hen you watch a band tour constantly for 11 years turning themselves into, whether consciously or unconsciously, giants in the scene, you perceive them in a certain way. When you look at a band who were writing music and playing shows before you even attended your first, you build up an image of that band in your mind, a fear, a sort of respect, but mostly a picture of them being waited on, only stepping off of their massive tour bus to grace the stage and then return again to pure luxury. Kings of sorts.

As I talked on the phone to Thrice front-man Dustin Kensrue, and as he dodged a Boston aquarium waterfall and screaming children while juggling the duties of dad and husband and being on the road, a lot of that stigma began to fall off, and what remained was a new found respect for a man that understands what is important in life, who has walked the block a few times, full of the wisdom gained from that, not hidden on some imagined tour bus heaven. He was real and he was honest, bearing his emotions, the bands’ victories, and their short-comings-And it is healthy. At first I was afraid to have my bubble burst, but when you can see one of your favorite bands in this new light you can connect with them… or finally allow them to connect with you. They succeed, they fail, they take their kids to the aquarium. They are you and me. Meet Thrice.

First off, with this new album Beggars Thrice seems to be heading in yet another direction. Can you tell us a little bit about what went into making this album and some goals that you had with these songs?

Dustin Kensrue: The big thing with a lot of it was us getting back into the studio and not having a big goal or real direction. We just started playing kind of unconsciously. It was less directed. We weren’t trying to make Air or Water or whatever. We just started playing together and they all started to have a certain gritty quality. It’s just a little more natural.

How did you feel when the album leaked, and so early? Is that something that you guys take seriously or is it a bit of a compliment that fans wanted the new material so badly?

DK: No, it definitely wasn’t a compliment. The guy stole it and it was pretty malicious. It wasn’t just that it came on the Internet early it was that someone stole it before we even had copies of it. It’s frustrating. I have no problem with people hearing it early and I think a ton of those people are big enough fans to realize that its extremely helpful to a band to go out and buy the record and support them in that way.

The jump that Thrice made from Vheissu to The Alchemy Indexes was quite a leap. What happened in between those two albums that you feel like contributed to the drastic change and where you see Thrice as a band now.

DK: I don’t really see a big change there other than just choosing to make that record the way we did. I think the bigger change was between Artist and Vheissu. But I think that there is a large sonic difference because The Alchemy Index was planned out and came from these different kinds of places. It really had to do with the content itself.

I remember speaking briefly with you earlier this year about your loyal fan base and how that may have changed when The Indexes came out. Do you feel like you alienated some fans with those songs? How did that affect Thrice personally and your writing for the next album?

DK: We’ve been alienating people for five or six records now (laughs). I think Vheissu was kind of the biggest place where people were really weirded out or bummed out and I think most of the fans who stuck on past there were just big fans of the band itself and music in general, not just one sound. When Alchemy came out the response was much better initially than Vheissu because I think people were expecting this band to do what they want, they are trying to do something different and exciting to them and they were going to check it out and listen to it for what it is and not for what they want it to be. And I think with Beggars, it was a better initial response than either of the past two records. We’re really happy with it and it seems like other people are too.

Do you feel like your evolution as a band into some different waters has been natural over time? Or do you feel like changing fads, listener expectations and tastes play a part?

DK: I think it’s pretty clear that we’re not writing for what people will enjoy (laughs). I think that it’s never been something we’ve particularly thought about. I think that it’s something in the back of your head at points in any one’s career. But I feel like the past three records we’ve pretty much eliminated any of those back of the head thoughts. We just do what we want and that’s the only reason we’re still making music. We’re satisfied in trying to create something that’s exciting to us. It would be dishonest toward ourselves and our fans to do anything else.

Why did you want to shoot for a more raw organic feel on this record?

DK: The tones are all very different too aside from just the vibe of the playing. I think there is kind of an arms race of sound and the way records are made these days…you know super compressed, or the loudest or perfectly in time but it just starts sounding not like people playing music anymore but for some reason that’s what sells. It takes the person out of the equation. We just had had our fill on being on the fringes of that and we were excited to make a record that just sounded like people playing instruments and it’s raw and it’s not all perfect. Music’s not about perfection, especially rock music, it’s about a feeling, a vibe and energy. So we wanted to make sure that was kept.

