An Interview with Matt Greiner of August Burns Red: On Recording New Music, Maintaining Authenticity, and Christmas Burns Red
Matt Greiner (Left) - Drummer for August Burns Red
Solid Rock Unplugged: What has been the biggest difference between where August Burns Red started to where you are now?
Matt: Great question. The biggest difference, well my mind goes immediately to all the ways that they’re the same. Because there are a lot of similarities. I’m in a band with the best people, the hardest working, talented and in it for the right reasons. Meaning we’re not going to settle and we’re not going to do things with half of our energy. We’re going to give it everything.
Every aspect of the band, you give everything. Not just the music, not just the performance. But the merch designs, the tours, and what mode of transportation we’re using to get to the airport. Like, we’re critical of everything and we think through everything. Because you have to for business and we’re supporting our families, five of us. We all have families to support. We all have a mortgage to pay and we get to do this band.
We get to do this after 23 years of doing it, which means on one hand it’s a tank and on the other hand it’s very fragile, because we look around and see all the bands that aren’t here any more. So what’s the biggest difference? I think it’s who’s not in metal any more, who’s not around. Man, I’m so grateful we are. We are really fortunate as a band to still be putting out music and still be touring. Still have fans show up to our shows and mosh and sing along and buy our merch.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Speaking of merch, I don’t know whose idea it was to bring back some of the old throwback t-shirt designs. Great idea! I got the Smokey The Bear shirt that says on the back “Only You Can Prevent Horrible Music.” So many conversations get started because of that shirt!
Matt: Yeah, I think we came out with that shirt in an era of metalcore that seemed like things were just very fluid. No one really wanted to do the 2003 metalcore any more. But no one knew where it was going, so there were all these kind of watered down styles. That was around the Rescue And Restore, which is how I see the messaging behind that album. It’s like “Dude, metal’s awesome!” We’re not going to just let it die, let it change and let it go somewhere we don’t really love. We’re going to stick to our roots and do what we want to do, not follow the trends.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Going through the writing process, what are your biggest influences when you’re writing new music?
Matt: My answer is really boring and I know that. I don’t have a whole lot of musical influences that creep into my playing when I’m writing drum parts. The biggest influence by far is what JB and Dustin have tabbed out in our program called TabIt. We send our songs over a program called TabIt. It’s all MIDI. So numbers represent notes and beats. They represent songs, so snare drum is 38, I had 42. Then you have the guitar tab for the guitar line and you have all zeros so it’s open chugs. They send everything to me that way and I look at the drums and say “ok, this is the idea they have for it so far.” That’s the most influential.
Because I’m looking at what they think would fit really well here. What do the drums do here that sells the song to the band? If I'm writing the song on guitar and I want to put drums in, I want to make sure everyone likes the song. So I’m going to write drum parts that make it sound cool and extreme and heavy and like all the different feelings. So I'm sitting down and I’m going to first look at that. Usually they’re amazing ideas. Honestly, really cool ideas and what I’ll try to do is improve them. Maybe the parts are really cool. I’m going to try to beat it.
That’s really our mentality as a band, it’s who has the best idea, lyrically, on the strings, on drums. It doesn’t matter what your position is in the band, I’m going to beat what’s there. If you don’t, then the thing that is coolest wins. It doesn’t matter who wrote it, doesn’t matter who tracks it even. Who wrote the best thing wins and they don’t win a prize. They just win. Their idea is what ends up on the album. That’s winning. Then August Burns Red calls it a song. It might be JB’s song, but everyone’s humble enough to say this is the band’s.
What if the US politics looked at ABR and said “Let’s try to model what we’re doing based on five guys that all think differently, live differently, believe differently, act differently, and let’s just see how it goes!” I mean, it takes time and it took some growing pains, but I’m really grateful to be in the band. It’s such a well-oiled machine. I look at the world around me and think gosh, people are so bored! People are so upset. They’re so bitter. They’re so resentful. They don’t get along with anybody, like their own kids, their own spouses, their own friends. Defriending people on Facebook because of some guy that got shot in the head.
If people had a drum set to play, whatever that might be for you: hiking, reading, sewing, golfing, fishing. If you find something that really fulfills you, when someone cuts you off in traffic, you don’t throw your middle finger in the air and lose your cool the whole way to work. It’s fine, it’s totally fine. I’ll be a little bit late. You know what I mean? It just cools you down, it centers you. I wish everyone had that sense of fulfillment because I know when I don’t, I”m not a great person to be around.
My wife will say “Matt, you haven’t played in three weeks, I can tell. Go play drums!” I’m like, “I’m fine!” 20 minutes later I come upstairs like “I’m a new man! I’m a new man, what happened to me!” What is it, you know? You have to ask yourself, what is it that I’ve been procrastinating, putting on the backburner. Because that might be the thing that I should be pursuing and prioritizing and actually working on. I do it all the time. I go mow my yard instead of playing drums. Why? Because I have immediate gratification when I mow the lawn. It’s easy. It’s relaxing. What’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done? This. What’s the most fulfilling thing I’ve ever done? This.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Speaking of the new album, what should we expect? Any themes, any stories that go behind the album?
Matt: Sure, I can’t talk about the lyrical content of the messaging and to be honest, I actually don’t know that much about it. I’ve been so invested in the drums, the drum factor. Coming up with cool parts that rip and fit the music. I can speak from a musical standpoint, the band really rooted in writing the music first. And the lyrics and vocals come later, like a layer cake. It’s up here. Now obviously vocals are eventually the most prominent thing, but musically, there’s so many hundreds of hours that go into this song.
