One Less Reason are back with their new full-length release after 4 years of absence. The new album entitled “The Memories Uninvited” is not only one of the top works that the band has released to date but also one of the best rock albums of 2016! Grande Rock had a chat with the vocalist, songwriter & producer Cris Brown about the new album, the band and various other interesting things…
Hi Cris, I’m glad to have a chance to talk about your new full-length release “The Memories Uninvited”. I have to tell you that I really enjoyed the album.
C: Thank you, we worked very hard on this record and it’s nice to see that for the most part no one hates it yet.
Hence, do tell us why it took you almost 4 years to release a new work. What happened in the meantime?
C: I had toured for ten years straight. Some of those years we were doing over 200 shows a year. So I took off the last four years and started a family and really just did what I wanted to do, whether it was write and produce for other artist or stay completely away from the studio.
How important was the fact that you have your own studio now and you can work there without any concerns?
C: Owning House of Blues studio was “a dream come true”. I mean to think that I own the studio that Matchbox Twenty recorded their first record in and Collective soul, Travis Tritt, Stevie Ray Vaughn…. that in itself was enough but to have it at my convenience was kind of surreal in a way and I think you can hear that studio on this record.
I’ve read that for the last 2 years you had been working on this new album. What has changed in your songwriting approach and which are the new things that you introduce with “The Memories Uninvited”?
C: With this record I wanted it to sound like OLR but I also wanted to add a new element to it with programming and I had this idea that with every new verse or chorus introduced I would add something so that even if you can’t pick it out what it is, your brain is definitely getting the vibe that there is a little more going on and the song is progressing.
Do you think that “The Memories Uninvited” can be regarded as an “overview” of all the music you have released to date?
C: No not really, I look at every record as a chapter of the book of my life. I was in completely different places with every single one of them and I think that those different periods can be heard from record to record.
How did you come up with the album title “The Memories Uninvited”? Which are the “uninvited memories”?
C: “The Memories Uninvited” are the things that keep you awake at night that you can’t change. Whether it was something you did or didn’t do, something you wanted to say but never got the chance or just a mistake you made. It’s the things that keep you awake at night and make your mind race.
Tell us a couple of things about each track…
C: “Break Me”: This is a song about how we as humans all have a human condition and at one time or another we all go through and experience the same feelings. We will all lose loved ones, we will all have heartbreak, we will all have anger etc… and we all end up Broken at some point. And this song is about how we all need a little help sometimes picking up the pieces that we leave behind when we do break down.
“Something Beautiful”: This is about taking negatives and making them positives. How sometimes through tragedy of our own we can help others out of theirs.
“Sometimes”: This is about when one person is all in and wants to be there for everything and the other person is all in half of the time. There is a reference to a Dishwalla song in the chorus but only a few people pick that up.
“Where Were You?”: This is about how blood isn’t always thicker than water and how I trust certain friends with things that I would never trust my blood with.
“Time”: I wrote “Time” for my daughters. They are only 3 and 4 but there is a bond there that feels like its thousands or millions of years old and in the previous life, this life and the next they will always be mine.
“The Trade”: This track talks about getting caught up in this silly music business and how music gets treated almost as a family member in some respects and that causes problems.
“One Day”: This is a prayer put to music.
“On the Way Down”: This song I wrote for about my niece whom is struggling with certain things in her life. That’s actually my oldest daughter singing at the beginning, she was 16 months or so and she saw me singing the parts and wanted to give it a try.
“The Lie”: This is a song taken from the point of view that If God had a wife or girlfriend before he was God and how now that he is God she never hears from him anymore and he made promises. It’s a conversation between the two.
“You Didn’t Know”: This is a song that has been around for 6 or 7 years and this was the first version of it that I truly liked.
“Rainmaker”: I wrote “Rainmaker” when I was 17 years old. It was the first song I ever wrote. My dad always asked me to put it on a record. He passed away two years ago and so that song is on there for him.
You did the production for album and you’ve also cooperated with Randy Staub (Metallica, Nickelback, Motley Crue) for the mixing. Are you totally satisfied with the final outcome? What would you change in you had the chance again?
