PipemanRadio Interviews Avatar at Aftershock 2023

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Hey, you have done to censure? Why pray you young? Whycoume America.

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It's time for the Adventures of pipe
Man on W four c Y dot

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com West pom Beats, his number
one internet radio station. Here's your host,

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the White Man. This is the
pipe Man here on the Adventures pipe

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Man W four c Y Radio,
and I'm here with Johanna s. Off

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the record, we talked about how
cute I am. So I'm already in

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a great mood. There you go. I love it. Yeah, because

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we were talking about I wouldn't be
able to miss you because you know,

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you're very like easy to spot in
the crowd. But then even without being

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on stage, you're easy to spot
in the crowd because also, for the

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record, I was the one saying
I was cute, and I still haven't

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heard it from anyone else today.
So it's it's a rough morning. Let's

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ask your tour manager. Oh,
that's deeply on professional coming, I know,

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right. Yeah, So after Shock? How many times have you played

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after Shock? This will be the
third time? Nice? Yep? Yeah,

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doesn't the media artist area keep getting
better and better? We are we

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are yet to find out, buddy, I think so, but I remember

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first time, feeling very cozy,
and I don't think it was as scorching

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hot as it's going to be today. And it was interested how Fan gave

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us an Avatar shaped cake and oh
that's cool. Always the first time we

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saw black widow in the wild and
in the porta potty, and that's not

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a good place to see one though, of all the places. Don't want

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to see them there, no,
no, no, no. Well I'm

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glad it didn't bite you because,
you know, because it wasn't a urinal

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side of this, it would have
been an interesting bites to get. Yeah,

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so I'm in South Florida. We
have two spiders that would freak out.

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One is a brown recluse, which
basically, John, Yeah, you

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have two spiders literally, yeah,
basically will eat your flesh. Yeah yeah,

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yeah, that's one. Yeah.
And then there's these banana spiders that

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are about this big. They're like, oh no, like six inches big,

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and they're up in the trees so
like you're walking through they can jump

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down on you. Yeah, no, we have don't. We don't do

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that. Up in northern Europe.
We have moves, but you can spot

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those. Did I ever tell you
the story? I probably did about when

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I had went to a wedding in
Sweden. Oh no, I don't.

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I don't think you did. Oh. I gotta tell you this because you'll

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love it. So we're at we
were up in like Uppsala. Yeah,

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and the bride's parents were reindeer farmers. Oh so like saw me from Wayne

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North? Yeah yeah yeah, And
so I was married at the time.

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I didn't eat meat, but my
wife did. And she's eating the meat.

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She didn't know what it was,
but I did. I'm like,

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does that me good? She's like, yeah, it's really good. I'm

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like, you're eating Rudolph. Because
you know Americans they think reindeer are this

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fictional character on Santa movies only,
and she's like, what are you talking

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about. I'm like, Ing's parents
are reindeer farmers. That's reindeer meat.

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And she's like, there's no such
thing as reindeer. Okay, sorry,

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sorry, I left at your whole
nation now though, right and there it

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is so oh man. And it
was super high then too, Like they

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told me it was like the hottest
on record. While I was there,

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I'm going there fair at all,
it's gonna be nice and cool. It

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was as hot as this. If
not hotter that year I went there,

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it's over for all of us.
Basically, how do you do the whole

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six month six month thing with the
sun and no sun? Do you do

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writing of all the music during the
darkness and then perform during the light No?

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Yeah, no, For one,
I think if it wouldn't be like

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that, if I would have moved
somewhere where it's, if I would move

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too close to the equator, I
would miss it like crazy. Yeah,

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yeah, yeah, I think you
you know, you build your Cicadian rhythm.

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I guess around the climate you grow
up in a stuff of course.

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Yeah. And if you don't have
those the amount of stuff that you get

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done on a rainy ues state in
November, yeah, no, it's it's

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one month worth of summer stuff,
you know. I guess that's the thing.

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It's hard to get stuffed, That's
what I'm saying. It may hits

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and it starts being nice. It's
as a while for everything slows down,

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you know, and people loosen up, and that sticks around to around September.

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Maybe people are readjusted. It'll be
functioning again. So you get your

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stuff done. You know that I'm
saying about the perfect time to write music

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when you have that right record,
I know, so you end up touring

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a lot. There's you know,
what we do is a bit of a

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hamster wheel anyway, you know that
keep running in where there's always the European

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tours tend to be late and early
in the year, right, and every

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kind of when we get closer the
summer, we come over here and the

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tail end of the summer, and
the summer is usually not always, but

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usually dedicated to European festival season,
you know, right, So in that

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hamster wheel, yeah, we usually
spend that time on the road and writing

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by necessity happens because I mean I
write two lines of lyrics every tour.

