Underoath

2010 has been an interesting year for Underoath. After two critically acclaimed albums, drummer and clean vocalist Aaron Gillespie parted ways with the band. However, the band hasn’t missed a beat, recording a new album and landing on one of the summer’s biggest tours with As I Lay Dying. On the Los Angeles stop, we talked with keyboardist Chris Dudley about Aaron’s departure and the new album.

Jerry@RRR: Let’s get some of the formalities out of the way first. Could you please introduce yourself and your position in the band?

Chris Dudley: My name is Christopher Dudley and I play keyboards in Underoath.

Jerry@RRR: Welcome back to LA! How does it feel to be back?

Chris Dudley: It’s good so far. We had a pretty bad experience with this restaurant down the street called The Waffle. Have you ever seen that place?

Jerry@RRR: No I have not.

Chris Dudley: It’s like a block from here. I woke up today and I’m like, “Man, I’m in LA the weather is awesome. I’m going to take a shower and go get some breakfast. Then, tackle the day.” I took a shower then we walked down there to get some breakfast. Our interviews started at 1:30. We got there and ordered our food, like eggs and hash browns. A half hour went by and we didn’t have our food. Forty-five minutes and then an hour we didn’t have our food. About an hour and ten minutes after we ordered, we still hadn’t gotten our eggs. We just left because we had start doing our interviews. That was the only negative thing that has happened today which is awesome. Don’t go to The Waffle; it’s a very bad place to eat.

Jerry@RRR: For about the past month or so, you have been on The Cool Tour. How has that been so far?

Chris Dudley: It’s been great. We started about three weeks ago. All the shows have been awesome honestly. There hasn’t been a show where it hasn’t been great. We have not toured with any band on this tour except for The Architects. We got to meet a lot of new people. But like Between The Buried And Me and As I Lay Dying, we have known them for a really long time but just never been on the road with them. So that’s been fun, actually be on the road with dudes that we know that we have not gotten to hang out with a lot. It has been cool.

Jerry@RRR: There are a lot of prominent bands on this bill. How did the tour come about?

Chris Dudley: No idea. We got a call saying, “Hey there is this tour going on. It’s going to be As I Lay Dying, Between The Buried And Me and then a couple of other bands. Do you want to do it?” We said sure. As far as we know, that is as far as it went. Our agent Tim is the one who put it together. Our record is coming out later this year, so we are way at the end of our record cycle. For us to headline right now would be hard, but since As I Lay Dying’s record just came out, they are headlining and we are direct support. It works out really well for us. 

Jerry@RRR: One of biggest news of 2010 was Aaron Gillespie’s departure from the band. Could you shed more light on the decision? Was it a long time coming or a spontaneous decision?

Chris Dudley: It was definitely a long time coming. Obviously, we had been in a band with him forever, but musically it had become increasingly harder to write with him. As a lot of people know, he has pop-rock tendencies and that was not where we were going with the music. There was that, but there were personal things and what not. He’s not going to leave the band because he does not like a song or something. He is doing another solo record right now. All in all, Aaron leaving was really beneficial for everyone involved. I was talking to him the other day and he said he was saying that he was working on his record and everything. It is so awesome because for a long time it had been—in a lot of ways—the five of us on one page and then him on another musically and in other ways. With him leaving, he is able to write the music he wants to write and work on his own, which he wanted to do for a long time. For us, it was awesome because when Daniel joined, he was on the exact same page as we are, as a person and musically. Aaron actually heard the record a little bit ago and he thought it was awesome and could not believe we had done it. I’m sure when his stuff comes out it is going to be awesome. All in all, for everyone, it was really good.

Jerry@RRR: When you came to the realization that Aaron would no longer be in the band, what was your initial reaction?

Chris Dudley: It is weird. The initial reaction is not necessarily the correct one per se. When we realized he wasn’t going to be doing it anymore, we were on tour at the time. There was a lot of emotion flying around. Guys were pissed about some things and sad about others. The five of us we all went and talked. It was probably a good three hours or so that we were at a gas station talking amongst ourselves, trying to get through stuff. Through all the emotions and all the things that wanted to be said, we just realized the most mature thing would be just to go to Aaron and say, “We think that this is the best thing. We’ll finish this tour out and when it is done that will be it.” That is what we did. We played the last five shows on that tour went home. That’s pretty much it. We didn’t really know what we were going to do after that. It was all up in the air. We thought about Daniel and called him up. Surprisingly to us, he was on board with it. We were really stoked.

