Interview with John Campbell of Lamb of God
By Robin Steeley
Richmond, Virginia's Lamb Of God began in1990 in a drafty damp basement, writing songs and crafting their unique
sound. The formula was one that soon had them creating waves in the local underground circuit under the name Burn
The Priest. They released a self-titled full-length album and soon changed their name to Lamb of God, a name that
would soon become known worldwide after they signed to Prosthetic Records and released ‘New American Gospel’ to
critical acclaim and eventually follow up album ‘As The Palaces Burn’ which led them to a new deal with Epic
Records. They have recently released “Ashes of The Wake” to critical acclaim and as the Sounds Of the Underground
tour is just beginning, we got a chance to catch up with John Campbell. After initially not being able to hear each
other, we finally settled into our conversation. He has an amazing southern drawl and an easygoing personality that
makes him easy to talk to.
JC: I’m almost to the front door. Can you hear me now? How you doing today?
Crave: I am nursing a hangover. A major one. A wine hangover, the worst. Now I know why I don’t drink wine. JC: Yeah all the sugar in wine will give you a major hangover. I had a little bit of one when I woke up
this morning myself but I didn’t have time to slow down for it.
Crave: So where are you and what are are you up to today? JC: Everything! I’ve been running around taking care of errands getting ready for the tour, trying to
get stuff set up for my wedding when I get back. We’re leaving here Thursday so I don’t have much time left.
Crave: That’s when the Sounds of the Underground tour starts? JC: It starts this Saturday and we have to leave this Thursday evening to get to the place Friday
morning so we can do sound check and production meetings and stuff like that, and It starts Saturday in Lowell,
Massachusets.
Crave: So what do you think of the line up for the SOTU tour? JC: It’s fucking incredible. I’m really excited about watching Gwar play every day. We’re from the same
hometown but I still don’t get to see them play as often as I would like. And there’s also bands like Strapping
Young Lad, High On Fire, Every Time I Die, Unearth, Opeth, and Clutch, it’s a pretty strong line up they have for
that tour.
Crave: Have you guys been celebrating the success of ‘Ashes of the Wake’? JC: I guess we are. We haven’t really stopped to celebrate it too much, we've just been working our
butts off trying to keep pushing it and get out there and do the right tours. It’s definitely cool how well the
record has done but we are already looking forward to the next one and trying to figure out how it’s going to top
“Ashes”.
Crave: How has the response been to the re-release of ‘Burn the Priest’? JC: It’s been great, it’s sold amazingly well and it’s a chance for us to have everything we’ve ever
done be distributed on that level and it’s a pretty cool thing.
Crave: What was it like filming the “Killadelphia” DVD? JC: It was two nights, and it was intense. We had never filmed a show like that, with that many cameras
on us at one time. The crowd was incredible both nights that we did it, it was two sold out nights at the Trocadero
in Philly. It was amazing, looking at the footage it turned out incredibly well.
Crave: Are people still doing the wall of death even though it’s not really included in your set? JC: yeah people are still doing it, it’s a lot cooler the way it goes now rather then Randy directing
the crowd. Those who feel up to doing it will do it on their own, and that way there’s not quite as many people
involved so its not quite as brutal and people aren’t getting hurt quite as badly as they were when we were doing it
before.
Crave: Ozzfest was insane. That’s some of the most violent footage I’ve ever seen. I watched it happen from side
stage and I was just blown away. It was brutal. I’ve seen a lot of pits and I’ve never seen anything like that. JC: Yeah, seeing all the kids going to the paramedics and people with broken thigh bones and stuff, we
felt some responsibility in all that so we changed the way we do things. I couldn’t imagine how bad it would suck to
break your thigh bone in a pit. Our fans are pretty hardcore.
Crave: What do you do in your downtime, what’s a perfect day off for you? JC: Wake up with my puppy licking my face, take him on a walk, come home, suck on a bong, play some Halo
2, and then go out fishing. Then come home late, grab a couple beers and enjoy a little time at the house with my
girl and my dog.
Crave: Has being on tour on the road gotten any easier? JC: A lot of the magic, the romance has worn off. It’s a job now. In some ways it’s gotten easier, I
could do it with my eyes closed at this point. But it is a job, and the difficult thing with it is there are people
who have their tickets for the day of the show, and they are excited, and can’t wait and that’s the day they are
gonna let loose and party, and they expect the same energy from us, and I’m all for it, but by the end of the tour
it gets tiring keeping up. We just did that Slipknot tour which was nine weeks and I was definitely feeling burnt
out towards the end, but I never felt like it affected my show as much as just my mental stability when we weren’t
playing.
Crave: How has the metal scene in general changed over the last ten years? JC: I think the biggest difference in the attention being paid to it. We have been doing this for ten
years, and a lot of the bands that are our contemporaries we’ve been playing shows with for ten years, and we are
all essentially the same dudes, we just managed to make It our jobs and keeping with the goal of trying to make the
most brutal music that any of us can. I don’t know if its something were involved in, or just lucky enough to be
there when it happened but metal has definitely made a huge comeback.
