P.O.D. Reflects On 30 Years Of Rock And Embracing The Resurgence

You might call it a resurgence, but to P.O.D., they never stopped making music and doing what they love.

I-Rock with Rock Stars had the chance to talk with Marcos and Traa of P.O.D. who have been rocking the party since 1993.  Marcos said, "We are blessed to still be here.  And to see all these young bands that say we're trying to sound like you guys...that's just crazy to us.  Not many bands can do it as long as we can."

P.O.D. From Then To Now

P.O.D. has been there and done that.  They took Linkin Park on their first tour ever.  Traa said, "Nobody was giving them a shot but we took them out and knew they were special."

They've played with Korn, Deftones, and so many others.  And have fans across the music industry.  "Vinny from Pantera was a big P.O.D. fan," Marcos told us.  He said every time they'd play in Dallas Vinny and Dime would show up with BBQ for them.

With all the past success, P.O.D. is still creating to "grow and sound fresh but still keep the roots of P.O.D."

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There are plenty of examples of that in the new album "Veritas".

Their song Afraid To Die features Tatiana Shmayluk whose husband (Alex Lopez) is currently playing drums for P.O.D.  Marcos told the story of how they all met at a show and Alex told them how "My wife loves your band.  She plays in this band Jinjer."  Then when the guys from P.O.D. saw her perform they asked if she wanted to sing these parts to the song and she said heck yeah.

The new album starts with "Drop" featuring guest vocalist Lamb of God lead singer Randy Blythe.

The guys said they started vibing with Randy on Ship Rocked.  "He was taking photos of us while we were on stage and it turns out he was a fan of us."

Delivering A Positive Message No Matter What You Call Them

P.O.D. has been lumped into a lot of genres over their career.  Traa told us they've "never considered ourselves nu-metal but we'll be whatever you want us to be to make that connection."

For some people early on they were a Christian band.  But Marcos says, "The band was never put together to be a Christian band.  We started in a garage and our goal was to play that kegger at so and so's house and have a positive message doing it.  We were still punk kids."

Traa added, "We're not selling a religion.  It's just our principle in life.  We've always had a spiritual base to our band but the Christian Music Scene rejected us early on.  We didn't fit in their box."

I asked them when it was all said and done what you want fans from the hardcore to the casual to take away and remember about P.O.D.  Marcos said, that they hope they "Left them with something positive in life and I want to just thank the fans for being with us."

Check out the full interview below and listen to our other I-Rock with Rock Stars here.