"We’re are one of the most high energy bands you're gonna see..."...Cory

Driving from West Covina was no easy task for this three man band, arriving in a car with no air conditioning, a la striving musician style. Although they lacked the luxuries of a fine automobile and not to mention a bass player, they were definetly not lacking in the musical and performance aspect.  Their sound was full and Energetic with a capital  E.  Although they were tired from the exhausting road trip they were not showing any signs of it during this interview or for the show, for that matter.  Enough talk, check them out for yourselves!

GILBERT: “I’m here with Leprosy of the Soul, and um, guys first of all, basic question. I want to know what you guys think about the Little House on the Prairie.”

L.O.S.: “Little House on the Prairie? I hate that show.”

L.O.S.: “I think it’s that show that cut off that Raider game, isn’t it?”

L.O.S.: “No, that was Heidi.”

L.O.S.: “Oh, that’s right.”

L.O.S.: (singing) “Heidi.”

L.O.S.: (in his best Heidi immitation) “Grandpa, Grandpa!”

GILBERT: “Heidi sold out. What do you guys think about Eeyore for Winnie the Pooh?”

L.O.S.: “Who?”

GILBERT: “Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh.”

L.O.S.: “Eeyore? Manic depressive.”

L.O.S.: “Yeah, he needs to be like on Prozac or something.”

L.O.S.: “He needs God.”

GILBERT: “Yeah he does.”

L.O.S.: “Even donkeys need God.”

GILBERT: “Yeah, donkeys need God. (laughs) Trago a burro manana aqui.”

L.O.S.: “Bring out the donkey in spanish.”

GILBERT: “Ok. When I point to you say your name and what you do, your occupation on stage. Ok?”

L.O.S.: “Ok.”

EVAN: “Evan Sickson, vocals.”

CORY: “Cory Garcia, drums.”

RYAN: “Ryan Barge, I play guitar.”

GILBERT: “So, what style do you concider yourself as? I’ve never heard, I’ve heard of you guys.”

L.O.S.: “What style? Um, we’re just three Christians that play music together for God and this style just, just comes from each of our own personal lives, so.”

GILBERT: “Awesome.”

L.O.S.: “We have a lot of influences.”

GILBERT: “Can you give us some of your influences, like band wise?”

L.O.S.: “Project.”

L.O.S.: “Zao.”

GILBERT: “Zao’s bad dude.”

L.O.S.: “Stavesacre.”

L.O.S.: “Officer Negative.”

L.O.S.: “Frail from the Blamed.”

GILBERT: “Rest in peace, Officer Negative.”

L.O.S.: “Yeah.”

L.O.S.: “A lot of stuff like that, um Embodyment.”

GILBERT: “Oh, yeah dude.”

L.O.S.: “Stretch Armstrong, Overcome.”

GILBERT: “Overcome, Overcome!”

L.O.S.: “Bigtime. Yeah, we have a little Overcome song.”

GILBERT: “This is, I’m feeling a bond here. Tiffaney, I’m feeling a bond. Overcome. It’s awesome. Yeah, I’m in a band. Our band is, we’re punk rockers and we love God. It’s awesome. See, punk rock is a feeling that sticks to your ribs.”

RYAN: “It’ll put hair on your chest. I wouldn’t know”

GILBERT: “It’s like Christmas morning, dude. It’s like going down and opening your Christmas presents, dude.  It’s trying to like, you want to ride the Matterhorn dude and you can’t sleep because you want to go to Disneyland so bad.”

RYAN: “How often do you shower?”

GILBERT: “I shower a lot you know. I’m one of those...”

RYAN: “oh, you’re not punk rock then.”

GILBERT: “I’m not the gutter punks.”

RYAN: “They only shower like once a week.”

GILBERT: “Yeah. I’m not like the gutter Officer Negative, Headnoise, those.”

RYAN: “Headnoise they shower a lot.”

CORY: “Yeah, Headnoise is clean people.”

GILBERT: “I’m like, dude. Officer Negative is bad, but dude I’m just like the kind of clean,like I guess youwould call me like, I don’t know.” “Yeah, we are good friends with Officer Negative.”

GILBERT: “Dude, those guys are bad dude. I’m serious. I saw those guys like once in my life dude. and I pitted like for once in my whole life dude, like a real pit, dude. It wasn’t like, it wasn’t a bunch of jocks, dude. It was like real dude, it was real. Anyways, on with the interview. Alright, so those are your influences, um can you tell me how the band got started? State your name and how it got started.”

