I caught up with Scott and he was very happy that he was able to do this interview from the comfort of his own home, a luxury that is not always granted. To him, being able to do an interview without the hectic lifestyle of on the road travel, was in his words “awesome”. As we talked, it was clear to me that this band, which has had its ups and downs, is nowhere near ready to give up the fight. With the new lineup that includes veteran members Scott Bartlett and Jason Null, both on lead guitar, Eric Taylor on bass, and new band members, vocalist, Scotty Austin and drummer, Steven Pulley, they have overcome their hardest obstacles and are ready to show off their new sound; a sound they always wanted to share but couldn’t. The public needs to get ready because their new album “Blood Stained Revolution” will awaken even the most arrogant of tired souls; the ones who thought there was no way Saving Abel could come back solid and steady. Their dedication and this album both prove that the resiliency of a band who has heart and who loves their music and their fans can outweigh any adversity along their path. Scott is truly an open book and willing to just pour his heart out about his passion for music and his country. With no time constraints, this interview spoke volumes to me and one thing I know for certain, Saving Abel is back and ready to kick some rock and roll ass.
Interview with Scott Bartlett of Saving Abel
By: Leslie Elder Rogers
Metal Exiles: Between Bringing down the Giant and Blood Stained Revolution there was a band upheaval with Michael and Jared leaving. What was the band attitude after the dust settled?
Scott Bartlett: We didn’t have time to reflect. Dust settled is a squirrelly term. I mean the hardest part was the initial split, when Jared left and then Mikey followed suit. It was kind of like, okay, so what are we gonna do? We had a long talk. It wasn’t exciting at first. It was scary because we’d been doing this for so long now, so what was next for all of us? We were like, well, we could just keep doing this guys. Other bands are doing it. It’s gonna be tricky and there’s gonna be haters. Jason and I had a long talk and then Eric and I had a long talk and then all three of us had a long talk. We questioned if there was anything that we didn’t do that we could’ve done musically. Was there anything that as we built Saving Abel and as Saving Abel was being pushed and pulled in different directions from various labels and producers, that we didn’t do. Now that we own it, this is the chance to do whatever we couldn’t really do because of all of the confines of way the infrastructure of the industry is. This is our baby now. I mean it’s always been our baby but it’s just an interesting industry and people want things from you. I get it. It’s just how the machine has always worked and we fought through all of that and got the name and now what are we gonna do with it? Are we gonna bury it now? We thought, why not just try it. Let’s get a singer that’s maybe a little grittier, a little edgier. Let’s make this a modern day Skynyrd. Let’s make this the Southern Rock band we always thought it could be and give it a shot. We didn’t have time to reflect as we cultivated and rebuilt it. In one month, it will be a year since the transition and we will have logged 300 shows on the books with the new lineup so there wasn’t really enough time to check attitudes or anything. We knew that if we did this we were just going to hit the pavement and tour heavy and reestablish the band with the new lineup in clubs the way we started initially. Now that I’m off the road and it’s been 11 months, I can honestly say that there’s been a lot of press and a lot of interviews about the record and the attitude is still overwhelmingly positive. We are still working really hard. We are still very tired but the music sounds like what we’ve been going through with what we’ve endured. I’ve had a few people tell me that we just sound like an old type rock-and-roll band that are old souls with still enough life left to go kick some ass. I like that because that reflects everything that we’ve done together. Rebuilding this, we’ve got two new brothers in the band now, literally, and like Jason said in an interview, we’ve got the tattoos to prove it. We all tattooed SA on ourselves because it’s a rite of passage. When you go through what we just went through, you’re part of the brotherhood.
Metal Exiles: It’s good that you kept going and that you didn’t let the loss of two members destroy you as a band.
Scott Bartlett: That’s the main thing. I didn’t want to tread water. I didn’t want to take a step sideways and I sure as hell didn’t want to take a step backwards so the overall thought process was that if we could do this on our own terms, why not try it. If we could reestablish this into the band we always wanted. We asked each other what we wanted to see done. I know I wanted to go a little heavier. We just talked about it. We didn’t even hold auditions. We just made a few phone calls and said you guys make your plans, tell your kids, tell your wives, you guys are coming out with us on tour, and they did it, so there you go.
