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Growing out of the evolution of DEATH (the band) comes CONTROL DENIED and in tow is TIM AYMAR. Tim found himself landing the vocalist when CHUCK SCHULDINER handpicked him over better known vocalists. Personally I was never a big Death fan... mostly because cookie monster vocals bored me but thanks to the awesome voice of Tim I now understand why people sing so much praise about Chuck. Tims talents alone could have made a name for himself but leading in an awesome band never hurt anyone! How did a relative unknown land such a job? Who is this guy? Why him? What makes him so special? Well shut up and lets find out. |
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dr. ManiC |
So how did you end up with being the Vocalist for Control Denied? Did you find Chuck or did he find you? How did it all happen? How did you feel when selected? |
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Tim
Aymar
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That all happened back when the Virtual Insanity EP was fairly new. We had started getting some positive feedback from the media and some of the record companies. We were working in a new drummer, because Steve pussed out, and I had gone to Denmark very briefly for a project that unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately) didn't work out. When I got back, Jim Dofka had a message for me that Chuck Schuldiner had heard our material, and he was interested in having me audition for a new project he wanted to take up. Jim said if he had to lose me to anyone, he'd be proud to see me singing for Chuck. So Chuck called and told me his plans creating a different style that would take Death to the next stage of evolution, which would be a cross between death metal and euro style power metal. I jumped at the chance, and went to Chucks for a week to record 3 tunes to see how well it would gell, and we all were totally satisfied with the results. It was an awesome feeling to be chosen, especially considering the others who were considered for this position. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Rumors were that Chuck wanted Warrel Dane to do the vocals and he turned it down? Was this rumor true? How does that make you feel to be the next guy in line after him? Has he ever been an influence on you? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Actually, from what I understand, there were 2 other singers considered for Control Denied; Rob Halford, and Warrel Dane. Chuck had contacted the Halford camp but I heard Rob had been working pretty intensely on a new project at that time. I don't think Warrel was ever actually contacted because Chuck made his decision to put me in the line-up already. I was happy to hear that I was chosen for the gig period; the band undoubtedly kicks ass. Halford is one of my greatest idols, but no offense- I hadn't even heard of Warrel, and he probably never heard of me. It took awhile to sink in that Chuck was no longer pursuing either of the other 2 singers. I was told of this after my audition, and I remember feeling a bit numbed by the shock (or was that the Jack Daniels?). I've never had the feeling that I was in line behind anybody though. I don't look at it that way. I simply passed the audition. I have to admit it felt great. Still does. |
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dr. ManiC |
What is the word with the new Control Denied CD is it taking so long cause of Chucks health or cause Steve's too busy pretending he is Sharlee D'Angelo playing in all those other bands?? How far along is it? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Yes, everything is on hold until Chuck is able to shred again. Richard and Chuck put together the demos at Morrisound, so the initial sketches for all the songs are all done since February, and we each have copies to get familiar with and think about what embellishments to create. The wait is definitely not because Steve or anyone in the band is keeping busy. Steve was hired after I had finished my tracks, and we haven't had the pleasure of hanging out together, but we've talked online and on the phone. I know Steve feels the same way I do about the band; it's the most satisfying work we've ever done to date as musicians. | ||||||||||
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He's a world class player, so I really don't think he has to pretend he's anyone. When you're that good, people want you to play for them. That's the whole idea right? Although we're all involved with other endeavors, we are waiting patiently at the gate to receive some good news and finally get out and crush. Before we knew for sure what was causing Chuck's headaches, we simply planned on waiting for the CD to be released, and we would all meet up again before the tour for rehearsals. Chuck said feel free to work on whatever projects we wished to, especially Psycho Scream, because my Control Denied bandmates are Psycho Scream fans and vice versa. I'm singing and working on multiple projects all the time too, and so are Jim and Brian. Until Chuck's health is normal again, I'm keeping my sanity by keeping as busy as possible. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Speaking of Chuck's health is he doing better? Has he actually seen any money from all these benefits, or are people making money off his suffering? |
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Tim
Aymar
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No, right now Chuck is in very bad shape. We are praying he get's through it, but it really is looking like his chances are slim. Throughout this ordeal, he has gotten better, then worse, then we thought he'd be totally out of the woods, but the tumor reappeared, he's had all kinds of problems with his medications, and a few weeks back he caught double pneumonia and is getting fluid around his heart, which is dragging him way down. I just hope he survives this struggle. No one deserves the hell he's going through. Well, at least he doesn't. It's a comfort to know that our fans care. There has been such a tremendous show of support for Chuck, it's almost a miracle. Although it's not surprising to me, because I have been a head banger from day one; I don't think the rest of the world would ever guess that the heavy metal fans of the world are capable of such heroism. Right now, we need them more than ever. I commend everyone involved, especially Chuck Billy from Testament who has cancer himself, but donated the proceeds from his benefit concert to Chuck Schuldiner. That's fucking metal, dude. Sadly, Chuck Billy is in bad shape again, he had surgery but they couldn't get the whole tumor, so he really could use help with his medical bills, and now I hear that James Murphy has a brain stem tumore and needs surgery. Is anyone else getting the creepy feeling I'm getting here? What the fuck is going on with all these particular musicians having cancer simultaneously? If you don't know what I mean, Look at the anthologies of Death and Testament. I dare not ask who's next. Little of the proceeds from the benefit concerts and auctions and donations