Metal Contraband’s Chelsea recently spoke with Kasey Karlsen of Deadlands, to discuss their new EP Seven and the inspiration behind the tracks, working with The Pretty Wild, Kasey’s roots as a musician, touring with Nita Strauss, and more. Check it out below: 

Chelsea here, excited to be joined by Kasey Karlsen. How are you doing today?  

I’m so well. How are you? 

Great, thank you! You’ve been killing it out there with awesome new music and I’m excited to talk with you about it.  

Oh my God, thank you, I’m so excited! We got lots to dig into, you know? 

Definitely. Well, let’s start with the newest and the latest, your new single “Limbo” is out now and we’re heading to the release of the Seven EP coming out very soon, just a couple more weeks. We’ve heard a lot of great tracks off of it so far. So let’s start with the new single and the ideas and the inspiration behind the track.

Oh yeah, so I mean, first and foremost, it’s a concept album. So we have seven deadly sins as the concept for this album, and this specific song, “Limbo”, is about the sin of lust, but not in the way that I feel like most people would go to first. You know, most people would be like the, “I want you, you want me, let’s get together”, but the way that we wanted to tackle it is by looking at the negative perspective of lust and like the aftermath of how it can affect people. Because you know, this EP was supposed to be very reflective, and it’s supposed to prompt people to just think a little bit more about what they’re doing and, how can this impact other people? With that being said, we came at “Limbo” from the perspective of we have one person who’s in love with someone else that doesn’t love them back. You know, only lusts them back and uses them just for pleasure. I feel like we’ve all been through something like that at some point in our lives, and it’s never easy and it’s never fun. And of course, if we’re talking strictly amongst the sins, the sin of lust is not the inherently sexual nature of it. What it is is the hurting of somebody else and  using them for your benefit. And I feel like that could be applied not only to just relationships, but also in multiple different aspects as well, of this is what happens when you use somebody for your benefit. And it like, it just hurts people and it will wind up biting you in the butt too *laughs*. 

A good message and a good lesson too, for sure. And of course you have “Villain”, which is another single that came out before this one. So how did you approach that one for the “seven deadly sins”?  

That one I definitely had to do some soul searching for because I’ll tell you, if you have read my comment sections on a bad day, I get so prideful. I am a very prideful person, but it’s because I care, of course. I want people to enjoy it and I want people just to respect me as a musician, and sometimes it’s definitely harder to bite my tongue when somebody says something stupid. So “Villain” was pretty much about that and also just about like, you know, I’ve been through so many experiences where like I will stretch my hand out and I’ll be like, “hey, let’s be friends, or let me help you”, or what have you, and then that person turns around and bites my hand and it’s just like, what? Why? I never understand it. And so we came at it from that perspective and again, the problem with Pride is not like the act of outstretching your hand and then getting burned, but the revenge aspect of it. And that is something that I as a person work on every single day to not be vengeful. It’s definitely easier said than done, but this is what this album’s about, of just looking inward and seeing what we can improve on as people. And that is definitely one of my faults that I am working hard to get better with.  

Can’t blame you, honestly. Comment sections can be a wild battlefield sometimes. And half the time, especially now, I feel like with more AI stuff popping up, some of them are not even real people, there’s lots of bots that come in just to start stuff and then people start hopping on that. So it can be a really crazy landscape out there with that.  

Insane, insane.  

So I can’t blame you for defending yourself once in a while! But usually the best approach is block, delete, etc., but sometimes you just can’t help it.  

Exactly. I mean, listen, we’re trying to turn the other cheek, but I wonder if I can turn the other cheek just to slap it, but like, you know. *laughs*

Definitely.  So another single we’ve heard so far is a collab with The Pretty Wild for the track “Kundalini”. And you guys blend a few different styles in one track. So talk to me about how that all came together with the video too.