Metal Exiles: Where did you find Scotty Austin and how did he fit into the band as you guys started writing for a new album?
Scott Bartlett: I live in Memphis, Tennessee, and halfway between Memphis and Nashville, on the music highway, is a town called Jackson, Tennessee (not Mississippi). Jackson, Tennessee is actually a song that Johnny Cash and June Carter did. It’s a song about Jackson, Tennessee. So he’s about 80-90 miles up the road from me and he’s under the same management as us. When we were talking to our new manager about the sound he was like, “Man, I’m not trying to tell you guys how to do your job and this is your thing. I have to defer to you but I’ve got a guy”. They opened for us and we watched it. Hell, even Jared was there watching. The writing was on the wall. It was almost an audition with Jared there too. I mean, Jared gave the approval to move forward with Scotty. We didn’t need his approval but it felt good to have it. Scotty’s drummer at the time was Steven Pulley and it just worked. Saving Abel sold a lot of records and we’d built a pretty big name for ourselves so it was an intimidating gig for both Scotty and Steven just to walk into. I knew Steven was a great drummer. The fact that he was born partially deaf was a big deal for me because Memphis is the birthplace of soul music and arguably the birthplace of rock and roll so it’s not about what it sounds like, it’s about what it feels like. It’s supposed to evoke emotion and to me if you’re a drummer that literally can’t hear, what else can you do but feel it? I think that’s cool and I would like to tell his story. We’ve always been fans of underdogs; it’s no secret. So just to overcome that, wow. Also, to have the preexisting relationship with Scotty and those two coming in together was good. I got the chance to meet them both and talk to them and they’re both cool cats; they’re laid back and get it. They saw the opportunity and saw the potential and they went with it.
Metal Exiles: To release Blood Stained Revolution you guys formed Tennessippi Whiskey Records. Did you feel now was the right time to take things into your own hands? How is that working out for you?
Scott Bartlett: Tennessippi Whiskey, we think the name is brilliant because you’ve got a bunch of red necks thinking are we from Memphis, are we from Jackson, are we from Mississippi? I was like, it’s Tennessee or Mississippi and we formed the term Tennessippi and we drink a lot of whiskey so it just seemed natural to name it that. But as far as the label itself, we got a call from our manager telling us that the way things are in the industry right now, it’s like everyone is grasping at straws. There’s no model in rock and roll that isn’t flawed. It’s not how it used to be. He said people think that you guys have a hit and you charter jets and I know for a fact that you’re all broke. You guys are smart guys with a lot of friends in the industry that have come up touring under you and you guys should be looking for active talent. You’ve got this big name, Saving Abel, and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t own a fully functional record label. I thought dude, that sounds great but I didn’t know what the hell to do with that. The way that it ended up being the most beneficial was when we finished writing the record, all five of us were sitting there going I guess this is it because what are we gonna do now? Go ask the label if they need anything else from us? I mean, the five of us are right here, the entire board is right here. We just agreed then and there that we were going to put out all ten songs, no B sides, this was the album. This was the record we had time to write while performing 300 days out of the year. I’m really proud of that. As far as building a label, it does take time and we’ll see how beneficial or how lucrative it is. People say it all the time, but I don’t care what it pays, I care that we stand for something that can endure this shaky rock and roll time. Maybe we’ll find some cool young bands. If we get paid, that’d be cool. I don’t really see it happening for quite some time but I’d like to be able to help other bands. We also help each other with that. We all have side projects. If you buy our record, it comes with a companion CD with different music from all of our side projects so it’s just a cool outlet. If you and I have another interview a year from now, I’ll let you know how well the money making part of it went, or maybe one in the first quarter of the fiscal year, I’ll tell ya’ then. I’m an open book.
Metal Exiles: Right up to release date you guys were pre ordering the album on Rokbiz with 10 percent going to charities for the troops. You have done so much for the military in the past but where did this idea come from and what else do you have planned for our servicemen with this album and tour?
