One of our favorite things about music in general is seeing a young band come up who have a deep respect and admiration for those they are influenced by, not a mere rip off, but a genuine love for the bands that came before them and did the style justice. It is no secret that Facedown Records’ A Hope for Home is heavily influenced by the ever evolving Thrice. I always find myself describing AHFH as beautifully heavy, while continually striving to progress according to their own desires and feelings of direction. When we decided to feature Thrice once again as our feature at Hopecore.com, we knew that we wanted to provide our readers with something different. AHFH’s Matt Ellis was that key puzzle piece. We’ll let him explain from here.

If I had access to a time machine and could visit my fifteen year-old self learning how to play guitar in his room to The Illusion of Safety so as to tell him that in ten years he would be talking about Robot Music with the guy on the record, well…I guess I’ll just cut to the chase and say that I was stoked to do it even today, ten years later, regardless of how stoked I would have been. Thankfully, the interview was done over email so I didn’t have to try and cover up my two Thrice tattoos when talking to the guy who got me into playing music in the first place, but the fanboy inside me was still quite giddy. In all seriousness, a lot is going to be said about Thrice’s Major/Minor upon its release on September 20th, and aside from being, in my opinion, the band’s most personal and emotional piece yet, it is always refreshing to hear just how down to earth and in-touch with the rest of us one if its chief creators is. This has always been one of Thrice’s biggest strengths, and is certainly one of the reasons the band continues to endure while their peers retire. That, and, they still write better records than anyone else.

Matt Ellis: To start, what made you guys go with Major/Minor for the title?

Dustin Kensrue: It was around originally as the working title for “Yellow Belly”. A lot of the record has a push/pull of major chords where there normally would be minor chords in that position in the key. It’s something that was prominent in a lot of early 90’s indie and grunge. It wasn’t something we were intentionally incorporating, but it started finding its way all over the record. Eventually we settled on it for that reason, but also because it seemed to describe the intense poles we were all experiencing in life in the last few seasons, a lot of great things and an avalanche of bad.

ME: It has been a while since you guys have recorded with someone else. Was it easy to invite someone back into that process when Teppei had been fulfilling it for so long?

DK: We have known Dave for a while so it wasn’t very strange to have him step in, especially since he wasn’t trying to get in the way. We had the record probably 80% written when he stepped in. He is easy going and great to work with and is especially good at capturing the good that is already happening.

ME: With “your sound,” I have noticed a very consistent gear flow throughout the history of Thrice. I remember wanting to buy a red SG back in the day, because it seemed like your go-to piece of gear. Then with Vhiessu, it turned into me scouring the Internet for gear photos- Teppei’s rhodes, Baritones, hollowbodies, then even later with your Line 6 variaxes and you guys using Reason to write electronic bits. It is almost as if Thrice has been gradually changing its language over the years. How different was your gear choice from Beggars to Major/Minor?

DK: I think I’m fairly neurotic about gear at times. I get really comfortable, and then for some reason I have to shake everything up. “Perfection = robot music, in the bad sense. Not in the cool ‘this music sounds it was sent back in time from hip future robots.’ It’s better to lay it down and feel it” A bunch of the gear change has both led and followed from changes in the sounds of our music at the time. Sometimes it’s a push, sometimes a pull. From Beggars to Major/Minor for me personally there is a shift. I used some Nash guitars that I had built and wired with Seymour Duncan’s P-rails, which can be used as humbuckers, p-90’s, or rail pickups. I used basically two guitars on the record. One of those that was in D standard, and one that was Baritone. I call them Jagulars because they are wired crazy and are full scale but they look like Jaguars. My main one was just stolen though. Bummer.

ME: Do you feel that the musical place you guys have landed with Beggars and Major/Minor is a comfortable one, or can you see yourselves eventually drifting further into new territories in the future?

DK: It seems the historical trajectory would suggest we will continue to be nomads.

ME: You guys have been doing this for quite some time. And certainly, the four of you must be very different people than when you wrote Illusion or Artist. Do you all come back to the same place when you get in a room to write or jam, or has that process evolved alongside the music?

DK: I’m not sure if you are speaking of a metaphorical or literal place. If metaphorical, I’m not sure how to answer it with the limited informational context. If physical, then the answer would be ‘not any more‘ because Teppei sold the house our studio was in, though we have used it to rehearse in since Vheissu, and recorded Alchemy and Beggars there.

ME: Your lyrics, I feel, have also ebbed and flowed in a very natural progression. For me, anyway, it’s the same thing as the music- you have allowed your listeners to grow into adulthood with you, from the ontological yearning of “Stare at the Sun” to dealing with fathers and marriage on Major/Minor. Obvious personal life aside, do you think the course of the Thrice discography can give us a little peek into your evolving consciousness?

DK: Definitely in certain senses. It is not a 1:1 ratio, but I try to always write honestly (though that word seems to mean less and less) and those snapshots can be pieced together to be viewed as a movie of sorts, portraying some aspect of my changing circumstances/worldviews/etc.

ME: You’ve spoken before about Plato’s idea of losing ownership of art once it’s out of your hands- before its release, and individual songs aside, is there any overarching theme to Major/Minor you want to be known, or is it up to the listener to discover/decide?

DK: I actually was unaware of Plato’s idea when I started talking about that in regards to my reflections on the concept in the lyrics of  “As the Crow Flies.” But, I don’t see an overarching theme – at least not yet. It usually takes a season or two.

ME: The first time we got the mixes back from our last record, I remember having a mini panic attack because I realized how different they were than anything we had done, and I felt like we had shot ourselves in the foot. And I know that it is foolish to think about that while in the middle of the creative process, but do you ever have difficulty moving your music from that intimate place of creation to a more universal arena?

DK: We have in the past, but have learned ways to get around that. Perfection = robot music, in the bad sense. Not in the cool “this music sounds it was sent back in time from hip future robots.” It’s better to lay it down and feel it and not nitpick it to death.

ME: Any specific literary inspiration this time around?

DK: Off the top of my head, there’s a lot of scripture and a quote from Betrand Russel, a nod to a scene from No Country For Old Men. There’s probably a fair amount buried in there, but not as much direct inspiration as some of our previous releases.

ME: What’s after this album cycle?

DK: God knows.