Jerry@RRR: How did Daniel’s inclusion in the band come about? Have you known him for a while?

Chris Dudley: We had known him for a long time. I met him back in 2001. I’ve known him for almost a decade now. We used to tour a lot with his old band back in the day and we’ve tour with him quite a bit. He was always an awesome dude and obviously he’s a really good drummer. We honestly did not know if he would be interested in doing it because at the time he was playing a band called Colour Revolt, which is this really good band and one of his favorite ones. He is also managing two bands and stuff. We were like, “Man, he’s got a lot on his plate. To ask him to do this as a full time thing, we don’t even think he would want to do it.” But, we felt that we should ask him anyway because we wanted him to do it. We pretty much called him up and were like, “Hey do you want to do this?” and he was like super into the idea. We didn’t ask him to be in the band. We were just like, “Hey do you want to come down and practice with us and see how stuff goes?” From the first thirty to forty-five minutes of the first practice we had with him, we were working on new material, which was crazy. He was really in sync with us as far as the music that we wanted to do. He was like, “I have this idea of doing this and this” and it was exactly what we wanted. There was a lot of good collaboration going on.

Jerry@RRR: When playing songs from the older records live, how are the clean vocals divvied up?

Chris Dudley: Spencer is doing most of it. The stuff him and Aaron would overlap on Tim is doing. Daniel does not have much of a singing voice [Laughs] but nor do I.

Jerry@RRR: As long as he keeps time right?

Chris Dudley: He’s a ridiculous drummer. It’s just that he does not sing. It’s not a big deal because with the new stuff, Spencer is doing all the vocals so that is not really going to be a problem from here on. With the old stuff, Tim and Spencer handle it perfectly.

Jerry@RRR: With Aaron gone, you are the longest tenured member of the band. What has it been like to see so many members come and go?

Chris Dudley: I don’t know. In a lot of ways, I view our band in two ways. There is 2003 to now Underoath and then there is 2003 and the years before that. When we started, we started in 1998, 1999. We were all in high school, just a bunch of dudes hanging out. From 2000 until 2002, 2003, that was a really big growing period for all of us because we were going from mid-teens to late teens and then late teens to early twenties. There was a lot of growing personally that went on there. I do not view it as this band where there is this constant revolving door of members. Because up until 2003, we had so many member changes because it wasn’t a serious band. There was a dude who left who was like, “I don’t feel like doing it anymore.” Another guy wanted to get married. It is funny because nowadays we hear about all the members we had, but back then nobody even knew who we were or cared so it wasn’t a big deal. It was like, “Oh, ok. We’ll just get somebody to play bass or get somebody to play guitar.” But when Dallas left the band and Spencer joined, that was when I feel our identity was solidified. We went from 2003 to a few months ago as the same lineup. So really, I view Aaron leaving as the only significant member change. Because when Dallas left, we weren’t big and no one really saw us or anything. When he left, the kids had come and seen us thought the band was over. We still wanted to play, so we just got someone else to sing. When Spencer joined, that was, in a lot of ways, when our career really started as a band. They’re Only Chasing Safety was the first record we had done with Spencer. That was a catapult in a lot of ways. Then, we did Define The Great Line a couple years later. That was kind of the same thing. Again, I feel that Aaron leaving is the first actual change in the core of this band. From 2003 to now, the six of us including Aaron was who Underoath is. We’ve said this countless times and even Aaron was like, “Before Spencer joined the band, it was dudes trying to figure out what they were going to do with their lives.” But with Aaron leaving, this is the first big change. Musically, there has been a huge change, which is going to be a given since we have a new drummer. And with having a new drummer, we kind of have a new vocalist because this is the first thing Spencer has done that has been his own thing. So, it’s awesome.

Jerry@RRR: It was reported that you finished recording your new album. Could you describe what it sounds like?

Chris Dudley: It’s a lot of fun. I like it a lot. It is always weird for musicians to talk about their music because being a musician and being with a song from when it is just an idea until it is something that is recorded, you can’t really view anything objectively because you are never know what the song is going to sound like the first time you hear it as a whole. You know what I’m saying? We had They’re Only Chasing Safety come out in 2004 and then the record after that was a big jump and a big leap forward for us. I was telling Tim the other day that this record is the biggest jump that we’ve had since then. In a lot of the same ways, it’s this big progression. We’re all very proud of it. The stuff that Daniel did and the stuff that Spencer did in particular were crazy to us, because we didn’t know what to expect. When we started hearing Spencer put the vocals down, we were just like, “Wow. We didn’t even know you could do that.” It is a whole new realm for him. I’m bad at describing our music but the best thing I can say is to listen to it.

