“We were getting ready to go into the studio before the whole world shut down” is a statement that could come from pretty much every band active right now, but for Kevin Bivona and The Interrupters, the pause that the pandemic brought on turned into a reflective moment that would inspire their new album, In The Wild.
“It was really sad to think that concerts had just completely gone away, so we decided we’d make a live album from our earlier tour in Japan so that way, even if there’s no Interrupters concerts for a year, at least there’s something to grab on to,” Bivona says. “And in the process of doing that, we decided to make a mini documentary that went along with the concert film. We were going through old footage of our lives, of us as kids, and you know, we’re always writing, but the songs that we’d been writing became an autobiographical thing for Aimee where she had this collection of songs that were stories from her life. She’d never really done that on an Interrupters record before, we always kind of spoke more generally, third person, but this was a lot of first-person, very personal stuff.”
With a bunch of songs written and inspiration flowing, what’s a band to do in the midst of a global pandemic when all the studios are off-limits? They build their own. “We built (the studio) in our backyard. We just had a little practice room, 10 feet by 20 feet, and as soon as we figured out the world’s not going back to normal anytime soon, we need to have a place we can record music, we built that place in our backyard.”
In their own COVID-secure bubble, and working to their own schedule, the band were able to find the big picture concept they needed for the album.
“We had so many ideas, but the collection of songs that everyone was most excited about were these very personal songs from Aimee’s life, like ‘In The Mirror’ and ‘Anything Was Better.’” And that kind of became the anchor for the whole album.” Bivona reflects. “It made it really easy with all of the song ideas to be like let’s save that one for later, let’s not do that one right now. Let’s just stick to these ones that are really close to her heart, close to all of our hearts.”
And (because) we recorded at home, if Aimee wanted to do vocals at three in the morning, it’s a four second walk to our backyard. And she did do vocals at three in the morning. We were able to stay very close because we were in our own little bubble. There isn’t any other time we’ve made a record at a studio like that.”
For In The Wild, Aimee was able to look at her life as an open book, finding catharsis in closing chapters each time she finished a song. And for Kevin, as not just her bandmate but husband too, it was a rewarding experience to witness her putting such vulnerable parts of herself into words. “The whole world doesn’t know her story the way I know it, so watching her finally be ready to put these ideas out there and just be really vulnerable in that way was so rewarding for me to watch as a fan of her as an artist.”
“I am constantly in awe of her strength and vulnerability throughout life. Once you get to know someone and you’re like, okay, this is an area we don’t go, and then you see them break those barriers down and go into those areas, it’s inspiring.”
Kevin was a producer on the album, as well as writer, guitarist, and vocalist, but none of those roles mean anything if he’s not holding up his role as brother and husband. “It’s everything about our band being a family and being as tight knit as we are, that type of energy makes all of us want to be better performers, better musicians, better songwriters, better people to each other. (For the) writing and recording process, we’ve never been so close. Everyone really put a lot of heart and soul into the whole process,” Bivona reminisces.
“We kind of all agreed this is our fourth album, let’s go places we’ve never gone before. If we don’t do it now, when are we going to, what are we waiting for? Nothing is promised. We had this realization that we can lose this at any moment, so let’s just put everything we have in us into this album and into the future of this band.”
Putting their heart and soul into the record meant allowing the songs to guide their own direction, and Kevin says the band were the most open-minded they’ve ever been. “One of the first songs that was written was “Alien,” which is the ballad at the end of the record. There’s no guitar on that song at all, which is funny because we’re a guitar band and we’re a punk rock band, but that song wanted to be what it became.”
“With the places Aimee went lyrically we just followed along and it was because of that we found ourselves pushing into other musical areas that we haven’t gone before, but it still feels like us. I never felt like we were stretching it so much that it was uncomfortable. We’re only going into places that felt right and felt natural.”
That family feel extends into every aspect of the band’s career and may well be the key to their tremendous success. “We have to be able to trust each other. There’s no one person in the band that dictates everything. It’s all about being able to coexist and bring out the best in each other and help people in the places where maybe they’re not strongest and then accept their help in places where maybe you’re not the strongest,” Bivona says.
