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Atlanta indie-folk rockers The Wild have been busy. They’re currently touring in support of their
brand new album Dreams Are Maps (recorded by Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace). They have played a sold-out show at the Troubadour last month, are recording a Daytrotter session mid tour and have just filmed the first music video for the new album. GroundSounds recently caught up with frontman Witt Wisebram to talk about the band’s music, motivation, and new album.
GS: How did you begin making music as The Wild?
WW: I started writing and touring a lot when I was 23. I was playing solo-acoustic political folk music. After a while, I started to feel a really intense neurosis about standing alone, playing quiet music in front of people and it got to the point that I felt like giving up on it. I was at a punk show at an old punk house in Atlanta called 141 Moreland around that time and ran into Kylee. She said that she was a drummer, and we decided to get together and play. (At the time I didn’t know she was actually just drunk and had never really played drums…ha!)
When we got together we used some of the songs I had written that I thought could be cool with drums, and somehow it felt really good. Even though she had never really played before, she was able to keep the beat and there was just a really good energy, so we kept going with it. Later we pulled in a bass player and some other members. The line-up changed a lot, but when we found Dianna to sing, Dakota to play bass, and Steve to play banjo…everything felt right.
Your sound has been called “folk-tinged punk” but it’s difficult to find an appropriate label or description. How would you describe your own sound?
I like to think that we have a pretty unique sound. We definitely have been involved in the folk-punk scene for a long time, but I think every band in that scene is doing something different and kind of has their own things going on. I think we’re a folk rock band maybe. Our value system and ethics as a band are very much in line with the punk world, but musically I don’t know if I think we’re a punk band. We try to play with the energy of a punk band, but I think musically we’re more of a folk group or even maybe just a rock and roll group. We just try to take the things we love… Springsteen, Dylan, This Bike is a Pipe Bomb, Rilo Kiley, Bright Eyes, The Grateful Dead, Jimmy Eat World… and put it all together. I think like any band, we’re a reflection of our influences, but we try to ad something that is our own.
Dreams Are Maps is an excellent album. It’s incredibly fun, while also very sincere and deep. How long did it take to write this album and what was your goal for it?
It took almost two years to write the album. I’ve never been a fast writer, and I don’t like to force myself to write if I’m not feeling inspired. That is one of the really cool things about being on a label like Asian Man Records. There is no pressure from anyone like, ‘when are you gonna get that follow up record out kid?’ or anything like that. My best friend, Anthony Poynter, was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, and that’s when a lot of the songs started to form. I needed a way to process how I was feeling about that situation. I’ve always been much better at expressing myself through writing than any other way, and I just needed an outlet for a lot of the stuff that was in my head. Once Anthony did pass away, I knew that I wanted this record to be something that could memorialize him and stand as a tribute to him. It would’ve been really easy to write a super-depressing album about this stuff, but I knew that isn’t what he would’ve wanted, and we always had a lot of fun together, so I’m glad that aspect of it comes across.
In my opinion “There’s A Darkness (But There’s Also A Light)” is the absolute perfect way to begin the album. The opening line immediately draws you in. What inspired this track?
As Anthony was getting sicker, I began to observe how sometimes the idea of duality plays into our lives. It seems like we have these great things happen at the same time as some awful things. ‘There’s a Darkness…’ is about duality… light and dark, good and evil, etc. So, I guess I just felt like there was a lesson to learn in that. You know… maybe bad things have to happen, so that we can appreciate the good. That song is kind of the mission statement for the album. It’s kind of like saying, ‘instead of your death being something that paralyzes me, I’m going to learn everything I can from it and keep moving forward, because that is what you would’ve wanted, and I’ll keep you alive in that way.’
What was the experience like working with Laura Jane Grace?
It was a pretty incredible experience. Against Me! has been one of my favorite bands for a long time, and it still seems very surreal that we got to record with Laura. We opened for Against Me! on New Years Eve a couple of years ago, and then we just sent her an email asking if she’d be interested in doing the album. When she said yes, we all kind of freaked out a little bit. It was just really awesome the amount of time and energy she was willing to put in. I felt like she really had a personal stake in the album and wanted it to be just as good as we did. It was just the band and Laura at the studio, and she did all of the engineering, so it just felt like a family vibe, and we were all there to make the best album that we could. Her family was super sweet and hospitable, and Laura is about the most down to earth and kind rock star you’ll ever meet. We are really grateful to have had that experience.
