BC: …on Steve Vai’s record label… (Favored Nations Entertainment http://www.favorednations.com)

CP: …On Steve Vai’s record label. We’re going to be having Martyrd…Zandelle…

BC: Martyrd’s classic thrash (metal), and Zandelle is prog/power metal…

CP: …and Phoenix Reign at the end.

MB: How did the show get put together…get organized. Was there a lot of hard work involved?

CP: Of course, there was a lot of hard work. Theresa reached out to Martyrd, Billy reached out to Zandelle and the Rob Balducci band. They were all willing to play…of course a lot of hard work to put this together just to get four different bands in a venue in Astoria, Queens, where not a lot of metal happens too much in Astoria, Queens, unfortunately.

Theresa Gaffney (TG): Yeah. Not too many clubs for that.

BC: Or in Queens!

CP: Or in Queens alone…or in the city…          

BC: ..in the city!

MB: It’s been about 2 and a half years since we have gotten to speak to you. Since then you have released the album Destination Unknown. What kind of feedback have you received from fans and press about the album?

Wayne Noon (WN): (sarcastically) They all hated it.

TG: *laughs*

MB: Wayne being sarcastic, ladies and gentlemen!

CP: They enjoyed it, they enjoyed it very much. They enjoyed Theresa’s vocals, calling her the little sister of…

BC:…Bruce Dickinson…Pat Benatar…

CP: …Bruce Dickinson…

WN: They liked the production this time.

CP: They did like the production.

TG: Yeah, they didn’t like (the production of) the demo. *laughs*

BC: We were in Metal Maniacs (heavy metal magazine)…Metal Maniacs did an awesome review on it, and then they went out of business. *laughs* The support for the album has been good, you know, as far as the press goes.

WN: Very positive.

 Phoenix Reign rocking out at March Metal Mayhem. Joining Phoenix Reign on the bill were veteran power metallers Zandelle, thrash metal young lions Martyrd, and instrumental guitar virtuoso Rob Balducci. The show was held at the Stathakion Center in Astoria (Queens), New York.

MB: What about record labels?

BC: Record labels don’t exist…*laughs*

CP: In Europe, a lot of magazines in Europe. We went to Greece, showed our music there…they wrote articles about us…very nice.

BC: They have (the album) at the major metal stores in Athens and Thessaloniki, the two major cities…we’re in like five stores, and we actually hit America too, a couple distributors.

TG: Distributors? Sentinel Steel…The End Records was distributing us, a few other ones…some in Japan…some in Germany.

CP: They all wrote positively about the bassist. *all laugh*

TG: Yes. They loved Chris.*laughs*

MB: You are included on the Sonic Cathedral compilation A World of Sirens. How did you get in touch with Sonic Cathedral?

BC: You guys referred us to John Wolff at Sonic Cathedral. They represent female fronted metal bands, and obviously we fit that bill. They help us out…they do as much as they can to help us out, and they like the music.

MB: The song “Constantinople 1453 (On the Eve of the Fall)”…Can you tell us the concept and story that is behind the song?

BC: The song is basically about what happens to the Emperor Palaeologos, who was the last emperor of the Byzantine Eastern Roman Empire, it’s about the last few days right before the invasion (by the Ottoman Turkish Empire). It’s about what happens to his guards, what happens at the court, and what happens at the walls right as the enemy lays siege to the city and captures everybody, and he dies heroically…as another medieval Spartan Leonidas. That’s basically the story there.

MB: Musically, it had to be quite a challenge to put the song together in the studio. What were the biggest challenges you faced putting the song together?

WN: Like, you mean, how long it took to record in studio? A couple of hours!

CP: That was just for your drums! Because the song is about twelve minutes long…Wayne had to put the drums down first…

WN: Remember when we did the click track, and it was all messed up, and we had to do it live!

BC: The easiest was actually the ethnic instruments. *laughs* Everything else was very intricate.

CP: That, in total, might have taken us a month, even, from beginning to end with the vocals…

BC: The layering, the choir parts…

TG: Yeah, getting the outside performers…

CP: We maxed out all of our tracks on that one.

TG: Pro-Tools was crunching away there!

MB: (To Theresa) What about vocally, was it a big challenge?

TG: Yeah, because it’s so dynamic. You gotta go from a very ethereal style for the beginning. I worked with my friend Melissa Iancono on the backing vocals on some of the operatic parts. So, we did a couple of takes on just that alone and then, obviously, there’s the main track vocals for the more hard rock stuff. So, you have to listen to it…different dynamics, I had to do that a couple of times. That was over a couple of days, at least.

BC: We got acoustic guitars in there, we got a lot of different layers of stuff.

MB: How did you all become interested in history as musical subject matter?

TG: Well, we’re not the first to do it, I mean, a lot of us just gravitated towards music with an open mind to it (history) like Iron Maiden or Grave Digger…bands like that who approached it with taste and style. Also, just the fact that a lot of work in our personal lives is done in history…whether it’s Billy and myself who have degrees in it, or Chris who is interested in it. It just all seemed to come together in a more natural way than anything. It’s not like something we necessarily planned out…we have a lot of songs that aren’t historically based, but the ones that have basis…now we have “Legend of Alexander”, we have a lot of stuff we’ve worked on that for us just seems to flow naturally…an expression of self.

