Swollen Members (left to right: Rob the Viking, Mad Child, Prevail, Moka Only)

Swollen Members have become one of Canada's hottest rap acts. Having gone platinum in Canada and recently signed an unprecedented 50-50 label deal between Virgin Records and their independent label Battleaxe records, they are on the verge of international stardom. They're renowned for their live show as they successfully bridge the gap between punk and hip-hop cultures. Their most recent album, 'Monsters in the Closet' is nominated for a Juno Award and the group is nominated for Group of the Year. You can check them out at: www.battleaxerecords.com. Many hip-hop heads feel like they've fallen off with all their success on MuchMusic. I got the chance to sit down with Prevail, (1/4 of the Swollen Member crew) and set things straight.

Prevail Interview:

Troy: I appreciate you doing this interview.
Prevail: Likewise
Troy: Again, I'm Troy, this is Ben (my associate interviewer)
Prevail: Ok.

Troy: First off, there's been some rumors going around that Vanilla Ice is opening for you guys on this Atlantic Canada tour.
Prevail: (laughing) Are you serious? Where'd you hear that? (still laughing)
Troy: That's just been circulating around.
Prevail: No. (still chuckling)

Bonshah: I didn't think so cause I heard DJ IV is opening for you. But Vanilla Ice is doing a Canadian tour here shortly, so I thought maybe.
Prevail: Oh really.

Troy: I don't know if you heard his last album, but it's actually pretty good. It's not hip-hop.
Prevail: It's on some rock kinda shit..
Troy: a Korn type of sound...
Prevail: Yeah, yeah. I saw a little special on him with was super interesting. He's like a professional motorcross racer.
Ben: (laughing)
Troy: Oh, is he.
Prevail: Yeah. He's super good too.
Troy: I didn't know that.

Troy: So what prompted this little excursion to Atlantic Canada for the tour?
Prevail: We're doing about six college shows before we start the Avril Lavigne & GOB tour. We hadn't been out here in a little while...
Troy: It's been a year and a half.
Prevail: Yeah, so we here and we feel like saying "yo we missed you guys!" and pop some shows off before we start the big tour.

Troy: Yeah, it's great timing too because you were here a year and half ago just as 'Fuel Injected' was coming out on video. So you guys hadn't peaked to where you are now. You've gotten so much bigger since then...
Prevail: Yeah, the show's going to be interesting cause you know... you guys live out here (Atlantic Canada) and know how friendly and awesome everybody is. As well as how much enjoying of fun and beverages there is (making a drinking from a bottle gesture with his hand).
All: (laughing)
Ben: We're proud of that.
Prevail: (laughing much harder)

Ben: We don't get a lot of good shows out here. So when something good comes around, everyone shows up.
Prevail: Yeah, it's gonna be fun.

Troy: Did you know that on Friday, the DMC competition is going on at the same time as your show in Halifax?
Prevail: Oh really (surprised).
Troy: I figured you might not know.
Prevail: No, I didn't. I hope maybe they do this thing where where the first 100 tickets to the Swollen show can also go to the DMC competition. Then it's like a whole hip-hop night affair.

Troy: Have you heard Classified, cause he's opening for you guys on Friday night?
Prevail: Yeah. He's dope man. I'm really feeling his shit, dude.
Troy: Should make for a great show.
Prevail: Yeah, I'm curious to see his show.

Troy: So what was it like working with Nelly Furtado on 'Breath'?
Prevail: Dope man. Me and Moka have been real good friends with her ever since childhood. It was awesome, super smooth. She like a gem.
Troy: Yeah, if you've been friends before, it's always nice to hook up for a track after you've done so well individually.
Prevail: Especially after touring together, cause that's when we did that song. Aside from her relationship with me & Moka, she got a really good chance to meet Mad Child. We got a chance as a group and as a separate entertainer to build that music energy. So when we went in the studio it was crazy.

Ben: You guys have toured with a lot of a people you wouldn't expect a hip-hop group to tour with. Has that helped with the crossover of exposing yourself to new fans? And what's it been like touring with people like Bif Naked and Avril Lavigne?
Prevail: Good. We're so lucky to get on those platforms. We've played with GOB, Bif Naked, Project Wyze, Nelly Furtado and now Avril. You wouldn't expect a hardcore hip-hop underground head to necessarily come and check out one of Bif's shows, or one of Bif's hardcore fans to checkout a Swollen show. But once you get them at the same venue, these people see why other people like us or them, and vice versa. For us it's been huge and like you said it's had more to do with our success than anything else except maybe MuchMusic.

