by Kent Davies
Stylus: It was a long process to get your EP off the ground. What happened?
Kevin Focht: Bascially in January our guitarist AJ Schmid had just moved into a new apartment with his girlfriend. Long story short we were holding all the band’s money and our merchandise there and three nights after moving in, the apartment went up in flames. They lost everything and all the band money burned along with the merch. So we had a pretty big loss and our EP release show became a benefit show to recover some of the money.
KF: We basically had to scrape up as much money as we could after the fire to do a small pressing and work our way back again. It was tough but we did it.
KF: No, but we were committed. It wasn’t the best of circumstances but we knew we could do it.
KF: It was really, really, really black singing. It set the tone. Len Milne was the producer and he’s a really great guy to work with. He’s very laid back. The whole process in creating the album was pretty fun. The whole process getting it out was not so great.
KF: Totally. It was.
KF: It was a very successful show. We made enough money to cover the costs of a new shirt design, catch up on jam spot rent, and drive out to Regina to play with Into Eternity and Digital Doomzday. Since then we’ve upgraded some of our equipment and have been sending our EP out everywhere, which has basically eaten up the rest of our funds.
KF: We are always writing new material. Sometimes too much. We have about an hour of music yet to be recorded, and we just keep on writing. It’s nice to have a few in the bag, but now the time has come to decide what material will be recorded, whether we are doing a full length or EP, which producer/studio to use and what medium we wish to release it on. Aside from recording our next release, we are currently making plans for a music video. So far we are leaning towards a video for The Architects of Starvation, although nothing is set in stone yet. Andrew Wiens (Psychotic Gardening) will be heavily involved in the production of this video.
KF: Originally, the idea started as a side project. We all had been playing in other bands except for our guitarist AJ. We basically all wanted to form a more technical death metal band. We got together and started playing some riffs and basically formed the band. We asked Chuck (Psychotic Gardening) to sing for us. We didn’t even think he would because he’s such a veteran in the scene and busy with his own band but he was stoked and over time it has become a main project instead of a side project.
CL: I can make it work. Both bands have been on tour together. We play the same show often. So I play two sets back to back. Mike and I would play two sets in a row. We were wondering if we could do it, especially on tour. Would it be possible psychically to do two sets a night for a long period of time? But as long as I don’t drink too much and just control myself I’m good.
KF: We decided when we formed the band to do something a little different. There are a lot of satanic metal bands out there with tons of different themes. You’ve got the zombie metal bands, cannibal metal bands. We wanted to go with something that’s not completely original but in our music we like to address the bad side of the world the politics of devastation, plagues, pestilence and disease. Eyam itself is a town in the United Kingdom, it had one of the worst cases of the black plague in history. They had situations of self quarantine and I think the town was wiped out. We related our music to the theme of disease and explore how mankind are their own worst plague.
CL: I’m always doing artwork. I did the album cover for Digital Doomsday, they’re kind of a hardcore-rap-metal hybrid. The new art for the Psychotic Gardening full-length and of course I did it for Eyam too.
KF: Yeah, Chuck does collect boots. He can never have enough boots. He is currently looking for a pair of Glen Benton spiked shin boots. So if you come see us, bring Chuck some boots.
EYAM is planning on infecting metal heads with death metal destruction at an up coming Halloween show. For more info check out myspace.com/eyammetal.