Uncaging the roar: in interview with Fivefold

By RingMaster Review on August 21, 2016 • ( 0 )

fivefold_RingMasterReview

Formed in 2007, St Louis, Missouri hailing Fivefold has earned a strong reputation for their melody thick and emotionally rousing rock ‘n’ roll. Taking in a quartet of albums and a host of shared stages with the likes of The Offspring, Buckcherry, Redlight King, 10 Years, Switchfoot, Sick Puppies, Greek Fire, The Urge, Shamans Harvest, Broadway, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Memphis May Fire, Jamies Elsewhere, HURT, Cavo, among many others, the quintet is one of the fresh breaths on the current music scene. We talk to the band to get a feel of their passion and invention…

Can you introduce the band and tell us to how it all started; what brought you all together?

Ryan Cheney – vocals

Matt Amelung – guitar, vocals

Matt Benne – guitar, vocals

Coco – bass

Derrick Huskey – drums

Derrick (drums) and Matt Benne (guitar) met through our late guitar player Jesse. Derrick met Ryan (vocals) at a church camp they were both attending. After a few line-up changes, Derrick, Matt Benne and Ryan met Coco (bass) from playing shows with his Hold On.

Have you been/are involved in other bands before? If so has that had any impact on what you are doing now?

Most of us have played in local St. Louis bands before Fivefold. I think we’ve each taken elements from previous projects and applied them to what we do in Fivefold.

What inspired the band name?

At first we did what every other band does…we looked through dictionaries. Haha! But really, we decided on Fivefold because it essentially means five different units/things that come together to accomplish one goal.

Was there any specific idea behind the forming of the band and also in what you wanted it and your sound to offer?

We just wanted to be “good”…and to promote positivity.

fivefold4_RingMasterReview How would you say your sound has evolved over time?

We’ve tried to push ourselves to continually refine our sound. In our case, I think that has meant approaching our music with more pop sensibility.

Has it been more of an organic movement of sound you deliberately setting out to try new things?

A blend of both.

Presumably across the band there is a wide range of inspirations; are there any in particular which have impacted on the band’s music and your personal approach to creating and playing music?

I don’t think anything one element impacts itself into our music. Rather, all of our inspirations impact our music.

Is there a process to the songwriting which generally guides the writing of songs?

Most of the time we just start jamming on a riff and take it from there.

Where do you, find inspirations to the lyrical side of your songs?

Honestly, our lyrics have no bounds. They are about anything and everything, whether it’s something one of us has been through personally or something greater than all of us.

Can you give us some background to your latest release?

Our latest release is Open Letter. We released it in December of last year and it’s the first batch of songs written with Matt Amelung on guitar.

What about its themes and premise.

Open Letter is our response/interpretation of the world around us.

Do you go into the studio with songs pretty much in their final state or have looser ideas to develop as you record?

We’ve done both over the course of our 4 albums. Both have their strengths and weaknesses.

Tell us about the live side to the band, presumably the favourite aspect of the band?

I think it’s definitely our favorite aspect. We like to make every show bigger and better than the last.

It is not easy for any new band to make an impact regionally let alone nationally and further afield. How have you found it your neck of the woods? Fivefold2