ust because Aaron Gillespie is no longer pictured in the Underoath promo featured above (you may want to look again if you haven’t noticed) don’t jump ship quite yet. Wait until November 10th after you’ve had a chance to listen to their new record Disambiguation. Because it is going to change your mind, as well as your take on Underoath. Standing taller, and grounded more firmly then ever, Underoath isn’t limping on, rather they march in unity. “How can this be?!?” you might ask. “Aaron was a founding member, vocalist, and had a drumming style that will not be easily matched!” Answer, well first of all… actually I will let frontman Spencer Chamberlain say it in his own words. The following is a conversation I had with Spencer from his home in Florida where he was taking some time off before their monster tour with A Day To Remember, Close Your Eyes, and The Word Alive.

I know that we talked about the future of Underoath the last time we spoke with Tim. But since Aaron’s decision to leave has that put a different perspective on the future of making music with Underoath, whether for the good or bad?

Spencer Chamberlain: I definitely think us parting ways was like a life or death situation for Underoath. I feel like as happy as we are now, and the way we get along and the way we are writing music together and agreeing on everything and really seeing eye to eye on things, the way it is right now is the way it probably should have always been. And I feel like this was the life that saved Underoath. We all feel like this is the best we’ve ever been by far with this new record and this new line up. Not just to say “We parted ways with a member or we just got another one we are just gonna limp on and just keep this thing going cause we don’t know what else to do”. We wouldn’t have done it if it wasn’t an improvement. And I know a lot of kids might understate it when the record comes out cause they’re Aaron Gillespie fans. …Its hard to understand if you’re not it the band, but it was a lot of tension before. It was the five of us all the time. The tension is gone, the stress is gone. We’re having fun playing music again. It takes me back to when i was jamming in my room in middle school, I just wanted to play all the time. That’s the only way to keep going cause if you’re not happy anymore then whats the point?

Was there a different vibe in the writing/recording process not having Aaron’s clean vocals and drum style there?

SC: Of course, we write pretty much as a team so now that we have a new guy behind the drums its totally different and I have complete freedom to do whatever I want. Like I said all that stress… we wanted different things, the five of us wanted something completely different than he wanted. So seeing eye to eye is very important I think everyone’s individual taste and everyone’s individual input is what makes a band. You know, obviously, when you have six dudes that are all different, but all on the same page, seeing eye to eye where this record should go, to really look at the song and go “Is this what’s best for the song not is this whats best for me and my part. This would really benefit the record if you did this here”. It’s a totally different vibe. It’s like we’re grownups now writing songs together.

Was it weird for you doing all the singing parts?

SC: No, I loved it. I’ve been doing stuff like that since I was a little kid. I grew up doing stuff like that so I really, thoroughly, enjoyed it.

I know a lot of people who were very excited when you announced the Danial Davidson (ex Norma Jean) would be drumming on the new record. How did this come about, and how was it working with him?

SC: It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to this band. Not bashing Aaron by any means, I’m just saying for the five of us it’s the best thing that’s happened. We’ve known Daniel for I think over ten years, since Norma Jean’s beginning times and done lots of shows and toured with them a lot. It was just kind of a no-brainer. We knew he had the skills to play the songs. It wasn’t like, you know, “Come down and here’s a song for you to learn”. It was like just “Come down, you know you can play the songs let’s see how we write together”. He just came down and we just started writing.

A lot of these tracks lack basic song structure, which I love. They are also really vibey but possibly the heaviest stuff Underoath has released to date. Who or what was inspiring your lives throughout this writing/recording process, whether it was music or a book or experiences?

SC: Um, I mean its just what happened when we all put our heads together. We’re all way older and more mature we wanted to make a more mature record. We’ve been wanting to do that for awhile, kind of get rid of the little kid side of Underoath, and it happened. It is definitely way different than the last record. Its way more structured I feel like, but still more experimental and chaotic at the same time, but you’re seeing the structure in those chaotic parts.

Talk to me about the lyric “Machines built by machines built by machines built by machines” and how that lyric is reflected throughout the rest of Disambiguation…

SC: The whole record is basically…What I normally do is write about the last two years of my life and I try to become more visual with every album just because I’m trying to become a better writer. Basically it’s just things that I’ve seen or I’ve been through or that my friends or my family have been through in the past few years-it’s just my take on it. Its my visual side coming through.

On “Reversal” that line is “deviate my life”?

SC: Deviate my life. Which is a change but it’s not used in that… if you look it up in the dictionary it’s not supposed to be used in that form. It’s kind of what makes it cool because it is kind of just like an interlude in that it strings some songs together and with the whole theme of the record it’s just painting these very vivid pictures. We put that interlude together and then we listened to it some and were like “It really needs vocals, like one line or something, like something really just bold”. So I went with something really bizarre and I really never heard anyone say that before. If you look it up it’d make sense but you wouldn’t say that. So I thought it was just a cool little play on words.

If there was one theme for the lyrics of this record what would you say it was?

