Wanting to ensure their debut album landed with a thunderous bang and not a limp, quiet thud, Galveston, Texas-based metal trio To Whom It May, spent three solid years on the road, road testing songs as they wrote them, to ensure maximum potency based on the feedback of discriminating live audiences throughout their home state.
The extra time, effort, diligence and patience paid off as The Great Filter was released in the fall of 2018, to critical and popular acclaim. To Whom It May’s lineup is comprised of guitarist, vocalist and primary songwriter Jonathan Jourdan, bassist Robb Mars and drummer Dexas Villarreal, who worked to create an album that was diverse, full of pulse-pounding riffs, but also infused with melody and lyrical depth.
They succeeded, as the songs have a live-off-the-floor feel, and the sound is incredibly full, considering there just three members in the band. Jourdan said he likes the focused intensity of being in a three piece band, and feels it’s the format and presentation that best suits the music of To Whom It May.
“I have been in a five piece, I have been in a four piece and now I am in a three piece and there is definitely something to being in a trio. Each person’s voice means a little bit more, so to speak, when making decisions. It’s good because it’s fewer opinions that you have to agree with, and I mean that in a musical sense. If we’re going to go in a certain musical direction, if those three minds are all in the same place and on the same page, we’ll be able to take it as far as we can,” he said.
“it is unique, because it also puts limitations on you because you can’t have crazy solos and crazy rhythms at the same time on one guitar. But I think that simplicity forces some reinventing of the wheel for us. We weren’t always a trio, this is kind of a new thing for us, it’s kind of like jumping into the deep end of a pool and just learning to swim.”
Texas has always had a wonderfully rich and vibrant rock, hard rock and metal scene, spawning the likes of ZZ Top and Stevie Ray Vaughn. Going even farther back, one of rock and roll’s most prolific pioneers was Lubbock, Texas native Buddy Holly. On the metal side of things, Texas became welded permanently onto the map thanks to one band and one album – Cowboys From Hell, released in 1990 by Pantera.
It was the second album featuring new vocalist Phil Anselmo and was a serious shift in tone and intensity, as the band moved away – far, far away – from its glam metal roots, becoming grittier and more intense progenitors of what became known as groove metal. The classic lineup of Anselmo, bassist Rex Brown, guitarist Dimebag Darrell and his brother, drummer Vinnie Paul, inspired an entire generation of groove metal bands, including many in Texas. Jourdan was one of those, and said since the heady days of Pantera, the Texas metal scene has continued to be strong, proudly independent, and diverse.
“The metal fans here are undying. They are passionate, and they really care. The Texas scene is great. We are continuously getting new metal bands and really good metal bands. There is an incredible underground scene. And Texas is also such a big place. It’s so huge, it’s the only place where you can drive 15 hours in one direction and still be in the same state but in a completely different climate. There’s such dedication from metal fans here and from the bands. They just want to rock here; these Texas metalheads are intense. I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else,” said Jourdan.
Genre wise, Jourdan said To Whom It May does take a lot from their Texas predecessors, including Down, who they recently toured with, but also from other influences, as they try to incorporate other metal styles into the fold.
“We get comparisons to The Deftones and sometimes Pantera and Meshuggah, bands with a lot of rhythmic changes. But in terms of genre, I think our goal is to take progressive metal music and complex ideas and kind of reduce them to their core concepts and make it something that someone who isn’t into prog could enjoy,” he said.
“I want to be a bridge to that for people. I don’t want to confuse listeners, but I also want to challenge people musically. That’s kind of our hope and goal is that people can listen to the band, feel emotion, feel the sincerity in the music and honesty, while also at the same time, being taken on a ride. I feel like everybody appreciates great musicality, but I also think that if it becomes too much it can turn people off. We believe that if you can’t play the song on an acoustic guitar, then it’s not necessarily a solid song. I know it’s a cliché, but I do think there’s a lot of truth to it. A good song, is a good song, regardless of the complexity.”
