Billy Talent

Editor’s Note: I was really excited for this day. We took the bus downtown to the Maverick Brewing Company, the local beer company from Edmonton, where Billy Talent were playing their new CD to some VIPS and fans. I was lucky enough to be one of the select few in attendance. After they answered some questions to the public, they went around talking to all the fans, signing autographs, taking pictures, and having some drinks. Then, Ian and Aaron sat down in the back corner with me, as far away from the noise as we could (although, some parts of the interview were still hard to make out), to answer some questions regarding their new CD, Billy Talent II, that was playing in the background. Of course, we were interrupted a few times for autographs and the likes, all of which are mentioned in the interview, but overall it went amazingly. Once again, they were nice guys to take the time to chat before hurrying off to the Oilers hockey game. Thanks to Ian and Aaron for doing it, and to Laura for setting it all up. Once again, enjoy the interview with Canada’s finest.

Please note: All photos of Aaron were taken from their site, without permission, and are copyrighted by their rightful owners. All pictures of Ian were taken by Jared Majeski.

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Bobby: Well, starting with the basics, your CD, “Billy Talent II”, comes out in a month and two days, are you excited for that?

Aaron: Really excited. It’s been such a long time coming. Lots of hard work and blood, sweat, and tears. We still haven’t seen the completed copy because Ian was just finishing off the artwork. He did all of the artwork with a friend of his, Henry. It’s being printed right now, so we’ll be able to hold it in our hands soon. It’s exciting.

Bobby: Earlier on, you handed out those posters over there. Is that going to be the cover?

Aaron: Yes, but a little bit different than that.

Bobby: What was the motivation? Like what was the idea behind that cover?

Aaron: Well, when you open up the CD, the burn hole, that’s Jon’s mouth and it’s kind of placed in the corner here. Then when you open the CD, the picture of all of us – it’s kind of an evil looking illustration of us, but it’s what we kind of look like when we play live. We all turn into different people when we’re on stage, we’re all pretty aggressive and energetic and the picture just captures all of that. So it’s kind of just a hint, a burning through, of what’s on the other side. On our first record, it was shadows of us. On this record, it’s kind of us burning through, showing a little bit of us. It’s all a constant progression of artwork, and the artwork is unbelievable.

Bobby: I look forward to seeing it.

Aaron: Yeah, I can’t wait for you to see the full artwork, it’s amazing.

Bobby: Why did you decide to call it simply “Billy Talent II”?

Aaron: It was easy. We didn’t want to have the long, drawn out name. Some bands will call the CD the name of the single, like we could’ve called it “Devil In A Midnight Mass”, but we just wanted the music to speak for itself. This is our second record, “Billy Talent II”. Led Zeppelin did it, there’s a lot of bands that did it. We’re getting a lot of response to the fact that we’re calling it “Billy Talent II” – a lot of people are asking us about it. It also kind of shows anyone that is new to the band that there is a CD before that; it’s just a constant evolution that we’re going through. So it seemed the sound verdict.

Bobby: Do you think you’ll keep that theme through your entire career, like “Billy Talent III”, “Billy Talent IV”?

Aaron: I don’t know. I have no clue.

Bobby: We’re listening to the new album now, what would you say is your favorite song on the new album and why?

Aaron: I like them all equally. “Pins and Needles” – we really experimented with our softer side and it still has the same vibe that Billy Talent has. That song, I think it’s one of the best songs we’ve ever written. The guitar line, the drum beat, and the way Ben sings and Ian has the lower harmony, it’s amazing. “Fallen Leaves” is my favorite song to play live now because it’s just an awesome, fun, song that people can tap their feet to and dance to. Hey! Here comes Ian.

Ian: Hey, what’s up buddy? How are you? Long time no see.

Bobby: Yeah, it’s been like two years since I last interviewed you guys.

Ian: It was at Red’s right?

Bobby: Yeah. They’re actually closing down on June 30th.

Ian: Really?

Bobby: They’re not making enough money or something.

Ian: Holy cow.

*Here, we talked about the demise of Red’s for a bit, how there’s not many all–ages venues left and Aaron took some goofy glasses from a fan who offered them to him, but you’re not interested in that, so back to the interview…*

Bobby: Well, like I was saying, Ben is a story teller. The single, “Devil In A Midnight Mass” is about a priest molesting children. What are some of the other stories in the rest of the album?