C: I am more than satisfied with the outcome. Of all of the “legends” that I’ve dealt with in music production, Randy is the only person that lived up to all the hype. He is a true master and to quote him when you say that sounds great he replied “It sounds like it’s supposed to”…
There’s a concept (and a lyric) video for “Break Me” and a lyric video for “Where Were You?” already out. Do you have in mind to release any other concept or lyric video at some point?
C: Yes, I did a cover of Leonard Cohen and Jeff Buckley’s “Hallelujah” that didn’t get pressed on the record but will be available soon that we are going to do a video for as well as the song “Sometimes”, “Time”, and “The Trade”.
Apart from the tour with Sick Puppies in September/October in the US, do you have any other touring plans for this year and next?
C: Yes – we are in talks right now about going to the UK for the first time which is very exciting for me because our UK fans have been very supportive.
What are your expectations for “The Memories Uninvited” and what are your longtime plans for One Less Reason?
C: I am here now doing what I love. I don’t know how much longer I want to do it, we have gotten all the standard reasons out of the way, money, houses, cars, women… I am only doing it for the love of it now. I told my manager Andy Gould that I will keep doing this while it’s fun and once the joy is gone I am out for good.
OK, time for our “weird questions”!!! If you found a genie in a bottle and you only had 3 wishes what would they be?
C: An end to all childhood diseases especially cancer. A world epiphany that would clarify that there isn’t much that divides us in true form as humans and the things that do are man-made and placed there so that we will be divided which makes us easier to control. An end to the “Real House Wives” series and this new crap called mumble rap.
If you were an animal, which animal would you be and why?
C: I’d be a Komodo dragon, because you think oh yea, it’s just a big lizard but then BOOM! I bite you and you die from a bacterial disease from the toxins I was storing and this is the strangest of all questions that I’ve received to date… maybe the answer is stranger though. (i.n.: It is in a way!)
Top 3 sci-fi movies of any era?
C: Event Horizon, The Matrix and Interstellar (I really liked that movie)…
Which are the top 3 Alternative Rock albums of all time according to you?
C: This is hard for me because I just listen to music and can’t really define a band as Alternative or not Alternative so I will give you my three favorite records and keep my fingers crossed. Brand New – “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me”. Matchbox Twenty – “Yourself Or Someone Like You” and Matt Nathanson – “Some Mad Hope”. Probably not Alternative rock, but they found me when I needed them.
Fill in the phrase… “Alternative Rock music wouldn’t have evolved the way it did, if it hadn’t been for…”
C: …bands willing to step outside the norm, be it Pink Floyd back in the day, Tool in the 90s to current date or Cobain with “Nevermind”. It really was people saying “everyone else is doing this, so I am going to do that”.
If you could “erase” one thing from modern music, what would it be?
C: Auto-Tune… (i.n.: M2!)
Name a band that you’d like to be part of (any time & era)?
C: Pink Floyd, I would’ve roadied for free just to hear David Gilmour play lead guitar every night.
Were you obliged to give just one album to extraterrestrials that would represent the whole of human music, which album would it be and from which band/artist?
C: It would be “Aenima” by Tool, because the human race hasn’t caught up to that record yet, so it’s probably close to what the aliens are listening to anyway.
You have the chance to have sex with the movie-celebrity/porn-star of your choice. Who would it be & why?
C: That is a strange question… if I had a time machine it would be Liv Tyler from that Aerosmith video… She was at that point the sexiest thing on two legs. She is still beautiful now but just in a “I’m a mom” kind of way. Not in the “I want to chew your clothes off” kind of way she was back then. (i.n.: I agree!)
Which character from the “Game of Thrones” would you have been – if you lived in the Seven Kingdoms?
C: I have never watched an episode so I’m gonna go with the hot blonde chic with the big boobs that controls dragons. I mean how could you go wrong with that? You would have to be a complete moron to fuck that up right?
Imagine that your girlfriend/wife is selling your whole album-collection just to buy an expensive ring for herself. How would you react?
C: I would say get all you can out of it and I hope that these stories of my turmoil and down times in my life can make you the happiest you’ve ever been.