SC: Visually more so than anything. I wouldn’t say the whole record but there was a lot more water themes throughout the record,  a lot of visuals of dark colors and water. I don’t know why, that’s normally the colors I see are dark polluted stuff so normally when I’m writing and something makes me feel a certain way I always picture colors and get some sort of feelings. So a lot of the stories I could be writing, not really obviously about drowning, but whatever struggle I’m writing about, I would always come back to that because I always felt that visual from the mood of the music.

That’s cool how you see that. What did you intend for disambiguation to mean in reference to this album?

SC: Well there’s a lot of definitions for it actually. One of them is “to make clear”. Obviously ambiguous is unclear and disambiguous is clear. Its not really a statement about the album per se but more so the band. Like I was trying to tell you earlier, Its not like “Oh Underoath is trying to carry on without Aaron, lets see how it goes lets keep your fingers crossed”. You know it’s like it was a decision we made together. It was like “I’m thinking about quitting, no maybe I’m not”. And we were  like “Ya I think we should part ways”. It seemed like the only way to progress was to change something. It’s more like to make clear. Because if we self titled the record you can only imagine all the backlash we would get. “Oh Aaron’s the only original member I can’t believe they did that” and all the stuff that would happen all over the Internet. It’s just more of a statement of let’s make this clear, we are very comfortable with who we are whether you are or not, we’re happy and this is our best foot forward and this is who we are now, it’s not gonna change. These six people are the most relaxed laid back easy going group of people I’ve ever worked with. So until Underoath dies I think this is what it’s gonna be and we’re very comfortable with that.

Ya, I know there was a lot of talk like you guys are just gonna put out one more album because you can and you have the platform to do it.

SC: Right.

Every record should be better than the one before or what is the point in putting it out. So whether it’s your style, genre choice or not you can’t have an open mind going into hear this record and not think it’s better than the one before.And then just sort of give it fifty percent and get it out and then be done, or whatever. So it’s cool to hear that it’s stated throughout this record that you are not going anywhere soon. It gives us something to hold on to.

SC: Ya. I mean we feel, our label feels, and our management, most all of our peers, all our friends in other bands that we’ve shared our record with, we all feel like this is our best record, as it should be. Every record should be better than the one before or what is the point in putting it out. So whether it’s your style, genre choice or not you can’t have an open mind going into hear this record and not think it’s better than the one before. You’re always going to hold onto certain things. You know like there are certain things that happen and you hear, this album was really important to me for this reason. I know a lot of people like our first record the best because, it reminds me when the band came out, and this that and the other thing was happening in their life. But I really think that you can’t listen to this record with an open mind and not think “Ya this is definitely their best record”. The kids that like They’re Only Chasing Safety the best are obviously not going to like it. But we’re obviously three records down the road and not making another one of those records, you know what I mean? So those people are still holding onto whatever that is and that’s fine, that’s cool, we still play those songs live and everyone is entitled to their own opinion but I don’t think you can’t look at those songs and look at Define songs and look at Lost songs and look at Disambiguation songs and not feel like everyone is better than the prior, you know what i mean?

Ya, and you guys have never put out the same record…

SC: Ya, a lot of people think that Lost In The Sound and Define are very similar, which is fine. We felt like we were going more experimental. But this record is definitely a pretty big step for us in a different direction without completely departing from the sound that we made pretty clear with Define, which was like “Okay this is pretty much who we are and we’re gonna go from here”.

I get a lot of people asking me these days if you guys are still on Tooth N’ Nail/Solid State Records. And of course you are, but what has caused you to stay with an indie instead of moving up to a major where there is not only more money but the possibility of captivating a larger audience?

SC: Well we resigned with Tooth N’ Nail before Define The Great Line so we’re still in contract. So it’s not an option even if we wanted to leave. Back when we resigned that deal I think it was definitely the best option. I think that if we’d been signed to a major back then they would’ve expected us to write radio singles and that’s obviously what we weren’t going for even though there are some songs that you could put on the radio. It’s a completely different style from Chasing Safety and Chasing Safety was like pop and The Warped Tour and what was happening at the moment and I feel like these are more 90’s Deftones heavy and dark and weird but I feel like back then, that would’ve been a mistake. But know if the option was open I don’t know what the best option would be. It’s basically whoever can put you in front of the most people because no one is going to buy your record anymore because everyone steals it-I mean lets be honest. You know rap and country, those people are still selling records because the majority of the people who listen to that music don’t steal music because they are older but our generation, the younger kids its definitely just kind of a given. You’re never gonna sell a lot of records ever again. It’s just never gonna happen so now it’s just all about how can get you in front of as many people as possible so I don’t really know what would be the best choice now.

But Tooth N’ Nail’s awesome, they’ve done a really good job with us and they’re doing a lot of cool stuff for this record. I think you can’t really not know it’s coming out, that’s a good thing. I think they’re great. Just as people, we’ve really liked them and with a major label you don’t really get that because people are getting fired all the time and A&R is constantly changing and you never really know what’s going on.

Well its been home for you guys for a long time.

SC: Ya it has. And they’ve changed some people as well and people have moved on and done different things but for the most part it’s a family. But when this contract runs out I don’t know what we’ll do. I really have no idea. And if we did something it would be no offense to them by any means, it would just be whatever makes the most sense for the band.

