Saturday night I got the chance to call up another great frontman in the form of Dustin Schumacher of the new grunge band, Inner Temple. As we talked, his Pennsylvania accent made me very nostalgic for home, adding to the sadness of our overall conversation (Which dealt a lot of with darkness in modern life) In the interview we get a chance to talk about his band and the future that it will have. We even touch a little bit on his upcoming record.
If you haven't checked them out on Facebook find them here: https://www.facebook.com/innertemplepa
How's it been going with Inner Temple?
It's been going pretty well.
Tell me about the exciting stuff you have going on?
Currently we're working on our first full length album, we released the EP close to a year ago which pretty crazy thinking about it now, we've been writing a lot of new material since the release of the EP. We've been doing a lot of shows and getting very good reactions which is jsut great.
What would you say is the driving force behind Inner Temple?
Just freedom of expression. Expressing what you believe in and helping others to come together as one and share the emotions that you have with other people to let people know that there are people going through the exact same things that you are so people can have something to relate to. Instead of having to be forced to relate to the pop sound and the radio sound, pretending that you're happy all the time which seems to be the standard of pop music. I believe we're in a time when no one is truly happy and it's so hard to relate to that music.
You're criticizing the radio sound, but isn't the radio what broke grunge?
Right, it did. There's a good and a bad to it, when Nirvana, Alice in Chains and all them broke through, they broke through by saying everything was not okay and gave everyone something to relate too.
Do you think that could happen again?
I believe so because I believe people want change really bad right now within music.
Do you think this desire for change goes to life in general?
Yes, I fully believe that life in general is just a very tough thing right now to live the day by day and work the 9 to 5. To always have a happy face. a lot of people have customer service type jobs and have to do that. It's especially tough with prices of gas rising, and it's just tough to survive anymore. Then you have people who are poor who really need things like food stamps, but they're being cut, it's terrible, I don't think anyone is truly happy anymore.
That's pretty interesting. So this sort of cultural sorrow... what's the solution to the sadness?
I think the solution is coming together as one and stop fighting each other because that gets you nowhere. Look back in history where does that get you? Nowhere. The main message outside and inside of music is to come together. To just be one, because we are one, there's one human race.
What song in particular off the EP most deals with this?
I honestly will say that the EP and the majority of what I have been writing is more about personal affairs more than worldly affairs.
And will that be found on the record too?
The personal affairs yes. I don't really like to go into worldly affairs inside of my music, because that causes too much debate on either end.
Tell us, what kind of personal affairs are you trying to deal with?
The EP touched on things like, having an alcoholic father which a lot of people can relate too which is very sad. Any kind of addicted parent is sad. The main part of the EP was breakups and being with another person and that person being totally obliterated from your life that's really tough. That's pretty much what the record is going to be as well. It will be very, very dark as people going through that can understand.
So, you don't think in this time of happiness we don't need something happier to lift our spirits?
That's tough as well. While some people need happy music in order to feel happy other people tend to feel better listen to someone that understands them, being engulfed in that darkness. Some people feel great after going to a show where they can totally relate to the artist.
What was that quote from Eddie Vedder about that?
They asked him "You have this, you have that, you're a multi million dollar artist on a huge record label, you've been creating songs for over 20 years, how do you keep creating such sad music when you seem like you would be one of the happiest people there is. He said "You never forget what made you start writing in the first place" That's true. People have good days, people have bad days. You have to remember where you came from and why you started to do something.
This desire to get at where you came from, I guess that's a founding a concept for the band right?
I write about things that I've been through. I'm not going to sell off and say I know what people have been through when I've been through it, I can't do it and I won't do it.
For the fans then, what are the major differences between the EP and the album musically?
There are going to be a few songs from the EP on the album. They'll be remastered to get them up to par with the album. But, it all ties in very well. All the songs tie in very well to each other. You really can't tell a year difference, and I'm saying that in a good way. You can't say "They've lost this" or "They're trying something different" It all sounds like it was made in one breath, I like that.
It gives your work a sense of unity.
One song does not sound like "Oh it shouldn't belong on this album" It's all on the same basis. That's the best way I can say it.
You have a very distinct sound, a lot of people in reviews have compared you to Nirvana or whatever. How do you personally deal with those kind of comparisons?
Trying to be Nirvana is sad. To that I say Fuck off. I'm not Kurt Cobain, I don't want to be Kurt Cobain. My drummer is not Dave Grohl, he doesn't want to be Dave Grohl. My bassist is not Kris Novoselic, he doesn't want to be Kris Novoselic. We're Inner Temple, we're not Nirvana and we don't want to be Nirvana. We just play what we like. If people want to honestly compare us to Nirvana, I got to say, we're being compared to one of the biggest bands that ever existed, I guess that's a good thing right?
Would you agree with me a lot of people have only listened to a handful of Nirvana of songs and claimed to be superfans but don't get at the magic of the deep cuts?
I know what you're trying to say. I'm not trying to bash on anyone, I'm sure there are people who only like Red from us, and maybe after this album they'll only like one more song. Does that make them a fan? Maybe. But, I think with any band you're allowed, as your free will to like one or two songs and that's it. It's free will, you can like what you like.
Do you think that there's going to be a new wave of grunge bands then?
I believe that there will be a new wave of reality musically. We might not label it as grunge, it could just be an alternative wave, which is what grunge is, alternative. I believe we're heading towards an alternative or a grunge wave. People are just tired of today's music. Where is this current or next generations Beatles. Where are they? You can't honestly, I can't honestly, maybe someone can, but I can't tell you who the new idol is, the voice for today's youth, or tomorrows youth and it's sad because it's so cookie cutter right now. I think people are yearning for that, to have that next voice, somebody who speaks for them when they can't speak for themselves. They might not be a musician but when they find that person who completely relates to them, that's their new voice.
When do you think was the last time we had that kind of voice?
To be honest, and I'm not saying it any relation, or to correlate to what we previously said, but I honestly believe that the last era of having a voice was the 90s grunge era.
Would you agree that in general rock music has become less honest over the last few decades?
I believe that we are currently in the 80s in terms of sound. It is more about sex drugs and rock and roll then it is about feeling. That's what the 80s was all about, hairspray, and drugs and rock and roll then the 90s came along and kicked the shit out of that. They were like, fuck you, I'm going to talk about true emotion and not sleeping around.
What do you love so much about music?
It's an escape. What I've always said to people is that if I were to say the things that I say on stage or within our albums I would be pushed tons of medications for it, but with music I get tons of understanding for it.
Any last words of wisdom?
I just want to say thank you to everybody following us, spreading the world and downloading our EP. It's honestly incredible. We just passed 1,000 fans on Facebook, and it's really humbling to see that happen. It might be very cliche but thank you.
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