Welcome to the Scene
Welcome to the Scene takes a candid and human look at the musicians of the indie rock/ emo scene of the early 2000s. Host Jeremy Houtsma, Licensed Mental Health Counselor, presents a free-flowing conversation that tends to go in inspiring and reflective paths that touch on a myriad of topics including mental health. The result is an intimate look at not just the music created but also the stories, history, and growth of these individuals. It's a whirlwind listen of nostalgia, inspiration, and insights into who these bands and people were and where they are now.
Welcome to the Scene
Talking Shai Hulud's legacy, reunion and beyond with vocalist Geert van der Velde
Shai Hulud has a special place in hardcore history. With the 20th anniversary of the band's trailblazing album "That Within Blood Ill-Tempered" and the thrilling announcement of their reunion at Furnace Fest 2024, my guest today is the vocalist of that album, Geert van der Velde. As the vocal cords behind the influential music, Geert unveils his journey from a metal-obsessed teen to frontman and vocalist of Shai Hulud, leaving an indelible mark on the hardcore scene. But the man behind the mic is more than just riffs and growls; he's a figure of multiple facets, including his ventures with The Black Atlantic and the strategic world of chess at Chessable.com, not to mention his strides in long-distance running and his cherished role as a father.
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Hello everyone and welcome to the scene, your favorite podcast about the early 2000s post hardcore, hardcore and emo scene, with the band, band members and just about anybody else in between. My name is Jeremy Houtsma and I am your host. 20 years ago, a little band called shy halloud you might have heard of them Made an album called that within blood, ill tempered. It was a monumental album in the hardcore scene and it made a lasting impact. 20 years later, the band just announced that they were reforming for furnace fest 2024 with their lead singer, geert Bender, who just happens to be my guest today. Geert and I talk about his love of music and how he got into the hardcore scene, as well as his time in shy halloud and how they reformed for furnace fest 2024. But there's more to gear than just his time in shy halloud. He also had a successful musical project called the black Atlantic for many years. He's also a long distance runner, father and head of chessablecom.
Speaker 1:So I hope you guys enjoy this conversation as much as I did and, with that said, welcome to the scene. Yeah, so it's such a small podcast that like I didn't even I didn't expect you to answer either and like because your Instagram, your Instagram presence isn't Huge either, so I was like this is a you know, setting out like just like a quick prayer that somebody enters. I've been amazed at the amount of different people who've just been willing to do this like Strictly off of Instagram. Yeah, so that's, that's the best way I've known her how to get people on here, so I really appreciate it. This is perfect. I'm really stoked because the time difference and Like just how it works up I'm off on Fridays, so that is really helpful.
Speaker 2:So I'm just like really stoked to kind of nice, you're wearing a legend of Zelda shirt looks like. I know. Actually it's called the Sazerac house, which is that I saw this D and I was just curious.
Speaker 1:Look, because the logo is very healthy, it is yeah, so it's um, it's a place in New Orleans. My wife and I went to New Orleans Just a little little bit ago and there's this place called the Sazerac house. That is the birthplace of the Sazerac cocktail, which is a pretty like American kind of cocktail. But I didn't put your, so your name is geared that's how you say it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's how you pronounce it. You're okay name and if I would pronounce it the Dutch way be Houtsma, yeah, it's how to my. Yeah, just is something akin to woodsy or woodman.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah. The amount of times people butchered my last name in my life is very sick, very significant to me. But I grew up in pretty much like a Dutch town in New Jersey, so there were a lot of smuzz, there was a lot of vans, um, you know, I originally grew up in New Jersey and then we moved out here to the West Coast, outside of Portland, but my family originated in Friesland, in that kind of area.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah so very region name.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah. So I was kind of stoked. We went to Amsterdam a few years ago and traveled to Friesland as well I did. Dutch are pretty I don't want to say fanatical, but they're really good about their genealogy.
Speaker 2:So being able to trace that yeah, is Anything bureaucratic and keeping archive? They're for the good at yeah so it.
Speaker 1:The United States is not as great at doing that, you know. So I've been able to kind of trace my ancestors. Ancestors, my great grandparents, I think, immigrated to the United States in the early 1900s. Yeah, so we grew up in kind of like a Dutch area Called Midland Park, which is like a small town Outside of New York City, and so there was just like a lot of Dutch presence there. So it's been interesting. We do all sorts of like stuff. I have a friend literally who I met over here and we get together and he's from the Netherlands. He immigrated for job, for like a software engineering job. Yeah, we get to to kind of talk and share. Hey, brought me some spice to almond cake for for Christmas and all sorts of Dutch streets, my probably drop off some like Ole Boland or something like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, for my mom just sent it to package today with a bunch of typical Dutch things because we were. We were in the Netherlands earlier in December to celebrate St Nicholas, which is like center cloud. That's bigger than in the Netherlands, that's bigger than Christmas when is it at least equal but it's more like the Dutch holiday. Obviously there's some Some controversy around some of the, the race or Pete's, yeah, that's, that's the unfortunate side. But the hey man, it's only cold, that's it, it's, it's not. Well, I mean, they've done a good job over the last few years of making it completely, you know, like by cultural and multicultural and just making it very inclusive. But if there's this, this funder current still in some pockets, especially the area of Friesland where people are kind of more conservative, where, yeah, they want their Pete black and you know and and not yeah, so what if he was?
Speaker 1:a slave, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Additional. Yeah, I cringe at that a lot, but but the the you know it's, it's. It's the Dutch Santa Claus and I enjoy that aspect of a saint bringing gifts and and and my kids enjoy it so.
Speaker 1:I was gonna ask if you guys did, since your class that's the first week of December, I believe yeah, december 5th is when you celebrated.
