P.O.D.: The nu-metal veterans exploring the cycle of life

We spoke to Marcos Guriel of San Diego's P.O.D. about the 'Circles' album and 27 years together as a band

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As the successful release of their 10th studio album 'Circles' showed when it appeared on America's Top Album Sales Chart at number 93, there is still a large and loyal following for P.O.D.. Their recent European tour was to largely sell-out crowds and the nu-metal band from San Diego are clearly still able to deliver on stage. 'Circles', produced by Los Angeles production team The Heavy, was well received by the critics. Blabbermouth.net wrote, "The rap-driven 'Rockin' With The Best' has an old-school P.O.D. sound that nods to the Beastie Boys, while 'Always Southern California' is a reggae-inflected rocker and the groove-heavy 'Soundboy Killa' is a hip-hop/metal hybrid', going on to say that "the dynamic title track even boasts moody electronic flourishes, glassy piano, and laid-back rapping verses".

Radio Hayah has selected five songs for its playlist: "On The Radio", "Fly Away", "Always Southern California", "Rockin' With The Best" and "Circles". We spoke to guitarist Marcos Guriel.

RH: Reggae has long been a musical influence on the band, hasn't it?

Marcos: "Yeah, it's like a musical buffet in Southern California; you can hear it in our music. It's definitely deeply rooted in punk, rap, reggae, pop, metal. And a lot of that is because of the diversity within each member of the band. We never want to come off contrived, we never do anything 'we have to do this because this is what's in or this is what's cool'. We do things because we honestly 100% love it and we feel it. It's all about vibrations. So, for instance, if I write a guitar riff or a chord progression, it's not the be all and end all. It won't be like 'This is it!' 'This is the way it goes!' It's more like 'hey guys, let's jam and let's see if we feel it, let's see if we can connect.' And then it turns into this thing and if it works, it works and if it doesn't I'm not feeling it. If it makes it past a certain point then we toss it over to Sonny and Sonny will write vocals over the music."

RH: You've got a very, very loyal fan base worldwide, haven't you?

Marcos: "Yeah, we're very blessed and grateful for that because when we started as a band we wanted to make it evident that we didn't just want to focus on the US. We wanted to be a worldwide band. It shows today and we're really grateful for that."

RH: When you signed with Atlantic Records all those years ago, was there ever any pressure put on you to pull back on the Christian message, to pull back on the specifically Christian songs?

Marcos: "There wasn't ever any pressure; it was more us being aware of so many different cultures, so many different belief systems worldwide and we wanted to connect; we wanted to show people where we were getting our positive vibes from, which were faith driven, but we didn't want to force anything upon anyone. We wanted to be a little more universal. When we played one of our first times in Singapore, we played out in the park. We were the first rock band to do that in that country's history and thousands of people showed up. You had Jewish people, Muslim people and they were all singing 'Alive' and it was a beautiful thing to bring so many different cultures and belief systems together with a song. And that's kind of like what we set out to do in the way of the almighty U2. They do that very well and it's something we set out to do."

RH: But the band have always been quite clever in writing songs which have one level on which a Christian would grasp them but a different level on which somebody who's not a Christian could relate to it.

Marcos: "That's the beautiful thing about art and music. We're not trying to segregate and say you can't listen to us because we're this way or that way. Music, ultimately, we want to be heard and we're gonna try to bring inspiration, hope and good vibes with our music, regardless of your belief system or your ideology."

RH: But you're known throughout the music world as a Christian band, aren't you?

Marcos: "Yeah, for some people that's all we are; that's their connection. And for other people we're just a good rock band that has a positive message. I've read interviews with Bono and U2 and they were known for that early on also. You just want to be universal and be able to connect with as many humans as possible."

RH: On the 'Circles' album, are there particular songs which you think are the strongest? What would be the two or three favourite songs from your point of view?

Marcos: "Technically, they're all my little children; I want to give them all love. But if I had to choose, my two favourites are 'Circles', the title track, we recently shot a video which is going to be the second single in the States; the first single was 'Listening For The Silence', I don't know if you guys have seen that video. The second one would be 'Domino'."

RH: Tell me a bit about the message of those songs.

Marcos: "'Circles' is like the cycle of life, the circle of beginning a new album, writing songs for a whole new record. Everything has a beginning and an end and we're like whoa, this is 27 years for us and we're blessed to still be here. It's like you know what, we're still here but that song can be taken in many different ways. It's like a painting; if you saw it you'd be like what's this talking about. If you take a direct listen and take it for what it is, it's about addiction and abuse and the struggle of life, the struggle of maintaining all that stuff. For me, 'Circles' is about that."

RH: 27 years, you don't feel yet that you've completed the circle, that you've come full circle yet?

Marcos: "I think every time we do a record it's a circle because there are times, as we get older and we are family men, we have kids, is this our last effort or is it not? We have record deals, as we get older people change, people want to be home. And then you realise it's not. I guess we're here and there are people coming out and people are inspired. And as long as there are people who want to listen to what we do and are inspired by the music and the positive vibes and the message then I don't see why we would stop."

RH: So no retirement plans yet?

Marcos: "Not yet, but we do take it one day at a time. We didn't know we'd be 27 years deep. We had no idea and the same four guys; that's incredible."