By James Wright

Shoutweb: Have your parents always been supportive throughout the years?

Jeff: Well at first they were reluctantly supportive as I was in bands all through high school and they always just think it's just a phase you're going through. They thought it was cool because we used to practice at my house! For them it was like, "Well, we know were he is on Friday night!" My parents have always been extremely supportive though. They know what it takes to make a career in this business as so many bands get signed but it's something like 3% of all bands that get signed will ever go on to sell 500,000 records!

Shoutweb: That's the big myth is that you become a rock star the second you get signed!

Jeff: Right, so they know what the odds are! They're really happy to see what we've already accomplished given those odds. They also know that we work really hard and that it is a 'real' job. I always get calls from friends saying, "What are you doing?" and I'll tell them, "I'm going back to the studio tonight! I was there till 3am last night!" It's really funny because whenever I'm in town my parents will come down to the show. When we were in Dallas my Dad came down and picked me up and took me out for dinner and let me do some laundry. My parents are always concerned because when they see their son get off a tour bus looking just a little bit less healthy than they'd like to, there is reason to worry. They know I'm not out there being a fucking heroine junkie though so it's kind of like they're happy that I'm happy.

Shoutweb: It's great your parents support you through everything though.

Jeff: Well, yeah, even through the tough times when we were going from one label to the other, they were supportive. What I was going through was I just didn't want to see us not get another shot because we had all this great material and I would have hated to put in all this work and have nobody ever hear it. I think my parents saw that and they we're like, "Well, you went to college and you've done this but if you really feel like you have to get this record out then do it because some day when your sitting around at 60 years old you'll be saying, "Why didn't I ever follow through on that?!"

Shoutweb: Care to explain how the name of the album came to be "Superstarved"? I read it has something to do with you guys starving to play new music?

Jeff: It was that whole thing when we left TVT. We were like jumping out of an airplane without a parachute. Would someone give us one on the way down? Maybe. So, you're scraping by, living on publishing checks, doing the odd show here and there, going into the studio everyday just wondering if we're going to be able to keep this together to be a band tomorrow. It's just a comment on both sides of this business really. One of our friends coined the term and we were like, "That's exactly what we're going through!" We had all this success with the first record and then not having the same success on the second record and then the whole rollercoaster ride of leaving the label. The word "Superstarved" is really just a comment on that.

Shoutweb: How has the Sevendust and the Pigface/Godhead tour helped to re-establish the band?

Jeff: The Pigface tour for us was good because it got us back on the road and helped us become a live band again. We were playing shows here and there but, until you play every night, there is no chance to develop chemistry. The Sevendust tour is more important because now we're touring with contemporaries and people are forced to wake up and say, "I thought this band was dead but now their on tour with Sevendust!" So they're forced into giving us another chance. This tour is also putting is back into people's consciousness, which wasn't something that happened a few years back but it is happening now.

Shoutweb: You guys seemed to be right at the tip of the whole "industrial" music explosion that happened a few years back with NIN, KMFDM and Stabbing Westward. Do you think it hurt the band as far as people's perceptions go to be categorized like that?

Jeff: You know what? It did hurt us quite a bit. When we were going to labels with all this new material they were seeing us with those glasses on. They were looking at it like, "Well, Nine Inch Nails 'The Fragile' didn't sell as well as Interscope wanted it to so…" We played like a billion shows in support of both of our previous records and there was this one guy at a label who was like, "Well, can we schedule them a showcase so we can see them play?" For us, it's like we are not going to schedule a showcase. We're not a new band! I don't know what they were thinking. So, in a way, I think being categorized as an "industrial" band did hurt us. There are elements of that in what we do but I think what we do, especially with the new record, transcends what traditional "industrial" music sounds like. We do more of a rock type of thing and we've always been more of a rock band than what people give us credit for or understand.

Shoutweb: Touring with bands like Sevendust and Flaw must help to break the band away from that categorization. Same genre of music in a sense but all vastly different sounding bands.

Jeff: I think that's why Sevendust chose to take us out. I think Sevendust wants to have different bands and in the past they took out a lot of bands that didn't necessarily sound anything like them. Fuel, for instance, whom they just toured with or even Creed. It's great for music fans to be exposed to different styles and with this tour everyone that sees the tour get a chance to see 3 very different bands. Granted, there are nights where the fans attending could give two shits about us because they're just there to see Sevendust, but that's what you go through as an opening band anyway.

Shoutweb: What kind of success are you hoping this album achieves? Are you trying to get back to the same level as the debut?

Jeff: Well, as far as the measuring sticks that are used to measure success are concerned on a commercial level, we can't control them. I'd love to sell 500,000 copies of 'Superstarved' and I'd sure as hell like to sell two million copies but at the same time we've already accomplished what we set out to do with this record, which was to get another shot. I know that may sound a bit more humble than you want to hear but it's true. We didn't know if we'd ever see another tour bus again. We didn't know if we'd ever hear another Gravity Kills song on the radio again or if I'd ever do another interview with someone like you again so for us we succeeded. I know it sounds way too fucking humble but it's fucking true and if you listen to the songs on the record then you'll know it's honest and comes from the heart. This is the most honest record I've ever been a part of whether it's Gravity Kills or any other band I've ever been in.

Shoutweb: What can anyone picking up a copy of 'Superstarved' expect if they've never heard it?

Jeff: I think this record is an incredible "headphone" record and it's very complex as far as the layering is concerned but at the same time the songwriting is not too over the top and self-indulgent. 'Superstarved' is a hard record that touches on everything from metal to electronica to rock! It's a fucking rock record but we just chose to paint with a few more colors than most rock bands do. Things like the electronics for us are just texture to the music and not something we're dependent on but it's something we do well, so why not use it?

Shoutweb: You can only be yourself, right?

Jeff: Right! I'm sure if we sell two million copies of this record we might be accused of "selling out" but we just did what we know how to do. If that's the case, and we do sell that many, then that's great because at least we will get to do another record and that's what being in a band is all about, being creative.