Not even a decade ago, you’d get laughed at for even mentioning nu metal when talking about heavy music. It was really seen as a laughing stock, something for the “real” alternative genres of heavy music like metalcore, hardcore and mathcore to laugh at. Fast forward to today and you see more and more people in all parts of the heavy music scene embracing and celebrating nu metal for what it is: accessible, creative and heavy as hell music. One of those people is Carson Pace, of the explosive metalcore/nu metal band The Callous Daoboys. I got the privilege to sit down with Carson while the Daoboys were on tour with noise rock greats ‘68 to talk about nu metal, its place in the current exploding youth revival of genres like metalcore and hardcore, touring in the UK and so much more.
J:
What's your name and what band do you play in?
Carson:
My name's Carson Pace. I sing for a band called The Callous Daoboys.
J:
What are your main inspirations for The Callous Daoboys?
Carson:
Yeah, I mean it changes day to day. Recently it's been a lot of slower jazz stuff. I've been very interested in stuff like Bohren & Der Club of Gore, if you've heard of that, or the Kilimanjaro Dark Jazz Ensemble. I mean, stuff like that at the moment. Just trying to figure out how I can use it to influence us. But as far as just day-to-day influences; Linkin Park, Queens of the Stone Age, Fallout Boy, Korn, System of A Down.
J:
You guys have been accepted by a lot of different communities, like the Metalcore community, the Deathcore community, the nu metal community, and even the hardcore community. You guys played Furnace Fest. How does it feel to be accepted by so many at a time? Is it hard to try and book shows with certain bands, having to decide which genre you want to play for?
Carson:
No, not at all. I mean, we came up playing in scenes that we didn't really belong in. The first year of this band was us mostly playing with surf rock bands, if you can believe that. Shoutout the Atlanta band Panist. We played a lot in that scene and we played a lot in the hardcore scene in Atlanta, and the post metal (and) black metal scene in Atlanta too. So we very much adhered to the phrase like, a gig is a gig. We're doing this tour with ‘68 and they're very different from us, but obviously Josh was in The Chariot and that's a very big influence of ours. They may be different, but that doesn't stop us from wanting to hop on. And we've done emo tours, we've done prog tours, we've probably done too many prog tours! We haven't really been accepted by the prog community. I like that you said we've been accepted by the Deathcore community.
J:
I threw it out there just because you guys do throw in some deathcore parts.
Carson:
Yeah, definitely. I mean, Hunter Young from Psycho Frame and Moodring is a very good friend of mine and he does deathcore. He is like the Prince of Deathcore. Or maybe the King. I don't know.
J:
Psycho-frame are crazy.
Carson:
He was showing me some of that stuff before it was even really announced and I was like, this shit is fucking bananas.
J :
Shit, I only got 22%, so we can't talk for an hour.
Carson:
Sorry I was yapping.
J:
No, dude. I've done 20 minute interviews before. The chat pile interview I did lasted for 30 minutes. It was a straight yap session. We just ended up talking about fucking movies at the end of it. Somehow we ended up on the topic of the Vanilla Ice movie. I don't know how that happened.
Carson:
Yeah, that sounds like something Raygun would want to talk about. I'm going to text him after this and just say Vanilla Ice Movie.
J:
He'll know who you've talked to. On the topic of hardcore, how did it feel when you played Furnace Fest, which was mostly oldhead hardcore bands?
Carson:
It was an honor to be asked to do it, and I think with us being an up and coming band, that's always a risk for a festival like that. But last year I think was a brilliant showcase of up and coming bands between No Cure, Orthodox, Vein, us (and) Koyo. Just banger after fucking banger for younger bands and I feel like that was the right booking decision. This is no offense to Furnace Fest whatsoever. I think very highly of them, but you can't just keep booking fests off nostalgia. So the sets I had the most fun with at Furnace Fest last year were the younger bands. I love Hatebreed. I love oldhead Hardcore, I mean Terror, one of my favorite bands, but I think that the display of the younger talent at Furnace Fest last year was the best part of it in my opinion.
J:
I just got back from LDB, that was like a week ago.I'm from Louisville. Surfaced opened up LDB, they’re from Louisville as well. They played their first show with you guys, if you remember.
