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Gulizia's Students Work On New Record |
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Written by Steve L
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Tuesday, 08 July 2008 |
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It has been over three years since funk rockers 311 have released a studio album.
However, the Omaha, NE natives are busier than ever. The band is currently on a co-headlining summer tour with Snoop Dogg and for the past year, 311 have been working on their next album with producer Bob Rock (Metallica, The Offspring).
"I don't know about other bands, but we get tunnel vision if we just sit around and keep writing and keep recording, so it's very healthy for us to get out and play in front of people," 311 drummer Chad Sexton told MTV News. “We wanted to make sure we tour every summer, regardless of our records, because we're here to play live music."
Sexton is a former music student of the Zephyr’s Tony Gulizia who taught him how to keep time and how to keep it cool.
After the summer tour, 311 will return to the studio to finish their album with hopes of returning to the basics. "We've experimented a lot in recent years and shifted this way and that way, and with the current climate out there, with record sales, it could be a coincidence that [our sales] just went down, down, down because of the Internet, or maybe we've been too experimental. Maybe we should get back to the basics — the 311 basics," Sexton said. To that extent, Sexton says that the new album will resemble the band’s first two albums, Music and Grassroots. "We figured, 'Why not get back to basics?' We can experiment further with our sound, but we've been doing that for a while now. We forgot to take a look back and say, 'Let's do that again,' because all of a sudden, going back to that original 311 sound is new to us again."
On choosing to work with Bob Rock, Sexton says, "We remembered how we felt when we first heard [Metallica's Black Album], and he's just so smart." He adds that this new album will be 311’s most mature record to date. "I think people will be surprised by how nice and solid it will sound," he told MTV. "There's something you can't really vocalize or explain about the experience behind what's going on. But I'm thinking people will think it sounds really solid."
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