“If we’re not happy as people and our relationships aren’t there, the music’s not going to be good; the tour isn’t going to be fun. We always try to surround ourselves with people that we love and keep them as long as we can. We’ve had the same managers, been on the same label, we’ve been with the same booking agent, our crew that we tour with, forever. We try to just stick with the people we love and approach every situation like family, and then everything else just falls into place.”
Being one of the biggest supporters of The Interrupters, Tim Armstrong has appeared on each of the band’s album since their 2014 debut. They’ve played together a lot over the years but playing as part of an Operation Ivy reunion wasn’t something Kevin ever imagined.
“It was a pretty surreal moment. We got asked if we would backup members of The Specials, and it didn’t really hit us until we got into band practice with Terry Hall and Horace Panter. It was incredible,” he gushes.
“Jesse Michaels is also friends with the people that put on the Rock n’ Roll Carnival, and still very close with Tim. We got up there and did “Sound System” and we’ve been covering that song in The Interrupters for years but hearing his vocals and having Tim during the bridge, it was like an out-of-body experience. We were so lucky to be involved in all of that.”
Tim Armstrong isn’t the only genre great the band collaborated with on In The Wild though. ““As We Live” was a song that Tim kind of brought to us, and it had such a great two-tone energy so we asked Rhoda Dakar from The Bodysnatchers to be on it. It’s great because it’s three generations of ska, you have the two-tone era, the 90s third-wave era, and this newer era,” Bivona says.
“And then we have “Burdens,” bringing in Hepcat. We just always heard their voices on it. Their harmonies were so great, their energy in the studio was incredible. They were having such a great time, and they brought this brightness to the track. We were just smiling ear to ear the whole time they were singing.
“And The Skints are a band we always wanted to collaborate with. We had this song that just felt like would be a great collaboration with them. They were in London, so we sent it to them. And then they did some parts and sent it back it was really fun because we’ve never done anything like that before where we were sending stuff back and forth.
“Like I said, [it’s about] surrounding yourselves with the people you trust and having them lend an ear and lend their abilities and talents, so we know that we’re doing the best we can with everything we’re doing. I love everybody involved on this whole record and I can’t wait for it to come out for the world to hear.”
When the album does come out, Kevin says it not the band’s anymore, it belongs to the fans.
”The more Aimee has opened up in this band and told personal stories, even from back on our first record with a song like “Easy On You” to our second record, with a song like “Turntable” to our third record with “Titleholder” and “Gave You “Everything,” people are always reaching out to her saying, ‘This song helped me through a hard time.’ Anytime anybody comes up to us and says our record helped them with anything, that’s exactly what music has always done for all of us. If you could put on this record and you’re having a party, and you’re just wanting music to have a good time, that’s great. If you’re having a hard day and you can put on this record, and it can help you. Anything this record could do — if you’re trying to keep the door open because there’s a nice breeze and you just want to use the vinyl to prop the door — whatever you could use this record for that will make your day better, we would be so grateful to hear about it. And that’s it.”
And the day it comes out, August 5, it’s not ours anymore, it’s everybody’s. And that’s how we feel playing these shows, it’s everybody together, having a shared experience of celebrating music and forgetting about all the other stuff that’s going on in the world and just really sharing a beautiful, genuine moment, and hopefully listening to this record will be very similar to that.”
And in case you’re wondering what the future looks like for The Interrupters, just look at the album title. “It’s been really fun playing shows again. We’re really excited to go back to Europe and to go back to the U.K. I’m really excited about playing the new songs,” Kevin says. “We haven’t put out a full-length album for years, it’s going to be so fun to put new songs in the set, and just see how it feels, I’m really excited about that. Going as many places as possible, because we were locked in our house for years and I want to go see the world and play some music.”
Watch the video for “In The Mirror” here:
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Photo courtesy of Erica Lauren
