Tilted (vocals/DJ)
Years active: 2018-present
How did you first get into music, and which band became your first real obsession? My brother Ian, who plays guitar in Tilted, and I would sit and play guitar hero for hours and hours on end as kids. Between GH, Madden 06 and 07, ATV Offroad Fury, and all those other PS2 classics with banging soundtracks, we both got hooked on metalcore/alt-rock and dance music from a pretty young age. When our dad saw that we had that interest he kinda blew the whole thing open for us, showing us bands and finding new ones with us. But as far as first real obsession goes, I remember being 10 and being absolutely fucking hooked on Disturbed and Breaking Benjamin. Tough ones to admit these days, but I can’t lie, I had every Disturbed CD.
How did you discover HC, what pulled you in, and which band served as your gateway? Back in 2016ish, when I started playing in bands with Scott, Tilted’s drummer, we were huge midwest emo heads and we started a few 3-4 piece bands with that twinkly tappy style, but somewhere along the way we were like “man this twinkle stuff is fun but we should write title fight worship riffs.” So we changed our name again to Tilted and hit up our homie Luke to play guitar as well. One more emo EP and a few shows down the line, Luke told us he had some hardcore riffs he wanted to write with (I was newjack as shit at the time so I thought he meant like Black Flag, Bad Brains, Minor Threat type shit) but when he started showing me the riffs and where he was getting inspiration from for the riffs, I was hooked. Bands like Madball, Incendiary, TUI, Expire, and even like Earth Crisis just to name a few.
Biggest musical influence? All time? Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.
Describe your sound in 3 words. Nu Metalcore Swag
Top LIHC / NYHC bands of all time? Crown of Thornz, Crush Your Soul, Sanction, Glassjaw, Beastie Boys, Warzone, Killing Time, Raid, every band that my homies play in
Top 3 non-HC bands of all time? Pearl Jam, Emmure, House of Pain
Current LIHC / NYHC bands worth checking out? If none, list from other places. Oh man here we go: No Unity, Fear Made Flesh, Ferment, Ten Years Out, Miseryiswithoutyou, Shootout, Grael, 100 Hour War, Field of Vision, Liberate, Pound for Pound, Last Laugh, Evil Ways, and probably like 50 more that I’m forgetting.
“Tell your friends you love them. If shit isn’t working out for you just try harder. You can drink 100 beers as long as you go to the gym and sweat it out. Playing Runescape is good for your brain. I don’t know, but if you’re going to listen to anything I say listen to this: ITS A CLEAN VOCAL METALCORE WITH EMO RAP AND JUNGLE SAMPLES WINTER, NEW TILTED SINGLE “YOU SCATTER THE ASHES” OUT ON 12/5.” —Kevin McNally
Photo by Lexi Horvath