from the worldwide metal community have gotten through to Chuck, but the funds that have are being used to make payments on debts accrued for Chuck's treatments. His family has had to seel nearly everything in their name to keep him in treatment and the bills keep coming relentlessly. They could really use as much help as they can get right now. Being that he is without insurance, and the medical industry is disposed toward running the uninsured financially and literally into the ground, rather than healing them, I'm inclined to believe that it will take a hell of a lot of money before this is over. I just hope there is enough to get him and all these other's well again. It's a travesty that in a country so proud of it's power and wealth, that people are sick and dying because they can't afford insurance. Chuck's just a face in the crowd of millions in this country who could die from lack of health care. As far as slime balls taking advantage of the situation, yes they exist. Some of the benefit shows were bogus, and others kept most of the profit for themselves. Another motherfucker is auctioning off illegal, unauthorized copies of our demos on e-bay, and we know who he is. He is someone in the industry, whom we sent an autographed copy to as a professional courtesy, and expreslly told him it was not to leave his hand, and now he has totally fucking betrayed us. He should live in fear. This is not just a copyright violation, it is a boil on the heavy metal music communities ass, and a personal insult to Chuck and the rest of us. From now on, we have to worry about sending demos out. If you want to help the musicians in the industry, first of all please do not buy our music from anyone except a licensed distributor. Artists are always last on the list for royalties and they make only a minute fraction of record sales revenue anyway, so if you want to profit to get to any artist, buy from a reputable record store and if they don't have the record in stock they can order it from the record company, that's what they do. You can buy our CD directly from NBA online, and if you buy the "Live In Eindhoven" video from the 1997 Dynamo festival from NBA, some of the proceeds go to Chuck. It's not like you have to walk a thousand miles to get it; a simple words search for Nuclear Blast America will get you there. Secondly,
don't waste your money, trusting that some promoter is going to
send the money to Chuck. They don't. Anyone who wishes to help,
donate directly to Chuck. The addresses are at the Death/Control
Denied website in the Netherlands: www.emptywords.org/support
Our friends there have gone out of there way to do a fantastic
job of keeping the record straight, and helping Chuck's family
cope with all this. If you can't donate, then at least surf by
and thank them. |
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dr. ManiC |
What can we expect from the new Control Denied CD? Does it have a name yet? Same vibe and feel as ? The Fragile Art?? Or more gloomy based on all the stuff Chuck has been going through? How many tracks are there gonna be? |
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Tim
Aymar
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As Death fans are truly aware, Chuck's creations are always exactly what you are not expecting to hear. The working title is "When Hate Strikes Down". I feel it picks up where The Fragile Are Of Existence left off, but it is much more aggressive all the way around. It was more taylor made than TFAOE because he knew who was going to be singing it. At least that's how I perceive it to be. There's plenty of atmosphere and moody sections and wide open spaces for vocals, but the violent outbursts are so much more like I would naturally sing them. Chuck did his homework and I give him an A+. The lyrics as always are symbolic and left to interpretation, although they are based on situations we can all relate to in our own way. There is nothing gloomy about Chuck's expression on this record, it is relentlessly brutal, and genius as ever. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
What are some of the issues that the lyrics tackle?? |
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Tim
Aymar
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In my opinion it's about the atrocious things that happen on a planet full of fucking idiots. It's appropriately macabre and cynical, to which I can truly relate. You'll have to wait until it's done and form your own impression. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Do you have control over vocal harmonies or is that all planned ahead of time by Chuck? How do you guys decide what works and what doesn't? What do you think is your best vocal performance on "The Fragile Art Of Existence" and why? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Chuck comes up with the basic melodic and harmonic structures and sings it on the demos, then I get to tweak it out a bit and embellish melodies or arrange harmonies here and there, it gets polished up a bit, but the initial integrity is preserved. Then we get together on it and tweak some more and rehearse it with the band. Once I get behind the studio mic, Jim Morris get his two cents in, and it shines a bit more. The formula works quite nicely. Each song is different, and sometimes there's a different approach from one line to another, so it's hard to say which performance I like best. If I had to choose one at gunpoint it would be.....fuck it, just shoot me. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Do you have any influence on lyrics? Or are they set in stone by the time you get to them? |
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Tim
Aymar
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With TFAOE I changed maybe 3 words simply to make the phrases work best without changing the meaning. The common good is always to produce a damn good record, it's not about who's lyrics are used or not. Chuck's no slouch with the lyrics, so let's just say if it ain't broke, don't fix it. My influence is mainly on the execution and expression of the words, making the lyrics come to life. With this record, we'll have to see once we get back in the game, so far only 5 of the tunes I have seen contain lyrics. Chuck took a turn for the worse right after he sent me the discs, so I don't know if there are lyrics for all the tunes or not. We haven't had the opportunity to speak about whether or not I will be writing lyrics, either way is fine. I write plenty of my own lyrics for Psycho Scream anyway, so to me it's totally cool if Chuck wants to write all the lyrics for Control Denied. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Speaking of influences, what singers, writers, movies, games, and books make up the influences on you and your vocal style? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Singers:
McCartney, Tyler, Plant, Daltry, Halford, Dio, Graham Bonnett, Joe
Lynn Turner, Coverdale, Ozzy, Meatloaf, Paul Rogers, Klaus Meine,
Derek St. Holmes, Brad Delp, Jeff Scott Soto, Tony Harnell, Lemmy
Killmeister, Blackie Lawless, Bruce Dickinson, Bon Scot, Brian Johnson,
David Wayne.
