got this spot I love to visit outside of town. It’s this busted up shack on the edge of hills of wheat fields. I came out here to get away for a bit and think. Sometimes it gets messy in my head so I throw on my headphones and let Switchfoot’s new record Vice Verses do the thinking for me. The album ends (gloriously), and Beautiful Letdown starts. All the sudden I am not at that shack in those fields anymore but I’m in Ventura, California on C Street. It’s 2004 and I’m watching the sunset with my buddies after a long day of surfing. The album finishes up (just as gloriously) and I head for home. The next day I get to talk with Drew Shirley (guitarist for this mammoth) on the phone as he is en route to LA almost 1,500 miles from me. While Drew’s life is different than mine, last night, that time in California and countless other nights, we shared a soundtrack. And I bet if you are reading this introduction right now, Switchfoot has been a part of your soundtrack as well. This soundtrack accompanies different moments for all of us; be it that time you studied all night for that test, or that road trip you finally got to take after spending the whole year planning, or that Winter when you lost that friend. Our journeys are all different but we get to share this. So here is to a new round of memories to a new soundtrack, Vice Verses.
I so appreciate the opportunity to get to talk to you! Where are you guys at today?
Drew Shirley: In California heading to LA for the evening.
This is easily the most diverse and different work that Switchfoot has produced. From tracks with a spoken word/rap vibe such as “Selling The News” and “War Inside” to more mellow nostalgic tracks like “Souvenirs.” Talk to us about your thoughts and goals going into creating Vice Verses and how you came up with the finalized track selection…
DS: It was a much easier record to make than Hello Hurricane (laughs). We thought before to pick out songs that we wanted to record and just work on those songs. For Hello Hurricane we recorded 80 songs.
Oh wow.
DS: Yeah, so it was a maze of editing and different tracks to choose or not to choose with each record that we’ve made and this record we decided in advance. We wanted to make a record that was focused and had songs on it that only Switchfoot could sing and I believe this record Vice Verses is the most soulful record we’ve ever made. Musically we’ve pushed the envelope or just focused in the direction of drum and bass. You mentioned “Selling the News”, that track is a new kind of sound for us. Its got Jon doing this spoken word a little bit. We just wanted to pick guitars and the keys to supplement the drum and bass in there. How we selected all the tracks? I think one of the characteristics of our band is that we can make a record that isn’t one flavor, that it has a bunch of different aspects and angles. It has a mix of fast and slow songs. (We) never pictured ourselves as a hard rock heavy fast song band, we can do something slower, something in the middle, something more rhythmic and so I believe that gives us kind of a more mass appeal. Although that is just the heart of the band, that is just what we all like. You’re looking at five guys that like diverse styles of music and where do we come together. All these songs rise up in a different way and we kind of just let the song be itself. It’s kind of like letting a kid decide if they do or don’t like baseball. The songs decide if they’re gonna end up being slow songs and that’s okay, we’re going to kind of let it go that way and not try and force it into a mold in any way.
You have made your sound very known and set apart by this time in your career but I am always curious about your relevant influences outside of music. So many of your tracks emit a wisdom that not all have been granted. What are some things that you would attribute your outlook to?
DS: Certainly reading a lot of books. Jon reads a lot of books (laughs). I am trying to catch up, but as the main lyric writer and the main song writer, reading a lot of books you get a lot of perspective. There were a lot of songs written after reading a certain book. And the wisdom factor, that’s curious, that’s interesting. I think we are more interested as people in things that are meaningful so that just comes through our music. We’re fun-loving guys that don’t take ourselves very seriously but we take the music very seriously. And we feel like we respect the listener to a point where we want to have something to say and we respect their attention. And I think that the band, as you said, after eight records, we’re looking a back at our history and our career and we have a way of asking questions I think, and that is something we get a lot of joy out of. It’s exciting to make people think outside of their own “world” or question hope or spread light to the world or hope to the hopeless… those are things that get us really excited.
You do pose a lot of questions in your songs… An example comes to mind with your title track “Vice Verses,” “Where is God in the city life? Where is God in the earthquake? Where is God in the genocide? Where are You in my broken heart?” Do you ever find answers to those questions in your life? Or are songs like this one just therapeutic for you, like an attempt to get things off your chest?
DS: That’s a great question. Yeah, some of them are so big that you ask the question and put it out there trying to get it off your chest and some of them you find answers to and then you grow up a little more and find that your answers are still pretty short sided (laughs). You know how life is, it just starts to unfold in different ways and some of the questions in that song “Vice Verses” are really heavy, very heavy questions. And “where is God in the earthquake?”, is one that I don’t know if I’ve wrestled to the ground yet, but we write about things that we’re wrestling with, we write about the things that are important to us and hopefully that question doesn’t stump people and make them afraid of the answer but spurs people to think and spurs people to search for the answers along with us.