Crave: What is the writing process like for you this time around? Was it hard to write under the labels time
constraints? JC: We’ve actually been talking about that recently, were going to start focusing on writing this fall,
and in order to give ourselves a little more time rather then the four months we had last time. Ashes was the first
record from us through Epic, and they were very interested in getting a record from us as soon as possible, so there
was some serious time constraints there, but now that we are in the fold and know the situation we have the ability
to plan and make it where we don’t have to scramble quite like we did.
Crave: that always helps, having a little bit more time, but sometimes when you’re working under pressure like
that, what you produce ends up being so raw and so brutal, that there’s no tampering with it, and I think that’s
what happened with ‘Ashes’. JC: Oh yeah, it ended up working perfectly for us, we had four months to write, rehearse, and record
those songs and we just put our noses to the grindstone and got done what needed to get done, and the tension and
the stress from the limited time helped to create a pretty amazing record.
Crave: What was working with Machine like? JC: It was amazing he’s a great dude. It took me a while to actually call him Machine, cuz I thought
that’s a really weird name to call a dude! (laughing) but he’s a super great guy, definitely very musically tuned in
and he came in there listening, critiquing, and coming up with ideas and ways to improve and change things in
general. It took us a second to swallow our pride and listen to them because we had never allowed anyone in like
that before, but we just went ahead and did it as an exercise and it turned out that some of the ideas he had were
great. He was great to work with; I consider him a friend and look forward to catching up with him when we get to
his town.
Crave: Do you have a favorite song off the album? JC: That’s like picking a favorite kid. We’ve been opening our set with “Laid to Rest” and its great to come out
and hit that first note and the crowd just goes apeshit. “Something to Die for” is always a good one. I can tell you
“A Faded Line” is one of my least favorite to play, it’s just a boring song to play on bass, its all right hand, no
left hand. But it gives me a chance to catch my breath and maybe stick my tongue out at the audience a little bit
or something stupid like that.
Crave: What did you think when you guys were banned from the Forum in LA? JC: At first, I was offended, but then I started to think about what that meant, and the way It ended up
playing out was one of the greatest things that could have happened to us on that night. Because of us being banned,
and with metal coming up in the eyes of the mass media, we were picked up by a bunch of news services about being
banned from the show and more people heard about Lamb of God because we were banned, then if we had just gone ahead
and played the show. It was kind of silly because we are not the band that they think they banned. The band that
they let play with Slipknot is a lot closer to the type of band that they thought we were. I remember a quote
released from these people and they said “Well they used to be called Burn The Priest and we assumed that they had
anti religious lyrics”. It ended up working out great for us; we went and played a headlining show that was bigger
for us anyway.
Crave: Do the brothers (Will and chris) ever have any sibling rivalry? JC: No they get along great (laughing) occasionally they bump heads, but we all bump heads. We’ve known
each other for fifteen years and spent a lot of time together. We all butt heads on a brotherly level.
Crave: Which is better, Arena shows, festivals, or smaller clubs? JC: They all have their good and bad. Arena shows are incredible when you’re playing in front of a bunch
of kids, but sitting in a locker room surrounded by cement and cinder block waiting for your set time and then
afterwards same locker room, its pretty god damn boring. They put those arenas away from anything cool to do, so
you’re pretty much stuck at the arena. Festivals are amazing, because you have the opportunity to play in front of
people who are not there for your band, who are there to see someone else, and you end up with new fans. The
partying backstage at festivals is a lot more fun because there’s a whole lot more people backstage partying. The
small clubs are the coolest for us cuz they are generally located in the city, there is cool stuff to do around the
clubs, and you feel much more attached to the people you are playing for because they are right fucking there, its
not like they are 30 feet away from you.
Crave: When you play shows like that, is there any tension after what happened to Dimebag? JC: I would like to think that they have stepped up security, but that was such a freak incident, and if
someone really wanted to do that, no amount of security could really stop them. It’s different at every venue. I
don’t think it will happen again in my lifetime, at least I hope it wont, and it was a horrible tragedy.
Crave: The way he was, always bringing everyone up on stage to do songs, and I think if he had survived that
accident he would have gone on to do the same thing, inviting people up on stage, its just how he was. JC: We saw him in Texas a few weeks before he was in Portland and he did the same thing, he brought us
up on stage, made us feel at home and was just the friendliest dude you could want to meet. I could think of a few
other assholes it should have happened to instead of him.
Crave: What’s in the near future, what happens after SOTU? JC: I get married! Then Randy gets married! Then we start working on the new record, we are entertaining
the idea of doing some limited touring in the fall, and we will probably go back to Europe before the end of the
year, but its time for us to get real serious about writing and recording again by the end of the year.
