Last November, Three Days Grace released ‘Mayday’, their first single since the return of original singer Adam Gontier. You’ll remember Gontier left the band in 2013 – now, Gontier is again part of the lineup with singer Matt Walst, who has fronted the band for more than a decade.
Drummer Neil Sanderson recently was a guest of The Metal Voice and talked about how the two-singer arrangement happened, “First and foremost, we’re a family. We all grew up together in a small town, and so Matt, who came in 2013 to replace Adam, he’s been in the band for, yeah, 12 years now. But he’s Brad, our bass player’s younger brother. So he was around as a kid when we were first just jamming in basements and trying to figure out our sound as we were teenagers, and he wasn’t even a teenager. And so for him to come in was just a very natural fit. And then, as time progressed on, we just started having open conversations, which is the notion of, like, what would this be if we joined forces and we become a five-piece? And it creates a completely new dimension and facet for the sound of Three Days Grace and our ability to artistically branch off into just different things that we can do with having two voices that are uniquely different, but come together in such a powerful way. So it feels like we’ve kind of come full circle and we’ve closed this loop. And it’s just fate, I guess, that we’re all seeing eye to eye now and the band sounds bigger than ever. And, yeah, it’s a great time to just see it all come into one full force moving forward.”
Regarding the musical direction of the upcoming Three Days Grace album and how “Mayday” fits into that, Neil said: “It’s definitely dynamic. ‘Mayday’ was a song that we — I guess we were pulling some inspiration from our (2006) record ‘One-X’ with songs like ‘Animal I Have Become’ and things like that, where it’s a really driving-force song. The lyrics are really a social commentary about how sometimes you feel in life that you’re like hurling at just warp speed through time and space and you don’t quite know who’s at the wheel… It feels like everything can be in fast forward and sensory overload, which isn’t always healthy for the human brain. And basically just making the decision whether you’re gonna swim against the current or whether you’re gonna fall in line with other people, and making those choices on a daily basis. So that’s what that song’s about. The rest of the record, we have a lot of really heavy moments. We do love sort of down tempo heaviness. I mean, we listen to a lot of Pantera and stuff like that, and that is contrasted with some songs that I think are really going to bring out the emotion, because they’re emotional to us. And I think that’s the strongest connection with Three Days Grace and our fans, is that we’re writing from the heart and from the gut and deep down in the psyche and putting it out into song. And when people can relate to that and see their own lives in that music, then that’s the most powerful thing you can have as an artist. So there’s a lot of that where we stay true to ourselves and we’re not afraid to write about the real deep down stuff. And that seems to always resonate with our fans because it’s coming from a real place.”
As for when you can expect the album? “It’s looking like we’re gonna be releasing it in June. We’re just putting the final touches on it… We’re past the recording stage. We’re doing some mixing right now and just doing some finessing, just kind of going over [everything]. Some of the times we’ll go back to it and just see like what we can mute, what we can remove. Sometimes that’s an exercise in making a record that’s good because sometimes you just have too much stuff in there and more isn’t always better. So we kind of go through, at this process, and just make sure that every part in there is deliberate and is there for a reason and is making the song better. If not, it’s gone.”
Three Days Grace played their first full show with Gontier in 12 years on February 25, opening up for Disturbed on the U.S. leg of “The Sickness 25th Anniversary Tour” at Ford Idaho Center Arena in Nampa, Idaho.
Gontier was recently interview on Nik Nocturnal and talked about being back in the band, “Well, I think more excitement than anything, man. ‘Cause it’s just been so long. And it just felt like the right time — it felt like the right time for everybody. So, yeah, just excitement and kind of ready to go. It took a little while to connect with the guys and do a couple shows together, a couple things, but, yeah — just more excitement than anything, and definitely some nostalgia, obviously. But, yeah, I think everybody’s really, really excited about this next chapter. It’s gonna be quite the year, I think.”
And cool to hear how Adam and Matt are dividing vocal duties, “Yeah, that’s what we’ve been doing. I mean, we’re all sort of writing the new stuff together, so we’ve been sitting in a room together, coming up with all this material and stuff… We’re in a room together and coming up with all that stuff… But yeah, I think the recording of vocals, who’s gonna sing what and where, it’s come pretty natural. There’s certain parts that we both now know, like, ‘It might make more sense for me to sing this part or you to sing this part.’ And at the same time, working with a couple of different producers on stuff, we did get some guys that would have some good input and just a good idea of what to do with two singers, ’cause it hasn’t really been done before — not in this world. So we wanna make sure we’re doing it right. So getting an outside point of view from a producer or something to put his two cents on where the guys should go and that sort of thing, that’s helped out a lot too. But, yeah, in general, it’s been pretty seamless. The whole thing has been really easy to navigate through.”
Of course, Gontier is still a member of Saint Asonia. That band hasn’t disbanded (and features Staind guitarist/founding member Mike Mushok, Adam’s cousin Cale Gontier (bass) and Cody Watkins (drums)). With Three Days Grace firing on all cylinders, who knows when you’ll hear a new album from Saint Asonia.
New Three Days Grace with Matt AND Adam singing?! I can’t think of a more-anticipated rock record. Can you?
