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Brief History:
“Jesse started writing the stuff when He and I were still in Zao – a year and a half ago, maybe,” estimates Rob Horner. “Obviously, he and I quit Zao. That’s basically how it got started. He and I both started getting tired of playing metal. We both still listen to metal bands and our friends’ bands and stuff. It’s more a dis-interest in playing the music. You reach a certain point where you want to evolve and grow into something else."

Difference In Working With Jesse As Drummer vs. Frontman:
“Me and him still work, basically, the same way together. He still has a lot to do with the percussion, like the drumming on the record and stuff. We’re actually shopping a drummer right now. Even when he was in Zao, he was writing guitar parts for Zao."

Christian Band & Christians In A Band Debate:
“It’s not an anti-Christian band, by any means; but it’s not a Christian’ band. There’s certain members that are Christians and certain members that are not. I’ve never really been concerned with who’s this and who’s that? As long as they’re good natured people…"

Style Described As Similar To H-I-M, Marilyn Manson, Type O Negative. Will Gods Takes Its Onstage Cues From Those Bands?:
“There won’t be any smearing feces or defacing the Bible…” (he chuckles after I bring up taking visual cues from other notable goth artists, like Marilyn Manson). “I don’t think there’s going to be any feces wiping.

“Things these days -- the lines have been blurred. I don’t really see separate scenes. I don’t really understand what that means. I kind of refuse to acknowledge that it exists, I guess. If you ask any kid, whether it’s a hardcore kid or whatever, he’s probably going to tell you a multiple genres of music. I think alienating people from a microcosm of a scene, I think that cheapens an audience. Just because you’re from a certain scene doesn’t mean you have to smear feces on you, or speak from a pulpit, or deface a Bible.

“We don’t want to alienate anybody. That’s the point. Why would you want to alienate anybody from your music? People can draw their conclusions. I don’t need to drop a cussword so some kid can get mad at us."

Dark Imagery = Dark Band?
“I could see where people might come to think that, but unless you really know Jesse, what you see on the outside doesn’t mean that’s going on. I don't really know what to say about that one. Jesse is, like, my best friend. His personal walk with God or whatever people want to call it – that’s his own business."

Plans for Full-Length Album:
“We recorded in December with Andrew Mangneisen, the drummer for Spitfire. We recorded it in his studio. It's done. It's going to be put out on Hand of Hope (Records). The release date’s been pushed back a couple months. I don’t think it’s coming out until May 5th. A couple of the songs on the EP (which was a demo) will be on the full-length. We did a lot of sequencing on it. It’s basically a straight-ahead record. There’s some pretty nice guitar leads on it. They’re kind of buried in the mix, though. They're pretty funny. We plan on touring a lot. We’re supposed to be on tour right now, but some financial things came up…”

Leaving Zao:
“I’d rather not comment on that. It wasn’t a bad experience, but it wasn’t a good experience. I don’t hold any bad blood for any of those people.”

Jesse Smith on New Album:
“I’m really, really happy,” gushes Jesse. “I would probably even go as far to say that I’m the most proud of this over anything else I’ve ever done musically. We spent three weeks in Virginia, sleeping on a cold floor and eating beans. We really busted our butts and I’m really happy with how it came out. It sounds really good.”

The EP:
"Things have changed. I think the EP is garbage. It was recorded in a basement just on a small Pro-Tools setup. Lyrically, some of the stuff going on was a little whack. I was kind of bitter at the time. Most of the songs have been written in the last year. I probably wrote 20 songs and did pre-production for 20. We ended up taking 10 of them. Since not playing with Zao I’ve just been working. I had a small studio for a while. I just demo-ed everything out. “That demo is just a horrible. It’s pretty whacked. It’s probably six months old. It’s complete rough, Pro-Tools demos. We had an offer. It’s kind of weird how you, like, learn from your mistakes with little things like that. You’re like, ‘Yeah, I want to get something out,’ and you have this little crappy thing and you’re like, ‘Whatever.’ And then you do something that’s awesome and you’re like, ‘Dude, why did we do that?’"

Transition from drumkit to frontman:
“It’s cool. We haven’t been playing for the last six weeks – just being in the studio. I enjoy it. It’s just music. We’re talking about even doing another project with a friend of mine singing with me just playing drums again. Just music and expression and art – it’s all hand in hand. It wasn’t like a mental note of, ‘I want to be in the front’ or ‘I want to be a band leader,’ or even, ‘I don’t want to play drums anymore.’ It was just I was writing a lot of songs and playing guitar and things just ended up happening that way. It’s cool. I enjoy it."

As A Frontman, Taking Cues From Who?
"I think it depends on the song. I think there’s … Obviously, with heavy music in general, there’s pressure on a lot of people to flip out and go as crazy visually as possible. We’re running a lot of… We’re getting to be a pretty visual band with the shows we’ve been playing. There’s a lot of lights. If someone in the band feels the need to get into it… We’re running some tv’s and video and stuff. There’d have to be inspiration. Certain songs call for that, I guess, and other ones don’t. Just putting on a good show and conveying your ideas live is probably my main focal point."

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