THE FRONT BOTTOMS // Here Today, Bottom Tomorrow

Earlier in the month pop-punk mainstays, The Front Bottoms, ushered into the world their brand new record Going Grey.

Setting free another trough of fan favourite jams including, but not limited to, Peace Sign and Vacation Town. As the name suggests, the record focuses on, well, going grey. The idea of impermanence. Considering the band are hardly old it may seem like a strange topic, but as we would learn from drummer, Mat, it’s never really too early to start thinking about the winter of your years. That and apparently vocalist, Brian, is starting to sprout some greys. The band rolled into town recently prior to the release so Aussie fans are going to wait a little bit longer to see Going Grey live. Before then though, we spoke with Mat to learn more about the release.

MORE: A Delonge Shot: We Want To Believe.

HYSTERIA: So I imagine this must be some cheeky down time before things get a bit crazy for you guys?

MAT: Yeah, we got like, two more weeks and then it all gets kinda nuts.

Well I mean, tell me how does it feel? You guys of course have had a bit of an experience now with releasing albums, so this isn’t your first time around the block, but I can’t imagine it ever gets old. So tell me, now that you’re just a couple of weeks away from the record dropping.

Well actually it feels real good and like, everyone’s so excited on our team and like, in the band, and the crew and you know as an artist you only really get a couple release dates, you know, your entire career, so you do like get all hype and siked on them and I feel like this is the one where we’re like ready for this one. This album, we started making it like a year ago. So we’re totally excited that kids can finally like people can finally hear it pretty soon.

I’m so unorganised that I would be using this final two weeks to freakishly look back and fix up all my guitar parts and all the things I forgot to do, so I’m glad you guys are more organised than I am.

Yeah, right? Luckily everyone is pretty helpful.

Good. Right on. So it’s a really cool album. It seems to be a really cool message behind the album, the title Going Grey and some of the language I was reading is that you guys kind of would … you know an album about accepting the uncertainties of life and the impermanence and things of that nature. I gotta say though I found that to be a surprisingly heavy topic the more I read about it. What was it like for you guys to make an album out of this topic?

I think it was like, we didn’t even realise at first that it was kind of what we were doing…and then yeah. Over the course of time of writing and recording the record, I think it just kind of clicked and then it came to us. You know?

Right. Well that’s really interesting. So what album did you think you were making before you kind of realised what was actually forming before you?

We thought we were making an album that was going to be called Don’t Fill Up On Chips and which actually ended up naming one of the songs off the album because we kinda really liked that name. I guess just like the way we went about doing this record; it was just like a deeper thing. The whole Going Grey, you know, basically everything from looks to the way you feel it’s like, interesting.

I feel as though you guys aren’t necessarily that old yet and shouldn’t be worried about these things. I feel like you’re putting too much pressure on yourselves to be concerned about impermanence at this stage in life.

Yeah we probably do stress ourselves out for unnecessary reasons and we are still pretty young, but I mean “You gotta nice couple greys coming in like a salt and pepper shaker.”

This album, we started making it like a year ago. So we’re totally excited that kids can finally like people can finally hear it pretty soon.
[MAT]

Oh man, damn. Well I gotta say I’m twenty-seven this year and I’m seeing wrinkles happening man, so I guess I gotta go back on what I say, but you get older quicker than I realised.

Yeah, we’re the same age. It hits.

It hits hard. I mean, I’m noticing that my knees are starting to hurt when I get up. I get hungover from just having one beer. It’s hitting me man.

Yeah, that’s the worst part. The hangover thing. I went out like, two nights ago and like, drank and then all day yesterday my day was shot.

So you guys were in town earlier in the year. Which was super awesome. There was so much love for that tour when it was announced. Tell me, now that you guys look back on it, did you guys have a blast when you were here?

Yeah. It was very unexpected how … that was one of our favourite tours the group of us have done in like, years. We weren’t sure what we were getting into, and the entire experience from the shows to the people we met and things we did on the days off. It was just like, very nice.

What do you think it was about this round of shows earlier in the year that just smashed so hard?

What I thought about is just that I loved that we didn’t fly necessarily. Which is the opposite thing to say. We didn’t fly to every show, so some shows it was going to be quite a show, get in the van and drive for ten hours to make the next city. Which sounds like hell, but there was something about that that was very like rewarding. Kind of took us back to like, older tours and just being in the van not really knowing where we’re going and then yeah. It’d be like all that and then we’d finally get to the shows and the shows would be like, amazing and everyone, like you said, had a great time. Like, I don’t know. It was great.

The universe just conspired for it to be a great tour I suppose.

It’s really interesting you enjoyed those drives because as an Australian there’s nothing that makes my skin crawl more than thinking about the drive between Brisbane and Sydney or Sydney and Melbourne. I mean, that is intense that lag.

I know. Yeah, I hear you dude. Looking at the tour ahead, but when it actually came it was very enjoyable.

So, tell me. You’ve got a bunch of shows coming up for the U.S. for later in the year following the new album. How is the record coming in rehearsals? I imagine you guys would be doing that kind of stuff now. Is it translating well live?

So we haven’t played any of it live yet to any audience. We haven’t really practised as a band, you know we gotta practise and we actually were adding on bringing someone to play cello and violin as well. So we went back to all the old songs and like, added cello and violin parts. Some that are not there and obviously there are songs like Maps which there is a violin part and now it’s being played on an actual violin. So for us getting ready for tour. Yeah it’s been awesome and I hope we’ll see … like cause the is going to be the way we tour for the U.S. tour and our tour and The UK and Europe and then hopefully we’ll decide to bring this over when we come to Australia and like, do the same set up.

Well yeah. I mean I was going to ask. We can’t be terribly greedy and I know we have to share you with the rest of the world, but considering you’re here just for this side of the year when do you guys think you’ll be back?

I would imagine we’d be back like, the front half of next year I’d say.

Going Grey is available here.