Legendary vocalist Time “Ripper” Owens is not a man who rests on laurels, always keeping busy and getting involved in numerous projects over the years including Judas Priest, Iced Earth and now his latest band The Three Tremors which features 2 other great vocalists in Harry “The Tyrant” Conklin (Jag Panzer) and Sean “The Hell Destroyer” Peck (Cage). We catch up with the man himself to discuss The Three Tremors debut album and upcoming tour as well as find out what else he has going on.
Andrew: How has things been?
Tim: It’s good! Things are crazy, touring and making records and same old thing.
Andrew: Yeah you are a very busy man, you seem to have a foot in everything these days. A lot of different bands going on, obviously the new one at the moment is The Three Tremors which is great stuff obviously. Tell me a little about this band and how the whole thing came together.
Tim: Well Sean [Peck] got a hold of me and said, ‘Listen I’m thinking about a record with three metal singers” and where he got me was he wanted to make a record. It wasn’t, ‘Hey let’s do three singers on tour and play our catalogue, let’s make a record’. So that’s what he got me with, the main thing was doing a record and touring the world playing the songs from the record. At that time it was just him and I and we started to figure out who to get for our third singer and he said, ‘Hey how about Harry Conklin?’ and I said, ‘I think that’s a great idea’. So that’s how it started.
Andrew: And the first album that you guys have done has just been released so what kind of feedback have you been getting from people so far?
Tim: Well it’s been really good and I think that the thing that people get is that this record is not a record that cross over to tons of different types of people, this is a metal record. This is a power metal, straight board metal, traditional, high notes. It’s given you artwork what people had in the 80’s and they fell in love with, that’s what it’s kind of like. It’s got that kind of logo, it’s got the artwork, it’s got the music, lyrics. So that’s the fanbase we’re trying to have and the response has been fantastic.
Andrew: That’s great to hear and you are obviously taking it out on the road as well so it should be a pretty cool tour. I assume you would be playing pretty much every song on the album I guess but will you be playing anything else at all?
Tim: We’ll be playing other stuff but it’s funny, we did a tour in Europe in October, before the record obviously was even out. It was supposed to be out when we toured so that’s why we booked it but we did 17 shows there and now we’re hitting the States so we’ll be doing “Burn In Hell” from the “Jugulator” CD and we’ll be doing “Scream Machine”. Harry does a Jag Panzer tune and Sean will do a Cage tune and we’ll do some other classic songs but we’ll play all 12 songs from the record. Even when we toured and noone even knew the album we played all 12 songs.
Andrew: This album seems like it’s been a really fun sort of project, the fact that you have 3 different singers involved. I mean how was that logistically worked out when you first went in and recorded this? Did you know who was going to be doing what and worked it all out pretty early on?
Tim: No it’s great how we did this! What it is, is Sean sent me the songs with his singing on it and then I went in and recorded the same songs with his melody lines and I recorded all the songs myself as well. So all 3 singers have a version of the record with them singing it themselves, not identical because I made sure I sang all my parts a little different with different voices than theirs and I really tried to make it stand out really different. So we can actually release this same record as individual records as well if we want so it makes it kind of cool. Then when Sean and David went in to the studio and pieced it together like a puzzle and took sections and parts and did it that way which makes it better where the singers didn’t just sing parts and pieces, we actually sang the whole record.
Andrew: That sounds very interesting! So taking it out on the road, will you be mixing it up and playing different songs at different shows?
Tim: We do all the songs every night and we mapped it out almost like a movie script where we’re all on stage at the same time, on every song except if I’m doing “Burn In Hell”, we’re all on stage at the same time and doing our thing and section it off to who sings what and different parts so it’s pretty cool.
Andrew: Yeah I think fans will definitely be looking forward to seeing you guys on stage. As I said before you have had your hand in so many different projects over the years and at the moment you’re in another band called Spirits Of Fire which that album is coming out this month. That’s a little different to The Three Tremors, I guess it’s a little bit more aggressive and a little more heavier. Tell me a bit about that band as well.
Tim: Well Spirits Of Fire is more classic hard rock/metal in the vein of like Judas Priest and Savatage whereas The Three Tremors is more power metal, power thrash mixed together. So there’s a difference of the two, that’s what’s nice. There’s actually another record that will be coming out called A New Revenge which was Project Rock at one time with Keri Kelli and James Kottak and Rudy Sarzo and that’s even different again in the vein of more hard rock. So all these records are always different, they are all recorded at different times so definitely not the same record.
Andrew: Yeah definitely and I guess that’s what you like, to keep it varied and try to do a lot of different things. You always seem to be busy constantly, the type of guy that doesn’t like to sit around and do nothing at all.
Tim: Well I’d like to do that some time but there’s always something going on. I mean I just had a record come out in October, on something called Tourniquet so I’ve stayed busy doing all kinds of stuff and I’m in the studio now recording stuff as well.
Andrew: How do you keep track of all this stuff? What is the motivation behind doing all these different projects?
Tim: I don’t know, I mean when was the last time we spoke?
Andrew: Oh it must have been ages ago now, maybe 5 or 6 years ago at least. It’s been a while.
Tim: I always try to think about when we might have talked and I was looking at it and I remember but I couldn’t remember when. But yeah you think about talking then and all the stuff I had then, I don’t know how I keep track! The one thing is, like I said they are recorded at different times so people think now that I must have recorded 3 CD’s at the same time because they’re coming out at the same time. But they are recorded a year apart but it’s not hard, it’s my job, it’s what I do. Now listen, if I was in one band it would be easier to keep track of it but I would also be working a 9 to 5 job every day so this is what I do.
Andrew: Definitely well it’s good to see you keeping busy and getting your music out there, we love what you do. I don’t know if you have thought about bringing one of these bands down to Australia but I know that the other band you mentioned, A New Revenge, is signed with Golden Robot Records last year which is actually an Australian label.
Tim: I was just about ready to say that was signed with them so yeah, that was with an Australian label. I was just in Australia as well not too long ago.
Andrew: OK so have you guys been talking about bringing a tour down here at all?
Tim: I hope we will. I was just there doing this AC/DC orchestra thing about a month ago or so and it’s funny, we were talking about doing a solo tour of me in Australia. After I did that we did one extra show at some little place called Frankies Pizza and it was so much fun that the band guys went, ‘Man we should do a solo tour’ and then I get home The Three Tremors is trying to book a tour in Australia which was booked but I was already booked up in America to do some stuff. We’re trying to get everything there right now so it’s kind of funny we went from not going there for years to now it seems like it’s going to be easy to get there.
Andrew: Well hopefully we will get to see you down here again some time soon. I better let you go but congratulations on the new album from both Spirits Of Fire and The Three Tremors, fantastic stuff and hopefully everything will work out well on tour for you guys.
Tim: Absolutely and next time I’ll make sure that you know that I’m there.
THE THREE TREMORS US TOUR DATES
Feb 14 Seattle, WA El Corazon
Feb 15 Denver, CO Herman’s Hideaway
Feb 16 San Diego, CA Brick By Brick
Feb 17 Santa Ana, CA Malones
Feb 18 Hollywood, CA Whiskey a Go Go
March 1 Poughkeepsie, NY The Loft
March 2 Wilmington, DE Bar XIII
March 3 Clifton, NJ Dingbatz
March 4 New York, NY The Gramercy Theatre
March 5 Niagra Falls, NY Evening Star Music Hall
March 7 Racine, WI Route 20
March 8 Joliet, IL The Forge
March 9 Westland, MI Token Lounge
March 10 Louisville, KY Tiger Room
March 11 Pittsburgh, PA The Crafthouse Stage and Grill
