HOUSTON, TX, December 2, 2011 –– Epic, symphonic, and rhythmically driving, Theocracy’s groundbreaking new album, ‘As the World Bleeds,’ is a decisive demonstration of the power metal band’s outstanding musical skill, progressive songwriting techniques, and profound lyrical depth. In fact, so honed and ambitious is this band that they stand out as exotic specimens among all other metal acts currently appearing on the international scene.
Musically comparable to Iced Earth, Blind Guardian, and Symphony X, one may wonder why Theocracy is so particularly unusual, even to the point of seeming odd. Put quite simply, it’s because they’re Christians. Yes, you read that right. If you didn’t think “power metal” was a small enough niche, try “progressive Christian power metal” on for size! An oxymoron? Maybe not.
Theocracy’s lyrics are rich with Biblical philosophy and laden with thought provoking speculations. But that doesn’t impede their viability as proficient masters of metal music. This will likely strike most Americans and metal-heads alike as a serious paradox.
Cartoon celebrity Bart Simpson’s favorite metal band is brazenly dubbed “Satanica,” which offers us an interesting insight into how pop culture in the U.S.A. perceives heavy metal music. It’s safe to say that when Americans hear the term “metal music,” they immediately think of bands like Metallica, Black Sabbath, and Megadeth. It’s certainly not a genre most would equate with Christianity, let alone the complex and epic musical arrangements of European metal icons like Blind Guardian.
If you happen to be in this cohort, prepare to have your preconceptions dashed. This up-and-coming power metal group isn’t pulling any punches when it comes to epic scope or gospel truths. But before you skitter away from this page in terror, groaning, gnashing your teeth, and asking the existential question “How on earth can Christianity and metal music ever mesh smoothly?” just consider these lyrics:
“I am the thunder and the glory and the blinding light
I am the still small voice that tells you what is wrong and what is right
I am the sacrificial lamb a guilty world reviled
I am the father ever waiting for his lost and wayward child.
I AM – you cannot see me
I AM – the resurrection and the life, the doorway and the vine I AM
I AM – You cannot touch me
I AM – The bread of life, light of the world, long before Abraham, I AM.”
I AM, by Matt Smith on “As the World Bleeds”
Far from being “preachy” or falling into the traditional “praise and worship” category, Theocracy expounds the Gospel of Christ with the same accessibility and candidness that Johnny Cash achieved in his folk-driven musical legacy, albeit with a more theology-packed approach. With Theocracy, there are no pretenses, no awkward moments, and no cheap taglines; simply an eloquent stream of genuine faith, courage, and redemption. Amassing much deserved praise from the secular metal music media, Theocracy promises to bear the test of time. There is little doubt that they will soon be listed among the great metal legends such as Nightwish, Blind Guardian, and Dream Theater.
Lead singer of Theocracy, Matt Smith
No doubt, Theocracy is the answer to many a Christian parent’s prayers as they raise young metal-head children, for while their music isn’t specifically geared toward teens, it will likely appeal to many due to its infectious melodies and rhythmic tenacity.
“Turn the pages, all down through the ages,
See the Master Storyteller bring his masterpiece alive,
All the shadowed glimpses, scattered fingerprints align
And tie the threads together to the Architect of Life,
Turn the page; the story is alive!”
– The Master Storyteller, As the World Bleeds (Smith/Hinds)
The mastermind behind Theocracy is Georgia native Matt Smith, who recently spoke with us about Theocracy’s new album, an upcoming music video, his songwriting techniques, and life as a Christian power metal artist. The full interview transcript is below. Visit www.TheocracyMusic.com for more information about the band, and check out Ulterium Records and Amazon for CDs and MP3 downloads. You can also find Theocracy on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Google+.
Interview Transcript:
GRASSMAN: Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with me. Your new CD is titled, “As The World Bleeds.” What does that mean?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): It actually occurred to me in high school just as a cool idea for an album title. It’s in reference to the state of the world and the situation we’ve gotten ourselves into. The title track explores it further.
GRASSMAN: It’s a very evocative title! And in keeping with that, your lyrics are jam-packed with Biblical theology. How do you go about writing? Is there a lot of research involved or a set process?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Sometimes there’s research. It just depends; it’s different every time. Of course it always starts with an initial spark of some sort. That could be a title (as in this case), or something I read or heard that sort of got the wheels turning, and things just develop from there.
