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Three Days Grace Biography
Review The Artist (74)
Source: http://www.threedaysgrace.ca/theband.asp
Adam Gontier - vocals, guitar
Brad Walst - bass, vocals
Neil Sanderson - drums, vocals
There's something a little creepy about growing up in a town so small, you can bear witness to indiscretions and trace the causes and effects on people's lives. On the self-titled Jive debut from Three Days Grace, the Toronto-based trio originally from Norwood, Ontario, Canada, has produced a potent hard-edged rock album, filled with melodic choruses and lyrics that explore the darker side of human behavior.
From the first single, "(I Hate) Everything About You," which deals with love-hate relationships; to confronting and fighting for your individuality in "Just Like You," Three Days Grace writes songs of inner struggle and the desire, in a way, for freedom. Musically, there's a range from the eerie "Let You Down," with its near demented vocal to the progressive "Burn" with its intricate rhythms, to a more straight ahead rocker such as "Home."
"We saw a lot of crazy things growing up and a lot of our material comes from that," says drummer Neil Sanderson, the more garrulous of the three.
"I don't find it easy to write about happy shit," admits lead singer-guitarist Adam, somberly. "You don't need a release when you're happy."
Adam and Brad grew up in Norwood, a town of 1500 people, just one set of streetlights, but a city's worth of drama. "You get a different perspective on people," explains Brad. "Everyone knows each other and you can't hide anything. Maybe that's why we can see through the façade that many people hide behind."
Neil hails from Peterborough, just 25 minutes away, a bigger city, which has spawned model/actress Estella Warren and rocker Sebastian Bach. When the band first formed a rock group (under a different name with a different repertoire) in high school, Adam isn't exaggerating when he says, "all 1500 people in Norwood were supporting the band."
The guys didn't strategize about how to get their faces on MTV or land a coveted record deal. They just loved playing live, anywhere. "We opened for a movie once," Neil points out. "We used to cruise up to the Muskokas (Ontario cottage country) in my K car with a tent trailer on the back and play three hour sets at the local bars."
While they always threw in a couple of original songs into their set, it wasn't until they relocated to Toronto in 1997 and adopted the band name Three Days Grace that they really came out hammering as an original act. "Like any small community, you get to a certain age, and you feel like you have three options. It's either sports, drugs or, for us, it was music. It was a way to get out," Adam explains.
Once settled in Toronto, they hooked up temporarily with an old manager, who introduced them to local musician, songwriter and producer Gavin Brown. "We played him years of material and he picked out what he called 'the golden nuggets,'" Adam recalls of the 90-minute set they performed for him at their rehearsal space.
Together, they sorted through the songs and pulled them apart, improving on them enough for the first set of demos. EMI Music Publishing Canada president Mike McCarty wanted to hear more. The band spent more time with Gavin and came up with "(I Hate) Everything About You," the potential chart-buster that landed 3DG its publishing deal with EMI (Feb./02) and would eventually become the first single from its Jive debut.
"There's a perspective that Gavin has that's really effective. We've learned a lot working with him," Neil says of songwriting. "We're influenced by bands like Kyuss and Sunny Day Real Estate, but Gavin really respects the Beatles and their songwriting standards. He taught us that every part has to be amazing and only then are your songs good enough to matter to others."
Armed with the second set of demos, 3DG's attorney quietly shopped them to record companies. A few came to Toronto to see the band perform, but it was "the Jive crew," as Neil calls them, that made the guys look no further. It started when the label execs made a daring trip in a Canadian snowstorm to see the band perform at Peterborough's Gordon Best Theatre "where we'd played a million times," says Neil. "It's a loyal crowd, a good environment."
The clincher was 3DG's trip to meet with Jive in New York. "We were drinking wine with the president Barry Weiss and he was talking about our music as if he hadn't stopped listening to it for weeks," Neil recounts.
"Having the president of the company involved in that sort of way is a big sign of how the company works," adds Adam.
In no time, 3DG had convinced the A&R team that to make the best possible recording, it would have to stick with its strong system -- Mr. Gavin Brown, even though few in America had heard of the Canadian musician who did time in the platinum-selling Canadian rock act Big Sugar and played with cool upstarts Danko Jones. He also produced fellow EMI Publishing act Billy Talent, another recent Canadian signing to a different U.S. label.
So in good hands, 3DG and Brown left Canada for greener pastures, literally, to Long View Farms, a live-in studio just outside of Boston. "In the months leading up to Long View, we started to do pre-production for the rest of the record, so by the time we went into Long View we had the whole record pretty well written, except for some minor stuff."
Among the material was "Let You Down," about deception, as well as the self-explanatory "Scared." "Some of the songs took years to write; others were put together in a few days," says Brad. "Overrated," the album's closer, he adds, "was written in one day."
Ignoring the temptation to ride the horses at the ranch-style facility, the band buckled down for half the record, before relocating to Bearsville, in Woodstock, NY. Both studios proved to be the perfect environment for these small-town boys easily distracted by big cities. With nothing to do but work, the three got into a creative zone mentally. Bearsville - at which one of Adam's favorite albums was recorded, Jeff Buckley's Grace - was still an isolated studio, but this time on a huge estate. While there were no horses, there were hoards of deer everywhere.
From Gavin's goading of Adam in order to get the most impassioned vocal take (he jumped up and down, banged on the glass or told the singer he sucked) to the ingenious idea of dumping pennies on a guitar to make it sound like a raging fire (check out the album intro), the result is an uncompromising rock release that gets the listener to think. Maybe then, big city folks will find that what makes a small town tick isn't so very different after all. |
Would you please submit the latest Three Days Grace biography to me? Thank You.
