Mather and Chopper were interviewed recently by deVour Magazine, here’s a few questions from it.
deVour Magazine: Describe your sound and influences to someone who has never heard the band before.
Mather Louth: We were recently described as “outlaw goth”, and I think that’s a rather memorable and visual description of the Heathen Apostles world. Certainly we have a country and roots element to our music, but there’s a definite Southern Gothic cloud over that landscape.
As for influences, my own run the gamut with regards to music (everything from crackling antique recordings of roots music to modern day shoegaze), though I am perpetually drawn to artists that are unafraid to offer a window into the inner workings of their hearts and guts- Mark Lanegan, Nick Cave, and PJ Harvey all come to mind as stellar examples of this time and time again. I am also a self-professed book worm and am fascinated with the art of writing, so I thoroughly enjoy the challenge of translating my own written words into song.
dM: I’d love for you to speak on your new album and it’s creation, obstacles and favorite tracks (if you have any).
Chopper Franklin: For our debut album (Boot Hill Hymnal), we knew we wanted a wide variety of sounds and influences, so the songwriting process mainly consisted of me tracking songs in as many different styles as I could and getting them over to Mather for lyrics. She did a great job of going with it on every occasion- the lyrics are fantastic, and the six songs we co-wrote on the record are the first six songs we wrote together (there are no outtakes or unfinished songs.) We each had two existing songs that fit right in with the album, so that was great, too. My two favorites on the record right now are “The Reckoning” and “Lonesome Whistle”, because they both show extremely different sides of the Heathen Apostles.
dM: I’d love for you to speak on your new album and it’s creation, obstacles and favorite tracks (if you have any).
Chopper: For Boot Hill Hymnal we knew we wanted a wide variety of sounds and influences so the songwriting process mainly consisted of me tracking songs in as many different styles as I could and getting them over to Mather for lyrics. She did a great job of going with it on every occasion, the lyrics are fantastic, and the six songs we co-wrote on the record are the first six songs we wrote together, there are no outtakes or unfinished songs. We each had two existing songs that fit right in with the album so that was great too. My two favorites on the record right now are The Reckoning and Lonesome Whistle, they both show extremely different sides of the Heathen Apostles.
dM: What is the driving force behind the style of music you play/write?
Chopper: As far as playing, we wanted to take these great traditional instruments – banjo, mandolin, violin, organ – and come up with a different style of music than those instruments have been used for in the past. Then as far as songwriting goes sometimes the driving force is just raw emotion, usually very dark, but that doesn’t always mean it ends up being a dark song.
dM: Do you see yourselves as “label” artists or do you aspire to go the independent route?
Chopper: Well, right now we are putting out our releases on my record label (Ratchet Blade Records, we have a Heathen Apostles EP scheduled to come out by Valentine’s Day 2014), but in the future we’ll take whatever path necessary to sustain what we’re doing at whatever level we happen to be at. We’ll always want to have complete control over the sound of our music, that’s something to consider too, so if there was the right deal we’d take it. And I wouldn’t mind going back to signing the other side of the check for a while!
(You can check out the Heathen Apostles debut album Boot Hill Hymnal HERE.
