But continuing line-up changes, delayed albums and tours, and near-bankruptcy can’t keep a great band down. We spoke to Weinman on the eve of his band’s latest tour, to support the group’s third and most diverse full-length, “Ire Works.” Naturally, the tour had been delayed due to Weinman’s broken foot, obtained during a video shoot.
How’s your foot?
It’s OK. Broken feet take a while to heal, it turns out. I’m a bit worried about the tour…is my foot gonna work?
You’ve had a lot of injuries in this group.
Yeah, we need a cleansing. We’ve had our share of accidents—one of our guitarists had nerve damage in his hand. I tore my rotator cuff. I have a herniated disk in my neck.
I heard at one point you had to hire a masseuse.
[Laughs] Not quite. A friend of ours is a masseuse, but he’s been in bands and helped out on the road. I brought him along at one point to do some tech stuff, and then he also helped me stretch and kept me going when the pain was bad.
Do you ever look around at the band and think, “Wait, who’s in the band this month”?
Yeah! We’re kind of the like the Dillinger Collective. I’ve kept a close watch on this band, though. I’ve been the band Nazi, for better or worse. I’ve kept it going forward no matter who was in the band. Until recently, it was just me and the drummer who were the only original members in the group. And when he left…well, he was a big part of our sound. I wasn’t sure if we could keep going…but then I realized drums don’t write songs. I decided we could evolve.
Did you know your new drummer [Gil Sharone] starred in an episode of “Full House”?
He did! It was awesome. One day, I don’t know why, we were watching “Full House,” and he’s like “Oh shit, that’s my jam!” It turns he and his twin brother were on one episode, but he claimed we’d never find it. But I searched the earth, and we found the episode. They were Uncle Jessie’s kids, or something.
Besides being the guitarist and lone remaining founding member, you are also the group’s manager. How do you have time for that?
It is time-consuming. It can be a source of problems in the band, but I’ve kept us going. We’re in a weird spot—we do well, but we have to be frugal. I’ve done this out of necessity. I’m the one hustling to get us to shows, photocopying fliers, talking to people overseas about a tour, getting plane tickets.
Last year you covered Justin Timberlake [“Like I Love You”] on an iTunes-only EP. What brought that on?
It was just for fun. There was no objective. We approached it the same way we did our Soundgarden and Nine Inch Nails covers. The thing is, Greg [Puciato], our singer, didn’t have a lot experience in our type of music when he started. His friends were into hip-hop; he didn’t have a metal or hardcore background. He listened to a lot of soul. That song was just an opportunity to use some of his influences.
A guy on punknews.org compared your audience to that of Avenged Sevenfold. He said: “Avenged might have more fans, but the ones at Dillinger shows are fatter and tougher…even the chicks.”
[Laughs] I don’t know. I do know our audience is more diverse than most metal bands. I’ve seen 60-year old guys in the front row of our shows. We get every shape, age and color…but yeah, not a lot of hot chicks.
Would you rather have your hardcore fanbase and critical accolades, or a gold record?
It’s hard to say. I’m proud of what we are. I don’t pay attention to the other hype…it’s not relevant. For one, I don’t listen to music in our “scene.” I’ll read all these reviews of bands supposedly sounding like us, and I wonder about it, because I know the intention and attitude that goes into each of our songs. I don’t really hear it; I guess it’s just easier to describe something as a “Dillinger Escape Plan ripoff” if you can’t think of anything better.
