FACT

Believe it or Not: FACT or Fiction?

Sonisphere Festival 2009 –
Saturday 1st August 2009 marked the launch of a new and great festival in the UK; Sonisphere. Primal Noise caught up with FACT, a band from Japan to chat all things relative.

Originally due to play inside the Bohemia tent on Saturday, FACT were instead called upon to take the main stage when Coheed and Cambria were stuck on a Ferry and unable to meet their time slot. We caught up with the guys later in the evening sometime after they'd already begun their after show celebrations, when they were a little more... “jolly” shall we say? While most other festival goers were battling the chill night air, somewhere behind the scenes we soaked up the luxuries of the Gibson Guitar Tour Bus with this excited, slightly drunken bunch!

PrimalNoise: Firstly, can you introduce yourselves?
Kazuki: I'm guitarist, Kazuki!
Hiro: Vocalist, Hiro.
Takahiro: Guitarist, Taka.
Eiji:(In English) I'm... f**king drunk!
Everyone: (laughing)
Tomohiro: Bassist, Tomo.

PrimalNoise: Can you tell us a little bit about FACT?
Kazuki: FACT are... Japanese hero! (laughs)
FACT: As far as sound goes, we started out as a metallic, fast, punk band. But we wanted to try and develop and incorporate a sound of our own, so we added in our electronic sound to it. Then we came up with the name 'FACT' in a restaurant in Japan, not a fancy restaurant, just a chain restaurant. We wanted to come up with an original name, be true to what we are and share what we view as living without being too conceited.

PrimalNoise: Since you formed 10 years ago, how do you feel you've evolved since then?
FACT: Well, we started out as a metal band, wanting to play really fast. But then, when the members changed to include Bassist Tomo and drummer Eiji as new members; we started to grow more, we started to look into different music. So, it was trying to incorporate everything that we were influenced by.
I think the biggest change though, was probably today, playing here on the main stage. We feel that we've evolved into a bigger band TODAY from that experience.

PrimalNoise: Is your music a way for you to develop as individual people, not just as a band?
FACT: By being in a band together, we're growing up as a band. But individually, because of everything that's going on through the band, we all HAVE to grow together. So, individually we are really just a band most of the time.

PrimalNoise: What things do you do outside of the band; hobbies etc,etc.?
Kazuki: (In English) I like surfing... Fishing... P**sy. (laughing)
PrimalNoise & FACT: (laughter)
Kazuki : (In English) Gambling. Driving. Horror movies!
Eiji: (In English) Scary movies! Kazuki surprises me!
FACT: Basically we like to watch scary movies... and then we try to scare each other!

PrimalNoise: Have your families always been supportive of your musical endeavours?
FACT: Everyone's really supportive. Especially because the guitarist and vocalist are brothers.
Takahiro: (pats Hiro next to him and smiles – speaking in English) My brother.
PrimalNoise: Aww~

PrimalNoise: How has your musical and artistic vision changed since you started out?
FACT: As a whole, we kind of started diversifying our musical tastes. In the past, when we were younger we were like “Oh we love hardcore! This is hardcore so it must be cool!” But now it's like, “This is cool. That is cool. That is great. That is amazing. That is a great song” We appreciate it as a song itself and not because it's thrown into one genre.

PrimalNoise: Two different scenario's, your best show and your worst show to date, and why.
FACT: Today was the best AND worst. It was a really hard show for us to play, because there were so many people there that really wanted to see the band that was SUPPOSED to play (Coheed and Cambria), so we were getting a lot of stuff thrown at us, because it was all arranged very last minute. But at the same time, it was such a great opportunity!
Eiji: I was so... f**king scared!

PrimalNoise: Has anyone ever hurt themselves on stage?
FACT: When we're playing in a smaller venue, we're much closer together, so we're all hitting each other with our guitars. We accidently hurt each other with our instruments!

PrimalNoise: Tell us something really weird/crazy thats happened to you whilst touring.
Eiji: (shows the deep scar on his arm)
Primal Noise: (gasps)
Eiji: (Spoken in English) Car accident.
FACT: During a tour in America, we endured a car accident. Eiji broke his arm.
Eiji: ( In English) 2 bones!
FACT: Everyone else had only slight injuries. We were all banged up and bruised, but Eiji was the worst out of all of us.
Eiji: (In English) 2 bones broken.
PrimalNoise: You're hardcore!
Eiji: Hardcore!! (motioning to his arm where he has implants)Like a hero, made of steel, very heavy!!

