Indiana is probably the last place you would expect to hear was the residence of a progressive power metal band but it is indeed not only the home to a prog metal band but to one of my all-time favorite bands to date. Since first hearing them in 2012, Indiana’s Draekon has been a favorite band of mine and watching them grow right before my very eyes has been nothing short of amazing.
This year, in 2014, Draekon was invited to be the opening band on the 2014 ProgPower Kick-off show. The band played its largest show to date and in my opinion brought it in a huge fucking way. After the show I had the pleasure of hanging out with Stanford Stivers (drums), Josh Simpson (guitar), Chad Barnes (bass), and Don Tate (bass) (keyboardist Alec Biccum was late to the party) and talking about the challenges of being spread out geographically, the excitement of playing ProgPower, and why the follow up to their Prelude to Tragedy EP has been delayed for some time. Draekon are an amazing band and even more amazing people and I hope you’ll enjoy this interview as much as I did conducting it. This is a band to watch out for folks.
Welcome back to Atlanta for round three! How does it feel to be back?
Stanford: Thanks man. It gets better every time actually. Atlanta is always awesome. You guys have always been amazing to us.
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You guys just got done playing at part of the ProgPower Kickoff. How did it feel to be on a big stage like that?
Stanford: Beforehand it was so nerve racking but it was really exciting.
Josh: It was really cool to see Tom from Everygrey and Michael Eriksen from Circus Maximus just hanging out before our set. These are guys we really like listening to. It also just showed us that we must be doing something right [laughs].
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It seems that with each passing year you’re getting that much closer to the main stage at ProgPower. Is this something you’re shooting for?
Josh: It’s one of our main goals.
Stanford: We’ve been dreaming about this night for five fucking years. We’re getting closer.
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What are you taking away from the experience of playing such a kick ass, big show?
Josh: I’m going to take this whole experience with me. We have a lot of things in the works and it’s been an uphill battle with life and the band being spread out; the distance between us. It seems like we’re coming to a place where we’ll be putting out more material. It’s not that we don’t have the material. It’s just been hard to put it out on the level and at the quality that we want it to be done.
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Thanks to technology, we’ve seen bands like yourselves where members are spread out all over the country and in some cases the world working together. In Draekon’s case, have you all ever considered migrating together in order to be closer?
Josh: A lot of the band has moved to Indiana where me, Stan and Don (Tate; bassist) live. We were spread out from North Carolina to San Diego at one point and we were trying to make things work. There were communication issues and other things.
So basically you all go from being separated to just showing up here in Atlanta and here you all are, together at the gig. Gigs must always be like a reunion for you guys.
Don: [laughs] Yeah, it’s been like a year and half since we were all in the same room [laughs]. It just feels really good for us all to be together again. Once we got everyone here together, it was amazing.
Stanford: It’s always just a great thing when we’re all together. It’s one of those things where it just picks up where it left off. Not a beat is missed.
Don: Yeah, we all get along really well and there’s no tension or anything between us.
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So let’s cut to the chase here. As you know, 2012’s Prelude to Tragedy was one of my favorite albums that year. Where’s the fucking album?
Stanford: [laughs] Basically, we’re in the process of recording the second EP. It’s been one of those things where time just kind of got away from us and we have not been able to get back to lay down the final parts.
Josh: A lot of things just happened in our lives that made things difficult for us. You have to remember, we’re working normal jobs, and we have relationships. The music is what we do because we love it. For me, personally, my life and my personal well-being have to come first. I can’t process music if I’m not in a good place. We basically have the 2nd EP completely done minus lead guitar parts and some clean and acoustic guitars. There were just some things that happened in life that made it impossible to let us finish it up. We just had to look out for ourselves and make sure we were all in a good place before carrying on. It’s not only a financial burden that we all have to bear because we’re doing this ourselves and trying to put out the best product we can but it’s also a toll on us stress wise scheduling.
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Are you content at the level that Draekon is or do you see this going to new levels?
