Home › Interviews › Patrick Graves of SALTWOUND “I’ve been seeing a lot more comradery rather than rivalry”.

Patrick Graves of SALTWOUND “I’ve been seeing a lot more comradery rather than rivalry”.

By capitalchaostv on September 27, 2019 • ( 0 )

Saltwound are an abbrasive new deathcore band out of Northern California. Their new music video ‘Revenant’ delivers the full buffet of beatdowns, blasts and gutterals fresh out the kitchen.

Q: How did you first get in to music? Who or what turned you onto heavy metal and did you ever enjoy hip hop, R&B and country?

Spencer: I first got into music listening to the old Bruce Springsteen and
Eagles cassette tapes my dad used to keep in his truck. I got into metal right around my first year of junior high when I was introduced to Marilyn Manson and Slipknot. I listen to rap and hip hop on a daily basis honestly.

Patrick: I found music at a young age to escape reality. Travis Barker was
my first music idol, then I found Matt Skiba when I was around 14. I’ve always listened to Ozzy, Iron Maiden, but got into Slipknot, Job For A Cowboy, Black Dahlia Murder, and As Blood Runs Black. My daily playlist is mostly Rap, Hip Hop, Nu-Metal, and Punk.

Brandon: I’ve been studying music my entire life. The first music I listened
to as a kid was almost all metal and rock like Slipknot, In This Moment, and My Darkest Days. For a long time when I was a teenager I stopped listening to metal and listened to EDM and rap, but I eventually just went back to metal and got into much heavier music.

Shawn: I’ve grown up listening to oldies my dad would throw on and he would sit down and play guitar for me for entertainment or knowledge purposes. I remember a period where we slapped nothing but old Eminem in the car back in the day. As far as country goes though, I won’t touch it.

Grant: I would say that my parents got me into music, I grew up listening
to everything from Metallica to Earth Wind and Fire. My taste in music developed from there and I grew to love more extreme genres of metal and underground rap/ trap/ gfunk . Now I think I listen to more rap than I do any other genres

Q: Who was your first concert, do you have vivid recollection of it
and have your parents always approved?

Shawn: My first show was seeing Disturbed and Korn headline Arco back when that was a thing. It was for my 7th birthday and my dad took me with a buddy. It was my first pit experience too and lets say little Shawn wasn’t too keen on throwing down. My dads always approved of my musical endeavors.

Patrick: Green Day, New Found Glory, and Sugarcult. My cousin took me during the American Idiot Album cycle. And no, but my mom loved and supported me regardless.

Brandon: My first concert was I Prevail. It’s actually how my best friend
and I met. I planned on bringing a girl I liked to go see them but she cancelled and this guy at school was just like “um can I go”. Also, I don’t have parents but if I did they probably wouldn’t approve.

Spencer: My first concert was the very first Aftershock festival they had
here in Sacramento. My mother definitely didn’t approve of it for most of my teenage years but grew to accept as I got older. I think she just felt she had less reasons to worry when I was up on stage instead of in the crowd.

Grant: My first concert was a local punk show at the Phoenix Theater in Petaluma CA. I was watching my friends from a school play in their pop punk band called Push (now known as One Armed Joey), as well as a few other punk and ska bands. My first big concert was Green Day with AFI opening for them at the Shoreline Amphitheater.

Q: What got you started playing music and how old were you?

Shawn: I grew up being completely mesmerized by my dads shredding ability to the point where I begged him for my own guitar. He hooked me up for Christmas when I was 6, gave me some pointers and since then I’ve been teaching myself.

Grant: What honestly got me into wanting to play music was watching my friends play in their pop punk band, seeing how much fun they were having up on stage was what made me want to start playing music. I was around 13 or 14 when this was all happening.

Spencer: I knew some guys in junior high that had a band and needed a bass
player so I bought one and learned how to play it.

Patrick: I was 12 years old. Alkaline trio dropped Good Mourning, Blink 182
just dropped Self Titled, and AFI had released Sing the Sorrow.

Brandon: I was about 10 years old when I started playing violin in school,
but my passion for music really blossomed when I was about 13 when I started producing music and dedicating all my time to being a musician.

Q: What was the first music you bought with your own money, and what
have you bought more than once in a different format? What is your most prized music collectible?

Patrick: Aiden “Nightmare Anatomy”. I had to buy a second copy of that same cd.

Shawn: The first record I ever bought myself was Slipknot’s Self-Tiitled. Lets just say I had an unhealthy obsession with that band in my younger days and they completely sculpted the beginning of my musical history.

Grant: I remember the first album I ever bought was Take Off Your Pants and
Jacket by Blink 182. I’m a huge fan of Gfunk and to me Warm Brew is the embodiment of that genre of rap/hip hop, I have their album Ghetto Beach Boyz in multiple formats. My prized possession though is Iowa by Slipknot on vinyl.

