UN: How did Drugs of Faith come to be after Enemy Soil had broken up?

Richard: There were a couple of bands in between the two, actually, so they're not directly connected, but the second drummer we had was the last drummer for Enemy Soil.

UN: Was there a specific sound in mind at first? Was there ever any conscious thought of moving away from what Enemy Soil had done with their sound?

Richard: The original idea came from Jeff from City Of Caterpillar with whom I started the band originally, when he said he wanted to start a punk band. I was interested in mixing grindcore with something else, I think, if memory serves. We've been called "Grind 'N' Roll" a couple of times, but the man at the label that released the CD suggested that that description sounds like Blood Duster and that we should come up with something else! But other than that, what we're trying to do is think about what is a standard thing to do with a song and avoid that. We have our influences, but we try to put them together or do something with them in a new way.

UN: I really like how the band breaks the conventions of grindcore. What would you say influences the band outside of grindcore? I almost hear an old school punk influence coming in and wouldn’t be surprised if you said Crass was a big influence on the band.

Richard: It's interesting that you say that because punk gets brought up a lot--although not Crass specifically--when people try to identify us, but we're not conscious of any punk influence, besides Shane's Washington DC scene upbringing. "Breaking the conventions" is also a phrase I've not thought to apply to us. I think that when you've been in a band for a long time you start writing in a certain direction and unless you specifically try to branch away from that, the direction will keep coming back, at least underneath the surface. So our old bands influence us, and we may write a part and be thinking of some song we've heard by a band we look up to, and that will rub off on us, but that's only in terms of inspiration. We don't go so far as to employ the technique Entombed has used in the past, which is to take a riff from another band and change it a little and call it an Entombed riff, no disrespect to Entombed.

UN: How did the deal with Selfmadegod come about? Were you looking for a label closer to home at first or does location even matter? Selfmadegod knows grindcore and is one of the best labels around right now for the style.

Richard: They certainly do. I've never approached a label based on its location before. But it seemed like a good idea based on the quality of releases on the label, and also because I've worked with the label over the years in the journalistic area. It was a lot easier to approach the label since a relationship was already there as opposed to sending a demo to Earache, say.

UN: Obviously this isn’t a band that is around for the purposes of making money or making a living. What keeps you motivated to play aggressive music? Do you consider the band an outlet for your emotions and thoughts?

Richard: Well, we'd be very happy if we could make a living at it, but a band has to make lifestyle sacrifices in order to make the commitment to go for that and we're not that type of people, at least not at this time. Sure, as many bands in the style will tell you, this type of material is very therapeutic. I can't write lyrics when I'm thinking happy thoughts, so to speak. I'm not inspired that way. But another of the main reasons is because it's fun, although it's a cliché thing to say. We have a lot more fun playing stuff like this than playing show tunes.

UN: Seeing as though you have been involved in extreme music for sometime now, do you feel disconnected at all with the current state of music? It seems that music right now is all about record sales and looking a certain way. Not that it hasn’t always been like that, but that was always reserved for pop music, not heavy music.

Richard: I guess an argument could be made that heavy music has had its share of image consciousness since day one. Remember that people will go out of their way to look like they don't care about what they look like. If you go to a show and everyone is dressed the same, it's not some random event that turned out that way: everybody wears blue jeans and t-shirts because everybody wears blue jeans and t-shirts. Crusty punks expend a lot of energy sewing on all those patches, the metal stars of the past would put on tight leather pants just like they do now, and so on. I should paraphrase from an interview I did with the old bass player from Entombed back in the '90s, in which he said that it's all about profit nowadays: the label says to the new group, "A-ha, you're a death metal band! Okay, you'll record at Sunlight, get Dan SeaGrave to paint the sleeve, and we'll take care of the rest." So that sentiment has been around for a long time. These days I think things in the area of image are getting a lot more extreme. You could always usually tell a metal band or a punk band by looking at them, but today you can also tell a metalcore band or a screamo band just by looking at them, too.

UN: You have gone through quite a few member changes since the band was formed. Do you feel like you may finally have a concrete line-up?

Richard: We certainly hope so! We are all enjoying playing together, we are friends, the song ideas keep coming, and we juggle our schedules so we can get together and practice. Unless something crazy happens, I don't see any changes.

UN: Do you think it is important to play with friends? It seems like bands sometimes are made up of people that don’t like each other or aren’t on the same page. I can’t understand why anyone would want to play music with someone they didn’t get along with.

Richard: I can't do that, personally. Half the reason I quit one band I started was because I couldn't get along with the singer. I honestly feel that attitude is more important than musical ability. If you can't even work together, or if some of you are into the band and some aren't, at some point the band is going to have to make a change.

UN: Would you consider Drugs of Faith to be a political band? I didn’t receive any lyrics with the CD and couldn’t find any of your website. From the titles I would assume that at least a few of the songs might be political in nature.

Richard: [Note: The full version of the CD has the lyrics to the songs included as opposed to the promo.] I actually never even considered putting any of the lyrics online for the album. We used to have the sleeves and full mp3s of our past releases on the site so people could download it, packaging and all. But I would say that our post-CD material is more political than our CD, which dealt in part with relationships, which could be interpreted in a political way: personal politics, perhaps. I wouldn't call us political because we aren't politically active as a band. Some of us turn our energies towards certain causes but not as a group.

UN: I was wondering if you could possibly explain the motivation behind the band name. It was actually one other reason that I suspected the band might be somewhat political.

Richard:To be honest I stole the name from an old band I was in. We found out there were, like, four other bands with the same name, so we had a couple of brainstorming sessions, and "Drugs Of Faith" was rejected. So when we started this band I took it. So I can't take credit for coming up with it. But one way to interpret the name is to think of Marx's "opiate of the masses" quote.

UN: I read that you guys will be taking part in a Napalm Death tribute album. What song are you guys planning on doing?

Richard: That's up in the air right now, and it shouldn't be confused with another ND tribute that features Pig Destroyer and Rotten Sound among others, but if it happens, we're doing an interpretive version of "Success?"

UN: Will the next release from the band be the split with Antigama?

Richard: There's talk of our CD coming out on vinyl from a Dutch label, but beyond that, yes.

UN: Do you think we can possibly expect a full length album any time in the near or distant future from the band?

Richard: Most definitely! We'll have to write a lot of songs, though. At this point a four minute song to us is an epic!