Rage of Angels played their first ever show in the Diamond Rock Club, Ahoghill on 21st June 2014. Prior to that show I’d talked to founding member Ged Rylands (formerly of Ten and now a member of Tyketto) on the Friday NI Rocks Show.
The show was originally broadcast on 13th June and was then available for 8 weeks via the On Demand Player. The show from 13th June which includes the interview can be heard at http://www.mixcloud.com/NIRocks/
A transcript of the interview is posted below.
Rage of Angel’s debut album “Dreamworld” was released in February 2013 and featured a number of vocalists including Danny Vaughn, Robert Hart, Ralph Scheepers and Harry Hess. In the interview, Ged talks about the upcoming tour and debut gig in The Diamond Rock Club as well as the selection of a permanent lead singer, plans for the second album and more. We then discuss four tracks from the album which are played on the show.
NI ROCKS – Ged, thanks for takings some time to talk to Rock Radio NI. I appreciate you’ve a busy few weeks ahead, both with Tyketto and Rage of Angels. It’s the latter band I wanted to focus on. For those who aren’t aware, can you tell us how Rage of Angels came into being?
GED – First of all Nigel, thanks for inviting me on, it’s great to be on the show. Rage of Angels, was never meant to be to be honest with you. It came about from me building a home studio just for a hobby, just for something to do to keep myself sane and stop myself spending ridiculous amounts of money going out. I built a studio and started to record things that had been going around in my head for many many years. It was only supposed to be a hobby and I made the mistake of starting to play the stuff I was recording to people who were still in the music industry. It kinda snowballed from there; from being a hobby and writing songs at the weekend to actually coming out as an album. The monster that was never supposed to be. I was persuaded to come back into the music industry against my better judgement, but I’m glad I did now.
NI ROCKS – I’m sure there are many who would agree. You were out of the scene for about ten years weren’t you?
GED – I was. It was almost exactly ten years since the last thing I did. The last show I did was a Z Rock Show and I remember standing on that stage and for the very first time I thought to myself, I’m absolutely hating this, I don’t like what I’m doing. I was in a very bad place personally and there was all sorts of things going on. I’d just had my daughter and I was having to bring her up on my own, and there was too much going on. I wasn’t enjoying music and I made a decision to come out of music. I never thought I’d come back in to be honest.
NI ROCKS – The album “Dreamworld” was released in February of last year and featured a number of lead vocalists. For touring you’ve announced Jason Morgan as singer. How difficult was it finding one person to cover the material to your satisfaction?
GED – It was incredibly difficult. The problem was that we that we didn’t have just any guys on the album, we had people like Harry Hess, Danny Vaughn, Robert Hart, Ralph Scheepers. You go from Ralf Scheepers who has a very distinctive, heavy metal, higher tone voice to someone like Robert Hart who has got a real dusky growl, classic rock voice and then you’ve got everything in between. You’ve Danny, Harry Hess, David Reed-Watson and Matti Alfonzetti that really cover that whole spectrum of tones. So trying to find someome who could not only re-create some of those voices, but who could move forward as the voice of Rage of Angels, because album two is in production now. It has been written, it’s probably a year late because I’m a bit busier than I thought I’d be. Trying to pick the voice that I wanted to do the songs live was a secondary consideration. My concern was getting the new album with the voice that I wanted to take it forward. With Jason Morgan, he’s not only been able to fit into what the new material will sound like, he has been able to take the songs from the first album and make them his own. He’s got the most the most incredibly powerful voice and the songs are taking on a new dimension, especially live. He was a real find. He was an unknown guy from Wales; he’s not unknown in Wales, but to the rock audience that we have he’s going to be a brand new name and he’ll definitely be a name that’s on everyone’s lips once they see those shows.
NI ROCKS – Any idea when that second album will be out?