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Maybe, so the real work in
music happens throughout the year, which I

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think, to be a bit more
serious about it probably is, you know

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how it should be beneficial to you
know, totore of life in different shades.

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Absolutely, And I even I grew
up in New Jersey, so I

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get what you're saying. Like Memorial
Day weekend where I lived, it's like

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the world opened up. Yeah,
Labor Day weekend shuts down and the rest

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of the year you're like hibernating and
hustling work wise because in the summer you're

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too busy partying because it's so nice
out. Yeah, and I know stories

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of this people who have been,
you know, moving to north this way

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to like who travel north for vacation
in summer and meet all these wonderful,

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open, lovely people. It's so
much fun. They make so much friends

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on the places they go to,
the things they get to see. So

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that screwed, I'm moving here,
and they do. And by the time

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you know they carried their Akiya couch
and their Billy book shelf stuff into and

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assimilated themselves. Everyone's calne. Where
do they all go? And the people

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get this post moving depression going because
we're living cycles like that. Yeah,

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totally. You know, it's you
know, the ant and the Grasshopper fable.

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You know that you still have to
work to get to get space to

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lose it like that, and there'll
be a functioning society. I think it's

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the reason why such great music comes
as sweet and personally because you playing time

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to be creative. Right. You
spoke about the Hamster wheel, and I

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say that all the time about if
you're going to take a positive out of

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COVID artists got the chance to jump
off the hamster wheel and like be creative

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for the first time in a long
time, because you're not like go go

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go, go, go go go. You had no choice but to be

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creative because there was no live views. Yeah, that shook things up a

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bit. Then. I think that
climates would with Northern Europe. Sure,

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as far as why we do a
lot of good music seemingly at least,

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you know, adjusted for population,
it's kind of crazy. I think also

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has to do. I think it
has more to do with that, you

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know, the welfare state thing,
honestly, where there's room for failure because

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I know if I have people,
if I know people from more southern Europe

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and stuff that would have similar dreams
or ambitions and everything, there is in

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a higher pressure in the culture to
like, oh no, no, you

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need to educate yourself now, to
get going on your career now, to

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secure you a future right now.
And I think in Sweden my feeling is

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always this wigal room to try and
fail and learn and get life experience and

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that thing of you know, end
up if you're gonna go for you know,

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study some stuff that you show up
there a bit later in life.

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Yeah, all my three out of
four siblings ended up kind of doing it

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like that and therefore stuck with it
and enjoyed it more and are more certain

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in their career choices than you would
be otherwise. Well, a great point

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too, because that's so true,
you know, because when you're you got

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you have to do or die.
Basically you usually make the wrong career.

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Then you become a doctor, you
know, yeah there or which you know

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is an awesome profession to have,
so as I'm not saying that, but

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it's just again that wiggle room.
And then I also think it becomes a

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self fulfilling prophecy because it is kind
of then in the culture that it's a

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thing to do where you know,
the value of our representation in any situation

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that is nice to have heroes that
look like you you know, share gender,

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skin color, whatever, that thing. I've come to understand more of

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the value in that. And the
thing is, do you know the town

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Fagishta, No, exactly, That's
where the Hives are from. Oh really,

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and every little Fagusta in Sweden tends
to have their own little the Hives.

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So if you're a Swedish kid,
you can like yeah, I could.

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Okay, what the hell? If
they could, then maybe I can

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too. And we all had that, you know, or kind of so

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that kind of feeds into it too. That becomes this valid career thing,

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or at least or thing to do
with your life, at least when you're

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young and parents are chill about it
too overall, you know. So,

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yeah, you know, I gave
you away a lecture because of the weather

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thing. But there you go.
I love it, though, so would

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you? Would you say that we're
with you? What was there some thing

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that happened or you saw or experience
that gave you the concept of Avatar?

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No, it grew over time because
first, foremust I joined Avatar? There

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was so that that stupid name was
already in place. I had nothing to

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do with it now because John and
Jonahs meant first, and they had a

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singer for two rehearsals that they were
too scare you know. The Swedish fear

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of conflict was strong enough that they
just disbanded and keet the rehearse room and

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started a new band without him.
So there's a question of definition if I'm

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the first singer after or not.
Because we were all so very young and

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that's place you're still learning to play
no and so No, it's been something

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that we've figured out together over time
and keep on figuring out together over time.