PrimalNoise: What are your biggest fears in life?
Kazuki: Aliens.
FACT: Ghosts. Cockroaches.
Primal Noise: So nobody has any fears of Spiders then...?
Kazuki: (In English) Spiders are my friends.
Eiji: (Showing us his spider tattoo) I have a spider tattoo. So I can't say I don't like cool spiders. Because I have a tattoo.
Primal Noise: Oh wow, that's cool.

PrimalNoise: Who would you like to do a tour with?
FACT: Skindred... Uhh... Anthrax... Anybody. We'd like to tour with anybody and everybody!

PrimalNoise: (Anthrax played at Sonisphere that day too) Did you watch Anthrax today?
FACT: Yeah! We played right after them!

PrimalNoise: Can you tell us your most influential artists?
Kazuki: (because everyone was laughing and shouting we didn't catch the answer)
Hiro: Hundred Reasons
Takahiro: Incubus
Eiji: F**king Anthrax!
Tomohiro: (with the drunken banter ontop, it's impossible to hear him aswell)
Primal Noise: We love Incubus.
Hiro & Kazuki: Me too!! Me too!! I like Incubus! Me too, me too. ME TOO!!
Primal Noise: (laughter) They are cool~!

PrimalNoise: Tell us about your album 'FACT'. What are you trying to convey with that album?
FACT: The general concept of the whole album is war. Whether it's a war within yourself, or a general statement of war. There is good fighting, like fighting within yourself and coming through to win and be on top. Then other wars that are NOT right, and you'd rather not fight. We want people to think about all those wars and fights and think within themselves what they should do and what they can accomplish themselves.

PrimalNoise: Hiro, How do you describe the direction of your lyrics on the album?
Hiro: With the concept of the war, instead of myself trying to send a message, I want people to be able to decide for themselves what it's about, either empathise or feel what we're saying with the songs, so I want to evoke that emotion.

Primal Noise: What makes you decide to write the lyrics in English?
Hiro: Well, there's multiple reasons, but one of the reasons is, we were always influenced by American and UK artists, so having listened to that music while growing up, we wanted to sing in English, since that's the universal language. Secondly, when we sing in English, it has a certain melody to it. When you sing in Japanese it kind of drifts away from that. It's not the genre we want to go to. To be able to fit the melodies phonetically, we feel we have to sing in English.

PrimalNoise: When writing new material, where do you draw your inspirations from?
FACT: We try to absorb everything that is surrounding us, as far as lifestyle, and even music that's just playing in the background when you're walking around, and hearing something. We try to asborb everything and incorporate everything and also including the music that we're inspired by. Trying to incorporate our music together as a group.

PrimalNoise: What FACT song are you most proud of to date; and why?
FACT: Fact of Life. This is our favourite song for sure. We think it's the most catchy one, yet different at the same time.

PrimalNoise: Downloading is a problem for the music business, how do you feel about it?
FACT: There are good things and bad things about it. Good thing is that a lot of people are able to listen to a lot of different bands, without going through a lot of hard stuff to GET the albums. The bad thing is because it's free and it's instant, it's not special to someone. There's no real attachment to the music itself. The whole process of buying an album. So, that's what's disappointing.

PrimalNoise: What have you been doing so far, this year? What have you been up to?
FACT: We had an American tour earlier this year. UK tour coming up after this. And making a new record.

PrimalNoise: What bands are you looking forward to seeing, or have you seen at Sonisphere?
FACT: Anthrax. Hundred Reasons. Metallica
Eiji: Lamb of mother-fuckin' God!

PrimalNoise: Since you were due to play on the Bohemia stage, but got bumped up to the main stage. How did that make you feel when you first found out?
Eiji: I was so fucking... SCARED. Oh my god~!
Kazuki: I was surprised!

PrimalNoise: Last question, How do you think the show went?
FACT: It was a really great learning experience.

Primal Noise: Thank you very much, for your time!
FACT: Thank you!!