Interview with Jasmine Marceau.
We caught up with vocalist Eric Vanlerberghe and guitarist Dylan Bowman of I Prevail before their headliner set on the Go Pro stage.
Hi guys! Extremely excited to meet you. Is this your first time at Slam Dunk?
Eric: No, we played five years ago? 2017?
Dylan: Seven years ago actually by my math!
Eric: Wait, is that seven?
Dylan: Yeah.
Eric: Oh my God.
Dylan: Five years ago was 2019.
Eric: Holy hell. You’re right. I hate that. I hate that you’re right. Time’s an illusion.
You are headlining to GoPro stage later, how do you feel to be back?
Eric: Stoked!
Dylan: They’ve still to give us any free GoPros.
Ah that was the point, right?
Eric: That’s the only reason we’re here! We’re really excited to come from where we played I guess seven years ago to now it’s like that was our first time we played all the Slam Dunk dates. We had one little headliner. There was like 400 people maybe and then boom seven years later we’re one of the main stages playing with this awesome lineup playing with awesome bands for awesome people. It’s a great time!
You thought I was going to say awesome that time, didn’t you?
You’ve just been touring Europe.
Dylan: Yes, sir!
How was it?
Eric: Yeah three weeks in. Where did we start? It was Germany, France, Italy, first time headlining there, Belgium, Netherlands. It was some of our biggest headliners, just in general, not even just in Europe, but in general. It was a fucking awesome time.
You’ve had to tour with a different set up with Brian not on tour with you. How has that been going?
Eric: The first couple days were challenging, you know, we walk out on stage and for the people who didn’t see the announcement, you know, they they come out and they’re like ‘wait, why is he singing?’. After the first song we let everyone know like ‘Hey he’s had a vocal surgery, he’s just not done recovering yet’. But we could either have postponed shows and the next time we were free, I think it was like a year and a half or we’re just gonna keep the party moving and so far, everyone’s been having a great time and that’s all that matters. I Prevail is I Prevail. It’s not just one person. So as long as we can come over and put on the best possible show and our fans appreciate it.
Absolutely! How is Brian doing?
Eric: Brian’s doing well! Yeah, he’s resting up. He should be good for the the summer tour in the states. His vocal cords are fine. It’s just the incisions that weren’t quite ready.
Glad to hear he’ll be back on the stage soon.
So, your most recent album True Power came out in 2022. Lyrically, you talk a lot about mental health and well-being, and combining that with the heaviest riffs, how does that coincide with the writing process?
Eric: Sometimes it’ll be a little bit of music. It’ll be a guitar riff, or maybe a verse, maybe something that could be a chorus. Every every song kind of has a unique origin. So it’s not to say, ‘We write the instrumentals and we put the vocals’ and vice versa.
With a lot of the topics, maybe we’ll get like three or four demos moving along, like intros to choruses and they kind of start to form an identity. Maybe we have like a hook for the chorus that we’re like, ‘okay this song that feels good’. The identity is kind of forming itself and then later on we’re like, ‘Ah, there’s a couple songs that we’ve already kind of touched on this. Maybe let’s find a, a different way or a more personal way or something that we can make it have its own identity and not feel like the same song after and after and after.
Do you have any new music on the horizon?
Eric: We’ve got some collabs that we’re trying to…
Dylan: I’m supposed to cut him off… There are some things coming, yes.
Eric: We’re slowly working on some new stuff.
I’ll wait in anticipation! You’ve been touring a lot, what are your tour must-haves?
Dylan: I need my gaming laptop in case I get the sudden urge to play Hell Divers or Fortnite.
I don’t know if it’s for us particularly, but we need to have salami and cheese in our green room.
Eric: Some hummus. Yep.
I’ve been dragging him into the hell hole of Magic The Gathering. So I’ve been bringing some decks out and playing. We love touring, love being on the road, love all aspects of it, but after like a week or two, maybe three weeks, you start like ‘Ah, you know, I kind of miss home’. So anything you got that kind of gives you that break from the monotonous same routine. We’re like, all right. Let’s go play some cards or I brought this book that I was was planning on reading at home or just anything like that.
Dylan: The app on my phone that allows me to see the camera in my house for my dogs, I need that too. I can speak to them. They kind of do the head tilt thing. That gives it gives me enough serotonin to go for a couple more days.
Are they ever confused?
Dylan: They know when they see us packing luggage now they know, and then when we FaceTime I do my little you know ‘Oh hey!’
Do you only pre-show rituals for when you go on stage?
Eric: We have, ever since show one 10 years ago. One of our favourite movies, this movie called Hot Rod.
I don’t know it!
Eric: Great movie. Check it out.
Dylan: It’s a comedy!
Eric: They have this goofy handshake, it’s just a passing thing. Like a throwaway joke that we’ve turned into our whole pre-show ritual.
Dylan: Yeah, it’s like almost like a seance and then we go into a secret handshake for everybody around the room.
Eric: Then usually I do a shot of whiskey, grab a white claw or a beer and then, yeah, good to go!
One more question! If you could sum up Slam Dunk in one sentence or a couple of words, how would you sum it up?
Dylan: The the whole thing I can’t yet because we haven’t done the second day. Today though! Great vibes. Good weather. Good people.
Eric: Yeah, great vibes, good weather, great people or any of those adjectives!
Dylan: Okay catering.
Eric: The chicken was bomb!
Catch I Prevail on tour, tickets are available now.