Red Chord Frontman Not Big On Ozzfest

Band Photo: The Red Chord (?)

While most young metal acts would maim — maybe even kill — for a chance to spend their summer traveling the U.S. as part of Ozzfest, THE RED CHORD's Guy Kozowyk's sort of blithe about the whole situation.

Sure, he's excited about being on this summer's Ozzfest and appreciates his band being invited. But to him, it's no big deal — he's not nervous, like some of the other bands on the tour because, the way he sees it, Ozzfest is just another gig.

"Whatever," he said, when asked what was going through his head the morning before Ozzfest kicked off here. "Honestly, for us, it's just like another day at the office. It's definitely exciting. If you'd asked me a year ago if my band would ever be on Ozzfest, it's like, 'We're a death-metal/grindcore/whatever band — Ozzfest is never going to go for that.' And so it's definitely unexpected and definitely crazy, but at the same time, we've played over 800 shows. We've played backyards, we've played basements and we've played the Sounds of the Underground in front of thousands of people. We're ready for anything. As excited as we are, we're just going to go do what we always do."

Kozowyk, who runs his own label, Black Market Activities, knows that Ozzfest is perhaps the biggest tour his band will ever be on and has heard people talking about how beneficial a slot on the fest can be for a band like THE RED CHORD. But he's not letting it go to his head.

"People say Ozzfest can make or break a band, but for us, we're ready to get bigger and we're ready to go back if it comes down to it," he said. "We've played so many small shows, and we're so comfortable in the small environment, that if Ozzfest doesn't break us into the mainstream, we're ready to go back to playing VFWs and basements. We've had such a good time that it doesn't matter what happens on Ozzfest for us. We're going to just roll with it. If it comes down to us being the big Ozzfest success, that's great. We'll sell a bunch of records. But as soon as the metal/hardcore/extreme-music thing drops off, and it isn't making the Billboard charts anymore, we really don't care — whatever. We'll be happy selling 20,000 records and playing to a couple hundred kids a night. It doesn't matter to us.

"Our attitude has always been THE RED CHORD are normal people playing to normal people out in the crowd. We're not better or bigger than anyone," he continued. "It's intriguing to think that we can come out of this tour and be the biggest death-metal band to date, because I don't know that there's any real brutal death-metal bands that have done this in the past. I think if [death metal's] ever going to get big, this might be our only shot. If it's not meant to be, it's not meant to be. We could care less."

THE RED CHORD's 2005 LP, Clients, was reissued last month with demo and live tracks, and Kozowyk said the band will settle into the writing process for its next album following Ozzfest and some more U.S. touring. He hopes to start recording the CHORD's third disc, which they've already named Birdbath, early next year.

"We started naming songs but we haven't really written any songs yet," he explained. "We have a bunch of song titles ['I Am Not a Lawnmower,' 'The Robot From the Future,' 'Skin Beef' and 'The Brian Slagel Song,' to name a few], ideas and a bunch of parts, but we just don't have the actual songs done yet. We want to have a new record ready for next summer."