As evidence for this approach is the first single from The Great Filter, the palpably intense and instantly memorable Calculate.
“It’s been cool getting such great feedback and amazing airplay for this song. It’s been a cool experience and it’s definitely been opening some doors for us. It’s been great to hear people singing along in the crowd recently. That’s been a head shaker and kind of a surreal experience. The song came together in a similar fashion as to a lot of the other ones, in my home studio working on some parts on the eight-string guitar. The eight-string is usually used in heavy music, but I wanted to find a way to put it in a song where it didn’t just bash the listener over the head with low stuff,” said Jourdan.
“What the song means to me, personally, is about being inspired by a hero throughout your youth, and then at some point when you’re growing up, the hero just loses his grip on his own life and starts to lose faith in himself and you have to come back to them, and this time the tables are turned and now you’re their hero and you’re trying to remind them why they’re amazing. And it can refer to a lot of things, it can parallel a relationship, it can parallel friendship, anything of that sort. But it’s really just about being there for the people who were there for you and who inspired you.”
The track Descend proves the band can whip out great rock riffs with the best of them.
“That one actually came together in the studio from just a riff that I had. It was one of the songs that we didn’t have a chance to iron out through live shows. It is pretty much focusing on the metaphor of slipping into quicksand and a person watching you slip into and you telling them as you’re going under not to look away, now that it’s gone past the point of no return, that you want them to watch it happen, because they have allowed it to happen just as much as you have,” Jourdan explained.
“That one was really special because it came out of nowhere and was the last song on the record. The album was pretty much wrapped up and one night in the studio I was with the producer and he and I just sat down and kind of cranked out this song. I woke up the next morning and listened to it, I was waiting to kind of say, ‘well it wasn’t nearly as good as I thought last night,’ but then during the playback it was more like ‘wow, I think we caught something special here.’ So, we kept it.”
Another of the stand-out tracks on the album is Ghost, which was on the band’s first EP and one of the first songs completed by the band.
“We had it out and road tested it on our earlier tours when we were still wrapping the writing of the record. And that one was another eight-string tune, and the goal was to incorporate some different tonal aspects and whatnot,” said Jourdan.
“In terms of the meaning, its about going inside yourself and facing your inner demons and just taking an introspective journey into your own mind and learning to understand that you can’t believe everything you hear, even if it’s coming from yourself sometimes. You just have to have confidence that you will do the right thing. And that was another one that I feel, rhythmically it really pulls on some emotions. We usually end the show with that one and it always sets the room on fire. That’s the groove I can’t wait to play at every show.”
And fortunately for Jourdan and the rest of To Whom It May, those shows are coming faster and at more furious. They recently performed outside of their home state of Texas for the first time, doing a run with Drowning Pool in December. After a show in Houston on Jan. 18, and one in Shreveport, Louisiana the following night, the band will hit the road for an extensive tour opening for Candlebox starting Feb. 8.
Jourdan also said that he has not really stopped writing and that a follow-up album could be coming sooner, rather than later.
“That’s one of my problems: I love to write. I probably have an album and a half’s worth of material already knocked out. And I am really excited about it and it’s just a question of how to put it out and when. We don’t want to step on the toes of the current record. We want it to have a chance for it to dig its roots. But we do have new stuff, and we’re really excited about it and there are a lot of really cool developments that we can build on from this first record,” he said.
“There is stuff being written every day, and we’re talking about it every day, just trying to chisel away at it, because I don’t want to have to wait three or four years for the next record. I never want to have to go that long again.”
For more information on tour dates, the new album and other news, visit https://www.towhomitmay.net.
- Jim Barber is a veteran award-winning journalist and author based in Napanee, ON, who has been writing about music and musicians for a quarter of a century. Besides his journalistic endeavours, he now works as a communications and marketing specialist. Contact him at jimbarberwritingservices@gmail.com.
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