me about the farm he used to live on with his family and I said something to him and I didn’t hear anything like a response back at all. I looked back and he was gone. I guess because I kind of seclude myself sometimes these kind of things happen to me. I think sometimes I get too deep into thought. It’s just who I am. I’ve always been that way. It took me a while, maybe about a week, to stop thinking about that. Well, I didn’t really stop thinking about it, but about a week after that, I came back to Jacksonville and picked up the guitar and out came all those riffs. Those scenarios are what creates our songs. For instance, it was about to rain you could picture a big cloud and you could hear this music with it and it reminds me of things and that’s where my music comes from. One day I would like to get into orchestral stuff. I like orchestrating music. I feel it and I hear it. So that’s where my part comes from and Alex, with the lyrics, believe it or not, it’s crazy enough, like with Creatures and the other songs, it was like she already had the lyrics written before I even told her I had music. So, in one day, “Creatures of Habit” was born.
Alex Marie: Yeah, that’s probably one of the fastest songs we wrote. I mean we meshed it together and it’s a great song.
Metal Exiles: Oblivion is a great example of a modern tone and a great showcase for the vocals. What is your approach to creating something like Oblivion or Fallout which are more modern as opposed to the classic approach of Creatures of Habit?
Alex Marie: I think it just depends on our mood. Honestly, my favorite type of songs to write are ballads. I love writing them. That’s where most of my passion songs is I think. That’s just the kind of mood I was in. We have tons of songs so when we had to take our pick really.
Michael: There will probably be about ten or twelve songs on the album. We plan on having a lot of album. We just wanna write and write and write. We hope success for all of them or one or whatever, that we release. We just wanna put out as much music as we can and for however long we can because you never know what could happen.
Metal Exiles: Do you know which song, if any, is going to be released as a single?
Michael: We were in Los Angeles, California about two weeks ago, and we met up with our radio agent. His name is Tim Binder. He works at New Ocean Media. They have Tesla and Asking Alexandria and those types of bands and he gave some affection to “Creatures of Habit”. He’s really passionate, just as much as we are. So we, along with the label, decided to go with him. He’s just a great guy and as for FM stations, it’s a game to get it on the big main, clear channel. They don’t give you the time of day unless they see a check. It’s kind of sad because back in the day, if a DJ liked your song, he’d play it. XM Octane and those stations, you can a lot of attention on now on those. When they first came out years ago, people still wanted and thrived to get on the FM stations, and we will be on whatever FM station decided to play us of course. I think up north and in the Midwest, FM is still really strong and even where our label is in Chicago and we’ll do really well there. For the most part, honestly, bands break in different markets. When you think of Bon Jovi, he’s a world-wide, hundred fifty million albums sold, artist and he actually broke in Japan and toured Japan for a couple of years before he ever really came back to America. Believe it or not RATT was actually bigger in America than he was at the time. It took off from there. A band from America goes to England or Europe to tour and then you have bands like Def Leppard that came all the way to America to play. I believe a lot of our market is going to be in the European and maybe Southeast Asia market at first. I may be proven wrong. You never know. “Creatures of Habit” launches in America and all of a sudden we have a tour and buses and we’re touring America. I don’t know. It’s really a guessing game and you kind of just roll with the punches and throw and see what sticks.
Metal Exiles: You guys have enlisted the help of One Spark to gain funds to tour. Tell us about this endeavor and why did you guys choose them over GoFundMe or PledgeMusic or one of the other pledge sites?
Alex Marie: It was something that was in our area and it looked like it was gonna be bigger this year than it was last year so we thought “Why not”?
Michael: On One Spark, it’s grown over the years. It’s been going on a couple of years now and I think right now, this year has been the best year of opportunity for a band like us. It touches a lot of aspects though, not just bands and music. There’s a lot of inventors and cooks and a lot of different things going on so I think there’s a little more attention now on someone like us to go join and put on a rock show. We’ve also done GoFundMe. When we went to Europe, a lot of people helped support that and we were able to come up with a little chunk of change to help support our European tour. We try to get any avenue we can. We all still work jobs to pay the bills. We’ve all worked a lot of different jobs, let’s put it that way. We’re still in that big stretch to make this our full-time job so we’re gonna do anything and everything we possibly can to make that happen, from a moral standpoint, you know.
