Finger Eleven singer Scott Anderson was recently a guest of Skratch N Sniff and talked about the band’s history, including their latest single, “Adrenaline”, and their forthcoming new album. Anderson talked about touring with Creed on their “Summer Of ’99” tour in 2024, his love for bands like Iron Maiden and Genesis, what it’s like being a dad, and when he realized “Paralyzer” and “One Thing” were going to be huge hits.
You gotta read what Scott said about “Adrenaline” (their first single from Finger Eleven’s new album and a new recording deal with Better Noise Music), “The new single, I’m excited about it only because there was a promise of, like, ‘Oh, okay. This song has a lot of energy.’ But for the song to cross the finish line, to complete it and keep that energy up and not lose what’s special about whatever demo you were working on, that’s what I like most about it.
“We went across the U.S. with Creed last year, and a song like that, you kind of feel, like, okay, it can hang in a giant venue. Finger Eleven very often tries to make big music. And so it kind of passed the litmus test there. And it’s got this nice kind of hype song quality about it and I really enjoy it.”
Anderson added, “The new album is going to have quite a few of those. There’s a lot of rockers on the new record. And there’s a few kind of songs in between and then there’s a mellow tune, but they’re all of a really crazy quality, which I’m so excited to let everybody finally hear. And they will be able to hear it very soon — sometime this year.”
Asked why it’s taken Finger Eleven over 10 years to follow-up 2015’s “Five Crooked Lines”, Anderson said, “One of the greatest things that that kind of time can give you is some objectivity. You can take a look at a song and go, ‘Oh, okay, that’s really good. But you know what? It needs work. This part is not working.’ And the scary process of opening up an idea and hoping that it gets better through that, I mean, you’ve gotta do it. And if you work on a new song and it loses its luster of the newness, then you come back to it and go, like, ‘Okay, I see exactly what this is. Let’s figure out how to make it better.’ And we’ve been doing that. We haven’t necessarily taken a break as a band through those 10 years. It’s just that every single one of us has a family now, and there’s all kinds of stuff that has taken priority. But we’ve been making music, believe it or not, all the way through this. So when it came time to say, ‘Okay, it’s time to put a record out’ — it’s a very democratic process — we all sat down and said, ‘Okay. Let’s look at this list of songs and what are our favorites and should we work on. And let’s just go one by one.’ And we’re finally almost done.”
“Sometimes you’ll deliver a record and you might not get the support that you’re looking for,” he explained. “There’s a million reasons why a song hits or it doesn’t hit. But I’ve got a really great feeling about our team now. And it’s so strange to say at this point in my career. It’s, like, oh, okay, this is a very, very strong record. I think it’s going to surprise a lot of people, just because you go, ‘Okay, these guys have been around for a minute,’ and you can tell that we still care a lot. And it doesn’t matter what I say. You’ve just gotta listen to the record and go, like, ‘Oh, okay. I get it.’ It’s not just a slapdash pile of songs. We’re still pretending like we’re 17 and this is the most important thing in the world.”
Finger Eleven’s “Adrenaline” was one of the most added rock tracks in the U.S. In Canada, it went to #1 for two weeks straight.
Is there another Canadian rock band you’re anticipating a new album from? Finger Eleven has got-to-be a front runner for the most anticipated!