CORY: “Hi, I’m Cory. And uh, me, Evan, and Ryan have all been friends for a long time.”

RYAN: “Like four and a half years.”

CORY: “Yeah, and uh, Evan had this hobby, like what he liked to do which was like.......And we used to be in church a lot. I feel like I’m talking to this black box."

GILBERT: “I’m just the dummy that pushed the buttons.”

CORY: “So like, we’d go to church and like start rapping and like we weren’t pretty bad. So he started singing and I played the drums and we threw around the idea for a couple of months.”

RYAN: “Yeah, we used to play in the living room too.”

CORY: “We used to be just like messing around, like me and Ryan were jamming and Evan would come over and just go off. So that’s basically just how it got started. We just, I recognize that I liked to play, I liked what Evan was singing and saying and wanted to play the drums behind what he was saying and so we got Ryan and we’re Leprosy of the Soul.

GILBERT: "How’d you guys get Leprosy of the Soul?"

EVAN: "Um, me and our former bass player were um, we were shoting around ideas for a name and he wanted something with leprosy, and we were thinking leprosy of you know, Officer Leprosy, Leprosy Negative."

ALL: (laughs)

EVAN: "You know stuff like that, hint, hint um and it just kinda came about with Leprosy of the Soul and we have like a little slogan for our band it’s called um 'Vacination through Cruxifiction'."

GILBERT: "Kinda like J.C.H.C."

EVAN: "Kinda ya um, something like that."

RYAN: "Everyone has Leprosy of the Soul."

EVAN: "Ya it’s um,"

RYAN: "Leprosy of the Soul stands for like, it doesn’t really mean like if you have leprosy like in general, it was like a nice disease that we thought of that was pretty gross, you know kinda like cancer and stuff, it’s just this ugly disease that you don’t wan’t to have and it represents sin in our lives and we need to um, the only cure the vacination of leprosy of the soul is through the crucifiction of Jesus Christ and that’s the main reason that we have our band and that’s like the meaning behind our band it’s not just some evil sounding death metal name."

GILBERT: "How is it playing without a bass player?"

CORY: "Ya, we did actually used to have other members in our band."

EVAN: "We used to have six members in our band."

CORY: "Ya and uh..."

EVAN: "They all disappeared."

GILBERT: "Really."

EVAN: "Ya ."

GILBERT: "That’s very sad ."(sigh)

CORY: (sigh)"Ya ."

"That’s what keeps me humble, being a Joy Electric fan..."...Ryan

GILBERT: "You guys sound good though even as a three peice, sounds really good, sounds different, differents good."

RYAN: "I gotta new guitar so it sounds thicker."

CORY: "We want some more people."

EVAN: "We’re not like anti bass player, but God just hasn’t put a bass player in our lives that he wants to be in our band."

GILBERT: "So how is it like, I don’t know what style of music you guys, punk rock is punk rock dude and I think your like the bomb dude, I just want to hug em’ and stuff but."

CORY: "I’m not punk rock sorry."

GILBERT: "I want to know,"

EVAN: "Mr. Grammatrain."

GILBERT: "I wanna know like what you guys listen to like, just give me like in general what you guys listen to, like say like I listen to this kind of music and this is my style and go like anyway you want."

EVAN: "I like all music, I love Vineyard worship everything from Vineyard worship, Third Day, all the way to Stavesacre, I’jm pretty open as long as it’s christian music I’ll give it a whirl, although I’ll say Stavesacre is my favorite band."

RYAN: "Go Crucified!"

CORY: "I listen to bands for their message but also I like listening to bands for their influence on my drumming I listen to Overcome cuz it’s just bad he tears my butt up and like Project cuz he’s pretty bad I don’t know his name but."

RYAN: "Alex"

CORY: "Ya whatever."

GILBERT: "Have you ever heard of Solid Mind?"

EVAN: "I’ve heard but,"

CORY: "Ya, I’ve heard but we don’t listen to them though, It’s not that we choose not to It’s just that we never heard them."

GILBERT: (laughs)

CORY: "And N.I.V. those are basically the like three drumming influences that I listen to."

RYAN: "Ya um, "

GILBERT: "Let me guess Officer Negative, Headnoise, Youth in Submission ?"

RYAN: "Not really actually."

CORY: "Not for this band."