Scott Bartlett: I think that when our first record hit in 2007-2008, we actually had a fan that sent back a video of soldiers reuniting with their families with “18 Days” playing in the background. This was back in the Myspace days. There was no budget but it was mood evoking. It would put a lump in your throat if you had a heart. They put it on our Myspace page and a lot of troops were commenting on it telling us that our music was so inspiring so we accidentally became the poster child of this rock and roll movement that actually cares about the military. We knew we should just do whatever they wanted at all times and all five of us unanimously made a pact to follow through with it. We all have family members that are over there fighting. I honestly can’t stand it when bands talk about it and then they don’t follow up on it. I’m not trying to talk about any of them but I know plenty that won’t go over there because they say it’s scary. I’m like, what do you mean it’s scary? You have to believe in democracy and you have to believe that the government is gonna keep your faith. We decided then and there that we were always put the troops first. We once declined a Motley Crue tour to do three shows in Iraq, Qatar, and Kuwait because it was the right thing to do. I don’t know why it irritates me as much as it does. I should probably just calm down. I’ve been saying it for so long. I hear bands open up giving shout outs to the troops and then if you’re talking to them after the show and they’re drinking whiskey, it’s just transparent that they don’t know what they’re talking about or even care. They’re just trying to sell records. I don’t like that. I’m like, you should put your money where your mouth is and you should actually do something. So if we’re able to generate any income off of this record, 10 percent of it can easily go to a charitable part of any branch of the military. It’s so awesome how much they all love each other but there are rivalry’s between the different branches so when we’re on a base, you never know what’s gonna happen so we often times try to make sure we don’t accidentally give a shout out to the Army if we’re on a Marine base and such. It’s really funny because they obviously love each other and our military really is the best on the planet. Just to be able to say that we’ve played for them. I’ve played in the Walter Reed Hospital. I’ve played “18 Days” for 20 year olds that just came to realizing that they’re not going to walk again. It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I believe it builds character and I’m proud to say that my band is a part of it. It seems like somewhere along the way, it got to be like supporting the troops was the cool thing to do and I hate that too. I would just prefer people do it for the right reasons and just prove it. You don’t have to talk about it because you want to impress someone. You have to do it to be an American. You have to do it to support everything that this country was founded on. We say it all the time; I don’t care if you support the war, if you support the president, that’s your right as an American but you better support the troops because they’re over there fighting for democracy for your name, for your legacy.
Metal Exiles: (Leslie Rogers) I know that I am not selfless enough to put everyone else before me so I thank God that he created people that do. I thank the men and women fighting for ME and for my rights every day. These men and women take that oath that whether or not they ever see battle, they are fully aware that they might and they are willing to endure that battle for me and sacrifice themselves for all of us who are not so willing and for that we are all blessed.
Scott Bartlett: My mom used to always tell me that if there was ever a draft, she was going to shoot me in the foot. There’s an old story about Gregg Allman from the Allman Brothers, something about getting his pinky shot off or something. I know it isn’t true, just good ole’ folklore. I think doing that Walter Reed thing honestly changed me and going to the burn unit. There’s certain things that we don’t see. I mean, we see footage on CNN and stuff but when you go in and really see. There was this one guy in particular, a lieutenant that they built up. His acclimades were outstanding. He’d won this medal for this and that but he hadn’t come to terms with the fact that he was probably never going to walk again. All he wants to do is get back over there and fight for his country and you guys are his favorite band. So we go in there, and it’s a kid, I swear half my age. He looks like he’s about 17, 18, 19 years old. I was like “What”? To play “18 Days” for him while he was crying right there with his parents, it was the hardest things I’ve ever done. It’s one of those things I will never, ever forget. So it’s this cyclical thing where we publicly talk about how much we love our military and they publicly talk about how much they love us and it’s just very real. That’s why I get so angry when I hear bands talk about it because it’s like “do you really know? What do you REALLY know”? I’m not going to call anyone out because I’m very thankful that bands do continue to do things for the troops and I know bands that do. I just don’t like how if we’re on a bill with six bands, every one of them goes out there and gives like a three gun salute and it’s like alright guys, really, come on now. I don’t mean to put that negative spin on it because it’s overwhelmingly a positive message. It’s just one of those things. Like I told you, I’m an open book and it’s just one of those things that really irritates me.
