Staind
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Blistering.com: You titled the album The Illusion of Progress. That title seems to hold a very skeptical, hopeless view. Why did you use this title?
Lewis: When the title appeared to us, so to speak, it just seemed like the perfect title because of the fact that it can be taken in so many ways and applied to so many different things. The fact of the matter is we were all hanging out, cracking jokes, shooting the shit when we should have been working and writing songs and Johnny K made a comment about it. He was like, “What the fuck guys? Are you gonna get some fucking work done today or what?” I laughed and said, “It’s like the illusion of progress.” Then we all just kind of stopped, and it was very obvious to me that was the title of the record.
Really, the title is quite shallow, unless you take it for face value. There are so many ways you can view it. You can view it in a political way. You can view it in a societal way. You can view it in much smaller ways; however you want to view it. The title is, as it stands without definition, a little skeptical. There is nothing wrong with being skeptical. You can love this country and still be skeptical; you can believe in this country and still be skeptical. The fact of the matter is we still pick our politicians from a pool of the dirtiest, bought-and-paid-for, from-their-own-agenda people. How are we supposed to pick somebody who is good for the country when that is the pool of which we are picking from?
Blistering.com: I described the tone as morose, yet not wallowing in misery. One area in particular is the songs —“Raining Again” and “Rainy Day Parade.” How does the theme of rain fit into the central idea of these songs?
Lewis: Rain is nature’s clean-up mechanism. Rain is always something that comes and washes everything away. After the fact, somebody pointed out to me that I had used rain as a reference in a couple different songs on this record. I guess I didn’t mean to. I like rain, rain is good.
Blistering.com: What was it like working with producer Johnny K [3 Doors Down, Disturbed, Avenged Sevenfold]?
Lewis: It was really good! Johnny has the uncanny ability of pushing you further than you wanted to go without making you feel you were pushed, if that makes any sense.
Blistering.com: So he does it in a subtle kind of way?
Lewis: Yeah, usually that is the issue you will have with a producer. They are just too overbearing; they make you feel like they are pushing you. Sometimes when you are creative, somebody else is pushing you away from what is natural. They are pushing you away from what is trying to come out of your mouth. Sometimes that can rub a person the wrong way. Johnny is able to do it without rubbing you the wrong way in anyway.
Blistering.com: How does he help the finished product?
Lewis: Johnny was there from word go. He was there from the conception of songs and everything. He guided us. He pointed out things like, “I don’t know if that bridge really works for that song. Try something else. Let’s see what comes out.” He did the entire record himself. We didn’t use an engineer, no assistant, no anything. It was Johnny! He did all the engineering. He did all that a producer would be responsible for. He wore three or four hats the whole time we were doing the record.
Blistering.com: “Believe” is the first single off this album. Why did you decide to use this track? How has the response been?
Lewis: We decided to use the track because it was definitely one of the tracks that we thought would be a good single. When you are picking a single, especially for the beginning of a record, you kind of want to pick a song that everybody is onboard with, from the record label and all the way on through. If the record label is all fired up about a song you are releasing, that is half the battle. You try to strategically pick songs that the record label feels strongly about, songs they feel they can make move through the radio. My hope is that everybody that listens to the record has a different favorite song.
Blistering.com: You also mentioned “The Corner” had Pink Floyd-like tendencies. What makes this track like a Pink Floyd song?
Lewis: The gospel choir, the gratuitous use of a Strat in the song, the bluesy nature of the song: it’s not cookie cutter Pink Floyd, but I could see Pink Floyd doing some version of “The Corner.”
Blistering.com: The blues were an element that I noticed you put into the album.
Lewis: The blues are the root of rock and roll. Every Jimmy Paige guitar riff and lick was blues. Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn… they all played the blues.
Blistering.com: Toni Iommi.
Lewis: Yes, only Iommi put a spin on it and played it all in the minor keys, which made it sound dark and morose, as your favorite word is. It’s the minor keys. What of the things that we do a lot is the verse is minor and the chorus will uplift to major. Sometimes that is how we create that uplift in the chorus. If you go from minor to major, all of a sudden everything goes from sounding unhappy to happy.
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