By James Wright

Remember that track 'Guilty' by Gravity Kills? They were part of the whole "industrial" explosion a few years back and had a track on the "Mortal Kombat" soundtrack? For those left wondering what did happen to Gravity Kills, this is your answer. Living proof that having a hit 'single' on the radio doesn't last forever is Gravity Kills. A great band that, because of unfortunate circumstances, fell by the wayside on a major label. Now the band is back with guns ablaze, readying the release of their 3rd effort entitled 'Superstarved'. The first single 'One Thing' is already burning up radio charts for most added and most played. This band is showing signs that it will surpass itself in terms of their previous success. With a hit song on the radio, a strong backing from a new label, and an amazing live show, the pieces are in place and things are looking up for Gravity Kills. Destroying audiences on tour with Flaw and Sevendust is where Shoutweb found lead screamer Jeff Scheel to talk about the bands past, being categorized as industrial, and why it's always great to have the support of mom and dad when having aspirations of rock stardom.

Shoutweb: What happened between you guys and TVT Records? The first record went "Gold" and then you guys kind of faded away!?

Jeff: What most people don't really remember is that 'Perversion' was still a top-twenty rock record in Billboard that year! People don't remember that stuff. I think with TVT we just got A&R'd really heavily and I think you can hear it on the record. We weren't going to be pushed into writing another 'Guilty' and it was kind of a knee jerk reaction for us to push the parameters a bit. I think it was a record we needed to make regardless of commercial success. What happened with TVT is just something that happens with a million other bands and their labels and you can imagine what it was like when the honeymoon was over and our A&R guy wasn't there and we had all new faces at the label. There wasn't an A&R guy there who was passionate about what we were doing and when that happens you kind of fall through the cracks and so in March '99 we asked to be released from our contract. TVT was very cool about it because they didn't have to let us go but they did. A few months later, we signed with Sanctuary, finished off the record and here we go!

Shoutweb: Was TVT trying to push you into recording another 'Guilty'?

Jeff: Well, that's any record company. They all want you to record singles. You can't blame them for wanting hits, right?

Shoutweb: Well, their job is to sell as many records as possible right?

Jeff: Right. Our job is to write music and play shows and they wanted something a little bit similar to the first record and we didn't even want to go there. You hear the same band on both records but they are still distinctly different and I don't think that was what TVT wanted. It kind of ended up leaving a bitter taste in everyone's mouth.

Shoutweb: Well now Sanctuary has quite the roster after signing yourselves, Biohazard, Pitchshifter, and Ministry.

Jeff: After we left TVT we went through the process of submitting demos to labels and the majors were saying to us, "I just don't hear that one single," which I find kind of ironic because our song 'One Thing' was the most added song on two rock formats last week and that was one of the songs on the demo! Our manger, Gloria Butler, knew some of the people over at Sanctuary because they had some of the Black Sabbath catalogue and as you know her husband is Geezer Butler so she had worked with them before. She gave them the demo and it took us awhile to get our issues sorted out with TVT. In that time, Sanctuary put a staff together here in the US to work a record like ours. It wasn't like someone at Sanctuary strolled into a bar and saw us play or anything! (laughs)

Shoutweb: I know a few people who work for Sanctuary. I think the main difference with them is that the people that work there are passionate about music.

Jeff: Well, obviously they want to make money and Sanctuary is like a $400 million dollar company. It's a huge company for an independent, if you wanna call it that. We have major distribution now, which is something we didn't have before as TVT was self-distributed before. We met people that work at the label like Steve over in the UK and Adam Sewell who used to be in Monster Voodoo Machine works for the label up in Canada and people like him know what it's about from our end.

Shoutweb: It helps when the person running your label has been in a band and seen all aspects of the business on both sides of the fence, right?

Jeff: Right. Sanctuary started as a management company to begin with managing Iron Maiden. They see things from the artist side as well as working to further their artists career and not worrying about moving units in retail. The other thing is they are not an A&R based label so they just write you a check and you deliver them a record, which is what happened with our first record at TVT. We pretty much did that record on our own without an A&R guy looking over our shoulder and we got to do that again here. We'll see what happens with this record but I think this record is a lot more focused and that's just a result of the way the label we're on is run.

Shoutweb: Was there less pressure from the label this time around?

Jeff: I think there was more pressure than on the sophomore record cause this is essentially our second chance so to speak. We kind of reinvented ourselves. We didn't go back and try and recreate the formula we used on the first record or anything cause that's not where we're at, but I think we just had to do what we were into at the time. This record is great because it's not another 'Guilty' and it's not another 'Perversion' but it is Gravity Kills. This record sounds like it was recorded now as opposed to sounding like it was recorded six years ago.

Shoutweb: You mentioned earlier that the first single for this record, "One Thing", has been most added on both formats. The song even got more adds in the first week than both Kittie and Lenny Kravitz! That's pretty amazing. Did you expect even half the reaction it's received so far?

Jeff: I think we were optimistic but we've seen both sides of the coin so it was a guarded optimism. I can tell you that I didn't expect to get a phone call from the head of radio at Sanctuary saying we were number one most added in two formats. When I heard that I started getting choked up cause I didn't know if I ever would feel that way again about what was going on. For that moment, it was like we had won that battle but there was still a million more to fight. I called my mom, dad, and sister! (laughs) It was a great day for everybody.