SplatterTribe:  I was fortunate enough to see you perform at Ozzfest 98' with your former band Kilgore, so as we now speak 10 years later, what is your opinion on the current music scene and how its changed since then?

Jay Berndt:  Well, alot has changed since then. It really feels like with that particular Ozzfest (1998), Metal became more acceptable to the mainstream. Some of the bands on that tour like Limp Bizkit, System of A Down, Sevendust and Incubus became huge stars. Plus shortly after came the success of the Osborne's TV show and then tattoo shows were on TV. Now metal heads aren't freaks anymore. Prior to that, the scene was really word of mouth. Remember the internet was in it's infancy back then and not in everyone's home. We didn't have cell phones. We had to send newsletters by US Postal to our fans. You bought the CD at the show and you let your buddies tape it to cassette. So it had this connection with your fans in a grass roots type of way. The only type of small success we had was by touring in our van, and doing all we could to connect with our fans. It was actually hard to find smaller bands like us and when you did as a fan, you felt special.

It doesn't feel that way anymore. There's too much access to bands too quickly. The market is saturated with mediocre bands that don't focus on good songwriting. They focus on gimmicks and have record contracts and tour buses on their first album without paying any dues. They become arrogant, jaded, after a few months of touring and why would you want to be a fan of an asshole? Plus their are some many different "types of metal" that the fans have been fragmented and judgmental. I love Doom Metal, but because it's more underground type of scene, and some of the fans have this holier than thou type of attitude for their type of metal and scorn for anything mainstream. Kind of sad.     S.T.: Having been signed to a major label

Photo by: Lisa Gourley Bloodwitch

with Kilgore, how do you compare it to doing it on your own with Bloodwitch?

J.B.:  Back then, it was they way you did it. You needed to get a record contract to get you music in stores. Now, you can burn your own CD's, sell'm at shows, or sell your music as digital downloads in many different places and worldwide. It's almost to the point that you really don't need a record company. You can really do it all on your own. Book your tours, create your music, create your artwork, and distribute your music all through your laptop. There are advantages to having a record contact and company at your disposal, but it becomes more complicated. You also start sacrificing much of your personal life to live strictly for the achievement of the band. It's very easy to lose focus of why you started the band in the first place. Our ambitions are very different that when we were in our 20's, so I have no desire for to work with a major label.

S.T.: Bloodwitch is a very heavy sounding band, very groove oriented with a crunch that catches you off guard, very pleasing, but unusual for today's current trends. Tell me about your fallowing, bunch of old timers like me or are you destroying the young kids too?
 

J.B.:  We don't really follow any trends. We just wanted to create music inspired on all the heavy music we grew up on; Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Dio, AC/DC, Thin Lizzy, ZZ Top and early Metallica. We just wanted to give a modern interpretation of those bands in a tasty, bloody sandwich. It's funny; teenagers seem to really dig us, and the over thirty crowd love us. The 20-something crowd are all like "This is kinda cool. Am I suppose to like this?" HaHa!!

S.T.: Tell us about the band, I know that you've taken from the ranks of Seemless and Kilgore and made this bastard child.   J.B.:  Pete Cortese (guitar for Overcast/Seemless) and I have actually worked together at the same company for 6 years, so we always talked about working together. After Seemless had finished touring for promotion on their second album, he sent me some MP3's of the new project he put together sometime in October 2007. He had gotten Jeff Fultz (bass player of Seemless) playing guitar and Jay Fitzgerald (Overcast) on drums and our buddy Jon Glassett on bass. I heard massive potential in the songs Pete was writing and they showed major enthusiasm for the songs I had written. So began writing and rehearsing for months when the rhythm section backed out. I knew the perfect drummer was Bill Southerland (Kilgore) and since we had worked so well together on the recent Kilgore reunion shows, and that I knew he would love the

band, I called him up. We then recruited local Worcester, MA metal gunslinger Pete Rutcho on bass. He had done production on the last Seemless album and was like family. And that's kind of how the band feels; like family.

S.T.: Your song Providence (by Kilgore) was an obvious tip of the hat to where your from, how does it feel being able to go home again?

J.B.:  Well, I never really left! Haha! Other than the touring I did with Kilgore, I always stayed in Providence. Bill and the rest of Kilgore moved to California after I had left the band to try and locate another singer. The song "Providence" wasn't really specifically about the city I live in, it was more advice for those that detractors back home who didn't understand what I was doing with my life. I was trying to say you have to take a chance and do something scary, unusual, different and embrace change so that you fulfill your dreams.
 

S.T.: Spring, 2007, Kilgore reunited for  "The Fight To Remember", a breast cancer foundation fundraiser, Tell  us about the importance of this issue to you.

J.B.:  Yeah, that ain't gonna happen. HaHa!! We're all in our thirties, have good jobs, families, houses... Hard to drop everything and live like shit on the road while we have mortgages to pay. Best you'll get is weekend road trips on the east coast. Maybe, maybe... a weekend or a week out west. Maybe....

S.T.: So when can we expect an e.p. or promo to hit our hands? (grim asking while biting nails!)

 J.B.:  Trying figure that out right now. We're planning on recording within the next few weeks. It would be a shorter (35 mins) full length album. All originals, all massive rock.

S.T.: In the current war of rock versus rap, rap is obviously taking the lead, what role do you consider yourself in at this point, General, Lieutenant, or a Private  in the rock army, and tell us why?

J.B.:  I would be more like Switzerland. Rock/Metal is always going to exist in some way and Rap/Hip-Hop is always exist in some way. Unfortunately, the mainstream versions of both types of music typically suck. Every once in a while, a Rock artist becomes very popular and it happens to be good, and the same goes for Hip-Hop. It's just that currently Rap sells alot where Rock does also, but not nearly as much. So what you have is watered down safe rock acts that can be enjoyed by those who enjoy rap too. It tends to be formulaic, generic and boring. The same can be said for most hip-hop. What ever sells, record companies find 12 other bands/artists that sound just like that. And they fool the general public into basically being sheep. So you are forced with a market of trends and gimmicks. I grew up on rock but also grew up in the early days of hip-hop (Run-DMC, LL Cool J, Ice T, Eric B & Rakim, BDP, Public Enemy). I gravitate towards music that has something to say. I found that early hip-hop as well as punk and hardcore really spoke to me a message of arming yourself with intelligence. That music was strong. There are artists today that continue this message, but they ain't in the mainstream. Most music consumers don't want a message with there music. They want to to be lulled into a state ignorance. So be it. So a war against rap, pointless. It's like a war on terrorism, you're never gonna win. If we could just get really good artists from both sides, that would be a start. Oh, and if they could stay segregated too. Rap Rock is just corny, shitty and wrong.