Aaron: One is about two friends of ours, loosely based on two friends of ours that grew up in Ontario and went to Vancouver and got caught up in some bad business. It’s called “Fallen Leaves” and it’s just about the losing the battle to heroin in Vancouver. What else is there?

Ian: There’s a song called “The Navy Song” which is kind of written from a perspective of a World War Two naval soldier who’s on the boat in the valley and he’s basically writing his final letter to his wife because he knows he’s going to die in the battle. I think that’s probably my favorite song.

Bobby: Where do you guys get most of the motivation for writing the songs? The music and everything?

Ian: I think it’s a collective of our experiences. Everything you go through, you experience some growth. Everything comes out in different ways. You’ll wake up one morning at home and be thinking about things that happened on the road. Stuff like that. It all finally comes out, one thing at a time.

Aaron: And we’re always constantly challenging each other and ourselves and pushing each other and pushing ourselves to just get better. *Here Fearless Fred quickly interrupts to get some autographs for the Bear’s Children Fund auction*. But yeah, Ian’s really good at pushing all of us to get better and do things we’re afraid of doing.

*While Ian talks to Fearless Fred for a few seconds, Aaron quickly remembered that I already had an advance copy of the album so he clarified some name changes for me* Back to “The Navy Song”… We’re changing the name to “The Navy Song.” It was called “The Navy Song” and then we named it “In The Fall,” but now we’re changing it back to “The Navy Song.”

Bobby: Oh, okay, I was wondering that. I was thinking there wasn’t a song on the CD called “The Navy Song”.

Aaron: I knew that you would be thinking that, so I just thought I’d clear it up.

Bobby: Okay, thanks. What was it like working with Gavin Brown again?

Aaron: Awesome.

Ian: Great. You know, he’s really good to work with and he brings out the best in us.

Aaron: He can really tell us when we’re doing too much sometimes, and get us to really strip it back down; keep it simple, but good.

Bobby: The second song on the album “Red Flag” has, of course, been available now for around a year. It’s been on various compilations, was on NHL 2006, and was released on the internet. Why did you decide to still put it on the CD even though it’s been a year when it’s been available?

Aaron: Because the version we released before was more of a demo version that we just recorded. It was really popular on the internet. It was really cool, so we put it up on MySpace and we ended up getting a lot of positive feedback. So we’d figure we’d put it on the album so it’s not the demo version.

Ian: Yeah, so it’s not just the demo, they have the real thing.

Bobby: The single, “Devil In A Midnight Mass” was released to radio and TV almost a month ago, and had been getting constant airplay. The CD still has a month before the CD actually comes out, with releasing the single so soon, are you ever scared that it will get too overplayed? Because I remember when Green Day released “Boulevard Of Broken Dreams” everyone loved it, but by the end everyone hated it because it was too overplayed. Are you ever scared that “Devil In A Midnight Mass” will be overplayed like that?

Aaron: I think if you overplay anything, you kill it – no matter what it is. That’s just sad. Sometimes you have to put a song away. Like I’ll revisit some of my favorite albums that I listened to so much that I ended up not even waiting to hear a single song for so long. And then eight months I’ll put it in and just remember why I feel in love with it again.

Ian: Yeah, I think by the time our record comes out, we’ll probably be releasing a second single. So we figured if we released this one, by the time our second single comes out, you won’t have the chance to get sick of the first one.

Bobby: Do you have any idea what the second single will be?

Ian: We’re still deciding right now, I think it’s either gonna be “The Suffering” or “Red Flag.”

Bobby: Your last CD, the self-titled one, had four singles from it. All four of them blew up instantly and everyone was singing them. Do you think your new CD will have that many singles too that blow up instantly?

Aaron: I hope so. It’s all the leg work we put into it as well. I don’t think the songs would’ve done as well if we didn’t tour and tour and tour and tour and meet our fans and do all the stuff that we did to back everything up. So we’re gonna work our asses off on this record and take it as far as we can.

Ian: It’s all about how much work you put into it. Usually, if things are going well for you, you’ll release another single. The record company will want to release another single. So it all kind of depends on how well things are going on tour and stuff.

Bobby: It’s been about three years since your last CD came out, why such a long wait? Why a three year wait?

Aaron: We toured the first one for almost two years.

Ian: Yeah, we never expected the first one to do so well. Like normally you release a record and then tour for like a year and then go back into the studio, but it just ended up that we were touring because the demand for us to play shows was really high. We ended up playing, touring, a lot longer than we should’ve and we ended up being on the road for two and a half years. So when we got home, we just started writing for the record and it ended up being a year.

