“These days, everyone can do whatever they want on a computer,” he says. “I’m the computer nerd of the band and I’ll be doing that in the back lounge of the bus. If I’ve got something cool to show I’ll put it on an iPod and we’ll play it through the bus speakers.
“Then we send all the demos to everyone, and Joel can start writing his lyrics because he’s got it on his phone and he can listen to it. It’s the digital age – it definitely makes it easier for us. Just jamming on stuff, we just don’t have the time for that any more. All our time is either with friends and family, taking some time off, or we’re on the road playing shows. We have to squish it in there somehow.”
Ultimately, it still has to be an organic and naturally flowing process, even though they’re writing in a digital format. “We’ll never write out of necessity,” Brown says. “We’re a band, and we want to keep putting out songs, but we’ll never release an album until we’re ready to release it. We’re not going to rush it and write songs just because we want an album to come out. We’re constantly writing, and then eventually when we’re completely happy with it, we go record them, rather than pushing something because of the time constraints.”
You’ll be able to hear the results of their efforts when they unleash their brand new album This Could Be Heartbreak. As is the want of most musicians in the lead up to the release of their band’s new album, Brown is excited and believes it to be the best thing the band have done in their career.
“It’s going to be awesome, I can’t wait,” he says. “I’m really excited about these songs, they’re definitely the best we’ve ever written. I know everyone says that, but these definitely are.”
He is so confident about what they do that he tends not to become nervous in that sometimes-awkward period in between completion and release. The only thing he worries about is whether the songs will hit the Internet before the initial release date.
“Not really nervous. I think sometimes you can get a bit nervous about whether it’s going to leak or not,” he chuckles. “I might get a little anxious. You’ve put in all this hard work and you just want it to come off. You want to show everyone what you’ve done and what you’re proud of.”
Something else The Amity Affliction are very proud of is the fact that they’ve made it to five albums and have survived as a band for well over a decade. It’s quite an achievement for any band in the current musical climate, let alone a heavy band. “I think we’re all very lucky, and also proud of ourselves for being able to do it for so long, it’s a nice little compliment,” Brown says.
The band will head out on tour as soon as the album is released, taking on a run of sold-out dates at home, before heading off across the globe on a gruelling schedule that will take them all the way to Christmas.
“It’s part of the job,” Brown says, about the list of tour dates longer than his arm. “It’s the best job in the world, so we can’t complain. It’s a part of it that we all expect. We had a quiet first half of the year, writing the album, so we all expected a busy second half of the year.”
BY ROD WHITFIELD
