I always appreciate it when a band takes up the challenge to step outside the box and be truly different. Enter The World Will Burn, a multination act to feature veteran front man Dale Thompson (from New Zealand) and guitarist Alan Zaring (United States) that recently released its third album Nothing’s As Real As It Seems. With its goal to transcend culture, language, and genres while focusing on emotion and passion rather than commercial success, The World Will Burn maintains its affinity for a modern meets hard rock formula that is both current and remains true to the past at the same time. Angelic Warlord had the recent opportunity to talk with Zaring and Thompson, who go into detail about the challenges of working remotely, their thoughts in regards to Nothing’s As Real As It Seems and the concept behind the album.
What are the circumstances that led to the two of you working together?
ALAN: I have known Dale and Troy for many years. I became closer friends with Dale in about 2013 when I helped in a small way with their Bride album “Incorruptible”. Not long after the album was released, Dale move to New Zealand. I had been working on some music but was struggling with lyrics. I e-mailed Dale a song and asked him to write some words for me. Dale never does anything in a small way, so he wrote the lyrics and e-mailed me back a video of him singing them over the song. By the way, that song was “No One Wants To Die” and it is on our first album “Severity”. I think the light went on for both of us at that time. The problem was figuring out how to make our music from different continents. We just started tripping into it. Learning about software and technology that would allow it to happen. That was three albums ago!
DALE: For me it was the aching to write again after moving to New Zealand. I had so many ideals and melodies, books of poetry and lyrics and nothing to do with them until Alan sent me a song he had recorded and that one song was the force that really woke me up. Why he sent me the song I shall never know, but it worked.
What is the meaning behind the name TWWB?
ALAN: Well, it sounds metal enough, right? Seriously we may have had name suggestions from folks on Facebook and that name came up. But we like it and it fits us and our music. The name is intense and we like our music to be intense, too, It comes from 2 Peter 3:10: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar, the elements will be dissolved in the fire, and the earth and its works will not be found’. This may sound depressing but with fire comes purification and new life.
DALE: There is a private pun in the title for me. But I can't share that. But on the other hand it simply means that the world will be purged by the fire of God's love. When one refines gold they put the gold with all of its impurities into a fire and the gold melts becoming pure. The dross lays on the top and all of these impurities are skimmed away and all that is left is purity.
How would you categorize the music of TWWB?
ALAN: Wow, that’s a hard one. We really have no idea. I think it’s best for others to put us in a category that they think is best for us. I think Amazon calls us ‘alternative metal’, even though we are more hard rock than metal. Above all, we are very conscious to be different sounding, and I think we have been successful with that. We sound totally different and yet strangely familiar at the same time. I think that’s because we both have a passion for classic rock with big hooks and catchy melodies.
DALE: We are a combination of psychedelic creativity and old soul hard rock. We are not really metal since the new definition of metal has taken it to another dimension of aggressive craziness.
What are your thoughts on the first two TWWB albums, Severity and RuiNation. Which is your favorite and why?
ALAN: I am really proud of both of those albums. Remember we had not a single clue what we were doing with “Severity”. We put it together with some really cheap recording equipment and lots of prayer. I was watching Youtube videos on home recording all during the process. Despite this, the album has a lot of fans and sound really strong. “Severity” has perhaps my all time favorite song from us called “The Me Dying”. I just love that song.
“Ruination” was a huge jump sonically and with our songwriting. We caught our wind, had found our sound and got our swagger. We reached a lot more people with that album, and it had “Love To Hate”, which if I may say is an unearthly good rock song. I like both of the albums, but “Severity” is the better one.
DALE: Between the two I prefer Ruination because by the second album we knew what we were actually doing. For me Severity was a 8 out of 10 Ruination a 9 out of 10 and our new release Nothing's as real as it seems a 10 out of 10. We get much more creative and break the very mold we had poured our self into.
Please go into detail about the challenges that the two of you face recording music remotely. Specifically, how did the writing and recording process for Nothing’s As Real As It Seems go?
ALAN: Luckily, I have enjoyed learning the process of recording and mixing music. I have now tricked out my basement into a nice studio space, and when the spirit moves me and I have time, I retreat there and start working on some songs. It was really rough at the beginning, though. There are a million things to know and we usually did about everything wrong and then had to do it over. We learned from our mistakes.
I start with some song ideas I have. And record those in my studio. Dale and I share back and forth until we narrow them down to the best ones. At this point I start to work the songs into a fairly complete arrangement, which I send to Dale. Dale then records the vocals on his home recording equipment, and sends me his vocal tracks. We put them together and like magic, we have a song.
This new album “Nothing’s As Real As It Seems” was our biggest challenge. How are we going to sound different when we already have two albums out there? Can we be different and still sound like The World Will Burn? We spent a lot of time getting things right and didn’t rush it. It took a long time to get it together but I think the time was well spent.
DALE: This is the truth. Alan would send me a completed song musically. I would thumb through my books of lyrics to find a lyric that matched the tone and mood of the song. I would start singing the lyric as I listened through my headphones. After two listens and no rehearsal of the song I would start laying down the vocals. Within an hour maybe an hour and a half including the backups my vocals were completely finished. I then would send however many tracks I had recorded back to Alan who would assemble them into a rough mix to go over. The entire album was done in this manner. Now I have used that pattern which I call "first impressions" with every other project I am currently working on.
What are your feelings about Nothing’s As Real As It Seems? Are you happy with the way it turned out?
ALAN: I am usually really critical of my own music, and I hate to sound conceited. But this album absolutely rocks! If this isn’t someone’s favorite album of 2019, they haven’t heard it. I hate to use the word ‘masterpiece’, so I won’t. But I really think we put together an amazing album and we are really excited for people to hear it. To be honest, I don’t know if we can top this album or not. If we can’t exceed this one, which will be very difficult, I doubt we will return to this format of music again. We got a little lucky with the final product, and a whole lot blessed. As Dale and I started to tell each other when things got challenging, ‘God will it!’
