“We’ve had people hanging off the rafters,” says drummer Alex Klein. “We haven’t had any stage-divers, but we welcome it.”
“Yeah, me and Jake go a little crazy up there," Milligan adds. "Sometimes we’re hitting each other."
Milligan's nine-year-old daughter, Paige, also regularly makes appearances during Ransom Note sets when she’s not holding down the merch table. “She’s cool as shit. She’s been doing music with me from the beginning. We have one song where 99 percent of the time, she’ll actually take over the second vocal part, so she’ll get up on stage and scream,” says Milligan, ever a proud dad. “Honestly, she's got a better scream than I do.”
“She’s better than that kid who did the Spiritbox cover on America’s Got Talent," Rogers assures.
“Yeah, people really love it,” Milligan continues. “You don’t see a lot of kids screaming.”
People are really loving whatever Ransom Note does, too. Since forming in 2023, the group has released a handful of singles, including the latest, “Claustrophobic,” this month. “It’s our heaviest one yet,” Milligan says.
And that’s saying something, since Ransom Note sonically settles somewhere between beatdown hardcore and deathcore, in part because of Castillo’s aggressive vocal attack.
“I just like talking about brutal stuff,” he says with a shrug.
Catch the Ransom Note crew, including the pint-sized singer who packs a big punch, on Thursday, August 29, at Lost Lake Lounge. Defected, Skin Dancer and SLUFF are also on the local bill.
Paige Milligan, the nine-year-old daughter of Ransom Note vocalist Terek, already knows how to hold it down on a mic.
Courtesy Ransom Note
Rogers and bassist Bailey Johnson officially rounded out the lineup earlier this year. Rogers, who is a meat-and-potatoes metalhead, recalls that Ransom Note’s early releases — particularly “Forced Isolation,” featuring Andrew Carey and Alex Varian of Evergreen Terrace — were enough to get him interested when the band put out an online call for a bassist. But the early “Claustrophobic” mix is what really sold him on joining Ransom Note.
“When I put it up on my studio monitors, it kind of blew my dick off,” he quips. “I was like, ‘Damn, this is the shit, right here.’”
A guitarist by trade, Rogers became the second riff-dealer shortly before Johnson, who'd only played in cover bands up until that point, joined. “I wanted to get situated with something original and more modern-sounding,” Johnson explains. “Also, because it sounds brutal and awesome, and Ransom Note is a pretty badass name, to be honest.”
That name wasn’t the first choice, however: The group originally called itself Misfortune prior to publicly putting out any material. With the new tag in tow, the members hit the ground running.
“We wanted to focus on singles and playing fun, local shows,” says Milligan, who knew Castillo from working together at Summit and the Marquis Theater.
Ransom Note’s definition of “fun” includes rowdy mosh pits, Terrones is sure to add.
“Just expect a bit of violence in the pit,” he says. “That’s always something that I hope to see, and I haven’t been disappointed at any of our shows.”
“It’s a violent, rough crowd, and that’s why I’m here,” Rogers adds.
Plus, with such a heavy-hitting squad now, new music is in the works, including tunes incorporating more layered vocals, according to Milligan, who handles the cleaner parts and pens a majority of the lyrics.
“It’s a good contrast. It’s different. You don’t see a lot of it,” he says of the two-vocalist setup. “I pull the overall theme of the song, then Jake puts some of the meaner imagery behind it.”
As far as what inspires his hardcore psalms, “a lot of it is dealing with internalized depression and jealously and shit like that,” he continues. “I know a lot of people feel that way, so I try to keep my lyrics kind of general to just that overall feeling of frustration that tends to get to you.”
But Ransom Note doesn’t have too much to be frustrated about, especially for a band that hasn’t been at it for a full year yet.
“We’re actually in a pretty cool spot right now,” Milligan admits.
It helps that Ransom Note recently signed with PinUp Artist Management and Blood Blast Distribution, a subsidiary of Nuclear Blast Records. "Now we have an actual distributor instead of just me doing it,” Milligan says.
So it’s all coming together quite nicely, the bandmates agree, and all part of Ransom Note’s main mission to create the most punishing, unapologetic extreme music possible. They know that’s not an easy task in such a ferocious local scene. But that’s ultimately the payoff the members are after, so stay tuned.
“We’re taking bigger steps to solidify our sound as well,” Klein says. “It’s completely unique. Our pre-breakdown vocals are unique; the anticipating shock value for the breakdown, as well.”
Ransom Note, with Defected, Skin Dancer and SLUFF, 7 p.m. Thursday, August 29, Lost Lake Lounge, 3602 East Colfax Avenue. Tickets are $20-$25.
