Underoath‘s Spencer Chamberlain and Aaron Gillespie open up on the making of their newest album ‘The Place After This One’, set for launch on March 28 by way of MNRK Heavy.
Plus, we have now teamed up with the band to deliver you this world unique purple and gold vinyl of the album, restricted to only 150 copies.
Obtainable for supply worldwide, order yours now at SHOP.ROCKSOUND.TV
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“Have you ever guys seen ‘A Full Unknown’?”
Aaron Gillespie posing this query to his bandmate Spencer Chamberlain and Rock Sound could appear a bit out of pocket on the floor when discussing Underøath‘s new album ‘The Place After This One’. However for these, like Rock Sound, who’ve seen Timothée Chalamet’s unbelievable portrayal of Bob Dylan‘s early years of success, it makes good sense.
The movie focuses on Dylan in the course of the 60s, changing into the brand new face of people music in an America at a time of big change while additionally endeavouring to not be pinned down by a specific anticipated sound. It culminates in his notorious efficiency on the Newport Folks Competition in 1965, the place moderately than taking to the stage with simply his acoustic and harmonica, he and his band plugged in and rattled by means of 4 songs totally electrical from his then-upcoming album ‘Freeway 61 Revisited’, sending shockwaves by means of the gang earlier than them and the organisers who had begged him to not.
For Aaron, with the best way Underøath has grown through the years – the successes, the expectations, the fallouts, the reunions – he sees a lot of how his band approaches the creation of artwork in what Dylan did that day.
“We’ve at all times been towing that highway slightly bit. We now have at all times made the album that’s slightly scary. Dylan needed to make that file, and he needed to exit and carry out it at an acoustic-only pageant and nearly get carried off the stage. That’s the place we reside, too.”
“You simply carry on making music that you just care about,” Spencer provides, now clear on the route his good friend was going. “Folks will come and go; you should have good years and unhealthy years. That’s simply life. It’s regular. You simply have to have the ability to journey the wave with the place tradition goes, and that’s what we have now at all times strived to do.”
A lot of that’s mirrored in how ‘The Place After This One’ seems like nobody else however Underøath. It’s frantic, bludgeoning, fascinating, weak, bizarre, and, greater than something, pressing. It’s exactly what some folks will wish to hear from the band. It’s additionally completely nothing like what others need them to be, and that’s a fucking unbelievable place to be over twenty years into your profession. Unafraid and unbridled, it’s a file that they may solely make proper right here and proper now, they usually couldn’t be prouder to have reached this place.
“We solely know easy methods to do issues a sure manner, and that manner is our manner,” Aaron smiles. “What which means is that we make regardless of the fuck we wish. If it is smart to folks, that’s a blessing; if it doesn’t, that’s okay, too. However I do assume doing issues that manner is the rationale we’re nonetheless right here.”
To uncover extra about their practices, Rock Sound chatted by means of each facet of ‘The Place After This One’ with the pair and found what it means to easily not give a fuck.
THE SOUND
There are moments on ‘The Place After This One’ that sound like a panic assault, just like the guttural chaos that holds opener ‘Technology No Give up’ in place. There are others that ship shivers coursing up your backbone just like the heavy-hitting ‘Survivor’s Guilt’ and events that really feel like a shadowy hand gripping your shoulder, just like the soul-searching grit of ‘Cannibal’. Creating such an intense, intricate and intoxicating compound for what Underøath consider heavy music needs to be in 2025 doesn’t come with out quite a lot of legwork. It additionally comes from every particular person member of the band not really listening to a lot heavy music outdoors of their roles within the band. However the result’s all of the extra fascinating, because the chase of connecting the dots from every of their separate passions, seeing the place the center assembly level will fall, is perpetually extra thrilling than the catch.
“The rationale Underøath works is as a result of the best way Tim would have performed a music is completely different from how I might have performed a music,” Spencer explains. “That’s additionally completely different from how Aaron would have performed the music, which can also be completely different from how Chris would have performed the music. Everybody’s style is so broad and on the market; this small area that we land on retains Underøath sounding like Underøath and serving to us progress ahead. The longer we do that, the extra our tastes change and the extra we discover ways to push and pull one another.”
