SPILL FEATURE: YOU SHOULDN’T BE SETTLING AT ANY STEP OF THE WAY – A CONVERSATION WITH JOHN-ANGUS MACDONALD OF THE TREWS

YOU SHOULDN’T BE SETTLING AT ANY STEP OF THE WAY

A CONVERSATION WITH JOHN-ANGUS MACDONALD OF THE TREWS

For the past 20 years, The Trews have taken Canada by storm with smash hits like “Highway of Heroes,” “Not Ready to Go,” “Poor Ol’ Broken Hearted Me,” and “Tired Of Waiting,” all of which continue to get huge airplay on radio stations. Since the 2000s, their combination of hard rock energy, catchy hooks, loud anthemic choruses, and bluesy swagger catapulted them to be one of Canada’s leading rock bands. Their newest record, The Bloody Light, which was co-produced by Brett and Jay Emmons of The Glorious Sons, is their first since 2021’s Wanderer. Recently, I chatted with John-Angus MacDonald of The Trews about The Bloody Light.

“I think this album is probably a cut above the last couple, especially lyrically,” MacDonald says. “I think Colin [MacDonald] really dug deep to get to a place emotionally and was really communicating well in each song. We were held to a higher standard both in song and performance-wise by the Emmons brothers, who we brought in to co-produce the record.”

Reflecting on The Trews’ collaborative creative process, MacDonald says, “Everybody has the chance to bring something in and present it. I think Colin is the most diligent worker in that he regularly writes all the time. I tend to write more on inspiration, and I think Jack [Syperek] might be the same way. We tend to have less ammo in a writing session than what Colin does… Anyone can go and weigh in, co-write lyrics, and co-write guitar parts. Sometimes guys will weigh in on what they think my part should be, and sometimes I’ll be like, ‘This is what I think the bass line should be.’ We try not to be like ‘This is my song. This is your song.’ We try to make them all band songs.”

The title track opens the record up. It starts as a gorgeous soul ballad and then explodes into a bombastic, grand, anthemic rock tune. “It set the tone and set the pace for everything that was gonna come after it,” MacDonald recalls. “We kind of broke into some new ground with that song. We never started a song that is kind of like a Stax Soul song and then went into this more rollicking anthem, which is what we are more known for. Then it goes back and forth between them, and it’s got multiple breakdowns and bridges, so we felt like the song had a bit of an adventurous quality to it that we really liked. We thought it was the right way to kick off the record.”

The Trews found that working with the Emmons brothers, who have been longtime fans of the band, really helped elevate The Bloody Light. “They had grown up listening to us and coming to see us play, and I met them around 10 years ago when they opened for us,” MacDonald shares. “I took them into the studio and I produced their first EP and their first album. We really have like an intertwined history and really know each other very well. I feel like they just wanted to hold us to a really high standard. They knew what they felt was our best work and wanted each song to match that. They were ruthless in both the preproduction and the studio. If they didn’t feel like something was measuring up, it was either dropped or it was changed, and that’s what you need. That’s what producers are for. They’re there to give you a shot in the arm. You shouldn’t be settling at any step of the way, you can say that about anything in life, but certainly in the creation of art.”

An example of a song that the Emmons brothers really helped shape was the bluesy southern rock tune “Get A Handle On It.” “I did a demo for it that sounded 80s,” MacDonald states. “When we showed it to the Emmons brothers, their feedback was ‘We love this song, but can you dirty it up and grease it up a little bit,’ which was fine by us. I changed the riff, and it became like a slide guitar riff. The drumming was really energetic when Theo [McKibbon] played it on the record. He was really able to amp it up in that way. We got a great vocal performance out of Colin. He plays the harmonica, too… We just made it less contained and a little more wild and a little more greasy.”

“One Fine Night,” one of MacDonald’s favourite tracks from the record, also underwent significant changes once The Trews recorded it. “It was much more ballad-y when I demoed it and kind of like a Roy Orbison style recording, and then again, we sort of heavied that one up, made it a little bit more alt – just made it a little more of a live off the floor performance,” he says. “It’s just got a wonderful atmosphere, like it is still kind of a heavy song, but it’s just got a nice atmosphere between the vocals and the instrumentation. I like how it kind of draws you in, at least with me, it draws me in, and I hope it does for others too.”

The highly energetic “Carolina,” one of the standout songs on the record, has a distinct 70s rock vibe. “I feel like a little Springsteen crept its way into some of these songs,” MacDonald says. “When we were in high school in the 90s, for whatever reason, we got very into The Who, and they had a massive influence on us. I feel like they are always there a little bit. Theo was able to step up the drumming in that way; there’s a lot of that in the chorus and some big drum fills in there too. Same with the vocals and the bridge, we were leaning into a Who influence. Colin also brought a whole lot of his own personality to the sound and the lyrics, which is his own thing.”

The song “Ship Of Fools” was lyrically based on the movie Triangle Of Sadness, a film they had watched just before they were prepping for a writing session. “It’s basically this great metaphor for modern society, capitalism, everybody thinks somebody else is in charge, and you might be careening to imminent demise, you don’t know,” MacDonald states.

For the closing track, “Endless Weekend,” The Trews had to play around with the arrangement as they struggled a little bit to find the right sound. “We arranged it one way that we thought was gonna be great, and then when we got into the studio, it wasn’t really feeling right to anybody,” MacDonald reflects. “We sped it up, slowed it down, changed instrumentation, and then at the end it was this weird mix of all the different styles that we tried. There is a surf element to what Jeff is playing on the organ, a bit of heavy guitar, but not as much as originally, and Colin is playing acoustic guitar through his vocal mics. We were just trying to throw everything up against the wall and try to find the right arrangement for the song. As a result, I find it is the quirkiest song on the record.”

The Bloody Light dropped on October 24. “To me, it feels like a rebirth and a really energetic time to be in the band again,” MacDonald smiles. “We feel like we’re armed with some really good material and really excited to get out and play these headline shows.”

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Main Photo Credit: Paul Wright