The Three Tremors: A Mighty Metal Singers Triumvirate

Photo credit:

Credit Dimitris Karageorgiou

There's a unique, crushing new power trio on the metal scene, and it's not what you might think.

The Three Tremors aren't a bass, guitar and drum triumvirate. Rather, the band boasts three premiere singers who share vocal duties on every song: Tim “Ripper Owens" (solo, Dio Disciples, ex-Judas Priest, ex-Iced Earth), Sean "The Hell Destroyer" Peck (Cage, Denner/Shermann, Death Dealer) and Harry "The Tyrant" Conklin (Jag Panzer, Satan's Host, Titan Force). Combing the talents of three metal singers on one album is an idea that's existed in theory for a while, but never realized until now. For that, a huge kudos goes out to Messrs. Owens, Conklin and Peck. The band’s self-titled debut is out now.

These three metal amigos belt out in-your-face, lungs of steel vocals throughout the album. The concept, and its perfect execution, is quite an impressive feat. The vocals blend perfectly and are sung rapid fire. Each singer has a unique sound, and the trio never steps on each other's toes, err, throats.

The album starts off with a scorching statement of intent. "Invaders from the Sky" sees our heroes wiping out an attempted alien takeover. "The Cause" pays tribute to Washington's revolutionary warriors and “King of the Monsters” is a well-deserved homage to icons Ronnie James Dio and Lemmy.

While the spotlight shines on Owens Peck and Conklin, they're backed by a great backing band definitely worth mentioning. Guitarists Casey "The Sentinel" Trask and David "Conan" Garcia, bassist Alex "The Captain" Picard" and drummer Sean “The Thrash Machine” Elg lay down a maelstrom of whiplash-inducing riffs and rhythms.

The Three Tremors roar into Dingbatz in Clifton on March 3 and the Gramercy Theatre in New York City on March 4.

We recently spoke with Tim “Ripper Owens.”

There’s been talk of metal tenors albums before that never came to fruition. How did The Three Tremors come about?

Sean Peck called me and said, “I want to do a record. a three singers thing. Not three singers performing their material from their bands but a new record with all three guys singing.”

That was the first thing that won me over and then the second thing was he wanted to make a classic, power metal record. I don't always do that type of stuff so that was exciting and that's what did it for me. When he came up with that name, it had been talked about back in the day but it never happened. No one owned the name. It's like an urban legend and we were finally bringing it to life. The name was perfect.

Originally Sean’s band Cage opened up for Judas Priest way back in 1998. We started talking a little and years later we saw each other again in Europe and started running into each other at festivals. I only met Harry once or twice before, crossing paths at festivals. But when we all met the chemistry was perfect. We’re very similar. We all really enjoy singing. We all work really hard to sing well.

Sean wrote the music for the album. Did he send you your parts to sing?

Actually that’s not what happened. He sent me and Harry the music and his singing. The idea was to listen to him and sing his vision of the record. So Harry and I both recorded the record individually as well, singing all the parts using Sean’s album as a template. We didn’t have assigned parts. I sang in a different voice than usual for me. More layering and falsetto. Kind of a Metal Church, AC/DC thing. I wanted to stand out by sounding different. What’s cool is that since each one of us recorded our own version I’m certain we’ll all release our own versions of this CD at some point.

So how did you decide who would sing which parts?

Sean started piecing it together when we started rehearsing in the studio. What’s cool is sometimes we switch up which parts we sing live. Maybe one of us isn’t feeling well and there’s a part where the range would be better for one of the other guys on that night.

What’s the live set like?

We do all the songs form the record and I do “Burn In Hell. from “Jugulator.” Harry and Sean also do one song from their bands. I’m thinking we might want to add some other songs and change the set a little bit. Maybe add a Dio song to celebrate him. The guys in the band are the Cage guys (Peck’s band). I think they're fantastic musicians.

Musically the album is a full-out metal assault from start to end. Sean’s lyrics are great too, covering everything from alien invasions to space travel to the Revolutionary War.

It’s all over the top, in a great way, from the singing, there’s so many high notes, to the lyrics to the album artwork. Aliens, vampires, that’s what you can do with heavy metal and Sean has done a really great job.

The song “The Three Tremors” has a line that says “We’re here to make you feel alive.” That about sums up the album and the live show.

That’s one of my favorite lyrics and songs. Those lyrics describe everything about what we're doing. We end the night singing that song.

As always you’re very busy. You’ve got the metal band Spirits of Fire that just released its debut and the more melodic hard rock veined A New Revenge (album out March 29). Plus you’re in Dio Disciples.

Yes, that’s for sure. All these records that I have coming out were recorded at different times though. A New Revenge was two-and-a-half years ago and we've been waiting to put it out. The only unfortunate thing is there’s not enough time to tour everything properly. I’m very excited and proud of all of this and I can’t wait for the fans to hear it.