There’s a song on the album called “Altar to the Unknown God,” and lyrically it’s the story straight out of Acts when Paul goes to Athens. And, you know, in a case like that where it follows a storyline almost verbatim, it’s definitely heavily researched. While other times it’s more – I wouldn’t say stream of consciousness – but it sort of works itself out in my head.
GRASSMAN: What about your songwriting? Do you write the music or the lyrics first?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): I’ve done it both ways. A lot of times I’ll write them at the same time, but usually the melody comes first and the lyrics work out from there. I’m always writing stuff down and making notes of cool phrases or titles or whatever. Sometimes if I’m feeling really inspired I may be working on a set of lyrics that aren’t associated with an existing melody yet. So I’ll work on them, and eventually match them to a piece of music. I may have to change some phrasing and rhyme schemes and things like that. Usually the melody helps dictate the lyrics.
GRASSMAN: Well that’s really cool! I write songs myself so I’m always curious. I tend to start at the lyric end and work my way towards the music, so I’m always curious as to how other people work.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): I’m the same way. I love hearing other people talk about songwriting.
GRASSMAN: Being a Christian band and a progressive metal band definitely puts Theocracy in a minority. Would you say your listenership is predominantly Christian? Or do you share a lot of fans with secular bands like Blind Guardian and Dream Theater?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): It’s actually both. It’s hard to break it down percentage wise, but we get a lot of Christian listeners who appreciate the lyrics and every aspect of it, and alternately we have plenty of people who aren’t believers but they like the music. I think in general we have a lot of discerning fans, and I think they appreciate the amount of effort that goes into [our music] and that it’s not just thrown together. We try to maintain a pretty high level of quality control with the songs, and I think people appreciate that. So, we definitely share of a lot of fans with bands like Blind Guardian, who also dig what we do because of the quality of the whole presentation, so that’s cool.
GRASSMAN: Why do you think it’s important in our culture to have a Christian metal band?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): You know, when I started Theocracy I didn’t think of it as anything important really. It’s a hard question to answer because obviously it is important as far as getting the message across. But really, this is what I do! It’s the music that I love and it’s what I believe and that’s just how it comes out.
I remember when I was young I loved metal, so I looked for Christian bands that sounded like the bands that I liked, and found it was very, very lacking. I’m not saying it wasn’t there – I may have been looking in the wrong places – but any of the heavier Christian metal that I came across was all kind of hardcore screamy stuff. You could tell they were really trying to rip off other popular bands of the time (they’d worked out a formula down to a tee), so it came off as second-rate versions of what was already out there. [Writing my own music] was just a great way to do what I loved and get an important message across, while aspiring to a level of quality that stands the test of time and stands up to critical listening.
GRASSMAN: I completely agree. As a Christian musician myself, I’m curious. There’s a Christian crossover artist named Brook Fraser (she’s more pop than metal) who said of the contemporary Christian music industry (CCM), “I'm vehemently opposed to being called a Christian Musician in terms of the CCM music industry, and … pretty disturbed by what [much of] CCM has become -- the merchandising of the Gospel.” How do you feel about the pop Christian music scene?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): It’s an interesting issue and I do agree with her, but there’s no way someone is going to get rich in Christian metal music. Even on a mainstream level its really tough. Metal in particular is such a niche style of music, especially over here in the states. You have to be doing it for the love and the right reasons. If you’re in it for fame and riches you’re going to be sorely disappointed. Even more so as a Christian metal band!
A lot of that [CCM] stuff just comes across to me as vapid and simplistic. Not that there’s anything wrong with simplistic music, but it kind of comes back to what I was saying earlier about back in the day when I was trying to find Christian bands and they all sounded like second-rate knock-offs. I still hear that stuff, and it bugs me, because as a Christian I feel like we should be leading the charge in terms of creativity and art. I just don’t see a lot of that, and that’s something Theocracy takes very seriously. So I definitely hear where [Fraser] is coming from.
GRASSMAN: And that kind of leads naturally into my next question. Do you view Theocracy more as a ministry or as a creative project that happens to witness?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Oh wow, that’s a hard question! To me it’s both. I don’t want to give you a cheap answer here, but you know, I don’t really separate them in my head. I have to write songs. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do. Before I was doing this, I was sitting in class and daydreaming and writing songs. It’s just part of me that I can’t turn off any more than I can turn off breathing.