Metal Exiles: You guys made a comment that losing Jared gave you an opportunity to write and record the music we've always wanted to. What was Jared holding you guys back from doing?
Scott Bartlett: It wasn’t just Jared and it wasn’t really Jared at all. It was the years leading up to his departure. It was funny. It was sort of this weird poetic justice because we were so tired and we were so worn down by everything that we’d been through within the infrastructure of this industry that as soon as we left our last label and everything was ours, it was kind of a dark period of “what do we do now”? It kind of put a halt to everything. Jared wanted to have his second child and be home for that. What can you say about that? We all understood that. Then it just turned into a long hiatus followed by him saying ‘I’m staying at home guys”. We said “That’s cool but we can’t stay at home too. We’ve gotta keep going, not just for us, but for the fans, so we can’t wait on you”. So some tears were shed but it was an amicable departure and when that happened again, my sentiment was we own this and it’s going to be an uphill battle for a minute while we reestablish from losing one of the better singers that I’ve ever met. If nothing was holding us back except for ourselves, then why not do everything that we never could get away with? So that’s why this record is a little bit grittier; a little bit edgier. Coming from a lead guitar player’s standpoint, Jason and I are guitar players and brothers and we love each but we hate each other. We have that mutual appreciation and he pulled me aside and said this was the best I’d ever played in my life. Then Scotty came in and said ‘yeah, I’ve heard all three records man, and it’s like you’ve been taking guitar pills”. All I did on that record was that I went in and had fun with it. I didn’t think my solos. I just kind of drank whiskey and I took my first take and our producer thought it was bad ass. It just sounds like a rock record and it’s not very pro-tooled out. I read a country quote from an old country guy that said “man, back in my day, we didn’t have pro-tools, we had pros”. This record, there’s no copy and paste the chorus and just fly it over there. If the chorus came out a little differently because you were playing it a little differently, it was a reflection of who we were and the sound we were trying to establish. It’s just less produced. You can tell we’re not looking to have hit after hit, which is what we always were. We were a radio rock band that was always a little friendly. It was hard enough to keep people bobbing their heads, but safe enough to have one or two tracks crossover to top 40. A lot of that comes down to how a record is mixed nowadays. A&R guys build careers off of just doing top 40 remixes. All that really means is you’re stroking their ego feathers and turning the guitars down. We didn’t analyze. We wrote rock and rock literally from our brains, our hearts, and our balls. All of us overdid it at one time. There was a time when we were topping the charts, there were about seven bands that were always playing on tour together. We were all buying for top five the entire time. How could we be competing to sound the same but expect to have chart topping hits. It turned in to cookie cutter rock and roll and it sucked the soul out of it and we were stuck in the middle because we were involved with record labels that, well. I love a good record label. I really do and being on Virgin Capital was one of the best experiences of my life, but ultimately the artist needs to be the one to have all that passion. We’re the ones that are artist minded that you have to extract that from. So when you start grasping at straws saying “why can’t you make it sound like this because this was just at number one”? I’m like “you really just missed the entire boat. That’s’ what you did”. It became status quo for that to happen and we just played into it and all of a sudden we got labels telling us that we’re rock stars and telling us that everything was really good, merchandise was really good and life was really good and we fell into the pitfall that everyone falls into. I’m glad that we got away from it but again it’s a squirrely time in rock and roll and I’m just glad that fans are embracing it because I was really nervous that it was gonna be too far gone for people to remember what real rock and roll sounded like.
Metal Exiles: What do you think is different about Blood Stained Revolution from the past aside from what we’ve already discussed with it being less “produced” in sound?
