Aug. 10, 2026

Microtonal’s Cameron Johnson on Thrash, Battle Jackets, and Finding Identity in Metal

Show Notes
Transcript

In this electrifying episode, Pipeman sits down with Cameron Johnson of the band Microtonal at Bloodstock, diving deep into thrash and death metal culture, band origins, and stories from the metal scene. The conversation spans from the nostalgia of handmade battle vests to Microtonal’s upcoming music, providing insight into the band's influences and the evolution of crossover thrash. Listeners get an inside look at Microtonal’s philosophy, their experience supporting DRI, and Cameron Johnson's roots in metal.Main Topics Covered

Battle Vests & Metal Nostalgia
- DIY patches and old-school creativity 00:25
- Metal icons featured on the hosts' and guests' vests
Microtonal’s Band Story & Influences
- Formation and organic growth of the band less than three years ago 04:48
- Blending thrash, death metal, prog, black metal, and more
- Emphasis on "Irish death thrash" and each member’s unique influences
The Evolution of Thrash & Metal Community
- Stories about early thrash/punk tensions and crossover 03:11
- The role of DRI, Suicidal Tendencies, and others in uniting scenes
Supporting Legends & Festival Experiences
- Microtonal supporting DRI in Belfast and Dublin 02:51
- Attending and playing at Bloodstock festival 04:27
Personal Metal Journeys
- Cameron Johnson’s early introduction to Metallica via his father 08:07
- Family musical influence and drummer legacy
- Deep dive into favorite bands and the enduring appeal of metal
Upcoming Releases & Shows
- Teasers for new music by the end of the year 09:20
- Plans for more UK gigs and desire to reach a wider audience

Key Discussions & StoriesMemories of Metal Battle Vests

Pipeman recalls crafting his own battle vest in the '80s, hand-drawing band logos like Slayer and Exodus 00:29.
Cameron Johnson shares that his girlfriend made his first battle jacket, sourcing rare patches from Mexico and Poland 02:08.

Crossover Thrash’s Historical Barriers

Reflections on the early scene: metalheads and punks were once divided, but bands like DRI and Suicidal Tendencies helped break those barriers 03:14.

Microtonal’s Musical Identity

Discussing members’ varied musical backgrounds, leading to a distinct blend of thrash, death, prog, black metal, and hardcore punk 05:40.

The Power of Musical Diversity

Both agree that thrash’s magic lies in its diversity, with the "Big Four" each sounding unique due to their mix of influences 06:29.

Origin Story of a Metalhead

Cameron Johnson recounts how seeing Metallica’s "One" video at age five set him on his path in metal 08:07.

Upcoming Music and Touring Ambitions

Microtonal teases new music due by year’s end and announces plans for more gigs throughout the UK and beyond 09:20.

Notable Quotes

"We call ourselves Irish death thrash... but every kind of member brings a slice of a different sort of subgenre to make up what we are." — Cameron Johnson 05:40
"The Big Four of thrash were not anything alike... that's because you bring other elements in." — Pipeman 06:39
"If you go in trying to replicate something, you’re just gonna end up sounding like something that’s already been." — Cameron Johnson 06:55
"DRI is the reason. Once they started growing their hair out, Suicidal changed, COC changed, everybody started changing." — Pipeman 03:36
"Literally from about 5 or 6, I was just dedicated to Metallica... Lars Ulrich's my favorite drummer." — Cameron Johnson 08:27

Resources & Links Mentioned

Microtonal Socials & Music
- Follow Microtonal on Instagram and other social media platforms
- Bandcamp: Search for "Microtonal" to find releases and streaming links 09:34
Bloodstock Festival
- Discussion about performing and attending the legendary UK metal festival 04:27

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Hi, you have done to censure for se wow for

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you you.

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This is the pipe Man here on the Avengers Pipe

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Man W four c Y Radio and I'm here with

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Camen Johnson's from Michael Turnle nice and I have to

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say I didn't bring it today. You should see my

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battle ves. I have it back at the hotel. It's

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all handmade, homemade from back in the eighties. And most

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of what you have on there are my favorite bands

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because I'm a total fresh metal head, so I have

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like on my vest.

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I'll show you.

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I have a picture actually, but it has Slayer on there,

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but not a patch because it didn't have a patch

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yet at the time.

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And then it.

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Basically I drew all over it. I have even I

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drew Exodus, but it's the original Exodus logo.

