Optimal Prime Q&A

Your name:

Maxi Scattergood.

Where are you from?

Swindon, Wiltshire, UK.

Name of band:

Optimal Prime.

Who else is in your band?

Gary Griffin - Guitar, Dave Housley, Guitar, Joe Wild - Bass, Tom Ross - Drums (and myself on vocals).

How would you describe yourselves?

We are a progressive-heavy rock band with some metal thrown in for good measure.

Who are your main influences musically?

We have a lot of influences; Rush, Opeth, Dream Theater, Yes. But individually, we have tastes from Metal through to Classic Rock, Prog, Jazz, Blues and even classical.

What do you hope to achieve in music?

To be honest, we probably wouldn't get considered to be signed, but we would love to be recognised for doing something different to the "norm" and that we can get our EPs out there and gig as much as possible.

What has been the highlight of your career so far, and why?

So far we have been blessed with our gigs, we may not been going long, but we have supported Lord Bishop and Steve Grimmett's Grim Reaper. Plus we have gigged at Riffs Bar who have won 'Music Venue of the Year' twice in recent years. Like I said, we may not have been going long, but we have done it in style lol 

And what’s the moment you want to forget?

Can't honestly say that we've had one of those yet... (wipes brow)

If you could choose just one of your songs to represent your music, what would it be and why?

This would have to be our 4-in-1 piece 'Psi War'. It was written by Gary and sums up what we do - it is a set of four songs (Flaming Telepaths, Psi Corps, War and Fractured) and tells a story of a 'Telepath War' - a bit geeky, but that's how we roll... Musically, it covers ballard tempo to metal double bass drumming and vocally it covers soft female vocals to hard male vocals with some affects thrown in too. We're hoping to record this as a live piece soon so watch this space :) 

Where can we listen to it?

Sadly we are still working on recording our EP and don't have anything together yet that the quality is good enough to put out there, but we are working on this and you'll be the first to know when its available ;)

Where can we find out more about your music?

We can be found on Facebook under Optimal Prime (pages) look for a grey/black logo and also on Twitter - everything links from our Facebook and all details there - if anyone would like to book us, please email the page and I'll get back to them asap.

Anything else you’d like to say about your band that I forgot to ask? 

Yes, you forgot to ask if we are awesome - and to answer in the words of our drummer, "Are we awesome? We created Awesome!" ;)