Sometimes it's hard for a whisper to not feel like a blaring announcement when the news is so exciting. Like, try this on for size: The Flatliners have finished writing the follow-up to their 2010 smash hit Cavalcade.
"Is the record done?" No. "Does it have a name?" Not yet, but the songs are written; the wheels have begun turning, and all that remains is for the band to shift gears and get the songs captured in front of the good mikes because, according to singer Chris Cresswell, they're ready. “I'm really happy to report that the songs for the new album are all written and and ready to go,” exclaims the singer with a (mock) triumphant laugh. “We're not far into recording yet – we've just bits here and there, really – but we've gotten a bunch of the ideas down in like a “demo” way to make sure they actually sound good, and that feels like movement in the right direction. We're hoping to have the record done and out in the Spring of 2013.”
Some punks reading will be overwhelmed. They'll be overjoyed; Cavalcade was a phenomenal high-water mark in The Flatliners' young career, and established that the band had ascended to a new level in it. The album was great and has had fans waiting anxiously for a new serving of songs for two years – so this news is definitely good and something that a lot of people will want to hear. “I do think that there are lots of bands who put out records more frequently than us,” concedes Cresswell, almost apologetically, “but I feel like the time we took is time we needed to make sure we had music that would live up to what we'd already done. On one hand, I can say that and mean it but, on the other, it can be fun to take your sweet-ass time, make people wait and make sure that what you're putting out is a really cool record that you're very happy with yourself. I really think that is what helps make a record that everybody's happy with and improves the performance of it when we hit the road to promote it.
…And, according to Cresswell, what he and the band are envisioning for the follow-up to Cavalcade will be well-worth the wait that fans have endured. “The plan for the new record has been to just do it and just see what happens,” says Cresswell frankly when asked what fans can expect. “We've always had a sort of loose plan regarding what we want to accomplish, but then we get into the studio and we really over-think things. Like with the last one, we're proud of it and I think Cavalcade is our strongest record to date, but it's very polished sounding. That was all well and good, but I think I speak for all of us in the band when I say that we'd all like to get something a little closer to a live sound on the next record.
“For this record, we just want to record a bunch of songs – like maybe twenty – and then just pare it down to fourteen or fifteen or however many,” continues the singer. “We did a really polished record last time, and I think I speak for all of us when I say that we all really love it and it's a great record – but there are parts of me that would like to put out a hard, fast album of songs which are all a minute and a half long. Not way far off of Cavalcade exactly – there were some harder songs on it – but not so pretty and shiny as it was. In fact, there are a couple of songs on this new record which are just really short and sweet bangers.”
While the heads of some fans may be swimming with excitement at the news of a fresh Flatliners record in the works, that excitement with certainly be tempered by the fact that fans will have to wait; no release date has been set yet. Not wanting to just tease fans though, The Flatliners have developed another gift for the holiday season: a new tour celebrating the band's tenth anniversary. “We figured that we wanted to get our turn as far as birthday parties go, and we've always been invited by a few of our friends to come and play the tours that they schedule right after the holidays are over and they're really fun, but I always feel like we don't even really get to see our families,” says Cresswell pensively, in explanation of the band's upcoming tour. “We usually end up taking the first couple of months of every year off to really experience Canadian winter and be trapped in a snowbank and do nothing, but that got pretty frustrating, pretty quick. What we've got planned is to just get out on a short, fairly local tour because it really is a fun time of year to tour Ontario and Quebec and, this year, we've even taken it a little further by doing an extended leg through British Columbia and Alberta too.
“Now that I've gone and mentioned the new record, people are going to want to know if we're playing it and, to be honest, I don't know,” continues the singer. “I mean, we always try to get as many songs in the set list as possible and play them the best we can, but I can't see us leaning too hard one way or another; not that we talk about it, but we'll probably just do what we've always done and play a little of everything, and give a pretty well-rounded set. We've never been the band who says, 'Oh we've got a new record out, so we're only going to play new songs.' I will say that, when a band is working on new material, it's always the best fun to play the new songs because they've played the older stuff so much, but you can never forget where you came from and I always feel like it's important to keep a good mix of songs to address every era of your band, and show respect to the fans who have come along at each different point along the way. I think that might factor in a bit because we just reissued Destroy To Create on vinyl too. I think we will throw in a few more old songs than usual because the reissue is out and it would be fun to revisit that, and maybe one or two of the new songs, but we're not going to focus on either one. I've always been a firm believer in the practice of playing one brand new song if you really want to, but do a short one and make sure you have it nailed. That might be the most we do; we have the new record written, but we're not going to play it all right now, before it's released, before people have the chance to hear it for themselves. So we're just going to go out, have fun and get it all out of our systems, and then go home and actually enjoy the holidays with our families. It's been a really good year for the band, and I think this is going to be a good way to just round it all out.”
Artist:
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The Flatliners' tour dates have been announced. Click here for an updated list of shows.
