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Throughout my often adventure-filled 'career' as a music and occassional entertainment journalist, I have graciously been presented with a veritable wealth of opportunities to work with artists and groups that the public at large (i.e. you, the increasingly faithful reader) are quite possibly unfamiliar with. Not surprisingly, I have frequently found myself openly embracing an increasingly mind-boggling array of international and national acts that are--in my ever so humble opinion, at least--deserving of your limited time and hard-earned money. As a result, my quest for the ultimate ‘undiscovered’ musical experience continues largely unabated, with my disturbingly intense focus now wholeheartedly centered on the James Hart (ex-Eighteen Visions)-led quintet Burn Halo and the group’s long-awaited debut…
Todd: What led to the demise of Eighteen Visions? Was it the proverbial ‘creative differences’ that have so often plagued even the most agreeable of alliances or was it something of a more complex or sinister nature?
James Hart: “Basically, we made a record in the Fall and Winter of 2005, which was released in 2006 (Eighteen Visions). I noticed when we were makin’ that record that there was more conflict, I think, with the writing process than there had ever been before and also with the musical direction. There was a lot of compromise given up by the various members of the group as far as the songwriting was concerned. The attitude with a couple of people goin’ in was ‘Well, if this record doesn’t take off, that’s it, I’m done’. When things weren’t going the way we had anticipated and were kinda slow moving, we were getting the raw end of the deal from the label as far as what they had promised and what they said was gonna happen didn’t happen. Things just started to fall apart. I guess the overall morale of the band was not very good. We were getting ready to film a video for the track “Broken Hearted” and were gonna give us a pretty big budget for it. But then, about a week and a half before we went in to go shoot, they told us they weren’t going to let us shoot. They told us they weren’t going to let us shoot, they weren’t going to spend the money on us and a couple of weeks later, and they decided they weren’t going to move forward with the band anymore. We had never really stopped writing music. We had always been writing music on the tour bus even when we were out, ya know? We were just tryin’ to prepare the next batch of songs. The batch of songs that wasn’t really Eighteen Visions. It didn’t really fit. When we were in Australia in February and March of ‘07, everyone just felt like things really weren’t in place. We just weren’t feelin’ it anymore, ya know? The excitement just wasn’t there, the passion wasn’t there and everyone just wanted to be at home and do their own thing. So rather than explore new opportunities with a new record label and make a new record. A couple of the guys got dropped at home because they didn’t wanna tour and we were just cancelling shows and turning down shows left and right. It just ultimately led to the break-up of the band. We played our last two shows that April. That was kinda all she wrote, ya know?”
Todd: It’s truly regretful that a group’s future can essentially be dictated by the impact of inner-label turmoil…
James: “It was just tough because we had been through the wringer with our label a couple of times, ya know? …With the second record that we had did with Epic (2000’s Until The Ink Runs Out), we had experienced shifts within the company where people were either getting let go or moving to an entire different record company altogether. …The President had switched out, the VPs and the Head Of Promotions had switched out. Everything just wasn’t right for us. When we signed to the label, everything was already internally in despair.”
Todd: In hindsight, what led to the formation of Burn Halo? Any truth to the rumors that you were initially pursuing a solo career as opposed to the ‘…traditional…’ band structure of Eighteen Visions and Burn Halo?
James: “Yeah. …How that whole thing happened was that I had been talking to my manager during the final weeks of Eighteen Visions. We discussed me teaming up with a guitar player or a songwriter, moving forward and trying to get a record deal. He sensed that I still had it in me and was really capable of something musically even after Eighteen Visions. He pursued a demo deal for me and got me a deal with Island/Def Jam. …About a week after Eighteen Visions played its last show in late April of ’07, I was in Tulsa, Oklahoma writing new music. I turned those songs in and got myself a deal with Island/Def Jam. This was obviously long before Burn Halo got started and before the concept of the band got started. Initially, I was just going to write with a series of different songwriters and different people from established Rock bands and kinda put together this all-star team of writers for a solo album. But the more I wrote with (former Nixons guitarist) Zac (Maloy), the more I realized I wanted to make a straight-forward, middle-of-the road Rock record that had that vintage twist to it. I felt that if I wrote with a bunch of different songwriters, that vibe might be thrown off a little bit and the songs might sound too different from one another to make a full album. So with that in mind, we went back and forth and back and forth in regards to how to market this thing and finally, we decided that marketing the songs as a band instead of as a solo artist would be the best bet. For me, I look at an artist like (former Soundgarden/Audioslave frontman) Chris Cornell in relations to what he’s done as a solo artist in relation to what he’s done with Soundgarden or Audioslave. The songs are much, much different. I don’t wanna say they’re singer-songwriter type songs, but it’s not Audioslave and it’s definitely not Soundgarden. To me, it’s very vocal-driven stuff and that’s not what this record is all about. I didn’t feel like I could go out after being in a band that not a lot of people knew about and be a solo artist, ya know? Ultimately, I wanted to make sure the songs got the proper opportunities and the correct push. I think that was the best way to go about it in the end.”
