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Interview with From Autumn To Ashes
By: Caz* Bevan
 Well into their twelfth week of
touring, Jeff Gretz (drummer) kicks-it (pun-intended) while
snacking on some frozen Pizza Rolls while Brian Deneeve
(guitar/vox) sits back strumming his acoustic guitar -
whatever tune that describes his current mood; Josh Newton
(bass/vox) is eager for tonight's BBQ specialty - courtesy of
their lead singer, Francis Mark and guitarist, Rob Lauritsen -
perhaps the greatest salmon BBQers to ever tour.
Sure to be cooking something fierce in a parking lot near
you, From Autumn to Ashes is likely to be touring for the
next year or more in promotion of their soon-to-be-released
fourth album, Holding A Wolf By The
Ears.
NowOnTour: Do you like the bands you're
with?
Josh: Most of them.
Who's your favorite?
Josh: Us.
Good answer.
Josh: Everybody's cool. Especially in the last couple of days
things have really come together. When we started out it
was like freezing cold but now that's a little bit warmer it's
more festive, like BBQing. It's weird because with so many
bands it's hard to actually meet everyone because there's so
many people. There's five bands and one of them, Alesana,
has like eight people with them.
Who did you record your new album
with?
Brian: Brian McTernan.
Josh: He recorded Thrice and the Biology record that Fran
and I did prior to this in Baltimore, MD. [Laughs]
Why do you laugh at that?
Josh: Baltimore is a weird, weird place. It's like a colonial
town with crack-heads.
Brian: Good description.
Josh: The houses are very skinny and everything is brick,
but there's crack!
Brian: I love it there.
Josh: I do too, and there's great beer!
What kind?
Brian: Resurrection Ale. The thing is they only have it
there.
Josh: Our tour manager came down to hang out and hear
some of the record. We went out and drank first and we got
half a song into the record and he started throwing
up.
Brian: The rest of the night he was throwing up.
Josh: We were like, "If it sucks that bad you can just tell us."
It was the Resurrection Ale. That's what he said.
Brian: That's alright. He works for us either way - whether it
sucks or not.
How long did you take to do this
record?
Josh: About a month.
Brian: A little over a month, yea.
I heard you had some drama in the process that
was expected.
Josh: It was no shock when it happened. We had been
writing after Warped Tour, every day we would just meet up
and go practice for a while, and somebody wasn't showing
up - which wasn't really a surprise because he wasn't really
involved prior to that in the creative process. So we're like,
'Well he's not going to show up so we're just going to do
everything without him,' and basically have it like a script
and he can be an actor like, 'Here's the words.'
We got to the point where we wrote everything, went down
to Baltimore, recorded rough demos where Fran just sang
everything - screaming and singing. Initially he was going to
come down and we were going to have him just do the
screaming parts. He was like, "Awesome! Great. I'm
stoked."
The day came for him to come down and he missed the bus,
turned his phone off, and sent an email to us and the label
saying, "I'm not really into it but give me until Friday to think
about it." And I was just like, 'Fuck that!'
Brian: This guy was my roommate. Not anymore.
How did that work out for you?
Brian: We only had about a week off after recording and
then we were going right off to Australia. I never went
home. I had a girlfriend at the time so in between Baltimore
and Australia I just went and stayed at my girlfriend's house.
So I never even came home.
Josh: We had a tour booked right afterwards in Australia so
not only did he screw us there he screwed us out of like a
$2,000 plane ticket to Australia. Then we had to scramble to
find a drummer so Fran could just sing.
Was the [fill-in] drummer somebody you knew
beforehand?
Josh: For that trip it was, a friend of ours that just filled in at
the last minute and we went and did it with minimal
practice.
Who was that?
Josh: A guy named TJ.... I don't even know his last
name.
Brian: I don't either, but we hadn't even seen him in years.
He just happened to be in the neighborhood.
Josh: We literally ran into him at Guitar Center and we were
like "Hey!"
Brian: It's a pretty sweet deal.
Josh: He got paid to do it and he got a free ticket out of
it.
How long did you take to find a new
drummer?
Brian: He's right there. Jeff. He's eating Cheezits and
uncooked Pizza Rolls.
Josh: It was about two weeks before this tour that we
started playing together. He just came in and started playing
everything right, which was amazing. We were really
happy.
[To Jeff] How do you feel about that, he just
complimented you?
Jeff: I feel good. I'm just trying to do my job.
Josh: I don't know if [Jeff] knows, but we were pretty blown
away. We all left like, "Holy shit!" He came and we played
four songs and we didn't even play them twice.