You have said that “Our ultimate goal is to tell stories that emphasize empowerment and not feeling alone.” This sentiment seems to fit perfectly with the vulnerability Laura must have felt going through such a transformation. What did you take away from your time with her about facing challenges or making difficult decisions?
I felt like there was a lot of energy in that studio while we were making the record. We came to not only play and record an album, but also to keep processing and working out our feelings about the death of our friend. I wanted to channel his energy while we were making this record. Obviously, Laura was also going through changes while we were making the record. She stood with bravery and grace, and I think whatever kind of flux energy she must have been feeling was also conveyed through the recording process. I mean… she’s got her own record about all of it, but I can’t help but thinking that somewhere in the sound of Dreams are Maps or the decisions that she made about mixing or fidelity or levels, that there is representation of that energy. I think this record was very cathartic for us and for Laura, and I think it was a unique time when a lot of forces came together and Dreams are Maps is the document of what happened there.
Having fiancee’s as bandmates doesn’t happen very often. What would you say is the best part about this dynamic and what might be the most difficult aspect of it?
I feel grateful and extremely lucky to get to share all of this with the person that I love. It is important to me that The Wild feels like more than just a group of musicians playing songs together. I think we try to interact and treat each other more like family and that it adds a lot to our energy. We fell in love singing together, so that is the easiest thing. The hardest part is figuring out how to make sure everyone feels personally fulfilled, and I think that is about allowing for some autonomy for everyone in the band and in our relationship. It’s really important I think in any relationship to make sure that people are still growing as individuals as well as within the partnership. So, we just make sure that everyone feels empowered to pursue the things they love other than the band, and I think it keeps things feeling really fresh, and everyone is able to bring new ideas and experiences to the table when we are all together.
Is there a song from Dreams Are Maps that stands out as a favorite for you?
I don’t think I could pick a favorite, but I do like that this record is more dynamic than Set Ourselves Free. Songs like ‘Five Senses’ and ‘New Bedford’ felt risky to me, because I felt like we were perceived as a ‘fun and super positive’ band and those songs are slower and less beat driven, so I’ve been really excited by the response to those songs in particular. My favorite song to play is actually ‘Come Home.’ I feel like it has some of the most interesting song structures that we’ve written and kind of hits on the driving folky punk thing, but it also has a lot of elements of folk rock stuff like you might hear in a song by The Band of something like that. It was the last song I wrote for the album and kind of like ‘There’s a Darkness…’ was the mission statement, ‘Come Home’ is the conclusion or summary. I felt like because I was able to write that song, that I had turned some kind of corner in my grief process or something.
You’re on tour now with You Blew It! and The Front Bottoms. How has the tour been and where is it heading next?
This has been the most amazing tour we’ve ever been on. We met The Front Bottoms last summer when we did a few shows with them in the Northeast, but it was just a little four-night run, so we were really honored when they asked us to do a longer tour with them. I just have so much respect for those guys as people and as a band. They’re doing something that is totally unique musically, and they are great human beings. We just met You Blew It! at the start of this tour, and they quickly became good friends. They have some really complex cool stuff going on and are just sonically way ahead of the game. It’s pretty rare when a group of bands get along so well and have so much fun at and outside of the shows, so we just feel really lucky! A lot of the shows have sold out and we’ve been playing to great engaged crowds every night. You really can’t ask for more than that out of a tour.
How is the music scene in Atlanta? What is your favorite music venue?
The music scene in Atlanta has always been really diverse. We have hip-hop, metal, hardcore, country… you know pretty much everything. So, it is pretty cool the way that the different scenes can affect the other ones. Right now there are a great group of heavier bands playing around Atlanta like Cheap Art and Dasher. There are also some great pop punk bands like Places to Hide and Wicked Pretty. My favorite venue in Atlanta is called The Variety Playhouse. You know… it’s kind of a large venue, but it has a great vibe and does a really good job of picking bands that play there. There used to be some DIY spaces that I liked better, but it seems like they have lost some of their momentum recently.
What’s on tap for the rest of 2014? Where can readers go to stay updated with you?
I think that we’re going to spend most of the spring starting to write for a new record. It feels like that is the next right step. Other than that we’ll be planning on hitting the road again this summer. We have a music video, our first real music video, coming out in a week or two for the song ‘Dreams are Maps,’ so we’re excited about that as well. We do our best to keep things updated at our website. Also… we are active on social media… Facebook… Twitter. Thanks a lot for doing the interview. We really appreciate it!
The Wild – “Dreams Are Maps”
