Phil Labonte Comments on the Death of Oli Herbert and the Future of All That Remains
All That Remains guitarist Phil Labonte has given his first interview since the death of guitarist Oli Herbert last month.
Herbert, 44, reportedly drowned in a pond near his home. The guitarist’s widow, Beth, says that unprescribed anti-depressants and a sleep aid were found in his system.
Now, in a new interview with Detroit’s WRIF, Labonte has shared his reaction to the sudden and premature passing of his longtime collaborator:
“I was shocked. He was 44 years old, and he wasn’t really a big partier. He would go hang out with people and stuff, but he didn’t really do a lot of drinking… He didn’t do drugs, he didn’t really drink a lot. He would smoke pot once in a while, but that was the extent of it. And so, yeah, it was a big shock. And we’re still processing it and trying to figure out how it is that we move forward and what that means and stuff. So… it sucks.”
Labonte also commented on the band’s decision to persevere despite Herbert’s death, with Jason Richardson (Born of Osiris, All Shall Perish, Chelsea Grin) filling in on ATR’s upcoming European tour with Sevendust:
“We’re gonna continue on. The band is not gonna end. It’s gonna be different and it’s gonna be weird. We’ve got someone that’s filling in for this European trip that we’ve got coming up at the end of the month.
“And he is the guy that Oli would have wanted to fill in, to replace him. And then we’ll start looking for a full-time replacement, I assume, shortly. ‘Cause we’ve got stuff that we wanna do next year.
“We don’t wanna let the [new] record be pushed aside. Oli would have wanted us to play the songs. He was excited about the way the record sounded and he was excited about a lot of the stuff on it, so he wouldn’t want us to stop.
“So we’ve just gotta figure out what that actually looks like and how we do that.”
Victim of the New Disease, All That Remains’ new album — and, sadly, probably their last with Herbert — is out now. Their tour dates with Sevendust are as follows:
12/1 — Southampton, UK —Engine Rooms
12/2 — London, UK — Electric Brixton
12/4 — Manchester, UK — Academy 2
12/5 — Glasgow, UK — Garage
12/6 — Nottingham, UK — Rock City
12/7 — Bristol, UK — Swx
12/9 — Paris, FR — Glazart
12/10 — Cologne, DE — Luxor
12/11 — Berlin, DE — Columbia Theater
12/13 — Prague, CZ — Meet Factory
12/14 — Wroclaw, PL — Firlej
12/15 — Vienna, AT — Flex
12/17 — Munich, DE — Backstage Halle
12/18 — Aarau, CH — Kiff
12/19 — Amsterdam, NL — Melweg Oz
[via The PRP]