Scott Bartlett: Jason had a good quote. We weren’t done with the record but we had just finished cutting the title track “Blood Stained Revolution” and we had a rough mix of it and we’re sitting there listening to it in this RV we’d bought that’s literally so old fashioned that it’s got a tape deck with the adapter that can go into your iPhone. Remember those? I was the session guy for a while and I was always told that the mix needs to sound good in your car stereo; that’s the true test. I believe it. For whatever reason, if it sounds good in this run down, freaking, beat up system, literally having to change formats in order to listen to it with a cable we bought at Walmart for $9.99, then there’s got to be something to it. We’re not tweaking it, we’re not EQ’ing it or anything. We just turned it up, dimmed the lights and just closed our eyes and the first mix we were all just looking at each other. I remember when we wrote ‘”Addicted”. The first time we heard the mix, all five of us; it was Blake, Eric, Jason, myself, Jared, and our producer Skid, we were all looking at each other like “this is the future of the sound of this band” because it was the last song we wrote on the first record. We knew we’d just created something. We didn’t know what it was but there was just something to that track. I’m not saying that “Blood Stained Revolution” will have the same traction that “Addicted” did. Lightning rarely strikes twice and with “Addicted” lightning struck like 17 times. So, I don’t know, but I know that the same sentiment was there at the end of that mix and we were all looking at each other and even though it was a different line-up, it felt very much like you said earlier, organic, and our thought was “we just did this”. Anyway, nobody wanted to comment on what it sounded like and all of a sudden Jason goes “man, it sounds like Saving Abel’s back and we’re pissed off”. I thought that’s amazing, I mean it’s not like we’re pissed off, like whiney bitch pissed off. I mean pissed off like we’re going grab the world and show them what rock is about. That’s’ what we do. I’m just really proud of it. That’s the tone that the whole record took on. It’s Scotty’s voice and even in a ballad, he sounds angry. I like it because one of the ballads is a really kind one. It’s one of those love, sort of sappy ones but Jason loves the 80’s power ballads. For me, lyrically, and he and I argue about this til’ we’re blue in the face, but for my ballads, and maybe this is why they don’t make that many records, the guy doesn’t get the girl. The guy ends up drinking whiskey in the corner writing a song about how he screwed up everything. Maybe that’s why I live in Memphis and I like the blues. I don’t know. Even when Scotty sings “I think about you even when I’m with you”, he and I were trying to change it to “I think about you even though I hate you” and Jason was like no man. We were gonna make a spin on it and do the “I love you but I hate you too” kind of thing and Jason was just like “why can’t y’all just be nice”? He said it’s a beautiful song. I said it’s gonna edgy enough because Scotty is singing the damn thing. If you listen to that track and close your eyes, it’s not perfect. We were worn down when we wrote this record. Scotty was like “I’ve just sung ten days in a row and now have three days off and you want me to spend them in the studio”? I said we didn’t have a choice. We literally made this bed. We have to lay in it and then get up and kick ass every morning. That’s the only way we can do this. You can hear it in the record. It sounds like rock and roll and that if weren’t just a bunch of ass kicking red necks, it would be tired and dead but we’re gonna fight it. I can hear it in the record. I hear it all over the record and I’m happy about it.
Metal Exiles: What is the significance behind the album title?
Scott Bartlett: Yeah, what we were saying before about people that would rather just bitch than to actually do something. I can’t stand the Facebook hiders that just want to talk about what’s wrong with the world all the time, all over Facebook and then blog and argue it with people for hours on end. There’s something better you can be doing with your life than (1) ruining other peoples’ lives and making them think it’s okay to just sit at home and play on the computer all day on a blog about what’s wrong with the world. Go be pro-active about it. Go do something. Go start a revolution. We didn’t used to be this complacent and dead as a society. We used to speak out. I mean, there’s a negative side of that too, especially after what went down last night with people asserting power, and I don’t want to get into all of that but the world has de-evolved into a very negative and dark place. I just think that this country in particular was founded on hope and the American dream and yet, the hope seems to be gone. For me, my hopes and dreams came true when I signed a record deal after having four bad ones; after working my ass off in this industry, almost giving up and then I got lucky, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. I’ve worked my ass off to get where I am. I’ve been playing 300 shows a year since I can remember so for me, I know hard work can pay off but if you’re gonna sit at home on the computer all day, nothing is going to happen for you. It seems like the hope is gone enough that it’s like a whole generation, and without literally, a revolution, I don’t know how it’s gonna happen. We don’t have that much of a voice, but Saving Abel has a platform so we’re here to speak our mind about it.
Metal Exiles: With the album done and you guys running the show, is life on tour different now and do you feel things are better for you guys as a touring act?