We’re done Cris. Thanks so much for talking to Grande Rock. Say anything you feel like saying before we close. Take care, dude!
C: The MTV VMA’s suck ass and are getting worse with every year. Glad I got that off of my chest!
C: Thank you, we worked very hard on this record and it’s nice to see that for the most part no one hates it yet.
Hence, do tell us why it took you almost 4 years to release a new work. What happened in the meantime?
C: I had toured for ten years straight. Some of those years we were doing over 200 shows a year. So I took off the last four years and started a family and really just did what I wanted to do, whether it was write and produce for other artist or stay completely away from the studio.
How important was the fact that you have your own studio now and you can work there without any concerns?
C: Owning House of Blues studio was “a dream come true”. I mean to think that I own the studio that Matchbox Twenty recorded their first record in and Collective soul, Travis Tritt, Stevie Ray Vaughn…. that in itself was enough but to have it at my convenience was kind of surreal in a way and I think you can hear that studio on this record.
I’ve read that for the last 2 years you had been working on this new album. What has changed in your songwriting approach and which are the new things that you introduce with “The Memories Uninvited”?
C: With this record I wanted it to sound like OLR but I also wanted to add a new element to it with programming and I had this idea that with every new verse or chorus introduced I would add something so that even if you can’t pick it out what it is, your brain is definitely getting the vibe that there is a little more going on and the song is progressing.
Do you think that “The Memories Uninvited” can be regarded as an “overview” of all the music you have released to date?
C: No not really, I look at every record as a chapter of the book of my life. I was in completely different places with every single one of them and I think that those different periods can be heard from record to record.
How did you come up with the album title “The Memories Uninvited”? Which are the “uninvited memories”?
C: “The Memories Uninvited” are the things that keep you awake at night that you can’t change. Whether it was something you did or didn’t do, something you wanted to say but never got the chance or just a mistake you made. It’s the things that keep you awake at night and make your mind race.
Tell us a couple of things about each track…
C: “Break Me”: This is a song about how we as humans all have a human condition and at one time or another we all go through and experience the same feelings. We will all lose loved ones, we will all have heartbreak, we will all have anger etc… and we all end up Broken at some point. And this song is about how we all need a little help sometimes picking up the pieces that we leave behind when we do break down.
“Something Beautiful”: This is about taking negatives and making them positives. How sometimes through tragedy of our own we can help others out of theirs.
“Sometimes”: This is about when one person is all in and wants to be there for everything and the other person is all in half of the time. There is a reference to a Dishwalla song in the chorus but only a few people pick that up.
“Where Were You?”: This is about how blood isn’t always thicker than water and how I trust certain friends with things that I would never trust my blood with.
“Time”: I wrote “Time” for my daughters. They are only 3 and 4 but there is a bond there that feels like its thousands or millions of years old and in the previous life, this life and the next they will always be mine.
“The Trade”: This track talks about getting caught up in this silly music business and how music gets treated almost as a family member in some respects and that causes problems.
“One Day”: This is a prayer put to music.
“On the Way Down”: This song I wrote for about my niece whom is struggling with certain things in her life. That’s actually my oldest daughter singing at the beginning, she was 16 months or so and she saw me singing the parts and wanted to give it a try.
“The Lie”: This is a song taken from the point of view that If God had a wife or girlfriend before he was God and how now that he is God she never hears from him anymore and he made promises. It’s a conversation between the two.
“You Didn’t Know”: This is a song that has been around for 6 or 7 years and this was the first version of it that I truly liked.
“Rainmaker”: I wrote “Rainmaker” when I was 17 years old. It was the first song I ever wrote. My dad always asked me to put it on a record. He passed away two years ago and so that song is on there for him.
You did the production for album and you’ve also cooperated with Randy Staub (Metallica, Nickelback, Motley Crue) for the mixing. Are you totally satisfied with the final outcome? What would you change in you had the chance again?
C: I am more than satisfied with the outcome. Of all of the “legends” that I’ve dealt with in music production, Randy is the only person that lived up to all the hype. He is a true master and to quote him when you say that sounds great he replied “It sounds like it’s supposed to”…
There’s a concept (and a lyric) video for “Break Me” and a lyric video for “Where Were You?” already out. Do you have in mind to release any other concept or lyric video at some point?