Speaker 2:December 6th is his official birthday and, yeah, yeah, we celebrate, we do what we call surprises. So you'll, you'll, typically you'll, draw lots, kind of like, you know, secret Santa, yeah, and. And then you, for what? For the person who's lot you've drawn? You, you create a gift and you do something special and you write some poem and Then and that's what you do, and then the other people just get gifts. It's a trip, but it's fun because it adds a little bit more of a creative element and you can, yeah, use, use the poem to kind of talk about something that you want to address or or you make fun of, or whatever. It's a funny way of spending a little bit of extra time.
Speaker 1:Bondeth on someone so I really really did like another one. So I went there. I think, like my wife and I talked, if we weren't so rooted here in the United States We'd probably love to immigrate over there. You know, I had just for Education opportunities and things like that. But it's not. I mean it's not gonna happen. But we enjoyed our time there, like we also got to go to, went to Amsterdam and Then we went. I got a speeding ticket somewhere in the Netherlands, as you do. I Got this thing back like six months later and I was like, if you don't pay this, you won't be allowed back in, and I was like, oh god, I better pay this. But we traveled to Bruges after that, which is probably my favorite city in in that area, and Prague and All sorts of different places was a big beer enthusiast, so we went to some of the monasteries and things like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we felt it was a good place for beer and Prague obviously also.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we went to, actually, a pretty cool Brewery that was inside of windmill in Amsterdam and for the life of me I can't remember, wasn't I, was it, I I think, I think, yeah, yeah, I think, so, I Guess, yes, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was my favorite beer. Yeah, it was really. It was really cool. We tried not to do as much like really typical touristy things, but like the minute we got off the train we flew in. I got off the train my like debit card was frotted like Instantly after getting like some, some currency out.
Speaker 1:The craziest story was like we were going out of the train station and we're walking and then all of a sudden we just hear this guy scream. He's like Stop him. And there's this guy looking at as fast as he possibly can and I'm just like I don't know what's going on. This guy's bolting and these two huge like I Think they were either Eastern European, maybe Russian just tackled this guy Hmm I and subdued him. The guy had like close to $25,000 that he had taken from this guy and just like booked it Like this was my first experience in Amsterdam Like off the train and we were like okay, like I guess this, this, this, this will be a little we're jet black.
Speaker 1:We're just kind of like this is kind of crazy. But my assumption that was when there was like a huge migrant population coming across for for work and a friend of mine was like I wonder if somehow somebody scammed this guy and this guy, I was like why is anybody carrying $25,000 on them? Like in general, my friend was like I bet this guy had his like life savings on him and like was just scammed or something like that. But so my first interaction was somebody stealing something and then the Dutch police taking care of it, and that was my introduction to Amsterdam. But everything else was fantastic. We, we loved our time over there, yeah, but I would love to go back Amsterdam. I could only handle like three days. I was like I'm good, like done it all, you know, actually really just kind of enjoyed. We went into Friesland and on our way to Beruz and stuff like that, and that was just nice to be in the countryside.
Speaker 1:It was a little hard because nobody really spoke English, so I had to get by. I'm like what little Dutch pleasantries I knew, made a pretty concerted effort to try and learn some pleasantries, just so I didn't seem like very ignorant in a lot of ways. Um, so you're based where you're in Barcelona right now. Yeah, okay, but are you? It also said that you were also based in London as well.
Speaker 2:No, no, never based in London, I. So the company that I'm the head of, which is now part of chesscom, but it's kind of a independent department, if you will. It's called Chessable, uh-huh, um, it was a startup about, you know, that started about seven, eight years ago and I joined about two years into it. So I've been with this company now for five years, um, and when I joined, it was a very small startup with like four or five guys, and at this point now it's about 80 people working there Wow, including myself and we were acquired by chesscom in the late 2022. And so this past year now we've been part of a really big American company that's that itself is scaling, and so Chessable was founded in England and the official headquarters are in London, but we have a subsidiary company in Barcelona and in fact, that's, I think, where a lot of our executive management folks are all based. So we're we all live within like five minutes of each other here.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's really cool yeah.
Speaker 2:So, but everybody kind of moved from everywhere to Barcelona. It's just a really nice place to live and you can kind of compare it to like a very small Los Angeles. So it's got this kind of bowl shape. You know. You have these hills that kind of like block the town in it's big city right, that's like three and a half people living there, but it's got the hills, it's got the beach, You've got the mountains about an hour and a half away, the Pyrenees right and and yeah, and it's this very vibrant, multicultural, super open city, lots of tech, very nice place to live and cost of living is pretty low compared to other major cities and yeah, it's just a great place to live and like right now it's like not cold. I went out for a run from four to six in the hills right by my house and I live I don't live in the city, I live just outside it, on the other side of the hills, so nice place Cool.
Speaker 1:So you guys moved. How long have you lived in Barcelona?
Speaker 2:I'm here now going on my third year, okay.
Speaker 1:Where did you move from the Netherlands, or where did you move from?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, we lived in Friesland, so the northern part of the Netherlands, in the countryside, in a small town with my parents, just right the road, and we had kind of moved around a little bit into the Netherlands, mostly up north. So after the whole Shy Lude thing, which was, I think, 2004, I went back to the Netherlands to go to university, cause I actually never did. I only did one year college and then I joined the band in 1999. And then I was just off, you know, sleeping on floors and playing shows for four years, five years, and then when I went back I studied philosophy for a few years, never got a degree because I eventually started doing this other new musical project called the Black Atlantic, which ended up being a full-time career for me for about, I don't know, loosely 15 years, like off and on.
Speaker 2:It wasn't all the Black Atlantic, it was various other projects, but the Black Atlantic is kind of the thread through it. All that paid the bills and that, like was the band that I had the most success with, if you will like, commercially at least. Yeah, so I had this kind of career in music for from the time that I was 19 until mid 30s, I don't know like 36, 37. And then I was company chessable and that startup scaled and that's a whole different story.
