The Record Company - Play Loud
After a long year and half away from touring, Los Angeles-based The Record Company are ready to turn up the volume and rock out. The band marks its return to the road October 10 at Turner Hall Ballroom in support of their latest album Play Loud. For singer Chris Vos, it’s fitting that the band will start the tour in Milwaukee—his former home—and end in his current home.
“As you can imagine it's a little poetic for me. I start it at home, and I end it at home,” says Vos. “And it kind of mirrors what my dream was. I always wanted to do what I'm doing right now and to be able to come back home and start this tour in Milwaukee at Turner, and then go on the whole tour and end it where I’m living now in Los Angeles, the irony is not lost on me.”
In some ways, Vos still considers himself a local musician. “I’m in a band that tours all over the place, but in my head I still kind of refer to myself as a local musician,” he says.
New Experiences
At the same time, Vos has turned into a seasoned, more confident touring musician since moving to L.A. nearly 11 years ago. The Record Company’s third album Play Loud, is proof. Rather than stay put firmly in the blues rock path taken on their previous albums, Vos and his bandmates decided to “throw the book out the window and just open ourselves up to some new experiences.”
That included working with a producer for the first time in veteran producer David Sardy and co-writing with outside collaborators for the first time. It aided the band’s quest to expand its sonic palate.
“[David] really had a hands-on, very passionate force, to make sure that we were putting the best songs and the best performances we could, on the record,” says Vos. “And he was great at helping us find new territory, so we didn’t go into it being like, ‘Oh, we're a three-piece, everything’s got to translate.’
“We went into do it like, ‘We're going to write the best songs we can and put everything we want on these songs and do what we want with them and then we'll deal with it later.’ And so, how we've dealt with it is, now we have two other guys that we’re bringing with us on the road, a keyboard player and an extra guitar player/bass player. Alex, our bass player, will play some guitar at times too and the other guy will play bass and then they'll switch. So, it’s been great, it was a real growth songwriting wise, sound wise.”
Prior to the band’s performance, the Shepherd Express caught up with Vos recently to talk about the new album and his Milwaukee roots.
How have you kept busy the past year?
At the end of 2019, we ended with a New Year's Eve show and then we were going to take a couple of months to finish writing and then record the record. What ended up happening was ... Well, we all know what happened. When everything got thrown off, instead of going back on the road in March or April, everything got held up for a little while, so we had more time to write and then we ended up going into a record with Dave and it was an excellent experience.
And then after that, we kind of sat around after we had the record done, so we were looking for things to do, so we started just messing around with some covers. So, we did a little thing, we called the Side Project EP, we had released it earlier this year, which was our takes on some things, not trying to replicate any sounds that we had on any of these covers. We picked kind of hot ball ones or re-imagined some stuff; it didn't really have a set agenda. It just kept our creative juices flowing and gave people some music to listen to until we could start putting out the singles from Play Loud.
How has the time off affected your songwriting?
I think that it really expanded what I knew. Just speaking personally, it expanded a lot about what I knew about myself as a person. Because from 14 years old on, I started playing in bands and being loud with loud amplifiers with a drummer next to me right away because my brother was a drummer. So, when we had to go into lockdown, it kind of took all that away.
So, it was a really great opportunity to just do some work on, kind of go back to being a kid, sitting on the edge of your bed, just wanting to get better at what you do and all the other distractions o ... Not distractions, but all the other things that are usually going on, none of them were going on. So, it just became solely about music.
So, I ended up really getting deeper into that, polishing up on songwriting, playing, singing, everything about it, just really just going in. And then just like a personal health way, I got into running. I had all this energy because I usually burn all that off playing live music, so got into running, got into meditation, exercise, trying to eat right. There were some good things about it, but obviously we'd much rather be just like everybody else, doing what we love. So, I'm glad to be back to having some ability to get out there.
Alex told me recently that the documentary on the making of U2’s Achtung Baby was a big influence on the band expanding its sound on this album. How do you think it was important?
We’re all obsessed with documentaries, especially ones about people making albums. There's so much to learn to just see what kind of mindset bands get in and you find out that everybody, no matter whether they're just starting out or they've been going for a while, in the end, whether it's going easy or not, the thing that everybody's searching for is that next song.
It’s always interesting to see how bands will try to find new ways to bring those songs out from each other. And their sounds, expanding your sounds, trying some things, trying to challenge yourself and hopefully you want to always have your listeners enjoy, your fan base enjoy what you do. But you also want to not make the same record over and over and over, you want to keep evolving. So that, I think, is one of the lessons we learned watching stuff like that, for sure.
