“We get into the studio, and we have to produce a song from scratch,” begins Type O Negative guitarist Kenny Hickey, talking about “Dreams Always Die With The Sun”, the first, and currently only song from his brand new band, Eye Am.

“Dreams Always Die With The Sun” was released on digital, CD, and cassette formats June 2nd via Corpse Paint Records. Although Eye Am is an unfamiliar name, the group is comprised of very familiar faces. Behind Kenny on the drums is Johnny Kelly, also from Type O Negative. Flanking Kenny is guitarist Kirk Windstein and bassist Todd Strange, who both played together previously in Crowbar and Down.

Sit back as Kenny introduces the world to Eye Am. “As far as me and Kirk and Johnny go, we go way back. The first time Type O ever played Texas, he was at our first show. It was this place called The Basement in Dallas. Kirk’s been a huge Peter (Steele) fan for years. He was into Carnivore, the first couple of Type O records; pretty sure he might even have introduced us to the Pantera guys. I met Kirk many, many years ago; probably 1993 I would say, something like that. But anytime we came through Louisiana or Texas, or wherever he was about, we would always hang out. Great dude, like a brother.”

“This whole thing, it wasn’t like, let’s get together and see what happens. It all came from our mutual friend Drew Spaulding, who is the owner of Corpse Paint Records; and he’s putting this music out. Drew is a close friend of mine. I met him when I was filling-in, doing the Danzig Blackest Of The Black Tour back in 2009. He was Danzig’s t-shirt guy. His two favorite bands were Danzig and Type O Negative. I think I met Drew the first night, after my first rehearsal with Glenn, and we drank a bottle of vodka together. The rest is history. Best friends. And, Drew was living in New Orleans. Who does he run into in New Orleans? He runs into Kirk and his whole crew. Drew becomes fast friends with Kirk. So, it was always his idea. ‘Two of my favorite guys, two of my favorite guitar players. What would happen if I put them together?’ It took many years. We were all drinking buddies, none of us drink anymore; Kirk still drinks a little bit, but Drew stopped. He got sober and got his shit together. He was like, ‘I really want to see something come of this.’ So, he called us both up and said, ‘If I finance it, if I pay for the flights, if I pay for the studio time to get you guys down here, would you do a song and see what happens?’ We both agreed.”

“We both had an open window, and Johnny had an open window, and so did Todd. So, it was just a hope and a prayer. We were doing it for Drew. We didn’t want to let him down,” states Kenny. “We all got on a plane with guitars. I had maybe a couple ideas that I’d sent to Kirk. He had a couple ideas that he worked off that. And we walked into a rehearsal studio. That’s how it began. Within three days, we rehearsed it, we arranged it. I was writing lyrics literally on the way to the recording studio the second day. The first day we arranged it in a rehearsal studio. The next day we were in the studio, which we had travelled about three or four hours to Gainesville, Florida. We recorded in this studio called The Moathouse, owned by Roger Lima; he’s the bassist from Less Than Jake. Great guy. So, after the rehearsal studio, we travelled to Gainesville, met him, and just proceeded to start recording. We did a couple of run-throughs with drums, just music. Nobody had even heard any lyrics or vocal melody yet. We just jammed five or six times, and it became what it was. It was like a nine-minute opus, jamming the whole ending. Then I had to come up with a vocal melody and write lyrics. Everything was really done on the spot within two days.”

It all seems so organic and natural. “It was. It was organic and natural,” confirms Kenny. “We’re all cut from the same stone, musically. There was no language barrier when we were conversing with each other, talking to each other musically. We understood each other, and everything went down really, really rapidly. The wonderful thing about a situation like that is, you don’t have time to second-guess it. You have to come up with something. The best thing you can possibly come up with, you’re going to put it out there, without second-guessing it, without over-thinking it, over-doing it. That’s probably where the organic nature of it is. The spontaneity.”

Kenny was the secondary vocalist in Type O Negative, complimenting lead vocalist / bassist Peter Steele. Kenny also sang lead vocals in Silvertomb and Seventh Void. However, Kirk is the lead vocalist / guitarist for Crowbar. How was it decided who would sing “Dreams Always Die With The Sun”? “Ah, it wasn’t,” admits Kenny. “I had an idea for a vocal melody, so I started laying it down. I wanted to do a verse, and then have Kirk come in and do the second verse; but he wouldn’t do it. He was like, ‘No, no, no. You sound good there. You do that part.’ For the second half of the song, we did come up with vocal harmonies for him to do with me at the beginning of the song, in the first verse. When the second part came along, we did the whole counterpoint thing. I actually got him to sing, ‘Dreams always die with the sun’, and counterpoint with me. That was like pulling teeth with him; he didn’t want to sing. For the whole session, we really did just hand the guitar off for different parts. He came up with a lead idea, I came up with a secondary guitar part idea. We were just utilizing whoever had the best idea first, whoever sounded the best first; that’s how it went down.”

