Staind
Disfunction (Elektra)
An interview with singer Adam Lewis
by Scott Hefflon
Where are you now?
In Philly.
I just talked to the Dropkick Murphys a couple nights ago and they were in Philly.
We’ve seen them around quite a few times on this tour. They’re on the same rotation of cities, but they’re playing different clubs.
Kinda cool, seeing as you’re both from Boston… Actually, you’re from Springfield, MA, and I like the fact that you make no claims of being from Boston.
Everyone from Massachusetts is from Boston and everyone from New York state is from New York. Actually, one member’s from Ludlow, one’s from Westfield, one’s from Enfield (CT), and I’m from Springfield.
What was Springfield like for you?
I moved there when I was in seventh grade…
Where’d you like before that?
New Hampshire and Vermont… Yeah, I’m a hick. Half my family is redneck Yankees.
You’re the “outdoorsy type”?
Yeah, that’s it. Hunting, fishing, living on a farm…
Yet your resourceful: You can fix a tractor axle with a wad of chaw, a fishing lure and a length of 10lb. wire…
That’s totally old school, like our bassist (Johnny April). He can fix anything with a piece of chewing gum and the gum wrapper.
We lose that in a consumer-based, semi-urban world. Instead of tinkering we call 800 number support centers.
Totally.
Did growing up a Yankee in the great open air affect your songs, your lyrics, or your outlook?
No, not really. But the pedephiles I ran into here and there probably did.
Any stories you wanna tell?
Read the lyrics. I have issues from the past that come out quite fully in the songs.
And judging from the lyrics, you’re a thoughtful guy that’s spent a lot of time thinking about this. Your voice carries a heavy emotional impact and you can tell you’re a guy that knows sorrow.
Unfortunately, I haven’t been sheltered from that aspect of life. Starting with the whole dysfunctional family, add to that a lot of things I really don’t want to get into, things that I wouldn’t wish on anyone… I don’t think people caught for stuff like that should get a slap on the hand, I think they should get locked up, or chemical castration, or something. I’m a firm believer in just punishment for just crime. If you’re going to take away the innocence of a child, you lose all rights to do anything else. Ever.
In some way, did it help make you strong? Did it make you bitter and untrusting before most kids really needed to be?
Everything. I think it affected me in every way it possible could.
[Conversation is interrupted by some jerk-off bitching about the band running their bus’ generator too close to the club. Or something.]
So you’ve gone from beat-up van to a tour bus in just a couple years.
From a six-passenger conversion van that was on its last leg three years ago to this self-sufficient tour bus with two generators, like, a six-cylinder motor, that runs all the electricity and stuff.
What are the highlights of the process?
Well, we were discovered by Fred (Durst, of Limp Bizkit)…
Dig back even further, seeing as I wrote one of your first reviews cuz Graham (Wilson, formerly of CherryDisc) got me a copy of your first release.
Alright… We put out an independently-released CD a few years ago, and we’d sold about 4,000 copies around the area, and we got the opportunity to open for Limp Bizkit at The Webster Theater in Hartford, Connecticut. We’d given Sugarmilk, friends of ours, a lot of shows, so they asked if we’d do the show. We said “Hell yeah!” So we’re hanging out at the show, I’m talkin’ with John Otto and Lethal, and our record came up, so I gave ’em a copy. Then, like 20 minutes before we’re supposed to go on, Fred comes storming up with the CD in his hand, throws it down on the bar, and starts flippin’ out on us. “What are you guys, a bunch of Satan-worshippers?!? What’s up with artwork?!?” Blah-blah-blah. He wanted to get us off the show 20 minutes before we were about to play. Luckily, that didn’t happen, but he stood at the side of the stage the entire time we played. When we got offstage, it was a totally different Fred. He said he was going to call Jordan (Schur), president of his label (Flip), and get us signed. We were like yeah, great, whatever. You hear that so many times a day, you get used to it meaning nothing. About four months later, we got a call, right after we’d done a four-song demo of some new stuff…
Where’d you record the demo?
At The Rock Shop in Westfield. Jeff Gilmer, our soundman, has a studio in Westfield.
