Musician, composer, graphic artist, writer and entrepreneur
Jacob Bannon (born October 15, 1976) is the vocalist, lyricist, and graphic artist for the American metalcore band Converge. He is the co-founder and owner of the record label Deathwish Inc. and the author of many visual works for independent punk rock and heavy metal musicians. Bannon has also composed and performed experimental music as Supermachiner with Ryan Parker and more recently as Wear Your Wounds.
It's important me as a musician and also as an occasional show goer to feel the presence of a band on stage, to hear a PA reverberating and slapping off the walls, the push and pull of an audience, the blood, sweat, and heat. It's a primal thing in a way.
What I've witnessed, managers are divisive and allow musicians to become clouded, irresponsible, and unaware of the world around them.
Though a song may race by in a minute and a half, every aspect of it is calculated and intentional.
I've never been a fan of bands that go out and celebrate their age, I'd rather be celebrated for being relevant.
The relationship that people have with music is entirely different now. People spend much less time experiencing music on a one on one level than they could have if they were a part of a different generation. I find this ironic since we have so many tools at our finger tips to be engaged by media in all forms.
Everyday that passes I am pulled from youth as how it has been defined by that culture into something else.
I feel that people spend as much time skipping songs as they do listening to them in their library.
I feel that bands can do whatever they want, after all, they own themselves and the art/music they create.
I am far from an "old" person in human terms, however I've spent over half my life immersed in the punk rock and hardcore community. I am not wholly defined by that as a person, but it is something that has been part of me for a long time.
As a writer, I never paid much attention to the length of titles. I've just wanted them to communicate the emotional overtones of the content of a record or song that they are describing
For me, hardcore is simply unapologetic music, free of rules. By that definition, we are a hardcore band.
I feel that people who are new to punk/hardcore don't truly understand the music and the role it plays in people's lives until they experience the environment for themselves.
Genres aren't that relevant. Nearly every form of music is a melting pot of things of things.
I don't regret the decisions or direction I've chosen, but I feel it's important to be self aware.
If anything, I feel that the current generation of listeners of heavy music are progressing a bit passed their gateway bands and are digging deeper than they used to and understanding more abrasive and complex music and art. It's like being around an unfamiliar language long enough that it eventually begins to make sense.
Time is always fleeting and the lunar phases represent that visually for me. What people take away from that and how they apply it within their own lives, that's entirely up to them.
Music being “good or bad” is a flawed idea. Artists make what they want to make and we either connect with it or we don't. Just because we relate to some songs more than others doesn't make the others less valid, we just don't understand them. In fact, we aren't meant to, and that's all right.