Speaker 1:But yeah, yeah. Well, we can get into that. I just want to make sure, cause, like I, just I don't want to keep you too long. So how much time do you have? Cause I know I'm going to be mindful at the time.
Speaker 2:You know 40 minutes. We can chat for an hour Like we've been doing it, so it's not strict. My kids are watching TV show. We're going to do bedtime in probably an hour or so Cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So speaking of you know, obviously with the announcement which I alluded, getting back together or with you as a lead lead singer back together for Furnace S23, I just I'm just interested in like the beginning of kind of like your musical journey and like how you got into music. What kind of music was like present in your household growing up?
Speaker 2:When I was little, my mom, we had a piano which we inherited I don't remember from who, but we had a piano in the house. My mom took me for piano lessons and went to some old ladies house and I really didn't like it and felt really awkward. And then so I did it for a little bit and then I just didn't want to do it anymore. And then she was like, well, how about you take guitar lessons with your friend Leon? So and I was like, yeah, that sounds fun. So we Spanish classical guitar lessons for a couple of years. And then I don't know how long I did that for, maybe like two or three years, but you know, I kind of had the basics down and when we moved, so probably like for three years, I was playing classical Spanish guitar and just learning chords and you know stuff. And then we moved back to my dad's neck of the woods, which is in the northern part of the Netherlands, in Frisia, and I quit playing guitar. And then maybe like a year later or two years later, I don't know, there was a period of time where I didn't play any instrument. But then, actually St Nicholas, a couple of years later, I got an electric guitar with a small hand and that got me back into playing music. Do you remember what the brand of that guitar was? Yeah, I still have it. You still have it. That's awesome, you'll have it. It's an old Ivan, a really low grade Ivan-esque. But it looked yeah, it looked metal and you could dive, bomb it and stuff. Yeah, so I got so. I did so.
Speaker 2:I started taking lessons again, but I made it very clear with the guitar teacher at the time that I was like I am not interested in any more classical music. In theory, I want you to teach me metal songs and stuff that I like, and if you and so. But by that point I'd forgotten all the chords and the theory and all this stuff. And I still don't remember any of that stuff. I don't know chords, I don't know any of it.
Speaker 2:But so what we would do is I'd take this cassette recorder and I would bring a song and then he would play all the parts. He would kind of like deconstruct it for 10, 15 minutes into the various chords, and then he would record the individual parts for me and my little cassette recorder and then I would go home, practice the song, come back, show him that I could play the song and then we'd pick a new one and that I did that for years. And then, probably by the time I was 15 or something, I was asked by somebody who knew that I played guitar and that I liked metal to go practice do my first band practice in some like I don't know squatted place.
Speaker 2:And that kind of set me on the path of playing guitar in bands, you know and like, up until like 17, 18, we were doing that in practice spaces with friends and yeah, and then I was, I got into hardcore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm interested about, like I mean, what got you into metal, like at such a young age, like what did you? What metal were you into? How did you discover it?
Speaker 2:You know, the path was red hot chili peppers, guns and roses, metallica, and then everything before Metallica was like out the window. And then Metallica basically changed my musical life, cause I was like, wow, this is like I was completely obsessed with Metallica and that's something that I share with Fox especially. We both love Metallica, the older Metallica and yeah, and then I got into metal but I like really ventured out and like it was right around the time that, like in high school 94, when there was a lot of amazing stuff coming out and I remember that coming out when I was in high school and I love that record in flames were coming out on, a whole second wave of black metal bands started coming out and I was like it was all this like mystery around that Mushoga came out with it. I saw all those so, so, like I was like hanging out with a bunch of guys were all metalheads and listening to metal and like I still love a lot of the records from that time.
Speaker 1:Um do you remember the first Metallica song you heard?
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, it must have been something off of Ride the Lightning, um, I don't remember which song, but probably, yeah, some some. I I mean the thing was I had a cassette and I had Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets. Um, so I had this 90 minute thing and I had Ride the Lightning and Puppets on both sides, right, yeah, so so it was all cassettes. So so, like a friend of mine would, um, his dad had like a really nice setup and and so he he would record all the CDs to cassettes and then he would like create copies, and so that that was my kind of like starting journey with that.
Speaker 1:I remember I was a I grew up in kind of like a conservative-ish Christian household and I went to a Christian school for up until the time I was in eighth grade and my friend Danny I remember all these kids were wearing like the only thing I was familiar with as far as Metallica was like Metallica was like evil, right, like metal was like evil, uh, and in some ways. But I remember hearing, wherever I may roam, like the first time probably on MTV, and that was kind of like my first introduction to Metallica and I was like this song kicks ass, like I like love it. But there was still that kind of memory in my mind of like oh, this isn't like good stuff. My friend Danny, in eighth grade I was like the new kid in school and he had a I think it was a master of puppets shirt. They were all into Metallica, pantera, like all that stuff and I I had no knowledge of like Metallica and also the master of puppet songs were like the thing that should not be welcome home, uh, like whatever.
Speaker 1:And I was like looking at the back of this shirt and it had all the songs on it. I was like what does that mean? I was like it's welcome, the thing that should not be welcome. Like I read it as a sentence oh yeah, it was like he just was like what do you like? What did you talk? These are the song titles. And I was like, oh, I'm really sheltered. Like that was my first memory of just being like so embarrassed. Um, but just kind of getting into Metallica myself. I mean, like were your parents cool with that? Were they like? Yeah, sure, take all the Metallica.