RYAN: "For this band like my influences are for some reason the new N.I.V. c.d. is only like 20 minutes long but I end up listening to it like about 80 times a day and um we listen to the new N.I.V. like everyday to like um keep are hardcore roots strong um, I also like alot of Overcome, the new Zao stuff, the old Zao stuff, the old drummer for Project , the new drummer, ah the drummer for Project's old band um I like this really intense really crazy like people sounding like they’re throwing up when they’re singing kind of stuff, like that dude, I like that kind of music alot, that’s what my dad says.  And I like Havalina Railroad Co. and I love Joy Electric."

CORY: "I make fun of him all the time."

RYAN: "That’s what keeps me humble, being a Joy Electric fan, because all I would have to do is go to anyone and say I like Joy Electric and people make fun of me so."

GILBERT: "Ya they make fun of me too, so how is it like practicing stuff with so many different styles of music like trying to put all your different styles into one?"

CORY: "We just usually just tell like we’re doing this song right now and Evan wanted to do it a little bit more uh rap style."

RYAN: "We had a good strong hardcore beat going but he said it sucked change it basically."

GILBERT: "So how is it um, working together as a band?"

CORY: "It’s good."

"I don’t really care about all that record deal blah, blah, blah, blah stuff..."...Cory

Ryan: "Cool."

EVAN: "It’s great , we’ve known each other for a long time so we don’t like,"

GILBERT: "You don’t box or anything?"

RYAN: "Nah, no we’ve gone through that before with other bands and especially um(cough cough) um, we make sure people we don’t know in our band that we only know for like two months or we don’t know who people are we make sure that we know who they are before we let them in our band, so their is no like conflicts, so we will all have a common idea of what we’re doing."

GILBERT: "Do you guys put on a good stage performance? How is your stage performance?"

CORY: "I would consider our stage performance excellent."

EVAN: "Even though we don’t have a recording I think we’re a live band especially since we don’t have recording but when we do we’ll still be a live band ."

RYAN: "Because the only recording of us we do have are live."

CORY: "We’re are one of the most high energy bands your're gonna see probably."

RYAN: "Ya."

EVAN:"Ya we are."

CORY: "That’s up to Evan, he does that, we dubbed him, he gets bloody like every show."

ALL: (laugh)

EVAN: "That’s my trademark somehow every show I have a flesh wound somewhere."

RYAN: "I used to take my guitar I used to throw it around and crash it into amps and step on em’."

GILBERT: "Have you guys seen Kill the Spider?"

RYAN: "No."

GILBERT: "They like hit their guitars and stuff it’s cool."

RYAN: "I used to do that, but the guitar I used to do that was like a $100 dollars so I didn’t care if I broke it, and like I used to walk on it and like bend the neck and I had like a $300 dollar Jackson and I broke the bridge on it like one show and that was bad it took about six months to bend it back and I just got a $660 dollar guitar for like my graduation present and I won’t be doing any of that anymore unless I had my other guitar back ."

GILBERT: "Do you guys like have any future plans?, what’s your future plans for Leprosy of the Soul? like do you have any future record deals, endorsements?"

RYAN: "Endorsement wise we’re looking to get sponsered by Rock For Life um, so hopefully that will happen, that would be really great if we got sponsered by Rock For Life."

EVAN: "We just put this band into God’s hands I mean you know if God want’s use us to touch three people in West Covina that’s we’re we’ll go stay for the rest of this bands life, then we’re happy to do that and if He want’s us to reach people nationwide we’re happy to do that, it’s whatever God want’s for us."

RYAN: "My goal is to play Harvest Crusade with Audio Adrenaline and Supertones."

EVAN: "And Greg Laurie."

CORY: "And my goal for the band,"

EVAN: "And Crystal Lewis."

RYAN: "And Crystal Lewis, gotta have Crystal Lewis."

GILBERT: "You better get there it’s tommorow."

RYAN: "Well I mean in a couple of years when we get good ."

GILBERT: "Supertones would be all old ."

CORY: "My goal for the band is to spread the word of God and let God do whatever he want’s with our band, I don’t really care about all that record deal blah, blah, blah, blah stuff if there is people out there and we’re playing a show and they hear the word of God and they get touched and it doesn’t matter we don’t have to be on a record we could be playing small shows, if somebody hears the word of God then our job ."

GILBERT: "Is done."

CORY: "Ya, no we’re gonna keep going till God says."

GILBERT: "Ya plant that seed ."

CORY: "If people tell us hey we want you to do a record whatever you know that’s cool."

RYAN: "We’re not going to sign to Tooth N’ Nail though."

GILBERT: "What about you Evan?"