Carson:
Yeah I do.
J:
They just opened up LDB recently and that's awesome. Those are my friends. So it's kind of like a full circle thing, at least for me because the first show they played with you guys was their first show of all time. Then they just opened up fucking LDB. That's fucking awesome. LDB has a good mix of newer talent and older talent. There's Hatebreed, Harm's Way and Obituary. Then you have your Koyos, your Sanguisugaboggs-
Carson:
Fucking awesome band.
J:
So how does it feel to be brought into the nu metal fold?
Carson:
I think I always wanted to be a nu metal band, and then hardcore and metalcore and mathcore kind of came into my life and I was like, this is the most subversive thing I can do. And when we first started as a band, nu metal was still kind of an ironic thing. I'm a little older than you, I would assume. Yeah, I'm 28.
J:
I’m 19.
Carson:
I’m almost 10 years older than you. Don't make me feel too old now! When we first started out, I was your age and 10 years ago people saying, oh, nu metal is actually good. That wasn't a thing. It was a joke. It was a punchline. And I genuinely liked that music at the time because that's the music I grew up with. So it just wasn't cool to do. I guess I injected nu metal moments into our music and there was nu metal influence there, but there was something about the visceral energy of hardcore and mathcore that I just wanted more (of) at the time? And I think now that we've been a little more accepted, I'm like, well yeah, I want to write a bounce riff. You know what I mean? I want to write a stupid rap part or whatever.
J:
I think that especially the modern scene after Covid, especially the hardcore scene kind of turned (away) from this kind of very cliquey, you have to do it this way or we won’t accept you type thing. And I'm seeing a lot more experimentation among newer bands, especially you guys. You guys have been heavily accepted by (a lot of people), even some of the oldheads are like The Callous Daoboys? They kick ass! I think it's really cool to see people admit, hey, nu metal had some fucking bangers. The first three Korn albums are some of the greatest albums I've ever heard in my life man.
Carson:
They say that all (nu metal) music is for 13-year-old morons. But I was 13 when the fucking Korn Dubstep album came out. I still think that shit's tight. You know what I mean? I think that shit's awesome. And it's not that nu metal had some bangers to me, it's like nu metal was everything to me at a certain age, you know what I mean? Linkin Park was everything to me. I lived and breathed that band. I would read their Wikipedia page for fun. You know what I mean? I was that variety of dork.
J:
I mean, I was also that kind of dork, but more for noise rock. When I first started getting into music, I got into Lightning Bolt around the same time I was getting into nu metal and stuff, so I would spend a lot of time just looking at Wikipedia and reading stuff. Just going to different sub-genre tags and stuff like that. It's how I figured out Fred Durst wrote a movie and he put his music in the movie.
Carson:
Moose Is in the House. Yeah no, it's crazy.
J:
Yeah, I feel like at the time, a lot of people in the hardcore community were kind of embarrassed to admit that they liked a lot of nu metal and stuff like that just because they wanted to seem hard. And I feel like a lot of that stuff now, people are looking (at nu metal and saying), it's just music. Everybody else grew up when nu Metal was popular, so it was cool to push it aside, but now I'm growing up when it wasn't popular at all. So I'm looking back at it.
Carson:
Also the kids that were my age when it was popular are like no, this music rocks actually because that's the music that we grew up with. And for example, Adam from Orthodox and I, all we ever talk about is System of Down or Mushroomhead or just these ridiculous nu metal bands. And Orthodox at a certain point, of course they're a hardcore band, but I would also kind of call them a nu metal band.
J:
Would you guys call The Callous Daoboys big pants music?
Carson:
I mean, look at these shits, man. (gestures to pants) I mean, it's got a lot of zippers. And also if I unzip this down here, it then gets baggier. There's so many zippers on these pants and I feel like “lots of zipper pants music” does not roll off the tongue very well and I don't want to jock Orthodox’s swag, but yeah, we’re big pants music!
J:
We'll let Orthodox know.