And you hooked up with Limp Bizkit again to get them the demo?
Yeah. They were playing a show with the Deftones. We left the tape with Lethal because we never even saw Fred. Then, at like 2:30 in the morning, Mike (Mushok, guitarist)’s phone rings and the tape is blaring in the background. It’s Fred, freakin’ out cuz he loves the new stuff. He wants us to come down to Florida to his house and work on the stuff. So right after Christmas we rolled down there, worked him for about a week and a half on the songs from the demo. By the time we were done, we were signed to Flip. Two weeks later we flew to L.A. to sign the papers. Then in July or August we recorded the album. It took 23 days from load in to load out.
What was the time lag between getting signed and recording the album?
We signed with Flip at the end of January, then we signed with Elektra in April, then we recorded the album in July and August in Seattle, at Studio Litho, which is Pearl Jam’s studio, with the master himself, Terry Date.
What was it specifically that turned you on to Terry Date?
It was a combination of Soundgarden and The Deftones, and he did White Zombie’s Astro Creep 2000… And actually, he thought he ruined White Zombie’s career when he did that record. When he was finished with it, he was on the phone to the label, freaking out that he’d just ruined Rob Zombie’s career.
Terry did a few of the Pantera albums as well.
He did a few, except the last one which I think they did themselves.
Pantera had a sound like no other. But finally the rest of the world has caught up, and now they call it “the new metal sound.” Seeing as I heard your last album, which was more heavy rock, and this one, which is new metal…
I think if you listen to both records, it sounds like the same band, but this one’s much more mature, both in songwriting and sound.
Production makes a world of difference…
You bet your ass. Perfect example is if you listen to the version of “Spleen” that’s on the Wonderdrug compilation versus the one on our record. One is before Fred did pre-production, the second is the produced version.
And you have the best of both worlds being on Flip and Elektra.
We’re on Flip, so we have the freedom of an independent label, but we have the major money backing and distribution of a major.
Flip doesn’t have an exclusive with Elektra, right?
Nope. Sometimes it’s Flip/Elektra, sometimes it’s Flip/Interscope, and Cold was on Flip/A&M;. Flip is Jordan. He takes the initial chance, takes a band to the next level, then takes ’em to a major.
Is your deal a one-off or long-term?
Six records.
Damn! That’s a lot seeing as you’ve only done two records…
And the first doesn’t count.
Tell me more about your background in Springfield.
Springfield’s a big cover scene. It’s a rarity when you go out to a bar in Springfield and see a band play originals.
With the loss of a couple clubs in Boston…
A couple key clubs, I might add…
Right. And when I get tour info from various labels, I often, almost usually, see Boston omitted from the list. But I see bands playing at The Infinity…
That place is like our home. They’ve completely redone the club, but the sound’s not as good cuz Jeff Gilmer, our soundman, used to be the house sound guy. We stole him.
Springfield and Western Mass in general has a pretty big hardcore scene too, right?
This whole area: Boston, Springfield, the whole Mass area has a big hardcore scene. We had a really hard time finding a niche for ourselves. So what was happening was our songs were getting heavier and heavier. Then Fred came along and said we were heading in the wrong direction.
You started out as more of a hard rock band, like Soundgarden perhaps, then got more hardcore, then came back into new, expressive metal.
While I’m into Soundgarden and Alice in Chains, I didn’t really draw off them. I try not to really draw off anything. I love Korn and the Deftones, but I also love Crosby, Stills and Nash, James Taylor, Cat Stevens, and The Beatles. And The Indigo Girls. They played probably the best live show I’ve ever seen. So impressive, they sounded so amazing. It was just the two of them, sounding great! And as for shows that bring goose bumps every time I think about it: Tool. They’re perfect.
Tool is such an amazing band and I respect the living hell out of them for not jumping at every photo op. the way Korn does.
Nothing! Absolutely nothing. They did it the hard way, keeping true and not overdoing the publicity and over-exposure, and they’ve prolonged their success by doing it.
What are your tour plans this summer?
We’re playing some shows early in the summer with Monster Magnet, and then from the middle of June to the end of July we’re going out with Limp Bizkit. That’s going to be huge.
