Interview with Robert Ortiz (drums)
Interview By: Matt Nistler 

Your new album “This War Is Ours” is Escape the Fate's first album with Craig Mabbitt doing vocals. Did you guys hold auditions for this position?

Well at the end of last year when the band was like in shambles and were just trying to keep everything together somehow, someway we started talking to some people and we just weren't sure if there was even a possibility of continuing the band or not. We knew we wanted to and we weren't going to give up no matter what we did. We heard a couple people but at the same time at that point nothing was official so we didn't release anything and we weren't like “we need a singer and we're holding open auditions so send us what ya got!” 

How did you guys go about finding Craig since there weren't auditions or anything like that? 

With Craig it was the weirdest thing because he had left Blessthefall and was looking to start up with this other band. He tried to call up their guitar player Joey, which is also our manager's name, but he called up our manager by mistake. He called them and told them what was going on and our manager told Craig. So Craig was like “Dude, I'm so down for that”. We've known Craig from the Black on Black tour last year and he was a really cool guy and an AMAZING performer which I think was crucial. The main thing [I noticed] when we started jamming together was he could've been the worst singer in the world, but his ambitions, the way he was driven to move on...he was always on to the next point. He just doesn't bullshit. He was intense but at the same time he wasn't ridiculous. He was someone that when he steps in the room you take notice. And when he started singing he was was just awesome. 

Did it take a long time to adjust to the new lineup? 

At first it was a little bit weird to deal with. Just because it was something we weren't used to. I mean we were used to one singer for, you know, seven years so you don't think there's other people out there that actually know how to sing. It was a little hard at first but eventually you put it aside and say “this sounds great for what it is”, which is what I'm sure a lot of our fans are dealing with right now. The fans are like “I don't like Craig” but they're just scared that it's different. But even if Ronnie were still in the band it would sound different. You know, it's just a new record and they're scared. You gotta put that aside that it's not Ronnie but it just sounds good and you'll be fine. There's no limitations about Craig and I think that's what I like about him. He has no limits, as a singer, a performer, as a person, there's just no limits to what he can do. 

What elements did Craig bring to this album that maybe weren't present on ETF's past albums? 

I think what happened with this album is that this record was a lot more exciting to make. We were so much more aware of what we were doing at the time and what parts should go where. With our first record we didn't know much - we just kind of winged it. With Craig, this was different than anything he'd done before and was something that was exciting him, but he was a little bit unsure of the direction where we wanted to go. He wasn't completely sure of what was weird and what would be cool. But that kind of thing opened up a direction of something that was new and that we wouldn't have done before. It was just real with him. He wasn't trying to do something all artsy or something because that's not what we're about. He also wasn't trying to be hardcore like his old band.  

We just took every song as it comes and tested what sounds good and what feels right. We play heavy shit that people are like “this is gnarly!” Songs that hardcore kids can get with in the pit. Then we also play sh** that all those little preteen girls sing along with and put our albums like right next to Miley Cyrus.  

With Craig's vocals he brought not just screaming but catchy melodies. Literally we made it official among ourselves that he was in our band like a day before we went out to California to start recording. At that point we had been working on it for four months but we weren't sure if it was really going to happen. We knew we wanted to but there was just so much going on with emotions that it was never 100 percent. Someone from our record label said with our last record we had about five complete songs and we ended up coming out with about fifteen and releasing the EP and just acted under pressure. With this one we had only one complete song and we were just able to put it together. We just act under pressure. When it comes down to making things happen it just comes. 

What's it been like dealing with not only the lineup change but also the entire situation with Ronnie?

Oh it was ridiculous, man. You wake up one day and you realize “f***” my whole journey and everything I worked towards might be gone! Mentally it just sucked and it was hard to deal with. It was hard for Craig to deal with what he was going through at the time. There were a lot of personal things for him as well and I know he started drinking a lot and stuff, but I mean he got over it and we all pulled together but it was really hard for a long time. But once we finished the record and we went to Australia and toured together then it was like “we're a band now...we're having fun...this is how it should be” but going through that transition was just insane. I couldn't sleep at night. I'm a healthy person...I lost a lot of weight anyways...but at that point I almost stopped eating and getting out of bed. You have to pull together and have to look to the future and just kind of move away from the past and stay strong - and we did. At first it was hard mentally but now I'm so much better as a person because I've learned that I'm capable of so much and I can do anything. I know it's cheesy but it's true. 