I've talked about this with all the bands that are cool with nu metal and everything, it's really cool to see all the styles come together. I've listened to Converge. I listen to a lot of Korn and I listen to Lightning Bolt. But I think it's cool to hear the influences of older bands come together in newer bands in ways I never really expected they could like with you guys.
Carson:
Well, thank you! I mean, I'm always trying to bring something fresh to what we do, even though I think that a lot of people could be like, this is just The Chariot again, or this is just the Dillinger Escape Plan again. I get the criticism if you were my age at the time when those bands were popular, I definitely see how you could be like, this is just happening again and I'm going to write this band off. But I mean, I really do try and bring something different every single time.
J:
I feel like there is an issue of people saying that newer bands are just ripping off older bands. But my thing is, it's not a ripoff, it's just people being inspired by artists they love.
Carson:
I mean, I think that a band in our space that gets that criticism lobbed at them a lot is SeeYouSpaceCowboy. I think that people have compared them to everything from Heavy Heavy Low Low to Misery Signals to Drop Dead, Gorgeous to Poison the Well. And if you listen to those three or four, maybe there's five new SeeYouSpaceCowboy songs out. I think that's some of the most original music I've ever heard in my life. And sure I can compare it to things, but I can only compare it because they heard something and they were like, oh, I know how to play that riff. And then they wrote a better version of that riff that they heard. You know what I mean? So I don't know. I'm fine with that criticism. If you don't like the music, if you think we ripped off a band, don't listen to it. I don't give a shit. But for my purposes, I don't listen to a Dillinger Escape plan song and then go like, oh, I'm going to play the riff backwards. That's not what I do. I listen to a Dillinger Escape plan song and I'm like, that's cool that they did that. What can I do to make it my own and new and interesting? Or I listen to some shit that you've never fucking heard of in your entire life. And I'm like, how can I make that palatable for some hardcore kid?
J:
All the jazz you talked about at the start. Literally never heard of any of those in my life. But now I'm like, okay, maybe I'll go check that out.
Carson:
It's awesome shit, man. It's really slow. It's like 60 Bpm. It's real slow shit. And also the other band I always am stealing from is Queens of the Stone age. I mean, I think that at some point, every dude goes through a Queens of Stone age phase. You know what I mean?
J:
When you reach 25, you start listening to Queens of the Stone Age.
Carson:
The first time that you're given a cigarette and you smoke it and you don't get addicted to cigarettes, you're like, yeah, I listen to Queens of Stone Age.
J:
This is really disjointed. So I'm sorry. I'm going to have to do some stuff.
Carson:
You’re good.
J:
I always like this style more because it's very, very personal and conversational.
Carson:
No, I love it.
J:
I hate when interviewers sit down. They're like, you sit there, I sit here, I ask you questions. And then it's just like, it feels very dispersonal, but it always feels like there's more to come out when it's like this. Anyways, what would you say besides music has inspired you guys?
Carson:
I'm a big movie guy. I don't know if I've said this in interviews before, I probably have, but I'm currently working on a movie. I'm writing one. I’ve been writing one for a long time. And that’s kind of how the music comes out, is I’ll see something in my head that I visualize and I'm like, what does this sound like? Because I can't draw. I can't use Photoshop. I don't know how that shit works. I'm getting better at making videos. I did all the music videos for our EP and some for our album before that too. That's something I'm getting better at. But without money and resources, it's hard to do. So the simplest thing I can do is see an image in my head and just basically output what that sounds like to me. And especially I do that with movies. I steal “images” and sounds and stuff like that.
J :
I feel that pretty heavy, at least as me as a person. I have a lot that I want to put out, but I've always been more of a writer than anything else, which is why I do stuff like this. I can't really draw or make music or anything, but I like creative writing and stuff like that. I like getting a story out there. And I feel like no matter how you do it, it's important as humans to create art.
Carson:
100%. And also, I think you have a lot of self-awareness. I don't know that you can't make music. I don't know that you can't draw. I'm sure you could make music if you tried since you seem to know a lot about it. But I think self-awareness is important as well. Knowing your strengths and knowing your weaknesses. But ultimately you should make whatever makes you happy. And if writing is that, that's fucking awesome, man.