Todd: What were the main contributing factors behind your departure from Island/Def Jam? Prior to signing with the Independent Label Group (ILG/Warner Music Group, did you have any doubt regarding your future?
James: “Island/Def Jam stuck with me until around January of ’08. Unfortunately, about a week before I was going to go in and start mixing everything, my A&R guy was let go from the company. …That’s really when things started to spin out of control. They weren’t sure what to do with me; they weren’t sure how to market me… For some reason, all of these things that were apparent when I had an A&R guy weren’t very clear to them anymore. What those reasons were, I don’t know, but they did decided to let me finish making the record. They paid for the mixing, they paid for the mastering but in February, they decided that they did not want to move forward with me. From there, it took a few months for us to really get a handle on what was goin’ on. I had different meetings with different labels, but for whatever reason, whatever A&R guys we met just could not get the ball to pass through with the Presidents or whoever, ya know? Fortunately, my manager Bret (Bair, formerly of Big Time Management) had a good friend over at the Independent Label Group and was given a deal just for this record. He didn’t even want to start up his own label. He just wanted to make sure this record saw the light of day. It took a solid six or seven months to get things firmed from that point, ya know? It took from January to July or August of ’08 to really get things going. From there, once we got that whole game plan going, everything really just started to fall into place. Everything was just so much easier because we didn’t have to worry what the major label wanted to do with this or that. We knew what the path was. We told the promotion staff at ILG/Warner Music Group what was goin’ on, what the path was going to be and what we were gonna do and they were totally onboard. …There’s really been nothing getting in our way ever since.”
Todd: Considering your previous experiences, your relationship with ILG must seem rather idyllic or surreal…
James: “Absolutely. …And they’ve got a great Promotion team over there, too. They’ve worked on countless records that have gone from Indie start-up status to shooting up past the major labels. Buckcherry’s 15 (2006) is the one that comes to mind right off the bat for me, ya know? They kinda started in a similar place. It (Buckcherry’s unexpected comeback success) may have happened a lot quicker for them because they were more established at one point, but timing is everything. I think being patient will really, really pay off for me.”
Todd: What are your current touring plans? I would imagine the group’s primary goal, particularly in light of the current states of the record industry and the economy is to play as many shows as humanly possible…
James: “Right now, were out finishing up some dates with Buckcherry and then we’ll be doing a few of our own Radio Promotion shows. From there, we’ll be doing about two weeks with Avenged Sevenfold, Buckcherry and Papa Roach, which will lead straight into the SnoCore tour with Saliva, Static X and The Flood. …Right now, we’re booked pretty solid. We’ll be doing the Rock On The Range festival and will be also looking at a couple of others. We’ll have to see what the Summer holds for us. There’s a lot of stuff goin’ out right now, so our goal is to just stay active, stay busy and jut keep this record goin’. …SnoCore is a diverse line-up, but diverse line-ups tend to work in our favor because I feel that with this record, we can mix it up really well. We can play that in-your-face style of Rock ‘n’ Roll that has a lot of attitude and swagger to it and we’ve also got mid-tempo, laid-back Rock songs that are a little bit more soothing and are easier to digest. Those songs can also go over really, really well. I’ve come to find that if you play the more aggressive style of Rock ‘n’ Roll, anyone can dig on that as opposed to putting together a whole set of mid-tempo songs and ballads, so we tend to take the more aggressive, in-your-face approach and it seems to be paying off for us.”
Todd: What type of set list have you been working with? Am I correct in understanding the group has been exclusively focusing on material from the group’s debut and have forgone playing Eighteen Visions material?