But it’s definitely a ministry (which sounds kind of funny, because I don’t think of us as being ministers!) One of my best friends is actually an assistant pastor now, which is very different from what we do, but a Christian’s life is always a witness of some sort. It’s definitely eye-opening some of the letters we get online. When it dawns on you how your songs are actually being used to affect lives, it’s very mind-blowing. In my case, it starts as a creative attempt to use my talents for God, in the right way, and for something positive, and over time it becomes a ministry.
GRASSMAN: And not only is Theocracy a Christian metal band, but it’s a reformed Christian metal band. Can you tell me a bit about the inspiration for the song, “Nailed?”
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yeah! It’s basically just the Martin Luther story; the situation of the church in his day, the corruption, the Ninety-Five Theses, the concept of grace, and taking on the church of his day. It’s funny – that song – I’m sure we’ll get flack for it. We had a song on our last album called “Absolution Day,” and it’s basically about how salvation is through Christ and not through religion or churches. We got all these angry letters saying we were Catholic-bashing and this and that.
That was a tiny percentage of the feedback we got, but if we got flack for that I’m sure we’ll get flack for this. Later in his life Martin Luther wrote some pretty anti-Semitic stuff, and my answer to that is just (and it’s obvious when you read the lyrics to the song) that this isn’t a celebration of Martin Luther as a fallen man, it’s just telling a story. It’s the story of what happened at a particular moment in time.
GRASSMAN: About “Hide in the Fairytale,” what’s the inspiration or story behind that song?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Sometimes song ideas – lyric wise – will come from hearing something that bugs me, and I start thinking about it, and I can’t get it out of my head, so eventually it turns into a song. Actually, “As the World Bleeds” started that way. I’d heard the question on too many times, “If God exists then why are things so messed up?” My response is, “All this stuff was laid out thousands of years ago in Scripture. We were told exactly what was going to happen; that if mankind went about things a certain way (and we did), bad things would happen. That’s where that song came from, and “Hide in the Fairytale” was kind of the same way. It was more just constantly hearing about how people are born innocent and over time become corrupted.
GRASSMAN: Sure, the “blank slate” philosophy.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yeah! But if you’ve ever been around kids who are quote-un-quote “sharing toys,” and supposedly have this quality of innocence, you know there’s no sense in it right away. That’s basically what that song is about; how the sin nature – the Jekyll and Hyde duality – is in all of us.
GRASSMAN: Yes! And it really reminds me of what Paul says about the Old Man and the New Man.
One of the songs that particularly fascinated me on the album is the song, “I Am.” Did any special idea go into the structure of the song? Did you model it after a Psalm or is there any kind of progression in the names of God you mention?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Nope. There was no plan at all on that actually, which sort of made it difficult. I’ve had that title, “I Am” on my list [of songs to write] for so long. It’s one of those where I said to myself, “I think I’ll hold on to that idea of ‘I Am’ … dot, dot, dot … and line by line insert different aspects of God.” So yeah, that one took some work!
GRASSMAN: I bet! Finding and thinking up all those names.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yes! But I’m always finding and recording little melodies, riffs, and bits of song ideas. I used to have a minidisc or tape recorder I’d fill up, but now I use my phone. Eventually I’ll say, “Oh yeah! This would go really well over here!” and stuff will match naturally.
In the case of “I Am,” the song goes through a couple verses and choruses and then transitions into a sort of upbeat Celtic section. I had it all flowing together naturally, but I couldn’t figure out how to end it! That was actually one of the … well … let’s just say the album would have been done a lot earlier if it had gotten completely written!
I’m really bad about writing 90% of a song. There is always one part I can’t figure out for like a year because I hate to force that stuff, you know? It has to happen naturally. And there are several different ways you can end a big epic like that; you can do a slow, grand reprise, or kick it up a notch and get fast. Now, three albums in, we’ve done the long song thing plenty. There are three of them on the first album, and the second had a 23-minute song.
I really love the ending in “I Am” now. I think it worked out great I think.