What were some examples of new sounds that the band experimented with that really surprised you?
We had every keyboard on earth going, we really were messing around with that. The effects room that Dave has, he has this great amp room and you're just kind of hardwired into it so once the beds are laid, you can just lay ornamental, melodic phrasing over what you're doing.
Some songs I’m screaming through a megaphone kind of thing, some song it's like you're playing, one of the guitars we played on one of the tracks was an Epiphone Casino that he had gotten from Noel Gallagher. So, it was weird to play a guitar that Noel Gallagher had played and said, “This is a great guitar.” We use that guitar all over the record because we're huge Oasis fans, so it was interesting to record.
Dave doesn't do anything just to do it. But if he’s hearing some crazy sound in his head, he'll do something crazy like plug in a boom box and have you record through the little mic, record your acoustic through the little mic on some old ‘80s boom box and go to straight into the board. And it sounds all janky and raw and cool and there's no other way to get that sound. We played around with a lot of different keyboards, synthesizers, pianos, different sorts of percussion, guitars, all sorts of guitars we were playing.
I didn't use one of my own guitars on this record, intentionally, because I really wanted to just go for different sounds. Alex played a lot of guitar on the record. His style and my style are completely different but the same, they're attached to the same roots, but he goes one way and I go another. So, it was really fun to play around with hearing what his fingers sounded like doing the parts and he wrote a lot of great stuff for the record. So, you're in there and Dave's twisting effects knobs while you're playing and blasting through the speakers.
It was a lot of fun. It’s one thing to horse around but when you're seeking a great sound and then you find the crazy sound you’re looking for by just doing wild experimentation, that's a really rewarding sensation. And we were fortunate enough to be working with a guy who knew how to find that stuff that would otherwise have been elusive or not exist.
The band worked with outside songwriters for the first time. What was that experience like?
It was funny because we were resistant to the idea at first. It’s like you're your own little bubble, but then our manager, Ken Levitan, said to us, “Look guys, you go into the room and you either jive or you don't.”
What was fun was, it was just like if you’re having a great conversation with a lot of good friends and then all of a sudden somebody else steps in and they have a lot of interesting things that they bring to the conversation, and it just makes the whole experience fresh and better and fun.
And we worked with a bunch of people, just trying things out and it was just the conversations that went out are the ones that where you really relate to the person. We had a great artist in Shungudzo, she brought a perspective and we just kept asking, “Hey, do you want to come over and work on some stuff?” And she just had a great way about her and we've never written that way before.
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And then, we wrote with Sam Hollander and Kevin Griffin, Kevin used to be in a band called Better Than Ezra. We only did one day with those guys and ended up coming out with one of my favorite songs on the record, “How High.” And it's like being in a band, you just have band practice but there's a new face in the room and you're throwing stuff around.
So, it kind of broke down the stigma of it to me. Because you’re not in there like at some factory pressing out songs, you’re bringing experienced people who are really good at what they do, in your little room. And in the end as a band, it's your decision what you like and don’t like. In the end, you’re responsible for that, so if you don't like something, you don’t do it. But if somebody flips the switch, you chase it and that feels great.
So, it was definitely a great experience. I’d encourage anybody to try it, it’s an interesting thing to do. At the very worst, you’re just going to meet a really interesting person and at the very best, you’re going to come out with a song that might be a whole different thing than you would have otherwise been able to conceive of on your own.
So, it was great, just like working with Dave, when you bring great people into your atmosphere that are talented, they up your game. It was super fun, and we'll do it again. It made it very refreshing, when you've been writing, just three guys for years and years and years and years, and then all of a sudden you bring in that other person. And then there’s still songs on the record that we did the old-fashioned way, the three of us. But just leave any option open, that was the beauty of it.
Can you talk a little more about how “How High” developed through collaboration?
We did that with Sam Hollander and Kevin Griffin in one afternoon and then we wrote the melodies and good part of the lyrics. And then kind of went away from there and Alex came up with a great baseline and Dave Sardy wrote a lot, he was always writing on everything we did. If he felt like a chorus, if a lyric, he didn’t understand or didn’t dig it or if he had chords or an idea or a drum beat or something, we wrote some songs with him that were great. He helped us on “How High.”
