Richard "Stitch" Thomas of Mushroomhead

Here’s an interview Metal Hell did with sampler, Richard ‘Stitch’ Thomas.

 Mushroomhead’s latest album, Savior Sorrow is out now.

 

METAL HELL: What’s up lately?

STITCH: Just basically the tour, we’ve been out here for like 4 weeks & we have 4 weeks to go. We’ve been playing shows every single night.

MH: What are your feelings on Savior Sorrow?

STITCH: The most, big difference on it that people notice is obviously the new singer Waylon. It’s definitely a new presence compared to what we used to have. Just having more variety with a new vocalist that can do the yelling & the singing & do it all vocally. That’s something we didn’t have before so it’s something we put to use a lot & we worked on enforcing choruses & stronger melodies & things like that & trying to make some more radio notable stuff.

MH: How did Waylon end up joining the band on vocals?

STITCH: We met him like 3 years ago, his band at the time: 3 Quarters Dead, bought on to a Mushroomhead tour & they were opening for us every day. Then his band came up to Cleveland & recorded an album with Skinny. When J
Mann left we knew his style was similar & he could also do other things so we called him up.

MH: Some bands say their first few albums are songs they’ve played for years, & then it gets harder to write. Have you found that to be the case?

STITCH: It’s pretty easy to come up with new stuff. With a large group everyone has so many different things they wanna do so when we do albums there’s always leftovers that don’t get used so we usually save that for the new record.

MH: Did you dig up older songs on this CD?

STITCH: Not really, there was one tune that was floating around for a while but everything was written over a process of about 2 years.

MH: Did you spend more time recording this time around?

STITCH: We spent as much time as we needed, depending on deadlines, cause sometimes when you’re releasing a CD for a major label they have deadlines & then we get rushed sometimes and have to rush a couple things. We own our own studio so it’s a little easier, so we just go at our own leisure.

MH: Any plans to re-release the old albums?

STITCH: We have ‘em for sale on the internet & at our merch booth every night, but as far as distributing ‘em we haven’t found anyone that would wanna distribute them but we make a decent amount of money selling them on our own on the side, not having to worry about paying a distributor. It makes it more of a rare collectible thing.

MH: Do you find a lot of people who didn’t realize there were 3 albums before XX?

STITCH: Yeah, some people don’t realize we’ve been around because you can only see the 3 records in the stores, cause they’re the only major label ones but the first record was released in ’94, not many people know that. If you go to our website you can find that information.

MH: What’s your take on the bands lyrics?

STITCH: Jeff is always pretty deep with the lyrical content. He always writes with a lot of double meanings & makes you think about what he’s saying & usually what seems like the obvious thing that he’s most likely talking about isn’t at all, it’s usually the complete opposite. He likes writing in ways where listeners can see multiple influences from it or multiple themes and subject matter & apply it to their own life. But definitely nothing negative. Nothing satanic. Nothing that says kill yourself. We’re not really that kind of band. Usually our lyrics are very positive & trying to influence people to think more than saying a bunch of swear words & talk about buying guns or something. It’s too easy to be angry.

 

 * Interview by Joe D. '06