For the band, though, does past success affect the type of songs you’re more interested in writing?
I know people want to hear “It’s Been Awhile” again, but why don’t you put some faith in the band that wrote that song and realize that maybe it’s here – just in some other form? Don’t worry about this formula for a song and just listen to what’s here. We turned in Dysfunction, our first record for Elektra. We recorded it, mixed it, turned it in – nobody said a word. Sold a million copies. Next record, it was “What are they doing? When can I hear demos? What’s going on?” And that’s when it changed. Now everybody puts on a producer’s hat and tells you what to do. We were like, “Look, you guys do what you do, and we’ll do what we do.” We sent somebody, who we were supposed to be listening to during Break the Cycle, some songs that were being finished. “It’s Been Awhile” was in there, the remake of “Outside” was in there, the song “For You” was in there, “Fade” was in there – it was like six or seven songs. I sent him a CD of it, and he made my life hell for three weeks: “You guys need to write more songs – you don’t have it. You need to write more songs – you don’t have it.” Well, last I checked, those songs did pretty well. [laughs] It kinda kills your faith in the people who are supposed to be telling you what to do, when I have examples from pretty much every record where they told us that something wasn’t going to work and it did.
I don’t care how confident you are as an artist – during that process of writing new stuff, that can be a really sensitive time.
You could make a joke about my mother, and I would laugh about it. I feel I have a decent sense of humor to joke around about things. But that hurts. There’s something about it – you want an acceptance because it is close and it is personal. And sometimes they are right, and I’m not saying we’re always right, ‘cuz we’re not. But we’ve been fortunate enough to have a decent gauge to know where we are and what the songs are that we have. So, have a little faith – just a little.
In terms of new directions, “Rainy Day Parade” seems to be Staind stretching out into discussing politics.
I can tell you about the music, but I don’t want to speak for Aaron [about the lyrics]. But I think it’s more of a pro-U.S., pro-country type of song. But the riff … I remember I didn’t feel well, and I didn’t go to practice one day. I started feeling better in the afternoon, and I picked up the guitar. It was a weekend and I was watching the Red Sox game, and I had a guitar – just playing around with it. I hit mute [on the TV] and I was like, “Oh, that’s pretty cool.” I brought it down to the band the next day, jammed on it, and we had a song.
Are a lot of songs that you come up with accidents like that?
I think about playing guitar a lot, different things to do. “Maybe I should write a song that has some bendy notes?” “Maybe I should try a different tuning?” And then I’ll go try it – sometimes you come up with stuff, sometimes it just pops up on its own.
Now that Illusion of Progress is finished, are there leftover tracks that might make the next album? Does it work that way for you guys?
Along the way, there are songs that haven’t gotten finished. There are songs that Aaron said, “I love the music in that song. It’s the coolest thing – I just can’t come up with anything over it.” That usually happens at the end of the record – there’s always one song where you’re like, “Hey, did Aaron do that song yet?” “Not yet.” “How about now?” “Nope, not yet.” And there was one on this record that was really disappointing. There was this one song that the riff was really cool – the whole song was always evolving and had these really cool parts. I couldn’t wait to hear that song done … and I still can’t wait to hear it when it’s done. [laughs] But it happens – what are you gonna do? Can we revisit it? Maybe we can rewrite a part of it. Maybe we take some of the cool elements and make it something else. But we’ve never done that. For me, that’s the past – let’s work on new stuff.