What sort of pressure do you face when you sit down to write a new song? Do you think about the million fans that will be playing that song on repeat for the next year or is that a thought you have taught yourself to suppress?
DS: We’ve totally suppressed that (laughs).
“Honestly, songs can be like a snapshot of where you were at that place in your life. And when I look back at Nothing Is Sound or Oh! Gravity those are snapshots of where we were at that time in life and if we recorded those songs today we may have written them differently, guarantee we would have.”(Laughs) That is a good call.
DS: (Laughs) It is a good call right? Honestly, when we’re in the studio we’re making a record that we like and that we are proud of and that we think is good. Then you kind of turn the page and release it to the public and you go “oh man, for the sake of my kids and their college education, I hope somebody likes it” (Laughs). But I mean, not even that. I think that some of my favorite songs that we’ve done weren’t very popular but that is okay. It doesn’t bum me out. It doesn’t make me that crazy because I’m proud of them, and it’s almost like a snapshot too. Honestly, songs can be like a snapshot of where you were at that place in your life. And when I look back at Nothing Is Sound or Oh! Gravity those are snapshots of where we were at that time in life and if we recorded those songs today we may have written them differently, guarantee we would have. But its okay ‘cause that’s where it was at that time.
And I think that is the beauty of it.
DS: It is. That is the beauty of music.
And it’s great ‘cause those are snapshots of listeners’ lives too. I can listen back to those albums and I know where I was at when I heard them.
DS: That’s just it man. It does that. Music does that. It’s our sound track to life.
And I love it. So after touring for the last decade do you find that you still enjoy it? What are some of the things that keep you out there traveling?
DS: Well, playing live shows is one of the best parts of the job. Traveling is kind of lack-luster to me now ‘cause we have traveled so much, but when we get there and set up for a show and play for people, that’s the best part of the day. Granted, some places, like when you’re in Europe it’s hard to beat being able to see Prague or something like that. But what keeps me going on the road is knowing that we believe in these songs and we believe that they are worth playing and we’re united behind that. So even if it’s a long drive or a long flight or early morning wake-up or a long time away from home, which is true, that’s kind of what we do, we live on the road sometimes out of suitcases, but it fuels us up every time people are singing these songs back. And to have an interview like this with someone who has taken the music to heart and let it influence and accompany their life, that is a real honor, that’s a real privilege for us to do.
Well, thank you Drew. What is weighing heaviest on your heart right now that you wouldn’t mind sharing with readers? Be it an issue or just something that you’ve read or something that has been pulling on your heart when you’re quiet.
DS: Right… Well, it’s funny but for me I’ve been thinking about adoption and I’ve had some guitar pedals that we’ve made, and James has pedals, and we had my daughter hand paint them and all the proceeds are going to go to adoption agencies to help kids find parents that love them. And then I got a couple other friends in my life who are adopting and we’ve been talking about it lately. So I guess that’s something that weighs heavy on my heart, just kids needing parents that love them. Anytime a kid is abused… when I see that I’m hurt. They’re always the victim in the situation, and then when you carry that one step further; handicapped kids really really really get me fired up because they’re often taken advantage of and abused. You know, locked in the closet or the car, and I’m thinking of extreme situations here but my younger brother has Down Syndrome and so I’ve grown up around a lot of handicapped kids and seen how beautiful their personalities are and how loving and carefree their minds can be when they’re just allowed to be themselves, and given them the confidence to just be whoever God made them to be. So that is something that really makes my heart beat.
Ya. Well I know you do the Bro-Am every year and it sponsor the Organization Stand Up For Kids…
DS: Ya and that’s right along the same lines. It’s a surf contest and beach event to benefit Stand Up For Kids and what they do is help at risk teens. It started in our hometown of San Diego and now it’s cross country. They are doing some amazing things, giving kids a home that are homeless. And also on our next tour that is coming up with a band called Anberlin, we’re collecting back-packs because that’s one thing that the Stand Up For Kids chapter in each city requests because the kids have to carry everything they have with them all the time and back-packs are like their whole house on their back. So we’re asking people to bring back-packs out to our shows.
Very cool. We just did an interview with Jedidiah Clothing and they are sponsoring Stand Up For Kids this month too and it is neat to see people using their platforms for good.
DS: I know, it’s really cool. I’m familiar with Jedidiah too, we’ve got a great relationship with them, they’re awesome.
They are really rad and we are enjoying getting to know them. I appreciate you opening up to us on that. So one last one, what are your tour plans after the release of Vice Verses?
DS: Vice Verses comes out September 27th and the single “Dark Horses” is out now on the radio and we start the tour just before the album releases and we’ll be on tour as the album is released and then afterwards and all through Christmas basically and for the next year we’ll be all over the map. But to find out about the tour you want to go to www.switchfoot.com. You can not only see the dates but you can see the tour blog, purchase tickets, pre-order the record and find out about Stand Up For Kids, and how to be involved in the things we care about. It’s all there on Switchfoot.com.
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