Culture
Heavy music with a smirk: Jeremy DePoyster reflects on 20 years of The Devil Wears Prada
By: Bradley Cunningham
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MANSFIELD, Ohio (WOUB) – Roaring from Dayton, Ohio, The Devil Wears Prada have evolved, embraced the humor in it all, and kept things heavy–for nearly 20 years.
Ahead of an upcoming performance at the Inkcarceration Music Festival, longtime vocalist, guitarist, and co-founding member Jeremy DePoyster spoke with WOUB’s Bradley Cunningham.
Find a transcript of their conversation, edited for length and clarity, below.
BRADLEY CUNNINGHAM: Around 2006, the band was a mainstay at Kettering’s The Attic. You once joked that if someone visited your hometown, they would think there’s no way a cool band could come out of there. Looking back, how do you feel now? How did growing up in Dayton in the Midwest music scene shape TDWP?
DEPOYSTER: I still feel the same way. My fiancée is from Portland, and I took her through Englewood, Ohio, where I’m from originally, and she was like, ‘What is this place, man?’ We had a cool scene, though. That was the thing about it. We were like a bunch of young kids, and everybody kind of played in bands, we basically just tried to carve out our own scene locally.
Later this month, the band returns to Ohio to perform at the Inkcarceration Music & Tattoo Festival in Mansfield. Does it feel like a homecoming? Anything special planned for it?
DEPOYSTER: It absolutely feels like a homecoming. I think for bands like us and Beartooth, it’s really cool to be playing at these massive festivals, and that we kind of dreamed of doing as kids. As far as something special, I don’t know. I keep doing really weird stuff at festivals, like at the last festival we played in Ohio, I had like 100 people throw Zyns at me. Maybe I’ll have to think of something goofy to do.
As you approach the 20-year mark as a band, what do you think is the most rewarding for the Devil Wears Prada today?
DEPOYSTER: I’m proud of everything we’ve done, but I think the coolest thing is that I’ve been in this band with Mike Hranica, our other singer, since we were literally children in high school. The fact that we’ve not only been able to maintain a relationship together in the band but be real-life friends, is really awesome. We just kind of look at each other sometimes as we’re about to go play, and we’re like, ‘I can’t believe we’re still doing this.’
The band recently released a new single, For You, along with a music video. The track feels like a return to your synth-laced roots—echoing early Depeche Mode influences—while also sounding heavier, more melodic, and more weathered. Was this mix of eras a conscious choice, or did it emerge naturally during the writing process? And how did you approach balancing experimentation with staying true to your sound?
DEPOYSTER: There’s just been kind of like an emo revival of sorts going on. Like we’ve played that When We Were Young Festival with My Chemical Romance and a lot of bands like that. I think you’re just kind of thinking all the time like, oh, that stuff is like really cool and emotional, and you get into your mid-30s, and it’s like you’re just trying to reckon with all. You’re thinking about when you’re a teenager. You’re thinking about all the stuff you’re going through now.
I think For You, in particular, started out a love song. I was trying to write to my partner, and then we kind of sabotaged it into like a love story gone wrong, and we tried to make the music reflect that.
Have you challenged yourself to write something upbeat just for the fun of it? Or do you feel like what you’re doing is just simply part of The Devil Wears Prada’s DNA?
DEPOYSTER: We have some songs on the new record that are upbeat musically. I just thought it’d be funny if we took those and made them the most depressing songs on the record, just a tongue-in-cheek kind of thing, but I think it’s just by the time you go to write a pen and paper, Mike and myself, we just, for whatever reason, the dark thoughts just come out. We’re not unhappy people in general, but everyone has dark emotions, and for some reason, they just come out when you’re trying to write music. It’s a release.
The video for For You stands out visually with its surreal, pink-hued aesthetic—a striking contrast to the darker, more brooding look of past videos. Visually, what do those elements—like the pink tones and the dancer—represent to you? And what kind of emotional response are you hoping to evoke from the audience?
DEPOYSTER: We’ve been playing with this floral theme for a reason as we gear up towards our next cycle. If I say exactly what it means, I’ll give too much away. This video is like seeing things that are so beautiful, but they’re so obviously artificial–you can tell it’s a set. It almost looks like a Pee-Wee Herman set, you know what I mean? Everything’s artificial, everything’s made-up, but it can still be beautiful in that way.
Is there anything you do to get into that headspace to create? And does that differ between recording a song versus playing it live?
DEPOYSTER: I don’t really party in the studio at all, and I party pretty hard when I’m playing concerts, so I guess that would be a huge difference. We kind of power through a bunch of beers before a gig. When you’re in the studio, that’ll just get in your way.
If you could build a “metal Frankenstein” supergroup, who would be in it?
DEPOYSTER: Gary Holt (Slayer/Exodus) on guitar, Jay Weinberg (Slipknot/Suicidal Tendencies) on drums, Bring Me the Horizon’s Oli Sykes on vocals, and Andy Trick (formerly of TDWP) on bass. I’d just be the manager; I’d just watch.