Speaker 2:And my parents are super liberal. They thought it was cool. Like, um, I think I started going to concerts when I was 15, 14, 14 or 15, um started going to shows. I think by the time I was 16, I was going to festivals with, like friends and over the summer break like summer break there would be a couple of festivals and stuff and I'd go to festivals. Um, yeah, and yeah, my parents were totally supportive. In fact, like the reason that I ended up joining Shilu there's because my um dad convinced my mom to let me borrow her car and follow those guys around Europe in my mom's car.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was very interested how a guy from the Netherlands meets a band from America and like how you stood, guys kind of like met or you said you had a transition sort of into hardcore. So just starting there, what was, what was your transition into hardcore Like?
Speaker 2:there was a dude in uh in the local record store in my town who was like skateboarder and uh, into hardcore.
Speaker 2:So he would like he said, come on, you got to listen to this, you play us grill biscuits and like all that stuff and and he had getting us into into hardcore and and skateboarding was super cool and like my friends were into skateboarding and like punk and hardcore and so like it was like you know, first propaganda record, no effects, uh, all that kind of stuff was uh was coming around and uh, and I really love that stuff.
Speaker 2:Um, um, lag wagon was, I think my first punk show, um, and then, uh, pretty quickly I got into all the New York hardcore stuff because it was right around the time that like math ball and sick of it all and like all those bands that were really getting big and started Europe and stuff, and so, um, yeah, so I started just like doing that and and you know, like the nice thing about punk hardcore is it's it's very inclusive, right, you know you play three power chords and and you scream over them and you have a song and so, and so that was really appealing and the energy of it and and and there's a lot of positivity that I really enjoyed and I was a little bit of a count, you know.
Speaker 2:And then for me, what really did? It was earth crisis. So so when I heard earth crisis, I was like yes, this is what I want hardcore to sound like, cause it was so so sounding and I liked the punk fast stuff, but it didn't hit the same. And I still, I still like metallic hardcore more Like if it, the closer it is to metal, the more that I like it, the more it's like youth Christian, more I'm like yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but yeah, like earth crisis. You know that first song, forced march, that I was just like what? This is heavy, and so I'm that. Really that was like my favorite band at the time. Like must have been 17.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. That's really cool because I often ask people on the podcast like what's, what's the song? That kind of like changed it all for you and a lot of the like. Other people have answered but you, you answered without even me asking that question, like it sounds like Destroyed machines.
Speaker 2:My earth crisis is what got me full fledged into hardcore. Yeah, that's what was like turning point for me. So it was Metallica. And then earth crisis, destroyed of jeans. And then, a couple of years later, when I heard hearts once nourished with hope and compassion, I was like, wow, like that was like, yeah, there were a lot of Florida bands.
Speaker 2:Morning again was another band that really that I really loved, also super metallic, right, and try this nice mix of they mixed the metal with this kind of melodic sense in these intricate time signatures and some faster parts. And I have to be honest, like I always I always pushed Shilude into more metal territory and not like math lecture was always pushing it into the punk stuff and math box was always trying to mediate. He was always trying to walk the fine line Like and he would write both types of songs. But he's like he really loves both, like he's a metal metal head that grew up on punk stuff and stuff for as well, and so he was always. He was always trying to do both and I like, as far as I'm concerned, like if we can just get rid of all the fast beats and just play straight up metal. That's my. That would have been your version of Shilude, so yeah yeah, and how did you guys?
Speaker 1:what was your first interaction like? It sounds like they came to tour.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they were to their first tour in Europe in 1999 and Chad Gilbert had just quit the band and I think also because he was like in new funk glory, so it's take off, they just record label deal, and so he had just quit and then Steve Klyce you know, the original drummer for the for the for the album Also quit and so they had lost two really important and really awesome contributors.
Speaker 2:So they they kind of just went over to Europe because tickets were booked and you know like would have just been money down the drain. So they had a kid to that in the last minute kind of showed up and that they tried out and that they thought would work out on vocals, like come with and do vocals, and then it turned out that that wasn't such a good idea and I don't know it was a big mess. There was like a, the band was there and this whole entourage of people, but it ended up being Matt Fletcher doing vocals and I don't know if you've heard Matt Fletcher's vocals but I've not. But by the time he was in the Netherlands for their one show that I attended, his voice was shot. He was just doing it on energy, pure energy, and handing out the microphone.
Speaker 1:So that's why that that in and of itself is such a hardcore thing to do. Right, like the crowd participation. It's almost kind of like, yeah, you want to perform, you know, but like, when all this fails, you can just throw the mic to the crowd If you're, if you're because the crowd participation in a hardcore is just like yeah.
Speaker 2:But they were a real one guitar player down. So at the time that I saw them, my first Shilude show was Matt Fletcher on vocals, andrew Gormley from Kiss of Goodbye on drums as a fill in drummer, matt Fox on guitar and Dave Silver, the original bass player, on bass and Dave Quinn after that tour, and so at that point there was just one original band member left, which was Matt Fox, but Matt Fletcher was actually a guitar player, and so when I met up with them like the way it played out was a couple of days later, they asked me to do a sound check with them, because I was there for every show and then they kind of pushed me onto the stage and then so we did a couple of shows with me and Matt Fletcher doing double vocals. Actually, there's a video of this on YouTube that I found in my very first show doing vocals with yeah which I alluded and then.
Speaker 2:so we did that for a couple of days. And then there was this big hardcore festival in Germany, in Kassel, called Kassel fest, which at the time was a pretty big hardcore festival.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And Shilud was one of the main bands, and so they were like, ok, dude, you got to do vocals on your own now, and Matt Fletcher's got to go back on the guitar because we want, we want to do the full thing. So that was the first time he played like real band?
Speaker 1:Were you down with that? Or were you like this is really scary.
Speaker 2:Oh, was it like yeah, but I mean they were my favorite band. Like the whole thing is bizarre.
