by Kenneth Morton

The Chariot will be rolling through Sounds Of The Underground this year, sharing the stage with acts such as As I Lay Dying, Trivium, Cannibal Corpse, and the almighty GWAR! We recently caught up with vocalist Josh Scogin to learn more about this exciting time.

How did the tour with POD go and what were some of the reactions you received from POD fans?
The tour was really cool. It was definitely us playing in front of new kids, which is always fun. And I think the reactions were sort of hit or miss, depending on which city we were in. Sometimes the kids were really into it and thought, “Whoa!” Maybe this is something they haven’t experienced before. And some nights, we just got the “Hey, what’s going on?” kind of look. But I think all in all, every night we’d go talk to kids. And a lot of kids were real open and real into what we were doing. It took a little getting used to, I guess.

Have you ever seen anyone out in the audience plugging their ears while you were playing?
Not physically plugging their ears, but basically, yeah – the same concept would be happening every now and again. POD can bring a generally older audience – a lot of times parents of kids would be basically plugging their ears without actually plugging their ears.

The big news is that you guys are on The Sounds Of The Underground tour this year. How did you wind up on that tour and what do you think of all the bands that you’re going to be playing with?
I’m not really sure how we ended up on it. I guess they invited us to be on it – I’m not really sure how that all works. But as far as the bands, I’m real excited just because it’s a whole bunch of bands that I’ve never been able to experience live. In a whole other way that the POD tour was new kids for us, I feel like this will be a lot of new kids for us. Even though it’s generally heavier music, it’s definitely a different spectrum that what we are. A lot of the bands that are on here are real metal, and sometime I feel like that we're not “as metal” as some of these bands will be. So it will be really cool to broaden our horizons even more. I’m always into trying new things, so I’m excited to get to know these new bands and just to see them every night.

Are you a fan of GWAR and do you plan on checking them out?
I definitely plan on checking them out. I definitely don’t know too much of their stuff. I went out to the one in Atlanta last year, and hung out with Norma Jean and Every Time I Die and few of those bands – and I definitely got to see GWAR last year. So I’m definitely excited to see what they’re gonna do this year. It’d be fun.

What can one expect from a live Chariot show on the Sounds Of The Underground?
Hopefully a really entertaining show that’s fun. And hopefully real safe and no one gets hurt or nothing.

How close are you guys to recording a new full length, and do you have a working title for it yet?
I don’t have a working title for it. Normally how I write songs and how I title them is I just have these titles I want to attribute to songs or lyrical ideas. But this CD, I’m kind of taking a different approach. I want to hear all of the songs first and let the music title the songs and the album. I don’t have a working title for it yet and I don’t even have titles for any of the songs we have written. But we’ll go and record by the end of this year – that’s the goal. And hopefully it will be out by the beginning of next year.

What direction would you like your music to go for this next album?
It’s hard to explain. It’s kind of written itself. In a way, I feel it’ll be much more deep within us. I feel like it will be a lot more punk rock. I feel like the members – we’re not very metal or hardcore. I just like trashy rock and roll and punk rock stuff where you can have fun live. I feel like at the end of the day, it will something along those lines. It’ll experience more of that nature instead of the hardcore, metal, whatever you want to call it type thing. I hope it’s brand new stuff for us. But that’s what you hope for every CD. And whether it actually pans out or not, you never know. So we’ll see.

At this point, would you consider The Chariot to be a Christian band?
Uh, yes, we’re all Christians in this band. It’s definitely a Christian band. I mean, that’s who we are. That’s the passion in our stuff. I mean, we’re just dudes in a band and those are our beliefs. Other bands have other beliefs, whether it’s political or whatever. These are just our beliefs and we stand by them. But at the end of the day, we’re just dudes – we’re human beings so I feel like we can relate to a lot of people – whether they’re Christians or not. So I feel like we can relate and hang out and at least come together in the common ground of the love of music. If we can bless them with life, then that’s awesome – and that’s what we’re here to do.

What do you think of O God, The Aftermath, and did you know Corey, the singer who joined up after you left Norma Jean?
I knew Corey real well from his old band Esocharis. We use to play with them a lot. He’s a total good dude and I love him to death for sure. And O God The Aftermath I thought was really cool. I thought it was a great record and I really thought it was cool what Corey did. I felt it was his own thing, and I have a lot of respect for that guy. I have a lot of respect for him as an artist and as a lyricist and a singer. It was awesome for me to see that continue on and do it in a way that I felt was his own. I’m definitely excited to hear their new record. They’re doing it with Ross Robinson so I can’t imagine what it’s gonna sound like.

Do you ever want to surprise everyone and come out with an all-acoustic The Chariot album?
(Laughs) I don’t know about a Chariot album, but its kind of funny you mentioned that, because I’m actually doing some acoustic stuff on my own – just for fun and for something to do. I’m almost always trying to do something new. I’ve actually got some acoustic stuff I’m doing. But I don’t know about a Chariot record. I mean to me, you’d never buy a Chariot record to hear that. You buy a Chariot record to hear Chariot music. It’s funny, because I love playing this music and I love the passion behind this music, but all too often it’s definitely not what I listen to. I listen to much more mellow music and chill acoustic stuff.

So do you have a Myspace for your acoustic music?
Yes, it’s myspace.com/thejoshscogin

Do you have any messages for The Chariot fans out here in the LA/OC area?
Definitely just thank you. I know that in the Anaheim area, that’s always been some of our best shows. It’s very, very thrilling for an artist to be so far from home – that’s almost the exact opposite end of the country of Atlanta, GA – and yet have such a great show – such a fun filled evening. So thanks to everyone that’s had anything to do with anything and hopefully they’ll continue to enjoy it.

The Chariot Links

The Chariot: Their Official Home Page!
Solid State Records: The Record Label for The Chariot!
The Chariot on Myspace: Their Official Myspace Page!
Josh Scogin on Myspace: Josh's acoustic project on Myspace!
The Highwire Daze Home Page: Return to the Main Page!

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