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Oh that's good.

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That looks so cool, right, yeah, that's proper, proper old skill.

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Yeah. Absolutely.

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Look there's the front, I mean, there's the back, and

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then I'll probably go to the front. Yeah, and I

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drew all that ship on there here. Awesome, great job,

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Like it looks like a pot like you know what

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I mean? Right, right, absolutely, Well, there's the front. As

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you can see, it's been through some wars for all

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the pits.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

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Yeah. So we didn't really have a multitude of patches

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back then. So I was like, I have s O

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D like you have on there. I know it's that.

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I know it's the s O D one right off

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the back.

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Yeah, exactly.

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I was, that's quite a wrong one. I'm very frankful.

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This is kind of like one of the first battle jackets.

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I got made. My girlfriend made it for me, frankfully

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and nice.

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I kind of went through I kind of had a

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look on eBay and all the different places, and I

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would just see all these cool patches, especially from back

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like the Mexicans love cool thraft metal patches.

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You're always coming from Mexico.

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Or Poland, you know, right, and I'm just you know,

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would get a bunch of them, just send them over

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to Belfast and just kind of again again all sewed

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it on, and but a lot of them as well

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because they're all weird ships, so trying to sew it

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on was quite difficult. You know, it's very weak corners

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and things like that. So but gener well, I immediately

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seen that and I was like, I need to have that,

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you know, represented, because the crossover frash in particular.

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I've got DRI as well. Oh I love DR. I

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on my best.

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We were very fortunate enough, Michael Tonell. We supported DRI

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last month. Really they played Belfast and Dublin and we

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were the opening bound and it was surreal because they're

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one of my favorite I remember when they grew their

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hair out. Yeah, I know exactly, you know, yeah, absolutely, ye, yeah,

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big beards and.

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Yeah, they were one of my favorites too. And back

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in the beginning you couldn't go to a DRI show

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if you were a long hair yeah, because crossover didn't

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happen yet and punks can.

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Go metal show. It was so stupid, Like we're similar music.

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We were both game bullied by the jocks, spanned together

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and they finally got smart. Yeah, and d d RI

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is the reason once they started growing their hair out,

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suicidal change, you know, coc change. Everybody started changing, you know,

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and there were the guys to give it the deal

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cast I exactly, exactly and you got the simple tour

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att Yeah. Did you know this is their last ever

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UK performance?

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I did, Yeah, because I have not been able to

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catch sepultur like for whatever reason, anytime they've been to

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anywhere in the UK or Belfast or whoever. I've not

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been able to catch them, so I'm like making it

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my mission to be like, I need to see Seplete

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before it's too funny because they're playing in Dublin on

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the Sunday in two days time, and I had tickets

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and then we find out that we were playing here.

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We went through the Metal of the Masses comments and

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we were given all weekend passes to come. So we

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were like, oh, you know, we won't be able to

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see them a Dublin but here, you know, we get

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to see them at Bloodstock, you know.

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So that's well.

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Yeah, So tell us a little bit about your band,

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not from a genre point of view, but how you

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the artists view your band, as how you want paint

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the picture of your music. Yeah, I mean, so the

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band got started less than three years ago and I

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just formed it. It's one of them things that actually

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is so cliche. I formed it with my friend. We

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both love thrash metal. Go Off looked at both both

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love death.

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Metal, and we were saying, hey, do you want to

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start a band? He play bass, I played drums and

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just started from there. He had He has a brother Aidan,

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who's our league guitarist he joined, and the kind of

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just we foind Mario or vocalists and arn our other guitars,

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you know, just kind of naturally we were looking for

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other guys to join and and they join, and I

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think it just happened so naturally and organically, and it

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took it took a while to kind of get fully started.

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But then once we be done, we've just kind of

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been on an upward trajectory. And but what's good about

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us is, you know, we're obviously beast. You know, we're

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focused heavily on thraft metal and death metal. We call

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ourselves Irish death Rafts, you know.

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Nice.