Stanford: We always strive for more. If we didn’t we wouldn’t be here playing the ProgPower Kickoff. I feel like this band really has a lot to offer. I think it’s one of those things were we really do want to push it as far as it can go.
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When I first saw you guys it was on accident. I was there to see Brave but was told I really needed to see you guys and first off, the thing that hit me was the quality of the writing and then hearing the EP was the quality of the production. That is obviously a really important thing to you guys.
Stanford: It’s a representation of us so the better the quality, the clearer the picture it’s going to create.
Don: I mean, when you’re recording, your end product is the fruit of your labor. You can sit and write all day long but until and play live but you’re only going to reach a certain number of people that see you live. With a recorded product people can listen to your music all over the place which gives you more exposure. If you have a great quality recording, it makes a great impression and first impressions mean a lot.
Josh: We knew that we had something good. The first thing we did was go into a friend’s studio to record a demo but we knew if we got with the right person it could sound great. We want people to say right from hearing us the first time that it sounds amazing. We want to sound like a professional band.
Stanford: If we think of what we’re doing from a business aspect, this is our product and we want our product to be high quality.
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Metal fans in general are the most opinionated fans and the internet is a playground for trolls like me. How do you guys deal with the harsh criticism be it constructive or not?
Chad: I’ve been referred to as being Seth Rogan singing metal on YouTube [laughs].
Stanford: That was, Don. Fucking troll [laughs].
Josh: I think one thing that we could be critiqued on more so than anything is our live shows because we don’t really get to play out as much as we’d love to. If there’s something we can do to make our presentation better than we are up for hearing about it.
If you guys could tour with any band who would it be?
Don: Weird Al [laughs]
Stanford: The guy’s a genius.
Don: If he parodied one of our songs, we’d know we’d made it!
Josh: We all really love Evergrey. Circus Maximus. We love those guys. To just be on the same stage as them would be amazing.
Stanford: Kamelot would be cool. When we first started out, we were very close in writing style to Kamelot. We’ve since broken off from that and taken our own path. That could work better now than before.
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What is one metal album nobody should live without hearing?
Josh: I would say, for me, it would have to be Recreation Day by Evergrey. When I first heard that album it just completely destroyed my mind. There was just something about that album. I feel like there are so many things that it brings to the table and it’s a very diverse album.
Stanford: There are way too many to pick one but I’d have to say Sonata Arctica’s Reckoning Night.
Chad: For me, my gateway to metal was Kamelot’s Black Halo. That album completely changed my life. I went from doing musical theater to doing metal music because of that.
Don: I’m going to be completely different from these guys and say Kill ‘Em All by Metallica.
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What are your hopes and dreams for Draekon?
Stanford: To just take this to the top. To be able to live comfortably and take this out on the road and do what we love to do the most and to share it with everyone.
Don: To do this for a living would be nice [laughs].
Josh: Just to be able to do this.
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What’s in store for the rest of the year for Draekon?
Josh: Just to finish all the shit we’ve been working on [laughs].
Get to fucking work dudes.
[Band laughs]
Josh: We’ve put ourselves in a position now to finish. Stan has been busting his ass recording other bands and has got some great equipment. This puts us in a position to be able to be recorded at the level that we can really get a professional sound.
Stanford: We just didn’t want to have to sacrifice the level of recording that we were able to do with the previous album.
Chad: Yeah, because once we produced that first EP the pressure was on. We have to do the next one that way. We can’t step backwards.
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Guys, thank you all so much for doing this. You guys put on an amazing performance tonight and you made me proud!
Stanford: Thank you so much, Don.
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And when you guys get invited to Wacken, put me on the list!
[Band laughs]
Josh: That’s our next goal! If we do have another goal, that’s it [laughs]. That would be awesome.
Don: I think that playing Wacken would be awesome. I think we’d be well received there.
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Ok, kids, that’s a wrap. I fucking love you guys and again, thanks for doing this interview tonight!
Stanford: Don, we can’t play Atlanta without you man!
Josh: Thanks again, Don!
Chad: We love you, Don! [laughs]
For more on Draekon, visit https://www.facebook.com/officialdraekonmetal
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