SOIL Bassist Promises 'Something Special' On Upcoming Album

Metal-Heads.de recently conducted an interview with bassist Tim King of Chicago heavy rockers SOIL. You can now watch the chat below. A couple of excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On SOIL‘s next studio album:

Tim: “It’s been three years since the release of our last record, ‘Whole’. We toured a lot on it, and the fan reaction to that record has been fantastic so far. It kind of got us back to our ‘Scars’ [2001]/ ‘Redefine’ [2004] roots of the band, and, naturally, with Ryan [McCombs] singing back on it, it was a coming of circles of sorts. And we’ve been teetering with some new riffs and some new material, so next year we’ll go back in the studio and get some tracks recorded. We’ve got some ideas that we’re working with. I don’t wanna give anything away right now, but we’re gonna do something kind of special this time around. It’ll be neat. We’re always a band that tries to do something a little special and different each time we do something, so 2017 will be that time.”

On how diminishing music sales in the streaming age have affected SOIL‘s ability to survive:

Tim: “It’s just so hard nowadays, because there’s so many bands and the economy, just across the world, has shrunk. And with things like Spotify and streaming and downloading and things, I kind of gave up being against them, saying that they’re evil and this and that, ’cause it’s so convenient and such an easy way to listen to music. I mean, you turn on Spotify, you don’t have to have a CD, it’s better for the environment, there’s no plastic, there’s no cutting of trees. If you buy it from iTunes, it takes up space on your iPhone. If you have a Spotify subscription or a Pandora subscription, it’s like having millions of songs on a jukebox that don’t take up space. I understand it, and it’s worthless to fight it and say it’s evil and try to take it down, because it’s gonna be there. So what do you do as an artist? Because you don’t make any money off it; you make a fraction of a cent per stream. So what do you? You go to touring and merchandise. Well, so many bands are touring, and there’s so much merchandise, kids can’t go to every show and buy everything. So the music business has changed; it’s just that it’s gotten smaller. It hasn’t changed in the fact that you still have to write good music, you still have to play great live shows, you still have to do all the things that you always did in the past — you still have to do those things — it’s just…. it’s smaller. So in order for bigger bands, and bands that came out before, like us and your DEFTONES and things, for them to live the lifestyles that they’ve become accustomed to, they either have to tour consistently or work harder, or they have to do various things. And that’s one thing we’ve learned — to go into different avenues and survive, because we still love doing SOIL and we still love our fans, our fans still love and come see us play, so we wanna keep doing it.”

“Whole” was released in August 2013 via Pavement Entertainment.