Wisdom In Chains : The Action Recon Interview

A few weeks back I was in Toronto for an interview with Glen Benton from Deicide. It was bitter sweet, as “Wisdom In Chains” were playing the same night and I had never seen them before. I arrived at the Deicide show early to interview Glen and about two seconds into the interview I realized that Glen Benton is probably the biggest jerk off I have ever interviewed. After some exchanges of words with Glen that were a total waste of my time, I decided, to hell with this I am going to the “Wisdom In Chains” show. I jumped in the car, tore across town and got to the venue about 35 minutes before “Wisdom In Chains” hit the stage. The show was amazing, the band was more then accommodating and I had the pleasure to sit down with “Wisdom In Chains” frontman Mad Joe Black and discuss what was going on with the band and how the whole thing got started. Check it out below.

Mad Joe, Myself and our good friend AK Ray from “Vietnom” and “Skarhead”.

1) Joe can you give us some back ground on “Wisdom In Chains” for those out there who are not familiar with the band?

Well it started out with a few guys here in PA and a friend of ours from a band in Europe called Daredevil and we all wanted to do some sort of a side project that was just straight up old school hardcore/punk. We never even had any intention of playing shows or anything like that. A lot of us had other bands going at the time, like Out Win, Krutch, Boxcutter and some other stuff as well, so it was just a side deal that we never thought would turn into a real band. We recorded our first album, put that out and just sort of went from there.

2) One of the things I have always loved about Wisdom In Chains is the way you guys have grown personally from album to album. This can really be seen in the lyrics of each album. Was this a story that you always wanted to tell through your music or did it just kind of happen that way?

It kind of just happened that way. We never had a set goal, sound or lyrical theme that we wanted to get done when we started out. Lyrically I just sort of starting writing stories about my life and they changed as time went on, its kind of funny when I look back at it and see how the themes have changed over the years. I went from being an angry aimless kid to having a family and being a father and the things that you look forward to and enjoy change, different things become important. But that is the way the albums turned out and when you look at them all together its cool to see the pattern of growth or change.

3) The song “Chasing The Dragon” off the new CD “Everything You Know” was that inspired directly from your many years in the hardcore scene? Was that your way of giving back and saying thank you to all the bands, friends and fans?

That song is exactly about that. The metaphor in the name of the song was my attempt at being clever I guess (laughs). To be blunt that song is about Sick Of It All man, its about Sick Of It All. Its about when I walked into the first show I saw of theirs and I was all scared and nervous, but excited at the same time and how a whole new world just opened up to me. I remember standing in line outside the doors at City Gardens in New Jersey waiting to get inside and I was like so nervous and so pumped at the same time, it was crazy. So that is what that song is truly about, ever since then I have been chasing that feeling and that excitement. So I called that song “Chasing The Dragon” because “Sick Of It All” use the dragon symbol and that is what I have been after ever since.

4) Wisdom In Chains has a video out now for the song “Back To The Ocean” can you give us some insight into what that song and video were about? Are you guys planning on doing any other videos for songs off the “Everything You Know” album?

Well back in the day I had a lot of problems with my home life and I was living on the streets for a while and hopping around to various spots where I could live. I had a friend named Jonathan “Ace” and his family let me stay with them and he had a younger brother named Mitchell who passed away just over a year ago from a drug overdose. The whole song is really about how I never got a chance to tell him how I felt about him and thank him for all he did for me. I was able to tell his family, but I never got a chance to tell him.

As far as any more videos we are actually going to be putting out a video for “Chasing The Dragon” and its basically going to be numerous clips from shows that we have played. We want to basically give people the idea of what a live “Wisdom In Chains” show is all about and what to expect.

5) In hardcore today there is a real lack of sincere bands, or in any music for that matter. “Wisdom In Chains” comes off as a band that is 100% sincere and dedicated, was this something that you had to work at or did it come naturally?

Thank you. We just wanted to be real man. Over the years I have been guilty myself of writing things that were not a completely accurate representation of myself, but with “Wisdom In Chains” we wanted to stay away from that sort of thing. So this whole band is just about us being honest and real. Its a nice thing because if it’s real and people don’t like it then it’s an easy pill to swallow because you know you put your heart into it and spoke the truth and nothing changes that.

6) How is the current tour your on going so far? You guys set it off tonight and the crowd was super into it, that must feel good?

Dude, its going great!!! We have been through a number of cities that we have never been in, even through the States and the response has been huge. The bands we are out on tour with have been great and we all get along really well and that always makes a big difference. So we are really happy with this tour, its going really really well.

7) Wisdom In Chains just put out a new 4 song 7″/ Ep called “Pocono Ghosts” can you tell us about that?

We recorded four songs for that, it was two originals and two covers. The original songs are more personal songs, the one song on there I wrote for my wife, it’s like a love song I guess (laughs). The other song is about wasted talent and people that are scared to try things and even to stand up for what they want to do with their lives. We also did a Motorhead cover of the song “R.A.M.O.N.E.S.” and then the last song was a song we did from The Twilight Zone and we had recorded it and never put it on anything so it’s on “Pocono Ghost”.

“Pocono Ghosts” is available on iTunes now, so go buy it.

8 So what is going to be next for Wisdom In Chains? Once you are done touring are you heading back to the studio?

We are going to try and release a new record sometime around the end of this year. So I would say around June we should be ready to head back into the studio.

9) What’s that record looking like so far?

We have not really got together yet and really sat down and hashed things out. I have about 15 songs written, Richie probably has about 30 songs (laughs). So we have to get together and see what happens and formulate a plan. We’re definitely going to take our time a little more then we did on other records, we now have an actual rehearsal space where we can take our time and write. What we used to do is I would bring in my songs, Richie would bring in his we would show them to the rest of the guys and try and record them from there. We actually recorded “Die Young” in about two days, “Class War” was four or five days and “Everything You Know” in probably three or four days. So we always had a tight timeline to get albums laid out and done, but now we are going to be able to chill and make sure songs are 100% perfect before we lay them down for good.

Me and Wisdom In Chains after the show.

So there you have it folks that is the end of the Action Recon “Wisdom In Chains” interview. We would like to thank Joe for talking with us and urge every single last one of you to support this band and check out their links below for additional information.

Wisdom In Chains Facebook.

Wisdom In Chains Myspace.

Related posts:

1. Wisdom In Chains “Back To The Ocean” video
2. Wisdom In Chains : Everything You Know : Review
3. Amon Amarth : The Action Recon Interview
4. Cisco Adler : The Action Recon Interview
5. Slaine : The Action recon interview