Platinum-selling rock band Hawthorne Heights recently released their new record, Fragile Future. As one of the most anticipated albums of the year, it comes in the wake of the group’s two previous and highly successful albums; 2004’s The Silence In Black And White and 2006’s If Only You Were Lonely. The new album sees the Ohio rockers building upon the experiences of the last few years. Experiences, that include the loss of the band’s long time guitarist and comrade Casey Calvert, as well as, a highly controversial lawsuit against their own label. The new album marks a new beginning for the band and one that sees a new vitality ringing clear on the new album’s collection of stories and songs. And, underscored by an emotional weight that is clearly heartfelt and extraordinarily sincere throughout. On the eve of Fragile Future’s release, Joe Matera spoke to the group’s guitarist Micah Carli to discuss the new album, the loss of Calvert and the band’s new found energy.
UG: My initial thoughts after several listens of the new album Fragile Future is that it is a lot harder rocking and has more of an edge to it than any of your previous records.
Micah Carli: Yeah I think it is because we actually tried to fit in a little bit more guitar work this time. And it was a lot fun too as we got to experiment a great deal with guitar riffs and other amps and guitars as well.
Loosing Casey and the band’s highly published legal dispute with its label, Victory Records, surely must have played a major part in the album’s more aggressive sounds too?
Yeah the whole lawsuit that we’ve been entangled with during the past two and a half years has been incredibly difficult. Actually having had to deal with the loss of Casey kind of made us put some things into perspective and made us go and resolve our issues with Victory Records. It made us realize what was really important to us. And that was the reason why we were able to work through it and finally reach a settlement with Victory and finally record this new record.
When Casey was in the band, Hawthorne Heights featured a three guitar lineup, so what approach do you use now with only two guitarists in the band and having to fill in for that extra missing guitar?
Obviously it is a lot easier in the studio because we can take our time and we can layer it as much as we want too. But live, both JT [Woodruff, vocalist/guitarist] and I have had to adapt our parts and our playing so that we can try and cover that deficit. And so far it has been going really well.
Before his untimely death, how much input did Casey have on the new record?
He had contributed several ideas. There are two songs specifically on the record; one is titled 321 and the other is called Scrantonicity which is one of the bonus tracks on the Fragile Future Wal-Mart version. Those two songs were actually penned by him almost entirely. He also contributed several more ideas that made the record in a different way because they got developed and redeveloped and refined as the album went on.
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| "We actually tried to fit in a little bit more guitar work this time." |
The track Four Become One is the album’s poignant moment as the band pay tribute to Casey.
It’s about us dealing with the loss of Casey and what the rest of us had to go through, and are continuing to go through, because of this loss. When Casey died we decided he was irreplaceable and that that it would be too strange to try and bring somebody into our close knit family and make that work. So we decided to carry on as just a four piece instead.
When it came to the recording process, how did it differ, if any, from your previous two records?
Things were very different this time in particularly with the fact that there was such a large gap between our last two records, a gap of two and a half years. So we had a lot more time to develop ideas and songwriting this time. Unfortunately our first two records were kind of rushed because we were touring non stop and then told to go into the studio to make the records. We had like a few weeks here to write and a few weeks there. But this time we were very prepared for the studio. And we also decided to record with a lesser known producer by the name of Jeff Schneeweis in a small town called Chico in upstate California. And we went with him because he has been a good friend of ours and because we wanted a really comfortable kind of low key studio environment. And once we got there, and since the songs were already, for the most part written, we were able to focus more on like the actual recording process itself. And we were keen to experiment with different instrumentation and tones and just really getting everything exactly the way we wanted. We didn’t have that luxury with that sort of time on the previous albums.
You were involved very much so during the recording process too, so how much of your own input is on the album with Jeff’s production?
Actually quite a bit, I mean our producer definitely had some great ideas but he was very receptive to our vision of the record and was very open to any ideas that any of us brought up. And so it is very much our record as well as his production.
You had 23 songs already written for the record prior to entering the studio?