Has Ronnie's blogging (from prison) affected you guys? 

A little...it's more annoying than anything. It doesn't affect me, like it doesn't break my spirit in any way. I don't get deterred like “oh man dude, he's right dude!” No, that's just stupid. With Ronnie the thing about him is that he's not an idiot. Ronnie's a really smart guy. I won't take away anything from Ronnie. It's true, he's a really great singer, that's why I was in the band with him. He was really good.

This has nothing to do with music and stuff. Well, I guess at some point it has to do with music because he was holding us back with his problems and I know that with his blogging and all this he's kind of like in denial.  

What's worst about it is when you look at the grand scheme of things we've sold A LOT of records. We've probably reached out to hundreds of thousands of people and you know that there's still kids who are passionate about him and care about his voice and his music. And those few fans that he sees are enough to like keep his ego there and justify what he's doing. Those fans kind of back him up and go “Yeah Ronnie, f*** them!” and other stuff that he's dealing with like with the family.  He's in denial. 

Obviously now he's in prison and he thinks he's in there for something he didn't do. And that's not true. He's in there for something he DID do. He thinks he's in there for something else but he's not in there for that reason. That's not why he's in there. I don't know if he knows that or realizes that, but I just know that he's telling people and so they're feeling sorry for him and that's not right. Even my own parents, because they care about him and watched us grow up together, are wondering about him and want to reach out to him. We're not giving any hint that he'll be back in the band if he picks things up, because we're beyond that. I just want him as a person to get better. With the blogging and all that it's just making things worse for him. In the long run the people who are out there supporting him...they're actually doing worse. What they need to do is leave him alone to think about his life and everything that he's done.  

On a lighter note, you guys worked with John Feldmann (The Used, Story of the Year, Atreyu) on this record. Cute is What We Aim For also just worked with him on their latest release. Does that mean we can expect more similarities between your sound and CIWWAF's? Maybe you can even adopt Shaant's hairstyle? 

Like, I know you're joking, but for real dude when you hear a record that John Feldmann helped make, it has a certain sound to it...it really does! Like I don't know what it is but the way he records you can just tell that John Feldmann made that record. But then I've never actually heard Cute is What We Aim For... 

In all seriousness though what was it like working with Feldmann? 

It was tough! It really was tough. He was like exactly what we were looking for. We went into this record and we were talking about who would do it and what we were gonna do. Especially with the state of our band, it was like who the hell is gonna take a chance on us right now? Who's gonna waste their time on us when we can't even keep it together? 

John Feldmann was ready to work with us with Ronnie and hearing that Craig was gonna be part of it, he like jumped at it! He was excited and he just had that chemistry with Craig. They liked each other but when it came time to actually get into the studio it was no bullshit. He doesn't waste time!  He just keeps going and going and going and has like a million things going on in his head. He was like our coach. We were coming up with all this stuff and he just put it together. 

But I don't know...I was in tears at some points. No lie, he made me cry. But he also made me a better drummer because of it. It was at the point where he was just like “you're not playing drums well, you need to step it up!”. It's like your ego just gets shot down yet you respect his opinion because he knows and he's not gonna bullshit. He's been successful at what he's done and he's not gonna let anything get by unless its absolutely perfect and so that was the thing that was hard in dealing with him.  

It was also very inspiring at the same time because it made me go “f*** that dude I need to get better, I gotta step it up! We need to step up our writing up!” We'd sit there and work with him for 8 hours and write songs. We pretty much co-wrote all of the record. There were a couple songs that he really didn't write on and there were some that he wrote a lot. It was just the chemistry that we would like take in all this stuff and then he'd run with it and change things too. Sometimes his changes worked and sometimes they didn't, but it was a great chemistry. We were always open to anything he had to say. It was a lot of fun and a lot of frustration and a lot of hurt feelings and at the end of it we all came out as better people. It was a great experience. 

You guys premiered the new single “The Flood” in kind of a unique way online. Can you explain what went down and who came up with the idea? 

