Name: Bryce Clayton Eiman
Bands: Weather Machine, Bicameral Mind

QRD – Do you try to keep your faith life & musical life separate?

Bryce – My musical life is the closest thing I have to a spiritual life.  Performance is my mission to the Philistines.

QRD – When creating music do you feel closer to God?

Bryce – Don’t know if brings me closer to G-d, but I feel more aware of His presence.

QRD – How has your music helped you grow as a Christian?

Bryce – If Noise teaches anything; it is that there is no such thing as an unloved sound.

QRD – How has your music effected your faith?

Bryce – Clear expression of rational thought isn’t one of the things Art does.

QRD – How are your faith & aesthetic ideas linked together? What do you think of Contemporary Christian Music?

Bryce – Frankly, I can’t conceive of any other music a Christian would be interested in making.  Those barftastic Vegas love songs to Jesus that inhabit Christian Music bins & radios just have a bad smell about them.  Why appeal to Babylon?

QRD – What has been your experience being a Christian in an underground “artistic” community? Have you experienced any negativity towards yourself regarding your beliefs?

Bryce – I get a lot of blowback about stupid crap clerics have done, but I’ve rarely been made to feel bad about what I believe in the underground soundtown.  Most of the negativity regarding my beliefs comes from Christians.

QRD – How do you reconcile the idea of making “dark” music against the perception that Christians making music “should” be creating music of praise or trying to “save” people?

Bryce – Um...I feel hearing my music is salvific; why else should I perform?  It isn’t a well-paying genre.

QRD – How do you feel about performing with & for people who have a completely different set of beliefs than you do?

Bryce – “completely different set of beliefs than you” is a problematic phrase for me, since the only folks that describes to me is family with the last name of Manson. The vast majority of our beliefs are held in common (do unto others as you would have them do unto you, what goes around comes around, don’t pull on Superman’s cape, don’t spit into the wind, etc).  Are you talking about theology?  Because, theologically, every time I walk out the door in the South I am in the presence of a set of beliefs very completely different from mine.

QRD – What’s your take on bands that refer to themselves as Satanic or Pagan?

Bryce – Well, there are many flavors of Satan out there, so it depends on which band we’re talking about.  Are you including Luciferian bands under the “Satanic” rubric?   Most of the “Satanic” bands I’ve encountered seem usually vegetarian & vaguely socialist & often gay, the three greatest sins for Petty Bourgeois Jesus, Inc. I got to confess that pagan bands tend to creep me out.  I mean, if they are totemic or animist I got no problem, & polytheists are cool, but a lot of pagans have a little too much race-interest for my tastes.

QRD – How did you become a Christian? Can you share your experience?

Bryce – It was an accident; I’d rather not talk about it.

QRD – Name a scripture that has personal significance to you & why?

Bryce – John 8:8   “And again He stooped down, & wrote on the ground.”  Pretty much says it all.
Oh, & also   “ὃν δεῖ οὐρανὸν μὲν δέξασθαι ἄχρι χρόνων ἀποκαταστάσεως πάντων ὧν ἐλάλησεν ὁ θεὸς διὰ στόματος τῶν ἁγίων ἀπ’ αἰῶνος αὐτοῦ προφητῶν.” Of course.
And also that thing about morality & ethics being as filthy rags compared to the glory of G-d.

QRD – How have traditional music & hymns influenced your music?

Bryce – I grew up in a small church with a big organ.  The pipes lined the entire back wall of the sanctuary.  Parts of the building tended to vibrate sympathetically with certain notes; the old square nails in the floor, panes in the stained glass, the flowers featured in the latest funeral.  On a song like “Ein’ feste Burg ist unser Gott” the whole building would ring like a bell.

QRD – How do you respond to people making statements like, “I thought you were too smart to be a Christian?”

Bryce – “That’s not what your momma said last night.”

QRD – Has your faith ever hindered your career in anyway?

Bryce – Well, I’m not a millionaire....