Do you think the transition between the singers was
pretty smooth?
Josh: It was ridiculously easy. [The former vocalist] just
wasn't into it. It was blatantly obvious. On tour we tend to all
hang out together and he would just sit in his bunk and
watch TV and not hang out at all. Not that it's a requirement,
but it was obvious there was a fork in the road.
Didn't you have somebody else
quit?
Josh: We had a guitar player quit - about a year ago? John
actually hated touring it turns out. We were totally having
fun being in Europe and Japan, everything was cool, but
honestly I think John felt like he didn't get the recognition he
deserved as the new dude in From Autumn to Ashes. I think
he thought he was going to be famous now.
Brian: I've been doing this band for a long time and I'm not
famous yet.
Josh: Yeah, maybe you should go do American
Idol.
Is that the way you want it? Do you just want to be
famous in the underground?
Brian: As long as I don't have to go and get a job.
Josh: We were talking about it last night, we realize that
we're really excited about the record coming out but we're
not like, "This is the one that's going to put us on
TRL." We're not banking on it, but life is pretty
good. We get to go around everywhere and play music and
some people give a shit so it's pretty nice.
Do you ever see yourselves going bigger than
Vagrant Records?
Josh: I don't know. This is the last record for them so maybe
[major labels will] come knocking on our doors to make us
Ashlee Simpson-esque. We're actually all going to take
David Lee Roth's place in Van Halen, all five of us.
So why are you a musician?
Josh: There was never any question as to what I was going
to do.
When did you first know?
Josh: When I was like five. When I saw KISS on TV. It was
never a question, ever. I never thought about another way
life could go. We've all had jobs and stuff to survive, but this
is the time that I've just seen in the distance.
So I read that you all agreed about how the new
album was about life in general and not so much about being
inspired by other music, so it's based only on your
experiences? Are there any distinct experiences you've had
regarding touring and being together as a band that has
influenced your new album?
Josh: I think we throw the rest of our lives to the wind every
time we do this. It seems like life in here for us is a vacuum.
Every day we go to the next city, we play our show, we set
up our stuff, we change the strings on our guitars - it's really
moment-to-moment.
Brian: It's weird to say - along the same lines - it's as if you
don't realize the world keeps turning. You go home and
things have happened. The world really does turn without
you.
Josh: For us it's like Groundhog's Day, for
everyone else things are going on. It's really weird because
friends stop making plans with you because they know
you're probably not going to be around and they don't even
call you when you are home because they are used to you
not being home.
Brian: And your girlfriend goes and cheats on you and goes
and gets other boyfriends without telling you about it. I am
single now.
[To Josh] And you're married?
Josh: I am.
How is that while touring?
Josh: It's good. She comes out every once and a while and
we fight on tour rather than at home. [Laughs]
Brian: It's amusing for everyone else.
Josh: We didn't fight this time.
Brian: It was boring! Step it up.
Josh: Sorry. She's older now, it was her birthday.
What other things kind of happen at home?
Anything that has really hit you hard making it difficult to
leave on tour?
Brian: Yeah, people die while you're on tour. Depending on
their significance in your life, you go home for a couple
days.
Josh: That happened last fall. My step dad died and I had to
miss a couple shows.
Brian: When we were recording one of the records, my
Grandmother died. [She] was one of the most important
persons in the world to me. You know what, you go home
and you stay for a couple of days. You do your thing and
you go back out. It's what you do. You go to work, you take
off a couple days, you do what you do and you move
on.
Josh: You know, as much as it's like a selfish thing that we're
doing this, other people depend on you to be there. If we
have no drummer, we have no show.
Do you ever get sick of it, like a regular
job?
Brian: You get sick of the grind. The end of my job every
day, people clap. Think about that.
Josh: That's not necessarily true! The end of the cool part of
your job every day, people clap. Nobody's clapping when
we're packing up the trailer! The positives super-outweigh
the negatives. We get to go to Australia and Japan. We're
talking about going to Brazil and Argentina to play music.
That's ridiculous!
Brian: There are kids in all these places that want to hear
what we have to say.
Josh: You get tired and cranky, but if you don't ultimately
realize how rad this is, you're a fucking asshole. There are
people who don't! There are people who are just pissing and
moaning about being on tour and having to do this the whole
time.
Jeff: That's why I'm here!
Josh: It's ridiculous. How can you not be so thankful that
anyone gives a shit in the least.
People look up to you.
Josh: Yeah! That's a whole other weird thing, just that people
care enough to invest their time in you is
amazing.
