Underoath - Defining the great line
Formed in Florida in 1998, Underoath could be considered the poster child for the success of underground music in the early 21st century. Their latest masterpiece Define the Great Line is an explosive offering of emotive melody and charged punk rock rhythm, and resets the notion of what hardcore, screamo or whatever you want to call it, can be. The 6-piece will be gracing the shores of Australia for their first ever headlining tour. The Dwarf's Kevin Bala catches up with vocalist Spencer Chamberlain to discuss the new album and the upcoming Aussie tour.
”Yeah, I am actually really excited, Australia, second to the United States is my favourite place to tour. When we came to Australia for the first time, for Taste of Chaos last year, it was so much fun dude! Australia and New Zealand were the best shows of the tour by far. The experience I had, it was just beautiful. Like in Florida it’s kinda like all bottled water and it’s nice and warm and tropical and stuff... but it’s just prettier in Australia.”
Having just recently released Define the Great Line, Chamberlain states that the writing and recording process was a lot different to that of their previous album They’re Only Chasing Safety which was Chamberlain’s first album with the band since his inception. The guys even had good friend Adam Dutkiewicz from Killswitch Engage to produce the album.
”The writing process was a lot different to be honest, there was a lot more collective writing musically. We were sick of where we were at with the last record and we were really into challenging ourselves, making sure that even before adding any lyrics that they were musically interesting enough alone. Like if we decided to be an instrumental band, would it still be interesting to listen to? That’s something that we were really conscious of, like writing the record guitar riff wise, to capture attention with the music, then I would go back to it and write the lyrics. The recording process was great because we got to record with one of our friends, Adam from Killswitch, he’s recorded with a lot of our friend’s bands, he’s a fun guy, really cool and super professional and we had a blast recording. As opposed to recording Chasing Safety which was more like a big headache. It was two totally different worlds, and I think you can hear that on the record. We were having fun and were actually getting what we want out of this record instead of stressing out, you know?”
Chamberlain tells us of his inception into the band in 2003, after previous lead singer Dallas Taylor left under controversial conditions. Chamberlain states that it was quite an organic process.
“It was pretty easy, I was touring in a different band (This Runs Through), and I was living with Chris (Dudley, Keyboardist)at the time, this has like been almost five years now. It was real easy you know, they had gotten rid of the previous singer and they had a show they had to do, they came to me like “Dude we have to do this show, even if this is our last show, u havta sing for us, can you do it?” and I’m like 'yeah that’s fine' and when we started practicing for this show, we just started writing music together and it worked out really well. So then were like, “should we keep the name, or change the name, cos this is gonna be the band regardless', and it worked out really well.”
Being a band with religious beliefs, there is always controversy surrounding the band with that stigma. But Chamberlain maintains that its all about the music.
“I think for any band with beliefs, it affects you, but I don’t think there’s enough negative effects or positive effects that really change anything about the band. I mean, I play music, I listen to music everyday and regardless of what the band believes in or what their songs are about, its good writing and good music, and its good lyrics. Even if it’s about stuff that I don’t personally believe it, if the writing is intelligent, like lyrically, I don’t care what they believe it, I enjoy good music and good writing. I’d like to think that there are people who feel the same way. I do feel that a lot of kids that listen to our band don’t believe the same things that we do, and I think that’s totally cool - if you dig the music, you dig the music, if you dig the beliefs and what’s behind the music then you dig that too. I think with our band, even if you don’t believe in what we believe in, you can still get something out of the lyrics, its just about normal everyday life, you know?”
Finally, Chamberlain tells us of Underoath’s plans for the rest of the year.
“After Australia we have some festivals in the United States to do, then we do a little bit of Warped tour, then we are gonna do a whole headlining tour in the States. Im really looking forward to it, should be exciting stuff!”
