Guitarist, producer, instrument maker… Kurt Ballou has established himself as a focal point in the landscape of heavy music. As his legendary hardcore band Converge get set to unleash their second album of the year, he talks us through his formative experiences....
In February, Converge released Love Is Not Enough, a long-awaited return to their classically chaotic heaviness following their immersive collaboration with Chelsea Wolfe on 2021’s Bloodmoon: I.
Outside the band’s labels and inner circle, however, nobody knew that a couple months later, they would drop the bombshell that a second Converge album would smash into an unsuspecting 2026. Drawn from the same sessions, Hum Of Hurt retains the high impact fury of its immediate predecessor, while its release reinforces the idea that this is a group of people determined to do things their own way.
“We just found a lot of positives to the idea of doing two albums in one year, especially as a surprise,” enthuses guitarist Kurt Ballou. “We were working on this material for a long time, all kinds of things slowed us down. But the love between each other and the love of our music is all still there.”
Alongside Converge, which he co-founded with vocalist Jacob Bannon back in 1990, Kurt has established a parallel career as one of the underground’s most in-demand producers, recording albums for a staggering number of heavy-hitters at his self-built God City Studio in Salem, Massachusetts. There’s even a sideline in making guitars and pedals under the God City Instruments banner. The throughline linking all these endeavours is one of integrity – Converge remain a beacon for hardcore’s ethics of community and respect.
“We value our human connections, with our fans and the people in our lives, and we value kindness and autonomy,” asserts Kurt. “That stuff is more valuable to us than money and other metrics of success.”
Wise words – and here are more of the things that he’s learned in a life lived at high volume…
“I think it was comedy that first got me into metal and punk. Pre-teen boys tend to have that desire for chaos and destruction, and anti-social behaviour, whether they’re doing it themselves or observing it. It’s like the next evolution beyond smashing your (toy) trucks together. I went from that to fart jokes to ‘I saw your mommy and your mommy’s dead’ by Suicidal Tendencies. I got into the stuff that The Dead Milkmen or The Meatmen were doing, maybe S.O.D. too, and I guess the Sex Pistols to a degree. But yeah, my initial interest generally came from that destructive, chaotic boy energy, which metal fits so well. My son right now is nine and he just found out what 666 means, and I’m like ‘This is awesome!’”
“When Converge were starting out, we had no expectation that we could continue doing this for so long. For the bands that I think of being the founding fathers of the stuff we do, Rorschach and Born Against, the scene just wasn’t big enough to support them to do their bands full-time. Throughout the ‘90s there were very few pro ‘core bands – maybe Sick Of It All, Napalm Death, Melvins and Neurosis. Once the 2000s came along, the whole thing just exploded. I think the timing of Converge releasing Jane Doe in 2001 meant we got the benefit of there being a global internet community for our type of music. But also, we didn’t yet have the downside of it being a completely saturated scene, and didn’t have the downside of streaming. People still bought records, basically. So we had hype from the internet, but we didn’t lose all our sales to it.”
“Touring was definitely different in the ‘90s, and I miss the way getting to play with different bands every night invigorated you. It was also great for local scene-building to have a different bill in every town. I think it made for great shows too, 'cause the local supports and their friends would be so pumped to get to play a show with their favourite band. I think it was really good for the scene in general, for the touring bands and the local bands to have an opportunity to interact with each other.”
“General male stubbornness probably led me to veganism! I was dating this woman who encouraged me to become vegetarian. I was heartbroken when we broke up, and then I went to a party and saw her doing jello shots. I was like, ‘That’s not even vegetarian! I’m gonna be a better vegetarian than you, I’ll show you!’ But the more time I spent away from eating animal products, the more disgusted I was with the idea of consuming them. The label of vegan is not something I have a really super-strong allegiance to, but it is a shorthand to communicate my catering requirements at a festival! I’ve definitely moved away from calling myself straight edge or any other benevolent labels that people put on themselves, to focus more on the values behind those labels.”
“I don’t want to record a whole bunch of bands that sound like Converge, that’s not interesting to me. I like a lot of (different) styles of music, and I want as much variety as I can. The idea of being pigeonholed in one genre sounds terrible. I’d rather be a jack of all trades than a master of one. Even if I’m not the best at anything, it’s a more interesting life. My dream client would be ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic. That would be the greatest thing in the world for me. My son and I are big fans, the music we listen to most in my house is Weird Al, Kidz Bop and, at Christmas, Twisted Sister’s A Twisted Christmas. We’re not listening to a lot of early 2000s metallic hardcore!”
“I’m thankful that I have an opportunity to keep doing it, to have made music with my friends for so many years. And I’m thankful that it hasn’t been the same thing over and over again, that we can do collaborative stuff, whether it’s the Bloodmoon record or other things. Axe To Fall has a bunch of guest appearances on it and that’s one of my favourite releases. We can do an impromptu outdoor show on a sidewalk in Austin, Texas, and then we can play a seated theatre in Vienna or somewhere. We can do all of these different things as a band, and I love the diversity of that journey we’ve had together.”
“The reason for any of the success that I’ve had in music, whether it’s with Converge, or with production, or with God City Instruments, all of that has been because I’m making a thing that feels true to me. No part of me is anticipating ‘What do the people want?’ It’s all about ‘What do I want?’ And that sounds selfish, but I think it’s also genuine. I think probably more than anything, people want authenticity from the musicians that they listen to and the artists that they follow. I think to try to anticipate what people might want is a recipe for failure. I accept that what a lot of fans want from Converge is not Bloodmoon, and that’s okay, but I want that. I wanna explore that side of my musical personality with my friends.”
“It’s been fun seeing new generations discover Converge. One thing I think is interesting about music is that when you’re discovering something that is being made in that moment, your experience is different than when you’re first hearing something that was made in the past. Like most first-wave punks hated Led Zeppelin, or The Eagles, or Fleetwood Mac – but that shit rocks! A version of that happens with every generation, where you can look to the past for music that you hadn’t heard before, and you can just take it at face value. You don’t have to care about any of the other context that influences how we feel about music. So it’s been cool to see younger fans of ours react to the new songs, and maybe like different ones to the fans that are our age.”
“It was super fun to surprise people with a second Converge record this year. What happened was, there was a final sprint during the last round of writing where a lot more stuff got finished than we were expecting. We had to decide what to do with all this material. Nobody has the patience for a double album, the way that people listen to music now. They’re not gonna be able to absorb all these songs. And we really felt great about them, so we wanted every song to have the best chance it had to be heard.”
“It’s not really for me to say what my legacy will be. I’m happy to be a part of a really vibrant, longstanding music culture, and to be even a small contributor to that is a good feeling. I think everyone is looking for ways to cheat death by being remembered in some way, whether that’s through your relationships, or through your children, or through the work that you leave behind. I hope that our work stands up for a long period of time, so that we can cheat death for a little while.”
Hum Of Hurt is released on June 5 via Deathwish/Epitaph. Catch Converge live at Outbreak Fest on June 27.
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