“There’s less ego, less drama”– 'What It Is To Burn X' and the future of Finch

Post-harcore quintet Finch burst onto the scene in 2002 with the incendiary What It Is To Burn. But following the commercial disappointment of 2005’s Say Hello To Sunshine, the band floundered through a series of breakups and makeups with little to show for their troubles. Having reconvened last February to celebrate the 10th anniversary of their breakthrough album, it seems like the band members have finally put the past behind them. We chatted with guitar player Alex “Grizzly” Linares about the band’s upcoming live CD/DVD What It Is To Burn X and what the future might hold for a reunited Finch.

Interview By: Jesse Richman

2013 was a really busy year for Finch, the busiest in a long time. How did it feel to stretch out those road muscles again? Did it come back pretty naturally, or did it take some work?
ALEX LINARES: Jeez, man, I’m so old! It took a second! I have to do, like, 45 minutes of stretching before a show nowadays. If you ever hang out backstage at a Finch show, the hours before the show there’s lots of drinking; the last hour before stage time, there’s lots of stretching. We all huddle around and start stretching our necks out and stuff. It’s going to be really comical if we ever get Coldplay-style huge, and we all start traveling with yoga teachers and chiropractors and stuff.

So why now? Why, after these last couple years off, was it time to pick up and continue on with Finch? Was it just because of the 10 year anniversary of What It Is To Burn, or was there more to it than that?
That’s what cracked the door open, for sure. We got a call from our old manager, like, “What do you think about doing one show?” And I was like, “I don’t know, it’s a lot of trouble for one show. But all right, I’ll do it for two shows! Let’s do a California show, and let’s do a London show. I want to go on vacation to England one more time!” So we got it set up, and then it just kind of took over.

So initially it was just going to be one or two shows, and it turned into a full tour?
It turned into a full couple tours! It literally was supposed to be just one show, and then it got to be four shows and five shows, and 50 shows later, we’re still doing it.

Was documenting the tour for the DVD always part of the plan, or was that something that just developed naturally?
That evolved because of our good friend Russ Hubley, who was sort of the manager of this project. He had the idea, so he contacted us and–we’ve known him for years–he was like “what do you think about shooting it? We can do it for not a whole lot of money but make something that’s really cool for the fans, and it’ll be cool for you guys to show your kids in 30 years.” I’m not sure how much we’re going to include of this, but he came with us to Europe and got a lot of extra footage. I’m not sure if it’s going to be on this DVD release, or maybe something later down the road, but there’s a lot of cool fly-on-the-wall stuff.

What exactly does the What It Is To Burn X CD/DVD include?
It’s for sure the entire show. A lot of the bonus stuff that we’re planning should be pretty cool. There are going to be guitar lessons–Randy [Strohmeyer] and I showing how to play “What It Is To Burn” and maybe a couple other songs on guitar, which will be terrifying, because it’s going to give away the secret that we’re both awful guitar players! We’ve been such a well-kept secret for so many years, and now we’re just going to let it out of the bag, which is unfortunate. >>>

On this tour, you debuted a new song called “Back To Oblivion.” I assume that means you are back writing together again. What’s coming next?
That’s a good question. I wish I had a DeLorean fixed with a bunch of cool gizmos, and I could go to the future and tell you what’s going to happen, but I honestly don’t know. We’re certainly working hard; we’re occasionally getting inspiration to write new music, and if it happens it will be because it’s the right thing to do. If it doesn’t happen, that’s because it was the better thing to do. But we’re working hard out here in Temecula [California], in wine country.

Is there an album in the works?
Right now we’re just locked in a room writing music. There’s no certainty as to what’s going to come of it. Maybe it’ll be a full album and two years of worldwide touring, or it’ll be 30 demo songs and that’s it. I think positively and hope for the best, but I can’t promise anything.

Finch attempted to record a third LP in 2009. Those sessions sputtered out, and the band ended up dissolving. What feels different this time around?
Age and experience, and an appreciation for what we’re doing now and what we did in the past. I think there’s less ego, less drama. We’re just more on the same page.

Your sound has changed pretty drastically between recordings. What do Finch sound like in 2014? Has revisiting What It Is To Burn affected how you’re writing now?
I think one thing we’ve learned from playing all these What It Is To Burn songs is there’s a certain energy to the songs that are simple and straightforward. That may be something we didn’t capture on Say Hello To Sunshine. We were so involved with proving to ourselves, and maybe to our peers, that we could write something that wasn’t just pop. We could write complex arrangements and do fucked-up rhythms and do some crazy stuff. I think it was a good record for us to do; it got that out of our system.

So do you think you’re headed back into a more accessible direction?
I wouldn’t use “accessible” as an adjective in this situation. I would say that, I think the energy that a simple song creates is something I’m more comfortable with. A song like “Gray Matter”­­–the verse is three chords, the chorus is two chords. It’s almost like the song gets out of the way of itself, and lets there be energy, and lets Nate [Barcalow, vocalist] do his thing. It’s not all complex for complex’s sake. Right now, we kind of like that a lot.

What about the back catalog? Any reissue plans?
There’s nothing in the works. There are a couple vinyl snobs in the band, so there’s always talk about getting a proper pressing of it done. The one that’s been in Hot Topic recently was not anything that we had to deal with; [Universal] just sold the rights to some company, and they put out a fucking awful pressing of it. The artwork is [pixelated]; I think they even cut one of the songs short. It was awful. Anybody that talks to us about vinyl, we always ask them very kindly not to purchase the Hot Topic vinyl pressing of What It Is To Burn. They do have our shirts in there, and the shirts are acceptable and really nice, and we support that. But whatever company is doing the vinyl should be dragged out back and shot.

You guys mentioned playing some non-What It Is To Burn shows on your Facebook, so I’m wondering what other songs might make their way into the setlist. What do you see as the essential parts of the Finch canon now?
There are a couple weird oddballs that I always like to include. “Worms Of The Earth” is one of my favorites. There are a couple obscure ones that we put out before the last time we split called “Hand Over The Fire” and “World Of Violence.” Those are always really fun, but they’re so obscure we would just get yawns and bizarre looks, like, “What the fuck is this?” But there are a couple Say Hello To Sunshine songs I would love to play, “Dreams Of Psilocybin” and “Ink.”

What about beyond that? Do you have tour plans in the works?
It’s in the works. That’s all I’ve got.

Can you say any more about how extensive it will be, or the timeframe?
I wish I could. I wish I had more details. There might be an announcement soon, as soon as things get solidified. I hate to make promises and not deliver. ALT