Silent Lapse on BackStage Pass debuts Sunday, January 20, at 7 p.m. on WKAR-TV. Here's an extended excerpt from the BackStage Pass interview.
BackStage Pass interview with
Mitchell Feldpausch, Scott Martin, Wyatt Aldrich of Silent Lapse
Interviewed by WKAR producer Mike Mihalus
June 2012
How did the band start?
MITCHELL FELDPAUSCH (guitar) : Well the band pretty much started when my brother, Taylor and I, were making some original material. We were creating a material a while before we met these guys, but we started thinking that we wanted to play it out. Matt, our bassist, made a message board where we would talk about music on there, and Scott was on there and Taylor and I went on there and we asked scott if he would play keyboard for us, and asked Matt if he would play bass. It originally started as a one off gig kind of thing, but after that we decided this would be the band to keep going with our original material in. And we needed another guitarist once we started decided to play originals and Wyatt was the guy. We knew him from his friends and he was a talented guitarist.
SCOTT MARTIN (vocals, keyboards): At the time we didn't have a singer, we could't find one and so I just kind of defaulted into it because I just, guess, was the least of the evils, and then I got time to kind of develop a bit and kind of become more of a singer.
How do you choose songs to perform?
MITCHELL: I think we look at our set list and just try to make the most exciting thing that we would like to see. We're fans of the music just as much as performers and we like to go to shows and have the ups and downs and stuff be really heavy at one part or slower at another part. We kind of look at that, we look at how much time we have and we just order it according to what we think will be the most exciting, what will really leave the crowd wanting more at the end.
What's the best part about being on stage?
SCOTT: What I really like about being on stage, is just being able to connect with the people. Sometimes they're in the front row, sometimes they're sitting fourty feet back, sometimes they're sitting way in the back and you don't even realize they're into it until after the show. They come up to you and you get to talk with them then, but it's just interacting with people before during and after, that I just really love.
MITCHELL: I think too, it's cool when your playing in a live venue, a bigger place like this, the sound is always cool. You want to hear that bass drum and have it make a big bang, and that's fun too.
WYATT: When we're playing I think it's cool when you hear the audience singing your song back to you. You can hear it over the music, that's one of the coolest parts about playing live.
About Taylor Feldpausch (drums)
MITCHELL: Taylor's my brother, so I'd probably be the most qualified to talk about him. Him and I started playing when we were about 12, I was probably about 14 and he was about 12. I had a guitar, he bought a drum set and we've been playing together ever since in all sorts of bands. Been very few times where we've playing out, that we haven't been playing together. He's a very, very good drummer. That's his job.
SCOTT: He's probably, of all of us, it's supposed to be me, but [Taylor's] the most charismatic of all of us by far. He's definitely engaging the crowd. Even from behind the giant kit, where a person could easily shrink behind and he's always up and engaging everyone.
MITCHELL : It's good he's not in the front, otherwise he would be taking our spotlight.
About Matt Schrauben (bass)
SCOTT: Matt is one of the goofiest people of all of us. We're all pretty goofy, but he probably takes the cake. But he's also an incredibly solid bassist and he knows exactly when to play and when not to play. Which is equally important. The creative bass parts that he comes up with, you don't even realize he's doing them until like, sometimes we got to the studio and were like "you were playing that?" It's great.
MITCHELL : He's the one who after a show we will say "hey did you screw up? Yeah, we messed up a little bit yeah," and he helps and he'll say "nope, played it perfect". That's very consistent.
SCOTT: And he's right. I can never notice him messing up ever.
About Scott Martin (vocals, keyboards)
MITCHELL : Scott stepped into the singer position pretty seamlessly I think. We were practicing together for a while, all the sudden we realized that Scott had a great range and for being a quiet guy who I didn't really know if you were interested in anything, but in general, but for being quiet, the guy can belt 'em out. Since our last album, he keeps on improving and our next album is going to be awesome. It's going to be a step higher as far as vocals go because of Scott.
About Mitchell Feldpausch (guitar)
WYATT: Mitchell writes most of the musical parts.
SCOTT: Mitchell writes, just the great riffs, great songs and one of the things that's really underrated about him is the harmonies that he's been doing. Especially the last year or so, live, has just really taken us to the next level with our song. Those are things, like on the previous album, I did most of my own harmonies and you can kind of tell and I'm excited to record with his voice because I think it is perfect for the harmonies that we do. And his solos are very tasteful. He doesn't just shred for no reason, there's a reason for every note that's coming out of that guitar.
MITCHELL: And I can't shred. (laughter).
About Wyatt Aldrich (guitar)
SCOTT: Wyatt is an outstanding guitar player. His rhythms are always spot on, right with the drums, right with the bass and he's actually quiet good at playing leads as well. He doesn't always do it, but he's very solid in that way. And he down-picks like crazy and the crowd loves Wyatt's down-picking. (laughter). Lots of James Hetfield in that one.
What makes a good show?
MITCHELL: What makes a good show is first and second of all, there's got to be performance and the way that you play the songs, you got to play well, you have to be a performer too, you have to engage the crowd like Scott was saying. Those can sometimes be interchanged for one another because sometimes you do something crazy and you can't play while you're doing that, or not as well. But you know, if you're engaging he crowd and one trades off a little bit for the other, I think that's where you get the good show. As long as they're keeping eachother at the same level, those two things...
SCOTT: And I think what I found is engaging the audience doesn't necessarily take away from your performance. In fact, for me, I think it helps because it kind of, you can relax a little bit and just let the music come out and just have fun and that's what it's really about anyway.
What is 'metal?'
WYATT: Metal is my favorite kind of music to play and listen to.
SCOTT: Metal is incredibly diverse. It's not all growling, it's not all screaming at everyone. It can be, and that's fun, but it's an incredibly diverse umbrella that I don't think everyone realizes as encompasses as much as it does.
MITCHELL: Metal is full of great musicians too. Incredibly technical players and the good and bad thing about metal too is that the crowd expects you to play the parts right. And that holds you, that holds you to it, makes you a better musician.
What is the band's personality?
MITCHELL: The band's personality is a very positive. We always try to make sure that we are putting out a good message, we want to not, we don't want to use vulgarity in our lyrics, we want to, we want to make an experience that everyone can attend and listen to as well as get something from it at the same time. So that's, I think that just pretty much overall...
SCOTT: I think positive would definitely be the first word that I would use to describe us as a band.
MITCHELL: And I would say hard workers as well. A lot of our weeknights are consumed with the band and promoting and practicing. We're trying to make this what we do, so it's a, we're working hard at it.
What influences do you guys have?
SCOTT: Our influences come from all across the board. Two big ones are Pink Floyd and Metallica, Katatonia is a band out of Sweden that we've taken a lot, especially going forward now. Ohpeth, also from Sweden, the producer of a couple of their albums, we got in touch with to do our last one, to do the mix just because we love the sound of those records. And then there's other influences that are from kind of all over the map. Some singer/songwriters some black metal out of... Matt is the metal aficionado of every style. Elton John is a big influence for me.
MITCHELL: As a guitarist, David Gilmour of Pink Floyd, yeah, he's tasteful in everything he does, it seems, so we try to pull from that. I do at least.
SCOTT: I think Taylor likes Rush a lot. Or Neil Peart, at least, because he is outstanding.
