had huge balls to do this. support anybody’s idea creatively. That song… it was like 4:00 a.m. and Jerome
Harmon, who’s co-writer and keyboard player pretty much on every song, he just
Rage: “Time” is a gem. How did that song play out for you when you wrote it? It’s so lyrically started coming up with this sleepy, sort-of-sad blues number on the keyboard
clever and the ending with “smoking on a cigarette, my six-pack right beside me” said over and they record everything. Anything that anybody’s doing gets recorded. I was
and over… listening to it and immediately just started writing the lyrics to it. Not feeling like it
CC: Tim came up with that. That’s like something that would be really surprising was going to be on the album but just doing it because we were there.
about him. Most of the time, he’s pretty quiet. He’d be sort of in his head thinking I sang it around 7:00 a.m. I’m actually not anywhere near the microphone. The
about music and thinking about a lot of things in Tim world land. And a lot of times, microphone was just in the room. If you listen closely, you’ll hear papers rattling
he would just quickly come up with like these really infectious, amazing ideas and (laughter). Then, they took that into a different studio and actually had a live
he would run in immediately and just record. There would be little things, little drummer play over it and Jerome played an old Hammond D3 and did it that way.
moments like that. The vocal was the first thing on that performance that was recorded.
The song itself is really one of my favorites, that song and “Ground Zero” especially.
They remind me so much of authentic versions of this period in music that is one Rage: Cool. You have to wait for it as there’s like 25 seconds of silence right after the final
of my favorites. That is the late 1960s soul and R&B period where suddenly that song “Watch Out” which totally smokes.
genre started including sociopolitical themes and attitudes. It was in a genre of CC: I was very much trying to avoid that song. I was working with the producer
music that was usually known for partying really. There’s something about that Jim Beans. He had written down a couple of lines that had a theme that was kind
tension. Like Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On?” It’s like this sort of sexy song with of like the way a rock band will write a song about their relationship with their car.
a sexy beat and infectious melodies but lyrically it’s super heavy. I don’t know why For some reason, I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the direction. I didn’t like the attitude.
but that type of combination of influences inside of a song where it makes your As a guy who writes rock songs, in a genre filled with what I think of as “idiot music”
body feel one way and the lyrics create this other emotion, it’s really interesting to about how guys write about girls and cars and partying. I always try to avoid it.
me. I feel like “Time” specifically and “Ground Zero” both live in that world. I don’t Then, I started to see that there is this metaphor of this woman’s whole life; her
think there is any other record where I would have had the opportunity to make mental state… everything about it. And the way that she’s driving is a metaphor
songs that I think authentically live in that world. I was really, really excited about for all of that and I sort of gave into it and started writing it from that perspective.
both of those songs. It seemed to end up having this different feeling. When I perform it live, it gets
this huge reaction. They are very energetic right away and it doesn’t feel like it’s
Rage: Some reviewers and fans are really beating you up for Scream. That doesn’t make any Deep Purple to me. It doesn’t feel like a dumb rock song… there’s something else
sense to me. I’m really enjoying the album. in there.
CC: Neither do I. It’s funny because the negative comments vs. positive comments
are sort of easy on this album to track. It’s pretty easy to figure out why they come Rage: Thank you so much Chris.
where they’re coming from. A lot of it has to do with age and geography. Outside CC: All right. Thank you.
the U.S., I’m getting a lot of great reviews. In the U.K. I’m getting five-star reviews,
“this album is genius”-type of reviews via the opposite of what I’ve gotten here.
Also, the online comments are very age-specific. It seems like if someone is in the
U.S. they are going to have more prejudice to it for some reason. I think maybe be-
cause they’re not as used to hearing combinations of genres like this. Deep-bass
music or club music crossing over into other areas, I think younger people are way
more used to hearing odd combinations of hip-hop and rock and pop music.
Rage: On the song, “Other Side of Town” it strikes me as very ELO in style. I love the layered
effects with your voice.
CC: It’s funny you say “ELO” because on that particular song, the soundman was
referring to it during the answers in the bridge as the “ELO” part. (laughter). I’m
like, “Oh yeah! That’s it. You got it.” There are moments on this album where it’s
resonated correctly. I say “correctly” and what I mean is it’s resonated with people
similarly to the way it’s resonated with me a lot. I find that to be interesting in an
album that seems to be polarizing people and also be so different than anything
I’ve ever done, I feel like it’s communicating what I think it should be and what
it’s communicating to me, it’s communicating to other people really clearly. As
much, or even more than other albums I’ve done. That doesn’t happen that often,
particularly for the writer. I think that’s a really good sign.
Rage: Tell me about the secret blues song at the very end of Scream.
CC: It was funny. It really was one of those accidents where that happened
because you have a lot of people sitting around in a recording studio. Working
with Timbaland, they definitely had an attitude toward always being prepared to
APRIL 2009 | RAGE monthly 47
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