Chris Howorth – In This Moment

ToddStar: Thank you so much for taking time out for us once again Chris.

Chris: Awesome, happy to be here.

ToddStar: So, let’s start with Blood.  The album is out this week. What can you tell us about it that on the surface someone might not know?

Chris: Well, I mean I don’t know how much people know, but we had a whole line-up change up happen right before Blood, and management change up right before Blood, so it’s the first album that we actually recorded with just Maria Brink, Chris Howorth, Kevin Churko, and his son, Kane, did some stuff with us too, wrote a couple of songs. But basically just Maria and I from the band side of it, with my producer. That’s one thing, and another thing we did that people really don’t know on the surface is normally when we do an album we write all the songs, go in the studio and fix them up, then do all the drums, and all the guitars, and just layer it all up. This time we took each song one at a time and did the song until it was done and then went to another song. So it was a completely different way or working, which we liked a lot. We had more time to focus on everything and make it good.

ToddStar: Since I have had the pleasure of listening to it for a few days now, “Blood” and “Whore” are two stand outs. “Blood” being the first single and “Whore” is just a great follow up to it. Are there any that you feel are strong, or stronger, or that you feel strongest about?

Chris: I think you are seeing exactly what is there. For me it is “Blood,” “Whore,” “Adrenalize,” “Burn From The Ashes,” those are all some of my favorite songs. When we were first deciding what single to put out for this album first, “Blood” and “Whore,” that was the question, which one shall we do first? And everyone likes “Whore” a lot, but we felt that “Blood” was probably going to be one that was more of a smack in the face attention grabber, and then “Whore” will be a great follow up, sort of thing.

ToddStar: How fun was that video?

Chris: The video was fun, except the guys were unfortunately sequestered during the blood girls’ day, so we weren’t really getting to be a part of all that so much.

ToddStar: So you guys are out on the road, how are the fans eating this new stuff up?

Chris: They’re eating it up. It’s really awesome. You never know what to expect. We feel good about the album, we’re also stepping up the image and the stage production and everything, and our fans love it.

ToddStar: Do you find that you’re making new fans by the end of the set?

Chris: Yeah, that’s the whole idea. A lot of the tours we are doing this year; Papa Roach, Shinedown, Uproar, it’s a little bit different of an audience than we normally would tour with, so we’re playing a lot of new songs and that’s the whole idea, to get new people who’ve never heard of us before and say ‘Oh my God, I like this band, I wanna buy their CD.’ And we’re seeing that happening, so it’s really good.

ToddStar: It’s kind of something you guys have had through your whole career. I remember when you guys did Warped Tour; it was the same kind of thing. You and I talked about it years ago where you said we’re just trying to get that other crowd. We don’t want to be in that… so is that kind of how you are going at this whole promotion of this album?

Chris: Absolutely, and its working great. We did a tour with Shinedown, like I was saying, and nobody knew who we were on that tour, but every night there was an influx of ‘Oh I just heard you guys for the first time and this is awesome’ and we’re also seeing them at our headlining shows. People who are hearing the song on the radio, never knowing who we are, looking up stuff on the internet and then coming to the show. So it’s just what we want to have happening.

ToddStar: What kind of other arts were there that kind of influenced you in the writing of this disc?

Chris: Arts besides music?

ToddStar: Yeah. Do the visual arts or reading; do those things influence what you do?

Chris: I’m honestly more on the music side of it. Maria is definitely… we have this balance that we’ve found over the years, you know, working together. At the beginning it was so raw and we were so new to each other that we just kind of clash, clash, clash. We argue a lot less and fight a lot less because I know what she’s really great at, and she knows what I’m great at and we both let each other do our thing. So a lot of the visionary stuff, the video, the look of the video, all that stuff, Maria has so many ideas that are just flooding through her head constantly. So I just kind of support her if she’s got something cool that I think is cool. If I really don’t like it, I’ll say it, but a lot of times it’s like, she’s got great ideas, you know? Same thing with the stage and all this stuff. So I just let her flow and do it.

ToddStar: Okay. As you are touring this and as the tour progresses, like you said, you guys are jumping on the Uproar tour and everything else, do you find you’re going to stick with a lot of the newer material, are you mixing it up? How are you running your set list?

