Interview: The Superlative talk new music and their new approach
Ottawa’s pop-punkers The Superlative recently put out a new song “Where We Left Off,” their first release in a year.
Fans of The Superlative’s past music will quickly find themselves rocking out again with the new track. You can certainly tell of some musical growth, but the biggest progress seems to be lyrically with the new music being a little more serious in nature.
We caught Kiel Burwell (Guitars/Vocals) to chat about what the band has been up to, their new song and whats next.
Interview with The Superlative
So it has been a little over a year since we got new music from you guys. What have you been up to?
We have been working hard on new music, stage performance (lights show, etc…), and playing as many shows as we can this past spring and summer. A few notable ones were opening for Hedley to over 20,000 people at an international fireworks festival. And also getting nods from Sublime With Rome and their management. We have been trying to build the band up and up as we do every year. And like every year, there were ups and downs.
What is the story/inspiration behind the new track “Where We Left Off”?
Where we left off is a lyrical collaboration between our singer Charles and myself (as is usually the case). The song is centered around the idea of how everything in modern society makes us so in a rush that we forget where we’re at sometimes and it in turn affects everything around us in so many negative ways. The song is basically about taking your time and working at things, and how slow and steady can win the race.
The whole collection of songs for this series will (for the most part) be about how modern upgrades in in our society being a blessing, but also how lazy, dumb and selfish it’s making a huge portion of society. How everyone’s attention span seems to be shrinking more and more each day.
In the past you have generally released an album at a time not just a single like this. What is your plan with Harmful Distractions?
We make music for ourselves first and foremost. That’s not to say we don’t want to adapt to modern ways that people listen to, purchase and share music. We see a lot of bands just putting out single songs that have no plan of being a full album at the end, and that’s cool, but also kind of sucks… We aren’t the first band to try something like this, but we definitely feel we have some unique aspects to what we are trying to do.
Majority of the time the guys and I listen to full albums, but sometimes we like a mix for while we are working, hanging out with friends and more… So we can see where music lovers are adapting to playlists and the convenience (but not artist payout) of streaming services. So we figure over the course of the year, if we release songs here and there for people to pick up on and see if they like each of them, it will give them more time to grow fond of each song… Hopefully enough to buy a physical record we will release at the end of the HARMFUL DISTRACTIONS series.
We also want to make a statement to people to love your smartphones, laptops, tablets, VR systems and more, but step the hell outside sometimes and leave them behind. Go do something that disconnects you from society for a few days or a week. Revert back to the way it was in the days when you couldn’t just shoot your friends a text to see where they were. Go out and explore your neighbourhood and see if you can find their bikes in a friends yard to know where they are at… you might realize what it’s like to be an independent thinking, attentive, human being…
You guys have developed a reputation of making some pretty hilarious music videos. Should we expect videos for these tracks?
Hahaha. We just shot a video for the song that will follow this one in about three weeks time. We invested in audio/video gear and are doing all that by ourselves now too. We love making goofy videos and being dorks for sure… However after the success of our last video (getting onto Exclaim, Blank TV and Alternative Press), it was a serious theme about suicide prevention, we kind of realized that maybe constantly making funny videos isn’t the best idea if we are trying to be taken seriously. I will hint that the next video will show how close we are as friends (no we aren’t naked…get that out of your head), and the brotherhood we have built with each other through the power of music and art. We want to make a video for “Where We Left Off,” but the idea we have is something we have to do some research on and maybe we can pull it off. We love our friends that do work for us, but we are very DIY if no one has noticed.
What is next for the band and when can locals get a chance to hear some of this new music live?
We have a few shows coming up in the fall and winter around Ontario and Quebec. Otherwise we will continue to work with our good pal Mike Poisson at Mike Poisson Recordings on the rest of the material for this song series. More new merchandise design, spring and fall show booking/festival applications, the usual band building necessities. We are really starting to see a lot of activity from fans all over the place and it’s pretty surreal, so we are talking to management and booking agent options and seeing what’s right for us.
We currently have 2 songs fully ready to release and are in the studio throughout October to do more. One of those songs is “Where We Left Off,” so there’s one left in the chamber. The entire record is written, we are just perfectionists and choose to take our time writing and recording everything, so we can have what we feel is the best product in the end.