 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Very Much in the Moment: A Conversation with Framing Hanley By: Brian Campbell  |
| |
Is Framing Hanley the best rock band today you have never heard of? I doubt that very much because you have heard them, but you may not know it. Their lead single Hear Me Now off their fantastic debut The Moment is prominently at radio, and there is a good chance that you have heard it.
The Moment is a great rock record, and is one of the better ones that was released this year. Frontman Nixon has the ability to draw you in with his passionate and sincere vocals, and the rest of the band creates such rich musical hooks that you wont want top leave and end up like me listening to the record multiple times each day.
I recently got the chance to sit down with Nixon and ask him about everything from the bands seemingly overnight popularity and his record The Moment to misinterpreting song lyrics.
AtHome: Tell me about the name of the band.
Nixon: Our drummers’ fiancée, Ashley Hanley, was in a car accident in 2006 and she passed away. She was someone that was really close to the band obviously. She used to take pictures of the band, and that’s where the Framing came from. It was a ‘in memory of’ type of thing. Right after she passed, all of these things starting happening with the band. It was kind of weird how everything started happening all at once. Being a local band, to going down and working with an awesome producer in Brett Hestla, and shortly after that we got the record deal. So we decided that the name would be fitting.
AH: The Moment is a very personal record. What inspired you to write it that way?
Nixon: It could be called a curse, because growing up I’ve always written down my feelings about anything. That’s just the way I work stuff out is write. Even before this band, it has just always been that way for me for some reason. Every song on the record is either something I have watched someone go through or I have been through personally. I just write about it and that’s the way it comes out. It turned out to work in my favor and like I said it could be really bad sometimes. Places now, like public places now, like MySpace or something like that, if I write anything in it, like a blog, I have keep it private because I don’t want people to think I’m some kind of little emo kid.
AH: 23 Days is one of my favorite songs off this record. Is there a story behind it?
Nixon: Yeah, there’s a story behind that. That song is actually, to be blunt, a song about sex. It about being in a relationship and wanting to be in that relationship, because of that sole reason. It sounds like the biggest toolbag song because you just asked about that song – all of the other songs have much deeper meaning. You can’t obvious set out to write a song that’s like ‘I miss having sex with you,’ you have to be in something poetic I guess, especially with such a brash topic. It’s a relationship song, but in the end, that’s what it’s about.
AH: I thought that song was a breakup song, like when you say the line, 'in your eyes I thought I saw tomorrow,' that’s what made me think that’s what the song was about.
Nixon: (laughs) Now your opinion of that song is going to be totally different every time you hear it. In music, a lot of times there’s a song about a girl and that song obviously is about being heartbroken and in the end its like the one thing you miss is the sex in that relationship. It sounds like a big toolbag comment, but it’s not a normal breakup song.
AH: Can I ask if the lyrics are about something that happened to you?
Nixon: Uh, no comment.
AH: Did you set out to write relatable songs? Or do they just come off that way?
Nixon: The most beautiful thing about music honestly is a song can be interpreted so many different ways by different people, obviously. I write in a sense to where I can get my feelings out, but I don’t have to be so point blank about it. Like with 23 Days, I don’t want to sit down and write I love you, I miss you; I really miss sex with you. I want something that someone else can listen to and interpret it the way they want. That’s the best thing about songwriting is people being able to interpret it the way they want to interpret it.
Every time I sit down to write a song, our goal is for people to be able to listen to it and take away from the song what they want to take away from it. There an old poem from one of the Cavalier poets, I forget which one, but the name of the poem was the Poets Purpose. It talks about how to put yourself and the reader in poetry, in the reader’s situation, so they’re there. When I write I write about what’s going on in my life but I write in the sense of being vague to where whoever listens to it can interpret it and have it relate to their life the way they want it.
AH: It’s funny that you mentioned that that is what 23 Days would be about. To me a song about sex would be Built for Sin.
Nixon: I guess I can tell you, I mean I say it every night on stage – that song is about an ex-girlfriend who had an addiction to some illegal substances and I just watched it ruin our whole relationship. There are a lot of lines in there that are directly related to what we were go through at the time and Built for Sin is referring to that fact that you’re not living your life the way you’re supposed to be living it. That songs not just about sex, that’s 23 Days buddy. I guess you’re going to have to have a new favorite song now.
AH: Tell me about the recording process of The Moment.
Nixon: We originally went down and did two songs with Brett Hestla, Hear We Now and the track Wave Goodbye. We ended up getting the labels interest with Hear Me Now originally and pretty much got a record deal before we had more than two songs as a band. We were put in the situation where we had a single (Hear Me Now) on the radio and didn’t have a record yet, which is assbackwards from how music works nowadays. We went through a lineup change at the beginning of the year and found Tim, one of our guitarists and wrote the record in 4-6 weeks. Actually a number of the songs we wrote in the studio while we were down in Florida. It was all weird and surreal, everything has been. We were put in the situation where they needed songs immediately and one thing I’m happy about is every song of that record is something that’s personal to us as a band and means something to us as a band. I don’t feel like we rushed anything at all and that was something we were honestly scared about at first. When you’re in that situation and you get a record deal with a single out on the radio, obviously you need a record to come out then. I didn’t want to feel like we were under the gun to put something out. Once we got Tim in the band everything started flowing so easily and we just started writing.