Speaker 1:It really does. That's what I was really interested about in talking to you, because it doesn't. When you go and you look at the band itself or even if you go on like a pity and stuff like that, there's this kind of it's all. Just, you know, Shaiolud is kind of like a big family tree and there's many different branches, like Matt Fox, you know, and Fletcher kind of like the root trunk system, that kind of goes out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say, matt Fox is the trunk, the trunk, yeah, that's a really big branch.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so like that transition to all of a sudden you know there's this guy from the other ones singing for Shaiolud and like that transition is just very interesting to me and just kind of like you, that star, it seemed very. Was it organic or did it feel very disjointed?
Speaker 2:I had an epiphany. I went to the show, had a chat with Matt Fox after the show and he kind of jokingly said why don't you do vocals? Kind of because I already had an American accent, spoke English with an American accent because I had been in exchange in the United States a couple of years prior and we just clicked but this is pre-cell phone, right. Pre-cell phone people match, pre any of that stuff. The internet was there, but it was like 1999. So like Europe was like the first European tour for Shaiolud was there was no Euro, so every single country had its own current Right, right, yeah, gosh, wow, this is so it's a long time ago. And so what happened was I went to the show afterwards, I crashed at a friend's place and that thing that Matt had said, why don't you do vocals? It just kind of like kept playing on repeat in my head and I told my friend I don't know, but I think I can do this. And so I called Matt up the next day in Belgium at Eeper they played which there's this famous festival there called Eeper Fest, but they played the venue. And I called them up at the venue right on my friend's phone and like, dialed, like called Belgium and I called the venue and they they brought Matt. Over a couple of minutes later he showed up and I was like hey, do you remember me? I'm the guy who like talked to you about these. Yeah, what's up, can I like join you guys for a couple of shows and follow you around? And I don't know, I didn't really have a plan. And he was like yeah, sure, it sounds fine and I think it would be friendly. I'll meet you guys in Germany. And so that's what happened.
Speaker 2:I just like went to Germany, met up with him there, matt Fletcher really kind of like took me under his wing and was like super supportive and for the next couple of days like rode with me in the car and like we hung out a lot and chatted and we really bonded.
Speaker 2:And then Matt started riding with me and then eventually I had the whole van in my car, because they had a van but it was full of people and I think they were at that point like Dave wasn't really happy and kind of miserable on tour and so they kept. They were kind of happy to get out of the van and kind of like hanging in the car and so so at some point I had like a couple guys in the car with me and hanging out and then and that's how we went from show to show to show and so I did like maybe 20 shows or something, driving around Europe following the Shildude van and just making sure I wouldn't lose them. And then if and whatever we did, we would just stop at a local gas station and be like, oh, they know where the club is and yeah, it's like really DIY, Super DIY when you like.
Speaker 1:Well, when did you get into the studio with them?
Speaker 2:Same year, but few months later. So the tour was over the summer, and at that point I decided after the tour that I was going to do this. But they didn't. They were like, oh, we don't know if you sound good in the studio. So I was like, okay, yeah, so just fly out here and try out. And I was like so my, my tryout consisted of going into Matt Fletcher's closet and screaming into a cassette tape recorder like a recording of For the World, with no vocals. And so my tryout was. And then they were like, oh, yeah, sounds good.
Speaker 2:And then we went and they had already recorded the music for the EP with another victim. Such a body of lays had already been written musically, but the lyrics weren't there. And so we worked on that together. Matt Fox, as usual, wrote most of the lyrics, but I contributed a little bit. And then we just went in and we laid down the vocals. And then, of course, there were those two cover songs. So there was the the Babylon Legion and the no effects cover, yeah, and we finished those up.
Speaker 2:And then I flew back to the Netherlands and I didn't have a work permit or any sort of permit ever. Yeah, yeah, I hadn't, you know, slept on a red mattress in their living room for two months or three months, recorded vocals in the studio, and then I flew back to the Netherlands and worked a little bit, saved up some money, flew back to the US, did that a whole bunch, bunch of times and eventually we ended up moving up to upstate New York. And that's when we kind of settled in Kipsey New York and that's when everything started taking off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so did you know you could scream or was like? I'm always interested in the, the mechanics of it, and for some people it comes naturally and for others there's like a method to the madness. Some people go and just blow out their vocal chords. Um, was it something that just came naturally to you?
Speaker 2:I had a band before Shy Lude where I was a guitar player. I was always a guitar player, never the singer, and I played a guitar in that band and then and then that band quit, whatever we just like, broke up and then I started another one and I had this guy who did and I was starting to write kind of intricate and melodic hardcore stuff, kind of like Shy Lude.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Trying to get this guy to sing the vocal patterns that I wanted on those songs, but he was kind of super straightforward and so he would never get it and so I would do it for him and then he would just mimic me. So I wasn't actually singing in the band, but I was showing him like this is what I want, and I knew from the practice, those practice sessions, that I could scream, but I didn't feel confident about it or didn't like my voice or anything Like I didn't know what it sounded like. So the Shy Lude thing was just complete. Uh, I don't know. Coincidence.
Speaker 1:Well, I was really curious because, like when, okay, so like, admittedly, my first introduction to Shy Lude was ill tempered. So I, and it literally just like five or six years ago, I was sitting down at the gym and just like it popped on the radio Uh uh, demons, wings or whatever popped on the radio and I was like what the f is this? I was like this is really good. And that's how I kind of got into Shy Lude. I can't imagine being a guitarist or whatever for myself and a musician writing like vocal parts for the like I don't know how you did it, like the disjointedness of the music and like how your vocals match with it. Was that difficult to write vocal parts for such a time? Signature bass like switch up, like that is hard for me to conceive of.
