Review Fix Exclusive: Attik Door’s Tim Shrayber Talks ‘Never in Agreement’

Review Fix chats with Attik Door’s Tim Shrayber, who discusses the band’s new album, “Never in Agreement.”

With sound easily described as a Mad Scientist’s concoction of awesome alternative rock- part DeVinyls, with some Disturbed, a nice-sized chunk of No Doubt and a side of Fly Leaf, as well as some Red Hot Chili Peppers, Attik Door have a sound that changes from song to song, but it’s always catchy.

Because of that, Attik Door will immediately catch your ears.

Review Fix: How did the band come together?

Tim Shrayber: The band was founded by Alex Shrayber and the former drummer Steve Shames. They played together in another project prior to that, so when it dismantled, they decided to form a new band. They invited Margarita, who played bass with them in the previous project, then Tim, who played at friends’ band. During that time, there was another vocalist in the band, however, due to conflict of creative interests and personalities, she was replaced by Liana. At that point, Attik Door was formed in its first functional lineup.

Review Fix: What are the band’s influences and how do they incorporate themselves into your sound?

Shrayber: The influences of the band vary quite a bit, since most of the members come from different backgrounds. Some of us grew up listening to hip-hop and R&B while others did so with hard rock and thrash metal, with a dose of punk rock, funk and nu metal thrown in the mix. The broad range of influences shows in variations of our music style, from metal-inspired songs like ‘Cyber World’ and ‘Bleed’, to hard rock-themed songs like ‘California’ and ‘Snorting Headlines’, punk rock overtones in ‘Moody’ and bits of disco in ‘Kosmos’.

Review Fix: What’s the band’s creative process like?

Shrayber:Everyone contributes to writing music. It can happen during a rehearsal jam, but usually everyone writes their material separately, polishes it and presents it to the rest of the band. If the sketch catches on with the rest of the band, then people begin building on top of it. On the other hand, writing lyrics is exclusively Margarita’s domain.

Review Fix: How was “Bleed” written? Is there a story behind it?

Shrayber: We really went outside our comfort zone with Bleed as it was our first experiment with rap. Liana did some collaborations with rap artists in St Petersburg so we knew she had it in her, we just never tried it within the group. When Liana was trying out the different vocal lines afterwards, rapping was the only version that sounded aggressive enough to fit the music. The lyrics were written overnight by Margarita after the Elliot Rodger mass killings in Santa Barbara, California, going along with Alex’s original working title “Bleed.”

Review Fix: What song do you think is most indicative of what the band stands for musically?

Shrayber: There probably isn’t one. The songs we play come from different personalities and reflect different aspects of the band members’ lives. Some songs deal with politics, others tackle social issues, while some songs describe interactions of personalities. Every lyrical theme and melody is precious in its own way.

Review Fix: What do you think makes this album special?

Shrayber: It is our first full-length album. Also, unlike with our debut EP, we had almost a year to come up with songs, so there was a lot of time for pre-production work. We had a great opportunity to polish melodies and song compositions, as well as experiment with styles, as we did in the chorus to ‘Kosmos’ or intro to ‘Time’. Overall, the amount of thought and effort that was put into writing the songs for this album is incomparably larger than that of the debut EP.

Review Fix: What have you learned about yourselves through this album?

Shrayber: We realized that we can work in more musical styles than any of us ever suspected. None of us expected that we would come up with songs like Kosmos, Moody or California, but it happened very naturally, much to everyone’s surprise.

Review Fix: How do you want it to be remembered?

Shrayber: As a great rock band from San Francisco.

Review Fix: What are your goals as a band for 2015?

Shrayber: We would like to play more in California, especially in Sacramento and Los Angeles. If things go especially well, we might make it to neighboring states.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Shrayber: Lots and lots of hard work.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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