Writers: Mark Twain, Lewis Carroll, Dante, Phillip K. Dick. Movies: Psycho, The Shining, The Exorcist, Friday The 13th, Halloween, Rosemary's Baby, Seven, Henry 2, Scream, The Thing, They Live, Enemy Mine, Silence Of The Lambs, Pet Semitary, Natural Born Killers, This Is Spinal Tap, Monty Python (all), Mel Brookes (all), Falling Down, Death Wish, Walking Tall, A Clockwork Orange, Calligula, Deepthroat, Debbie Does Dallas, The Wizard Of Oz, Up In Smoke, Saturday Night Fever, Grease, The Song Remains The Same, The Kids Are Alright, Quadraphenia. T-Back. Games: Quarters, Pass Out, Bullshit, Bong Zonk, Strip Poker (with girls), Hide The Weenie (with girls), Trivial Pursuit. Books: The Holy Bible, The Inferno, Modern Recording Techniques, The Master Handbook Of Acoustics, The Craft Of Lyric Writing, The Rock N Roll Singers Survival Manual, How to Be A No Limit Person. |
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dr. ManiC |
Will Control Denied ever tour the US? Did you guys have enough sales here to warrant it? Or is that why you're not on Nuclear Blast anymore? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Actually, I have no way of knowing what the sales figures are. It would be nice to know, especially if it's doing well, but obviously NBA has not pushed it as hard as it would take to influence the US market. Otherwise, we'd be seeing some checks. Then again, we don't wear grease paint, and there's no scratching on our mixes, and nobody in the band is gay, or hooked on heroine, or has breast implants, so the US market will probably not be all that interested. I hope we'll tour the US though; it would be great, we could open for Britney Spears or NSync. Seriously, we couldn't tour with Chuck sick, so it didn't make sense to them I guess, but they made some big boo boos too, at the beginning. I really don't foresee much prospect over here either honestly. I'm not knocking the American fans, but the rest of the world really loves metal a lot too, and they buy the majority of the records so we'll probably tour there first. if all goes well we can come back and celebrate with a U.S. Tour if America will have us. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
What else besides the Psycho Scream and John Bowman were you been involved in before Control Denied? Tell me a bit about them please. |
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Tim
Aymar
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I've
been in quite a few bands and got pretty close to getting signed
to decent record labels, but someone else in the band always decided
for me to not take the deal, that's what took so long to get noticed.
313 was a metal band in the late 80's, and we had just started writing
some really cool material and getting our shit together, and CBS
records offered a development deal, and my band passed, and then
I got a vocal rock band together, Dr. No who was just starting to
take over the Pittsburgh scene and passed up a management contract
with a guy who worked with Kiss and Prince and all these big mega-artists,
then Triple-X decided they'd rather stay local than pursue the development
offers we got. I kept running full blast into other peoples walls,
and it really had me pissed off for a long time, but I'm over it
now. It seems pretty trivial compared to the other shit I've had
to overcome.