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Review about Three Days Grace
wonderful | Reviewer: amber | 7/13/2008I love three days grace ever since I heard the song pain I feel in love, I have never heard such songs that make so much... well I have never heard something so articulate untill I heard them. story of my life. thank you
three days grace rock and kik ass too | Reviewer: andrew godinez | 6/23/2008
when i heard one x in my dream i got angry
in the song animal i have become.animal i have become ,home i hate everything about you,pain,over and over,
it all over,justlikeyou,and overated were my first songs i heared
Three Days Grace | Reviewer: Bridget | 5/29/2008
"Home", "I Hate Everything About You", and "Just Like You" were the first Three Days Grace songs I ever heard. From those, I knew I wanted to hear more of their songs, so I started listening to the "Three Days Grace" and "One-X" albums. I can associate so much with their songs that they're virtually all I listen to.
Home remains my favorite song of all time, and I feel like that so much. If I'm feeling like crap and depressed over life, I always listen to Home a few times, pretty much the whole "Three Days Grace" album, actually, and it usually gets me fired up again. IDK how the most depressing song I know can cheer me up like nothing else, but it does. I still prefer the harder songs on the "Three Days Grace" album to "One-X", but both albums rock, and I can associate to most of the songs on both, even though the harder songs are more my style.
Go Three Days Grace, they've pulled me through some tough times.
Three Days Grace | Reviewer: Bridget | 5/29/2008
"Home", "I Hate Everything About You", and "Just Like You" were the first Three Days Grace songs I ever heard. From those, I knew I wanted to hear more of their songs, so I started listening to the "Three Days Grace" and "One-X" albums. I can associate so much with their songs that they're virtually all I listen to.
Home remains my favorite song of all time, and I feel like that so much. If I'm feeling like crap and depressed over life, I always listen to Home a few times, pretty much the whole "Three Days Grace" album, actually, and it usually gets me fired up again. IDK how the most depressing song I know can cheer me up like nothing else, but it does. I still prefer the harder songs on the "Three Days Grace" album to "One-X", but both albums rock, and I can associate to most of the songs on both, even though the harder songs are more my style.
Go Three Days Grace, they've pulled me through some tough times.
ESABIDA!!!!!!!! | Reviewer: Brittany | 5/4/2008
Three Days Grace is one of the best bands ever besides Breaking Benjamin!!!!! the song w/ Bone Crushers is freakin messed ^!!! u ruined the song Just Like You!!!! NEVER, I MEAN NEVER, COMBINED ROCK W/ RAP!!!!!!! IT RUINS THE ROCK!!! I HATE RAP!
i love three days grace!!!!!! | Reviewer: Ravin Shai Alaniz | 4/7/2008
well i love the band three days grace because they are amazing!!! well i really dont think that three days grace is emo i think it's more mad angry type music because i know when im mad i listen to thier newer cd one X but when im mad i listen to thier song riot and never to late all of thier music can relate to my life in a way well all i have more to say is i love three days grace and i love Adam Gontier i have myspace so look me up if you have something to say i only accept bands and my friends also hot people.
one more thing | Reviewer: Anonymous | 2/4/2008
and i dont have a problem with emo or expressing emotion. three days grace can express all the emotion that they want. the emotion is definitely not the reason im not a fan. its more that theyre music is really cut and dry nothing really complex and its something weve already heard by bands like nirvana and the alternative metal bands of this decade and its been done a lot better. they have the lyrics down now they just need a better sound to go along.
one more thing | Reviewer: Anonymous | 2/3/2008
i didnt even really bash emo in my first post. read the post and dont jump to conclusions. what i said is i dont like the mix of emo and metal a statement i must revoke because that is not a proper description of three days grace. my thoughts on them sylistically are in my post from 2/1/08.
DEFENDING MY RIGHT TO OPINION | Reviewer: Anonymous | 2/2/2008
okay for those of you bashing me cuz i have an opinion i am not saying that three days grace is emo. mcr taking back sunday those are emo bands. i mean to me i just hear an element of emo in the music and i dont think id be saying this if i wasnt familiar with them. yeah just cuz someone is in touch with their feelings doesnt mean youre emo but if you piss and moan about your feelings that is kind of emo these guys tend to do that and there isnt anything to save 3dg from avoiding being seen as a little emo. emo is an offshoot of punk and hardcore and three days grace are probably closer to that style than heavy metal. heavy metal bands do express emotion but in an angry style rather than a really whiny style. if you like three days grace thats fine i sing in a band and our guitarist loves them but if you wanna defend your band im gonna defend myself if you think its nesseccary to go after me.
You go girl! | Reviewer: Bella Cullen | 1/26/2008
DEFENDING THE BEST BAND | Reviewer: Anonymous | 1/23/2008
Okay Three Days Grace is not emo okay it maybe punk if you have to put them under a label. Honestly putting people labels before getting to know them is stupid. Three Days Grace likes expressing their fellings so what and you wouldn't want to express happy feelings because you just dont want to. You might not want to judge a book or in this case an album by it's cover because people are different then they looks. SO AS an 12 year old defending her FAVORTITE BAND IN THW WORLD !!!!!!! LISTEN
I agree! You shouldn't label people or bands. I just wanna say that you rock! Anyways, I've gotta go....my friend is coming over.....and tomorrow I see Cloverfield!
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Review the Artist Three Days Grace
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