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But I think everyone in the band kind of has

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different paths from where they've came from. Like, for example,

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you know Aidan or guitarist, you know, he he's big

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into his favorite bands, make it efforts, you just praised

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you're playing on Sunday, And but he also loves a

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lot of like the kind of shredder guys, you know,

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Steve I Jucetriani, So a lot of his solos can

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sometimes be quite like kind of that edge to it

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that you know, maybe not over kind of thrash, soolos

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Have and Marty his favorite bands are like Pantara. He

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loves like a lot of the sludgier stuff like trow

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Bar and things like that. So I think his vocals,

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he always thinks he kind of comes from a kind

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of more sludgier background, but I think it works perfectly

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for what we do, you know. And so it's although

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we're kind of based and thrash metal predominantly, there's I

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think every kind of member brings a little kind of

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slice of a different sort of shop genre to kind

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of make up what we.

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Are, you know, absolutely, and see that's the whole basis

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of thrash. I talk about it all the time. Yeah,

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the Big four thrash we're not anything a white Yeah,

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none of them signed anything like you because you bring

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other elements in. Yeah, And I've been talking about it today,

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like Slayer Lombardo was a punk, Hanneman was a punk,

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and Carrie was a metal head and Tom didn't even

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know what metal was.

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Oh yeah, exactly.

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Yeah, So that's what greats that great music, Yeah.

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Absolutely, Yeah, Just I think if you go in kind

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of trying to replicate something, you know, and you all

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listen to the exact same bands, You're just gonna end

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up signing something that's already been you know, yeah.

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Try I see it now, a lot of bands, they like,

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use this formula to make music, and that's not what

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metals about.

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Absolutely, and especially with us, you know, I personally speaking

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of my eye might be bad, but a lot of

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our songs definitely again have the similar sort of feel.

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You know, it's definitely thrash met but every sort of

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song has a bit of something different, and I think

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with us, I think definitely with our debup that came

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out in Halloween, they're in October.

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You know, if you love thrash metal, it'll be your thing.

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But there's always a bit of you know, that's a progue,

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be's of black metal, bets of everything that you know,

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you can like that's a hardcore punk, you know, that

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kind of are all sprinkled in. That's so it's not

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just like shap up thrash metal. You know, we do

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try to keep it old school and try to keep it,

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you know, back to its core. But as you said,

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you know, thrash metal was made up with so many

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different things, so I think we do a good job

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of trying to kind of you know, and we let that.

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Definitely, I love it.

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What was that first moment in life that got you

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into being a metal head?

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Was the sorry?

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What was that first thing in life that got you

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into being a metal head?

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I don't know why, but my dad when I was

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about five, showed me one by Metallica with the music video,

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and there was one in things. I didn't understand it.

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I had no idea what was going on, but there

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was something about it I absolutely loved, and so literally

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from that point on, from about five or six, I

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was just dedicated to Metallica and they're still my favorite

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band now and large Stalk's my favorite drummer, which a

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lot of people might find a bit crazy, but then

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ever since then and my dad, I'm very fortunately come

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from our musical family.

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You know.

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My dad was into the definitely more like heavier stuff,

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and my mom, she was kind of wren the kind

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of like the sort of British indie music and things

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like that. But my dad, especially when it comes to

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forming this band, and he's a drummer as well, and

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I'm a drummer, so I kind of learned a lot

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from my parents and for my dad and he showed

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me again like likes of Metallica and Megan fin Slayer,

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all the Big Four and then from I kind of

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then went deeper into you know what I love Now

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you have Demolition Hammer and Exodus and Sodom and Creator

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and all bands like that. So I've been very musical

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from a very young age.

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Nice, you know, So what else do you want the

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listeners to know about your band that we haven't covered

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Array and what you have coming up in the future.

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We've got some new music coming out. I don't know

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definite date, but we will have new music out by

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the end of the year. So if you haven't, you know,

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followed us on macrotonal, on Instagram or any of the

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social media platforms.

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And definitely keep an eye out for that.

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And again you can find us on band camp at

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Microtonal and you know we're on all the streaming platforms

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and anything like that. In terms of gigs, we've got

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a few kind of local shows coming up in Belfast

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and things like that, but we definitely want to try

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and you know, this is our first time playing in

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England and so we kind of definitely want to push

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the boat out and get to as many UK dates

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as possible and hopefully beyond you.

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Know, yeah, there you go.

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Thanks so much, you guys rock and thank you for

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being here at Bloodstock and thanks for being on the

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Adventures by Man.

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Yeah absolutely mon, Thank you so much. Tee you got it.

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Thank you for listening to the Adventures of Pipe Man

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on w for CUI Radio.

Microtonal’s Cameron Johnson on Thrash, Battle Jackets, and Finding Identity in Metal

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