Ben: It's cool cause you get out people who aren't huge hip-hop fans to begin with. I know I'm not a huge hip-hop fan and I tend to be quite picky about it, but every once in awhile an act comes around with guys and a skate scene. You guys do that, so it's cool. Um... What's you connection with Red Dragon? Do you guys know Moses?
Prevail: Yeah, we know Moses and all those guys. Mad's from North Van, so that's RDS territory. I grew up with this kid Sid Clarke who runs the RDS store in San Diego. So, I grew up with him and Moka used to skate. Moka was sick. Mad Child used to be one of the sickest. I never skated, but I always hung around and appreciated it. I always knew what was going on, so it was kinda natural for me. I just got back from Whistler yesterday before heading down here for our shows. I snowboard and I've been riding for four years now. It's part of our everyday lives, so it ends up that the music gets translated to those people, which is awesome.

Troy: Do you guys have a relationship with Circa as well?
Prevail: Yeah. We're still great friends with all those guys, but we're on DC now.
Troy: So you're sponsored?
Prevail: Yeah. It's cool man. DC & RDS. That's cool.
Troy: Yeah, Ben saw Rob the Viking with the...
Ben: brown shoes... I was like, 'ah man I've been looking for those shoes.'
Prevail: They're dope, right. DC makes good gear.

Troy: You mentioned how touring with other groups gives hip-hop heads the chance to experience them. Now lately, it seems like a lot of those underground heads are falling off because they're saying you sold out cause you signed to a major label. What do you have to say to them? Cause I don't feel like you're any less underground. You just got to the stage where you needed...
Prevail: Are you talking about the Virgin thing?
Troy: Well, Nettwerk too.
Prevail: Here, I'll put some clarification on that. In Canada, we signed 50-50 net distribution deal which is the first time that's ever been done with Nettwerk. Nettwerk has two sides: the label side and the management side. We're managed by Nettwerk, but on the label side, they are our main distributors for Canada. We're still independent, but it's like two independent companies making a business merger. It's Battleaxe and Nettwerk. So, we just did the same thing with Virgin, but it's Battleaxe-Virgin. Mad Child explains it best, but I'll try. A major label is like a bank. Sometimes as a small business you can have all the best ideas in the world and have what you believe is a great product, but if you don't have the means to get it out there limited to only so much. So we basically borrowed money from a bank, they're going to get their investment back and in turn make our business grow.

Troy: I think a lot of people envision getting a label deal as meaning that you're set, but it's not that way at all.
Prevail: Ah, dude, exactly.
Troy: You have to be there and work hard. I think the way you've done it is the perfect example of a big label deal because you were at the point where you needed that boost.
Prevail: I think too it's important to clarify to people that we didn't sign as Swollen Members to Virgin. We signed up a label deal with our priority artists getting that first run of that money we borrowed. Swollen Member and Moka Only are the two most developed and concentrated acts on Battleaxe Records that we're trying to take to that next step. They gave us a budget and we figured out what we needed to spend on the studio, what we awarded to ourselves, living allowance and so on. We've got lawyers and managers and such, so it takes a lot more work and thought than it does to only answer to yourself.

Troy: In the end it's worth it cause...
Prevail: Yeah, it's the only way you can do it. Maintaining independency on a major, as opposed to just getting swallowed up and shelved.
Ben: And you get to keep your Battleaxe logo on the records right?
Prevail: Of course dude, of course.

Troy: Do you ever get frustrated by the ignorance that some people exert, when people stop supporting you because they see you've signed a deal?
Prevail: Nah. It's a complicated thing. The way I explained it, Mad Child probably would have explained it 100 times more clearly. A lot of people don't know the business side of the music business, why should they - they're fans. So for those people who're confused, that's where we stand.

Troy: You've gone platinum in Canada. What kind of sales have you been getting in the states?
Prevail: Real good considering we've done very limited touring down there. We don't get radio play down there. We don't have videos out. Once in awhile someone'll call me up and be like 'Yeah, they played your video at 4 in the morning!' All: (laughing)
Prevail: I'm sure there's some people watching, but not as many as primetime viewers. It's good though. We're definitely selling units down there, and Mad would be able to give you better numbers, but easily hundreds of units per week. So we're looking forward to getting down there and giving it a major push, so hopefully we'll see those number move up.
Ben: A hundred a week is gold in Canada anyways, isn't it?
Prevail: (laughing)

Troy: You worked with Todd McFarlane on the last video. Did it turn out as well as you would have liked?
Prevail: Yeah it did. It's crazy. It's a cool video. It's funny because before Todd came to the table for the directorship, I had Nelly (Furtado) on the phone and we were putting some names on the table. She called me back the next day with a bunch of names, but the overall general consensus was that everyone wanted the video to be dark. The last couple of videos we had done were real bright and bumping and right in your grill. So we wanted something to take it back to 'Lady Venom' days. Nelly (Furtado) was excited to do something like that too cause for her it was something different too. It gave her the opportunity to go off and do her own thing. Then when Todd came into the picture, we were like who better than the guy who did the best episode of Spiderman ever and started Image Universe. It was great cause he's a super cool guy to work with and his right hand man, Terry Fitzgerald made everything as smooth as possible.
Ben: Was he (Todd McFarlane) a depressing guy?
Prevail: Nah dude. He's just a creative mind. It's kind of like how we approach doing music going from all that bright, happily motivated kind of stuff, to the other side of reality, which is still motivated, but in a different direction. Not necessarily negative, but you gotta talk about that stuff too cause that's everyday life.