Metal Exiles: Considering you have One Spark happening, aside from the shows I see locally in Jacksonville, do you have concrete plans to tour?
Alex Marie: Everything is really tentative right now on our release. We really don’t know what’s gonna happen once our EP drops and our video for “Creatures of Habit”. That video is coming out too. We would love to tour. It’s our goal once everything drops.
Michael: The whole thing about touring, nowadays, is that the way to make money most of the time is to tour. A band has to tour. There’s a lot of humongous acts that aren’t making their marks on record sales. It puts them on the road far longer than they used to be one the road. We’re building a demand. Right now is the actual starting point for building a demand to be able to break into a market in whatever region, overseas, or wherever we start. We don’t wanna be in the negative anymore. We want to make smart choices so that the band can have longevity. You never know what can be offered to you right when you release. We don’t turn down great opportunities. We’ve never been known to do that. We’re definitely gonna be doing a lot of big spot dates, big shows that really count. We’re gonna do some radio promotions and some acoustics on some radio stations. We’re just gonna pump this EP up, these four songs, the radio song, the video, and the band name, in as many avenues as we can so that when we do tour, we’re packing out these places.
Metal Exiles: Being brother and sister, do you have any issues with sibling rivalry as far as the band goes?
Alex Marie: We pick and we get mad sometimes.
Michael: I’ve only choked her a couple times (laughing).
Alex Marie: I have an example: Michael had just got his nipples pierced and my mom saw and then to deter her from yelling at him, he was like “oh, well Alex has a boyfriend”. That’s the stupid things. Really nothing in the band room. We know what to do.
Michael: Really the arguments are simple brother-sister bullshit.
In closing, we discussed Welcome to Rockville a little bit and how, even though the Agent in charge will not give them the time of day at the present time, our hopes are that very soon, Lawless Hearts will be kicking some ass on a Rockville stage.
Visit the Band website @ http://www.lawlesshearts.com
Follow them on Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/LawlessHeartsMusic
Follow them on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/LawlessHearts
Listen to ‘Creatures of Habit” here:
https://soundcloud.com/lawless-hearts/creatures-of-habit-1
Interview with Alex Marie and Michael Thomas of Lawless Hearts
By Leslie Elder Rogers
Metal Exiles: So you guys have been around a little while, about six years right?
Michael: Well, really, me and my sister have been involved in music our whole lives. I got my first guitar when I was probably about six. My mom sings too and my dad plays guitar. He’s actually a chef too but, we started real young. We just absorbed music and it’s been a part of our family forever. We both went to an art school in town called Douglas Anderson. Alex actually went there for creative writing a couple of years before me and then I went there for guitar. We had other projects throughout the years. She had other bands. We both had different styles of music that we were into. She had a little more of a poppy music style at the time and I was into rock, but then somehow it just all came together with the lyrics that she writes and the music that I write; it created Lawless Hearts. This band has been going on about six or seven years and we’ve been trying to push it and get to this point.
Metal Exiles: It sounds like you come from a family of good food and good music. Hell, you can’t ask for more than that. So After being together for so long why did you decide to put out an EP and not a full length?
Michael: Exactly. We want people to enjoy our songs, that’s the main thing we want. Of course, you wanna be able to support yourself eventually, but we play music and do what we do because we love it. We haven’t really been able to support ourselves so far but that hasn’t discouraged us. We’re gonna keep doing it until we can, 100 percent. We’re just at the very beginning of big things, I believe. The feeling that I get, per say, is that lately I’ve been waking up and having this sensation I’ve never felt before. Say you have this rocket ship and the fire is just percolating and it hasn’t launched yet. It’s just sitting there and it’s all the anticipation, and all the parts are in the top, in the nest of it. There’s all these people hopping on board while it’s just warming up because they know this thing is about to go to somewhere from which they’re never gonna return but the place is just far better where they’re at. I haven’t felt that sensation before so I think we’re on the right track finally.