C: Yes, I did a cover of Leonard Cohen and Jeff Buckley’s “Hallelujah” that didn’t get pressed on the record but will be available soon that we are going to do a video for as well as the song “Sometimes”, “Time”, and “The Trade”.
Apart from the tour with Sick Puppies in September/October in the US, do you have any other touring plans for this year and next?
C: Yes – we are in talks right now about going to the UK for the first time which is very exciting for me because our UK fans have been very supportive.
What are your expectations for “The Memories Uninvited” and what are your longtime plans for One Less Reason?
C: I am here now doing what I love. I don’t know how much longer I want to do it, we have gotten all the standard reasons out of the way, money, houses, cars, women… I am only doing it for the love of it now. I told my manager Andy Gould that I will keep doing this while it’s fun and once the joy is gone I am out for good.
OK, time for our “weird questions”!!! If you found a genie in a bottle and you only had 3 wishes what would they be?
C: An end to all childhood diseases especially cancer. A world epiphany that would clarify that there isn’t much that divides us in true form as humans and the things that do are man-made and placed there so that we will be divided which makes us easier to control. An end to the “Real House Wives” series and this new crap called mumble rap.
If you were an animal, which animal would you be and why?
C: I’d be a Komodo dragon, because you think oh yea, it’s just a big lizard but then BOOM! I bite you and you die from a bacterial disease from the toxins I was storing and this is the strangest of all questions that I’ve received to date… maybe the answer is stranger though. (i.n.: It is in a way!)
Top 3 sci-fi movies of any era?
C: Event Horizon, The Matrix and Interstellar (I really liked that movie)…
Which are the top 3 Alternative Rock albums of all time according to you?
C: This is hard for me because I just listen to music and can’t really define a band as Alternative or not Alternative so I will give you my three favorite records and keep my fingers crossed. Brand New – “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me”. Matchbox Twenty – “Yourself Or Someone Like You” and Matt Nathanson – “Some Mad Hope”. Probably not Alternative rock, but they found me when I needed them.
Fill in the phrase… “Alternative Rock music wouldn’t have evolved the way it did, if it hadn’t been for…”
C: …bands willing to step outside the norm, be it Pink Floyd back in the day, Tool in the 90s to current date or Cobain with “Nevermind”. It really was people saying “everyone else is doing this, so I am going to do that”.
If you could “erase” one thing from modern music, what would it be?
C: Auto-Tune… (i.n.: M2!)
Name a band that you’d like to be part of (any time & era)?
C: Pink Floyd, I would’ve roadied for free just to hear David Gilmour play lead guitar every night.
Were you obliged to give just one album to extraterrestrials that would represent the whole of human music, which album would it be and from which band/artist?
C: It would be “Aenima” by Tool, because the human race hasn’t caught up to that record yet, so it’s probably close to what the aliens are listening to anyway.
You have the chance to have sex with the movie-celebrity/porn-star of your choice. Who would it be & why?
C: That is a strange question… if I had a time machine it would be Liv Tyler from that Aerosmith video… She was at that point the sexiest thing on two legs. She is still beautiful now but just in a “I’m a mom” kind of way. Not in the “I want to chew your clothes off” kind of way she was back then. (i.n.: I agree!)
Which character from the “Game of Thrones” would you have been – if you lived in the Seven Kingdoms?
C: I have never watched an episode so I’m gonna go with the hot blonde chic with the big boobs that controls dragons. I mean how could you go wrong with that? You would have to be a complete moron to fuck that up right?
Imagine that your girlfriend/wife is selling your whole album-collection just to buy an expensive ring for herself. How would you react?
C: I would say get all you can out of it and I hope that these stories of my turmoil and down times in my life can make you the happiest you’ve ever been.
We’re done Cris. Thanks so much for talking to Grande Rock. Say anything you feel like saying before we close. Take care, dude!
C: The MTV VMA’s suck ass and are getting worse with every year. Glad I got that off of my chest!