3rd Strike
Photo: Hollywood Records

Rock and roll has led to the ruin of many formerly sober folk. Not so for 3rd Strike, a California rap-metal band who credit music for saving them from drugs and nihilism.

Vocalist Jim Korthe said he was a gun-toting L.A. gangbanger who had done stints in jail for armed robbery and weapons possession. Guitarist Erik Carlsson was a chronic drug abuser whose second home was rehab, and bassist Gabe Hammersmith also suffered with substance abuse problems.

"At the point right before I joined [the group], I was really going in the wrong direction," admitted Carlsson from his record label's lounge a couple of hours before the band's first New York City performance. "I'm just glad I hooked up with the band at the time I did. It's made me do a 180 in my life. I think it's just been a positive force for everyone to stay on the right track."

The band's debut album, Lost Angel, which comes out May 14, chronicles the members' growing pains with showers of volcanic guitars, piledriving beats and vocals that seesaw between pugilistic rap and nasal, melodic wailing. While Korthe's lyrics aren't directly about wilding and busting caps, songs like "Barrio Raid," "Strung Out" and "Redemption" obliquely address the singer's violent and painful struggles. The first single from the disc, "No Light," builds from a buzzing lament to a cathartic scorcher, loosely addressing a particularly painful moment.

"It's about feeling hopeless and depressed," Korthe revealed. "I had gone to visit the grave of one of my homeboys who had passed away, and the emotions just poured out when I was writing this song. He was killed by a rival gang member who was a Desert Storm veteran who came home from the war and went on a shooting spree. The night before it happened, my friend put his arm around me, kissed me on the cheek, and said, 'You know what? We're never gonna die.' Next day, he was dead."

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The video for "No Light" was shot in February by "Ultimate-X IMAX" director Bruce Hendricks in Temecula and the L.A. desert. Hendricks, who specializes in filming extreme motocross, wanted to correlate images of Metal Mulisha daredevil cyclists leaping high into the air with the band's style of propulsive rock.

"The Metal Mulisha are the ballsiest guys I've ever met," Carlsson said. "One of them crashed during the middle of the shoot and ruptured his spleen and broke his ribs and had to go to the hospital. These guys are no joke when it comes to entertaining."

3rd Strike will continue their affiliation with extreme sports in their quest for an eclectic audience. Thanks to the band's label, Hollywood Records — whose parent company also owns ESPN — "No Light," "Redemption" and a cover of Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" will be featured in the "Ultimate-X IMAX" movie soundtrack.

"We did 'Paranoid' with DJ Muggs of Cypress Hill," Korthe said. "It was originally supposed to be the title track, but it ended up not being that. It's still in the movie, though."

Korthe's disappointment at not having the lead cut was palpable, not because he wants to gobble up the limelight, but because Black Sabbath's Ozzy Osbourne was such a major influence when he was a kid.

"The first time I knew I wanted to do music was when I heard [Ozzy's first solo album] Blizzard of Ozz," the singer said. "My sister was a punk rocker and her friend got the album somehow and went, 'I hate this. Here.' And I played it over and over and sang with it. When I sing high, I still sound a lot like Ozzy. He changed my life."

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3rd Strike Live From Ozzfest 07.19.02

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