Interview: Four Year Strong
on July 30th, 2011Massachusetts pop-punk outfit Four Year Strong are set to return to Australian soil as part of Soundwave Revolution later in the year. Currently though, the band has been busy writing album number 5 to follow up 2010′s ‘Enemy Of The World‘. Deborah Konopnicki recently caught up with Alan Day from the band in the studio. Click below to expand this post and take a read of the interview.
Hey, Alan. How are you going?
I’m going great! How are you?
Good thanks, mate! I’m a massive fan of your band so pretty stoked to be having a chat with you today!
No problem!
What’s happening at the moment?
We’re actually in a studio working on our new record.
Yeah, that’s so exciting! How is that all going?
It’s going amazing. We’re kind of nearing the end. Not really I guess… we still have the rest of the month in here but we’ve been working on the record since January.
What kind of songs have you been writing? How would you say that it’s different to “Enemy Of The World” at this point? Or similar for that matter?
Well I think it’s very different! We’ve been dipping our toes into a little bit of everything with this record. We’ve always been afraid of certain territories in music. We didn’t know if our fans would get it or have it be too crazy or too outside of the box but with this record we’re really just taking inspiration form all over the place, from all of our influences. We haven’t been afraid to do anything! We’ve just been doing everything that we felt like. We felt like if we were to make “Rise Or Die Trying part 2” or “Enemy Of The World part 2” then we wouldn’t be staying true to ourselves and what we really wanted to do. We’re putting everything that we have into this record and we’re really excited about it so far.
I can’t wait to finally hear something from you guys! Would you say that there has been anything in particular at this point that has been inspiring this newborn freedom?
We’re definitely touching on a lot of new subjects with this record. There’s a lot of darker songs on this record and there’s a lot of different emotions. With Four Year Strong in the past there has mostly been songs that were mostly uplifting… most of the time! It’s always been one emotion. We’ve always been hesitant in the past of certain things because we weren’t sure of how people were going to take it but we’ve just said “Fuck it!” this time and did what we really wanted to do and touch on those darker subjects… all of them! Things like anger and not to sound ‘emo’ or anything but sadness and neglect. Just tackling those issues.
Did Josh (ex-keyboards) have any input on the new record or was that just between the four of you guys?
Nah it was completely the four of us. The reality is that it’s always been the four of us writing the music. He never had anything to do with the writing side of the band. I know that a lot of people think and are going to think that things are different because he left the band but in reality that is not the case.
Do you have a release date in mind at this stage?
We don’t know for sure of an exact date yet but I’m crossing my fingers that it’s going to be out by the time that we come down for Soundwave!
That’s not too far away at all!
I’m not sure if it will be so you can’t quote me on that! Either right before, while we’re there or shortly after we leave. It’ll be around that time is what we’re hoping for.
So kind of like what happened with “Enemy Of The World”! You were here for Soundwave and then it dropped right afterwards.
Yep!
I saw that you guys have been playing one of the brand new tracks “Falling On You” on the recent tour that you did with Rise Against. How did that go?
It was great! Kids seemed to really like it, we got good feedback on the Internet because it got onto YouTube and things like that. Part of the reason that it went on so well is because that we have fucking fun playing it! We’re really excited about these new songs and the direction that we’re going in so we had a Lot of energy when we played that song.
As you touched on before you are due to come back here at the end of September for the Soundwave Revolution. What made you decide to come back here and be a part of that tour?
Really we got an offer to do it and the second that we got the offer we were like “Absolutely! Why would we not?!” We love going to Australia and we played it last year and we were treated so well by everyone on the festival like the crew and things like that and the bands and especially more than anything else; the fans. The ones that come to the shows and yeah. We were treated so well and we felt so welcomed by the festival crowds and it was just such a great environment that we couldn’t say no!
Last year’s line-up was probably my favourite Soundwave line-up so far. Did you guys have a standout moment from that festival? I know that it was a little while ago now but it was just so damn fun!
One of my favourite bands of all time is Jimmy Eat World so the fact that I got to watch them every single day was huge. They were so good! They are one of the best and tightest bands that I’ve ever seen. It was surreal! Obviously getting to see Faith No More and Janes Addiction was awesome. There were tonnes of friends there and everyday was like a party. We were there with Set Your Goals, Comeback Kid, Gallows and Paramore. There were just so many friends on the tour that you couldn’t go anywhere without seeing someone that you knew!
Well what about this one coming up; who are you keen to see?