Speaker 2:So a lot of the vocal patterns and a lot of the lyrics were written by Matt Fox, just because he's always had full creative control of the band. I think I wrote more music than I wrote um lyrics. Uh, for, for that, within the little temper, so the opening melody for um, scornful of the motives of virtues of others, that's me. And Matt Fletcher's riff, like the melodies, he did the, did it, did it, did it, did it, all that stuff Like, at least that's how I remember it.
Speaker 2:I remember working on the master room. I don't exactly remember how it all came together, but there's a whole bunch of parts where, um, there's a few songs where I contributed more music than lyrics, but there's a few songs where I wrote some lyrics, willing oneself to uh forget what can I otherwise be forgiven is one that, um, where I wrote a lot of the lyrics, whether it's cry or destroy um, and then a lot of the other, oh yeah, um, um, uh. Well, there's a few others, but, um, it was mostly Matt showing me the vocal parts and me screaming them.
Speaker 1:Okay, right.
Speaker 2:And then and I would put my own spin on it because sometimes his timing and his stuff just didn't work for me and then I'd be like, yeah, I'm not, I'm not doing that, I don't like timing and I would do my own. But it was a, let's say, an 80, 20 adherence to what Matt wanted to hear. Yeah, and I would have done things a lot differently and I had a different musical vision. But I got to express that much later when I started doing other music.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to be mindful of your time, but the the how did this come about for this fest 23?
Speaker 2:The record was 20 years old. Yeah, the record was was 20 years old earlier this year. Right, we're still in 2023, something cost of 2020. And I just texted the guys I said, how about we do reunion show? And everybody just instantly said, come in. And so that was it. Yeah, and then it happened to see the guys.
Speaker 2:I was in New York earlier this year in April for some work stuff and Matt lives right by and Eric Dillon, who's been kind of like main touring member for I've pretty much since I left and always kind of helps out, he lives in New York city. So so I met up with Matt and Eric and we just kind of talked about like how, how we would do it, and we instantly all agreed that probably furnace fest would be the the most logical choice. And so we waited for furnace fest to the finish and then I think Matt just threw the idea out and then they said, yeah, let's do it. Have you been excited about the response? I really didn't think it was going to be that well received. The way that it was, it kind of was super heartwarming, really cool.
Speaker 2:I didn't just. I just just wait till the show. I had no idea. I've been out of this for years. I haven't. You know, I've been doing other stuff, so so it's cool, it's really, and I'm getting messages now like daily and you're not even the only podcast that wants to interview me or ask me questions. Been really cool. I didn't think that it was, I just thought it would be fun. That's really cool, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, I've talked to a lot of different bands since this kind of whole thing and Furnace Fest and a lot of reunions that we're getting back together and stuff like that, and they're always just so floored by the response and it's like I don't think it's surprising to the fans because like, at the same time, the music that you may continue to have an effect honestly, generationally, right, kids introduced their music. You know, parents introduced, we're parents now. So like it's not uncommon for me to have my five year old and my two year old sitting in the car listening to ill tempered right, like you know what I'm saying and so, like you know, it's wild, yeah, and it's like my dad used to listen to the Beach Boys and so I still listen to the Beach Boys and then my kids listen to the you know what I mean. Like it's, it's, I can imagine that too. I talked with Steve Lamos, who's the drummer for a band called American Football.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you know them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we, we. I stayed at the, I stayed at the guys one of the guys who was in American football we stayed at their house in Chicago and we played some. We played some shows with them later with with the black Atlantic.
Speaker 1:Oh nice, yeah. So I talked to Steve the drummer and I you know, it's kind of, it was kind of the same thing. It was like you know, I, if you asked me 20 years ago, but would I still be doing this? He was like, no like. Nor did I think this little EP that we did, or like the first LP that we did, would have. He's just, you know, he's a college professor now. Like, what I like about doing this podcast too, is because it's like it's not just about the past, it's about what people are into now. So, being mindful of the time, it, you know, I'm just you're, you're a CEO, yup.
Speaker 2:Is that your title of a chess company Officially? I mean, it changed from CEO to head of just because Chesscom has a CEO, right? So you have the most CEOs in one company. So, but, yeah, yeah, I'm on the head of a company. Are you ranked? Are you ranked player? Yeah, yeah, I have a rating, but it's you know, I'm just a casual club player. I'm not very good at chess, but I know a lot about chess.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, I was wondering how you kind of got into that, Like what, like Blaine.
Speaker 2:Rob Puzo from One King Down slash Most Brescious Blood. He got me really it was him and my brother but I replayed some shows in Wilkes. I met Rob in Wilkes Bear of Pennsylvania and we played a show together with One King Down and Rob's really into chess still is I've connected with him on Twitter a while ago and he's still slightly better than me, which really irks me. But yeah, so he was really into chess and then we would play and then I kind of could hold my own and then at some point, like I even beat him a few times and then, you know, I saw him again at like what with Health S2002 or something, and then he like started crushing me with a certain opening and I was like I got to study this stuff too, and so it started like Rob got me into that and then I started buying chess books and studying in the van every day and I had my little chess set with me and yeah, that's how I got into chess.
Speaker 1:And then all the so. How'd you go from that to a complete company, even the head of a complete company?
Speaker 2:Well, in between getting into chess and starting the company which I didn't start chessable I joined chessable two years into it being a small startup, but I was one of the key members and I built half the team, hired half the team and et cetera, et cetera. And so the CEO, founder of the company, when he sold the company, he asked me to take over for him and it was like it was kind of a really obvious choice. There wasn't really anybody else that wanted to or could do it, so I kind of took that step at the time. But, yeah, getting back, I don't know, like we're kind of drifting all over the place, so I don't know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I want to be just being mindful of the time, so I want to get all the questions in that I can get in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's you know the story. In short is a startup, a lot of success during COVID and lockdown and then, of course, queen's Gambit really got a lot of interest and that helped us. We're chess training platforms, so it's not a place chessable is a place where you go to study, so where, literally, we have interactive versions with video of chessbooks and people that are into chess you know they go there and then people who want to play they go to chesscom.