Alex Marie: Yeah, I mean, we’ve pretty much had the album already written for a while. Originally we were doing this idea to have it like a sonnet trilogy where we would do three EP’s or three smaller albums instead of one full length and they each would tell a kind of story, but now, since we have the label, we’re gonna actually just put it all in one. I think it’s gonna come together pretty well. It’s been a long time coming. We kept thinking maybe next year, and then, maybe next year, and now finally its happening and it’s kind of surreal because things are really happening and this is actually real.
Michael: The main thing is that we have big faith, I mean we’re not a Christian rock band, but we do believe that everything has a place and a time and a reason. When we were younger, of course we had the rock edge and we were different still but the times in the market wasn’t right. If you look back at years ago when we first started this thing, I mean, the stars have to align and there’s a time and place for that. Our songs, for instance, they’ve evolved into something far greater than what they originated as. They have a commercial appeal but we’re not taking away from the sound of Lawless Hearts. We’re not just creating songs to put on the radio. We’re still writing what Lawless Hearts was founded in but we’re able to bridge the gap of commercial appeal for the regular listener to appreciate it but it’s also something new and different and fresh that a bunch of young players can be encouraged by so they can go and pick up a guitar and learn the instrument and write songs and tell stories. That’s’ what we are. We’re just story tellers. Now, I feel the market more than ever. For instance, we have that game rock band, and also guitar hero and all these kids, I mean, they’re my age and I’m 22, but when they were younger, before they could drive, they were playing this video game and they were not hearing these new songs that were on the radio. They were hearing things like AC/DC, Guns & Roses, Thin Lizzy, and KISS. Now they have cars and they have girlfriends and they’re driving around and turning on the radio, they’re like, “wait a minute, what is this”? I believe the young kids are urging for their band. I mean, they love their parents’ bands but they want their band now. I’m not saying that’s just us. I want to start a market, a movement. I wanna be a part of the whole resurgence of actual talent because there’s a lot out there and I want to encourage that.
Metal Exiles: Alex, since you went for the creative writing side, do you write all of the lyrics for the music or is it a collaboration between the four of you?
Alex Marie: Yeah, I’m pretty much the sole writer of the band but there’s a couple of songs that Michael has written. Our new bass player, Robert, is pretty good at writing. We haven’t used any of his stuff yet, but we have plenty of time to get with everybody, but yeah, as of right now, I pretty much write everything.
Metal Exiles: The EP is a great mix of influences, notably 80’s hard rock. You’re pretty young, what moved you guys to dip back into that genre?
Alex Marie: Honestly, our parents, well, our dad would always have Led Zeppelin and Rush and Pink Floyd playing. That was his thing but really we picked up on the music ourselves from just wanting to learn the instruments. I guess we just kind of found it on our own.
Michael: For me, my dad worked a lot of different jobs as a chef where everywhere he went, I would go. When he worked in Atlanta, I lived with him there, and then in Orlando. All of the concerts we’d go to were all rock and roll. That influenced me a lot and I gained an affection for that. I don’t know if my parents installed it in me, but I remember as I was getting older I thought, “Let me get a football and go down that road”, but I would still go home and practice the guitar a lot more than I would football. It wasn’t until I went to art school that I was just like “Fuck it, I’m putting the jewelry on and tight jeans because this is who I am”. As a man, I went to my coach and told him I loved sports but who I am is this. I recently spoke with him not too long ago and he’s been seeing everything that’s been going and he was glad that I really pushed through because I knew what I wanted. I guess he respected that. A lot of my guitar styles, I have the 80’s hard rock heavy hitters, obviously, in my books but a lot of my influences come from jazz horn players. I don’t know, I put that technique to the guitar and it makes this big huge sound the way the transitions are in jazz when you put it to rock. I love it. I’ve kind of counteracted to do both sports and music because I love fitness and bodybuilding. My uncle is a personal trainer so I wanted to acquire that. I’m into health and fitness so I’ll have the best of both worlds. I can go up on stage looking good and not all whacked out and play the guitar and can put that together in a package and sell that.
