Nick: Thanks for agreeing to do the interview. So you guys just played Kent last night - how�d that go?
Chuck: It was cool, we played with Rue and Cotton Candy, the guys from Village of Dead Roads. The dudes from Soilent Green came out, so we got to hand out with them too.
Nick: I heard you lost your van years ago in Youngstown at Emissions from the Monolith. How did it feel to play in Ohio again? How did that happen anyway?
Chuck: Yeah, it was our van and our trailer. We played first on Thursday. I think it was JJ Paradise Players Club, they canceled, so there was a slot open on Sunday. We heard rumors we may get asked to play again, then Greg [Barrett] asked us. We played right after Lair of the Minotaur, which was hard �cause those motherfuckers are bad ass. So then Eyehategod was jamming, we were having a good time, then I went out of the club. My brother and the old guitar player asked if I moved the van. I knew right then it wasn�t good. The police founded it dumped the next day. Everything was still in it, but it wouldn�t run - they ran the hell out of it. They found the trailer the next day, totally empty.
Nick: So have you played there since then?
Chuck: We already made it through there since and I guess we made it all right [laughs]. We had this tour booked ten days after emissions and had this benefit show setup by the girls from New Orleans: Sarah, Angela, and Joy. We borrowed gear and played Youngstown, but yeah, after that we got the hell out of there. Actually we ended up staying in Kent after that - we figured we ain�t staying in Youngstown [laughs]. So last night our friend Kareem [Imbetterthaneveryone Records] got us a hotel room. Normally we would have crashed with Burns, but the Solient Green boys were already there. It was cool to see all of them.
Nick: So what�s next on the tour?
Chuck: Pittsburgh tonight, then tomorrow we go to New York and play with Harvey Milk, Bloody Panda and Growing. That�ll be fun. Then there�s Boston - that�s an Only Living Witness Show. I�m really excited because it�s going to be crazy. It�s already sold out. Those guys are really cool for asking us to do that.
Nick: And in the larger sense, how�s the tour been so far? It�s been a while since the last one, right?
Chuck: It�s been going great. We�ve been treated well, and been getting a good reception. People have been cool with us. It�s good to be back out there. My brother [Phil Schaaf], had a baby last year, so we�ve been sitting around working on the record. We finished it up, sent it out to Billy [Anderson] and he sent us back mixes. When we got the final mix we were blown away. We recorded the entire thing on analog at my house, converted it to Pro Tools and he just went crazy with it, doing things we�d never be able to do ourselves.
Nick: So it�s been a nearly two years since The Head and The Heart. Have you been working on Twilight Ritual all this time? How long did it take to finish it?
Chuck: It took forever to make. We went through a couple of lineup changes. We didn�t necessarily start it over or anything though. At one point we had tracked everything with the original guitar player [Alan], even though we knew he was leaving. That was going to be the record. We did that on digital, but I got the tape machine up and running in that time. Jay, the new guitar player, he recorded it. Then the bass player [Todd] left. Reid from Rwake stepped in and we re-tracked all the bass parts. It took a lot of time to get it all together, plus we did it on our own time. The idea is that for the new one, we�ll go to someone else�s studio for a week or two, depending on how much money we have.
Nick: So did the parts change as you re-recorded tracks for it?
Chuck: Definitely the lyrics and vocals. They evolved through the whole thing. The music was already there� the drum tracks were laid down and ready to go. So we really didn�t change a lot of the music. I figured having that much time with it, having our own studio, I�d spend more time with the vocals and the lyrics. I�d sit down, write out an idea, and go record a track. When you go to someone elses�s studio, you don�t want to show up without the lyrics. But with our own studio he had time to let those things build over time - it really helps.
Nick: You used to play guitar in Rwake - is that how you met Reid?
Chuck: He�s always been a brother, a good friend. He�s a great musician and when Todd left, the first thing I did was call him up and ask for help. He sounded like he�d think about it, but he called me right back and said yes. It�s been tough; it�s a three hour drive from Little Rock to Fayetteville. And with the gas prices, that makes it more difficult, seeing as how we�re all poor [laughs]. It�s been especially killer playing out with him on this tour. It�s the first time we�ve done that. Everyone we had has been killer for that matter.
Nick: So how does it feel to play live with him?
Chuck: The live show? It�s just feels a little stronger. He�s doing vocals with me too. Originally Alan and I swapped off and on, but when he had to leave we lost that. We�ve got that back now. Reid�s tone is great - Todd had a really great tone too and was specific about it. Reid just brings a big energy. It seems more forceful. We�re still working out the melodies. Like I said, having our own studio, we went crazy with vocals and haven�t nailed everything yet. The clean parts are there, but we�re still figuring out the harmonies. It�s definitely come a long way.
Nick: Have you always sang clean parts in your music? I�m talking before Deadbird. It�s one of the distinct parts of your sound.
Chuck: I think it�s something that I�ve always been into music-wise. I love death metal, black metal, all sorts of stuff, some of it with nothing but screaming, but I also really like a bunch of stuff with melody like Dio and Black Sabbath. You know, Heaven and Hell. I grew up in the South, at age 12, buying cock rock at Walmart. But my dad was a musician. He was into the Rolling Stones and The Beatles, and got me into that. He was a singer, and that was something I�ve always wanted to try. I never felt like I had enough confidence, but having your own studio, being able to listen to it, it give me more confidence to do it live. Sometimes you feel self-conscious singing clean when you�re in a heavy band, but after I sat down and listened to it, I thought, �that�s not too bad - I can do that shit live.�
Nick: The vocals on Twilight Ritual are more predominate than the first album. Was that Billy�s idea?