Speaker 1:Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, I mean like be knowing that I have a very rudimentary, like I know, one opening move and that's about it. But I kind of mentioned to you something about how I see chess as a mental game. But it's also, for me, being a therapist has been a very has a whole other dimension to it, because when I think about chess, sometimes for me it's an assessment tool.
Speaker 1:I work with a lot of children and adolescents in the past. If you're working with people with ADHD or you're working with people who are struggling behaviorally or something like that one chess is a good relationship builder off the bat. Like I played a lot of chess with kids, because kids don't, they can't sit still right Like they're all over. The place of playing games is always helpful. But if I wanted to assess whether or not somebody had or working with ADHD, say, where executive function thinking long term versus short term is really difficult.
Speaker 1:So sometimes assessing kids like impulsivity, like oh, is this kid able to think through his moves but using it as a teaching tool as well, that's kind of like slow down, like don't move your piece until you've kind of like contemplated what you're going to do with it and how that strategy plays out and as a mental health component. I've used that as a way to teach kids to try and be less impulsive or to try and really bring the concept of like your brain wants you to go now, your brain wants you to do things now. Like all the time, phone all that stuff, you're getting kind of like instant pleasure all the time, like how do you think through things? Like how are you less impulsive? So that's always been like a go-to for me in terms of like building relationship and even using it as a teaching tool.
Speaker 2:Well, it's a language, right, Like, chess is a language. It's a nonverbal language. The cool thing is, like if you know the rules of the game and you're kind of half-designated, you can go anywhere in the world where people play chess and you don't even need to be able to speak their local language. But if you play chess you can communicate. There's a lot of stuff there that allows you to connect just over the game.
Speaker 1:When I was working in inner cities. I worked in a lot of inner cities in Philadelphia High poverty rate, african American poverty rate. Like black kids were so like some of them were so in the chess, like it was this kind of like equalizer in a lot of ways and they were good man, like an eight-year-old could kick my ass, yeah, and but it was also a discipline strategy for them too, like to keep focused and to also kind of like strategize things. So I see chess as a way as like an equalizer, like you said, in like a lot of different ways in a language and a situation. You know it's fantastic. You know, kind of wrapping things up a little bit, your dad apparently a long distance runner, which I don't understand. I don't know how nobody could run for two hours straight, but what's do you go? Do you do marathons? Do you do ultra marathons?
Speaker 2:I'm training for my first ultra in April. I'm going to run a 60K on this volcanic island called Madeira, which is a part of like Portugal, but it's off the coast of Africa, it's really far out, so it's kind of a mountainous race. So I'll be running that in April. And yeah, I run marathons. I run four, five times a week and I do all sorts of training and et cetera. And in fact I just started doing a certification program to become a certified a USCA certified ultra running coach as well. So by the time that I will finish my ultras because I have a couple scheduled for next year and my marathons and my program will be certified coach and et cetera. So I love running, I know a lot about the training and physiology and I've spent a lot of time studying and learning all this stuff myself and. But I mean, running is simple, right? You just put on some shoes and go outside and run.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for me. I, oh man. I know I need to learn how to run correctly. It's a big thing for my own, I need my own.
Speaker 2:I think people over complicated. You just put on some shoes and if you can't run, then walk. I started like I ran from very early age and so I have this really good base. I was given like I ran like Dutch national championships at some point in my teens and et cetera, but I picked running back up a few years ago. After I was doing, I started walking, then doing a lot of hiking and then got more into running and then I had set that goal of running a marathon like three, four times and got about halfway and then quit. And then this time what I did was I set a really ridiculous short amount of time, which actually, in hindsight, was very stupid, but it didn't get me to what I wanted to do, which was run a marathon. And so I trained for only eight weeks, which is extremely stupid You're supposed to take, even if you have like a decent base.
Speaker 2:Taking 20 weeks is advisable, I would say and even I would say like, if you're going from couch to marathon, taking a whole year and just slowly building up towards it, is a much better way to do it. But for me that the doing it in eight weeks helped me actually get it done. And so I did my first marathon. I ran a good time and then I was just hooked and I love. Yeah, did you get that runner's eye? Yeah, but you mentioned mental health.
Speaker 2:For me, running is much more than the racing and et cetera. It's not so important. Obviously, I'm ambitious and I want to run certain times and et cetera, but it's the process that I love, and have the goal allows me to establish the process towards the goal. But really what I love about running is is that it gives me a lot of time with myself. So it's that time I just did a two hour run here in the hills and just I put on some music and sometimes no music and just be with my thoughts and kind of like order, what's all inside that head and just, and then when I finish I feel amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like it provides a mental clarity in some ways, like I'm a firm believer, like the first front line for mental health is exercise. Yeah, like, just you know, just yeah, there's actual.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah 100%.
Speaker 1:You know that's one of the first things I do. I work with people with anxiety and depression disorders and like exercise, like can you get outside? Like there was an important exercise.
Speaker 2:There was a super interesting control group experiment where they took two groups and this was double blind, but they took two. Well, I guess not double blind, but it was a control group. Okay, let me back up. Let's scratch the double blind thing, because there's other research that's been done with double blind groups, with running. But this was a study where they had two groups. One was put on normal antidepressant meds and the others were doing exercise three times a week. And the group that did exercise three times a week and I think this was eight weeks or something they actually had better results and less depression after than the other group.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's why I mean a big thing for depression is the motivator right when it's like getting you know. Sometimes we just tell people to take steps Like hey, even if you don't feel like it, like get on the bike, you don't have to even do anything, just get there, like when I I at one point had lost a bunch of weight and I remember I think it was like Terry Cruz, who's like a celebrity, he's like a super jacked, like gym guy, but he was like half the battle, more than half the battle, just getting to the gym and like just stepping foot and then you can decide what you want to do.