Oh man, so I had found The Pretty Wild, I believe it was on TikTok from their song “Black Ops” and instantly I was like, there is no way that these girls actually exist. I had seen that, I think it was literally just the breakdown of “Black Ops” where it’s like, “SOS, someone help, nah, f it, I’ll do it myself”. And then the “Manifest” scream was really what got me. I was just so blown away. I started stalking their accounts, of course, as you do. *laughs* And I saw one of the girls is a ninja. I was like, a ninja? There’s no way. And I was diving into their discography. I’m showing everybody – we’re on tour at this point – so I’m showing everybody in the van. I’m like, “guys, these girls are insane!!” And at that point, “sLeepwALKER” had not been out yet, it still hadn’t dropped. It was “Renascence”, it was “Only Fans”, it was “Black Ops” that was about to come out. And as soon as they released Black Ops, I was like, “Holy God, who are these girls?” And even before “Black Ops” came out, I sent them a DM and I was like, “you guys are incredible, we have to collab on something”. And they were like, “new song”? And I was like, “there’s no way you just said that”. And at the time they were a little smaller than us and I was just like, man, our fans would just eat them up. We have to do this, we have to do this! They are so powerful. They’re so talented. They’re literal musical geniuses. I mean, being in the studio with them was unlike any other experience I’ve ever had. Them and Andrew Wade are so, so incredible. I literally don’t have enough words in the English vernacular to describe how much I love them. They’re amazing. And now they have exploded beyond belief and I’m so proud of them every single day. I think about them often and sometimes I’ll text them. I’ll just be like, “I’m so proud of you guys”. And they’re just the sweetest. So yeah, they were absolutely incredible.

That’s very cool, and you not only got an awesome song out of it, you also got a new friendship out of it as well, which I love! 

Exactly! Win-win.

And also, The Pretty Wild is not the only time you’ve teamed up with other cool musicians. You very recently did a collab with Lauren Babic, another awesome metal vocalist. So how did that come about?  

Oh, yeah. I mean, it’s so crazy because it was such a full circle moment for me. I think probably two years ago or so, she had DM’d me and was like, “dude, we need to collab”. And I was like, “there’s no way” because I literally, from, I believe it was her “Smokahontas” cover years ago, I think that was how I found her. And I was just like, “Oh my God, I love this girl, she’s awesome”. And when she reached out to me, I was like, “Dude, we have to”, and then the time just escaped us as it does, of course. But then we rekindled. I was like, “Yo, dude, we have to do this Lady Gaga cover, “Disease” is so cool and I feel like you would be so good on it”, and of course she was. She was absolutely phenomenal. I had actually met her at our Nashville show that we played on our second leg of our tour over the fall and she was unreal. And that was, of course, the worst day vocally for me because we were still on a 6-day stretch of shows and I was sick. So I had no voice, and my voice gave out mid set – it lasted up until Nashville and I was like, we were so close. We were so close to making it, but you know what? It’s fine because the rest of the tour finished out. We got through the set and that’s like the most important thing. So next time you can only go up, you know? 

Exactly! Yeah, and I’m sure with the voice that you did have left, I’m sure you did a lot better than you feel like you do. Everyone’s always more critical of themselves than other people perceive, I think you probably did better than you think.  

That’s true, thank you. Thank you.  

I mean, we’re all human and especially when your voice is your instrument, your own body is your instrument, it can be frustrating when it kind of feels like it betrays you in a way.

Oh girl, you don’t even know. It’s the worst feeling ever. You feel like your heart just crumbles and it’s the worst. But you know what? We got through it, that’s all that matters.  

Now, you’ve got a very powerful voice, no matter what. And it’s funny how you have these reactions when speaking about collaborating with other people of like, “there’s no way” because I feel like they’re excited to collaborate with you too. You’re building a really solid name for yourself, you’ve got a great following as well. And you should definitely give yourself some credit for being an incredible musician as well.

Thank you so much, that’s so sweet. I mean, I just feel like the inner child in me is kind of healing…or the inner preteen, I guess I should say, because I had watched these people since I was like 12 or 13 and now I’m actually amongst them. It’s just a very weird feeling. It’s awesome, but it’s very jarring. 

I believe that. But I mean, you’ve got such a great catalog of covers already out on social media and it’s fun how you kind of play between different genres. It’s not only strictly metal, you can kind of explore a little bit as well. So I’m curious about your inspiration for your content and how you decide to cover songs. Is there some ongoing list in your head of songs you want to cover or do you maybe hear something and suddenly get inspired and say, “Okay, that one now”? 

I mean, for the most part, I feel like a lot of it is just requests most of the time, and whatever’s popular. I try to do things that will ultimately try and bring new fans to Deadlands and myself. But also just have fun, a lot of it is just supposed to be me messing around on my computer and just experimenting, and practice, ultimately, just to try and get some new techniques. Like I used to do a couple of Ariana Grande impression ones that were just like, the shits and giggles of it all, and just having fun and sometimes you just have to get back to the roots of like, “it’s not that serious” and that’s my way of doing that, I guess. 

Definitely, yeah. How did you originally discover the different sides to your vocals, that you had such a nice, strong melodic side, but then you could also growl with the best of them? 

