Track By Tracks: Die Another Day - Wild Fire (2020)

1. Ignite the Flame:

As we were getting ready to go into the studio, I had the idea for an intro track to “Wild Fire.” Just off of the words I had written down, our producer, Jesse, and I threw together the track that we felt best described these lyrics and really gave us the proper introduction into this EP/ first full track.

2. Wild Fire:

This is where the head-banging begins. Jared wrote this very aggressive riff and began adding all the extra synth parts that really make the song come together. To us, this is a song that really knocks you off your feet; when that chorus hits the first time, all I could picture was a crowd exploding into this giant mosh pit, and if you aren’t moshing, then those gang vocals will get your voice nice and warm when you join in on the fun. The lyrics are based upon my experience of living in negativity (both physically and mentally.) It becomes draining and tends to send you into a downward spiral. If you were to continue on this path, you’d find yourself losing a lot of relationships with loved ones, and end up really stuck in an endless cycle of burning every bridge/ connection to your life that you’ve made.

3. Razorblades:

This has to be one of the most powerful pieces of music I’ve heard Jared write. It really encapsulates the style of music we wanted to go for when writing out this EP. The lyrics are very hard-hitting, and cover a serious subject through his relationship with alcohol which he has chosen to end. You can really feel the struggle that he’s gone through when you listen to the lyrics, and the music perfectly compliments that internal struggle. The amount of work we put into recording this one was another step forward for us too. We didn’t stop writing or working on this even through recording. Every time we stopped while in the studio, it seemed like one of us or Jesse, would have an idea of something to add, whether it was to the vocals or any of the instruments.

4. Green Eyes:

Metalcore bands can write love songs, right? This song was probably the biggest collaborative effort for us to write. It’s a lot more progressive than anything we’ve previously worked on, Jared and I wrote these lyrics together (we spent months bouncing lines back and forth to each other,) and it was a lot of fun to get to try so many different things in the studio for some of these sections. We added a couple of sections from the original demo and even our original performance, so it’s really cool to see it change and evolve into the final result from start to finish.

5. Fear the Future:

We like listening to different genres and trying them out within our songs. They don’t always pan out, but I think we hit the mark with this one! Jared challenged me to write lyrics like a nu-metal/ rap song I had written for a previous band, and this was the result. The verse is the right tempo that you could probably even change the style/ instruments used to make it a rap song. Still very aggressive, and hard-hitting from start to finish. The style of chords that were chosen in the verse really express the struggle that we talk about in the lyrics, whereas the more resolved sound and feel through the chorus really ties it together perfectly. I think I definitely put Jared through hell the first week or so of him having to both learn the words as well as learn how to get enough air to scream them at the same time.

6. Poison IV:

This song originally just went to the breakdown after the first chorus then ended. It was an attempt to see if we could write a metalcore song that was to be played by a punk band. It uses some slightly different music theory then we’ve ever used before and took a lot of work to really figure out how to blend a couple genres and styles together that we don't typically use. This one really pushed our boundaries. Lyrically, it covers a situation in my life that is really hard to explain or understand for me, so it’s written from the perspective of someone else through the conversations I had with them about said situation. It also wraps up our EP perfectly through the piano outro that Jesse helped us write plus add-in.