GED – (Laughs) It should have been out last year. I would imagine, tentatively next Easter. But the release date for that has just coincided with the American shows for Tyketto, so who knows. I/m going to busy myself away for a few months after this run with Tyketto and Rage of Angels. I’ve got a couple of months where I don’t have any shows and don’t have any commitments so I’m going to do as much as possible to get the album as finished as possible and then we’ll just take it from there.
NI ROCKS – The Rage of Angels tour kicks off in the Diamond Rock Club in Ahoghill on Saturday 21st June. Are you looking forward to that show, where else are you playing and what other plans do you have for Rage of Angels?
GED – Very much looking forward to the show. We all are. We’ve got management over there and we’ve got friends over there. A lot of friends in England have been ove rand played gigs in The Diamond and every single person has come back and said “wow, what a crowd” and“you’ll love it, it’s a special place like nowhere else”. It’s one of those places where not one single person has anything but total praise for and everyone has special memories of. We’re very much looking forward to it. This is going to be the very first Rage of Angels show, and there’s a lot of pressure to deliver so we thought there’s nowhere else really that would be best suited to go and do it and which would hopefully make us feel very welcome and relaxed so that we can make it a special evening.
NI ROCKS – We’re very fortunate to have it on our doorstep. It’s a great club.
GED – Some legendary names have played there, week and week out. Derwin’s a great guy and he’s looked after us already so we’re very much looking forward to getting out on that very small stage I’ve been told (laughs).
NI ROCKS – After the Diamond you’ve a few weeks before the next gig.
GED – After the Ahoghill show we’ve got a couple of weeks where we’ve downtime and I’m able to do other things with Tyketto. Then we’re out on the mainland UK. We’ve shows in Stourbridge on 9th July, Bolton Railway on 10th July and then up to Scotland, in Dumfries on the 11th . Hopefully we’ve got another couple of shows to add in which we can confirm really soon. Then the week after we’re at Vasby for the open air festival in Stockholm.
NI ROCKS – A change of subject slightly. You’ve just done your first radio show for Firebrand that went out last Friday, around the same time that my own show goes out. Thankfully with podcasts etc people aren’t having to choose between your shown and mine (laughs). How did you get involved with Firebrand?
GED – I know Rick Palin who is the owner of Firebrand and I just got an e-mail message out of the blue saying do you fancy doing a radio show. I thought that’s a bit mad, then I thought about it and said yeah it could be fun, but didn’t think it would go anywhere. But within two hours they were talking about schedules and that kind of stuff and I thought I’ve got myself in a bit deep now but lets give it a go. If its terrible at least I’ve tried. I thoroughly enjoyed doing it. The feedback was superb and they were pleased with the ratings. If I can give anyone a couple of hours of enjoyment and entertainment then I’ll keep doing it. As long as people want it and enjoy it then I’m happy doing it.
NI ROCKS – The album “Dreamworks” came out last year and I was wanting to ask about the writing and recording of four tracks that you’ve picked out and which we’ll play on the show. The first of those is “See You Walking By”.
GED – “See You Walking By” is one of those songs that I’ve had in my head probably since the Ten days. I’ve had the chorus in my head. It started off as a very slow paced ballad and it was going to be slow tempo. I started recording it that way and one day I was messing around with the riff and I just suddenly speeded up the tempo on it. And it suddenly worked, because it hadn’t been. I then heard something like a Journey song, something like “Be Good To Yourself”. It was that kind of vibe to it. I thought, “Oh, I know where I’m going with this song now”. I didn’t have the lyrics for it and I was thinking who could I get to sing it. And Harry Hess was mentioned. I actually tailored the lyrics to his style of vocal and that is the only track on the album that I did tailor to the particular vocalist. Everyone else just sort of came in and we chose the tracks, but with Harry we actually wrote it in the Harem Scarem style. That was one that started as a ballad but ended up as quite a fast paced song. It’s one of my favourites on the album.
NI ROCKS – The next track we picked was “Falling”. You want to tell us a little about it?