“How High” was definitely a song that a lot of people stuck their hand in there to try and get that thing to be what it is. So, we really were stoked with how it turned out.
I like how “Paradise” is followed in the track listing by “Awake.” Alex had mentioned in the press material something about dreams with “Paradise,” so it’s interesting correlation between the two songs.
With “Paradise,” it’s just a dream. Paradise is kind of that thing you chase, that's kind of an illusion … Let’s say you have a goal or a dream, you say, “I want to do this. I want to accomplish this and that's my dream.” Well, when you get to that point, if you do accomplish something and you're satisfied with it, then what? Right?
And then what you start to realize is, what really matters is what we’re taught most of us as youngsters, which is be good within yourself and your experience, wherever you end up, will be better. And it’s like, if you're chasing something that’s outside of you, thinking that that is going to bring you completion, in my experience, you’re missing the whole trail that brings you to the experience.
The trail is what gives you the experiences that stick with you and when you cross the line of like, “Oh, I’ve just done something I never thought I could do.” If you get there and your only reason was to be there, it goes past pretty quick and then you're left with this feeling of, “What did this mean?”
But if you have a solid anchor inside that says, “I’m at peace inside myself, this paradise is more paintable.” If you're taking a positive and open-minded approach in life, I think is what we were thinking about. And then the song “Awake” was kind of the same thing. It's like you’re coming out of this haze and you're realizing that you’re seeing things differently, you're coming around to new experiences. So, everything’s done with something in mind.
“Awake” seems pretty relevant considering the past year with people realizing what's important in life.
Yeah. That’s kind of the thing, there are certain needs we all have, they deserve attention, and they deserve to be honored. And meaning family, friends, the things we love, the things we value, community, being together. These are things that are really important.
And for me, that was really reinforced through the whole experience of COVID. Especially since I was in Los Angeles and having grown up in Wisconsin, I couldn’t see anybody for a long time. So, it was interesting, we'd do our little Zoom, family Zoom every week, that was the only way to talk to people. And it was a real oasis to have, in that really unsure time to have a couple anchors of knowing it's like, “Oh, here’s the person that I really care about that I’m talking to now.” And we get to speak longer than normal because after this conversation, there’s really nothing else I can do, except for go practice my guitar or whatever.
It’s about a decade or so since you moved out west.
Yeah, 11 years. It's home, Wisconsin's always home too. I actually currently am in Wisconsin right now at my parents' farm, just helping around here and doing some stuff around here and then I'll be going back in a little bit here, like a day or two.
Milwaukee still seems to be important to you.
Oh, I love it, I went crazy when the Bucks won the championship, I went crazy. I thought it was amazing.
I spent the majority of my life in Wisconsin, experiences I’ve had here, I carry with me everywhere and it informs a lot of who I am on a daily basis. There's just some grassroots stuff in my heart that just comes from being in Wisconsin, be it the lessons I learned in my youth about work and family and being kind to people and also remembering that you, yourself are in fact, not perfect and should always keep in mind the other person and the fact that nobody knows everything. So, I try to be humble that way.
And then what I learned in Milwaukee, the work ethic of the musicians in Milwaukee, they're hardworking people. Everybody that works in Milwaukee, if you're at a restaurant the person serving you your food, more than likely, is doing the best job they can.
Everywhere you go, everybody’s just really working hard. It's just in our blood, it’s in our nature as Wisconsinites to work hard and to be polite, as much as we can be, to each other. I think that's our nature, even though we've all seen it get tested but I think that when we're looking at each other in the eye, we know there's a person there and you want that person to feel comfortable and to be happy. As long as everybody's being respectful, that should be easy to attain. So, Wisconsin is my home and Los Angeles is now my home and I have indeed found that you can have two homes, you can have many homes.
So, it’s been interesting that way too, because there’s a whole thing going on out there, it’s a different scene. But it’s funny, people think very fondly of folks from the Midwest, especially when you’re talking about work ethic and politeness. Because we're just very good people as far as wanting to make sure we're doing a good job and that the other people that we’re around feel comfortable. And that translates anywhere you go in the world, if you're a hard worker you're going to do better, no matter where you are.
So, I’m glad and proud and I say it all the time, everybody knows I'm from Wisconsin, I say it all the time. If you meet me and you've never met me before, I guarantee you that within the first four minutes of the conversation, I'm going to say, “I grew up in Wisconsin on a farm or I lived in Milwaukee for 10, 11 years.” That's going to come up.
