Post by Heather on Mar 27, 2011 10:57:26 GMT -5
Bombshellzine Interview with Sum41
Well, how are you guys doing? Enjoying some time off after the festival yesterday?
Steve: Day off? (laughs)
Not really?
Deryck: There’s no time off!
Well, what has the agenda been like since you finished playing your set yesterday?
Cone: We just watched a few other bands for the rest of the day and that was it!
Steve: We did some interviews and watched some bands.
Did you get a chance to wander around the city at all?
Cone: Yeah, we’ve been here a few times so we know are way around which is good!
Steve: We’ve just been hanging around with the other bands in the city. It’s been awesome.
So far you’ve played the two festival dates; Brisbane on the Saturday and Sydney yesterday. What have been some of the standout moments so far just two dates in?
Deryck: The size of the crowds that come over and see us! You can never really expect how many people are going to come and watch because there are so many different stages and so many different bands. Both shows have been, well, the size of however many people can fit into the space!
Steve: On Saturday we were playing in like this camping area and there were people on the outside trying to listen to us playing. It must have been pretty difficult for them to hear but they were standing there anyway.
The reports coming back from your set yesterday were massive! It looks like you had one of the biggest crowds on the stage for the day. How do you feel about having such a massive crowd coming out after a little bit of a break from the industry?
Cone: It’s nice to know that kids still like us, to hear new stuff and just want to come and see us play.
Steve: I mean, something that has been happening since we started touring – and we’ve been on the road for a while now and the album still isn’t even out yet – we’re playing these shows all over the world have been amazing. They’ve been so big! They’re been bigger than we ever would have expected! I didn’t even know what to expect. Australia is wonderful. It’s been really well.
Deryck: It’s actually been like that everywhere around the world. Our shows are selling out faster and are bigger than ever!
Steve: And the album isn’t even out yet!
Do you think that’s a sign of the massive anticipation surrounding everything getting moving again or do you think that it’s always been the case? That these fans have always been there eagerly awaiting your return.
Deryck: It’s constantly getting bigger and better for some reason. We don’t know why. We haven’t tried to do anything different, it just happened.
Cone: it’s just been us building a fan base for 11 years, so it shows. We’ve done our touring and people like it!
You’ve got a couple of sideshows coming up as well. You have the show in Sydney tomorrow night and one in Melbourne on Wednesday night. What are you expecting from these shows as opposed to the festival?
Steve: Well we deliver the same show as far as our energy and enthusiasm goes. We don’t totally scale down on our level if the show is smaller. I mean, the only difference is the amount of people. I mean, we’ll play a bit longer… that might be the only difference! As far as the energy, it’s going to be crazy in a smaller venue or at a festival. It’s sort of the same wherever we play. The reaction is always the same, it’s just the size of the crowd that’s different.
As you mentioned, you guys have been around for about 11 years now. During that time you’ve released some killer records. How do you go about deciding what to include on a festival set list? There are going to be so many songs in there that would have been either fan favorites or person favorites that you would have to omit!
Cone: On as festival set like that it’s mostly past singles and songs that everyone is going to know. At our own shows we’ll play some stuff like album tracks and some cover songs here and there, so that’s kind of the only difference. At the smaller shows there are going to be more hardcore fans, they are he ones that come and they’ll probably know the album tracks anyway!
Have you been playing much of the new album live?
Steve: We’ve been playing the new single yesterday and we’ll play a couple of new ones. The album isn’t out yet so we won’t play too many more because people won’t know any of them yet.
How have people been reacting? The single has been on the net for a little while so I assume that the majority of the crowd would be singing along to it.
Steve: Well, heaps of people sing along to every word, so that’s cool! The reaction is great! I think that people are happy with it and the way that it sounds. We’re happy with the way that it’s all turned out.
The album is out on March 25th. How are you guys feeling about the songs on the record? Are you totally happy with how it’s all turned out?
Deryck: We just can’t wait for people to hear it. That’s the exciting part.