But, thank God I found Dofka. He's one of the most persistent, hard working fuckers in the business, also one of the greatest guitarists this side of hell. He not only works himself hard, but he's kept me going strong since I started working with him in 94. I took some time off from Psycho Scream, basically because we had no drummer and my life took a wrong turn into the corporate world in order to keep a roof over my head ( that's not totally true, because I was enjoying the accomplishments too) . I had also been working my ass off in a recording studio for obvious reasons. That's where I met Bowman. I sang on his demo as a session vocalist. Then I was producing his band for him. They stiffed me for a studio bill that I covered their asses for, at a time I really needed it, and it led to me losing my apartment. They still haven't even offered to pay me back. Fortunately, with Psycho Scream we've been able to pick-up where we left off, and I consider Jim one of the best friends I've ever had in my life. You know you have a friend when you can be totally honest with them and vice versa, and you can respect each others differences and still work together as a team. We've had our growing pains as bandmates and co-producers, but we've made it though the hardest part, and I hope we continue to work like we do for a long time. Jim has hooked me up with engineering gigs, and session work and a teaching job, and a thousand times more than I could ever ask for. He really has looked out for me, and he's pushed me to my full potential as a singer and I appreciate it. Brian Mihalovich is a great guy too. I love his playing, especially when he plays his music man, it has great tone, and you can hear his fingers through the massive distortion. Very metal. Now all we need is Dave Lombardo (that's who the parts are written for, and why nobody else has been able to play them) and the band will be able to tour when the disc is done. |
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dr. ManiC |
Can you describe Psycho Scream and compare the similarities and differences between it and Control Denied? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Both bands are unique, and neither are copying anyone elses groove. Psycho Scream has a more traditional European power metal flavor, but with a few twists and turns that would suggest it is modern; and Control Denied is undeniably evolutionary and experimental. Psycho Scream leans a little more toward the classical side of metal, and Control Denied when you really take a close look at its innards, has more jazz orientation, especially considering what Richard and Steve lend to it; therefore I'd consider it a progressive form of death metal. The main similarity I guess is my voice. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
How is the new Psycho Scream CD coming? When will it be done and what can I expect? Will it be easier to find then the last one? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Brian is finishing up his tracks and Jim has a couple solos left, which should all be complete by the middle of December at the latest. Then comes the fun part. Mixing probably won't take very long because we took our time getting the sounds we liked when we tracked. Actually, we retracked a few times before we were satisfied with it. The toughest thing to mix will probably be vocals. There's tons of them. There's another difference between the bands. Psycho Scream is a bit more vocal oriented. I'd say realistically by the end of January we'll be shipping it off. We would like to get Virtual Insanity re-released before them to whet the appetites of new fans, and finally get the faithful followers a digital version. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
How do/did you train your voice? What breathing exercises do you do? When did you stop trying to sound like someone and just starting singing like you? |
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Tim
Aymar
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I sang in chorus and played the trumpet as a kid from 3rd grade up until I joined my first band in 10th grade. I sang for that first band Alladinsane/ Overlord for 4 years and moved to Orlando, and played with a top 40 band, singing 3 sets every night, and that's really where I started getting my technique together. It was a matter of learning not to push too hard to get the tone to work. Then you can sing loud all night every night. After that band, I was in a band that only wrote songs and recorded at a home studio, and we shopped the material around and got an offer, but I got hit by a truck, then I moved back to Pittsburgh and wrote like 40 ballads with a friend of mine, then joined Overlord again then 313. Our producer said I should do exercises to perfect my intonation, which was good already, but the studio mic is totally unforgiving so I jumped right on it. I bought a book/tape course called singing for the stars, by Seth Riggs in Hollywood, who has taught literally hundreds of stars his vocal technique, which is a bel canto technique called speech level singing. It worked so well, that people started asking me for lessons and I had 30 students before I knew it. Another great course is Vocal Power, by Howard Austin and Elizabeth Howard; it's great for learning style as well as improvisation. The one I find best for breathing exercises and vocal enhancement is The Rock And Roll Singers Survival Manual by Mark Baxter. All of these courses are great for helping a singer find their true voice and what works best for you, and breaks you away from mimicking other singers. I guess I stopped trying to sound like other singers when I heard my rehearsal recordings from the cover bands didn't sound much like those singers anyway, I just felt like they did when I was singing them. I was putting unnecessary strain on my voice and restricting myself as a result. It's a good tool at first to copy exactly what a good singer is singing, but once you learn good technique, eventually it comes time to discover the unique qualities of your own voice and use them. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
How do you keep your sanity? What helps you continue forward when all looks bleak? What people or things do you own your sanity too? |
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Tim
Aymar
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That's a good one. I've had a lot of evil things happen to feel really bad about, and at times, I have felt like there is no hope, or no reason to go on, or no reason to let others go on living and hurting me. I think lot's of people have those feelings from time to time, but they see no way to shake it off. Metal has been good therapy for lots of us. Fortunately I've had music to express my feelings and the support of my friends to pull me out of despair. I know this will probably piss a lot of death metal fans off, but what has kept me from crumbling is the promise of hope. I pray to God. Although I'm not very fond of churches, because of the experiences I've seen there, I do worship and try to walk in the light. It helps. | ||||||||||
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dr. ManiC |
Any final comments? |
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Tim
Aymar
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Keep The Faith, It's Working. | ||||||||||
