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Interview with Scatter The Ashes
By: Patrick Steven Patterson
 I recently had the pleasure of talking to Daryl Stamps, vocalist of Nashville's Scatter The Ashes. Mr. Stamps was very accommodating, considering we're all idiots over here. Besides their recent signing with Epitaph records and their first full-length on the way (Devout/The Modern Hymn, May 25, 2004), we had plenty to chat about: some influences ('Joy Division, Led Zeppelin - going back to the roots of what we like in current music'), what kind of kids are at their shows ('one girl wearing a Good Charlotte shirt next to a guy with an Icarus Line shirt. It's really diverse, that's why we like it'), and what they're touring in ('a van, all of our gear in the back and we sleep on the floor in the front').
NowOnTour: About how long have you been together?
Daryl: This formation of the band has been together for about two years, maybe a year and a half. We've been doing this for maybe all of three years, trying different formulas, but we got comfortable and got our direction about a year-and-a-half ago.
[Surprised] And you hooked up with Epitaph late last year, so that was about a year into the band...and you get a label deal?
Yeah, we just tried to take it real seriously from the start...put all our money into a van and get out there and start booking ourselves and touring and doing everything we could, and I think it really paid off.
A lot of our site's readers are in indie bands, just starting out, looking for "the way" to do things. When I'm asked touring questions, I usually recommend that bands build a local following, then branch out regionally, say maybe a 300-mile radius. Is that the type of approach you guys took, or did you go a different route?
When we first started, we booked a show before we had started practicing, which is a bad idea (and we wouldn't do that again), but at the same time, we started promoting big-time and that helped us get a fan-base real fast. Once we got the hang of that...well, we're from Nashville, so Atlanta is four hours, Louisville is three hours, Birmingham is four hours. There are a lot of major cities that are really close so we [thought] 'let's just take this to places that we can be hitting up as frequently as possible.' Before we bought the van, we just drove in a bunch of cars. But booking DIY is hit-and-miss. We didn't have a lot of good shows, a lot of good dates, but the main thing is you can't get discouraged. It's worth it to start from the bottom and work your way up - it's really good to do that - instead of starting like a lot of bands do and by getting on great tours. They don't understand what it's like to work from the bottom.
You guys were booking yourselves for quite a while?
Oh yeah, we still are.
Any tips?
Dylan, our drummer has pretty much handled the booking, but from what I could tell, he was sending emails out seeing who wanted to put on a show. Just get your own routing plan - and don't go out too long so you don't lose too much money. Try to do weeks at a time, in a circle. Email, and whoever gives you a show gives you a show. You don't know what you're going to get yourself into, but it's always worth a shot. It's definitely an experience... learn something from it whether it goes good or bad.
A lot of bands I talk to are upset that they are getting $75 for a gig that's 200 miles away...
That's good [laughs].
The thing is, where are you going to make your money? 'Where are you going to make your gas?' is what you're looking for at that point. Is it bringing a lot of merch on the road; is that how you're going to do it?
Yeah, bring merch, but just expect to get gas [in payment] and hope that goes well. You have to make good connections with the promoters and the places, and that's where you'll be successful because they'll promote you more because you're friends with them, and they'll be willing to pay you more and put you on better shows. But what's also key is promotion - getting on the Internet and sending people posters or flyers, or going [to the city] yourself. Sometimes if our show was in Atlanta and if another big show was going on [near our date], we'd drive down there and pass out fliers, even if it was just Web site flyers. 99% of the shows we had, we'd drive there and promote ourselves, or send stuff to the promoters.
Were you guys actively pursuing management and a label, or were those just things that came along because you were busting your asses?
We knew where we wanted to take it, so from the start we knew eventually we'd have to get managers and hopefully, eventually a label would come along. That was the goal from the start, do the only thing that we could do: take it really seriously, treat it like a business, treat it really professionally and things would fall into place. You have a lot of fun doing it, but you still have to know what you want to do with it and focus on that. We weren't focused on getting managers at the time, or getting a label deal, we were just trying to get enough money to get some recordings done and busting ass and playing shows.