It’s funny when we get asked “What kind of lyrics or what kind of message do you guys want to say?” That’s kind of like me as a drummer hearing “What kind of heads did you use?” It’s more than that. Obviously, it’s the most important part. But at this stage in writing and recording it, it’s such a peripheral thing to me, because there’s so much that goes into the music. I will say Jake is absolutely destroying it. He’s working his tail off. So is Brent, helping him come up with patterns. So is Grant, helping him, pushing him. I think he’s pushing himself in a big way.
I think we all are pushing ourselves. We are looking at AI and saying “Ok, people are going to start to wonder what’s real and what’s not.” We’ve been asking that for 15 years with metal, because everything’s fixed up and doctored and beat detected and perfected. We like that sound but now it’s to the point that we don’t really like it anymore.
We especially don’t like the idea that you can just tell Suno to make a song and ten seconds later it spits out a metal song that sounds ok. So we’re trying to get our best performances instead of having to fix everything up and make it sound over-the-top glossy and fake. Musically, we are returning to our roots in some ways. There’s some speed and there’s aggressive, just bites your head off kind of breakdowns.
Solid Rock Unplugged: So you’re going back to that Messengers-type sound?
Matt: I would certainly say some parts are. Constellations for sure.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Are you halfway through the recording process?
Matt: No, we’re two-thirds of the way through. I have four songs to track on drums yet. Guitar is almost done, vocals are pretty far along.
Disclaimer: This interview took place at the end of October. August Burns Red has announced they have completed recording the album.
Solid Rock Unplugged: For people who are getting ready to see you guys at Christmas Burns Red, could there potentially be a new song played?
Matt: No, no definitely not. There won’t be any new songs anywhere, online or heard, until next year for sure. Yeah, next year is going to be a great year. So much to look forward to next year!
Solid Rock Unplugged: Speaking of Christmas Burns Red, how did that get started? I know it started as the CI Christmas Show and then it’s kind of morphed into this two-day extravaganza of metal.
Matt: We wrote Carol of the Bells and recorded it with Messengers back in 2007. We started playing it live, I think that year, at the Chameleon Club. CI Records did their Christmas show. We started doing Christmas songs every year - just one! We recorded Sleddin’ Hill in 2012. We thought “Man, this is fun!” Now we have a Christmas album. People are coming out every year. We’re wrapping gifts. Jake’s dressing up as Santa Claus.
Eventually we’re like alright, let’s just make our own festival. We’ll make a weekend festival like a destination so that bands can come here and experience it. It’ll be awesome. They can just stay in the hotel where we’re having the show, in the Convention Center. We’ll have a bunch of our friends come out and play and that’s exactly what we’ve done. It’s been so cool.
Solid Rock Unplugged: I’ve noticed in the past couple of years, you guys have taken the chance to pay respect to Thrill Seeker, Messengers, and Constallations. This year you guys are celebrating both 20 years since Thrill Seeker and 10 since Found in Far Away Places. It doesn’t feel like it’s been 20 years since Thrill Seeker!
Matt: I think it feels like it’s been 20 years. I remember it. I’m very fond of that time of my life. I remember it really well actually. But to think it was half of my life ago, it makes me almost think “Boy, that was half of my life before it.” That seems like way too big of a chunk to be before Thrill Seeker if I’ve lived the same amount since. Which I guess just means that 20 years have flown by since Thrill Seeker.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Will we be getting an August Burns Red Christmas song this year?
Matt: I don’t know. I know that we are working on new songs currently that are not Christmas and that’s filling our plate pretty full. So I think it’s safe to say we’re focused on the album for next year. Which next year’s going to be a big year. We have some really cool touring next year. We obviously have the album to look forward to eventually.
Solid Rock Unplugged: How was it touring with Trivium and Bullet For My Valentine this year?
Matt: This spring, yeah it was cool. I never really knew about Bullet For My Valentine. I knew the name, but I never listened to them. I’d heard the one song because it was a big song. Man, I thought they were such a good band live. They are tight. They sound great. Jason’s an awesome drummer. I really liked touring with them and Trivium.
Same thing, I never really listened to Trivium. I of course knew the name, I knew they were a big band, and knew they were shredders. But I would say that tour was somewhat easy because we played second of four. We played a shorter set and we played big rooms. We didn’t really have to work to get crowds in the door. We did do our best to win the crowd that came. So I will see how much it benefited the band next year when we get out there and start touring again. See how many people come back.
Solid Rock Unplugged: What should fans expect from this year’s Christmas Burns Red?
Matt: Pretty much the same look and layout as they’ve come to expect. If you’ve been to CBR, you know it’s in the Convention Center. We dress it up in a very festive look. We try to up our production every year and make it bigger and better. As far as the bands, you can see those on our Instagram or website, christmasburnsred.com. You can see who’s playing. I honestly don’t have all the bands memorized because I’ve been busy writing and my brain’s full of information. I’m personally excited for Animals As Leaders above all. I really like that band and it’ll be good to see Tosin [Abasi] again and Matt Garstka. Some of the most talented dudes out there.
Solid Rock Unplugged: Is there anything else you’d like to share?
Matt: Thanks for having me on Solid Rock Unplugged! I’m looking forward to Christmas Burns Red, I’m looking forward to the new album. I’m looking forward to 2026. Thank you so much to everyone that supports our band. We could not do this without you. You know that, we know that. We don’t forget that. We don’t take it for granted and we’re really grateful.
Check out August Burns Red on Instagram, Facebook, and Spotify. For tickets to Christmas Burns Red on December 12 &13, go to christmasburnsred.com. Get ready for brand new music in 2026!
Keep your eye out for a special Christmas Burns Red 2025 Guide, dropping TOMORROW, 11/24!
