Truth In My Hands

1. So tell me about Truth In My Hands, how old are you all? Where are you from and what do you do when you’re not playing in the band? Was there a goal when the band started out?

Well TIMH as a band started as a 4 piece in the rehearsal room, and 5 on tour (we take one of our closest friends as a second guitarist). The youngest member is 24 and the oldest is 29, so we’re still pretty young at the moment. We all come from Sardinia, it’s the second biggest Italian island and we all live in small villages close to the main city, Cagliari. Anyway we can say Cagliari is our home base, we hang out over there, we book-see gigs over there and most of us work in the city. I work for a ship chandler company; it is my real first job. 4 years already passed by from my first day in that company and the shit never changes. I don’t know what’s worse, the hard work when your back seems to break, the tough sailor men on every ship or the stupidity and disrespect of the owners. Anyway everybody has to put up with shit everyday, that’s the truth. Andre’ and Nicola both work for a steetwear shop in Cagliari and Mirko got a new job a couple of weeks ago in a Biker shop in the city.
Everybody try’s to go to as many gig’s as possible, and sometimes we book directly gigs by ourselves. We live on an island and it’s not as easy as in other cities. We gotta fight against long distances and don’t forget the sea that divides us from the mainland. Anyway we don’t give up hope. This is one of the reasons why we started TIMH. Our first goal was and still is to tour as much as we can, meet new people find new cultures. We can’t tour too much ‘cause of the lack of opportunity to find a new job once we’re back home. Sardinia as far as all the other places in south Italy, has to deal with a very bad situation regarding job opportunities. You’re lucky enough if you find a job, and if for one reason or another you lose it, you can say goodbye to most for your dreams. We’ve 50% of unemployment between young people. Anyway we try to do at least a whole tour of 20 days per year and last year we did an extra mini tour too. Another step was to prove to all Sardinian bands that if you work hard enough you can tour Europe, release CD’s and cross the fucking sea! We did it and it’s not enough. Every time we left our home for a tour, we brought with us our culture, and show people that in a small island like Sardinia is, there’s a HC band with something to say. Every time we go abroad we’ve to pay something like 500 euro just to cross the sea and board to the mainland.

2. Filippo you also run the bands label Step Ahead Records? Tell me about how you got started in the hardcore scene and how you eventually set up the label? What are your aims with it to promote your local hardcore scene I presume?

Yes you’re right… It all started when I was a teenager, 10-12 years ago. I got involved in a grind core band (Vomit Fall) back then. Everybody got pissed off about the fact that we were starting a new band (it was my very first band, not for the other members) and have no chance to spread our stuff all around. The other 2 members played in several HC bands before and never released a demo. I took everything in my hands. We recorded a demo and I was in charge for releasing it. I made 1000 professional printed covers and at the end I sold something like 700 copies. After that we released a 7” for a CZ label and I was down for putting out copies, in that moment I realized that was time to start a label, my own label. In ’96 Step Ahead rec. saw the light with the split 10” Agathocles /Vomit Fall. After that, other releases came out. I started my own label ‘cause I wanted be part of the scene from the inside, not only going to shows. I’d like to give a chance (not big) to bands I believed in, to record their songs, to release a record and to be “known” outside Sardinia. Sometimes I failed with my intents, till TIMH get started. In TIMH I’ve put all my efforts and I got repaid for everything. With a full time job I’ve not so much time to spend on label things, so I’m not 100% on it, but it’s ok. What I want the most for TIMH is to find a cool label that’s able to do more things than I have done till now. That’s my goal! S.A. rec. helped out TIMH in so many ways, all label contacts was used for the band, S.A. set up all tours, also the band helped the label to grow up. It’s a team work, you know. It was the first time the label got feedbacks from their bands.


3. What sorts of things are important in all of your lives? Tell me about where you grew up, what is Sardinia like?

Uuummmmm. Now I’m going to answer to this question all alone, trying to speak for the rest of the crew that are not here at the moment.
Basically friendship is one of the most important thing in our lives. We try to help each other out, and be there for one another in times of darkness. Sometimes we felt kinda tense that fight between us seems to be very close. 2 of 4 chose a vegan lifestyle the remaining 2 a vegetarian way. 3 of 4 are into straight edge.
About Sardinia we can stay talking for years and never getting to the real point. As every place you’ve pro and cons. If you want, you can have fun at least 6 months per year. I mean if you go to discos, if you feel ok hanging out on the beach with friends trying to catch the coolest girl lying on the sand. Beside that it’s totally shit. You can drive at least for 250 Km and you can find nothing else than the same sea you were watching when you left. As I already wrote above we’ve serious economical problems, and you can thank god if you’re lucky enough if you’ve found an underpaid job. If you decide to move, I don’t know for what, you’ve to face with high cost of transportation (airplane or ferry), long distance to cover (if by ferry at least 11 hours or 6 only in summer season and only in some ports) and the last but not the least, time spent on travelling (by ferry 1 night and more in and another out). So when a Sardinian band like us, decides to plan a tour we have to allow at least 2 days for travelling, pay a van 2 days more (time spent on travelling) and at least 500 euro for the ferry (it’s for 5 people and a van, and we’ve special price too). If we’ve to book a show for a non Sardinian band we’re lucky if the band will come here by ferry (and we spend at least 800 euros for 5 people and a van) or if we really wanna book the band we’ve to pay the airplane (sometimes it’s even cheaper than ferry, if we found low cost companies). So it’s our life, not so terrible but a little bit harder than other place…

TRUTH IN MY HANDS www.truthinmyhands.com is:

Filippo – Vocal
Andre’ – Drums
Mirko – Bass
Nicola – Guitar

Releases:
A Place Full Of Good Intentions CD
Too Fast For Love
Various comp.

All releases are available at 7.00 Euros plus postage at:
stepaheadrec@tiscali.it

STEP AHEAD Rec.
Via Sassari 98
09032 Assemini (CA)
Sardinia -Italy