Alex Marie: Our parents never forced us into music lessons. We asked to take lessons and they encouraged us so if it wasn’t for them paying for all of that, we wouldn’t have even done it.
Michael: My dad was always asking me why I didn’t grow my hair out. He was a tanker before a chef. I don’t remember this but my mom said that when I was younger, if my hair touched my ears, I’d flip and now I have woman hair. During this process of trying to make it, it can be so stressful at times. You can get testy because you’re in close quarters and all but I give it all to my parents for all their support. Sometimes I sit back and think “man, why the hell was I an asshole just because I’m in this rut of trying to make it”? When it comes down to it, if it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t have been anywhere near where we are right now. I’ve had a lot of friends that I’ve known throughout my years that have nice cars that their parents bought them, or their parents give them plenty of money to go out with their friends, and I had one friend tell me that he would give up everything and ride a bike everywhere if his parents would just appreciate what it was that he wanted to do. They’re pushing him to medical school and all that standard shit; going to be a nurse or whatever, but he doesn’t want to do that. When he told me that, it hit me pretty hard.
Metal Exiles: Most of the bands I’ve spoken to recently talk about rock not being supported now like it used to be or like it should be or that rock and roll seems to have become underground, how do you feel about that?
Michael: The thing is that I feel like history repeats itself. I may be wrong and all, but that’s what I feel. I am a firm believer in that. We had the punk phase and disco and all that shit come out and when disco was at its highest but as soon as Metal Health by Quiet Riot hit, it seemed like the day after that everyone hated disco. It was crazy. Then you had all the hair bands (and I’m a hair band fan) and in the late 90’s, it kind of got Campbell soupy. As soon as it got very, very replicated and they were taking people and trying to make bands just to make some money, it went down. The reason that Nirvana was so big was because there was nothing like it. It was raw. It was natural. It was real. They were out in the 80’s and no label would sign them, with that grungy, stinky dude, and then all of a sudden they saw that potential. People are real and it’s all about the people. The people have the last say. It don’t matter how much money you put into something. I mean, you could have a million dollar signing bonus and it don’t mean a damn person is gonna buy your shit. It doesn’t mean anything. I have a feeling that things are about to change. Not just for us, but there’s a lot of bands that deserve it. I’m glad Pavement is giving us a chance and this is only the beginning by far.
Metal Exiles: What have you guys done to build up your name in such a tough climate to break as a band?
Michael: Well we had a couple of these interviews in the past where I wrote about whether it was hard to get a record deal since we’re from Jacksonville because there was Lynyrd Skynyrd and Molly Hatchet and Shinedown and all those bands from Jacksonville, and that kind of falls in the same line of building up our name. It’s really just sticking to our guns and not changing at all and just rolling with the punches. When we first decided what our sound was and it came together, it was all like the heavy, hard core rock and roll. Not just rock and roll but heavy, like screaming and all, or Emo like.
Alex Marie: And we even tried a Paramore style. We tried to change it a bit and tried to go a little poppy because we thought that’s what people wanted. We called every single label and we would get “you’re not ready”. We were like “How do they know when we’re ready”?
Michael: Just sticking to what we knew in our hearts was the sound of this band and it is what is on that EP. The album is ready but we’re taking our time to release that later in the year to start slowly drawing attention and letting the fans know that it’s ok to like a band like us. There are so many kids out there that are young man, and they are aching to get that guitar. It’s a larger than life scenario what this life brings.
Metal Exiles: Creatures Of Habit touches that 80s notion with its classic riffs, where did this come from? Do you write about your own personal experiences?
