DWW’s Bucky opens up about the new album six years in the making, jungle adventures, their upcoming show at BU, and his kung fu movie fetish.
Last week, I had the opportunity to interview Bucky from Down with Webster before they hit up the Centennial Theater on January 25th to rock the BU population. It’s been an insane year for the 6-piece band from Toronto, receiving double nominations at the Juno Awards, the release of Time to Win Vol. 2 – six years in the making, and then going on to tour Canada and U.S. in 2012. Bucky chats with me about their live performances, the new album, and some other surprises you’ll have to read to find out.
Sean Carlin: It seems that you guys as a band have come a long way from playing in a public school battle of the bands and then going along to receive nominations at the Juno Awards. So, how are you feeling about your success so far?
Bucky: “It’s been a whirlwind. It’s hard to absolutely, you know, comprehend. We’re so busy and we’re always going; it still hasn’t really had a good chance to settle in but I mean we’re more than grateful and so blessed that I’ve made it this far and, you know, thankful to all our fans that have helped us.”
SC: Did you find a difference working with ‘Demo’ on Time to Win Vol. 1 vs. Boi-1Da on Vol. 2?
B: “Well he [‘Demo’] still had a hand in Time to Win Vol. 2 as well. So it wasn’t that different, but I mean it was really cool just being able to work with 1Da because it’s doing something that’s not really up his alleyway; he’s been more like straight-up hip-hop and stuff like that, and we’ve never really got the chance to work with somebody outside of our own camp. So it was just a really great fit, and we’re big fans of everything that 1Da has done so far. It really worked well to see him kinda step out of his comfort zone and then us being able to experience working with another producer that hasn’t been in our camp since day one. That was probably one of the best highlights of the differences between working on the first and second album.”
SC: This album took quite a journey to write and record, with some tracks being written as early as 2006. When you finally had it done, when you were finally ready to give it up, was there still a sense that “well we could probably do this, we could tweak this”; did someone actually have to pry it out of your hands?
B: “Literally they did! Most of the time, when you’re finished writing the record you submit it to the record company six months or so before the release date right? And you only have a certain amount of time from when you hand in that album before they have to do all the pictures and packaging and all that kind of stuff. Most albums have six months, we had two weeks! So they definitely had to pry it out of our hands. When you’re writing a song like that or working on an album, technically you could keep working on the same song until you die. Every time you hear it you’ll hear something different or you’ll think that you could change this, make that louder, and make this softer, until the next day and you can think something completely different. So you know you have to let it go at some point and just believe in its life on its own.”
SC: If you had to sell the album on one track which one would it be, and could you tell me a little about that track?
B: “Ouuuuu that’s hard man, that’s really hard. That’s like saying ‘If you could give up one child which one would it be?’ There are a couple of them on there, honestly. I couldn’t really name one, I could maybe name two or three. “Professional” is one of the songs on there, one of the ones we got to do with Boy-1Da, that I just feel is pretty much a good way to encompass us and capture us in a nutshell, as you’d say. It’s very rock but still energetic and hip-hop oriented, a heavy Beastie Boys to it, but still very edgy and modern. Then another one of the songs that were really proud about on that is “White Flags” ‘cause it’s very diverse in a sense that it crosses a lot of genres in a short period of time. I could say anything that describes where we’re at right now is probably those two songs, but that’s just me personally. Who knows what the other guys in the band would say.”
SC: Those are great choices. So do you think you’ve grown both musically and personally since your last release?
B: “Oh completely! It’s been one of those things where it’s like since our last release we’ve really kind of got to see what it would be like for the rest of your life. It puts you in a mindset that, you know, changes your whole approach to how you look at things and how you do things and how you write music and so you just grow and with all the things that have happened in that time, we’ve definitely done a lot of growing and so you can hear it in this new album. So a lot more comfortable in our own skin, I’d say.”
SC: What would you say is the highlight of career so far?
B: “Ouuu. There are a couple of them. Being able to work with Boy-1Da was one of them. I’d say going on tour, being able to tour, you know, this whole country, being able to go to places like Cancun, being able to go to Dominican, being able to go to London. All of those things wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for our success. Literally, just like the small things are great; just the fact that you get to travel and the fact that I get to live with my best friends. Those are the things that really top everything off.”
SC: You were talking about touring, is there one song that you love to play live and another that you’re starting to get tired of?
B: “Oh yeah! See like “Big Wheels,” our first single off the album, I love that song to death, don’t get me wrong, but it’s one of those songs especially when it’s your first single, you play it and you play it and you play it, and then you hear it and you hear it, and it’s one of those songs where it’s not there yet but I can tell soon it’s gonna start to drive me batty. One of the songs that I really love playing right now is the song “So Cold,” which is a new one off the album and it’s very very tense music. It’s a lot different when we play it live than how it’s tracked on the album. It’s got a lot more dynamics and a rock out section, so that one I’m really excited for, and that’s my favourite one to play now, but it changes all the time.”
SC: What about ones on your previous release?
B: “Oh ‘Whoa Is Me’ has always been my favourite, ‘cause it’s just such a great song. We always close our show with it. It’s kinda like our goodnight and it’s always like a big finale. That one is always great to play live. There wasn’t really one song off the old album that kinda really drove me batty ‘cause there weren’t that many and we always played a bunch of them. So yeah the one that I really love to play is ‘Whoah.’”
SC: Is there one thing you don’t leave Toronto without when you go on tour?
B: “Yeah, the one thing that I never leave home without is my boom box. It’s this big golden boom box that you can play an iPod off of and I swear to god if you have that, no matter where you are it becomes fun. In an airport, you could be waiting in a waiting room, you could be in the middle of a field and as long as you got some beats, it becomes a party. So that’s one thing I never leave home without.”
SC: What can fans expect from the WINTour?
B: “Well first of all this is gonna be our first time playing in Sherbrooke.”
SC: Well you guys played at our frosh back in 2009…
B: “Oh yeah that’s what it was, at the college there right? Well if any of you guys have seen our show before expect a brand new pleasure amped Volume 2 crazy party. It’s gonna be nuts! The more energy that you bring, the more we’ll give you!”
SC: Are you guys going to write on tour?
B: “Yes we are! We always do. We bring our little studio set-up and have it in the back of the bus. Maybe we’ll even play some of the new ones that we write on the road when we’re out there.”
SC: I was wondering, if you weren’t writing music and playing music what do you think you would be doing?
B: “I think I would either be…. A chef or I’d be some sort of jungle adventurer. Like take people down the Amazon and stuff.”
SC: What do you do to unwind when you’re not with the band or on tour?
B: “Usually I just kick it with my friends, you know. I’m a big fan of the clubs and partying. Kind of letting it all go counts as unwinding for me, so I like going out and doing it up big at the clubs and being an idiot. You let it all loose, you let it all go and you come home and you feel like you’ve got a weight off your shoulders.”
SC: What is one thing die-hard Down with Webster fans do not know about you? A guilty pleasure or something?
B: “I love watching kung fu movies; like I have a weird fetish for kung fu movies. If there’s anytime that I’m in front of a T.V. screen, cause I don’t get to watch T.V., its just kung fu. That old school Wu Tang kind of kung fu. I don’t know why I like it so much but I don’t watch T.V. shows, I don’t watch movies, I just watch that old school kung fu. When I’m on the tour bus, they’ll all see me watching it on my iPhone. There’s some sort of weird relaxing thing to it but I really [chuckles], I really love watching kung fu movies. That is kind of a weird thing.”
SC: Where do you see yourself and the band in ten years from now?
B: “Hopefully doing exactly the same thing but way bigger, way better and all over the world!”