J:
I mean, there have been some awful punk bands I've listened to, but the fact that they love what they're doing, it just makes me love what they're doing because you can fuck up a riff it is the worst thing I've ever heard. But if someone that's writing it actually has some passion behind it, I'll find something to like about it. And I feel like that's something that I think a lot of people are kind of realizing. It doesn't really matter how good you are at guitar or how good you are at this, that, or the other. I think what matters really is finding that love for expression. And I feel like that's why a lot of people are pushing away, especially in the burgeoning hardcore and nu metal scenes, people are pushing away the more corporate “music” that feels like it was made more to make a dollar than it is to create something.
Carson:
Well, yeah, I mean, the monoculture is collapsing and everything's going to become more niche, and everything's going to stay niche. And there's going to be more shows like this (gestures to the 400 cap venue we are at). Shows like this are going to get bigger. But it's all going to move into a niche community of people just going, okay, what do I actually like? And then they go support that instead of something that someone's telling them to like.
J:
Yeah, and I think especially because of the internet, it's becoming a lot easier with Tik-Tok’s algorithms and all the algorithms on Spotify and other websites/apps. It's easier for people to razorwire narrow down their taste and go like, hey, I like this. When you were a kid, you had to go to MTV to find (music and say), this is a metal band I like.
Carson:
I mean, Spotify wasn't a thing until I was in high school. I had to find bands through record label sampler CDs, which I assume you haven't seen one of those ever.
J:
I got one at LDB from Maggot Stomp. They were handing them out for free.
Carson:
That's awesome.
J:
All the stuff on their label. They just had one free song (per band) and he (Scott Magrath, founder of Maggot Stomp) was just like, hey, take it. I mean, I want you to listen to more stuff on Maggot Stomp. And I was like, okay, free cd. I need more of those in my car.
Carson:
With sampler CDs, not to get all back in my day on you, I bought the first My Chemical Romance album from Eyeball Records on CD. And in that CD there was an Eyeball Records sampler, and the (band) Number 12 Looks Just Like You was on that sampler. That's the only way I would've ever known who that band is, period. So it's interesting nowadays that that's just not how people find music. Even when we started, I never would have expected somebody to come up to our merch table and be like, I found you through my Spotify algorithm. And that happens at least 10 times a show where I'm like, that's crazy. That's just not how I grew up. And also, it's not really how I find music today at all.
J:
I actually found you guys because of Holiday Kirk.
Carson:
That's awesome.
J:
He was posting your stuff.
Carson:
He’s a freak about us, man.
J:
I saw you guys, I think you popped up on Spotify once or twice, but I didn't really click or anything because at the time I was super deep into nu metal. I was listening to Slipknot religiously. But then he posted your stuff and I was like, what the fuck is this? I had never heard of Mathcore in my life before.
Carson:
Not the genre you want to make if you want lots of fans.
J:
Speaking of Mathcore, it's cool to hear you guys bring that stuff on the table. I found this band called Black Matter Device randomly on Band Camp.
Carson:
They're a fucking awesome band, just truthfully one of the coolest bands I think that we've known. We got to play with them in DC and then they came down to Atlanta and they played with us then. And then we played with them in Virginia pretty recently. They're just a fucking awesome band.
J:
The first interview I ever did was with them after they dropped Buckshot Mouthwash.
Carson:
That single is very, very good.
J:
I think they deserve a lot more attention.
Carson:
They're our first related artist on Spotify.
J:
It's awesome that you guys are coming out here playing smaller shows. You guys have toured with pretty big artists, right? What was the biggest artist (you guys have toured with), have you gone on stadium tours or anything yet?
Carson:
We haven't done stadiums. We've done very big venues across America and Europe. The biggest two I think would probably be, we did a US tour with the band Avatar, this Swedish metal band.
J:
Oh yeah. They're really popular with the Slipknot crowd.
Carson:
I believe Corey features on one of their songs, and they've toured with Slipknot, I believe. And then we just got back from a European tour with Tesseract. So yeah, I mean, again, a gig is a gig and we're not really at the level where we can play venues that those bands play. But tonight was sick. I'm very happy with tonight. This whole tour has been sick.
