Punk came along and grunge made guitar solos uncool.

The thing I like about the band [Dead Child] is that there's no pretense. We aren't even trying to be artists or poets.

I don't know if it was related to the type of music that we were doing at that time or what, but Todd Cook actually just turned to me and was like, "You know what would be a great name for a metal band? Dead Child." We talked half-jokingly that we were going to do a band. I guess as time went on, I started writing songs that were more metal sounding, and it just evolved from there. It actually started with the name first, and then the songs came second.

There are five of us. We've all played in various bands together, in different combinations. I know that Todd [Cook] and Tony [Bailey] are my favorite rhythm section - they're just like a unit. I guess we've all just played together in various capacities, so when the band was coming together, it was sort of like we just chose members because they had similar sensibilities and also because they're just cool. We all got along real well.

I stayed a kid for a pretty long time, and the logistics of being in a band, I did not take seriously at all.

In my entire life I never set out to do anything ground-breaking or pioneering, and I'm not going to start anytime soon.

You can go to any small town in America, there's going to be a metal fan there. You can't say that about post-rock.