Chuck: Yeah, Billy really brought a lot of that up in the mix. We did a bunch of mixes, Nigel York and I, in the studio, mostly for practice and to hear things rough. But man, when we got that final mix it really blew us away.
Nick: You guys are obviously close with Rwake, but you�re also close with a lot of other bands from around Little Rock. Seahag for instance�
Chuck: Yeah, we just played in Memphis with them [June 14] - they just killed. It was awesome. We�ve known those guys for years. That whole Little Rock scene: Rwake, Seahag, Shitfire, we�ve all known each other for years. Actually Allan Wells, he�s in Shitfire, he owns a club downtown that just moved to a bigger room. It�s a really cool spot. When they were building that place I gave �em a hand. Spirit Caravan came through there and all these bands, that there�s a scene there, that it�s a good place to go. People really take it seriously down there.
Nick: This tour is four weeks. That�s a long tour after not doing a long stint of tours for a year. Have you played longer tours? Any plans for festivals coming up?
Chuck: Well, before that year off, we had one with Facedowninshit for five weeks. That�s the longest one. Aside from that he had one with our buddies in Boston, Moonshine, and that was two and half weeks or so. A couple of the guys have families so it�s hard. My brother has offspring [laughs] and Reid�s married. Two or three weeks or so is average for us. Unless things look a little better there�s really no way to afford more than that. We have to be home and pay bills. In Chicago the other night [June 16] we were talking to someone about the festival there this fall, August I think. We hung out with the Minsk and Indian guys there and ended up crashing at the Emperor Cab guys� warehouse [laughs]. It was a great time. Last night was the first time we actually stayed in a motel. Every other night someone is nice enough to open their home or warehouse for us and that�s awesome. We wouldn�t still be out here if we had to pay for a motel every night.
Nick: So what�s up next for touring? West coast? Overseas?
Chuck: We�ve been wanting to do the West Coast for a while. I definitely would like to do that this year, so hopefully our next tour we�ll be able to do that. Of course we have dreams of European shows. For right now we�re concentrating on over here, but it�s be fun to get over seas.
Nick: Will At A Loss be pressing a vinyl version of the new record?
Chuck: Yeah we want one. Josh is wanting to hold off on that one for a while. He�s been really cool to us and we�ll keep working with him. As far as I know it�s his deal at this point. Hopefully sooner rather than later.
Nick: John Santos just did a t-shirt design for you, right?
Chuck: Yeah, Santos did the artwork for it and we�ve been selling it on this tour. It turned out really cool. He actually emailed us and said it�s directly based on the lyrics for �Feral Flame.� He�s the first one to really look that deeply into it. I�ve got one his High on Fire shirts from way back. Our buddy Kareem hooked us up with them. He�s going around to art shows for Imbetterthaneveryone Records and meeting all these artists, putting out vinyl only stuff. He�s really going all the way with that shit.
Nick: Do you collect vinyl yourself?
Chuck: Vinyl, yeah, I wish I had more money� we�re out here without any personal money right now. We were in Chicago the other day near this record store and I said I�m not even going in - they�re going to have all this great stuff and I�m broke. Vinyl is sacred to me. I have CDs that I trade in and out, but I always keep vinyl. I�ve still got some records from when I was a kid. I didn�t collect for a long time but I started working at a record store a while ago with my brother. We grew up in Batesville, it�s a smaller city, and this California store moved in. Good for us, bad for them. People would come in - �they still make these things?� - then look at the price tag and leave. I�ve gotten a lot of records at metalfests and of course going up to Youngstown.
Nick: So how long have you and your brother been playing together? Did you learn your instruments together?
Chuck: We�ve kind of been jamming off and on together for at least the last ten years, and even before then really. We had a couple of bands together, Benoint and El Conduit that we were really into, but they were built around everyone. When someone left they were done. I think that�s why we put Deadbird together like this. We�ve survived lineup changes because it was just me and him first. When people had to leave we just pressed on. I�m three years older than him, so I got into playing music first, but we when got to the same age he go into it too. My dad�s a musician and my mom�s a painter. It�s been great to be raised in that, it really inspired us.
Nick: And is Reid a permanent member of the band or was this just a recording/tour thing?
Chuck: He�s definitely a full-time member. We�re glad to have him here - he�s a great brother and a great bass player. Because of the geographical deal we�re not playing as often as I�d like us to be. It�d be nice to play at least once a week for a good chuck of the day. Right now it�s just the three of us. Reid�s starting a new job, so he�ll probably be able to travel more. Ideally he�d come up once a month, we�d go down there once a month. Eventually we�ll probably end up in the same area. We�ve talked a little about moving down to Little Rock.
Nick: Thank you so much for talking. Is there anything else you�d like to add?
Chuck: Not really. We�re just grateful to be out here. It was a long break - I was beginning to wonder if we�d ever go back. Thank you to everyone who�s helped with the record and the tour.
