Dez - vocals
Meegs - guitar/backing vocals
Rayna - bass
Mike - drums
The following is the bio that is on the official Coal Chamber site [mysti.com]
If there is a thread to carry through Coal Chamber's story,
perhaps it is turbulence. Turbulencewithin the band - turbulence on stage - turbulence
in the studio - turbulence in their personalrelationships. Formed in Los Angeles in the
Spring of 1994, the band quickly recorded aself-produced demo and set out on a street level
raid that put their name on every street cornerand underneath every slimy rock in L.A.
Ensuing word of mouth quickly led to packed shows atwell-known Hollywood clubs such as
The Whiskey A Go-Go and The Roxy. Within a fewmonths, Coal Chamber were drawing as many
people to a club as locally established peers whohad been doing the rounds for 2 years.
Mixing hip hop, punk, goth and hardcore influences witha thick, molten, down-tuned riffing
style, they were marinating their sound, and sweating away ina dark rehearsal room at the
same time as then-unknowns Korn were doing the same in OrangeCounty and the Deftones in
Sacramento. In the Fall of '95, Dino Cazares of Fear Factory andproducer Ross Robinson
simultaneously brought Coal Chamber to the attention of RoadrunnerVP of A&R, Monte Conner.
Blown away by "Loco" (the demo's opener) and intrigued by Dez'sschizophrenic vocals,
Conner immediately offered them a deal. Life was suddenly easy. Theywere on the rise.
And then, it all came to a halt. According to Dez: "I met my soulmate, and she couldn't
deal with the hours, the people I had towork with, just none of it was copacetic to her.
I left the band because of her and I left it foralmost half a year. But I always missed it.
I just missed the music, missed performing, being withmy friends and making music with
them. I spent most of my days just in a haze, not reallyinspired anymore. Then my friend
Meegs came knocking on my door one day and said,
‘Look,none of the singers we've tried have been working out. We really had magic, let's go
for it again'and the rest is history." Regrouped by Spring 1995, Dez's decision to commit
to Coal Chamber bred a"no-looking-back" attitude that fueled passion and fire into their
music. From the opening lines ofthe twisted "Loco" (now the lead track to their forthcoming
self-titled album), it became clear:"Pull - steamroller rollin' through my head said
attached to loco power up coal through thesystem..." This band were here to move forward,
letting nothing get in the way. Meanwhile, onstage, the band's performances might better
have been called ritual possession, or exorcism-- asif each show were an attempt to
simultaneously reconcile the past and set a tone for the future,with the members visually
switching their appearances every few months, like writers racing tocatch up with their
thoughts. With Coal Chamber no longer a question of "if" but instead "howgood and how
soon", they put their urgency and determination together with maturedperspectives gained
from their time away. The Roadrunner deal was finally inked during Christmas of ‘95
and the band were faced with thedecision of finding the right person to lay their magic
down to two inch. Never afraid to takechances and try fresh ideas, that right person
turned out to be two, as the band gave a shot tolong time L.A. scenesters, Jay Gordon,
a local musician, and Jay Baumgardner, house engineerat NRG Recording
(home of Hootie, White Zombie and Green Day). These two were starvingfor their
first big break and had as much to prove to the world as the band. By the time the
NRGsessions were completed 30 days later, the band were emotionally and mentally
drained, and theproduction duo had proven they had the goods to compete with the
big boys. The album's style is that of a work in progress, tapping the veins of immediate
experiences.Explains Dez, "The day I started recording my vocals, my wife left me.
She left me in thedriveway of my home, taking the dog and everything I fuckin' owned.
Everything I fuckin'thought was real." Asking him "Are you alright?" before she took off,
Dez's response, "Do Iseem alright to you?," was being laid to tape in a flood of tears
10 minutes later in the studio.Those words becoming the new chorus to "Unspoiled."
"Making this record was the most difficult thing any of us has ever gone through.
We werechallenged physically, mentally and emotionally, and it was pure hell, especially
on my end. Ineeded to rid myself of all this emotion so that I could feel alright again.
This LP is like a closureto that part of my life, and a new beginning at the same time.
That was a very turbulent andchaotic period. But you know what we've since come to realize?
We thrive on that. That's whatdrives us and gives us our edge.
That's what keeps it real." Groove heavy, with a flair for the theatrical, and the
spirituality of knowing better, Coal Chamberinevitably crosses genres and styles to
present a kaleidoscopic view of a world of inner conflictsput to aural form. It's a
sound that is still evolving as you read this.
Full length:
