Page 31 - Black Velvet Issue 96

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“I went through some rough stuff, relation-
ship-wise, the past few years. I was ques-
tioning everything that was happening
between me and my baby’s momma. I started
dating somebody else that was in a band
herself. I thought that would work; “Hey, if
anyone else can understand what I go
through it’s got to be you, you do the same
thing.” That’s not always the case, obvi-
ously. So it was a very rough rollercoaster
ride of different emotions and that definitely
went into the songwriting. It’s just something
that people go through every day, every
week, every year of their life. So it’s very,
very relatable. It’s just what we all felt like
writing at this point in our lives.”
Craig’s friend Joe Cotela worked on a
song with him, which appears on the album.
“Funny enough I’ve almost worked with him
on every album I’ve worked on and it started
when I was still in Blessthefall and Blessthe-
fall was still a local band,” explains Craig.
“We were working on the ‘His Last Walk’
album and there was a local band called The
Cover Up who Joe sang for. I was a big fan
of their music, I loved them, the guys were
amazing, and I asked him, “Do you want to
sing on a song for me or help me write this
song?” and I ended up naming the song
‘Could Tell A Love’, which any Blessthefall
fan who knows the album knows that track,
but they might not know that it’s a pun on his
last name, as his last name’s Cotela, so I was
just naming the song ‘Cotela Love’ pretty
much, just using different words. And I’ve
worked with him on every album pretty
much. He’s actually having a lot of success
with his new group, Ded. They’re doing really
well. They just toured with Korn, so I’m really
proud of them and happy for them. Once
again, I was like, “I would love to have you
on a song,” and he’s on a song called
‘Recipe For Disaster’. He sings on the sec-
ond verse and wrote the second verse. He
absolutely killed it.”
f you take a listen to the album, you will
Ihear that their musical recipes were
anything but disasters. Every song is a hit in
our eyes (and ears). Escape The Fate are
stronger than ever and ‘I Am Human’ could
and should catapult these four humans up
into the rock ‘n’ roll stratosphere. Drummer
and original member Robert Ortiz once said
‘I know Escape The Fate will be around for-
ever’. We end by asking Craig if he feels the
same.
“I definitely feel like that,” he replies. “I
definitely think it has become something big-
ger than anybody individually in the band.
And I think that that has been proven with
the dedication of the fans. This band has
been through the wringer. We’ve had our ups
and downs. We’ve had the perfect VH1 ‘Be-
Ours’ on iTunes; “Listen, I’m looking at all along to every word. So we went in with that hind The Music’ story with this group. We’re
our albums on iTunes, guys. Every album mindset as well. still here. We’re still able to play shows and
has the songs that have stars next to it. ‘This “This new album is the first one where I
go on tour and work on albums and hop on
War Is Ours’ has the most songs with the started playing some songs for my daughter, the phone and talk about it doing interviews
most stars.” There are a lot of songs with who’s getting older; she’s 11 years old now, which I think is a great thing – and we defi-
stars next to them, which means they’re and she was, “I really like this. This is some nitely owe it to the fans.”
played a lot, and it seems to be our poppier, of my favourite stuff that you’ve done, Dad.” Be a good human and buy ‘I Am Human’,
sing-along tracks, as well as some of the To me, if my family, my little sister, my mom,
out on Better Noise Records. Visit www.es-
heavier ones… Like ‘This War Is Ours’ has my gran before she passed, my daughter; capethefate.com for more info.
always been one of our poppier ones. So I they were all loving all the stuff that I was
told the guys. I said, “Why don’t we try to showing them from this record specifically Words By Shari Black Velvet
write songs like this?” Why don’t we write because it is more feel-good music.”
songs like ‘Something’ or ‘Ashley’; feel-
good, sing-along stuff that you probably espite the music being feel-good, the
hear DJs play on emo night and the whole Dlyrics can be very deep and emo- Band/Craig Mabbitt Photos By Adam Elmakias
Live Photos By Brandon Thrift
crowd’s drinking and going nuts and singing tional. Some relate to relationship break-ups.
ESCAPE THE FATE