Troy: I read that with the next album, you're planning on taking time to go back to your roots and make it more introspective and maybe a bit harder and darker?
Prevail: Yeah. We're seven songs into it right now. It's cool because the way that the first three albums went, with Balance, we recorded the whole album and then we did 'Lady Venom.' That was the second to last song we recorded. For us, when we did 'Lady Venom', it felt like we were making progression. So we carried that fire with us until we started recording Bad Dreams. But in between, we really didn't stop recording. When we started recording Bad Dreams, it was sort of the same thing. We recorded 'Fuel Injected' with Moka Only, and were like 'Ah man this is a whole new sound for us, while still doing what we love to do.' Then when we did 'Breath,' it was sort of the same thing and put it on another level. So we keep carrying that energy from those progressional songs over to the next album. So with the next album we're ready to set it off from the very first song. We're gonna go all guns blazing. As I said, we're seven songs into it. Seven completely different songs, but you hear them and know they're Swollen. It's got our sound, but all different. It's gonna be ill!

Troy: When do you expect it'll be out?
Prevail: We're pushing for September for it for when the kiddies go back to school. Something new to pump in their walkmans.

Troy: Any big names going on there that you might already know about?
Prevail: We've done a song with Everlast so far. He's doing country bluesy type stuff, and brings his stuff to the table. We just did two songs with the Bass Brothers who produced a gang of shit for Eminem. They did Eight Mile and 'Lose Yourself'. They're old skool with him. They really helped set his career off. So we're working with them. We haven't really done any other songs yet, so I can't talk about it, but some other cool things are in the works. And of course Evidence from Dilated.

Ben: How do you separate yourselves from the rest of the hip-hop scene? There's a lot of people in it now and not all of it's awesome. How do you say, this is where we are. Where do you think you stand? What do you think people think when they say, 'that's how Swollen Members do it'?
Prevail: For one, if they've ever seen our live show, I think that's something we really find some self-identification in. We try and go off and have the best time possible. That's the only way the people are going to have fun because they don't want to see any pre-rehearsed crap. We make our live show something we really stamp our own name on. With the music, I think it's the energy of the personalities we have in the group. We're all such different people, but we have so many common underlying ideas, themes and views on life. We've all been such good friends for so long. I grew up with Moka, I've known him my whole life. There's just a lot of feeding off of each other.

Troy: Where did Rob the Viking come into the picture? Comes there seems to be no background info on Rob the Viking.
Prevail: That's cause Rob's from an island about the size of this table (pointing to a 3 foot by 3 foot table and laughing). He's from a super small island just outside of Victoria.
Ben: He had nothing to do but practice, eh.
Prevail: Yeah. He was in a group before this and he gained his experience there. Mad Child brought him over to Vancouver and put him through a technical music college. He lived with his equipment for the next year and a half following that. Then he started making stuff for like Buc Fifty, Defenders of the Underworld and those first couple compilations, just basically learning to create his own sound.
Troy: So Mad Child put him through the technical college?
Prevail: Yeah.
Troy: Man, that's cool. Good investment!
Prevail: Hell Yeah!

Troy: Having gone two for two at the Junos, and with the Rascalz being up against you guys this year, what are your expectations for this 3rd nomination (for 'Monsters in the Closet')?
Prevail: The whole category has a great spread of hip-hop musicians. To be nominated for a third year in a row, with three different albums, it's crazy dude. If we win this year, it'll be the first time it's ever been done in hip-hop history in Canada, (winning three years in a row). We're also super excited about the best group of the year nomination. It's crazy because it's the first time a rap group's ever been nominated in that category.
Troy: Well, good luck!
Prevail: Thank you.

Ben: I've noticed a lot of similarities between the hip-hop and punk culture. I know a lot of people in the punk scene and they were all talking at the lunch table today about going to see Swollen Members tonight. Where do you see the connection between punk music and hip-hop?
Prevail: You look at punk and where it started, then you see the attitudes of people who propelled it, and we think to ourselves, "we're just doing our own thing." This is what I'm into, and because that person's into it, I don't even have to know that person, but because they're into something as concentrated as this then they have to be somewhat cool. The energies on stage: with punk shows, there's nothing liver. It's crazy energy. We try to do the same thing, but in our own way. Mad Child grew up listening to a lot of punk. I grew up listening to AC-DC cause they were my favorite band. So we grew up on that heavy rock energy, especially at the shows we went to as kids where we'd see people just go off and put on a great live show. So, we try to bring that to our show.

Troy: Ok, to wrap up, is there anything you'd like to add?
Prevail: Check out Battleaxe Records at www.battleaxerecords.com.
Troy: Thanks for your time.
Ben: It was nice meeting you.
Prevail: You're welcome. Thanks for the interview.

For more information on Swollen Members, check out their website at www.battleaxerecords.com.