It’s asking one another continually, “What can we wish to hear once we take heed to heavy music?” that retains issues in steadiness. Being a central cog within the scene machine for 2 and a half many years, they’ve seen and heard all of it even once they weren’t strictly on the management board. Watching developments come and go and seeing bands shapeshift to chase the algorithm has seen them endeavouring by no means to fall into the identical traps, even when, at instances, listeners assume they’ve. However seeing how heavy music is having a well-deserved second within the highlight proper now and seeing that the bands on the chopping fringe of the tradition are those crafting their very own lane has solely bolstered Spencer and Aaron’s perception that marching to your personal beat is the one manner.
“Throughout COVID, each rapper was doing pop-punk,” Aaron laughs. “Ten years earlier than that, it was no matter else. Stuff is simply cyclical. Issues simply cycle round, and proper now, it’s heavy music’s time, which is cool. When you, as a band, stick at it, it’ll proceed to go. When you love what you’re doing, you might be okay with that. When you don’t love what you’re doing and also you’re chasing the industrial facet, your fashion will change many times relying on what is occurring. There’s nothing unsuitable with that, nevertheless it’s not for us.”
THE COLLABORATORS
When it got here to manufacturing duties, the band turned to an acquaintance of Aaron within the type of Danen Rector. With the likes of Grayscale, Boys like Ladies and Charlotte Sands in his portfolio, his experience in making an infectious pop hook is evident to see. The classes for the album’s recording with Danen happened in a cabin up within the beautiful environment of the Blue Ridge Mountains, with the contemporary air and pure splendour taking part in an enormous half in making the experiments and sonic expeditions that little bit extra tranquil and grandiose. And although Spencer admits that Danen was good in his function, changing into a sixth band member all through the method, he doesn’t level to his involvement as the principle purpose for issues falling into place like they did. He doesn’t level to the environment they dedicated it to tape, both. These are issues put in place of their pursuit of making one thing that causes goosebumps. Of eager to really feel one thing. However the purpose that they have been in a position to develop that was due to the place that the band have been in as an entire. Collaboration, be that with others or with one another, solely creates gold while you’re in the fitting spot, and that’s the place Underøath are actually.
“Each file we have now performed has been the very best illustration of us at that second in time,” he remarks. “ our profession, the band being in a great place and catching us making that finest illustration of us on the proper time is the place you get issues which can be particular. ‘Outline The Nice Line’ and this album, the rationale they really feel much like me is as a result of we have been in these good spots in our private lives and with one another.”
“I feel that while you’re making music, it ought to put you out of your self slightly bit. It needs to be very important to you. It ought to make you’re feeling one thing,” Aaron provides. “That’s what we try to make, and that’s the place the cabin and Danen is available in. I feel that we actually try to arrange these conditions. For us, that has at all times been the factor. Creating that and doing issues our manner and creating our personal manner. Any music could make you try this.”
THE LYRICS
The truth that the band are in such a great place additionally pertains to how they’re writing lyrics this time round. Throughout each different album course of, they’ve been in the course of the storm moderately than trying again on it. And when the rain is soaking you to the pores and skin, and it looks as if there isn’t any finish in sight, your notion of issues can be completely different. And that has been clear all through the Underøath story.
2004’s ‘They’re Solely Chasing Security’ was a band determining who they needed to be, and 2006’s ‘Outline The Nice Line’ was a inventive response to the strain of what had come earlier than. 2008’s ‘Misplaced In The Sound Of Separation’ noticed them falling aside, and 2010’s ‘Ø (Disambiguation)’ was created off the again of shattering into items. 2018’s ‘Erase Me’ was returning with no concept who they have been anymore, and 2022’s ‘Voyeurist’ was a file made to show some extent. Completely different circumstances at completely different instances however the identical sense of attempting to tread water because the flood swells round them. Being out the opposite aspect has provided a lot needed readability for Spencer and Aaron, they usually know that ‘The Place After This One’ has considerably benefitted from that.
“Each file has been us writing in regards to the shit while we’re nonetheless drowning in it,” Spencer reiterates. “This time, all the things that we’re talking on, we’re doing when we have now returned to shore. We fucking made it, now let’s speak about it. That was a extra stunning spot to put in writing from than I’ve ever been in a position to do.”
“While you’re writing at it from the opposite aspect, you may write about it inside the entire narrative as properly,” Aaron factors out. “You bear in mind the place the storm began and the place it ended and all the things that occurred within the center. I feel that’s an incredible place to put in writing from. It’s a wierd place however stunning songs come out of that.”
