Interview with Todd Clark of Pilot Speed

Would you say it’s a little darker and somber?

Maybe. I thought the last record was incredibly dark. That’s one of those things that I find interesting, I am not a dark or somber person myself. I mean, ‘Today I Feel Sure’ or ‘Wooden Bones,’ they are certainly not cheery. Maybe ‘Open Arms’ is a good example of a song that, yeah, there is a sense of darkness and somberness at the beginning, but hopefully that goes away when you get to the end of the song with the, ‘Hey, brother are you out there?’ part.

I always say that the band is the last person you should ask about their music because they are the farthest from it. There are so many bands that think they are reinventing the wheel and their perception of them is so far off. In my mind, it’s different, but if I sat down and studied it the way an outsider would, I could say, ‘She was right, it is dark.’

Our past album, Into The West, it’s obviously first person, ‘This happened to me,’ and a lot of people like that sort of intimacy in a record and this record is less of that and more of, ‘This is what is happening around us, and this is what happened to this person.’ I can step back a bit from the music. It’s more of an observer point of view, so maybe when you are an observer you can afford to look at the dark things because it doesn’t affect you as much. There are different vocal styles on this record, too. If people have gotten used to our band sounding like Radiohead and U2, I think ‘[Put The] Phone Down’ expels that. It’s just a different approach.

Is it difficult for you to acclimate yourselves into a particular scene? You’re not like a Pantera or Iron Maiden who have this clear mission to just shred and be as heavy as possible, but then again, you are not straight pop either.

We have always been, like, not a pop band, but not the indiecore band, so you are kind of always in this gray area where you try to find a place for yourself. Sometimes, it’s tough to navigate. Then there’s little things, too, like out in Canada we have rock radio and then we have soft rock, so there is always pressure from this country, ‘Well, we need a song that’s like rock radio.’ Most of Canada is into really hard, like Nickelback rock, and we just don’t do that, and if we ever tried to do that the results would be horrendous. The one thing that is to be concluded is that it’s not even your job to write anything like that. You write really good songs and everything goes away.

When will you being touring?

I don’t think we’ll be out until mid-May.

Are you enjoying the downtime?

Actually, I am busier that ever right now because I am producing all the B-sides to the record. There were like eight to 10 songs that we knew weren’t going to make the record and the label said, ‘Yeah, finish them, we’ll find a use for them.’ So I have kind of been doing all the producing and engineering on that. It’s nice because there is room to move, and it’s nice to get experimental. I think there is going to be a B-side for ‘[Put The] Phone Down,’ a song called ‘Signs Of Life,’ which I think is really neat. I’m sure it’ll get used in some capacity. I am just happy to keep doing it and finish it while we have got this little gap before we head out on tour.