Q&A: The Loud Return of Comeback Kid

If Comeback Kid was forgotten about by anyone in the hardcore community, their latest release, Die Knowing, should act as a firm reminder that this Winnipeg, MB, collective is back and it means business.

Now four years removed from their last studio album Symptoms + Cures, the band – Andrew Neufeld (lead vocals), Jeremy Hiebert (lead guitar, backing vocals), Kyle Profeta (drums), Matt Keil (bass, backing vocals), and Stu Ross (rhythm guitar) – have a relentless new offering that pounds with fury, but doesn’t collapse into chaos. Die Knowing is not just heavy, it’s a hell of a lot of fun.

This year, Comeback Kid will find themselves all over the world spreading the gospel, but before they jet-setted too far away from home, Riffyou.com had the opportunity to speak with Neufeld about what took so long for this album’s emergence; its direction; and having past vocalist Scott Wade perform on a track.

RY: Die Knowing is a little behind you now in terms of the recording of it. So at this point, how does the album sound to you?

Andrew: “Right now, I’m just excited to have gotten it out. It’s been a long time in the making. We still see it as very fresh and we’re trying to add a couple of these new songs to the set list. Seeing people starting to learn our new songs is pretty encouraging.”

RY: You’re going to hear this question a lot: why did it take four years for this album to come out?

Andrew: “We’ve never been a band that can release a new album every year…we usually end up spacing them out. I think that has allowed us to have longevity as a band. [I mean] we’ve been around quite a while (since 2000) and have five records. I know other bands have put out three records in the time it took us to put out this one. We tour a lot, and we just try to not burn ourselves out. We spend a long time working on records, and never feel rushed.”

RY: I’ve read that you wanted to take a more simplistic approach with this album. What did you mean by that?

Andrew: “We just wanted to write some fun hardcore songs and that was the point of [that statement]. I think we tried to imagine what we want to be doing live, and put that into the writing…just feel engaged in the songs, and they don’t have too many restrictions.

RY: Do you think that Comeback Kid has overthought some of their past albums?

Andrew: “I think if there’s one thing that I’ve learned with song writing…we did some different things with Broadcasting… – nothing too out of the box, but we got more experimental with longer songs. I feel like we didn’t come back here to put up [new] parameters. It’s the best to stay within your parameters. When people want to listen to Comeback Kid, they want to listen to Comeback Kid. We just wanted to keep this album direct.”

RY: I saw that you had past vocalist Scott Wade come in and do a song (“Full Swing”) on this album. What was that experience like?

Andrew: “It was cool. We did some shows with him last year, so [him having a song on the album] was an inevitable thing that we wanted to do. I recorded that song in Italy somewhere backstage. I then sent him the song, and he had a friend record it. I just got him to write lyrics for his part. We tried to write the lyrics together, but we just ended up smoking weed and not doing it,” [laughs]

RY: Not all bands are able to bring back their old singers when they still have a current one. What does it say about Comeback Kid, and the friendships within the band, that allowed this to happen?

Andrew: “We’re like best buds. It’s not awkward or weird at all.”

RY: What expectations do you have for this album?

Andrew: “We’re not trying to take over the world or anything with this album. We’re just happy to play music, and as long as we feel welcome to play shows, then that’s what we want to do. We’re really excited to play these songs. The fun thing about putting out a new record is the fact that we’re a band that tries to hit up weird countries. The new album affords us the opportunity to go back to all of the places we’ve been before…it’s a nice excuse to do our rounds again.”

-Adam Grant

Click here to view the Canadian tour dates for Comeback Kid.

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