Hey everybody, it's Em Schell. Thank you for listening to Max and Kevin, always bringing you
the best in Wisconsin punk, hard rock, and metal. I have Bach and Steve with me of Abadons and
at a Central Wisconsin. Thanks to you both for being here on the show. Thank you for having us.
Absolutely, so I am fairly new to your band, admittedly, unfortunately, but I'm really excited to
learn more about you guys and and really dive in, so tell me a little bit about Abadons and.
Steve, let's just start out with the background and then I can take over where we came in.
Yeah, that sounds good. A band's end has been was formed probably six years ago by me and the
co-founder as Kyle Hall, the drummer. And about a year ago we decided to go a different direction
with the style of music and we brought Tim the guitar player in and Adam as vocalist and what
you hear now is the great thing that we came up with. Yes, so Tim and I joined in December.
On December 16th of 2022, we started playing, we did our first gig in April of 2023. I think we've
done about 35, 40 gigs since then and we just keep on rolling. Wow, that's awesome. Momentum, for sure.
So where does the name come from exactly? You want this one Adam? I don't have Steve.
Well, it comes from the book of revelations out of the Bible. The badden was some people
thought it was of the devil and some consider him an angel of God that enforces God's punishment on
us when we when we pass away. So what are some of the influences that you guys pull from for your
music? Go for it, Adam. For me, it's, I grew up in the 97, you know, music when
slip night came around and going so far to the Cheval and stained and a perfect circle.
Manor James King ends a big influence on me. So it was Aaron Burr and Lewis and Corey Taylor.
And then as I grew up, I even have here, I'm into heavy stuff like suicide, silence,
even newer stuff like architects, bad old men. I'd like to stay fluent and keep going.
So I try to take some bits and pieces from everybody and throw it into what I got. Steve's got a
a longer history of his influence as well. Yeah, I go back to I was big when I was a kid in the
Van Halen Zeppelin. Then through the years, then my biggest part of my biggest influence was
corn, disturbed. My father was a bass player. He was with played with Waylon Jennings for a while
and then they were in a rock band back in early 60s. So my influence came from him. I learned
everything I know from him. It sounds like a decent amount of music across decades. It's really
cool that you guys can pull from a lot of different. What we would say genres now, to me, it's all
all rock and roll. It's all awesome stuff. I've been a fan of a lot of those bands in genres.
It's cool to see a band pull from a lot of that. Yeah, if you see us live, every song is different.
That's that's what I love about live music. I listen to a friend talk about how they're upset
because there is some drum solo and then a guitar solo that wasn't on the album. I'm like,
yeah, that's why you go to a live show, right? Because you want it to sound a little bit different
with that rock experience. From what I understand, you guys have some whammy nominations.
Yeah, we were nominated for the best new band of 2023. We were also nominated for best song
with asset in that 11th and best hard rock performance. I was nominated as best male vocalist
in 2023 as well. We want to give out the shout-out to Kent Ray for being nominated for fan of
the year as well. He supports us a lot. Yeah, Kent's a good guy. Fans are what it's all about.
Really, they're the ones that keep things going, making the music that we do.
We call our fans family. We don't even use the fan terms. I love that. But you guys also have
some new music coming out soon, too. Can you tell me about that? Or is it too early in the
stages where it's still under wraps? We are doing a personal barbecue for our biggest fans and
family and we are going to let them vote on the favorite songs from the set list. We are going
to pick the top three and we are going to pick our favorite songs from that one and that's going
to be our next single that we're going to record. Ah, that's such a cool idea. You know,
crowd source, some of that, you know, but then it also gives. We're going to keep cook out a bunch
of weeners and burgers and then we're going to have a big potluck and play a private show for them
and I don't know. We really appreciate them coming to all these shows for us. That's awesome.
It's heartwarming, too. So tell me about the release party. One of you guys planning this album release.
We don't have an exact date nailed down. We're going to get this next single recorded. I would say
sometimes by the end of summer beginning of fall, we will have an EP out. Are you guys independent?
Are you on a label? Oh, we're, we're signed with Kurt Paul Records out of Florida and
he's got us so busy right now that we're just trying to squeeze in where we can do different things.
So it's been, it's kind of tough right now, fine and time. Do you have some advice for unsigned
or DIY artists looking to get picked up by a label or, you know, look at the the manager side
of things, you know, it obviously has some pros and cons. Do you have some advice for those
types of artists? I say play every show you can. It doesn't matter if it's a big show. If you're
with a national act, if you're the opener, if you're the headliner, if there's one fan, there's a
thousand fans. Play every show you can. You never know who's going to be out there in the crowd.
Make sure you're out there with the crowd, not sitting in the back in the green room. Make sure
you're reducing yourself to people. You're really personable with people. That reflects a lot.
New as a person in your music and your connection and managers and promoters really see that and
they're really like that. In the music community too, it's also really big to support each other.
It's not a competition. In our eyes, it's not a competition and we're not
when you're on the stage, we're on there to put on the best show we can. But we also want to
support all the other bands. We have like, would you kind the Apex Oral? We do a lot of things
with them. They do a lot of things for us and we appreciate it. It's one of those things where
you've got to support, be out there, be in front of them. Other people that are at the show see
another artist in front of the stage and then supporting it. It makes them want to be involved.
Absolutely. Do you guys have any upcoming shows?
We have some exciting news. In the past, we've been talking back and forth the year we've been
together and it has come to happen that we have put on a new member to our band, which will be
starting at the Muskie Fast, he will play part of the show with us at night and we're pretty happy
to have him. We have a keyboardist now that's going to travel with us and do shows. So our music is
going to have a little more to it for all the fans out there. Awesome. Congrats. That's very exciting.
Yeah, we're very excited to have Cole on board. Cole Huffman came, he did an audition with us
two weeks ago and we absolutely loved it. You know, we see a lot of bands do a backtracking and we
don't have a problem with backtracking, but we love the live feeling. So we wanted to get that
sound and stuff and still be able to have a complete live feeling and not be tied to a track that's
playing behind us. So we wanted really wanted to get a keyboard on board and we are really excited to
have one. Absolutely amazing. Congratulations to you guys. Sounds like it's going to be an awesome
year for you. I can't wait to get out and see you guys live at some of these shows.
Where can we find your music and how can we stay in touch with you? We are on Spotify, iTunes,
all the streaming platforms. If you want to see us live and you know you haven't seen us live yet
and you want to give a little snippet of it, you know, if you want to go vote for us on the
whammies and you're wondering, how good is their performance? We have a couple live performances
on YouTube. We also have a Facebook, TikTok, Instagram. We try to stay up with as much as we can.
We also have a website at www.abenzand.com where you can get merch and you can see your dates and
all that stuff on there as well. That's fantastic. Is there anything else you guys want to
mention or talk about at all? I don't want to say thank you to you. I want to say thank you to all
the fans that follow us and our stream music. All the people that come out and support local
original music. It means a lot to all of us to have people supporting original local music.
Absolutely. That's what it's all about. And I know Tim, the guitar guitarist and Kyle, the drummer,
feel the same way. They want to thank you too for what you guys do. Awesome. Well, thank you.
I appreciate that. Nothing but gratitude all the way around. Thanks for coming out here for
the interview and thanks so much, guys. Thank you. Thank you.