Although there are some speedy musings on what every member has skilled the previous few years baked into these songs, the longer view of the storm can also be the main focus right here. The relationships – each private {and professional} – which were shattered and repaired all through these final twenty years. The band’s notion of religion, a component of Underøath that has lengthy outlined them, for higher or for worse, and the way they really feel completely different to the children they have been looking for solace in scripture. Such uncooked vulnerability and honesty within the face of issues they haven’t been in a position to talk about earlier than has additionally allowed Spencer and Aaron to take again possession of their story. Utilizing the readability they now should set the file straight and present that issues are completely different is okay. Change is sweet and expressing that as a lot as doable is vital.
“While you’re nonetheless in the course of that storm, perhaps you’re not able to admit all of it,” Spencer builds. “I feel that’s why this album feels so pissed off. It’s actually fucking offended, and it comes from my thoughts being clear. That’s from not being on medication or being riddled with nervousness or in the course of these fucked up conditions. Now you can go, ‘That was fucked up, fuck that’. It’s the primary time you may say it with an open thoughts.”
“I don’t assume anyone makes artwork with the intention of it to not be heard,” Aaron provides. “However this album, for the primary time in a very long time, us ending it seems like the most important success to me. The issues that it says and the issues that it means, it feels very important. And that’s the place the success lies.”
THE TITLE AND ARTWORK
Regardless of approaching issues with that clearer thoughts, that doesn’t make going over such uncooked topics any simpler. It doesn’t make taking a look at what comes subsequent any clearer, both. You simply should set your self alight and run into the unknown, hoping that one thing past all this can extinguish you.
That’s the place the title of this assortment comes into play. The world doesn’t cease spinning simply due to what you’re going by means of. Life doesn’t decelerate to present you an opportunity to rise up to hurry. So, you must have religion that no matter is across the nook is there. The Underøath story boils all the way down to continually feeling like there was one thing nonetheless to return by means of each excessive and each low. So having ‘The Place After This One’ umbrella these aggressive, angular, audacious songs feels becoming. The exorcisms and expressions that happen on all of it filter again round to the idea that there’s something nonetheless to return. In fact, there is a component of existentialism to that, the heaven and hell, which is mirrored within the discussions of religion inside these songs, however greater than something, it’s the place we’re on this mortal plain.
“We’ve been a band a very long time,” Aaron muses. “We’ve made quite a lot of stuff, we’ve made quite a lot of errors, we’ve had quite a lot of successes, and it’s all from asking, ‘What’s subsequent’? And are we okay hanging on for that journey? For a very long time, it was asking, ‘Why aren’t we like this? Why aren’t we this band? Why not us?’ For the primary time in our profession, I don’t give a shit about any of that. After we get on stage, I do know what we do and what it’ll really feel like. It’s at all times going to be particular as a result of it’s us.”
THE FUTURE
The final body of ‘A Full Unknown’ is a straightforward however efficient one. It’s Dylan on his bike, driving to God is aware of the place and slowing however absolutely getting sooner, his give attention to no matter is forward of him unwavering. The fact is that after the film’s occasions, ‘Freeway 61 Revisited’ grew to become one of the crucial influential and best-selling albums of all time. However in that second, of letting the wind circulate by means of his hair as he rides into regardless of the world has for him, freedom is all on his thoughts.
Now, Aaron is certain to reiterate that he’s not evaluating what Underøath have performed and can do to the profession of Bob Dylan, however that freedom and that pleasure of not realizing what’s coming subsequent is one thing that basically lingers inside him about the place the band discover themselves now. It’s thrilling however scary, gratifying however traumatic. Greater than something, it’s human, and after driving the wave, each ebb and circulate, for so long as they’ve, to have that feeling at their disposal is a present that can’t be purchased. Greater than that, Underøath really feel part of a motion as soon as extra. A member of a bunch of bands which can be doing issues the best way that they see match. And the extra bands that be part of them, the stronger this scene will develop into.
“You will have all these bands swinging again by means of and doing one thing completely different,” Aaron smiles. “Bands are doing issues I’ve by no means heard earlier than, and persons are doing regardless of the fuck they need once more. And we’ll miss with information and miss with songs, however then we win once more, and that’s what we’ll carry on doing.”
“You do what’s best for you,” Spencer provides in conclusion. “That’s the place the most important successes are. You’ll be able to’t have an explosion into an entire new world and mind-set with out pushing in that manner.”