GRASSMAN: I agree. It’s one of those interesting songs with a really unusual structure, and yet, it works.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yeah. And that was basically a super-long answer to say that there was no real plan for that one. It was just kind of free-formed. That’s the fun part of writing for me.
Going back to the last album, “Mirror of Souls,” with the super-long title track, it wasn’t planned to be 23 minutes, it was planned to be 11 or 12, but as I was going through the story I kept thinking of more and more ideas and it just grew and grew. That tends to happen a lot when I write for some reason.
GRASSMAN: That’s so funny! I can imagine that. Beyond touring, what are your next plans for Theocracy? Are there any music videos or future albums on the drawing board?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Well, we are actually talking about doing a video. I think we’ve found a director, so hopefully we’ll start shooting that in the next month or two.
You know, it’s weird because back in the day you had to have a music video (especially as a metal band). But then in the 90’s they became a waste of money. Once MTV and everyone stopped playing videos there was no point. Now with YouTube and such it makes a lot of sense again. So, I’ve always wanted to do one. Beyond that, we’re just getting ready for shows, and Europe! We’re about to have our second tour over there.
As far as future albums, I’ve always got a backlog of songs in the works, but I don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s actually funny, a lot of the songs on “As the World Bleeds” were written back with “Mirror of Souls,” (at least the basic skeleton of some of the songs).
GRASSMAN: Speaking of previous albums, my husband has been looking for your first CD and he can’t find it. Are there any plans to re-release it?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Actually, yeah! It was basically a solo project. That wasn’t the intent. It’s just that at the time I couldn’t find anyone around here who knew what this music was, let alone would want to play it.
GRASSMAN: Sure. You’re doing a specialty thing.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yeah. So I did everything on my own as well as I could. I used a drum machine and the production isn’t very good. Also, it was a limited run. The little label that put it out is gone now, but Ulterium, the label we’re with now, wants to re-release it. I think what we’ll do is go back and record real drums and remix the whole thing.
GRASSMAN: Sure. So you still have the tracks and everything.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Yes. So, hopefully a decent sounding version will be released on Ulterium, and hopefully that will happen soon. I don’t have a timeframe yet. It’s still in the works. It’s one of those tricky things you know, because, listening to that stuff I feel like I could do it all so much better now. It was so long ago. I feel like I didn’t know what I was doing, and that I can sing better now, so I want to kind of redo the whole thing, but …
GRASSMAN: I know! I understand what you’re saying because my debut album came out in 2006, and since then it’s like I’ve got all sorts of new harmonies and ideas worked out for the songs. But at the same time albums are a milestone in your life as an artist and there’s something kind of precious about that.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Exactly. And people love that album so much. I think if we reworked it too much people would hate it, even if it was better. Like you said, it’s a snapshot in time. It means something to people as it is, so I’m just thinking of re-recording drums and remixing it and putting the same recordings out.
GRASSMAN: That’s awesome! One final question (and it’s a silly one). I’m a cat person and I happened to look on your Facebook and see pictures of Truman, your cat. Can you tell us about Truman?
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): He’s actually right here! He’s a very odd creature. He’s my best buddy. I worked in a pet store way-back-when and he was our store-cat. We brought cats in for adoption all the time, and when Truman came in – even as a kitten – he had these gigantic paws. So they thought, “Wow! He’s going to be huge! He’ll be a big fat lazy cat. Let’s make him the store-cat!” And that turned out to be a terrible, terrible decision.
GRASSMAN: Oh no!
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): He is the least laid back, friendly cat you can imagine. He’s a holy terror. I mean, he’s as sweet as they come to me and we’re best buddies, but he was not store-cat material at all. He would run around, kill the parakeets we were selling, and bite customers. So, we decided he had to find a new home. My girlfriend at the time (now my wife) took him in. He’s been my best buddy ever since.
GRASSMAN: And he is huge!
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): He’s pretty massive.
GRASSMAN: He’s a lion kitty.
Well Matt, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me! Good luck on your tour and with the music video.
THEOCRACY (MATT SMITH): Thank you!
About Jennifer Grassman:
Singer, songwriter and pianist, Jennifer Grassman is an award-winning recording artist based in Houston, Texas. Subscribe by RSS feed and read more from Jennifer at www.JenniferGrassman.com. You can follow Jennifer on @JGrassman or Facebook.com/JenniferGrassmanMusic
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