Scott Bartlett: Here’s the thing on that…we were blessed to be on tour with Nickelback for about a year. People can talk all they want about Nickelback but I love the guys. Talking bad about them got to be the cool thing to do and that’s just thoughtless, spineless, mindless people. It makes me upset because I have a degree in music and a degree in composition and when people tell me “oh everything they do sounds the same”, I’m like, “It’s the same four guys. What do you want them to do”? They created a formula that worked for them and by the way, it’s a pretty bad ass formula. They kind of literally reinvented the wheel. I could get into the nerd side of it and kind of talk you through it from the composition side but they deserve all of the success they got. Anyway, we were on tour with them at the height of their career so that was this multimillion dollar production every night. We were on tour with about 20 buses and 25 doublewides. It was hedonistic beyond my wildest dreams and it was AWESOME. It was everything I thought rock and roll was and could be because everybody was about the music but everybody was about the after party afterwards and that’s the way I grew up in my basement dreaming about working on scales, hoping one day I’d get to experience this. Cue in right now, we’re playing small clubs that oftentimes don’t have dressing rooms and we’re fine with it because we feel that it’s our rite of passage as far as reestablishing our lineup. We wanted our fans to know that we didn’t just jump into amazing clubs with perfect hospitality; that we sweat and bled the same way we did when we started this thing. We didn’t want anybody thinking we were coming into a new gig and were just going to be rock stars overnight. After work, we delegate responsibilities. I do interviews even when we’re off, as you know. We work. We’re a working peoples’ band and we’re proud of that. I really think the public gets it. The quality of life is way different but we’re all a little older and know how to squeeze a dime a little further and we’re all happy. Granted, we have bad days. Wives and kids don’t like us being gone 300 days out of the year. It’s hard and it’s hard work. That’s what our song “Love like Suicide” is about. This music thing, “She’s got love like suicide”, “SHE” is music. We got bitten by this bug years ago and is it slowly killing us? Probably, but we are choosing to do it and we need our fans to know it and they do know it because we’re on tour relentlessly, living in pretty unrealistic conditions but we make it work because we get to play music for a living. It’s not glamorous. I will tell you that. You should smell the RV.
Metal Exiles: What does 2015 see for Saving Abel?
Scott Bartlett: I can tell you what I’d like to see. That would be us doing this for one year, and the way we’ve been touring it’s almost like dog years; one year is about seven years equivalent. We’re pretty beat up so we’ll have time to recharge our batteries. We finally got a week off for Thanksgiving and then we’ll get a week off for Christmas. I’ve seen the tour dates. We’re actually going out with Saliva; our friends from Memphis, which makes sense. We’re just gonna go with some old friends that are doing the same thing we’re doing, so we’re gonna pair up the package and maybe get in some bigger rooms. We may or may not have to take a little bit of a pay cut, we don’t really know. We have a great team. I’m very proud of our agent and our manager and our publicist because we need them. Just because we run a label doesn’t mean that’s it. There’s certain things that have to be fulfilled on this end. We’ve really built and cultivated an understanding team of people and the band knows we make all the decisions, the five of us, as a democracy and then we just delegate responsibilities accordingly. We are in on everything that happens. We’re in on our Facebook. We’re in on every little nuance, we know about it. That being said, for 2015, we just want to see the slow climb again. You can follow it in the charts. You can follow it with album sales. I want to see 2015 the year when we come back out heavy, back on the charts. I certainly don’t want to miss the festivals this year. We missed them last year on purpose. We didn’t really feel like we were gonna be ready with the new lineup just expose everybody to what we were working on. Now we’re just a tight, tight rock band. I texted Lajon from Sevendust drunk the other night that I hoped we get to open for them because we are going to kick their ass. He was like “yes, I can’t wait”. It was just one of those moments, I’m so proud of what we’ve built that I’d put us up against anybody. The public has been great. Our fans have been great. Even the haters that you are going to have when you undergo a change like we did, even they came around. You can see it when you go back and follow our Facebook page, people were talking about this just isn’t the same and now they’re saying things like “hey guys, just wanted you to know I’m bringing you some Jack Daniels this time” and stuff like “it was great last night”. That’s amazing because we just told people if they hate, we respect their opinion but give it a shot. This is a different band. If you come hear “18 Days”, you’re not gonna hear Jared Weeks because there’s only one of him, but there’s only one Scotty Austin too so just give it a shot. I feel like we’ve weathered the storm and “2014 was the year of the transition but 2015 is the year of domination”! You can quote me on that.