CP: Music provides the avenue to tell the story of history to kids, because when they go to history class, they’re bored. They fall asleep. But, when you listen to music, it’s a different medium that they can pick up lessons from.

BC: I had my brother, I think, when I was 9, or 8...he came, put these headphones on me…going like “You have to hear this!” it’s “Flight of Icarus” and other one was “Alexander The Great” from Iron Maiden, and I’m like “Oh My God!”, and that was it!

MB: Do you see songs that you have written, like “Constantinople” being used in teaching young people about history? I think it could be a great medium.

CP: You got the audio there, if you can add some visual to it…you could cover all the learning modes of these kids, so, absolutely, you can.

BC: Music is the way.

MB: The song also inspired you to make a long form video/movie. Can you tell us about the making of the video?

On the set of the video shoot for the song “Constantinople 1453 (On the Eve of the Fall).” (photo courtesy of Mark Getman)

CP: Yes, on http://www.blacktuesday1453.com, you can check out the website. We have the “Making Of” and there’s a trailer on it. We got together with a cast of about 50 to put together this music video…

TG: A lot of them are here tonight.

CP: Yes…checking out the show. Very hard work, but in the end a very nice product came out of this.

BC: It’s living history coming to life through music, basically. Costumes…cool stuff.

CP: And it’s all research based…historically based. All those costumes used were the costumes used back in the 1400’s.

MB: You’ve built up a relationship with a performance group called The Greek Warriors. How did that come about?

BC: Actually, our director and our friend and partner, Peter Giakoumis…he’s a co-founder of the organization, which was in our organization 10 years ago. He’s a costume and an armor expert. We wanted to do a medieval organization out of the Greek Warriors, and “Constantinople” was the song (to start with). Make music, and to create a living history group that’s Byzantine after that. Not just the ancient stuff. The website is www.thegreekwarriors.com. Basically, we are all metal heads, we love heavy metal. He loves our music, especially that song, and we approached him about the idea of making a video out of it, and it happened. There are a lot of ethnicities in the video too, there’s not just Greek in the video, that represents it. There’s Venetians, Russians, Germans…other people…from that Middle Age era.

MB: Has the band been working on any new material that touches on historical subjects?

TG: I just mentioned “Legend of Alexander”…so that’s one…but…

CP: We have “The Odyssey”…

TG: “The Odyssey” and “The Iliad” are based on poems by Homer. So, yeah, we’re still working on them…they’re done, but at the same time we’d still like to get them…because they’re not on albums yet…the final product, on the next album, whenever that is…I’m looking forward to hearing it.

MB: Given the hard times we are having right now, I know it is a challenge to keep an independent band running. What inspires you to keep going and what drives you to succeed when times get tough?

TG: The fact that we’ve never really been in it for the money helps still, because, you know, if you start off with the right attitude that you’re in this to love the music, it’s not going to change in hard times. It might be a little more difficult to play certain shows, and get people to attend them, but we’re getting a healthy turnout tonight. We’re charging only 10 dollars at the door, so we’re being economically minded. We’re doing it ourselves…it’s always been that way and we’re taking that approach a lot more to heart now. You’ve gotta stand on your own two feet, you can’t depend on others so much.

BC: Basically it is very hard to get gigs, to get a lot of stuff in New York. With the other 3 bands (on the night’s bill) we got together, and since we’re involved with this Greek parade and this Greek center…to use it as a foundation so we can do something different in our own venue, in our own neighborhood…with help from them to make it into a bigger thing, a bigger metal festival because it doesn’t exist and everybody has to be dragged out to places where their fan bases can’t go, you know? So, that’s it. Grass roots is the best we can do right now.

MB: Do you have any idea when we can expect some new Phoenix Reign material?

CP: This is the beginning of it, and hopefully we will start laying down some tracks. We have a lot of new material that we are going to play tonight and hopefully we will start laying down some tracks down for that. By fall stuff should be in the works.

MB: Thanks a lot guys! I know this has been a challenge with all the goings on tonight. Do you have any closing thoughts?

CP: We thank people like you who keep the metal scene alive because it is a struggling field, but you keep it alive and you get us out there and we owe a lot to you. Thank You.

TG: Thank you.

Phoenix Reign showing off the latest 1400s heavy metal fashions during the video shoot. Very metal! (photo courtesy of Mark Getman) 

Thanks a million, Phoenix Reign! You guys, along with Martyrd, Rob Balducci, and Zandelle made the inaugural March Metal Mayhem a huge success and we were honored to be a part of it! We hope there are many more of these to come! For more info on Phoenix Reign, check out http://www.phoenixreign.com. For more info on the video for “Constantinople 1453 (On the Eve of the Fall),” check out www.blacktuesday1453.com. For info on The Greek Warriors, go to http://www.thegreekwarriors.com.