Chris: Well on Uproar we’re only going to have like 25-30 minutes, so we’re focusing on the newer stuff, making sure we at least play 3-4 songs off the new record because we’re giving everything towards people who haven’t heard of us before, so we’re going to pick our strongest songs that we think are going to make an impact in today’s market and people are going to get. Obviously we’re always going to throw in a few little flavor songs, for those people who go to our headline shows, we play a lot more songs. But for shows like Uproar we’re definitely hitting the new songs pretty hard.

ToddStar: If you had to name 2-3 songs from your catalogue that you think will always be part of an In This Moment show, what songs would you say?

Chris: “Blazin’,” “The Gun Show,” “Beautiful Tragedy” – I mean a lot of fans at these headliners want to hear “Daddies Falling Angel” and “Prayers,” which I love playing but I kind of feel like we’ve moved on from that period of our lives, as far as the metal core, but definitely “Beautiful Tragedy” off the first album. Then for The Dream, we’re not really playing anything off The Dream right now, but “Forever” is always going to be one of them too.

ToddStar: If you had to pick a perfect pairing to go out on a co-headlining tour with In This Moment, who would you pick?

Chris: Co-headlining?

ToddStar: Yeah, somebody that you guys would complement, that would complement you, and the fan base would work.

Chris: I think the Deftones would be awesome. We’ll be at that level where we can co-headline with them at some point in the next year.

ToddStar: That would be awesome.

Chris: Right now we’d be happy to open for them too.

ToddStar: I’d kill to see the Deftones with you guys. That would be a great show, the way you guys would play off each other. When it comes to the writing and stuff like that, I know that you and Maria have always kind of done the bulk of it. You see now where more and more guitarists are going out saying okay; I’ve written this other stuff that doesn’t fit In This Moment. Do you have stuff like that, where you’ve said this is my stuff, and one day I’d like to do my own thing and put out a solo disc? Do you ever see that in your future?

Chris: Yeah, man. It’s not like I have riffs that I bring and then Maria says no and I’m like, oh my God, I love this riff so much I’m just going to put it in my pile. It’s not like that. When we’re writing its like any idea is thrown out there and I can almost tell at this point what she’s going get and what she’s not going to get a lot of the time, because I just know her, but I do have a very heavy bone in my body, and I want to play heavy stuff. But I know, also, I want to be in a band that is going to be timeless and have great songs people will remember forever. I love listening to certain songs. I’ve listened to them since I was a kid, I hear them still to this day and I’m like yeah, I want to have songs like that. I know some brutal metal band with cool riffs is not going to be that band. This is that band for me. But I do just want to get my rocks off and play some heavy stuff, so at some point, when In This Moment dies down to where we’re really not busy, which hasn’t happened in 8 years, but when it does happen I will definitely put together a little project and get a deal on a small metal label and put out a great metal album. We could do some small tour with it. But, nothing is ever going to take my focus away from In This Moment.

ToddStar: That’s good to hear. I know you guys are short for time so I just want to wrap it up with one last question. I love going back and looking at your answers all the time because you always give me such great ones on this one. Chris; what’s the meaning of life?

Chris: Oh my God! The meaning of life, for me, is to try to appreciate all the good things that happen in the day and appreciate the little things, because that’s all it’s about, from one moment to the next. Latch onto those really good moments, if you can. It’s hard, you know, you wake up every morning and you want to ‘Argh, this sucks’ but being here in this awesome place; it’s cool weather outside, sitting here with a smart guy, doing a good interview. I’m fortunate enough to be here to do it. It’s awesome.

ToddStar: Cool, again, thank you so much for taking time out for us, we really appreciate it.

Chris: Thanks for having me.

See our photo galleries of In This Moment

http://www.toddstarphotography.com/Music/Artists-I/In-This-Moment-August-11-2012/24712528_FVVkdD#!i=2021036813&k=P84MXVj

http://www.toddstarphotography.com/Music/Artists-I/In-This-Moment-July-29-2011/18316503_hLh3qD#!i=1781550548&k=8N8qfhx

http://www.toddstarphotography.com/Music/Artists-I/In-This-Moment-August-6-2010/14614681_pfRv4r#!i=1087089542&k=BmQRT6C

Tags: Blood, Chris Howorth, In This Moment

Category: Interviews