You stated on your website that Beggars is largely centered around the idea of what we don’t see as gifts given to us and that our circumstances are beyond our control. Can you expand on this idea?

DK: Not the whole record but the song Beggars especially is the idea that, especially in Western society and America in general, we look around and say look what I’ve accomplished, look what I’ve done, look at how I’ve succeeded. The flip side of that is looking down on people who are in worse circumstances for whatever reason. I think there’s a blindness there too to the amount of things that are out of our control; where we were born, who our parents are, what natural talents we have, our intellect-just so many things that you have no control over. You can build on your gifts, you can build on things that are given to you and that’s great but at the core of it we need to take a step back and see where all the roots of this come from. I would argue that whether you believe there’s a god that has given them to you or you think its blind chance, I think that’s something you need to wrestle with. It changes your perspective on your own accomplishments and your own life and then also for other people, I think it can give you a great look into those circumstances.

A lot of your lyrics come from a very spiritual place. Can you talk to us a bit about what role your faith plays in your life as well as in Thrice?

DK: I’m a Christian and I say my relationship or whatever you want to call it is central to where everything in my life flows from that, or at least ideally it does. That affects the kind of husband I am, the kind of dad I am, the kind of friend I am and the kind of person I am in this band. That’s not to say that I’m perfect in any of those ways but that’s where everything flows from. I think that even if someone doesn’t realize it, everyone has a world view that dictates how they see everything and for me that’s my world view. It greatly affects how I write music and the things I choose to write about but I don’t approach music as a way to try to change people’s minds about various things. I try to write about things I care about and naturally the things that are close to my heart are going to come through in the music. I think that any good art is honest art and for me to do this any different would be any dishonest. In the same way as me trying to write music that people might like or what I think they might like or write lyrics that are so bland that they won’t offend anyone but I’d rather write things that are engaging whether you agree with them or not. I think there is definitely a need for that. I think there could be more tolerance for discussion there. Real tolerance is disagreeing with people but accepting them as equal and being able to dialogue. I think tolerance has been distorted in modern uses; it’s come to mean that you’re not supposed to disagree about anything but that’s not it. It’s that you think you’re right about something but you tolerate other views and I think that’s healthy for growth. I listen to bands coming from all different places and I’m intrigued with what they think about things and I hope that the reverse it’s true as well.

Since Thrice is a band that is constantly changing and evolving, where do you see yourselves doing this for the next 10-20 years?

DK: (laughs) Man, I have no idea. I didn’t know I’d be in a band for eleven years. It’s been a really cool journey and something I never planned on in the beginning so I’m very open to playing another twenty years and I’m very open to stopping next year if that’s what happens. I don’t worry about it too much. Its gone on just naturally so far. We never had big plans or anything. We just make a record, tour, make a record, tour.

Looking back at your old albums now and seeing how much you have changed do you cringe a bit or do you just see it as that’s what was on your heart at the time and you’re still proud to have done it?

DK: There’s cringing but there’s also looking back in fondness and even being proud of certain things for what they were at the time. We talk about it as a snapshot idea sometimes like if you ever look back at a picture of yourself ten years later there’s some nostalgia but also comes cringing like “oh look at that hair” because styles change. I think now though, we strive to create something that is more timeless and better than what we did in the past, something that will stand up over time. The reason that we don’t play a lot of old stuff is there’s a fair amount of new things that probably provide more nostalgia for other people than for us (laughs). We try to mix it up as much as we can but the other main reason we don’t play older stuff is that as we get more and more songs it’s hard to fit things in and make the set flow as nicely as possible without jumping back and forth between time periods.

That being said, who influences you now?

DK: I don’t think any of us could point to a band that is actively influential. We just listen to a ton of different music. Usually our demo process is like writing little things that pop into our heads. Everyone has their own demo style too. I usually come with full songs.

Tell us a bit about your current tour.

DK: We’re out with Brand New but that ends on Saturday. We’ll be heading back west fairly quickly just covering some ground and playing some shows in California. It’s a really brief run on the way back. The market is really clustered touring wise right now so we’ll be hitting the west coast then heading out again in the spring.