DALE: Thrilled, could not be happier. Alan has written some very cool songs and I feel the melodies and subject matter that I have laid on these tracks are for right now. For everyone to take in and meditate upon. Tim Bushong did a superb mixing and mastering of the album and added bits of his own flare on the album. I encouraged him to do so. Alan and I both have immense respect for Tim's musical genius. He has a golden ear. And Tim's son contributed drums which brought every track to the next level.
What are some of your favorite songs off the album and why?
ALAN: All of the song on this album are different, but very tied together at the same time. They reference each other and feed off each other. This album is very unique in that respect. It is a loose concept album, and flows along, telling a complete story. So it is hard to talk about just one song. Our first single, called “Sins And Tragedies”, is just being released and really killing it. It is a jamming song and we are grateful so many people are loving it. My favorite song on the album, though is called “Love Fills”. I doubt it will be a single, because it requires a little more time to develop and you have to listen to it a little more to truly appreciate it. But that song has great dynamics, big hooks and tons of emotion. Dale kills the vocals. It is a perfect TWWB song.
DALE: Sin and Tragedies and New Creation Man stands out for me but my very favorite is going to have to be the quirky, Tom Waits type of song we through on for fun called Lead Balloon. I listen to a lot of "out there away from the mainstream of music styles" so to have a couple of songs on the album like Lead Balloon made my day.
Several guest musicians appear on the album, including guitarist Troy Thompson, guitarist Tim Bushong and drummer Aaron Bushong. What led you to work with the three?
ALAN: Troy and I have been friends for a long time. I really knew Troy before I knew Dale. Troy is a real legend and a monster guitar player. We both love big hooks and compelling musical compositions. Dale sent him an early version of the song “Rainbow’s End” and Troy called me and said he had an idea for the song for me to hear. He came over and recorded this amazing guitar part that fit perfectly. I am embarrassed I didn’t think of it. When Troy has an idea I totally trust it. I am honored to have him on this album.
Originally, we were going to have Michael Feighan from Whitecross join the band as our full-time drummer. Schedules and life got in the way, and it just didn’t work out. Our engineer Tim Bushong suggested we listen to his son Aaron, and we discovered he is a great drummer. It really was God’s will for the album.
Tim Bushong has been our godfather from the first album. He has a lot to do with our sound. All three albums are sonically amazing, and that is all due to him. He does the mixing and mastering, and has absolute authority to add anything he wants to or to take anything away that he doesn’t like. Some of his best work is actually removing parts from songs. He just has an ear for it. Tim added some excellent lead (guitar) on some of the songs, and we are luck to have someone of this skill play on it.
DALE: They were dirt cheap.
I understand that Nothing’s As Real As It Seems is a concept album. Please provide more detail about the concept in question.
ALAN: The entire album tells the story of Jesus’ last days on earth and the period immediately after them. The songs stand alone when you listen to the album from front to back. There is a much deeper meaning to it as a whole. This album has many layers and they all feel together perfectly, which was kind of a surprise to me that it worked out. It was like trying to create a 3-D sculpture from the outside in. Depending on how you look at it, you see a different picture. I think this aspect of the album is what really sets it apart from anything out there at the moment. It is extremely complex on some very deep levels, but hopefully an entertaining listen on the surface.
DALE: I wrote this loosely based concept on the factual occurrence of Jesus dying on the cross, descending into hell and leading the captive free singing all the way from the time when Jesus sang My God My God to rejoicing with song as he emptied the pits of hell.
What challenges & obstacles does TWWB face as an independent artist? Do you prefer to work independently or with a label?
ALAN: I can only imagine what we could do if we had a label that helped us along with some money and helped to market our music. At the same time we may not have been able to make “Nothing’s As Real As It Seems” without throwing caution to the wind and just taking lots of chances. The difficult thing is getting the music in front of people who would enjoy it. Places like Angelic Warlord are a huge resource for artists and fans alike. So thank you for all you do for heavy music. We have a small but loyal group of people that listen to our music and they are really our marketing department. They share us with anyone who will listen. We really appreciate them.
I can’t say I have ever worked with a label that gave us a lot of support so being totally independent is really all I know. We have released our past albums through a record label but we didn’t have any support from the beginning. Dale has been signed to major labels before with mixed results, so it all works out for the best.
DALE: I honestly would like to be signed to a nice label who handed over big sums of money however that is far from the reality. Being an indy artist gives you a certain amount of control, sometimes limited funds limited resources however the only overhead that an indie artist has is the one they create for themselves whereas a record label can pretty much cook the books in their favor at any time and who would ever now the difference? There are labels that I do work with that I know are up front and honest and I am thankful to be associated with them with some of my other projects but this time The World Will Burn decided that we would stand on our own and see if we could work a little harder and get the same results as being on a label.
What does the future hold for TWWB? Are there plans to record an album in follow up to Nothing’s As Real As It Seems?
ALAN: We are busy promoting this album and by the time most people read this, it will be a full release. But we are already working on some ideas that will take us in a different direction while being true to the sound that people expect from us. If God wills it. We’ll have some more music in the future.
Let me say thank you again for giving us the chance to talk about this album and connecting artists and fans. We love what you do and appreciate the service you provide.
DALE: Alan and I have plans to work together more in the future. As far as The World Will Burn goes, we have recorded
three stellar albums. One does not want to wear our his welcome so we will have to see what the Lord proposes to us in the coming year.
THE WORLD WILL BURN contact info: www.theworldwillburn.com & www.facebook.com/twwbband