Have you ever had fans that are totally obsessed?
Brian: Yes! I had one the other night. She wouldn't leave
and I was stuck on the bus all night. She sent me 200 text
messages in the next 3 or 4 hours.
And you were just being nice, hanging
out?
Brian: That's all I was doing.
[To Josh] Did you meet your wife touring or did you
already know her?
Josh: Umm. I actually met her because of our old singer.
She was his ex-girlfriend's best friend. So he was good for
something.
Brian: Let's not talk about him, he puts me in a bad mood.
He stole money out of my checking account. There. Tell the
world! He paid his bills online with my checking
account.
Josh: That's also part of the reason we didn't get along with
him very well.
So he doesn't get along with
anybody?
Josh: No, he gets along with everybody! He's a
politician.
So it's a face-to-face sort of thing and then he goes
and locks himself in his room? So he's too emo for you
guys?
Josh: He's not emo. He's more like a shitty country
song.
How do you see that?
Josh: I mean - in the sense of - I got drunk on whiskey and
my dog died. He's willing himself towards that. Wow, we're
really dishing the dirt. He's like Kerouac without the
road-trip.
Brian: He's like Jack Kerouac without the talent!!! He's an
asshole! Fuck him! Print it! Let's move on.
So how do you feel about the new record? You
already said it was kind of 'meant to be,' and it was easy to
make the transition. Do you like it better this
way?
Brian: It is 100% the best thing we've ever done.
Are you wondering why you never did it in the first
place?
Brian: Well, that...
Josh: If you're going to say that, then why didn't a certain
painter paint a certain painting at that exact moment? Why
not start with the Mona Lisa and then move on?
Then where do you go from there?
Josh: Exactly. For us it was the right time and the right
combination of us.
Brian: And delicious, delicious beer.
So it's all due to Resurrection beer. That's ironic.
Josh: I'd say it's 73% [due to the beer].
Brian: That's about the alcohol content.
So how would you say the record is different from
your previous record besides the singer,
obviously?
Josh: I think we've raised the level of our musicianship, yet
again. From the second to the third [album] we've got two
new guys and the bar was raised a bit. Then with this last
one, I mean it wasn't a conscious thing, but I think we're
playing things that are a little more difficult.
Brian: I don't want to say it's a conscious effort to do it like
that. It came out better. It's just a better record. We're all
comfortable in our stations with how things are done in our
particular roles.
Josh: We really didn't give a shit what everyone
thought.
Brian: Really! For the first time - not that we ever wrote a
record for anyone particular. Six months ago we didn't think
there was going to be a record in the first place so we really
honestly didn't care what anyone thought. We didn't care
what we thought.
Josh: If we didn't get bored playing it, it stayed. That's pretty
much how it came about.
Do you think all the tension of the changes added
to your musicianship?
Josh: No, because it really wasn't an issue at the time when
it was written. We didn't expect there to be a change, we
just didn't expect him to contribute to anything. We decided,
'Maybe we couldn't count on him, but we could count on him
to be him.' It wasn't a surprise at all.
How did you all know each other in the first place?
Josh: They were a band - Brian, Ben, and Fran were like the
original guys. Then the bass player, I took his place. I
dunno. I met them from touring. I was playing bass with
Reggie And The Full Effect. That's how I hooked up with
them. Last Spring Brian and I just did another couple of
tours with Reggie.
Are you all New York based now? What
part?
Josh: Most of us live in the Brooklyn/Manhattan area and
one of us lives on Long Island still.
What's your favorite part of living in New
York?
Josh: The rent.
The fact that you can afford it?
Josh: Every time I have to pay my rent all I can think is,
"God I deserve this. I deserve to pay way too much for a
room about this big." Seriously my rent is $950 for about
this much space.
For half a bus essentially?
Josh: My wife and I live in it together.
Jeff: Mine's $12,000 for one bedroom. I'm in
Manhattan.
What is Brian's rent?
Jeff: His rent is like $2,500 [on Long Island]. He's too cool
for us. I can't even go down there.
Well, I was going to end this with a totally amazing
question but Brian's not here, so Jeff, you'll have to answer
this. Ok, the question of the moment is - if you could be a
Ninja Turtle which one would you be?
Josh: I don't know how they differentiate
themselves.
Jeff: Donatello had the big stick right? Yea.
Donatello.
Josh: I'd be whoever Corey Feldman did the voice for. I'm
too old. I'm 33.
Jeff: You're only three years older than me.
Alright we're good, no more confessions.
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