“Anything else than taking away gratitude is the wrong attitude”

From a gated community of Mexico, I had the pleasure to talk with DAMIEN SISSON, the heavy mellow bass player of DEATH ANGEL, on the pandemic situation is a good moment for a deep talk where we touch many themes, with the main idea to know a little bit more the person behind the stage, some questions are answered here:

Which other musical projects are you currently working on?

I try to work on, I´ve been working on music a couple of different things to work on, I´ve been working on a lot of my own music which it´s a bunch of different type of stuff is collaborating with friends and musicians from throughout the years, they´re putting on vocals and doing guitar tracks and different things, a bunch of it´s an eclectic thing to collect a bunch of songs the way I like to say it´s musically expressive commercial music, so there´s a lot of musicianship but is somewhat ease easy to listen to, you know, don´t think about specified listening, is not jazz or death metal where it takes a special ear to appreciate it it´s pretty much right down the middle like an adult-oriented album raw.

I´ve been also reporting at the house this day and age with telecommuting and the digital resources it makes it so easy to put an album together with never even being in the same room with anybody.

I´ve been working on…I can´t really announce it yet but there will be announcements soon about a band, a project that´s gonna be coming out, it´s a four-piece in the thrash metal realm, so did some recordings for that and then always preparing and doing stuff with DEATH ANGEL, whether it´s going to be a telecast, working on new songs, going over stuff or things that are coming up, you know, they’re always trying to throw something up in the mix to keep it fresh, if I´m not doing that then I´m gonna be playing guitar and working on something else musical so the extent of my boredom is the limitation, as much as I keep myself motivated and proactive productive there are things to do which are going to stay productive

Damien has moved to Mexico for a year and a half, so in retrospect, What cultural differences can you recognize between America and Mexico?

One thing I can say about American culture is that the issue and controversy of race and ethnicity is very complex there, anybody can go into more detail but we got a whole lot of different opinions ranging from hostile to hospitable and in Mexico there really isn´t the issue of race and ethnicity people here don’t have a conflict about if they´re light-skinned Mexican or dark-skinned Mexican or if they´re Mexican from European descent or you´ve Mexican from indigenous descent all in all, I mean you still have upper class people who regardless of what they look like, reflect upper class people in any culture anywhere in America very much but as far as complexity of race in Mexico is not theirs, so what I find is I don´t have to deal with racism I don´t have to deal with prejudice and I don’t have to do a deal with like discrimination generally speaking it´s very hospitable country and people will go oftentimes very out of their way to try to make me feel comfortable or try to include me knowing that my Spanish is pretty shitty so I´d say that is right you know, that body language is like 70% of communication so I´m still using my hands a lot and just the gestures and the tone you give off with your body kind of shows whether you´re an open whether you´re open to a situation or not so I try to make conscientious effort to stay humble and be open-minded and embrace the culture as much as I can while I´m here because I´m a guest but although it´s a good experience I lived in America for a good 38 years and I don’t see why getting some change and adapting, I have presumably more years of my life to make more changes it´s a part of the journey

What can you tell me about your musical relationship with WILL CARROLL?

Will got his pounding funky way of playing and I´ve just kind of learning in which ways I could support him by playing alongside him in which way that could support him by kind of laying low and letting him do his thing and then jumping back in and he´s a pounder and a lot of energy comes out of that dude and I definitely find that the less is more

Some advice for new people in music:

I remember when I was growing up people were talking about rockers and I was always kind of a guy who liked music a little older than my generation so I remember when kids were getting into electronic music they´re telling me “my Black Sabbath and my Judas Priest are dinosaurs” and the fact of the matter is now I do kind of feel like a dinosaur because we have these mew mediums the digital, Spotify, YouTube, if I was to give a recommendation and advice based on what worked for me it might not be applicable to this new day and age so in addition in what I´m saying is that.

They need to practice absolutely there´s no way about it that they really need to practice their instruments and it´s a very competitive market more so than ever, so if you think you´re a good musician go on YouTube and you´ll find a six-year-old Chinese girl doing it better than you so there´s a competitive market out there, and that´s nothing to be ashamed of because these people are working their asses off to be good so, first of all, you have to do your practice and second of all you need to understand what the new mediums are these social media.

Social media is a new business card I don´t really promote mine too well but if you could get them if these new kids are doing their homework and they really have the talent then they shouldn´t feel ashamed about promoting themselves on social media to get exposure.

The exposure get some sponsorship it gets them some endorsements it gets their foot into other doors meeting other people so I would say all those things are very important  however the old school method that I used was crusty, a dirtier I spent my days in the club as soon as I was done with my homework I was in the rehearsal studio rehearsing or driving to a show, to play a show every day a lot of times what I did is I bartered my services if someone needed a bass player I´d say  “I´ll play bass for you and I´ll help you out for as long as you need and then maybe when you get some shows you´ll book my band as an opening act” and it worked a lot of people appreciate it I wasn´t asking too ever anything too much out of the ordinary they needed my help and I needed theirs

One-on-one interview, if you want to know more about the musical influences of DAMIEN and the current music he uses to listen to (which is not metal), and what he thinks about some delicate themes like success, capitalism, “a franchise of gentlemen rockers” (really interesting concept), the milestones of DEATH ANGEL and a lot of more, please click below these words!

Follow Damien SISSON at:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/DamienSissonBass/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heavymellow_bass

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/heavymellow1/featured

AMPEG: https://ampeg.com/artists/damien-sisson/

Follow DEATH ANGEL at:

https://www.deathangel.us

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deathangel/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deathangelofficial

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