"...I wanna get songs that are even more intense, more like you think our heads are gonna blow up..."...Ryan

EVAN: "What about me?''

GILBERT: "Yes."

EVAN: "As far as what?"

GILBERT: "Future plans, your goals."

EVAN: "With the band?"

GILBERT: "Yes."

EVAN: "Um , I know me and Cory have kinda the same thought, we just um, we want to play, we want to preach God, we want to, deffinately we’re a Christian band, we want everyone to know that we’re a Christian band that our purpose is to preach the love of God whether it is to non-Christians or to encourage Christians or whatever have you may we’re just you know we’re doing what the Bible tells us to do we’re just planting seeds and watering seeds if we do that for one person or ten thousand people."

GILBERT: "So what do you guys think about your music? So what do you think about your music instrumental wise? since this is like a musician’s studio, do you guys like enjoy the style of music you play?"

CORY: "Ya if people like us they like us."

RYAN: "I wanna go into both directions harder and softer because right now we’re like middle of the road hard you know we’re pretty intense but I wanna get songs that are even more intense more like you think our heads are gonna blow up because it’s just like that tense."

CORY: "Evans head."

RYAN: "Ya Evan turns pretty red It’s pretty cool ."

EVAN: "Because it’s like most hardcore singers sing from their what’s it called their diaphragm? I don’t know what it is since I don’t use it."

RYAN: "Yes."

EVAN: "Mine definately comes out of the throat so you see this big vein coming out of my throat ."

RYAN: "I’m the same way, I was out in Cornerstone about three weeks ago and I like threw my voice out and I haven’t got it back yet."

CORY: "I play out of my arms and my legs."

EVAN: "People say I look like Bob the tomato when I sing."

GILBERT: "Ya (laughs) Bob the tomato."

EVAN: "Doing it for the kids."

GILBERT: "So how would you guys rate yourselves as musician’s 1 thru 10?"

EVAN: "Me definitaley a zero because I’ve never had any training in singing ."

RYAN: "Negative 10 I’ve taken 2 guitar classes and I still suck."

CORY: "Ya I’ve never taken drum lessons."

EVAN: "Someone tried to teach you jazz." (laughs)

GILBERT: "You guys are like the first negative band, the most I’ve got was like a negative 2 I think , I’ve gotten bands with like 7 1/2 oh I’ve gotten 8 1/2 one time."

RYAN: "Man that person has problems."

EVAN: "No, maybe they’re good, don’t say that.  I’m sure Tony (Solid Mind) is a very good musician he deserves an 8 1/2."

GILBERT: (laughs) "I don’t know about that."

RYAN: "I don’t know I just play my guitar."

GILBERT: "That’s awesome, you guys are awesome um, you guys have anything to say like last comments? like I said this is going to be on our newsletter and it’s going to be on the internet right Tiffaney? It’s gonna be on the internet people are gonna see it anything you wanna tell the kids of America?"

RYAN:"You can reach us at punks4christ@webtv.net um, you can reach us at area code 626-919-3516."

EVAN: "Oh his phone number, he has a girlfriend sorry."

RYAN: "Ya sorry ladies I have a girlfriend sorry."

CORY: "And you can page Cory at 433-9073."

RYAN: "That’s also 623 area code."

CORY: "You can hear a nice Overcome song on my,"

RYAN: "Ya, it’s a ripper."

GILBERT: "I’ve got the Little Mermaid on my pager."

RYAN: "Ya?"

GILBERT: "It’s awesome."

RYAN: "And we have a website, but it’s really hard to get to, it’s on Geocities which is like the worst place for a website so we’re gonna be changing pretty soon."

CORY: "We’re from West Covina too."

GILBERT: "Do you have an address? "

RYAN: "No I don’t even know how to get in there."

CORY: "Ya if anybody like knows where that’s at,"

RYAN: "Ya I don’t know the address, oh yah if you go to the Rhythmstx site we have a link to our website oh there and you can just go there."

CORY: "I own a Speak N’ Spell."

EVAN: "I’ve got a chicken in the oven!"

CORY: "I do have a Speak N’ Spell I don’t have a computer I have a Speak N’ Spell."

RYAN: "I had a chicken in my oven once."

GILBERT: "Cool, well I guess that’s it guys and um play awesome tonight and I’ll be right there and punk rawk and hardcore and that other great stuff dude."

RYAN: "Cool."

GILBERT: "Um, excited to see you guys."

RYAN: "Cool."