Steve: I mean, it’s been ready for a few months now, it’s just been that the label has been a bit delayed and thinking about when they wanted to put it out. We’ve shown a few people these new songs and we know that our fans are really going to like it. There’s no point in really playing stuff that nobody knows, so they’re going to have wait!
It’s been a little bit of time since “Underclass Hero” was released. Did you find that there was much pressure surrounding the band to deliver something special after the time that you took off?
Deryck: We’ve never thought about any of that at all. More then ever, we just had to record songs here and there. We never had a deadline, we never thought about what people were going to think about it, we don’t even care what people are going to think about it. We’re just having fun and just making music. I think that helped the record.
Cone: There’s always anticipation from your fans base though, but that’s a good thing. If you didn’t have that then there must be something wrong. We just kind of took our time. Deryck was writing all the time and there was always these new songs coming out, so we just recorded sporadically at times.
Deryck: It was really random. There was just no thought. There were a few discussions that we had which would start off by me saying “Ok, so I wrote a song in ten minutes”, so we’ve get together and record just one song. We didn’t really care about it.
Steve: We also didn’t really know that we were doing an album until the album came to us. At first we were just thinking of doing an EP or just recording some songs for fun. One day we sort of just realized that we were ¾ of the way through what could be an album. It just sort of happened whereas in the past it hasn’t been the case. I mean, we haven’t really been like “Oh, this is going to happen here and this is going to happen there”, but this way was way more natural.
Deryck: It was also good to just record the songs when they came out because it was over a three or four year period, so it never really felt like we were starting the record. It was just like we were recording a song and just collecting the music all the time. Then we went and realized that we had done an album!
Was that more of a relaxing process? Not having strict deadlines to work with?
Deryck: It was definitely more relaxing! We never spoke to the label really. We never had any discussions about anything. It was just kind of hap-hazard here and there. Really random.
You mentioned that there was a delay due to the label. Is that a bit frustrating? Having something that’s ready to be released but it’s being held back for marketing purposes?
Deryck: Yeah, like Steve said we’ve been done for a while! It’s just that they have to figure it out.
Cone: They had to figure out and co-ordinate the perfect time for us to release it.
Do you guys have any favorite tracks from the new album yet?
Deryck: I don’t really, for me. I like the whole thing from start to finish. I like them all equally.
Steve: The album is actually an album. If one song was missing it, for whatever reason would feel like it was lacking something. I mean, some songs stand out more than others but it’s not like a single based album. It’s not like “These are the three songs and the rest are filler”. Everything blends together to make this whole thing.
Deryck: Which is weird because it shouldn’t have.
Steve: Yeah!
Deryck: It was done very sporadically and there was no thought process to it. It shouldn’t have been as cohesive as it is.
When you did eventually approach the record label and told them that you had this album, did they put any pressure on you to produce a track that couple be a radio single or something that you couple market the album around?
Deryck: Well, the thing with us and this record is that we just don’t care about radio play or the single kind of thing. It just didn’t matter to us. They probably want a single but we just kind of blocked everybody out and did our own thing. We didn’t really care about anything. We just wanted to make a good record. If the radio hated it, we don’t care! We just wanted it to be good.
And have your fans enjoy it!
Deryck: Yeah, the 40,000 people coming to see us! Once we realized that we had that freedom, it became really fun and easy to just live life and make music. We’d go on tours and they’d sell out fucking fast!
You’ve said that with this album you had a lot to say and a lot to prove. It’s also a heavier sounding record. What lead to this direction?
Deryck: These are the sorts of things that we never really think about when we sit down to write songs. You don’t think about it until you get asked! I think that what we can really do and is just live our lives and make music, and not really think about it.
Cone: we never really thought about it like we had to make a mature album or anything, it was just natural. It was just like whatever came out was it!
Steve: I don’t think that it’s like we’ve been writing immature music for years either. I mean, ‘Still Waiting” which was like ten years ago is not an immature sounding song! I think it’s just the perception in the press. We don’t really think about it. I think that what has happened is that we’ve become better as musicians and the song writing has become much better and that’s I guess what you’d call maturity!
