The Procedure
OK, lets start with the usual intro question…. a little history on the band?
Well, the guys in this band have all been friends of mine for a long time. I went to college with Jesse, Ed, and Frank. And I’ve been playing music with Mike since we were fourteen years old. Writing songs has always been one of my main hobbies, and at some point I just had too many songs written that I really felt were too good to go unused, so I started a new band with friends of mine. It was really just something to do at first, and we were all really surprised how well it worked out right off the bat. So we stuck with it. And now, almost two years later, it’s still just five weird friends.
Bill you were previously in Thursday and The Purpose, what made you move on and form The Procedure?
The last band I was in before The Procedure was Thursday. I left that band right before they signed to Victory. Partly because I didn’t want to sign with Victory, but mostly because I was not willing to drop out of school to do the band full time. So I stayed in college and graduated. And like I said, I’ve always been writing music. And at some point I just realized that I had so many songs written that other people might enjoy, it felt like kind of a waste to not try to turn the songs into a functioning band.
Were the early Procedure songs really recorded on a computer with a ten dollar microphone?!
Totally. I started dabbling with computer recording software six or seven years ago. When I started, I really didn’t have any good recording equipment at all. I’d had a nice microphone, actually, but someone stole it. So I just had this ten dollar piece of crap microphone laying around and it actually made me get really good at recording at home because I had to learn to get a nice quality out of poor gear. I actually recorded our first seven inch in a basement on my computer.
You recently released “Rise of New Reason”, what kinda of reaction are you gettin to the CD?
Response has been awesome, for the most part. We’ve gotten some strange reviews by people that don’t really listen to hardcore… like the one that compared us to Judge and Bane. Which just makes no sense whatsoever. But a lot of people have really responded positively to the record.
And how is it going down at the live shows?
We’ve been playing outside NJ a lot lately, and we’ve really only played Jersey once since the CD came out, so we haven’t had a lot of shows where kids had time to learn the words and sing along. But somehow, there were still some big sing-alongs to some of the new stuff at our record release show. I guess that’s the beauty of the internet, for you. File sharing before the album is released, and all of a sudden kids know the words for the CD at its own release show!
How did the recording of the CD go? Any problems?
Recording was great. We worked with a friend of ours, Aaron Sturman at Frankensound Studios in North Brunswick. I love recording. I wish we could do it all the time… But that’s not really too cost effective.
How did you hook up with Brightside Records?
I’ve known Clay from Brightside for a few years now. I had met him through shows in New Brunswick. Once the Procedure started playing, Clay got into us and started talking to me about how he wanted to start a label and wanted us to become a part of it. I definitely got the feeling that they were trying to start something that would be really positive for the bands, so we were excited to become involved.
Whats it like being a band in the NJ/NY area – Is the scene still strong?
Definitely. As we’ve started to tour, we get to see what the scene is like in other places as a comparison. I appreciate the scene in NJ. The kids definitely pay attention to the music and, for the most part, have a good appreciation for talented bands. Some other places we’ve been, the kids go out to shows to have a good time, which is cool, but they don’t necessarily pay close attention to the music. I love the DIY shows that go on in this area. It’s great that kids are still doing everything they can to support local scenes in the face of some of the venues and promoters that are wrecking the scene by commercializing it so much.
Tell us about this 13 song Bad Religion cover show you are doing on Nov.1st?
It’s sort of a new tradition in Jersey to have a Halloween show where some NJ bands get dressed up and cover classic hardcore/punk acts for the evening. We got on the show and chose to cover Bad Religion. They’re really the band that got me into the whole punk scene when I was younger, and they’re still one of my favorite bands to this day. We definitely don’t have too similar a style to them, but they certainly influence us as a band. A lot of my sense of melody and harmony can be attributed to Bad Religion. As well as the fact that The Procedure, like Bad Religion, always tries to put forth an intellectual musical product.
What have been the funniest and scariest moments in The Procedure?
We probably have a new funniest moment every time we have practice or get in the van for a show. A lot of them may involve things that Jesse has drawn. We just got back from tour the other day, and I feel like I spent almost the entire time laughing. I love that about this band.
We probably had our scariest moments last week on tour in Binghamton, New York. Apparently there were a lot of belligerent folks in that town who were trying to start brawls with little or no reason. The band had two incidents in the span of a few hours and fortunately, I managed to be absent for both of them!
What are 5 favourite albums?
I’m not sure if I can pick five. Six maybe? These ones I probably love equally: “Manic Compression” by Quicksand, “Against the Grain” by Bad
Religion, “Uomini D’onore” by Fireside, “Until Your Heart Stops” by Cave In, “Perspective” by By the Grace of God, and “Building” by Sense Field.
Whats been the most memorable show you’ve been to / and the most memorable one you played at?
The most memorable show I’ve ever attended was easily when I went to Metal Fest in Asbury park last year. I got to see twenty metal bands in a day, including Cannibal Corpse, and most importantly, MANOWAR. That was just a day of pure fun. As far as the most memorable show I’ve played, that’s probably our CD release show last month. I loved every band on the show, and so many people that were really important to me came out to the show
to see us perform. I might change that answer next week after the Halloween show, though. I’m really excited for that.
Your earliest hardcore memory…!
I went to some bigger punk shows when I started to get into the scene. I remember that Pennywise and Bad Religion were my first two punk shows. But my first local show, if I can recall, was Ignite and Mouthpiece at the Arts Council in Princeton. I remember it being well over 100 degrees and humid in there that day – it was in August. And as uncomfortable as it was, I had never had so much fun before. The place had a really low stage, it was so intimate… Pile ons to the ceiling, it was just great. I pretty much stopped going to bigger shows then, with a few exceptions.
In your personal Bio’s whats with the Yanni thing?!
Haha. Well, we’ve always just kind of thought that the whole concept of Yanni is hilarious. The man, the myth, the moustache. I guess our music can seem really serious, but we’re definitely not the most serious people when you spend time with us. So every now and then we try to inject some of the silliness to let people know where we’re coming from.
Any of you guys involved in other bands / zines / jobs / college?
Mike drums in another band called Underboss. Jesse and I have a few side projects, but nothing at all serious. As far as jobs and school go, I’m a full time C++ programmer and computer science graduate student, Ed is a freelance graphic artist and student, Mike works for an overhead door company, Jesse is a NJ park ranger, and Frank manages a movie theater and also works for a record store.
What are your views on George Bush and the Iraq situation?
I wish I could understand this arrogance that our country displays in international affairs. The majority of the world understands that all this violence is a terrible idea, and the United States just never cares. It’s not just George Bush. A majority of the people in this country
actually support the war, which baffles me.
Thanks for the interview, the final words are yours…
Thanks for asking good questions, and for putting together such a quality site for punk info!