As you’d expect from any band that would call its debut
album “No Pads, No Helmets… Just Balls,” the self-titled
release is a fearless, without-a-net excursion into dynamic music-making,
taking what we love best about Simple Plan—the unbridled
energy, the ripping guitars, the hook-filled melodic sensibility—and
incorporating a slew of inventive sonic approaches informed by
new collaborators such as Nate “Danja” Hills (Timbaland,
Justin Timberlake, Duran Duran, Nelly Furtado), Max Martin (James
Blunt, Kelly Clarkson, Avril Lavigne), and Dave Fortman (Evanescence,
Mudvayne).
Simple Plan began working on the new album in the spring of 2006,
shortly after wrapping up the touring cycle for “Still Not
Getting Any.” The expectation was for a quick writing process
and equally speedy return to the studio for its follow-up. Bouvier
and Comeau immersed themselves in the writing process and when
fall rolled in, the band had assembled a pretty extensive collection
of songs. But something didn’t feel right. “Everybody
was like, ’Yeah, yeah, this is great,’ but nothing
was sticking out as being really fresh,” Comeau says. “We
could feel that. We had strong songs, but they weren’t really
where we wanted to go.”
At that point, the band knew they had to rethink their approach.
A high regard for recent work by Justin Timberlake and fellow
Canadian Nelly Furtado led the group to Danja, a young producer
on the rise who had been thriving under Timbaland’s wing
for many years—and who, coincidentally, had also targeted
Simple Plan as one of the groups he wanted to work with as he
expanded into the rock realm. So in April of 2007, Bouvier and
Comeau found themselves in Miami—foreign territory that
started to feel right in short order when they came up with an
initial pair of songs, including “The End.”
Bouvier recalls that after that first session, “we were
like, ’Oh, shit, we’ve got something really fresh here!
We got stuff going on! This is what we’ve been looking for.” The
excitement and enthusiasm they felt was so strong it gave the
band its second wind.
Back in San Diego, Bouvier and Comeau started doing just that,
enlisting the help of an old friend, Arnold Lanni (Our Lady Peace,
Finger Eleven), the man who produced Simple Plan’s first
album.
Another trip to Miami soon followed, and Lanni was asked to tag
along. That second session with Danja yielded “When I’m
Gone” and “Generation,” two of the most innovative
tracks on the album. The duo solidified the rest of the band’s
support by taking the Danja tracks back to Montreal. Considering
the final results, “Simple Plan” seemed like the title
best-suited for this project.
“When people ask me to describe our sound,” Bouvier
says, “I always think of it as angry, negative, depressive
lyrics over really poppy, uplifting music. That’s the way
it’s always been. This is just a really personal record.
It’s a record about how we’re feeling, so that’s
what reflects out of it.”
Simple Plan is now ready to take “Simple Plan” where
the band feels best—on the road. The group has rehearsed
extensively to work the new material into live performance shape
and is confident it will rock its fans just as hard as its two
predecessors.
“I feel so strongly about these songs,” says Stinco, “and
I’ve believed since we started this band that a strong song
always prevails. These are definitely songs we can stand behind
and endorse, and I can’t wait to play them live.”
What David Desrosiers said
about Dean Markley Strings:
While we were in the studio recording
our first record I would spend time comparing the different bass
stings. I would blind test each string company, by listening
to the different tones through the studio PA system, playing
the exact same parts over and over again. At the end of the day,
we always went back to the Dean Markley Blue Steel as they were
the ones that had the most growl to them! And to me, that is
important as I play with a pick and love when it is rocking!!!
Simple Plan uses Blue
Steel Bass ML and XM 4 String.
Be sure to visit the Simple Plan website at:
www.SimplePlan.com.
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