In past interviews we talked about how much you guys love performing and how that is your favorite part of playing music. So on that note, what would you consider your least favorite part of playing music for a living?

SC: Photoshoots (Laughs).

(Laughs) That’s awesome. What is it about photoshoots you hate so much?

SC: It’s like when you have a 12 hour day of looking at a camera and changing your clothes…. some people can be into that but for me it just sucks (Laughs).

It is a little vain (Laughs).

SC: Ya it’s not fun just standing there trying to not smile or laugh or whatever and be serious it’s just kind of lame to me.

So fair. So we see a lot of different bands come through town with different styles and ways of showing what they believe. Some are more bold and give more of a talk on stage. Some give a shorter talk. Others just let the music and their lives speak for itself. Is this ever a discussion anymore as to how to approach your beliefs as a band? And what do you believe is the best way to approach this subject?

And I feel like for our band the purpose is to share with people honesty and open mindedness and having an open heart and then sharing with those people what we believe but not to really push it on anyone…SC: We’ve always just said a few words. We don’t like to take up too much time because we do very secular tours we don’t really tour Christian venues or with Christian bands very much. And I feel like for our band the purpose is to share with people honesty and open mindedness and having an open heart and then sharing with those people what we believe but not to really push it on anyone and say you should believe in this that or the other because we are just kind of old jaded dudes and we’re not perfect by any means and we didn’t set out to be role models or expect to be, but it kind of comes with the territory I guess, but basically we’re such a secular band our calling is to be like… Christianity has a really bad name, we both know that. I mean people think of Christian’s as naive, stupid, ah… judgmental, all the above and think that we’re just a bunch of snobby stuck up people and I feel like Underoath’s job is to just throw it out there that it’s not what you think it is, it doesn’t have to be that way. Granted a lot of Christians do give Christianity a different name but it doesn’t have to be that way. It’s a spiritual one on one relationship and we’re not telling anyone that they’re going to hell, that’s not our job. People that call themselves Christians, it’s not their job to point their finger at all these other people that don’t believe in the faith that they do. So what! Everyone goes through different phases at different times in their life. There’s times I question what I believe and then there are other times that I’m like a hundred percent on fire for what I believe in. You don’t know what those people have been through, so don’t point the finger at them for what they’re doing. If they ask for your opinion or your help then sure give them your best shot but I just feel like its kind of where we come in to be like “This is what we believe in, this is why but it’s not the way you think it is”, and just leave it at that. And we are always by the bus and hanging with kids and some of us are better at talking about it than others. But they know where to find us and we are very online friendly as well. We’re a very secular band as well, and we don’t want to take up too much time and force feed anyone anything.

I’ve seen that in you guys and that is a cool perspective because often times people will see an urgency about it and they want to be bold, and I still see that in you guys, but too often people can get forceful about it. There is definitely a fine line between the two.

SC: Ya and we definitely don’t want to be forceful about anything. That is never the right way to approach anything.

Ya that isn’t love.

SC: Ya and so we are very comfortable just being who we are. Take it or leave it. You can talk to us about it if you want and we don’t pretend or act like we have it all together either. I’m not outside really preaching to kids. but I’m like “I can tell you what I know or what I feel but that’s me. If you want to hear about it I’m glad to tell you but I’m not necessarily the right guy to preach to you and get loud and pitch all these Bible verses to you but I’ll sit there and listen to you tell me about your life and tell you what I think and tell you my story if you want”. And that is what we do.

Is there a certain aspect of the new album that you are most excited to show everyone in a live setting?

SC: I don’t know. The whole thing man. I really just want to play these songs a lot (laughs). We are really stoked about it. But there are not really any parts I’m looking forward to more than the others.

Where can we catch Underoath on tour next?

SC: We’re going out with A Day To Remember in a few days and then we come home for Christmas and then we’ll be back on the road in January for who knows how long. But we’ll be doing our own headliner. We’ll be doing Europe, we’ll be doing Australia and all the other countries. If the A Day To Remember tour isn’t coming to wherever the reader is, we’ll be doing our own tour. So we are not going to miss a beat. We’re going to play everywhere we can.

Great! So I have on last one for you. If you could say one thing to our generation, straight out, what would it be?

SC: I don’t know. I would just say being true to yourself. I know that is a very open and broad statement but I see it a lot, starting bands because it’s cool, or trying to be somebody else because it’s cool, or doing all these things because someone else was doing them or beause its cool right now, but you just need to do what’s best for you. And be yourself with whatever your doing especially if its creative. Trying to be someone else never works. So being true to yourself and what you believe in and what you feel like doing and just going for it. I even told that to kids in the crowd. Find something you believe in and go for it. I don’t care if you tell me if you’re Hindu as far as religions go, if you’re Muslim, if you really believe in it then go for it. Who am I to tell you to do something that’s not right for you. I think really being true to yourself will save you a lot of time when you’re becoming a man and trying to figure out whats right for you and what works and what doesn’t work.