HATEBREED's JAMEY JASTA Wanted To Prove He Could Do More Than Write Hardcore Music

Paulie Walnuts of HardDrive Radio recently conducted an interview with HATEBREED frontman Jamey Jasta. You can watch the entire chat below. A few excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On how his recent JASTA solo record, "The Last Chapters – Volume 2" came about:

Jamey: "I don't know if it was something around the tour, that JASTA AND FRIENDS tour, when I had Howard [Jones, LIGHT THE TORCH] and Dino [Cazares, FEAR FACTORY] and Kirk [Windstein, CROWBAR] and everybody come with me, but something clicked within me where I just thought, 'Man, our time is so fleeting.' We started looking at, 'Wow, it's been ten years since we did this. It's been 15 since we did that. It's been 20 years since we did this.' When I first saw FEAR FACTORY, it was literally 25 years ago or something. And I was breaking Dino's balls: 'You should have ten ASESINO records out. What's the hold-up?' Then we started talking about all the different projects we've done and the different labels we've worked with and stuff. Really, what it came down to was one, our fear of releasing too much stuff at one time; two, the red tape with the previous labels and stuff, and that's understandable. If your main band is doing something, they don't want you to do a project that might confuse people or whatever. But then also, I feel like just seeing the difference in fans from doing that track with Howard ['Chasing Demons'], it was amazing to me that no one had heard of me. They didn't know HATEBREED; they didn't know who I was. They didn't know the podcast, anything. I thought, 'This is so awesome. There's a new metal and hardcore fan. They're born every day. And they're finding out about the music and now they're learning about other artists.' They don't know that I booked Howard's first band in 1996 or whatever and that we've known each other. So, people started liking that record and they looked up the old record where I did the songs with Randy [Blythe] from LAMB OF GOD ['Enslaved, Dead Or Depraved'] and Zakk Wylde ['The Fearless Must Endure']. Some of the reviews on that record were really bad. I never take reviews to heart, but, at that time, I thought, 'Shit, if this is how I'm going to get treated, why am I going to bust my ass to put all this blood, sweat and tears into a record if some idiot is going to write this terrible review in a magazine?' Then I started thinking that that's fear-based. That's, like, 'Why should someone keep me from releasing a song that's a different style?' I think with the track that I did with Zakk Wylde, that was a track that was going to end up on somebody else's record. I just wanted to prove that I wasn't just writing hardcore music. As the KINGDOM OF SORROW records came out and as the HATEBREED sound sort of evolved, this stuff that I had for years sitting in a hard drive, it started to not have a home. I thought, 'All right, I need to do this now. It doesn't do me any good sitting on a hard drive. I can collaborate with all these artists I admire.' And now it's going to be here. [Laughs]"

On fans of heavy music not having an awareness of who he is in spite of his visibility as the frontman for HATEBREED:

Jamey: "It's a whole new generation of kids. In the 2010s, which, if you think about the music that's become popular since 2009 when HATEBREED did the self-titled album, until now, in 2010 when we did the KINGDOM OF SORROW album, there's two or three waves of bands, just in that one decade. So, you go, 'Wait a second.' Someone was just telling me about the band BRING ME THE HORIZON. They made a switch from being a heavy band to being sort of a more radio-friendly band in 2010. I looked that up and it was true. I thought, 'Just think about all the kids that that's their gateway band.' What happens is, they search other bands and they find SUICIDE SILENCE and they find KILLSWITCH ENGAGE, then they see SUICIDE SILENCE covered HATEBREED, and KILLSWITCH ENGAGE's former singer does a song with the guy from HATEBREED. They have these weird ways, these weird gateways that they find other artists. It's amazing. I really feel like it's changed my outlook on everything. It's like we're living in… There's less gatekeepers. I remember being crushed when they said MTV2 is not going to play the HATEBREED video. That's part of the reason I wanted to be the host of the show ['Headbanger's Ball']. I was, like, 'If I can't get my video played, I've got to get in there somehow and try to change the system so that they don't look at us as just this screaming noise.' So, now, there's less — you can put a song up on SoundCloud; you can pay a guy… Shoutout to Paul [McGuire]; he did the video with Howard ['Chasing Demons']. We did it in our jam spot. It's got two million streams; it's got a half-million on YouTube. I've sold out every pressing of the CD. I did it totally DIY. That really started making me think, 'Wow, it's exciting. You don't have to go to a label and say…' I love all the labels; don't get me wrong. You don't have to pitch your project to somebody who might not be at that label in a year or two. I've had that happen with the HATEBREED DVD. They wanted to cut the budget on that. Luckily, we were able to get out of that deal and go to eOne and eOne gave us what we needed to do, and that DVD went number one. That previous company could of have had a number one DVD, but they didn't believe. They just see the name, 'This is crazy. This guy is yelling at me. He's wearing a bandana. What am I going to do?' Now, it's exciting, man."

Jasta released "The Lost Chapters – Volume 2" on December 13. The album also includes additional guest appearances from Max Cavalera (SOULFLY),Jones, George "Corpsegrinder" Fisher (CANNIBAL CORPSE),TRIVIUM's Matthew K. Heafy, KILLSWITCH ENGAGE's Jesse Leach, and many more.