J:
Do you prefer smaller, more intimate shows or bigger, more bombastic shows?
Carson:
There's advantages to both. We played a 2,900 cap venue in England with Tesseract right? And I'd say probably a hundred of those people in that room were going crazy the entire time we were playing. And that's awesome because it's like 2,900 people are watching us. It's sold out and they're looking at a bunch of people enjoying it. And we probably gained a good amount of fans from that show. But small, intimate stuff like we've been doing on this (tour), we just played up in Detroit at this venue called Sanctuary, and it was like 250 people there, but every single one of those people knew every word to every song. So it's like, that is amazing! And that's more personal and directed at us. And one day, Lord willing, I'm manifesting it right now, we're going to be at the same level where we can play in front of 2,900 people who know every word. You treat every show like it's a stadium show.
J:
I feel like that's something some artists don't really get. It's important to love what you're doing when you're small.
Carson:
I mean, I think that part of being a band is playing to no one. I think that if you are playing in front of a thousand people at your first show, I think it stunts your growth a lot. I think it's kind of a bummer, honestly, because then the second you play a 250, you're not going to be grateful at all.
J:
I mean, shit like this wouldn't have happened. And I think that's one of the coolest things about playing smaller shows, at least for me, as a concert goer, is just being able to do stuff like this where I can walk up to an artist and say hey, what's up? I love your music.
Carson:
For sure.
J:
To wrap it up with some final questions, how's the tour been with ‘68?
Carson:
Amazing. I mean, so many of the shows have just felt like straight up hometown shows almost. And we end it on a hometown show in Atlanta, so I couldn't be more ecstatic for that. (I’m) just very grateful and very humbled by this whole tour. Couldn't have asked for a better one, especially after, frankly, eating shit for six weeks in Europe.
J:
Was it that hard?
Carson:
Crowds were just real tough over there. They're different. They're different than America is.
J:
(In broken British accent) The Callous Daoboys??? What does zat mean??? I've never heard of what a CALLOUS is.
Carson:
Pretty close to that. I mean, England loves us, but the rest of Europe, is, y’know…
J :
The rest of Europe is super death metally, right?
Carson :
They're everything, man. I mean, any genre can prevail over there, but if you're playing outside of your genre like we were, and no issue with Tesseract, no issue with Unprocessed. We love those guys, but we are very different from them musically. And people who are there to watch Tesseract aren't there to mosh. They aren't there to hear breakdowns. They're there to hear what Tesseract does, which is very different from what we do. So eating shit is kind of subjective, I suppose. We had some great shows. Prague was great. Norway was amazing. All of Scandinavia was pretty much amazing. All of England was amazing too. All of the UK was amazing. But (it was) the hardest tour I've ever done in my life. And I've been touring since I was 17 years old.
J:
If you were going to give some advice to up and coming hardcore (and) nu metal (bands), any bands trying to do something, what would your advice be?
Carson:
Don't stop. Even when you think the juice has been squeezed out of the lemon entirely, you can always get back up. That's not really how things work. It's not really that you're in a vehicle that has a certain amount of gas. It's that being an artist means that there's ebbs and flows, y’know? We're doing awesome right now on this tour. This tour is amazing. But that doesn't mean that we're not going to play a bummer show one day. That doesn't mean we're not going to suck. And that doesn't mean that we're not going to try and tour again and only sell 12 tickets in another city. What you need to understand is that it's like that sometimes, but you will be back up. You will be back up as long as you just don't stop.
J:
Two more questions. One, if you could collaborate with one other band, have a feature with them, what band would it be? Any band at all.
Carson:
My standard answer to this is always Mike Shinoda (from) Linkin Park or Chino Moreno (from) Deftones. That would be the two.
J:
Last question. Want to shout out any smaller bands, artists, that don't really get the attention they deserve? That you really want to get out there and say, hey, listen to these guys.
Carson:
Sure. Beljavin, FromJoy, No Cure. Hidden Mothers. Mastiff. What else, what else, what else… Fallen God. Tracheotomy. That's what I got off the top of my head.
J:
Any last words you want to throw out there before we're done?
Carson:
We're touring a bunch this year. Come see us!
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