Yeah we did have many songs written but a lot of them were raw ideas as well and not fully developed songs. And a lot of the songs also changed once we got into the studio. All the tracks we recorded for the album, made the final track listing though there were two additional tracks we recorded in the studio that appear on the Wal-Mart exclusive version. Those were the only ones that didn’t make the twelve track version of the record.
Switching to gear, what guitars and amps did you use on the record?
We had a quite a few different guitars. We also brought several of our own favorites along too. There was a 1981 Sunburst Les Paul Custom, a Gibson Firebird, a Fender Telecaster and even a square neck, flat Dobro which I used on Sugar In The Engine. You can hear it at the end of the song behind the spoken word part that JT does. That part of the music I actually recorded myself back at the hotel. I hung a microphone from the shower curtain rod in the shower and recorded a couple acoustic guitar tracks and some slide on the top of it and it ended up making the record. As for amps, we had a Mesa Boogie Stiletto, a Marshall JTM-45, a Marshall 1959 SLP, a Framus Dragon and a Mesa Lone Star. There were loads more but that’s all I can remember at the moment.
Did you do much amp blending for tones?
Not too much actually. We didn’t really blend too many tones on top of each other like that. We actually got some great amp tones by using some guitar pedals. I had a suitcase full of guitar pedals with me so we had a lot of fun lining up overdrive pedals, phasers, delays and anything we wanted in order to get some wacky ear candy sounds. We also used a lot of Line 6 pedals like a Line 6 Delay Modeler and the Filter Modeler.
What are you and JT using for your live set-up?
JT has been using an Ovation electric guitar and running that through a Mesa Stiletto while I’m playing Gibson Explorers through a Soldano SLO-100. And I’ve got a pedal board with a fair amount of effects as well too.
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| "We were able to find a new soul and to release a new record." |
The album’s last track Come Back Home (Reprised) has a connection with your previous record?
Yes, at the end of that song there is another clip that, again, I recorded myself back at the hotel where I got all four of us to record our vocals in the shower. And JT had the idea of tying in the lyrics from the song This Is Who We Are from our second record, If Only You Were Only.
It seems many artists are joining with Wal-Mart when it comes to releasing new albums. Why did Hawthorne Heights decide to follow suit?
I have mixed feelings about it all. I understand everyone is trying to rejuvenate the music industry because sales are so low in general. And because of that, every one is thinking of ways of making albums more special. And I appreciate that angle but sometimes I think that the whole issue isn’t really about quality, it’s all about quantity. People just want something extra to release because they have it. But I think, in part from that perspective, it only makes things worse because if you get more and more crap out there, then the quality of music is going to do down some more. I’m not saying that we rushed anything on our exclusive with Wal-Mart. Actually, I’m very proud of the stuff that is on the Wal-Mart version, the two extra tracks and the four acoustic versions of the songs that are on the record. I think they all turned out wonderfully.
Are there any plans to release a DVD in future since it’s long overdue?
We shot a lot of footage of us in the studio and on the tour since then but right now we don’t have anything on the books or anything in the works for a DVD. But I guess we’re ready and really need to do something soon.
The album’s title conjures up quite number of connotations with it?
The title was actually penned by JT and on a personal side, it relates a great deal to our situation of being in such an uncertain world. Of having been in a lawsuit for two years and a half and of having lost a member. And that we didn’t know whether our band was going to even continue on, let alone release our third record and how well it was going to be received. So it very much describes our state. But we just figured you can also apply that to anything right now like the situation in the U.S where it’s going through a pretty major presidential election. As well as the gas prices across the world which are sky rocketing. It’s an uncertain time so the title just seemed appropriate.
With everything the band has endured these past couple years, are you happy, personally and professionally, with where you’re at today?
I’m very happy and we’re all very happy with where we’re at and are. Especially after all the hardships we’ve been through recently. We’re really appreciative of the fact that we were able to find a new soul and to release a new record and get back out on the road and just do what we love to do.
Interview by Joe Matera
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