In a new interview with the Columbus, Ohio radio station 99.7 The Blitz, FILTER frontman Richard Patrick spoke about how the music industry has changed in the 32 years since the band’s formation. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “Streaming has taken a massive, massive toll on our industry. [FILTER‘s debut album, 1995’s] ‘Short Bus’ was written and recorded and we made the record for, like, three or four hundred thousand dollars. Now we make records for 20 grand, 40 grand. We are streamlined. Everyone has their own computer, a studio system with preamps and compressors and stuff like that, but they’re all in our bedrooms. So I’ll send the song to Jonny Radtke [FILTER guitarist] to have him do overdubs or Bobby Miller [FILTER bassist] to have him play bass. And then I’ll take the song, as it is when it’s completed, to a studio with my drummer, and we’ll record eight songs in a day drum-wise in Stag Street [a studio in Burbank, California]. And that usually, just that right there was, like, 50 grand to do drums back in ’95. So we’ve had to learn how to save money, be thrifty. And that’s the difference.”
Richard continued: “And other things, like movie soundtracks. We made so many movie soundtracks back in the ’90s — ‘Demon Knight’, ‘The Crow: [City Of Angels]’, [the song] ‘Jurassitol’, we did ‘Trip Like I Do’ with THE CRYSTAL METHOD for the ‘Spawn’ soundtrack. And those paid a lot of money, so those made a lot of bills go away. But now there’s no soundtracks anymore. It’s not like the old days.
“Everyone’s, like, ‘What’s the difference between now and then?’ It’s really the business — the business has completely changed,” Patrick explained. He went on to say that because recording technology has evolved so much, “a lot of really great people are not being paid what they deserve — engineers. I’ve had to learn how to become an engineer,” he said. “I’m recording myself in front of my computer, in my studio, and I have a big microphone and a bunch of preamps and stuff like that. And I sit there and record it, and I’m the only one there. There used to be like a guy behind the glass, someone running a tape machine. It was a big operation. And hats off to the next gen, like Billie Eilish, her and her brother Finneas with a laptop making amazing music. Same with Rezz. She’s amazing. I love her. So it’s all good. It’s just different. But creatively, it’s awesome to be in this world with technology being so freeing.”
Last month, Richard told Kevin McKay of Florida’s 99Rock WKSM radio station that he is currently working on the follow-up to FILTER‘s 2023 album “The Algorithm”, tentatively titled “The Antidote”.
Patrick recently wrote a song called “The Gunslingers Of Redemption” and composed all the music for writer-director Brian Skiba‘s just-released western “Gunslingers”.
Richard had previously composed soundtracks for several films, including “Dark Crimes” (2016) and “Last Rampage” (2017). He also contributed to the soundtrack for “The Last Rampage” with his brother, Robert Patrick. In addition, he has composed music for TV series like “Comedy Kitchen”.
“The Algorithm” came out in August 2023 via Golden Robot Records.
Originally conceived in 2018 as a collaboration between Patrick and fellow FILTER founding member Brian Liesegang, “The Algorithm” was given a tentative title, “ReBus”, as a nod to FILTER‘s 1995 debut, “Short Bus”, before being changed to “They Got Us Right Where They Want Us, At Each Other’s Throats” and later to “Murica” and then back to “They Got Us Right Where They Want Us, At Each Other’s Throats” and eventually “The Algorithm”.
Photo credit: Chapman Baehler
Source: blabbermouth.net
