I caught up with SOiL’s lead vocalist Ryan McCombs in Manchester before their gig and had a chat…
You toured the UK in 2011 with Puddle of Mudd when you re-joined the band, to commemorate the tenth anniversary of “Scars”. How did that tour go? Why did you choose to tour the UK at that time and not the US?
R: I was with Drowning Pool at the time and the UK tour was offered to the tour guys and they got a hold of me see if I was interested, we started talking more and more, I thought about it and it worked out perfectly time wise and I was available to do it, my touring cycle with Drowning Pool was coming to an end after 7yr hitch I kinda go through. Coming over with Adam and Tim doing shows was fun and we had a lot of fun joking around together and was all it was meant to be. We talked and talked some more about doing another album and that’s what we did three years later having just released “Whole” six months ago and touring the UK again. Reason UK was kinda a no brainer was because the UK opened its arms and embraced us from day one and doing a tenth anniversary of “Scars” tour was a no brainer, they deserved it and we wanted to do it.
Your album “Whole” that you released last summer seems to take you back to the sound you had round the time you released “Scars”. Is this a lot to do with your influence in the band?
R: Yeah it makes perfect sense to me when I hear that because you have the three main ingredients in the writing of “Scars”. Adam’s always been the soul, he’s responsible for 97% of music that had the title SOiL stamped on it. Someone asked me to throw out a riff once in a while but age for living was rock when SOiL was just getting started, so I felt first hand every night. Somebody makes a little riff out like Tim did, were sitting there for next two or three hours building a song around that riff. So you got him and the music, Tim’s always been throwing riffs out and stuff, so you got them two and me, I wrote the lyrics and the voice so you got the three main components back together. I think at first I was worried when writing, is it going to be SOiL the old school fans are gonna enjoy, and then after a while I managed to stop myself, we always will do natural and always will do it again.
You used Kickstarter to help fund “Whole”. What is Kickstarter? What benefits did you offer the fans that gave money?
R: Well I’m not really sure how to explain Kickstarter, it’s just a site basically that provides a foundation for artists/musicians or whatever to start a business or something. In trade for money we offered everything from early downloads of the album to coming to Chicago and seeing first of all a show, or going out with us to eat some pizza or have a few beers, just for people who bought the option of doing that, like VIP. I didn’t like the thought of it at all, it was actually a friend of mine that said “Dude, when you was 15/16 years old, can you imagine if you had the chance to go for pizza with Metallica?”. If you step outside of yourself here and put yourself in the shoes of that person that loves your music, and would be glad to pay that to do that, so that made me feel a little bit better about it. First I thought I’m sitting there standing on a street corner with my hand out to the people that allowed me to be here, I felt weird about it but once she explained to me that way’s not that bad, I guess, “can’t take it that direction your right”.
You don’t have a permanent drummer, why is that?
R: Three minds are easier to deal with than one, one less opinion we have to deal with, that’s basically it. The three members of SOiL we have now are original members, so it wouldn’t be right unless we brought back one of the originals and there’s no way they would ever be welcomed back in. The members we have now are the most original you could put back together without their being some sort of swinging (laughs) and yano, why add to it, like I say, three minds are easier to get on the same path than four.
Any last words for your fans?
R: Yeah, I feel like I’ve had lived in fans for 17yrs and that’s the truth. We do what we do because they allow us too. We’re still here 17yrs later because they support us, buy the music and come the shows and buy t-shirts of the show, they have allowed us to be able to do this for a living. We’re just like everyone else living pay check to pay check, being able to do something we love to do because they allow us too, I say it every night, music starts with them and ends with them and reason we’re here so thank you…
R: I was with Drowning Pool at the time and the UK tour was offered to the tour guys and they got a hold of me see if I was interested, we started talking more and more, I thought about it and it worked out perfectly time wise and I was available to do it, my touring cycle with Drowning Pool was coming to an end after 7yr hitch I kinda go through. Coming over with Adam and Tim doing shows was fun and we had a lot of fun joking around together and was all it was meant to be. We talked and talked some more about doing another album and that’s what we did three years later having just released “Whole” six months ago and touring the UK again. Reason UK was kinda a no brainer was because the UK opened its arms and embraced us from day one and doing a tenth anniversary of “Scars” tour was a no brainer, they deserved it and we wanted to do it.
Your album “Whole” that you released last summer seems to take you back to the sound you had round the time you released “Scars”. Is this a lot to do with your influence in the band?
R: Yeah it makes perfect sense to me when I hear that because you have the three main ingredients in the writing of “Scars”. Adam’s always been the soul, he’s responsible for 97% of music that had the title SOiL stamped on it. Someone asked me to throw out a riff once in a while but age for living was rock when SOiL was just getting started, so I felt first hand every night. Somebody makes a little riff out like Tim did, were sitting there for next two or three hours building a song around that riff. So you got him and the music, Tim’s always been throwing riffs out and stuff, so you got them two and me, I wrote the lyrics and the voice so you got the three main components back together. I think at first I was worried when writing, is it going to be SOiL the old school fans are gonna enjoy, and then after a while I managed to stop myself, we always will do natural and always will do it again.
You used Kickstarter to help fund “Whole”. What is Kickstarter? What benefits did you offer the fans that gave money?
R: Well I’m not really sure how to explain Kickstarter, it’s just a site basically that provides a foundation for artists/musicians or whatever to start a business or something. In trade for money we offered everything from early downloads of the album to coming to Chicago and seeing first of all a show, or going out with us to eat some pizza or have a few beers, just for people who bought the option of doing that, like VIP. I didn’t like the thought of it at all, it was actually a friend of mine that said “Dude, when you was 15/16 years old, can you imagine if you had the chance to go for pizza with Metallica?”. If you step outside of yourself here and put yourself in the shoes of that person that loves your music, and would be glad to pay that to do that, so that made me feel a little bit better about it. First I thought I’m sitting there standing on a street corner with my hand out to the people that allowed me to be here, I felt weird about it but once she explained to me that way’s not that bad, I guess, “can’t take it that direction your right”.
You don’t have a permanent drummer, why is that?
R: Three minds are easier to deal with than one, one less opinion we have to deal with, that’s basically it. The three members of SOiL we have now are original members, so it wouldn’t be right unless we brought back one of the originals and there’s no way they would ever be welcomed back in. The members we have now are the most original you could put back together without their being some sort of swinging (laughs) and yano, why add to it, like I say, three minds are easier to get on the same path than four.
Any last words for your fans?
R: Yeah, I feel like I’ve had lived in fans for 17yrs and that’s the truth. We do what we do because they allow us too. We’re still here 17yrs later because they support us, buy the music and come the shows and buy t-shirts of the show, they have allowed us to be able to do this for a living. We’re just like everyone else living pay check to pay check, being able to do something we love to do because they allow us too, I say it every night, music starts with them and ends with them and reason we’re here so thank you…