Individual By Design

Falling In Reverse

Whether he's been beefing with former bandmates, going to battle with keyboard warriors or casually ditching microphone stands into fans, drama storms have followed Ronnie Radke like clouds follow Garfield on a Monday. But that all seems set to change as he's recently become a father. There's no ranting during the course of our interview and he barely speaks ill of anyone. He just seems content with music and life.

In a desert drawl he explains where he was coming from with Fashionably Late, the new record from his band Falling In Reverse . “I just sat for a long time and thought how am I supposed to be innovative? I don't want to be like anyone else, ever. I just thought how can I do this? I've been rapping for a long time and nobody really knows about that. I'll just do demos and see if I can try and mix rap without sounding like Linkin Park or Limp Bizkit or any type of what you would call 'rap rock'; try to not sit in that form of what they were.”

Radke's flow can be found on tracks like Rolling Stone, Champion and Self-Destruct Personality. “I took the best of the best and tried to blend it together. I made sure I separated the rap in the songs from the metal [though], so it wasn't together on purpose, [but] it pretty much [takes] you on a rollercoaster ride in each song.” Radke levels: “[Rap] will never be the main thing in Falling In Reverse, but it will have its [place].”

Painstakingly, Radke wrote this sophomore offering twice before his bandmates arrived in the studio to add what he calls the “flair”. Producer Michael 'Elvis' Baskette and “the best mixer in the world” Chris Lord-Alge then used their studio wizardry to give the LP a sonic sheen that illuminates through the speakers. And although, like most everything Radke has a hand in, it divides opinion, it succeeds in the rocker's quest to stand as a round peg in a world of square holes.

“Growing up people were telling me what I can and can't be,” he relates. “I've always been the type that's tried to do everything different. I just want to be a different breed of band where we can do everything.”

With this considered, his following statement comes as no surprise: “I'd describe Falling In Reverse as a genre of music; it's just a genre now,” Radke says genuinely. “Every genre that you could think of has one band; some guys call us 'everything-core', but I just say that Falling In Reverse is an actual genre now because it's everything that you could possibly think of. And my voice, it just ties it all together.”

Radke has mentioned that Fashionably Late is the album he should've made years ago. However, as a founding member of Escape The Fate he never had such creative liberties.

“My band, my old band, they would dull me down,” he reveals. “I had so much eccentric writing capabilities... [But] I'm not here to talk crap; I won't talk crap about them anymore. They were just not letting me use my full potential of writing. [Now], I can't believe the response that we're getting, it's astronomical; everywhere I go someone is talking about [the record] – it's cool to see.”