Jerry@RRR: You mention that it is a progression. How do you think it compares to you previous work? How would you describe the growth?

Chris Dudley: Honestly, the only way I can describe it is in pointing out the differences between They’re Only Chasing Safety and Define The Great Line. We are not the type of band that will put a record and be like, “Yeah it’s more like this record that we did.” Some bands say that they want to get back to this type of record. We’re the opposite where we don’t want to that again. Define The Great Line and our last record Lost In The Sound [Of Separation] have a similar feel. This record is not that at all. It’s a lot different. I can’t really compare it to something that we’ve done before because to me it’s not like anything we’ve done.

Jerry@RRR: For some fans, there is lingering trepidation about how new material will sound due to Aaron’s departure. What would you say to calm the qualms of said fans?

Chris Dudley: Well, I would come and see is. It has been really encouraging for us because everyone we’ve talked to on this tour is like, “Wow. They didn’t lose a beat or a lot of kids think that it is better now.” We had confidence in Daniel and us. When we first started writing together, the vibe was completely different in the best way possible. There’s even been dudes in bands on this tour that have said, “Wow. We can tell the vibe is a lot more exciting.” I’m not going to talk anyone into liking our band still. Come and see us and that’s it. When the record comes out, listen to it. If you like it, awesome! If not, there’s not much we can do about that.

Jerry@RRR: There have been clips of a new song performed live online. Can you provide some insight into the song, such as a track name? Is it going to make the record?

Chris Dudley: It is definitely on the record. The track name…I don’t know what we can talk about and what we can’t as far as track names and record titles because of record labels and publicists. I can say it is the fourth track on the record. I don’t know what else to say other than that. It’s a fun song to play. I love it.

Jerry@RRR: Do you have any rough ideas for the title of the record?

Chris Dudley: We have a title for record now, but it’s one of those things where I don’t know when we are supposed to say it. We really don’t care that much. We’ll tell anyone. It’s one of things where the label wants you to wait.

Jerry@RRR: In a recent interview, Tim stated the band was shooting for an October release. Are you still on schedule to make this target date?

Chris Dudley: Yes. As of now, we are still shooting for that. We have a meeting with our label coming up. Once that meeting is done, we should have a release date then. We are doing everything we can to put it out in October.

Jerry@RRR: When can we expect a single from the album?

Chris Dudley: [The album] is probably going to come out late October. Maybe in late September have a song online. I don’t know if it is going to be the single, but we are probably going to put something out early because that is what happens now.

Jerry@RRR: Since you’ve been on tour, you must have a great tour story. Feel free to pick the wildest or the craziest one you can think of! We’ve had stories of flashing John McCain’s tour bus. Do you think you can top that?

Chris Dudley: Oh gosh. We don’t have a lot of crazy stories. Are you talking about from this tour?

Jerry@RRR: Any tour.

Chris Dudley: One time, we were out with Darkest Hour and Atreyu. This was back in 2003 or 2004. This was back when all of us were still in vans. We were having these van prank wars going back and forth. One night, Darkest Hour turned our van into a chicken. When we were playing, they got a bunch of maple syrup and a bunch of feather pillows. They doused our van in maple syrup and tore up the pillows and feathered the whole van. It was hilarious. We were just driving around in this maple syrup covered van. As soon as they started playing, we ran outside and jacked their trailer up and took the tires off. We put the trailer up on blocks and chained the tires to the top of the trailer. We got all the nuts and bolts that hold the wheels on and put it in this two gallon concoction that we made. It was all this disgusting stuff like mayonnaise, pee and hot sauce. Anything disgusting you can think of we put in there. There was two gallons of this stuff. We put all the nuts and bolts in there and locked the chain so that the tires were on top. We put the key in there as well. But then, we also bought ten other keys that looked exactly the same and threw all those keys in there too. We put a top on it and put it on top. It was awesome. It was the worst foul smelling thing ever. That was fun.

Jerry@RRR: That’s all the questions I have for you today. Thank you so much for doing this interview. Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Chris Dudley: Yeah no problem. We got a record coming out. If you want to check it out, feel free to. We’re stoked on it.

Who knows where the band goes with their new record. By the way Chris described it, it should definitely be an interesting listen. Keep your eyes peeled here at Review Rinse Repeat for up to date news and look for the currently untitled album to drop in October.