Deryck: I mean, the way that we approach writing songs and music is like, I write a song, send it to everybody and say “Hey, we need to record this song, and what do you want to do for dinner tonight?”. There’s no real thought in anything.
Has there been much feedback so far from your fans in terms of the new material?
Steve: One of the things that we did was put some songs on YouTube and all of the fucking messages or whatever they’re called were all positive!
Cone: It’s a pretty good indication of what they thought.
Steve: It shows that the kids are still interested. It’s hard to gauge. I think that our fans will like this. I think that there are songs on the album that they’ll REALLY like. It’s not like they’re singles though. We have one song called “Over My Head, Better Off Dead” which was never a single. It was like the forth song that we put on the internet but it’s became a fan favorite. People know every word! Every time that we play people want us to play it, so we play it. People go crazy for it. Even at festivals we play it and people love it. This song wasn’t a single and this one feels like it’s a single chosen by the fans. This album is full of that. It won’t be the one that the label picks that become the favorites, the kids pick it.
Do you think that after the Soundwave festival is done and dusted that you’re going to be able to make it back down here and play some headlining shows in support of the new record?
Steve: Oh, yeah! We’re definitely going to come back. This is just the beginning. It’s great way for us to start, to come back to Australia after being away for a few years and playing enormous festivals! Then we’ll come back and do our own tours for sure.
Just one most question for you today, what are you expectations for the rest of your time here in Australia?
Deryck: We’d like to see Iron Maiden.
Steve: I’d like to see Iron Maiden and Pennywise who are friends of ours.
Cone: I’d like to see Social D. There are tones of good bands, we just haven’t had a chance to see many yet.
Steve: It’s just the first couple of days, we’re still jetlagged and stuff. I was everywhere yesterday watching bands, but I was too drunk to remember anything so I’m going to have to go and watch all of those bands over again!
Cone: It’s more relaxing than Warped. You get to hang out in hotel every day!
Steve: Yeah, but you have to do press all-day and fly to different cities!
Well, how are you guys doing? Enjoying some time off after the festival yesterday?
Steve: Day off? (laughs)
Not really?
Deryck: There’s no time off!
Well, what has the agenda been like since you finished playing your set yesterday?
Cone: We just watched a few other bands for the rest of the day and that was it!
Steve: We did some interviews and watched some bands.
Did you get a chance to wander around the city at all?
Cone: Yeah, we’ve been here a few times so we know are way around which is good!
Steve: We’ve just been hanging around with the other bands in the city. It’s been awesome.
So far you’ve played the two festival dates; Brisbane on the Saturday and Sydney yesterday. What have been some of the standout moments so far just two dates in?
Deryck: The size of the crowds that come over and see us! You can never really expect how many people are going to come and watch because there are so many different stages and so many different bands. Both shows have been, well, the size of however many people can fit into the space!
Steve: On Saturday we were playing in like this camping area and there were people on the outside trying to listen to us playing. It must have been pretty difficult for them to hear but they were standing there anyway.
The reports coming back from your set yesterday were massive! It looks like you had one of the biggest crowds on the stage for the day. How do you feel about having such a massive crowd coming out after a little bit of a break from the industry?
Cone: It’s nice to know that kids still like us, to hear new stuff and just want to come and see us play.
Steve: I mean, something that has been happening since we started touring – and we’ve been on the road for a while now and the album still isn’t even out yet – we’re playing these shows all over the world have been amazing. They’ve been so big! They’re been bigger than we ever would have expected! I didn’t even know what to expect. Australia is wonderful. It’s been really well.
Deryck: It’s actually been like that everywhere around the world. Our shows are selling out faster and are bigger than ever!
Steve: And the album isn’t even out yet!
Do you think that’s a sign of the massive anticipation surrounding everything getting moving again or do you think that it’s always been the case? That these fans have always been there eagerly awaiting your return.
Deryck: It’s constantly getting bigger and better for some reason. We don’t know why. We haven’t tried to do anything different, it just happened.
