Touché Amoré Opening Doors by Opening Shows

Opening for one of the hottest shows of the year has it’s perks and downfalls.  Touché Amoré opened for AFI at the Catalyst on Oct. 28. for a show that sold out in less than an hour. It was great exposure for Touché Amoré but their hardcore fans were unable to snag tickets faster than the die-hard AFI fans.

Calloused, hard-hitting, and honest in both music and lyrics, the Los Angeles-based band is moving up in ranks since their beginning in 2007. In the six years since they’ve formed, Touché Amoré have toured the world with long-established bands, headlined their own tours and are currently celebrating the release of their third full-length album “Is Survived By.” The album was released on Sep. 24, 2013 through Deathwish Records, and offers a cleaner recording quality while maintaining the raw lyrics and salt-in-wound sound.

The band took a different route to their studio process this time around for their September release. Unlike with their previous “Parting the Seas,” they had more than five days to record “Is Survived By.”  With more time available to fine-tune and experiment, the band did just that. They also got a few pointers from their producer, Brad Wood (MeWithoutYou, Smashing Pumpkins), who attended Touché Amoré’s band practices and had more of a hands-on experience.

“We wanted that different sound. You know, we want to try both things. If we make it to another record I don’t know what we’ll choose [but] I’m happy we got to see both sides,” said vocalist Jeremy Bolm.

During their stay in Santa Cruz frontman Jeremy Bolm discussed the Touché Amoré’s beginnings, recording process and past in Santa Cruz. 

How did you you guys come together?
Bolm: I quit the last band I was in and I wanted to start something just completely different. I’d always played guitar in bands and I wanted to try my hand at singing. So I kind of just grabbed random friends from different parts of my life --no one really knew each other-- and I just put them all in a room together and was like ‘let’s see how this goes.’

Did you see yourself as a singer before you became one?
Bolm: I always wanted to try it but I didn’t have the confidence for it. And I, you know, I figured it’s worth trying at least. It took a while to get used to because when you play guitar in a band you kind of are hiding behind something.  But when you’re singing, all of the focus is on you. I didn’t really want that at first but then I got comfortable with it.

So you’re comfortable with the spotlight now?
Bolm: I mean, it doesn’t I used to have a hard time even looking at the audience and I’ve just grown and gotten past that. It took me like a year to get over that sort of thing but yeah; I’m a lot more comfortable with it now.

In the six years since forming, what’s been the most important lesson you’ve learned?
Bolm: I just try to do my best to not put my foot in my mouth.  Never be too cool for anything. That’s what I’ve always tried to base a lot of the things we do around. I feel at this point we’ve still maintained that. There was a little controversy [recently] because I made a few comments about never wanting to play Warped Tour. A lot of people took that as me saying that we were too cool for Warped Tour, which is completely not the truth. It had more to do with the ideals and a lot of things that go into Warped Tour these days that don’t appeal to us at all.

Comments were said like ‘oh but you’ve toured with Rise Against and you’re touring with AFI’ and stuff like that. It’s like, yeah because they’re actual punk bands and they’re not bad people. We’ll play anywhere, honestly, as long it makes sense [and] feels right.

Patch: In regards to your music, do you write the lyrics?
Bolm: Yep, all of them.

Patch: What inspires your lyrics, is it mostly just life events or? Do you ever do concept songs?
Bolm: I have [but] not a lot.  There’s even been semi-political songs. It’s just if something gets to me enough and I feel passionately about it, then I’ll do that, but otherwise it’s more just like day-to-day life events or things like that. This record was digging a little bit deeper because I didn’t want to write the same record again.

Patch: What was your favorite song to write?
Bolm: I think “Harbor” is my favorite song on the record.  I think it’s a different tone from anything we’ve really done before. It was the one that when we were first writing it, when we first played it —when we write songs everyone has equal— so when I finally got the lyrics for that I went in and then we played it all together. As soon as it ended everyone just looked at each other and was like “awesome.” Everybody was [had] that feeling of excitement that I feel like if you’ve never played in a band, it’s hard to explain that excitement. When a song finishes the first time and everything is all together and you’re finally just like “YES!” That’s still my favorite song on the record for sure.

Patch: Now as for this tour with AFI, how do you feel the crowd compares between this tour to a crowd at a headlining tour?
Bolm: This tour we’re playing to people who don’t know us at all, so there’s that. We’re happy on this tour —clearly it’s fun— but many of these shows sold out within minutes, which means no one who knows our band got tickets. So what we have to hope for is that there’s cross over kids who grew up on AFI and found us later on.  Most nights there’s a pocket of kids, between five and ten, if we’re lucky, that know us. We have had a couple lucky nights where there’s 20-some kids and it can get real rowdy, but the front four rows are just AFI die-hards. The point of doing these tours is that you’re hoping to make new fans. When you’re up on stage you can’t help but feel “man everyone here hates us,” but you can’t expect a crowd who has never heard you to just go nuts. It just doesn’t happen.

Patch Has it been a little bit of an ego-shot?

Bolm: I think these tours are necessary. Some nights it’s a little discouraging ‘cause the record has been well received which is beyond any of our expectations how well it has been received so far.  Every night we’ll post something like “oh we’re playing Santa Cruz tonight” and then there will be comment after comment with kinds saying “please come back, I wish I could see you.” You try to not let it get to your head and be discouraged to where you’re like “I wish we could be playing to our audience,” but the opportunity is great. This is a tour that people would kill to be on so we’re all very thankful and they’re all great guys and treat us really well.

Patch You guys played the Gilman in Berkeley yesterday. Was that a little uplifting?
Bolm: Absolutely. I’d been counting the days till the Gilman and it was really fun. There was like 400 kids on a Sunday afternoon so can’t complain.

Patch It was an early show too right?
Bolm: It started at 5:00 [p.m.], yeah.  And we played with bands that have all either been friends in one way or another. It was good, it was a fun night, so [I’m] happy it happened.

Patch You have played here in Santa Cruz at the 418, has there been anything really memorable about your experiences in Santa Cruz?
Bolm: I mentioned my old band earlier; this was like our stomping ground. No one gave a shit about us in LA, and we would always play here or Morgan Hill. It was just in a different era, a different time so I had a bunch of friends here throughout the years but I think they’ve all kind of moved on to like either living in San Francisco, or moving to LA.  Santa Cruz holds a special place in my heart for all of that. This is just a great city. It’s so different from anywhere else I think. It’s like a crust, punk, hippie, other world—

Patch You just don’t know what you’re going to get.
Bolm: Yeah, I feel like there are people here who have never left, you know, and it’s such a parallel universe, but at the same time there’s something so loving about it. It’s a great place. It’s beautiful, you know?  It’s way cooler than San Francisco, it’s way cooler than Oakland. Those are just regular big cities, you know, but this place, you have to experience it.