I’m extremely excited to play alongside of Van Halen! I never would have thought that would happen in a million years that it would happen so that’s really cool! It’s really cool to play with all the headliners and all of those bigger bands but at the same time it’s just as awesome to play with all of my friends that I just don’t get to see all that often. Set Your Goals are playing; Every Time I Die… they are some of our best friends. It’s going to be fun times.
As we spoke about just before “Enemy Of The World” dropped as you guys were packing up from Soundwave to head home. Was there any point after the alum was released that you were tyring to get back here to play some headlining shows?
Yeah it’s just been complex with timing because we’re been so busy with everything, but we’re hoping to do some Sidewave shows! There’s nothing set in store yet. I don’t know if we’ll be headlining or if we’ll be supporting someone but we definitely want to be able to play some shows there and we definitely want to headline over there after Soundwave at some point, probably early next year or something. These are all just ideas in my head that I’d like to do!
So I guess that it’s safe to say that when the new album does drop and you have your world tour that Australia will be one of the first places on the list?
If we are touring the world then Australia WILL be one of the first places that we go!
I just want to have a quick chat about “Enemy Of The World”. It’s one of my favourite records from last year and one that you’re no doubt still focusing on in a big way live. It’s been quite a bit over a year now since it was released so how is that album sitting with you boys from a live perspective?
We love it. We’ve never not loved something that we’ve done as a band. Every time that we play those song… man, you’d think that because I play them every single night of my life that I’d hate them or that I’d get sick of them or that I’d go into auto-pilot mode but still it throws me back into that time of my life when we were making that record and it was just such an enjoyable time in my life. When I wrote about moments that happened in my life in the songs, I still think about those moments and those things when I play. We just love playing the songs and we love having people love them. The success that we’ve had from the record was far beyond what we ever thought we could do. I could say that about pretty much everything that this band has done since we started. We’re just guys that like playing music and like having fun and like showing the world what we can do. We love playing the songs off of “Enemy Of The World”… any song. I mean that’s just what we do!
Has there been a particular song that’s really stood out?
Off of “Enemy Of The World” I would probably say ‘Wasting Time”. That was one of the most personal songs for me that I wrote lyrically. It was just about a specific time in my life, just this one summer that I’ll never forget. It’s the type of thing that whenever I see any of my friends from my that time who I all keep in touch with… all of them; that’s all that we can talk about, that one summer. Everyone has that time in their lives. That was the first time that I touched on a subject that was so personal and meant so much to me. I still think about that every time that I play the song. When I hear kids sing it back to me it’s such a warm feeling. It’s indescribable really!
You also released a totally kick-ass 90’s cover record called “Explains It All”. There are so many tracks from there that I’d love to hear live. Do you ever play tracks from that record?
Occasionally we do. We play Third Eye Blind’s “Semi Charmed Kind Of Life” but we don’t do it very often. Playing covers is fun but there’s something about that energy that you get from kids singing songs that came out of your own fucking head.
So I totally went through a bit of a faze last year where I would sit down on my computer and for a good hour I would search YouTube for you live acoustic performances. I found some great ones actually! Is that something that you guys have ever considered? The possibility of an acoustic record?
Absolutely! We talk about it all the time really! Me personally, I’m a huge fan of indie and folk and acoustic stuff. I’m just hugely into every kind of music but I love the music side of that, like harmonies and melodises and different arrangements of songs – the different kind of creativity that you can have with that kind of stuff. We did acoustic versions of songs off of “Enemy Of The World” and we just had so much fun re-arranging the songs and coming up with strings arrangements and coming up with percussion and crazy harmonies and all that we can talk about since then was writing some original acoustic stuff and putting something on the record that’s a little bit different. We definitely want to at some point it just hasn’t lined-up timing wise. We actually wrote a song that we thought had a beautiful melody and we just HAD to use it but we didn’t think that it would fit on the record. Me and Dan wrote it and it’s kind of about our fathers and we released it on fathers day! It was just a video of us playing in front of a camera. It’s a really fun song to play and it’s really meaningful to us and it was really cool to get that out to the world even though it was a low-key version of it. It wasn’t like a high production version or anything like that.
I have like ten seconds before the phone line cuts out so just quickly what should Aussie Four Year strong fans be expecting from you boys this time around?
We’re just going to do what we always do and that is to put on the best fucking show that we can play and make it be the best show that we’ve ever had. That’s our goal for every show that we play.
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FOUR YEAR STRONG – Enemy Of The World
Instores Now – Click [Here] to purchase it, and other Four Year Strong titles.
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