There’s a plethora of surprises at the bottom of Marianas Trench once you dive underneath the surface (no, not the ocean floor). In regards to genre categorization, this Vancouver quartet might as well be the pop-punk equivalent of yesteryear’s emo kid: once you get to know the real him, turns out he’s just a misunderstood, complex guy.
“Sure, sometimes you get classified as pop-punk, rock, whatever, but I think the nice thing about the record is that, yeah, it appeals to the masses through the radio and stuff,” guitarist Matt Webb explained to me, “but if you take a closer listen to it there’s a lot to hear, and if you read in between the lines, there’s a lot more to it than just a pop band.”
Indeed, last year’s Masterpiece Theatre features the pop-punk anthems “Cross My Heart” and “All to Myself” that we’re all so familiar with thanks to constant media exposure over the past several months, but the band also wanted to up the ante and challenge themselves conceptually and sonically. The album’s backbone is structured by three separate title tracks—the opener, the interlude, and the closer—that mesh together The Black Parade, The Crickets, “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and Pet Sounds.
You can even hear some of these experimental flairs creep into some of the album’s more traditional pop-punk songs. I told Matt that the opening vocal melody to the band’s latest single, “Celebrity Status,” immediately reminded me of The Beach Boys. “Beach Boys are a huge influence to the band,” he responded. “You know, in the bridge of that song, the ‘look around round’ part, it’s very unusual, like you never hear any other rock/pop band do that kind of stuff. And the fans appreciate that because it’s something a little bit different and we’re working hard at it.”
Making meaningful connections with their fans is certainly no alien concept to Marianas Trench. Widely known for personally creating and orchestrating many grassroots-styled contests and promotional events, such as Marianas Trench Day and fan t-shirt designs, the band recently invited fans to post video performances of the song “Good to You” onto YouTube, and the winner will perform a duet of the song with the band on stage for their Toronto show at Massey Hall tonight.
“We put that contest out there and we have crazy awesome fans that’ll go to great lengths to do anything for us, which is amazing,” Matt commented. “It’s important to interact with the fans. They have done amazing things for us and we like to make them as involved as possible. People know that we’re just normal dudes, and we’re always looking for advice and feedback from the fans.”
The band’s concert in Toronto tonight is part of Canadian Music Week, which will feature over 700 shows during the weekend in 45 venues throughout the city. There will also be several award ceremonies, and Marianas Trench has been nominated for three Indie Awards, as well as the Canadian Radio Music Fans’ Choice Award, up against Hedley and Nickelback, among others.
I’m personally hoping for a heated battle to the death between Marianas Trench and Hedley, so I inquired about maybe starting a rivalry with Hedley. “Oh, that’s existed for years, my man,” Matt joked. “I actually used to live across the street from Dave Rosin, their guitar player, so we’re all really good buddies. I’m sure there’s a little bit of a rivalry there, of course; but those guys are good guys, and we always have a lot of fun hanging out with them.” Ah yes, the old friendly rivalry. Those aren’t nearly as exciting as hate-filled rivalries, but, I’ll take what I can get.
Right now, Marianas Trench is focused on touring as much as they can in support of Masterpiece Theatre, and they hope to be back in the studio sometime next year. Although, following up a pocket symphony album is never an easy task. “I think the record is pretty impressive, and it’s going to be tough to follow it up for sure,” Matt admitted. “But I think every band should evolve to a certain extent. You know, your fans grow up and you grow up; we’re not going to be writing the same songs a year from now as we were from before.”
I recommended to him they pull an In Utero and write an album with all double-time songs. “Yeah that’s not a bad idea,” he responded, completely straight-faced. “We considered doing like a trombone record, where it’s just all going to be trombones.” A small part of me doesn’t think he’s joking.