AH: So you’re saying that from, the time Hear Me Now hit the radio you had the record done in two months?
Nixon: Yeah, the night we tried Tim out for his audition, we wrote the first track on the CD, Home. That right there was a sign that maybe this Tim guy was going to work out. We got to the point that we were writing, writing, writing and a lot of people now are like ‘now that our tour is over we are going to start writing,’ well, we never got the writing out of our system. We just started putting out songs, we had a record, and now it’s like the whole time we were on tour we were everyday stage with acoustic guitars writing more music and that is definitely something I’m really excited about.
AH: Before you went into the studio, did you have these songs written? Or was it something you did in the process?
Nixon: Wave Goodbye and Hear Me Now were written before we recorded them. For the most part, the way we did the rest of it is we would all just, the five of us, sit down and get the songs written music wise. When you go and work with a producer things are going to change, that’s the whole job of a producer. That’s the whole job of a producer, and we were fortunate to work with an amazing producer, Brett Hestla, frontman for Dark New Day, and me being a frontman, it was just really weird and really awesome that we got to work with another frontman. He really pushed us, we knew where we wanted to go and he helped take us there. We just focused on the music at first and when they recorded the songs, the drums and the guitars, when you hear everything pieced together, that’s when the stuff I had ideas for just started to spill out. I would just sit there on my laptop in the studio and write about what I was feeling and what I was thinking.
AH: Did the way that Hear Me Now took off at radio surprise you?
Nixon: Yeah, like I said we didn’t have more than two songs written. When it hit at radio we were shocked and I would lie to say that we weren’t scared. I know for a fact that all five of us were scared. We knew we had to put out a record and we had to start writing. We didn’t want to feel rushed about anything, but it was so weird – the first time I heard the song on the radio we were in Orlando recording the record, so many miles away from home and every time the song comes on the radio its still a strange feeling. We usually just end up turning it off.
We’re not band that takes anything for granted at all. Were fortunate to be where were at and we know that there are thousands of musicians out there that are way more talented than us that probably won’t ever get a chance. We definitely know that being five white boys from Tennessee how lucky we are to be in the position were in. We tell people that every night. We met a guy in Abilene, TX that told us he was watching his heroes on stage. Its amazing but at the same time the fans are our heroes but this whole opportunity is because of radio, because of fans, they are what are keeping the business alive now. It’s always cool to meet people and let them know that we are five down to earth guys that want to hang out and party, and play music.
AH: In the Hear Me Now video, it’s a little weird not to see any performance scenes. How did you come to making that decision?
Nixon: The director and I were talking about concepts for the video and we didn’t want to do something – one thing I hate about a lot of music videos is that I’m not a big fan of putting the performance videos in there just to put them in there, I love performance videos but it would totally take away from the story of the video if we were in a psych ward playing our instruments. Its kind of takes away from the story in which you’re trying to get across if I’m in my pajamas singing and in the next scene I’m playing chess with an invisible person. We’ll definitely, depending on what the next single is there will probably be a performance based video. None of us are big fans of throwing performances in there just to do it.
AH: You don’t have any idea what the next single is going to be?
Nixon: It’s up in the air between Built for Sin or Alone in This Bed (Capeside). I would love for Built for Sin, a rock song, to be our next single but I would not mind Alone in This Bed because of how personal it is to us as a band.
AH: Do you have a favorite song off The Moment?
Nixon: Alone in This Bed.
AH: Do you have a favorite song to play live?
Nixon: We don’t play it live that much, but Alone in This Bed is probably it. Either that, All In Your Hands or Count Me In, I love playing those live. Those are our two like ‘in your face’ songs live every night.
AH: What are you listening to in your downtime?
Nixon: Its different all the time, I’m a huge singer/songwriter fan, so I love Damien Rice and stuff like that. Lately, Thrice’s new record is the majority of what I have been listening to, and Anberlin and it goes from stuff like that all the way across the board to Breaking Benjamin, Evans Blue. I’m a huge Evans Blue, unfortunately. Fair to Midland is another band that I’ve gotten into. It’s different with everybody in the band. A lot of the guys listen to metal. I’m not a huge metalhead, I’m more of a chill music type guy, but lately it has been Thrice. There is a band called Evaline, we’re huge 30 Seconds to Mars fans, Saosin, Deftones, it is all across the board.
AH: Do you have a favorite record of all time?
Nixon: Probably both Use Your Illusion records by Guns N’ Roses. They are the whole reason I am in a band.
All things Framing Hanley can be found at www.myspace.com/framinghanley.
|
|
Baltimore is a music city with some of the best local talent in the nation. Baltimore music fans have a need to know what’s going on in the music industry, be it local bands or national acts. If you know about a band or music group that you believe we should be covering, we want to hear about it.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|