Interview withSteven Juliano (vocals) of I Am Ghost
Los Angeles based dark-rock group, I AM GHOST, resonated from Long Beach, California and was conceived and founded by front man and vocalist Steven Juliano in 2004. Little did he himself realize what his idea of formatting a band and making a fun idea out of it would lead too? How about a quick signing to Epitaph Records causing a major uproar leading off to an EP, and two LPs to get their name out the door. After various line-up changes over the years and 2007 had struck, Steve Juliano (vocals) along with Timoteo Rosales III (guitars), Ron Ficarro (bass) and Justin McCarthy (drums) had re-formed the band's direction and sound returning to a much more raw and powerful intensity that has inspired them to making music in the first place.
Adding a seamlessly mind blowing essence of metal, melodic-hardcore, and screamo tactics, with a sweeping sing-along choruses. Blending together fantasy and reality into one big twisted tale of death and tragedy. Juliano seems to want to reveal in showcasing the world in a beautiful decaying fashion adding his own attitude to all this depressing drama currently surfacing about the planet. I AM GHOST placed amongst the music scene aside most elite bands with the most reenergized passion and energy known, set to unveil their music and their legion of fans everywhere they roam. Steven spoke to me briefly about how the band formed, what's exactly in store for the next set of months and everything else in between.
Reflections of Darkness (RoD): Tonight you plan to record your first live album, is there a reason why you chose the Chain Reaction, and why now?
Steven: The biggest thing was we were really proud of our live show most of the kids talk about I Am Ghost who sees us as a live energy and live show aspect rather than we were really proud of our albums. But when you listen to the album it is totally different from the live experience I guess you can say I don’t’ know if we’ll be able to do I want to see if we can capture a live performance. I think that will turn on more kids to the band because we are a live band more than anything else we’re not a studio band like other bands out there. We have amazing albums, and you get to see them live you’re like “eh” and so we wanted to see about what we can do live and the Chain Reaction is perfect our hometown and shows are always fun and this place has a rich history with us and It was where we had our first show ever and we love to come back here again and again.
RoD: What is the secret show you guys plan on having?
Steven: It’s a small show this Friday in a place called De Pees Ozzman’s in Long Beach with our friends band Vanity XO they asked us to play and we told them sure as long as we wouldn’t tell anybody until the show was over. It’s a small place that only holds 200 people and it’s just really intimate it’s a full bar but it’s all ages and its going to be a party more than anything else. Its $5 if you’re over 21 and $8 if you’re under 21.
RoD: Is there any work on the next album or music video?
Steven: We’re shooting a music video in August for ‘Bone Garden’, an actually real plot of it this time. It won’t be a live version with a live show aspect up on YouTube and on our site so we decided to do a new video with a budget and actors and stuff this time. Another album probably not be for a while because ‘Those We Leave Behind’ is out right now the new one we’ve done it hasn’t even been a year yet. Usually bands tour a good year before they go back and write so we’re basically going to be touring for the next 6 or 7 of months and then take some time off and write the next album.
RoD: When you guys started this band, where did you see it going? What were your goals?
Steven: Originally this band was just something we did for fun, like we didn’t think we’d get signed so quickly become like a local scene type band. We did a demo and did it ourselves because we wanted to get shows, that’s the main reason we didn’t do it to get signed and we didn’t do it to get big. We just loved the venues around L.A. We’ll book you if you have a demo and it just blew up and we were more surprised more than anyone else actually.
RoD: Did you ever see yourself being a "professional" musician?
Steven: If you would have told me 6 years ago or 5 years ago I’d be doing this for a living I’d probably laugh because I’ve tried with countless other bands to get signed it wouldn’t work ever. No one wanted to sign my last band. So I decided with this band just to have fun with it and do a demo and the rest is history I guess…
RoD: When and where was the first I AM GHOST show? Can you describe the scene?
Steven: The actually first show ever was a sold out show at the El Rey Theater with Sonia Bomb they broke up a while ago. Our manager at the time put us on as a favour at the time and we just got the demo done and we’d never play a show. To have your first show and have thousand people some of the guys in the band were barely 17 our two guitarists at the time so it was their first real show too, most of the time the first real shows were backyard parties so it’s kind of cool.
RoD: What keeps you guys going?
Steven: The fans sometimes like every band you tour forever for like a month and you get back and every band goes through it’s a hard job it’s a hard business and you wait for your family, friends, girlfriend, fiancé, when you’re always gone just feeling the road and you wonder why you do it. When you show up and its 50 kids or 500 you see the kids singing along and seeing them going crazy for you that’s what keeps me going.
RoD: Have there ever been any major road bumps where you'd consider you'd had enough of the band?
Steven: Not necessarily giving up but definitively a lot of razor bumps when it comes to like losing members we’ve gone through 4 different members since the band started and lost 2 members at one time Kurt and Brain that was hard for us. For us we just to play and rock out we hadn’t been a band for that long only been touring as a band since 2006 its funny how people think we’ve been out a lot longer than we actually have.
RoD: Looking back, do you have a favourite album or any particular song, and why?
Steven: Honestly the new album is my favourite, I love ‘Lovers Requiem’, but to me I Am Ghost the members in this band now, all 5 of us is what I always wanted the band to be we all get along we all hang out now, and we’re all friends and there was something missing always clicks you have a wife or husband live in your band there always going to be their own little click and now we’re finally together.
RoD: How long do you see yourselves doing this? What do you want to accomplish with I AM GHOST? Have any last words?
Steven: I want to do this for as long as I can rather it’d be another year or if it’s another 5 years there is no time for a family. There might be a day where we get together for a lunch and we might all decide hey we’ve done what we can do. We all wanna get married and want to settle down. As of now for 2009 we are 100% in this band and we’ll do anything we can to do, what we can do, as far as we can.
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