Interview by Brian McLean
Relentless
Work Ethic
An Interview with Strapping Young Lad's Devin Townsend
“We are Strapping Young Lad from Canada. Buy t-shirts.”
That's the philosophy for Strapping Young Lad's founder and front man Devin Townsend for financial security. Townsend knows he won't become rich, but the thought doesn't discourage him.
Like many others, Townsend would like to be wealthy one day and would like to do it in five years. But he doesn’t want to do things just for the sake of doing it for the money.
According to Townsend, the whole purpose of making music is for as many people to hear it as possible. So in respect to the computer, Townsend believes in downloading music and downloading the hell out of it. He says if the people like it, they’ll come back and purchase a disc, t-shirt, or something.
“We don’t do great, but we keep ourselves alive.”
That’s ultimately how SYL makes a living.
For nine straight months, SYL constantly toured in support of their latest CD simply called Strapping Young Lad released February 11, 2003 on Century Media records. Since January of 2003, SYL was part of four separate tours that criss crossed America and overseas.
The Lad supported Nile and Napalm Death, Meshuggah followed by Superjoint Ritual and then their most recent tour with Samael, which concluded in September. There were a few American and European festivals mixed in between the tours including the long running Milwaukee Metal Fest in July.
“Metal Fest was a weird gig and the whole vibe wasn’t there. The sound was bad, it looked bad but there were some cool bands. A gig is a gig and just as long as people see a decent Strapping show, it’s cool.”
In between the first two American tours, SYL somehow found time to play Europe by hitting places like the U.K., Paris, France, Holland, Belgium, and Germany.
Upon completion of the fourth American tour with Samael, as in the following day, SYL traveled to Canada for the All in the Family Tour. Townsend pulled double duty nightly with SYL and the Devin Townsend Band for ten shows.
Following the Canadian dates and a well-deserved two-week break, SYL had a handful of shows slated for Australia. After that, Townsend planned on taking a long and well deserving break from SYL.
Overall, SYL managed to log over 120 shows from January through November in eight countries.
“We [SYL] have managed to push our way into the thrash or speed metal, death metal scene or whatever. I want do that on a more progressive level and back up my shit.”
As Townsend says, he’s going to clear his head and do other stuff like The Devin Townsend Band. One is of emotional release and the other is of extreme release. As an overall project, SYL is important to him as the same with DTB.
Townsend wants to get into another genre and attempt to make a mark there. That occurred when DTB supported Symphony X on an American tour last fall. The tour did hit the majority of the major stops but some towns didn't get the Townsend, specifically Dallas as well as a few others.
But that wasn't all in Townsend's bag of tricks. He already had another undertaking lined up following the Symphony X tour. Townsend had more of an ambient project slated as well as other activities including remixes of his older records, a forty-page book and digi-pack CD combination. It was just a lot of stuff as according to Townsend.
For Townsend, his ultimate touring environment would be being able to function completely while being out on the road. Touring is tiring to a certain extent, yet Townsend considers it a lot of fun but it’s the stimulus he finds to be exhausting.
Townsend's work ethic simply defines staying busy.
“This is my job. I love it and I have to keep doing it, but times are tough.”
And there are sacrifices. Townsend said at one point during 2003 it was nearly a year and a half since he spent quality time with the family back home in Vancouver. The look in his eyes said it all.
Sitting in the back of the SYL tour bus in what Townsend calls the “tricked out lounge” he finds what he considers one of his luxuries while on tour, personal space. With a sunburst Fender Stratocaster securely positioned on the U-shaped teal leather sofa, Townsend hits the strings and with the simple twist of a knob, the guitar sound is heard throughout the bus sound system.
Townsend then proceeds to explain how he constantly writes while on the road with the assistance of a cassette recorder and a studio on his laptop computer.
“I feel about my music the same way as I feel about myself which is love / hate. Sometimes I like it. Sometimes I think it’s the best music in the world and then other times I think of it as claustrophobic paranoid delusional music.”
Townsend’s father’s playing of Johnny Cash songs prompted him to pick up the guitar at age eight. As time passed, his musical taste changed. Early on, little Devin was into Bluegrass, folk singers, musicals such as Paint Your Wagon and Fiddler on the Roof as well as pop music. Townsend then discovered bands like the Eurhythmics, Slade, Styx, Abba and Hendrix.
“I saw Judas Priest and then started getting into Metallica, Grim Reaper, WASP, and Iron Maiden. Then guitar players like Yngwie, Steve Vai and then industrial like Grotus, Godflesh and then ambient and creepy chill out stuff.”
There was also Ween, Immortal and Vader. There was everything in order to make Townsend’s vision. He wanted to have a really good working knowledge of everything musically. A smorgasbord as Townsend says.
“I get stuck on a record, tear it apart and then it always tends to come out in what I do. I feel it makes my music interesting. I like music a lot. I hope it sustains me for enough time to establish myself but at the time same time I am well aware of my faults musically.”
“I am trying to change my faults as a human but also as a musician. If that’s what comes out, that’s what comes out. It may be really stupid and I may be aware that it is really stupid but I needed it to come out, I needed to get rid of it, get past it. If people like it, that’s cool, that’s great.”
Townsend produces and engineers himself in a way to keep the overhead low. He doesn’t have the necessity financially to be a superstar.
“I have the necessity financially to be productive but that’s a compromise.”
Ultimately Townsend doesn’t want to be a star, he would much rather maintain his anonymous identity for the most part and be able to carry on through life. Like others, he would like money but at the same time Townsend would like to continue to do what he wants on a creative level.
At the root of it, Devin Townsend just wants to be known as Devin.