Seneca Valley High School classmates Neil Fallon (vocals), Tim Sult (guitar), Dan Maines (bass), and Jean-Paul Gaster (drums) share an unshakeable musical and personal bond now three decades strong. Shaped by the same region which birthed Bad Brains, Minor Threat, and Rites Of Spring, Clutch crafts hyper-literate and libertine jams informed by hardcore fury and fuzzy, athletic, stoner rock.
Now those classmates return with “Sunrise On Slaughter Beach”, the band’s thirteenth studio album – a slamming summary of everything that makes the band great and another giant leap forward into career longevity. We talk to drummer Jean-Paul Gaster about the new album, how the band create music and what it feels like to be back touring.
On being back touring after the last two years of the pandemic:
JP: It’s been great! We’ve really enjoyed getting back out there again, it’s been a long time. I feel like we’re super appreciative and I think the fans are just as appreciative to be able to get out there to see the music and we are thrilled to be able to get out there and play.
On the new record Sunrise On Slaughter Beach:
JP: We started writing almost immediately [After the pandemic began] and I tell you, the first batch of material we threw out pretty much in it’s entirety. I don’t think it was because it was bad or we were dissatisfied with it, I think we realized that there was this opportunity to dig in and try to get into some different things and I think we were success with that in the end.
On where the album title came from:
JP: When you hear that name it sounds very powerful and it sort of sounds terrible at the same time but Slaughter Beach is actually a beach that’s quite close to our homes in a very small state called Delaware and there are a lot of stories as to how Slaughter Beach got it’s name and some of them are more terrible than others! But I think it sort of encapsulates a feeling or an idea and that is what Neil (Fallon, vocalist) is so good at, he can take the name of a place and maybe it’s a place that we grew up with and we knew all about but when you say it to somebody else, it sounds wild.
Check out the full interview
Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/cExY9j6AOrk
Listen to Podcast version on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3KiSax1
Get Sunrise On Slaughter Beach here: https://www.clutchmerch.com/collections/music