Brandon: First music I bought had to have been a Skrillex cd. And I’ve bought multiple Blink 182 albums in different formats. Also, my most prized music collectable is a drumstick signed by Spencer from Ice Nine Kills.

Q: How did you become singers, guitarist’s and drummers and who are
your main influences?

Spencer: I started out playing bass in garage bands and switched over to vocals when the current vocalist of one of my old projects wanted to play guitar instead. My main influences vocally are Manson, Bryan Garris, and Darius Tehrani.

Patrick: I’m primarily a guitarist and vocalist, but picked up bass for the
rumble. My main influences for bass is Matt Freeman (Rancid), Lemmy, and Dan Andriano.

Brandon: When I started getting into drums a lot, I had a couple punk bands
that practiced at my house playing old Green Day songs. My biggest influences gotta be Dave Grohl, Pablo from Chelsea Grin, and Chris Turner from Oceans Ate Alaska.

Shawn: My journey pretty much picked up where my dad left off. Once he lost his passion for playing music, as sad as that is to say, I started finding my passion for it. That man, is my biggest push. As far as musical influence, I really get down with deathcore, slam, beatdown, and hardcore.

Grant: I started my music career with bass when an older cousin gave me a
knock off Music Man Stingray. After a couple years I started to learn how to play other instruments like guitar and drums. I’ve always been a singer, but I started to take my vocals more seriously around my sophomore year of high school when I was learning
to scream.

Q: How much has the local scene changed since you started playing in
bands?

Spencer: Ultimately, I’d say its gotten a lot better. When I first started playing in the scene in Sacramento, it seemed like core bands were hard to come by (my last band played many shows with punk rockers and indie bands alike). Nowadays, it seems there’s a wide market of new metal bands that are consistently playing together and supporting each other.

Patrick: It seems to be growing. And speaking from my personal observation, recently I’ve been seeing a lot more comradery rather than rivalry.

Grant: I’m from the Bay Area so my local scene is a little different from the other members of Saltwound. Punk, Thrash, and Hardcore seem to be incredibly popular around here. And recently with the help of promotion companies like Pin Up Productions and Sonoma County Metal and Hardcore the scene is growing exponentially.

Q: What kind of gear is bringing us the Saltwound sound?

Patrick: I play a Schecter Stiletto Stealth 4 string and I’m running a full Peavey stack for live shows.

Brandon: All black Mapex Armory shells with a 20” kick, 14” snare, and four
toms, 10, 12, 14 and 16. Zildjian A Custom high hat, Sabian crash and ride, a 20” china, a trash stack and a bell of death.

Shawn: I’m grinding with an 7 string Jackson dinky running that through an
Aris Effects overdrive pedal shooting back into my Crate shockwave 350 watt head pushing a Mesa Boogie rectifier.

Grant: I’m currently using an Ibanez Art with a EVH 50 watt tube head and
a Orange 4×12 stack

Q: What is the plan for recording new music, where, when and with who will be recording you? Will there be physical product available for purchase and if so in what formats? Will there be any cover songs?

Spencer: Our single “Revenant” is out on all music sharing platforms on September 27th along with a music video via Beheading the Traitor. We have an EP that will be released in 2020. As far as cover songs go, you’ll probably just have to come out to a show and see for yourself.

Patrick: As far as covers, I’ve been pushing for a rendition of Hollaback Girl.

Q: Which bands are you fans of whether regional or local?

Spencer: Spite, Aethere, Dead Things, No Right, Smack’d Up, Whitewolf, The Anima Effect, and Kind Eyes.

Patrick: Lioncourt, A Waking Memory, Hobo Johnson, Spite, William Wallace, Diversity of One.

Brandon: Spite, Dance Gavin Dance, The Willow, Dead Things, Nail the Casket, Exiled From Grace, Smack’d Up, and A Waking Memory.

Shawn: Code Orange, The Willow, Dead Things, Spite, Smack’d up, A Waking Memory.

Grant: My local choice would be 4199, Halfslug, Audeo, and One Armed Joey, as for regional I will always love bands like Volumes and Being as an Ocean.

Q: Top 5 albums or songs released in the last 12 months and all time?

Spencer:

World Demise – Falsifier

A Different Shade of Blue – Knocked Loose

Left to Die – KILL

Spite’s Self-Titled

Antichrist Superstar – Marilyn Manson

Patrick:

Is This Thing Cursed – Alkaline Trio

Hotel Diablo – Machine Gun Kelly

The Silver Scream – Ice Nine Kills

The Sufferer and The Witness – Rise Against