A couple of days ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing a long time friend of mine, Deb, who probably is the only AFI fan who has listened to Crash Love in its entirety.
We didn’t want to make a long interview which would lead us to know facts we already knew. Instead, we asked 8 simple but great questions that she answered.
Many, many thanks to Deb for accepting to do this interview! :)
AFI News HQ: Davey says he believes that this album has a similar energy and ethos at its core as Black Sails In The Sunset. Do you feel this too?
Deb: Crash Love is a very energetic cd.. but it’s very different to Black Sails. One noticeable difference is the lack of aggression. I think this is what alienated a lot of people around the Decemberunderground era. It was that aggression and hopelessness that created a community of like minded people. It seemed that Davey had ‘grown up’ and matured.. and with that came a new outlook on, well, everything. Crash Love is a mature record. It’s passionate and emotional, but that’s as close as it comes to Black Sails. I hope that I haven’t looked too far into the question.. I’m just really excited about this new direction.
HQ: Many people were disappointed with DU and still praise STS and older works. What do you think these people will say about CL?
D: I really do think that people will embrace Crash Love, for the reason that I mentioned above. Decemberunderground was a shock to the system. Everything that we’d ever come to love about AFI seemed to change without warning. Three years has passed, and I think that people that were fans pre-DU have either come to terms with the constant progression, or will simply appreciate a rather passionate [and] honest record.
HQ: Some people have theorized that “Sacrilege” is anti-religious. From what you can remember of the lyrics, is this accurate?
D: ‘Sacrilege’ isn’t an anti religion song, per se. After giving this song a REALLY good listen, I understood that Davey was distressed by this blind faith and ‘holier than thou’ attitude that a lot of people love to impose. I could be a little off the mark, but I really appreciate his honesty. It’s so refreshing to hear people speak their mind, and not say what they thing the majority want to hear.
HQ: Are there instances of screaming or harsher vocals?
D: There’s no screaming at all.. and no ‘harsh’ or ‘raspy’ vocals. He does get quite passionate at times which really shows in his voice, but as I mentioned, this isn’t an aggressive album at all. There is simply no need for screaming. The screaming on everything pre STS (and STS included) added another dimension to the music. It helped us better understand the pain, anger and hurt. The screaming felt really forced on DU.. and I think a lot of fans saw right through that. I really like that Crash Love doesn’t have any screaming. It would have been so phoney.
HQ: Are the bridges comparable to those found on STS and AOD?
D: The one thing that I loved about STS was how songs could transform into something special in a split second.. for example, on ‘Bleed Black’ .. the bridge just changes the song, giving it such an epic feeling. There are a few songs on Crash Love that have the same effect. I’ve noticed that a lot of people are a little disappointed with ‘Medicate’, but I have to stress that they can’t make any judgment until they hear the song in full. The bridge just changes the dynamic completely.
HQ: The fastest song on Crash Love is as fast as which song in AFI’s history?
D: I’d say that ‘Sacrilege’ is the fastest song. It would be most simular to ‘Girls Not Grey’ off the top of my head. They’re not a hardcore band anymore, so people shouldn’t expect anything like songs before STS.
HQ: Although it had some rock-ish songs, DU had slow-tempo songs. Would you say CL is a fast album, or a slow album?
D: Crash Love is well balanced. There are some ‘faster’ numbers, and some more mellow tracks.. but even though they are mellow, they seem to have this (I’m trying not to use ‘epic’ so much) grand feeling. Even the slower songs still sound ‘big’. Just like how ‘The Great Disappointment’ seems quite chilled to begin with, it just transforms into a masterpiece. I really think that after a few listens of CL, AFI fans will agree.
HQ: Is there any special song structure like Miss Murder, or do all songs follow the intro-verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus-outro structure?
D: All the songs are pretty ‘standard’ in the verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus sense.
This was the whole interview. We got special information out of this:
* Despite its title, Sacrilege is not an anti-religious song.
* There is no screaming or yelling in the album at all.
* The fastest song in the album is Sacrilege
* The bridges during songs are back
* All the songs follow AFI’s typical song structure (intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro)
Once again, many thanks to Deb for this interview!
Note: On June 30, 2010 AFI News HQ was hacked and all posts were deleted. This is one of the posts that was affected. The text here was imported from a backup, but all of the original comments are gone and the author credited below is only responsible for reposting in most cases.
