In between sets at Fort Rock in Fort Lauderdale, FL, Frank Novinec of Hatebreed spoke with Side Stage Magazine about their current tour and festival run. Celebrating two album milestones for the band, they’re also working on new material and just as busy as ever. In the following interview, he briefly touched on the what the band is up to, and threw around some jokes and what’s he’s enjoying about the festival.
Side Stage Magazine: So it’s 20 years of Desire, right?
Frank Novinec: Yeah. Our first record is out actually 21 years ago. Between that and our 15 year anniversary of Perseverance we’re touring off the anniversaries of those records the last year and playing most of the sets from those records. Now that that’s over, we went and rehearsed a bunch of songs we haven’t played ever! And we’re working those into the set now too.
You guys had a great set! We have Bullet for My Valentine playing in the background right now.
Oh, I was wondering who it was.
Do you guys get to enjoy the festival, or are you constantly on the road?
We’re not there for the whole weekend, obviously. We’re here for one day, so we’re able to check out the bands if we want. We’re here before it starts, and we’re here when it’s over most of the time. If we want to check out the bands, we’re able to. It’s cool, Europe is awesome for that too. Their festivals are second to none.
They know how to rock!
They’re just more variety, as far as different bands and more stages. I’m looking forward to that this summer. We’re on a lot of those. We’re going there June and back in August. That’ll be fun. We always run into our friends. That’s another thing, you know, that goes on at these festivals. We’re all friends with these bands. Some we’ll see two weeks ago and some we haven’t seen in three or four years. It’s always a fun time just to catch up and say “what’s up” to people. Not even just the bands, but the road crews. A lot of these people have worked for Hatebreed before. I like to get to shoot the stuff with them and shit on stage. I was talking to somebody, a friend of ours, and he’s working with Shinedown now.
What band are you looking forward to seeing today?
None. I’m going home!Just cause we’re in Florida and this is where I live, so I’m going to sleep in my own bed tonight. I mean, we’re friends with everybody here. I like to BS with the Five Finger Death Punch guys, they’re cool, they’re big Kiss fans, like myself, obviously. I always talk a lot with Ivan and Jason and Jeremy and Chris. Power Trip’s cool, they’re doing a lot of cool things right now, they’re a newer up and coming band. We just toured Europe with them this January. Those were the two bands, for sure. I think carolina Rebellion, there’s more going on for us than today.
And it’s a three-day festival too.
I think Ozzy, Clutch, I forget. It’s hard to remember where I’m playing tomorrow, yet alone next weekend.
You’re just focused on your bed tonight.
Right! I know we’re in Pensacola tomorrow. That’s far as hell from here.
Thanks for talking with us today. Enjoy the rest of your day.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The cops are coming for us now. They’ve got their lights on and everything. [festival security drove by]
Have a great night!
Thank you, have fun!