James: “We’re just doing songs that are on the record right now. We haven’t started to write any music together as a band yet and I don’t foresee that happening within the next year, to be honest with you. To me, there isn’t a whole lot of a reason to worry about new songs right now, ya know? …If it really hits, we might be out for two and a half to three years with this album because we really are kinda comin’ from out of nowhere and have to work our way from the bottom to the top. That sometimes takes a lot longer than it would for an established artist who can just put out a record and tour for a year or a year and a half and then just go back and make a new one. So I’m not really focused on writing new music right now, but I do have quite a few songs from the writing sessions for this record that obviously could be tracked if we need additional songs for B -Sides, but right now, we’re just focusing on the songs on the album, mainly focusing on the aggressive Rockers on there and throwin’ in a few of the mid-tempo songs just so we can show off our overall diversity as a band.”
Todd: Despite the group’s relative anonymity, do you feel the majority of your audiences have been receptive?
James: “It’s been really, really positive. I think so far we’ve just been showcasing with the right kind of bands, ya know? I think the tour we did with It Stays The Same and Black Tide was definitely a little different for us, but I feel like we were able to win over a good percentage of that crowd. And that’s what we have to do every night, regardless of what type of bands we’re out with. We’re nobodies, we’re no-namers and no one has ever heard of us before, so our goal every night is to go out and turn heads and translate these new fans into sales.”
Todd: With the group’s debut being recorded by a series of obviously talented guest musicians (most notably Nickelback drummer Daniel Adair), did you find it difficult to find suitable replacements for touring purposes?
James: “I met (bassist) Aaron (Boheler) first. I met him in Oklahoma when I was putting the finishing touches on the record before I started the mix. I met him through Neal Tiemann (ex-Midwest Kings, David Cook), who had done some writing on a couple of songs and had played about ninety nine percent of the guitars on the record, so he came highly recommended. I went down and saw his Country band and I was just impressed with how he played bass and how he looked onstage. …He’s a great bassist and I was looking for a truly great bass player, which for me is something that’s usually hard to come across. Usually, you can find a guitar player who will say ‘Yeah, I can play bass’, but they won’t really know inside and out what it means to play bass. They just don’t get the theory behind it. So I was really looking for that. …(Lead guitarist) Joey (Cunha) and (rhythm guitarist) Allen (Wheeler) were mutual friends of (Papa Roach frontman) Jacoby Shaddix, who referred both of them. I met up with both of them, saw them play and jammed with them and it was nothing but positive, ya know? They’re great players and have great attitudes. As far as drummers are concerned, we actually have a new drummer right now. His name is Timmy Russell and he was previously in Beautiful creatures and Bang Tango. He was referred to me by a friend of mine (Bang Tango/Beautiful Creatures frontman) Joe Lesté. I originally had Joe slated to play drums for this whole thing in early ’08, but things kinda fell apart because everything was taking so long to develop. Joe kinda had to pass the buck, ya know? …Joe had contacted me after I had done probably two writing sessions, so it had to have been the Summer of ‘07 and said ‘Hey, I’m your guy’, so when it came time to put a band together, I jammed with him and was just blown away. Unfortunately, things just took so long to get off the ground. With all due respect, he’s gotta do his own thing. He’s been a great friend and he’s been a lot of help along the way. He had other opportunities he had to take. ...We had (ex-Agony Scene drummer) Ryan (Folden) for awhile, but things just weren’t workin’ out for whatever reason, so I called up Joe. …Timmy also came highly regarded and it’s worked out very well so far.”
Todd: Overall, in comparison to Eighteen Visions, how would you describe the musical output of Burn Halo?
James: “With Eighteen Visions, I was always pushing the envelope with being a true Rock band, ya know? We came from the Metal world, so there was always this progression from record to record, ya know? With Burn Halo, I was like ‘This is something new. This is my thing and I won’t have to compromise anything’. I love pure Rock ‘n’ Roll, ya know? No holds-barred, no gimmicks, no sub-genres. You hear what it is and you know what it is. I wanted to make a record like that and thankfully, I was given the opportunity. I guess if I had to describe this record, I’d describe it as a clear-cut Modern Rock record with a little vintage twist to it, ya know? If somebody asked me what the recoded sounded like in comparison to other bands, I guess I’d say that it’s got a little GNR, a little STP and a little bit of Nickelback, ya know? …Those three probably sum it up the best.”
Select James Hart Discography
Burn Halo (2009) **
Eighteen Visions (2006) *
Obsession (2004) *
Vanity (2002) *
The Best Of Eighteen Visions (2001) *
Until The Ink Runs Out (2000) *
No Time For Love (EP) (1999) *
Yesterday Is Time Killed (1998) *
Lifeless (EP) (1997) *
* as a member of Eighteen Visions
** as a member of Burn Halo