Alex Marie: Michael’s is the music part but most of our songs are about overcoming struggle and we’re all creatures of habit and we’re all dealing with things. Creatures of Habit is about trying to decide what’s right and what’s real and what being a good person really is. I get inspired by everything from relationships to being angry about the manager that we had that was a total nutcase to something I read in a book. I could be sitting in a coffee shop or something like even right now, I’m with a friend of mine at Target and we’re sitting in these little bitty chairs…
Michael: It’s the truth man, about how our songs come together. I timed myself and was trying to be competitive before this interview. I was 13 miles away from my little river spot where I ride my bike to and think and shit and I was like “I’m gonna call her right when I stop at the river”. It was about to pour down rain, which it is right now and I made it with to right under the little cover way just as I was calling you. Ok, so as far as the lyrics and the riffs go, I just pick up a guitar and I’ll play it. Basically what it comes to is this. When I was living in Atlanta a couple years back, I rode this trail called “The Silver Comet Trail”. It was like a 60 mile bike trail with old railroad tracks. I’d just gotten out of high school and our apartment complex was just right around the corner. My dad worked at the Braves stadium and everything and I would go to that trail that was just a couple of miles up the road. I rode the whole thing multiple times. One time I went off down to this little river down at the bottom…this is a true story and don’t know how you believe but this older, black guy comes down walking with his cane. I’m a very clear conscious person but I know what I believe in so I can’t be swayed. So he asks me how I’m doing and we sat down and talked about everything, every topic, politics, religion, life and in the end (to make a long story short, because I’m very detail oriented and will go off on an ADD tangent) he said, in politics it takes something gigantic to really make a mark in history and change the world, but you write one great song and you’ll be remembered forever. Just one great song. That’s’ what he told me. I’d never told him I was a musician. I have long hair and stuff but that don’t mean anything. He never said “oh yeah, you’re a musician”. He just said that. So we were walking up the hill because it was getting late and he was telling me about the farm he used to live on with his family and I said something to him and I didn’t hear anything like a response back at all. I looked back and he was gone. I guess because I kind of seclude myself sometimes these kind of things happen to me. I think sometimes I get too deep into thought. It’s just who I am. I’ve always been that way. It took me a while, maybe about a week, to stop thinking about that. Well, I didn’t really stop thinking about it, but about a week after that, I came back to Jacksonville and picked up the guitar and out came all those riffs. Those scenarios are what creates our songs. For instance, it was about to rain you could picture a big cloud and you could hear this music with it and it reminds me of things and that’s where my music comes from. One day I would like to get into orchestral stuff. I like orchestrating music. I feel it and I hear it. So that’s where my part comes from and Alex, with the lyrics, believe it or not, it’s crazy enough, like with Creatures and the other songs, it was like she already had the lyrics written before I even told her I had music. So, in one day, “Creatures of Habit” was born.
Alex Marie: Yeah, that’s probably one of the fastest songs we wrote. I mean we meshed it together and it’s a great song.
Metal Exiles: Oblivion is a great example of a modern tone and a great showcase for the vocals. What is your approach to creating something like Oblivion or Fallout which are more modern as opposed to the classic approach of Creatures of Habit?
Alex Marie: I think it just depends on our mood. Honestly, my favorite type of songs to write are ballads. I love writing them. That’s where most of my passion songs is I think. That’s just the kind of mood I was in. We have tons of songs so when we had to take our pick really.
Michael: There will probably be about ten or twelve songs on the album. We plan on having a lot of album. We just wanna write and write and write. We hope success for all of them or one or whatever, that we release. We just wanna put out as much music as we can and for however long we can because you never know what could happen.
Metal Exiles: Do you know which song, if any, is going to be released as a single?
