High On Fire would be a difficult band to explain for those who have not already heard them. Perhaps "thrashy doom" would be the best synopsis of their style. Irregardless, they are one of the best things going these days as far as the American doom scene goes and boast a strong heritage with guitarist Matt Pike's previous band being the legendary Sleep and new bass player Joe Preston's work in The Melvins and Thrones.

Matt: Well, it did more than I thought it would and it was up and down, you know, it was kind of rough 'cause we were playing to a bunch of kids who do not know who the fuck we were. But overall, I had a good time playing, it was really weird to play amphitheatres, (laughs) I mean, that's a whole new different fuckin' trip. I don't know, it was up and down, but I had a good time and I met a lot of cool band people and stuff like that.

Matt: I just feel like it's different and I feel like we've evolved and we've kind of found a new niche; I feel really good about what we did on it. I don't know, I love "Blessed Black Wings". It's really a personal album for me too, I mean, a lot of it's really heartfelt and about myself and about my struggles with myself. It's about being a musician and touring and having a hard time. I had a good time making it and I think it's a great album; I really like it a lot. So I'm not ashamed of it in other words. (laughter) I feel really good about it.

Matt: It was kind of Relapse, but then again, I wasn't opposed to it. I wish the mix on it would be a little bit better, but the way we are live, it's so fuckin' loud… we got the monitor mix, basically. I think it's pretty cool, but I wish the guitar was a little louder and the bass was a little louder and the drums… I wish it sounded more like how the show sounded, but other than that it's cool, it's alright. That and it was a typical L.A. crowd, which a lot of the time they don't move or do shit, they just stand there and criticize you or whatever. (Phil laughs) Whatever, I don't really care. (laughs)

Matt: He was one of our first picks as far as calling somebody. Me and Des were going back and forth, "How many bass players do we know?" "Tons." "Who would be the best one for the job?" and Joe came up and we're "well, we'll call Joe Preston" and I had my roommate Cyrus playing for awhile, I had a couple people try out for us and Joe had the best touring schedule, called us back right away, came down, learned the songs in four days and went on tour with us. So it was pretty amazing that we pulled it off. I was so stressed and it worked out better than I thought.

Matt: Yeah.

Matt: Yeah, I suppose so. We get a lot of Thrones fans, that's for sure, that normally wouldn't go to see us, but they do because Joe's in it or whatever. I mean, it's not a bunch, but all these weird, cultish people who are into Joe will come and stuff. Yeah, it's been alright.

Matt: Well, my old bass player, George Rice, called me up and he asked me if I'd ever heard this E.L.O. song called "Fire On High". He asked me what I thought of that name and I was like, "'Fire On High'… I'll call you back in a little while". I tuned it around, "What do you think about High On Fire?" and it kind of stuck. We were going back and forth between names and we had our first show and High On Fire got put on the flier, so it was cool. It kind of stuck, it looked good on the flier and we're just like "fuck it; okay, that's it". (laughs) And no one else had it, names are hard to come by nowadays; that's why every band nowadays has a sentence for a name, (laughs) 'cause everything else is taken, you know?

Matt: Well, basically, a lot of that is Arik Roper and he's been doing art for us for a long time and there's another guy in Seattle named Santos. We just pretty much give the artists our CD and let them go off with what they feel about it, like draw to it, see what you come up with and that's what Arik Roper came up with, so I've got to give him credit for that.

Matt: Oh, probably not, no. The three song, no, definitely not. I had a falling out with that guy. There was a while where I kind of loathed him, but I don't really hate him or anything, I just don't want anything to do with him. I just want any sort of drama cut out of my life that I can and he's drama and I don't feel like I should put that out again. I have things to do in the future, not the past. It's kind of one of those things.

Matt: Yeah, it's just like I don't need to do that, 'cause I can make another album, you know, move on. I'm glad I made it when I made it and it's helped us to get this far, but I'm over it; it's not a big deal.

Matt: No.

Matt: Actually, just the other night, I saw the old guitar player who was actually the one who did that. He's living in Austin, Texas. It was just one of the members, he was the guitar player at the time and that was after the first album.

Matt: No, usually they have a lot of respect and usually they like High On Fire and Sleep, but High On Fire and Sleep are definitely different. But no, I haven't had anybody that had massive disrespect or anything.

Matt: I don't know. The bands that are playing doom, I like the fact that they have a little bit of balls, because it's not a big thing right now. It's kind of gone downhill for a long time, you know? It was big for awhile and I think that not a lot of kids are getting it and there's only a certain amount of people that like it and they're all very cultish, they stick to their thing. I like a lot of bands that are doom. Wino's always been kind of doomish and there's also Graves At Sea, there's a lot of bands that I really dig that are doom. But it's not what's going on right now, it's not as wanted as it once was. I don't have much of an opinion, 'cause I like it and anybody who doesn't, whatever. I've always played kind of doomy shit, whether it's thrashy or whether it's slow. I think doom's great, I think it aspires after having kid of a hard life and a hard time and things not looking up. Obviously, Sabbath was the first doom band and they grew up in an industrial city and I think a lot of doom comes out of a lot of places like that; you live in the ghetto, you live somewhere weird, you're poor, things suck and that what doom's kinda all about. I think doom's just fine and I wish more people were doing it and more people liked it. It's just one of those things; I enjoy it, I'm cultish and so are the people who listen to it. Other than that, I don't know how many people are into it nowadays; it's not a big scene like it was for a little while; it kind of died out. I've always played it. Maybe that's too much; maybe you should edit eighty fuckin' things I said into one sentence. (laughter)

Matt: Yeah, you got it man, you got it.