Thank you. I honestly, I sang very casually since I was young and I was doing third grade chorus – so, so serious, clearly. 

Highlight of the career. *laughs*

Exactly, exactly. But I mean, I would just sing when I was playing video games for fun. I would play Guitar Hero and I used to put the mic over into my ceiling tiles and have it hang down so that I could sing into it and play guitar at the same time. Ridiculous. 

Little Lemmy style going on there.  

Exactly, exactly!  But like, I never took it too seriously until I started getting traction from my covers. I really just did it for fun. And even for the screaming, I really wanted to learn only to preserve my singing voice for fun at concerts. And I thought I would have more fun screaming along at concerts, which was true. When you feel like you can hit the notes and you feel like you could just hang and not ruin your throat, it’s just the best feeling. 

Definitely. I’ve always been a big Avenged Sevenfold fan myself, so I love that you tackled “Buried Alive”. That’s such an intense song and you handled the balance between the melodic and harsh side of that so well. And that’s another thing about your covers is I wish we could hear more of the song sometimes. You just do little snippets for social media, it’s like, I want to hear the whole thing now.  

Thank you so much. I mean, Avenged Sevenfold was such a…they were my gateway, honestly, into metal, period. I think they hold a special place in my heart for sure. And that cover was so much fun to do. But yeah, I mean, I actually do have a couple full covers. I have a couple on YouTube and then I’ve been taking my Patreon a little more seriously too because I do a lot of punk goes pop covers over there and then most of the time, I try and do it once a month, I’ll sprinkle a regular standard instrumental cover on there. But overall, it’s just a lot of fun. I love covers and they will always hold a special place in my heart. And I wish one day that maybe we could do a Deadlands cover of something. We’ve done the “King for a Day”. Daisy Grenade, I feature on one of their songs and it’s just a cover of Pierce the Veil’s “King for a Day”.  I love it, you can’t go wrong with a cover, especially if it’s done right and it’s fantastic. And also, Daisy Grenade is fantastic. You should absolutely check them out if you don’t know them.

Very cool shoutout. I think I’ve heard the name, but I’ve definitely got to dig into them a little more. 

Oh yeah. I just saw them yesterday. I went up on stage with them and it was unreal. Their energy is unmatched, for sure. 

And speaking about being on stage, of course we have to throw in a chat about Nita Strauss as well. You’ve fairly recently joined her as a touring vocalist over the past couple years. So how has it been working on Nita’s music with her?  

Oh, she is fantastic. I mean…again, it was one of those full circle moments of, is this really happening? Like I had seen “Dead Inside” when it came out, I just remember seeing it  and being like, “oh my God, this girl is insane”. Like just her stage presence alone, the straight up skill.  And I still can’t believe that I have gone on tour with her and continue to tour with her as much as I possibly can. She’s just incredible. It’s been wild to be in the same circle as them.  Especially because, you know, they are so close to so many of the people that I idolize. Being that they are also in that umbrella. So it’s just been a really crazy ride and she is the best. Josh is the best. I have to text them, you just reminded me. *laughs*

A little quick reminder, right? It’s like people use, you know, that phrase like, “hey, call your mom”. We’re just like, “hey, text Nita”. 

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. My tour mother, as they say. 

Now, coming back to Deadlands, you guys are also from Long Island, which I feel like doesn’t get enough attention when it comes to the metal scene. You know, there are a good amount of metal bands out of Long Island, but it’s not the first place people name when they’re talking about metal. So I feel like we need to acknowledge the scene a little bit more. 

Oh yeah, 100%. And you know what I think we need? I think we need to get another venue out here because, you know, we have Amityville Music Hall and they’re, they redid everything. They’re fantastic. I love AMH, but sometimes I want one that’s just right in my backyard in central Long Island. You know, 89 North is such a nice venue, but I don’t even think they have heavy bands playing anymore. I think they’re too afraid of us. And that’s fine, you know, I get it. But we have, of course, the Paramount in Huntington, that’s one of my favorite venues of all time, and I got to play it with Nita and that was again, a full circle moment. Just really weird when stuff happens like that, especially being that I’m not late into my career whatsoever. I’m so new to everybody. I feel like, you know,, it’s only been two or three years since I really went full throttle with everything. So like it’s been a whirlwind for sure.