Michael: We were in Los Angeles, California about two weeks ago, and we met up with our radio agent. His name is Tim Binder. He works at New Ocean Media. They have Tesla and Asking Alexandria and those types of bands and he gave some affection to “Creatures of Habit”. He’s really passionate, just as much as we are. So we, along with the label, decided to go with him. He’s just a great guy and as for FM stations, it’s a game to get it on the big main, clear channel. They don’t give you the time of day unless they see a check. It’s kind of sad because back in the day, if a DJ liked your song, he’d play it. XM Octane and those stations, you can a lot of attention on now on those. When they first came out years ago, people still wanted and thrived to get on the FM stations, and we will be on whatever FM station decided to play us of course. I think up north and in the Midwest, FM is still really strong and even where our label is in Chicago and we’ll do really well there. For the most part, honestly, bands break in different markets. When you think of Bon Jovi, he’s a world-wide, hundred fifty million albums sold, artist and he actually broke in Japan and toured Japan for a couple of years before he ever really came back to America. Believe it or not RATT was actually bigger in America than he was at the time. It took off from there. A band from America goes to England or Europe to tour and then you have bands like Def Leppard that came all the way to America to play. I believe a lot of our market is going to be in the European and maybe Southeast Asia market at first. I may be proven wrong. You never know. “Creatures of Habit” launches in America and all of a sudden we have a tour and buses and we’re touring America. I don’t know. It’s really a guessing game and you kind of just roll with the punches and throw and see what sticks.
Metal Exiles: You guys have enlisted the help of One Spark to gain funds to tour. Tell us about this endeavor and why did you guys choose them over GoFundMe or PledgeMusic or one of the other pledge sites?
Alex Marie: It was something that was in our area and it looked like it was gonna be bigger this year than it was last year so we thought “Why not”?
Michael: On One Spark, it’s grown over the years. It’s been going on a couple of years now and I think right now, this year has been the best year of opportunity for a band like us. It touches a lot of aspects though, not just bands and music. There’s a lot of inventors and cooks and a lot of different things going on so I think there’s a little more attention now on someone like us to go join and put on a rock show. We’ve also done GoFundMe. When we went to Europe, a lot of people helped support that and we were able to come up with a little chunk of change to help support our European tour. We try to get any avenue we can. We all still work jobs to pay the bills. We’ve all worked a lot of different jobs, let’s put it that way. We’re still in that big stretch to make this our full-time job so we’re gonna do anything and everything we possibly can to make that happen, from a moral standpoint, you know.
Metal Exiles: Considering you have One Spark happening, aside from the shows I see locally in Jacksonville, do you have concrete plans to tour?
Alex Marie: Everything is really tentative right now on our release. We really don’t know what’s gonna happen once our EP drops and our video for “Creatures of Habit”. That video is coming out too. We would love to tour. It’s our goal once everything drops.
Michael: The whole thing about touring, nowadays, is that the way to make money most of the time is to tour. A band has to tour. There’s a lot of humongous acts that aren’t making their marks on record sales. It puts them on the road far longer than they used to be one the road. We’re building a demand. Right now is the actual starting point for building a demand to be able to break into a market in whatever region, overseas, or wherever we start. We don’t wanna be in the negative anymore. We want to make smart choices so that the band can have longevity. You never know what can be offered to you right when you release. We don’t turn down great opportunities. We’ve never been known to do that. We’re definitely gonna be doing a lot of big spot dates, big shows that really count. We’re gonna do some radio promotions and some acoustics on some radio stations. We’re just gonna pump this EP up, these four songs, the radio song, the video, and the band name, in as many avenues as we can so that when we do tour, we’re packing out these places.
Metal Exiles: Being brother and sister, do you have any issues with sibling rivalry as far as the band goes?
Alex Marie: We pick and we get mad sometimes.
Michael: I’ve only choked her a couple times (laughing).
Alex Marie: I have an example: Michael had just got his nipples pierced and my mom saw and then to deter her from yelling at him, he was like “oh, well Alex has a boyfriend”. That’s the stupid things. Really nothing in the band room. We know what to do.
Michael: Really the arguments are simple brother-sister bullshit.
In closing, we discussed Welcome to Rockville a little bit and how, even though the Agent in charge will not give them the time of day at the present time, our hopes are that very soon, Lawless Hearts will be kicking some ass on a Rockville stage.
Visit the Band website @ http://www.lawlesshearts.com
Follow them on Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/LawlessHeartsMusic
Follow them on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/LawlessHearts
Listen to ‘Creatures of Habit” here:
https://soundcloud.com/lawless-hearts/creatures-of-habit-1