HELLYEAH Gray’s Anomaly interview

June 29, 2007

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Hard rocking American roughnuts Hellyeah keep the power chord alive with their self-titled debut album, writes STEVE TAUSCHKE. They play Metropolis Fremantle on Tuesday, July 3.

Does ye olde team of champions necessarily maketh a champion team, as the ancient adage suggests?
It’s all immaterial to Chad Gray, noted screamer with veteran math-metallers Mudvayne and now moonlighting frontman with Hellyeah, a Southern supergroup also comprising Damageplan and Nothingface members who are hell-bent on putting the fun back into modern metal. Obviously Hellyeah encompasses more your typical hard rock grooves than Mudvayne. It’s been a refreshing move for Gray, who views it as an embrace of his musical origins.
“We wanted to bring the personality of the members out in the music,” he says. “There are so many bands out there right now where everything’s serious and completely political and anti-human. And we didn’t want to be that band. We grew up with bands like AC/DC – it’s about having a good time and letting your hair down and not listening to the preacher tonight.”
While the good times have rolled, it’s rumoured that former bassist Jerry Montano’s recent sacking was a result of letting his hair down a bit too far recently (read: being thrown out of a club after punching guitarist Tom Maxwell then threatening to return with a gun).
“I’m not going to get into it but it was definitely bizarre how it went down,” Gray says. “But we just kind of moved past it, we had to do the right thing and Jerry understood that - and that was where it was amicable. You’ve always got to keep moving forward (Damageplan’s Bob Zilla now plays bass) and I mean we’re very passionate about this. We don’t look at it as a side band, we look at this as another band that we all play.”
According to Gray, the formation and development of Hellyeah’s music has helped drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott “find his smile again,” after the tragic death of his brother, Pantera/Damageplan guitarist, Dimebag Darrell. As for Gray, he says music has given him a sense of freedom.
“I’m an artist in many areas and I can exercise the demons from my past and I can speak out on things that bother me,” he says. “It’s a very freeing experience to go and put down songs and to be able to re-live it every day. Sometimes that can be painful though if you write about the wrong thing.”
So do you have to careful what you write?
“Oh yeah! Sometimes you’re like ‘oh, I’m glad I got that off my chest’ but the next thing you know you’re singing it and re-living that experience every single day. It kind of freaks you out.
“In the beginning of Mudvayne I really wore my life on my sleeve to the point where you could go through there and see some of the stuff I’ve been through. I still do that to a certain point.”

If you’d like to win one of five double passes to Hellyeah’s show at Metropolis Fremantle on July 3 email win@xpressmag.com.au with your contact details. Please note that this is an 18+ show.

http://www.xpressmag.com.au/archives/2007/06/hellyeah_grayas.php