Bobby: Well like we’ve said, the CD comes out in a month, is there anything you want to say to get people excited about?

Ian: I don’t know. I think it’s one of the best records that we’ve ever put out.

Aaron: Yeah, it’s the best thing we’ve ever done. And I can’t wait to play these songs and share them live on stage.

Bobby: So I’ve been lucky, I’ve had the CD for about a month and a half now since the Toronto office sent me a copy. My favorite song on it, and all my friend’s favorite song, is “Where Is The Line” and listening to the lyrics about fashion it got me thinking about how much fashion has taken a big role in the punk community as of late, how important do you think fashion is in a band now?

Aaron: It’s important, but for some people, it seems to be more important than the music.

Ian: It shouldn’t be as important as the music at all.

Aaron: No.

Ian: It’s something that’s secondary to the music. Like that’s what bands do. That’s what bands like the Pistols and Clash were actually doing. In their fashion sense, they were rebelling against fashionable people. They toured the world with jeans and crappy looking shirts and stuff like that, but it ended up, years later, becoming a fashion statement. It’s ridiculous. They were doing it as kind of a tongue-in-cheek kind of mockery of fashion sense and so it’s not as important as the music at all. It’s totally secondary.

Bobby: Do you think now bands can easily get a record deal and a following just by what they wear, their makeup or their hairstyles?

Ian: I think with that combination and one good song or two good songs; like a band can release a record with two good songs and eight crappy songs and as long as they have good fashion sense, they can become a huge band.

Aaron: But fans can smell that a mile away too. A lot of the time the record companies do do that but things are totally changing and bands, they just *they stop to pose for a photo for a fan and then keep going*. Because kids can see through it now. *They sign some autographs for other people* What was I saying?

Bobby: Fashion stuff.

Aaron: Kids can find music that they fall in love with and they know when the band means what they say, and we’re putting our hearts and our souls into these songs and we’re not just doing it because we want to be on TV. We’re doing it because we love to play music. I think because of the internet, it’s making kids smarter – music wise. Because it’s so accessible, everything’s so accessible.

Bobby: Last time I interviewed you guys, way back in 2004. I asked you guys about Pezz and if you were ever going to re-release it or re-record it, and you (Ian) said, and I quote, “No” while you (Aaron) said “It’s all in the past” – and yet, a year later, you guys re-released the entire CD. What made you guys re-release the album?

Aaron: The fan demand.

Ian: Yeah, the kids on our message board were trying to find the songs so much that we were like, “you know what? Let’s just re-release it and sell it on our message board.” And if kids really want it, they can buy it off the net.

Bobby: Can you get it anywhere else?

Ian: iTunes released it, you can buy individual songs from there.

Aaron: We’re gonna bring it out on the road with us too.

Bobby: That’s when I’ll be picking up a copy. You guys spent a lot of time in the studio, are you excited to get back on the road and tour Europe and the Warped Tour?

Ian: Yes, definitely. That’s like the funnest thing to do – European festivals and the Warped Tour.

Aaron: I just can’t wait to play these songs live.

Bobby: Most importantly, when are you guys going to do a Canadian tour? You said earlier something about Rise Against and Thursday?

Aaron: January, February.

Bobby: Are you going to be coming to Edmonton?

Aaron: Coast to coast. Every city.

Bobby: That will be great, Rise Against are amazing live.

Aaron: Yeah, we can’t wait. We’re gonna do Warped Tour with them, then we’re gonna tour all over America with them and then we’re gonna bring them across Canada with us.

Bobby: Of course today is like a press day. You’re showing the new CD to VIPs and fans. Is it weird ever going to these things, meeting random people, taking photos, signing autographs? Does it get overwhelming? Like do you ever wish you could go back to anonymity and not be known again?

Ian: I don’t think it’s weird when people are fans of the band. I feel like we have fans of the band no matter where we play, they come to the shows; they really get the band and what the band’s all about, what the music’s all about. So I don’t think it’s weird when fans of the band come up to us. When there’s people that don’t really know the band or half the time they think I’m from Sum41 – that’s when it get’s weird.

Bobby: I guess that’s about it, thanks a lot. Do you have any final thoughts you’d like to add?

Ian: No, we just can’t wait to come back and play in the fall/winter, I guess.

Bobby: Awesome, I’m looking forward to seeing you live again – and with Rise Against, even better. Thanks a lot.

Ian: Awesome, good seeing you again.

Aaron: It was great.