- Has music has always been a big part of your life or did it come later? When was that moment for you?
Music has always been an important part of our lives. Our upbringings all had very important musical experiences that influenced us to pick up our instruments of choice.
Kate’s parents met in music school and played a lot of the artists that inspired her to pick up a guitar and start singing, including Fleetwood Mac, the Foo Fighters, Rush, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and Jimi Hendrix. She started playing at six years old.
Zach was introduced to music at a young age with classical music. Later on, Zach discovered rock and metal in middle school. He was interested in bass from his biggest early influence Geezer Butler. By the time he was in high school he was listening to and playing more progressive music such as Rush, Dream Theater and Yes. Now at 21, he enjoys many genres from classical to metal and almost everything in between. Zach is also a bass collector and currently performs with 4 primary basses, two fender P basses, Geddy Lee signature jazz bass and a Rickenbacker 4003.
Mike: Music has always been a huge part of my life, I don’t believe there’s been a single moment, but more of a collection of moments that cultivated into the love that I have now.
- What are some of your favorite albums of all time?
Led Zeppelin One, Machine Head by Deep Purple, Moving Pictures and 2112 by Rush, Rainbow Rising by Rainbow, and Master of Reality by Black Sabbath are some of our very favorites.
- What are the hardest and easiest parts of making music for you?
The hardest part of making music is creating new material that isn’t too reflective of your old material. Making sure every song sounds unique, yet authentic to your sound is where a lot of difficulty lies. The easiest for us is improvisation. We all have natural rhythms and creative styles that work well as a team in that application.
- When making music, what does the creative process look like for you and the band?
Typically when writing, we either bring parts that we have written ready to the table, or we generate them by doing a group improv session. We generally agree or disagree unanimously on whether we or not we should use said part.
- What is the biggest dream you have for the band?
We want to redefine the standard of modern rock music from the ground up. We feel that the current infrastructure of the industry stifles a lot of creativity in an effort to generate more revenue with a ‘cookie-cutter’ radio sound. That’s not what music is about to us though. It’s about self-expression, and the freedom to carve one’s own path.
- When did you first play music in front of an audience? What was that experience like?
We first played music in front of an audience back in high school. The experience was pretty laid back compared to current day, given that when you’re just starting as young as we did, a lot of the time there’s not as much of a strict time frame with the bill that you’re on and not as much of a concise promotional guideline for the event.
- Out of every show, you have played, what are some experiences that stick out the most to you?
All of the experiences that stand out are our experiences with our fans. Whenever a fan tells us that our music has impacted their lives in any way, it’s a profound experience.
- What is the dream tour or festival that you would love to be a part of?
We would love to set up a festival with Rival Sons, Tyler Bryant and the Shakedown, and Goodbye June. It would be a fantastic show.
- For the rest of the year, what plans does the band have?
We will be finishing up our summer tour, then returning home for a bit to finish writing and recording our second album. We’re very excited to unveil this project, we think it’ll push the boundaries of what we are as a band.
Keep up to date with Dark Serenity on their website.
Special thanks to the band and Rogue PR for the interview.
Images provided by Dark Serenity
Tristan Zelden 