The thing is, there used to be the Revolution in Amityville, which was just down the road from Amityville Music Hall, definitely a bigger size than Amityville Music Hall, but I think it was around 2020 or so, it just kind of got lost with a lot of other businesses and it’s a shame when venues close because there’s so few to begin with and you’re like, “no, that one can’t go too”. There also used to be a place called the Backstage Pass in Ronkonkoma that was literally just felt like the blink of an eye, it was there and that was gone in about a year or so and it’s just like…the venue scene really needs to get better for sure. 

It really does. And you know what? We need more bands. I mean, we have Farsight, our boys in Farsight. We’re actually playing with them next week, so that’s going to be amazing. And then we also have Resistor, who is incredible. Sage is based, I think, in New Jersey. But like, there’s there’s so many like New York, Long Island based bands. We have to be able to get it out. I think this is overdue. 

Right? Honestly, a bunch of Long Island bands should just get together and make a venue somehow just carve one out somewhere, find some hole in the wall and make one happen.

Sign me up, sign me up. 

There you go. And then the other thing is I feel like when people think Long Island and metal, they’ll go back to Twisted Sister, which is awesome too, of course. Love Twisted Sister! But there’s definitely a newer metal scene to be found beyond just the one band, so yeah, I think this needs to happen.  

Yeah, correct. Oh, also Life of Agony. Great, they’re fantastic. 

Oh, of course, they’re fantastic. Absolutely killer band. There’s also Cryptodira, a band I interviewed a couple years ago and they’re also from Long Island. They’re kind of prog experimental vibes. Healturn is another good one. There’s so many, we could go on for hours about Long Island bands.  

Hours!

For sure. So coming back to, like you said, you just kind of started this whole thing for fun, getting on YouTube doing covers and everything. So how did Deadlands actually come to be? How did you find the other people in your band and in your life there? 

So let’s see, I went on this app called Flint, and Flint is essentially Tinder for finding band members, not relationships. And, you know, I used it for maybe a week and I was like, this is not getting me anywhere. So I get a DM from my friend named Anthony Conte who is in Resistor, he is fantastic, and he hits me up on Instagram and he’s like, hey, I found you on Flint. Are you still looking for a band? He’s like, well, you want to come jam with us? We’re in Massapequa. I was like, “hell yeah, I do”, So I booked it over there and we jammed and, I don’t think CJ was there for the first one, but I do know CJ was there for the second one.  And we were jamming, we were doing everything fine, but the band just wasn’t the genre that we were looking for. Like, I had signed up for a metal band and it turned out to be more like pop punky type stuff.  And so we just decided, CJ and I, we wrote a song together in that band. And the chemistry, we literally finished the song in a day. It was insane. And it’s actually a decent song, for an 18 and 22 year old, I think it’s pretty good. So then we decided we were going to start our own band, and then we had found Kyle and then we just, like, “you guys want to start a band”? And then we were like, yeah, okay. And then I go, “so what’s the name”? CJ goes, “Deadlands”. We go, “yup, done”. *laughs*

That was that. *laughs*

That was it. *laughs* 

Honestly, lots of times when things are meant to be, they just kind of pan out. You don’t have to think about that hard about them.  

Exactly, I mean, me and CJ, to this day, we have worked so hard to get to where we’re at. And I feel like it’s finally paying off, and when we look back at the old times of the original inception of the band, we’re like, “man, we’ve come so far”. It’s just such a good feeling.  

Well, it’s a good feeling for your fans too. We definitely see you guys on the rise, a hard working band and you guys are getting out and touring more, which is awesome. And just seeing more and more coming from you is definitely very exciting, very inspiring too. 

Thank you so much.

You guys have the upcoming tour with Scene Queens and Girli, so how are you feeling heading toward this one?  

Oh man, we are so excited! It’s our first support tour ever. So we are just really, really hyped to finally get in front of an audience that isn’t our own and hopefully turn over some fans. I mean,  Scene Queen is so iconic, Girli is so iconic, and their fans are just incredible. So I feel like the dynamic, especially being that it’s all women in the forefront of this bill, and I think that’s incredible. So we’re just really excited and we’re really stoked to be there and it’s a huge privilege for sure. 

Well, they also have a privilege of having you guys on there, like I said, hard working, up and coming band. You guys are really killing it out there. So thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me today, Kasey. This has been really awesome getting to know more about you. 

Thank you so much for having me. It was a pleasure talking to you, and Strong Island represent, girl!

There you go, exactly.  Thank you so much. Well, best of luck with everything. Have so much fun on the tour and hopefully we’ll talk again soon. 

Thank you so much, we’ll chat soon!