Cone: it’s just been us building a fan base for 11 years, so it shows. We’ve done our touring and people like it!
You’ve got a couple of sideshows coming up as well. You have the show in Sydney tomorrow night and one in Melbourne on Wednesday night. What are you expecting from these shows as opposed to the festival?
Steve: Well we deliver the same show as far as our energy and enthusiasm goes. We don’t totally scale down on our level if the show is smaller. I mean, the only difference is the amount of people. I mean, we’ll play a bit longer… that might be the only difference! As far as the energy, it’s going to be crazy in a smaller venue or at a festival. It’s sort of the same wherever we play. The reaction is always the same, it’s just the size of the crowd that’s different.
As you mentioned, you guys have been around for about 11 years now. During that time you’ve released some killer records. How do you go about deciding what to include on a festival set list? There are going to be so many songs in there that would have been either fan favorites or person favorites that you would have to omit!
Cone: On as festival set like that it’s mostly past singles and songs that everyone is going to know. At our own shows we’ll play some stuff like album tracks and some cover songs here and there, so that’s kind of the only difference. At the smaller shows there are going to be more hardcore fans, they are he ones that come and they’ll probably know the album tracks anyway!
Have you been playing much of the new album live?
Steve: We’ve been playing the new single yesterday and we’ll play a couple of new ones. The album isn’t out yet so we won’t play too many more because people won’t know any of them yet.
How have people been reacting? The single has been on the net for a little while so I assume that the majority of the crowd would be singing along to it.
Steve: Well, heaps of people sing along to every word, so that’s cool! The reaction is great! I think that people are happy with it and the way that it sounds. We’re happy with the way that it’s all turned out.
The album is out on March 25th. How are you guys feeling about the songs on the record? Are you totally happy with how it’s all turned out?
Deryck: We just can’t wait for people to hear it. That’s the exciting part.
Steve: I mean, it’s been ready for a few months now, it’s just been that the label has been a bit delayed and thinking about when they wanted to put it out. We’ve shown a few people these new songs and we know that our fans are really going to like it. There’s no point in really playing stuff that nobody knows, so they’re going to have wait!
It’s been a little bit of time since “Underclass Hero” was released. Did you find that there was much pressure surrounding the band to deliver something special after the time that you took off?
Deryck: We’ve never thought about any of that at all. More then ever, we just had to record songs here and there. We never had a deadline, we never thought about what people were going to think about it, we don’t even care what people are going to think about it. We’re just having fun and just making music. I think that helped the record.
Cone: There’s always anticipation from your fans base though, but that’s a good thing. If you didn’t have that then there must be something wrong. We just kind of took our time. Deryck was writing all the time and there was always these new songs coming out, so we just recorded sporadically at times.
Deryck: It was really random. There was just no thought. There were a few discussions that we had which would start off by me saying “Ok, so I wrote a song in ten minutes”, so we’ve get together and record just one song. We didn’t really care about it.
Steve: We also didn’t really know that we were doing an album until the album came to us. At first we were just thinking of doing an EP or just recording some songs for fun. One day we sort of just realized that we were ¾ of the way through what could be an album. It just sort of happened whereas in the past it hasn’t been the case. I mean, we haven’t really been like “Oh, this is going to happen here and this is going to happen there”, but this way was way more natural.
Deryck: It was also good to just record the songs when they came out because it was over a three or four year period, so it never really felt like we were starting the record. It was just like we were recording a song and just collecting the music all the time. Then we went and realized that we had done an album!
Was that more of a relaxing process? Not having strict deadlines to work with?
Deryck: It was definitely more relaxing! We never spoke to the label really. We never had any discussions about anything. It was just kind of hap-hazard here and there. Really random.
You mentioned that there was a delay due to the label. Is that a bit frustrating? Having something that’s ready to be released but it’s being held back for marketing purposes?
Deryck: Yeah, like Steve said we’ve been done for a while! It’s just that they have to figure it out.