Delving deeper into “Dreams Always Die With The Sun”, Kenny shares his lyrical inspiration for the song. “Me and Kirk were talking about it. We were both kind of nervous about coming up with lyrics and coming up with vocal melody on the spot. He was like, ‘It’s never the lyrics that are hard to write, it’s coming up with a subject to write about.’ And I totally agree with him. We had no subject. The first night, I went back to the hotel; I had my wife with me. I said, ‘What the f*ck am I going to write this song about?’ She’s like, ‘Write it about friends past.’ So, that’s what it was about. I’ve had many friends that are now gone. The song is not so much a tribute to friends past… it questions the afterlife; if you really read the lyrics. Is there really an afterlife? I meant that fantasy is always destroyed by reality. Wishful thinking is always counterpointed, negated, by the truth. And ‘Dreams always die with the sun’, was just one passage in it. And Kirk really loved the passage. He said, ‘That’s it! That’s the chorus. Just sing that on the end of the song.’ The whole outro part, the second riff after the verse – the outro part, that’s Kirk’s riff. He wanted me to sing ‘Dreams always die with the sun’ over that. And he titled the song; he really liked the line. That’s how it came about.”

The band name, Eye Am, is a nice little play on words. “Drew Spaulding actually came up with that. Thank God we didn’t have to go through that process,” laughs Kenny. “That was his idea. It spurs a lot of different ideas. It doesn’t have to be this metal band; it could be a rock band. It could spread out into so many different directions.”

Eye Am is working on a full-length album, and recording will begin at the end of June in New Orleans. “Yes,” confirms Kenny. “I’m going to fly down to New Orleans June 22nd, and me and Kirk will meet up in the studio June 23rd. We’ll start throwing our ideas together, and I think the guys come down on the 24th. We have eight days. We’ll see what we can come up with in eight days. We did one song in three days, so we’ll get as much down as we can. Maybe it’ll be so prolific that it’ll be a whole record, who knows? I’m gonna go for an album. It’s hard to come up with, jam, arrange an entire album in 11 days, though it has been done. Right now, I’m just compiling ideas, recording, getting them down, and I’m just going to throw them at the guys and see what happens. The way this song (‘Dreams Always Die With The Sun’) was concocted, it was a very specific format. I came up with two ideas, sent them to Kirk. He played off those two ideas, then we brought them down to the guys, and they helped us arrange it. Johnny added the tempos, and he helped arrange it too. So, I think it should keep going that way. I don’t want to complete anything. I just want to send a couple of base ideas – a verse with a riff, or a verse with a chorus. Something like that and throw it into the pot. We’ll see what comes out.”

Johnny is incredibly busy touring with Quiet Riot. Kirk is currently in Europe with Crowbar, and he also has a second solo album coming out. Aligning the schedules to find time for Eye Am doesn’t seem like an easy task. “Kirk’s really the busiest guy. He’s got four European tours between now and the fall; it’s ridiculous. Johnny’s like a weekend warrior with Quiet Riot. They literally fly him out for the weekends, for the most part. He plays casinos, or wherever they’re playing, and he flies back. He’s got days during the week where he’s open, we can do it. Todd is at home in Texas now, he’s got the time. I’m working on a new Silvertomb record; I’m currently mixing it. So, I’m busy with that. But even though we’re busy, we got really excited about what happened when we got together, and we really enjoyed it. So, when you enjoy something and you’re excited about it artistically, you make time for it.”

Kirk seems to have a penchant for being part of incredible side bands, just look at Down and Kingdom Of Sorrow. If Eye Am could achieve even half the success that Down has, that would be awesome. “That would be f*cking amazing! Of course, it would. Success is always nice, my friend. You work really, really hard as a musician; no matter what you do. When you’re working, success isn’t in the forefront of your mind. Maybe only as far as writing something artistically successful. We try to break ground or do something that’s worthwhile listening to. When you put it out there and in the end you do get positive results and success, there’s nothing more fulfilling than that.”

Apart from Quiet Riot, Kenny and Johnny seem to always be in a band together: Type O Negative, Silvertomb, Seventh Void, Danzig (for a brief spell), and now Eye Am. “We’ve been playing together since… Johnny was 17 when I met him; I was 20. We met in 1986, so we started playing together. There’s a natural vibe between us immediately when we play together. We might not see eye to eye all the time with other things, but when we’re playing, it just happens. He’s always my first choice when I’ve got music coming. He’s a great drummer. He’s got a great feel; he can swing. He does things that modern drummers don’t do anymore. Again, we’re cut from the same stone.”