BANGALORE CHOIR/Ex-ACCEPT Singer: Illegal Music Downloading Is Killing Us

Anthony Morgan of Metal Forces recently conducted an interview with vocalist David Reece, formerly of German metallers ACCEPT and currently of melodic rockers BANGALORE CHOIR. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

On YouTube and illegal downloading:

Reece: "With the drinking laws in America, if you drink a couple of beers and you're stopped, then you're going to jail. For somebody to go out and spend their money on tickets when they can sit at home, drink a beer and watch the show on YouTube literally minutes after you're done… I think that's murdered us, and a lot of the American acts. I just did a show with Vince Neil (MÖTLEY CRÜE vocalist) a couple of weeks ago with this young outfit that I'm working with; there were about 2,000 people there, but they had expected twice that for the show. I got home at midnight, and about an hour later I could see pretty much everything I'd done. It's killing us, and the illegal downloading of records through the Internet is killing us, too.

"There are about 10,000 [download] sites right now that have got [the latest BANGALORE CHOIR album] 'Metaphor'. Unfortunately, I think some of the journalists who get the promo CDs and the people who pretend to be DJs who get the promo CDs upload them when they're not really official people in the industry. They don't realize the harm they create. I think the mentality of society is 'take, take, take' — it's not like when I was young. I really liked going to buy records and spending the day listening, following a band, and reading the liner notes. I think everything is so fast that the attention span has died. The loyalty has gone. It's better in Europe I would say; the fanbase that I have in Europe is far stronger than in the U.S."

On new BANGALORE CHOIR album "Metaphor":

"I think 'Metaphor' is a stronger record. I'm proud of 'Cadence'; there's some moments on that record… to be honest, I've done a lot of records in my life, and with every record I always wish I could've done more. After you listen to it when it's finished and you've laboured, you always feel you could've done better. With 'Metaphor' it's more of a group effort, everybody writing material. I feel stronger about 'Metaphor' right now, which I think is a little more in line with 'On Target'. Melodically, I think there's some more similarity there. There's still some of the 'Cadence' elements. I don't know if you would agree with that, but I think because the band was totally more involved on 'Metaphor', it feels a little more natural to me. I wasn't the main songwriter like I was on 'Cadence'. I kind of opened the door on 'Metaphor' and said 'Everybody bring your ideas,' and that's the way I wanted it. I think you hear that on 'Metaphor'. It's a stronger record, I think."

On being a member of ACCEPT:

"The good of it was in those days I played seven days a week, five hours a night in America. You had to emulate a lot of the singers you were copying, so you went out, you had a strong voice, and you sang every night, but you kind of lost your identity. You didn't really know if you're a singer or not, or if you could hit the notes. When I got into ACCEPT, [producer] Dieter Dierks really worked me as a singer, and the result of that was I developed my own style. That's one of the good things. Some of the bad stuff was I was never really comfortable in the group, and trying to replace Udo (Dirkschneider) is a difficult thing. Nobody really can; it's not really ACCEPT without Udo. That's some of the bad, but overall, learning the work ethic and what it takes to be professional and do it was good. It was a whole different atmosphere for me. They don't mess around (laughs)."

On forming new metal group WAITING FOR WAR:

"It's very heavy, kind of melodic JUDAS PRIEST meets AVENGED SEVENFOLD, so that's cool. I'm really enjoying it; the stories are deep, and the hooks are there. The drummer Eric Domagall has a band called DOWNTREAD, and they have a guitarist named Brett Petrusek. They're just monsters; they're fresh, they're hungry. They're maybe 10 years younger than I am, and I'm 50, so… these guys have played around the area. They have a recording studio that's like the old days. The band is always together because they live in the same city; they play a lot of shows, and play a lot of open airs for a lot of the big acts that come through the Midwest. I had gone down to the studio called Pound Sound, and a guy named Jeremy Tappero tracked the vocals for 'Metaphor'. He played some of this band's music, who were DOWNTREAD. I said 'Who is that?' He told me who it was, and I said 'Those guys are great. I'd love to sing on some of their stuff'. He goes 'Well, that's kind of interesting you said that. They're fans of yours, and they would like you to record with them a little bit'. One thing led to another, and then we sat down in a room and just started writing songs. Right now we've finished the third one completely, and there's six more that are floating around. Hopefully, I'll make a record with these guys this year. I've put the feelers out to let record labels know what I'm doing. They've said 'As soon as it's done, we wanna hear it first', which is great. It's nice to have that opportunity (laughs)."

Read the entire interview from Metal Forces.