GED – That’s another one that started off with a different riff and almost a different style. If you can believe that it was darker because it was! Then one day I was playing around with the riff and tried something and it came to live as more of a power metal song. When we were talking about vocalists for the various tracks Ralf Scheepers name was mentioned and instantly “Falling” came to mind because it was in his range and it was in his style. It’s a bit more power metal than some of the other tracks. When we got the vocal track back it was outstanding. He actually e-mailed me and said he’d had the hairs on his arm stand up and it had given him goose-bumps. He said he hadn’t felt so passionate about a song in five years, which I thought wow. To have someone like Ralph saying that about your material is great. It’s the real symphonic power metal track on the album. Flawless vocals by Ralph Scheepers.
NI ROCKS – The next track we’re going to talk about is “Through It All”.
GED – Features the vocals of Robert Hart. I’ve known about Robert Hart ever since the very first days of Ten. When we put Ten together and got into rehearsals you swap all kinds of stories and Vinny Burns used to tell me that his favourite vocalist was a guy called Robert Hart. I think Dare had done tours in Europe and Hart was part of the three band line-up. And he kept telling me how great this vocalist he was and then of course I got to know his material with Bad Company and stuff. So when his name was mentioned as a possible vocalist for the album I jumped at the chance. This was the first track he recorded. The minute I got the vocals through it brought everything to life. You write the song and live with it day to day but when you get the vocal on top that brings the magic to life. I gave him a basic melody for it, but he just brought years of experience to it and did a magnificent job. In many ways it helped bring his rock career back to the attention of people that mattered. He’s doing his own Diesel album.
NI ROCKS – Yeah, I’ve been listening to that album. It’s a great album. (http://www.rockradioni.co.uk/back-stage/music-reviews/1569-ni-rocks-recommends-qinto-the-fireq-by-diesel.html)
GED – It is a great album and there’s a real resurgence there. I’ll glad that we had some kind of part in bringing him back. He’s an absolutely incredible vocalist.
NI ROCKS – Our last track to talk about is “We Live, We Breathe, We Die”
GED – “We Live, We Breathe, We Die” - when I started to write it was about someone very very close to us here at home who had died. He took his own life. I wanted to tell his story because it was quite remarkable and I wanted to remember him in some kind of way. And at the time I started writing this particular song we has six deaths in our families within two years. So it started off as a tribute to one person, but actually in the end it was about all the people that we had lost who were very close and dear to us. It’s a song I think more people identify personally with on the album because it brings memories of their own loved ones that they’ve lost and it touches a lot of people.
Having heard “Through It All” I was really adamant that Robert Hart should sing this song. This was the last vocal we had for the album and Robert agreed to do it. On the day that Robert was supposed to record the vocals his uncle died and he was very close to his uncle. So he ended up recording the vocal track a week later. He e-mailed me and said he put a lot of emotion into it. It was a very emotional day because the lyrics had touched him, thinking about his own loss. He said how much the song had meant to him personally. So there’s a lot of emotion has gone into that track from everyone who has played on it. We played it in rehearsals over the weekend and there wasn’t a dry eye in the room. It’s one of those songs. It means a great deal and I hope when we go out live it will mean a great deal as well.
NI ROCKS – Ged thanks very much. I look forward to seeing you on the 21st, but before that you’ve Download with Tyketto.
GED – Yeah, we’re on the Friday night. I forget which stage but who cares. It’s Castle Donnington and it’s somewhere I’ve wanted to play my whole life since I was 12 years old stood in that field.
NI ROCKS – Thanks very much for taking the time to talk to us.
GED – You’re very welcome, look forward to meeting you in Ahoghill.
Check out https://www.facebook.com/RageOfAngelsUK or http://www.rageofangels.co.uk/ for more information.
Check out NI Rocks on Facebook – www.facebook.com/NIRocks or Twitter - www.twitter.com/NIrelandRocks