I'm not exactly sure who came up with the concept, I think it was someone at Epitaph. What we originally had planned was we saw this horror movie. In the movie they had this person online getting tortured and the more views the website had, and the more people that logged on, the faster they would die. So we thought it'd be insane to do something like that with our stuff. And we had this whole thing planned out with like water and “The Flood” but realistically it would've been insane because it was hard enough to try to pull together by just having 50,000 people log-in to the site at the same time to unlock the song.  

Honestly the idea of this was because we wanted to make the fans work for it. I was a huge Avenged Sevenfold fan when I was in High School. I still am a fan but back then I was doing their street team thing and was really trying to promote the band and whatever they came out with. I was always out there putting posters up. I wanted fans to have the opportunity to get excited and tell their friends “the new song is coming out, you HAVE to go online!” A lot of people doubted us and didn't think we could do it and they're like “you guys don't have that many fans” but obviously we proved them wrong. They stuck with it and actually pulled it together. We wanted that hype. People release songs every single day on websites and some people know about it and some people don't. We made people go out of their way to hear it. It was like the World Premiere. People were pissed off...they “hated” it you know? But it was all in good fun and I'm sure at the end of it they were like “I was a part of that!” 

The album's title “This War Is Ours” shares its name with a song on the album “This War is Ours (The Guillotine Part II)”. What does this title represent? 

The song is actually a continuation of a song from our other record called “The Guillotine.” That song originally was about the game Halo. But with this song it's not just about the game but its also the sense you feel when playing that game that's like “I have to save the f***ing world”. With us we were battling everyone and everything and all this negativity with people who were like not believing in us and didn't think we would actually do it [record this record]. That's just what it felt like. That's what that title represents and that's why we decided to use that as the name for the record. It's a bold statement that we thought was perfect for the situation. 

What are the lyrical themes of this album? 

A lot of the lyrics go along with the same kind of concept of having pushed through all that bullsh** and there's some songs that focus on more of the direct situation going on with the band and like I said Craig was dealing with his personal situations too. So a lot of it is just about moving on and letting go. Not backing down and stepping it up, you know? That's what we needed in our lives at the time so that's what we needed to do. 

Will fans be able to hear these new songs on the upcoming Chiodos tour? 

Oh yeah there's gonna be a mix of some old and some new. There's a lot of newer fans that never got to experience our older stuff because we had canceled a lot of tours with all the sh** going on so we're gonna bring some of that older stuff to them. But obviously we're really excited for the new songs and at this point we're learning them so we'll see which ones make it the best and if there's some we want to save for the record for them to experience that way first rather than live. 

So that means Craig will have to learn both the old and new songs? 

Yeah, Craig is actually having a harder time learning the old stuff. Like in Australia there were a couple times where he missed lyrics when we were playing all the like old stuff. We're like “come on!” I don't know it's funny, but yeah he's got 'em down now. It took him time though because he had to learn so much so quickly, so it was probably a bit of an overload...but he's got it all down now.  

There's a line in “The Flood” along the lines of “You left me on the side of the road...I can't believe the troubles that you've caused.” Is that one of Craig's lyrics about his personal life or is that referring to Ronnie? Or both? 

I think what happened with this record is that we were a lot more collaborative both lyrically and instrumentally. When we were writing “The Flood” we actually sat down in a room together and we were just writing lyrics and sharing them. We'd never done that before, so it was really crazy. But yeah the part you mentioned is a line directed at Ronnie. That's kind of what the concept of the whole record was and “The Flood” being about the negativity of everyone and everything that's trying to hold us back. The flood in general that is coming is representing all the negativity. But you know what? We can swim, we can survive this thing! So yeah, the one line is directed straight at Ronnie but Craig was around us too so he still saw how we were feeling. 

What else does everyone need to know about this album? 

WE'RE BRINGING IT! That's what they need to know. This record I think is gonna blow people away. That's the thing...like it may not be immediate, but I know for sure there is one song that people are gonna be like “D***, THESE GUYS ARE INSANE!” because it's so intense. Also, we don't just stick to one thing on it and that's why people are gonna want to pick this up and that's why they should!