Vocals: Cliff Rigano
Guitars: Jason Bozzi
Bass: Danny Horboychuk
Drums: Phil Arcuri
If Dry Kill Logic’s new record The Dead and Dreaming sounds especially energized and motivated it’s because the band has faced numerous challenges since the release of their 2001 album, The Darker Side of Nonsense. And since adversity not only builds character, it reveals it, they have come through stronger at the other end by creating music that satisfies their creative hunger.
The results are staggering an album of pummeling beats, precise, ripping guitars, dissonant aural embellishments and vocals that alternate between vehement animosity and haunting melodicism. At any given moment, Dry Kill Logic brings to mind the classic sounds of Slayer, Pantera, System of a Down and Killswitch Engage without sounding like any of them.
So, what got under Dry Kill Logic’s skin enough to inspire them to craft such a personal tome of scorching might? Coming face to face with serious adversity and overcoming it. First, they had to change their name from Hinge to Hinge AD to Dry Kill Logic. Then, just as the metal community began embracing their scathing mix of thrash and hardcore, the events of 9/11 unfolded. The band’s former label temporarily stopped supporting aggressive music and encouraged Dry Kill Logic to record more melodic songs that would be easier to push to commercial radio.
The band, whose penchant for melody is almost as strong as their desire to destroy, could have given in and crafted an album of hook-filled heavy rock, but that would have meant compromising every principle under which they were founded.
We’re doing this for the fans and because we believe in ourselves. We enjoy playing the music we love, whether it’s in mom’s basement or on a stage in front of 10,000 people, Rigano says. So, we decided to write the record that
we wanted, not an album someone sitting behind a desk thinks he can sell.
In other words, Dry Kill Logic decided to do things their way, the hard way. After a mutual split with their former label, they decided not to seek another record deal, and instead take their career under their own wing, self-releasing their music on their Psychodrama imprint and handling most aspects of their career themselves.
Soon after they decided to adopt a DIY approach to their music, Dry Kill Logic’s guitarist and bassist quit, leaving Rigano and drummer Phil Arcuri as the only original members of the band. You could see from the mass exodus just where people’s alliances lay, said the singer. That was a good thing because everyone that’s with us now is on the same page and ready to give 110 percent.
Not having a record deal has paid off in a number of ways for the band. In addition to enabling them to shape their own destiny, they have been able to retain ownership over the master recordings and license them to different labels
in different territories. In North America, The Dead and Dreaming will be issued through Gary Ashley’s new label, Repossession. Ashley is the former MCA label executive who orchestrated the merger between punk label Drive-Thru
Records and MCA and is responsible for the success of such acts as Garbage and Blink-182. In the UK and Europe, the new record will see a release through SPV / Steamhammer which will be overseen by the band’s imprint Psychodrama, headed by
Rigano.
The partnerships with Ashley and SPV / Steamhammer will allow Dry Kill Logic greater control over the business, financial and creative aspects of their career. Benefits so far include the ability to get their music in video games, TV and soundtracks without getting caught up in traditional red tape – Dry Kill Logic’s riffs have been heard in games by Eidos, Midway and Activision, as well as in the Viva La Bam and releases from Frontier Films, Fleshwound Films, H-Bomb Films and many others.
We were keeping busy peripherally making music for various outlets while we were still writing the record and playing shows, Rigano says. This is a business, and we look at it as a career. So, we want to do everything we can to
keep that career moving forward.
Rigano’s grab-the-world-by-the-balls philosophy is a major force behind The Dead and Dreaming, an album that addresses self-reliance, courage and the pursuit of ambitious goals.
The first single from The Dead and Dreaming, Paper Tiger is about the misconceptions that many artists have about the music business. In addition to painting a grimly realistic portrait, the song serves as a warning to anyone who thinks rocking out opens up a path to riches.
I’ve been to the other side, and there’s no pot of gold. All success comes from hard work, there’s no glory from signing the elusive record deal. All new bands say, My life would be great if I could just get a record deal. I’ve got some news for you. It’s only the beginning.
The roots of Dry Kill Logic stretch back to 1993 when Rigano formed Hinge in Westchester, New York. The group’s first EP Cause Moshing is Good Fun marked the birth of Psychodrama Records, which Rigano created to distribute the disc and its follow-up, the band’s first full-length Elemental Evil. In addition to honing its skills in the studio, Dry Kill Logic developed a frantic, mindblowing live show, which they fine-tuned on tours with Coal Chamber, Anthrax, System of a Down and others.
In 2001, Hinge changed their name to Dry Kill Logic, and released their second album, The Darker Side of Nonsense, going on to sell over 100,000 copies, and hailed by Amazon.com as genuinely unhinged, wild-eyed and bolt-tight. The Dead and Dreaming is even tighter, more incisive and more original. Dry Kill Logic began writing the album while they were on tour in 2002, and recorded much of it at Millbrook Sound in upstate New York with producers Eddie Wohl and Rob Caggiano. The disc was completed earlier this year at Scrap 60 Studios in New York City.
Few albums so concisely and powerfully capture the mindframe of their creators. The opening track, Lost, for instance, is a death spiral of battering beats and scorching riffs that cries out for redemption and liberation, and Paper Tiger combines a verse fueled by crunching guitars with a textural, melodic refrain that encourages thoughtful rebellion. Yet even the mellowest moments are dipped in a coat of rage.
Most people piss me off, Rigano says. I think what I want fans to get out of our music is the realization that everyone’s got problems and issues. But if you work really hard you can overcome your issues and live a better life.
Maybe it’s that hint of positivity lurking within Rigano’s blackened core that makes Dry Kill Logic ring with extra authority. Unlike many of his cantankerous, pessimistic peers, Rigano actually wants to help make the world a better place. The moral compass of society is so skewed in every sense of the word – people in general seem to be content with being unhappy with their lives as long as it means they can avoid the hard work it takes to make a change. The least we can do is to try to be the best people we can be, to lead by example and try to show people that with a bit of hard work, you can make a real difference. For us, that begins with giving back to the metal community by making real music for the fans and for ourselves, and no one else.
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