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You do change it up, which
is good, Yeah, because I

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think that's that's important to us,
Like we are want to do things that

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we are fans of, and we
want to surprise ourselves and we want to

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I mean a huge reference point for
me and what I'm about to say now

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would be like someone like Devin Townsend, right, who I am a lifelong

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fan of. And one thing that
makes it life long is that his project

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of you know, self discovery and
putting that into music is constantly ongoing.

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That Now, their last album,
Light Worker, came out now he was

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just about to turn fifty, I
think, and that's the only album that

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will sound like a Devin Townsend just
about to turn fifty with a teenage kid

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and this and that and a mortgage
and know whatever's been going on in his

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life as opposed to that. He
got a lot of attention in his late

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teens early twenties, but it shows
not to get stuck in that realis that

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wasn't good for him, and that's
an ongoing journey which means that potentially,

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because that makes every unique experience in
his life will give makes all the music

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unique in what comes out. In
that sense means that potentially he's always has

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his greatest work ahead of him in
a way that if you were, Hey,

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remembered girls, girls, girls,
I could be see him out a

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daughter. But I'm writing one of
those second you know that doesn't happen.

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Yeah, you know, So then
there's not the law of diminishing returns.

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And I mean, and we still
feel there's so many different angles and directions

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to take in what we're doing,
where some sometimes we feel very much with

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what feels very serious to us,
like hunter Gatherer, or we really screw

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around trying to see how stupid can
we get away with being and having fun,

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you know during something comedic with Avatar
country right and all of that that

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we get to. Yeah, So
it's like I said, an ongoing,

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there's not a vision for Avatar that
this is the thing I love that I

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mean, and I'll tell you,
I'll tell you why I love that.

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Well. First, I'm gonna comment
on the Devin Townsend thing because it made

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me think of an interview I had
with Joe from the Vandals and he knows

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I'll never ask this, but everybody
always asks him when are the Vandals coming

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out with new music? And he
said, he said, why do people

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keep asking me that? Who wants
to hear a fifty year old write a

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punk rock song. We're not gonna
do new, you know. So when

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you brought up Devin Townsend, that
is what I love because you know you

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do it. You can't be a
fifty year old, right, and like

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as if you're a teenager, no, you know, so you got go

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by what's going on then, and
as far as you guys go, what

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I love about is there some bands, even bands that play here at Aftershock

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this year that yeah, I I
need to go see the said I can

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repeat what they're saying in between songs
by now, you know, whereas your

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sad can repeat what I'm saying between
songs on this tour, right, And

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that's what's great about avatars, Like
every show you might not know what to

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expect, you know, and that's
what keeps it growing and long term,

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because it'll get old after a while
if you just keep playing the same set

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for ten years. Yeah no,
so yeah, we try and you try

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to balance that because also it's still
head and metal man, right, and

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you know if as much as you
know, for instance, Judispriese Firepower was

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such a return to forum that it's
you know, oh thank you, you

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know. Yeah. With that being
said, when I see them, of

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course they with that, I want
to see that. But I also need

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break the law and I need to
say that. The next song we're gonna

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play for you tonight contains the word
law in the title, breaking the what

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Mike out to us exactly. So
you have to balance kind of I think

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tradition also matters, and that communal
thing that is a show totally and it's

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that and to get that to treat
to find the right flow and the set

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please and to have that kind of
by right to show energy in what you're

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doing well at the same thing.
Then. But that being said, we

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on the last couple of tours when
our new albums come out, we have

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played roughly half the album on every
tour confidently and obnoxiously, and we will

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keep as we will keep aiming for
really making our best album ever ever.

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Retime, we're gonna shove that down
people's throat, no matter how much of

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the gold and oldest, you know, that, and it should be.

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If you're an artist, you gotta
grow. You guys have an experience.

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You know, you get better at
your craft, so you have to expressed

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to allow yourself to get better,
you know, because it say, it's

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a weird. It's a weird dynamic
there when people start to really expect what

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your band is about. But for
us, it boasts down to yeah,

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you know, riffs, metal and
then kind of whatever goes makes sense and

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an absolutely incredible performance that nobody should
ever miss. Yeah, we'd like to

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run around. I love it.
Any final words for our listeners? Final

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words, Well, we can say
some fine words such as purple, burglar,

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alarm. Those are some fine words. Hard to save your Scottish can

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you try? Hey, I can. I'm not Scottish, but I try

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to see a Scottish man say purple, burglar or alarm and it might be

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difficult. I'm going to ask when
my Scottish friends doing that. I love

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it. I can't wait for your
set here at after Shock, and I

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can't wait to see a lot more
of you guys. Thanks a lot for

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being on your adventures. Thank you
for listening to the Adventures of Pipement on

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w fur Cui Radio