You have a record coming out in a couple of weeks. Give me the low down...you went to New York and recorded?
Yeah, we did it in NaDa Studios in New Windsor with this guy John Naclerio. He did a lot of demo work for Brand New and the first My Chemical Romance CD. He's fairly new; he's just got a new studio built. He's an awesome, awesome guy. It really was good working with him.
This is your first big-time studio, your first big-time recording, your first full-length. Tell me about it. Why should I buy it?
Yeah, definitely, we're excited. We're trying to take a whole different approach to Rock music today. We're influenced by a lot of stuff from the 80's and stuff from overseas, so it's got a lot of ethical, dark stuff to it. We're not trying to say we're groundbreaking or doing anything different, but I think we've got a different approach to [Rock] than what's going on today. I wish more bands were trying to branch out and do different things. A lot of bands try to do different stuff, but it's completely out in left field. I think we're just trying to do a different version of Rock music, how we feel today and how kids our age see Rock music. It's kind of dark. All the tracks flow real well together and are a lot different from each other. I think it has a lot of different appeals to different people. It's got a minimalistic approach to it to where it can be taken a lot of different ways, and it's not in-your-face, black-and-white, 'this is what this means, this is what this says, this is how you're supposed to feel.' We leave it up to the listeners to take their own things from it.
When listening to the record, I noticed a lot of long pauses, a lot of space in the songs. You seem to use that to great effect on the record. Is that something you guys think about when writing songs?
Yeah, definitely. Like I said, it's a real minimalistic approach focusing on having parts intertwine, and certain parts are really good with pauses and really good with not a lot of stuff going on. That makes the songs flow real well.
What's Uncle Brett [Brett Gurewitz, Bad Religion guitarist and founder of Epitaph Records] like?
He's honestly an awesome guy. He really, truly is. We've met a lot of people in the industry and we were waiting for him to be an asshole and dick us over, but we're really excited that he's just a really good guy. He's no bullshit.
What are some of your favorite places to play? Do some places respond better than others?
I don't know, we'll go up to, say, New York and play and there's a great response there and then come back the next time and just get lost in the fold, but we like playing up there. We played out in LA and that was really cool, and we're real excited about going down into Florida because we haven't really explored that yet, and we've been hearing a lot of good things about that. We also just played in Texas and that went real well, too. I don't know, we really don't care. We're attached as long as the audience is responding.
What do you think about the Nashville scene? I've put on some shows here and it's always hit-or-miss for me. I see all the kids on the streets that should be going to these shows. Sometimes I don't think that they come out and support it. What's your take on the scene?
Well, Nashville's got a lot of colleges and that has a lot to do with it. One year you can have 500 kids come out to a show and the next year you have 30 because kids come and go. It's like a wave. When we first started, we were able to flyer and play shows for 400 kids. We played a show last month and it's just nowhere near that number. A lot of the clubs lately have been shut down - I don't know why - and that's really hurt it. But, they're slowly starting to get it back up, and I think it's going to get back up again because a lot of the kids are really supportive of it. With the clubs shutting down and the big venue shut down, so a lot of big tours don't come through and people get jaded and go elsewhere. And like I said, college, people that are there for six months and are gone...that doesn't help a lot either.
Where's your [Southern] accent?
I don't know. Sometimes it comes through and sometimes it doesn't. I'm born and raised, and only when I have to say 'born and raised' does it show. I hear it come out sometimes.
Scatter The Ashes are getting some great publicity. What say you about the future of Rock? Is it you guys? You can brag, come on.
I don't know. That would be fantastic if it was, but I think that our approach to it could very well be it, not necessarily our style, but our approach: just going back and taking all the vanity and stuff like that and just trying to 'create' music again, like the Punk kids. Like A Perfect Circle, they are one of the only bands out there that are trying to push the boundaries of right now in the mainstream music.
That's all I've got. What are you guys listening to in the van?
Depeche Mode.
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