Cone: They had to figure out and co-ordinate the perfect time for us to release it.
Do you guys have any favorite tracks from the new album yet?
Deryck: I don’t really, for me. I like the whole thing from start to finish. I like them all equally.
Steve: The album is actually an album. If one song was missing it, for whatever reason would feel like it was lacking something. I mean, some songs stand out more than others but it’s not like a single based album. It’s not like “These are the three songs and the rest are filler”. Everything blends together to make this whole thing.
Deryck: Which is weird because it shouldn’t have.
Steve: Yeah!
Deryck: It was done very sporadically and there was no thought process to it. It shouldn’t have been as cohesive as it is.
When you did eventually approach the record label and told them that you had this album, did they put any pressure on you to produce a track that couple be a radio single or something that you couple market the album around?
Deryck: Well, the thing with us and this record is that we just don’t care about radio play or the single kind of thing. It just didn’t matter to us. They probably want a single but we just kind of blocked everybody out and did our own thing. We didn’t really care about anything. We just wanted to make a good record. If the radio hated it, we don’t care! We just wanted it to be good.
And have your fans enjoy it!
Deryck: Yeah, the 40,000 people coming to see us! Once we realized that we had that freedom, it became really fun and easy to just live life and make music. We’d go on tours and they’d sell out fucking fast!
You’ve said that with this album you had a lot to say and a lot to prove. It’s also a heavier sounding record. What lead to this direction?
Deryck: These are the sorts of things that we never really think about when we sit down to write songs. You don’t think about it until you get asked! I think that what we can really do and is just live our lives and make music, and not really think about it.
Cone: we never really thought about it like we had to make a mature album or anything, it was just natural. It was just like whatever came out was it!
Steve: I don’t think that it’s like we’ve been writing immature music for years either. I mean, ‘Still Waiting” which was like ten years ago is not an immature sounding song! I think it’s just the perception in the press. We don’t really think about it. I think that what has happened is that we’ve become better as musicians and the song writing has become much better and that’s I guess what you’d call maturity!
Deryck: I mean, the way that we approach writing songs and music is like, I write a song, send it to everybody and say “Hey, we need to record this song, and what do you want to do for dinner tonight?”. There’s no real thought in anything.
Has there been much feedback so far from your fans in terms of the new material?
Steve: One of the things that we did was put some songs on YouTube and all of the fucking messages or whatever they’re called were all positive!
Cone: It’s a pretty good indication of what they thought.
Steve: It shows that the kids are still interested. It’s hard to gauge. I think that our fans will like this. I think that there are songs on the album that they’ll REALLY like. It’s not like they’re singles though. We have one song called “Over My Head, Better Off Dead” which was never a single. It was like the forth song that we put on the internet but it’s became a fan favorite. People know every word! Every time that we play people want us to play it, so we play it. People go crazy for it. Even at festivals we play it and people love it. This song wasn’t a single and this one feels like it’s a single chosen by the fans. This album is full of that. It won’t be the one that the label picks that become the favorites, the kids pick it.
Do you think that after the Soundwave festival is done and dusted that you’re going to be able to make it back down here and play some headlining shows in support of the new record?
Steve: Oh, yeah! We’re definitely going to come back. This is just the beginning. It’s great way for us to start, to come back to Australia after being away for a few years and playing enormous festivals! Then we’ll come back and do our own tours for sure.
Just one most question for you today, what are you expectations for the rest of your time here in Australia?
Deryck: We’d like to see Iron Maiden.
Steve: I’d like to see Iron Maiden and Pennywise who are friends of ours.
Cone: I’d like to see Social D. There are tones of good bands, we just haven’t had a chance to see many yet.
Steve: It’s just the first couple of days, we’re still jetlagged and stuff. I was everywhere yesterday watching bands, but I was too drunk to remember anything so I’m going to have to go and watch all of those bands over again!
Cone: It’s more relaxing than Warped. You get to hang out in hotel every day!
Steve: Yeah, but you have to do press all-day and fly to different cities!