IAN THORNLEY
AS HEARD ON ...
THE DEARS
MADCHILD
PHOTO : NIKKI ORMEROD
IAN THORNLEY
AS HEARD ON ...
For the new solo , acoustic album Secrets , were these songs written for this project , or were they part of a larger batch of songs that may or may not be Big Wreck songs ?
PHOTO : RICHMOND LAM
Murray Lightburn of
THE DEARS
It used to be a tour was a promotion for an album , but now it seems somewhat reversed , where an album is a promotion for a tour . Does that make the commitment of an album more daunting , knowing you ’ ll have to tour extensively to recoup expenses and make money ?
Thornley : I ’ d say more the latter . I am not the type of writer who sits down in his writing office and says , ‘ Now I am writing for this …’ But for the most part during the writing process , you just try to follow it through and try to keep it as authentic and honest as possible . After that , the craft process comes in and with this album , that part was more like turning things off for me . I had to turn a lot of things in my brain off and just go with the flow . Like these kneejerk reactions like , ‘ I ’ ve got to go back to fix that , of course .’ With this , we didn ’ t … because if it captures a certain magic or vibe and this musical conversation between the three of us , I think that is more important than me perfecting a note or two at the beginning of a song .
Lightburn : Quite frankly , it ’ s getting even harder to make money on the road as well . But , you ’ re basically looking at your whole business . I couldn ’ t tell you the last time I actually held in my hand a cheque for royalties . It is like a never-ending pit and just the thing they tack onto your account that just goes on forever [ laughs ]. Every once in a while you get lucky and do see that kind of dividends , but you have all these different moving parts of the business of being a band and you hope something will yield a sizeable enough living that you ’ re able to do it again . But there are so many mouths to feed , including in just your own family , and in the circle of a band there are so many mouths to feed and you want to see everybody succeed who are attached to a project . You ’ re not just looking at that one part of record sales … It is just having all these fingers in all these pies that you hope to see some kind of living from it .
MADCHILD
You ’ ve released your third solo album , Silver Tongue Devil , which is also your 14 th album when including your work with Swollen Members . You ’ ve also recovered from a serious opiate addiction , which you ’ re very open about . Considering that , do you get a different kind of satisfaction from music than you used to ?
Madchild : It is way more satisfying now , for various reasons . I shouldn ’ t say way more . [ Swollen Members ] were a worldwide underground , successful hip-hop group and it is funny because we toured Europe , Japan , and America before we ’ d even toured Canada . So to become this anomaly in Canada and ride that four-year wave of success with multi-platinum albums and four JUNOs and top-10 hits and Much Music Awards , it was an amazing experience . It all happened at a pretty young age for me , so I probably didn ’ t handle it as well as I would now ; well , I know I didn ’ t . But that is something that no one can ever take away from me . That happened in my life and in our lives . It was an incredible experience , but now , I would have to say it is more rewarding because my music is like therapy . I ’ ve been through trials and tribulations … but the good news is I ’ ve been drug-free for nearly four years and have rebuilt my life , started a solo career three-and-a-half years ago , and I ’ ve had what I think is amazing success in a short period of time .
PHOTO : DOMINIK MAGDIZAK PHOTOGRAPHY
18 • CANADIAN MUSICIAN
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