By: Dr Matt Warnock
Raleigh, North Carolina based Modena is a band with equal parts talent and heart who are willing to work for every gain and who hold the highest expectations for themselves. Possessing unequivocal discipline and a strong sense of purpose in their live shows, studio recordings and interactions with fans, the band is constantly focused on transcending genre labeling while concentrating on the music and their fans.
Their dedication and raw emotion is earning them the respect of listeners everywhere they play, while cultivating a loyal fan base, not just in their home town, but throughout the Southeast and overseas. Shunning conformity to the blueprinted formula so commonly heard on today’s rock and pop radio, their catchy, hard edged sound can not be defined by merely one classification. They are rock in its truest form, a band that is as much committed to originality as to the rock scene itself.
Recently releasing their second EP of original songs, Modena stands poised at the forefront of a new generation of rock n’ roll bands. A band that is keeping their sites set on returning the Raleigh scene to its creative roots as a musical oasis and hurl rock back to the top of the charts.
Modena guitarist and singer Justin Womble sat down with Guitar International to talk about the bands early successes, plans for the future and the struggles and triumphs of being an Indie band in today’s tough market.
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Matt Warnock: Who were some of your influences on the guitar when you were growing up?
Justin Womble: My first big influence was Ace Frehley from Kiss. I first learned to rock power chords from Ace, and his vibrato is really well defined so I spent time working on getting that sound. As I got older I branched out and got into Gary Rossington and Allen Collins from Skynard. Then later on I was all about the shredders like Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Paul Gilbert, it was really an amalgam of all those different players that influenced me as a guitarist over the years.
I would listen to one guitar player for a long time, then I’d kind of hit a wall with their playing and what I could take out of it, so I’d move on to someone new in an attempt to learn their techniques and develop my own playing.
Matt: Now that you’re out with your own band and have developed your own style, are you still checking out new guitarists for more inspiration?
Justin: I’m always listening and finding inspiration in new players. When I was a teenager the bands that were big were Staind and Limp Bizkit, those kinds of bands. Those guys were using chord voicings that went beyond simple power and barre chords, so things like that will catch my ear and I’ll go work them out on the guitar.
Recently I’ve been checking out the guys from Children of Bodom, they’ve got a cool sound going on. It seems like every time I turn on the radio I can find someone new that’s worth checking out, it’s an almost endless, life-long search for new inspiration.
Matt: Modena is based out of Raleigh right now. What’s the rock scene like there these days, are things happening?
Justin: We’re out there playing every weekend, but I don’t think there’s a big a scene as it may seem. For a certain type of music things are really happening, but it seems for our style of playing it can be tough at times to get out there and get gigs. The bands that are doing really well, playing for big crowds and making good money, are bands that are doing covers.
There are a couple of places that are dedicated to showcasing original music, which have a decent following of people that come out and support those bands. I wouldn’t say the scene is booming, but it’s not dead. The longer I’ve been out on the scene the more I’m noticing that the bands playing straight ahead rock are the ones who are gaining the most recognition. The indie thing used to be it, places only wanted to hire original acts for a while, but now the scene is shifting focus to the straight ahead thing.
Matt: You guys run with a two guitar lineup, how do you figure out who plays what when you’re writing new songs?
Justin: We pretty much divide it into rhythm and lead parts, similar to what you’d find in the classic rock bands of the ’70s. The songwriting is pretty much split down the middle as far as who writes what. Jaymz and I both have very different styles of playing, which helps to mesh things together.
Jaymz is a rock-solid rhythm player, which really helps give me the cushion I need to do my thing. I’m not always playing lead lines and he’s doing chords, but we’re always doing two different textures, even if it’s two sides of the same musical coin sort of thing.
Matt: It seems that with the rise of social networking and cheaper websites that it’s now easier for an Indie band to survive than ever before. You guys have found success as an Indie band so far in your careers. Do you think it’s now possible to survive as a band without the backing of a major label?
Justin: In the ’70s and ’80s a band couldn’t get anywhere without some sort of major label backing or at the very least having a large regional following. For our first record we put it out on Deep South Digital, but our second EP was released on our own. It was a lot more work to do it ourselves, but by doing so we’ve learned that it is possible to survive as an independent band these days.
If a band is willing to put the time in to promote their own music, both online and off, then it can be done. It also offers the band more freedom to do their own thing, which might not be possible if they’re tied to a record contract with a major label. Just doing little things like getting our CD into Hot Topic, Sam Ash and Guitar Center has led to some opportunities for the band that we wouldn’t have had if we didn’t get out there and promote ourselves that way. Even the little things can really make a difference, it’s all about putting in the time and effort to get things off the ground.
Matt: One of the things you’ve done to help get the word out, and to involve your fans with the band, is to hold a wide array of contests. Tell us about how that idea came about and what some of your contests have entailed.
Justin: We all got together and brainstormed about ideas on how to involve the fans more with the band. When I was growing up I would always enter contests for bands like Kiss to win autographed posters or albums or whatever. So we decided to start doing things where people who were spotted at a certain place and time wearing a Modena t-shirt would get an autographed CD or poster.
When we got the street team going we started to give those folks a little incentive and thanks by giving them free tickets to a show, or some free merchandise, just a token of our appreciation to our street team getting the word out for us. Without the fans we’re just four guys playing music in our garage, so we want to make sure our fans know that we appreciate them and their support.
Matt: Getting into your guitar playing a bit more specifically. You get a very thick, heavy sound on your guitar, but it never sounds muddy or overbearing. Do you play in standard tuning or do you experiment with dropped tunings at all?
Justin: When I joined the band, the other guys had been together for about six months, and because of the vocal range of their singer they were tuning down a whole step, plus dropped the D down to a C when they wanted that solid, lower end sound. That was just too low for me to sing over, so I suggested that we tune down a half-step, then drop the Eb to a Db when we needed it.
A lot of my favorite bands like Kiss and Alice in Chains tune down a half step so it was pretty natural for me to play and sing in that tuning. The half-step tuning was better for my singing range, but I also just love the way the guitar feels when it’s tuned that way. It’s got that slinky feel and you can just get that fat tone out of the guitar all the time.
Matt: What gauge of strings are you using to get that fat tone, probably not too slinky with the lowered tuning?
Justin: I use nine-gauge strings on all of my guitars and I don’t find that they get too slinky, if I went any thinner they would probably be too light to get the tone that I need. I’ve never had any problems with them flapping around too much on the low end. I can still get those crazy Zack Wylde squeals out of them without being too overdone. I have Floyd Rose’s on all my guitars which helps them stay right in tune, and it helps keep them set up just how I like them.
Matt: With your new EP out are you guys planning on releasing a full-length album in the near future?
Justin: As we speak we’re demoing some new songs out in our rehearsal room. We don’t have concrete dates yet to go into the studio, but we’ve got our sights set on doing a new record before too long. Our bass player was sick for most of last year so we didn’t get to push the EP as much as we wanted to.
The last record seems to still have some staying power, so we’re a little hesitant to go in and do a new record when the last one is still doing well and people are still buying it. But we’re always writing new material and will definitely be heading into the studio sooner than later.
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