Speaker 2:So it's like I don't really like about running is you don't need to go to a gym. Yeah, you just put on shoes and you and like, the best thing you can do is just put on your running gear before you go to bed, wake up and now you're in your gear. All you have to do is put on the shoes, step outside and you can go. And if you can't run, just walk. And if, if, if you go from walking to walking and running a little bit, and walking and running a little bit, and et cetera, eventually that is going to eventually just going to be able to run all the time, and then you can think about racing and doing all sorts of other stuff. But the the act of running is super simple. It's something innate. Anybody can do it and you don't have to compare yourself with others. It's just you, just what. However, you measure yourself to you, and that's what I love about it Like I can.
Speaker 2:I remember when I first started running in the hills here and the first time that I did it, I, you know, I I could go for two minutes, and then my heart was so high because I was going up a mountain. I was just like I just had to walk and now I can, I can run the whole thing. So I can go a thousand feet climbing in one steady run up in 20 minutes and and you know I'm going slow but but I'm running and I'm like I'm strong. And then when I go down and like actually running down, I'm not like so. So it's like really an illiterating feeling of total freedom.
Speaker 1:You. You must be like a very busy guy, though If you have kids you're running two hours. You're the head of a company. Like are your children on the older side or the younger? Because I might energy levels with a five and a two year old? Or like when.
Speaker 2:so my kids were very little and kind of grew, became more independent right after COVID. So I have a 14 year old and a 12 year old and an eight year old. The eight year old obviously takes more time and needs more guidance and support, but the, the 14 year old, is really independent and she, she you know she goes, where she goes.
Speaker 2:She's a teenager and now starting to go to high school as well, so so those two are starting to need less and they entertain themselves and et cetera. Obviously, we spend time with them, do things together, but yeah, they. But I started seriously running and training about three years ago and in fact my son, who's now 12, he ran a half marathon distance when he was 10. Oh amazing, he saw me run the marathon and then I got injured after the marathon and he was like but I want to run one. And I was like well, then, I'll train you. And so he he. He did it for four months. He trains and he ran a marathon.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. Yeah, well, I know we're we're kind of at our time here. I just I really appreciate you setting this up with me and like being able to do it on the fly. I'm incredibly, incredibly grateful for that. So you know, I'll let you go. It's probably bedtime for the kids, we're for sure at this time, but again, I just wanted to. I just wanted to say thank you and I appreciate it, and it'll take me a little time to get some of these episodes out.
Speaker 2:It's just it's very, I hope. I hope we said something that was interesting for listeners and how things got together. But I think I think we did, yeah, cool.
Speaker 1:I'm more or less interested, and especially in the podcast about people's whole story, not so much just about certain time periods and bands, because I think it's more interesting. I like talking to people and the whole of people and so I'm just as interested in about chessable as about shy, hallowed and that kind of process, and whether or not people want to listen to that for me is like cool, and if they don't like, that's cool too. Like to me this is a form of therapy for myself as well, to talk with people who've made a difference in my life or impacted me musically. So I do this more for myself than self in the most part.
Speaker 2:So okay, well, hopefully people like it and hopefully this is a good chat for you too.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, well. I hope it was a good chat for you too, because I really, I really did enjoy it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Thanks for the interest, and you know, I guess, are you. Are you planning to go to Furnace Fest or watch the stream?
Speaker 1:No, definitely planning on going. I went to Furnace Fest 2021. And that was an amazing lineup. That was like yeah, so many bands were playing and I have a feeling that this year is going to be basically the same thing A lot of bands.
Speaker 2:I am moving through and I'm stoked for Poison the. Well, I mean, I'm still friends with those guys at a distance and they put out some of my favorite records, heavy records of all time, which a lot of people don't give versions a lot of cred, or you come before you, but you come before you is probably top five favorite hardcore record of all time. And so one I love the fact that those guys are friends of mine, you can sit with them friends, and two that I'm like a huge fan so, and so the fact that they're playing. I seriously, when I heard about these shows that they're doing now and January and stuff, I had planned to go and didn't work out travel wise but I would have flown to the US for probably Chicago show or whatever.
Speaker 1:I would have flown to see Hope's Fall and Poison the Well in Los Angeles. I was fortunate to get have a beer with Adam and and Chad Chad the bass player when their album came out I brewed a beer for them. You know, we just kind of got together so we got to hang out at the brewery next door and have a beer. So I am I'm looking forward to like reconnecting with some people. I've spoken to a lot of people but I haven't really seen them in person. So if this weird guy comes up to you at Furnace Fest and it's like hey, how's it go, I'm like it's probably me.
Speaker 2:At least we, at least now I know what you look like too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we talked like a year ago like that's cool. Yeah, no, I'm very still. Actually, the biggest thing for Furnace Fest for me was not that it was like post I mean, it was sort of the middle of COVID-ish, but like I got to meet some friends that I hadn't seen in a really long time and catch up and like to me, relationship is always the most important thing and like the music cultivates that relationship, you know, and like I really really value that. Um, you know, if I see I'll come say hi, cool, I hope I won't be too awkward or weird, but hopefully you'll remember the conversation I'll remember it for sure.
Speaker 2:Thanks please, man, and we'll see you at Furnace Fest then. Yeah, all right.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Eric, have a good one. Well, that does it again for the show. I'd like to thank my guests George VanderVeld again for coming on. If you like what you hear, please consider subscribing. You can find welcome to the scene on all major podcasting platforms and on Instagram, TikTok, the scene cast. Stay tuned for my next episode with Johnny Smerno from beloved and Adam. See you later.