And there you have it guys. It doesn’t get any simpler than that.
Watch the title track video @ http://youtu.be/oCaZ_OS61zc
Band website: http://www.savingabel.com/
Follow on Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/savingabel
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/SavingAbel
Follow on Instagram @ http://instagram.com/thesavingabel
Interview with Scott Bartlett of Saving Abel
By: Leslie Elder Rogers
Metal Exiles: Between Bringing down the Giant and Blood Stained Revolution there was a band upheaval with Michael and Jared leaving. What was the band attitude after the dust settled?
Scott Bartlett: We didn’t have time to reflect. Dust settled is a squirrelly term. I mean the hardest part was the initial split, when Jared left and then Mikey followed suit. It was kind of like, okay, so what are we gonna do? We had a long talk. It wasn’t exciting at first. It was scary because we’d been doing this for so long now, so what was next for all of us? We were like, well, we could just keep doing this guys. Other bands are doing it. It’s gonna be tricky and there’s gonna be haters. Jason and I had a long talk and then Eric and I had a long talk and then all three of us had a long talk. We questioned if there was anything that we didn’t do that we could’ve done musically. Was there anything that as we built Saving Abel and as Saving Abel was being pushed and pulled in different directions from various labels and producers, that we didn’t do. Now that we own it, this is the chance to do whatever we couldn’t really do because of all of the confines of way the infrastructure of the industry is. This is our baby now. I mean it’s always been our baby but it’s just an interesting industry and people want things from you. I get it. It’s just how the machine has always worked and we fought through all of that and got the name and now what are we gonna do with it? Are we gonna bury it now? We thought, why not just try it. Let’s get a singer that’s maybe a little grittier, a little edgier. Let’s make this a modern day Skynyrd. Let’s make this the Southern Rock band we always thought it could be and give it a shot. We didn’t have time to reflect as we cultivated and rebuilt it. In one month, it will be a year since the transition and we will have logged 300 shows on the books with the new lineup so there wasn’t really enough time to check attitudes or anything. We knew that if we did this we were just going to hit the pavement and tour heavy and reestablish the band with the new lineup in clubs the way we started initially. Now that I’m off the road and it’s been 11 months, I can honestly say that there’s been a lot of press and a lot of interviews about the record and the attitude is still overwhelmingly positive. We are still working really hard. We are still very tired but the music sounds like what we’ve been going through with what we’ve endured. I’ve had a few people tell me that we just sound like an old type rock-and-roll band that are old souls with still enough life left to go kick some ass. I like that because that reflects everything that we’ve done together. Rebuilding this, we’ve got two new brothers in the band now, literally, and like Jason said in an interview, we’ve got the tattoos to prove it. We all tattooed SA on ourselves because it’s a rite of passage. When you go through what we just went through, you’re part of the brotherhood.
Metal Exiles: It’s good that you kept going and that you didn’t let the loss of two members destroy you as a band.
Scott Bartlett: That’s the main thing. I didn’t want to tread water. I didn’t want to take a step sideways and I sure as hell didn’t want to take a step backwards so the overall thought process was that if we could do this on our own terms, why not try it. If we could reestablish this into the band we always wanted. We asked each other what we wanted to see done. I know I wanted to go a little heavier. We just talked about it. We didn’t even hold auditions. We just made a few phone calls and said you guys make your plans, tell your kids, tell your wives, you guys are coming out with us on tour, and they did it, so there you go.
Metal Exiles: Where did you find Scotty Austin and how did he fit into the band as you guys started writing for a new album?
Scott Bartlett: I live in Memphis, Tennessee, and halfway between Memphis and Nashville, on the music highway, is a town called Jackson, Tennessee (not Mississippi). Jackson, Tennessee is actually a song that Johnny Cash and June Carter did. It’s a song about Jackson, Tennessee. So he’s about 80-90 miles up the road from me and he’s under the same management as us. When we were talking to our new manager about the sound he was like, “Man, I’m not trying to tell you guys how to do your job and this is your thing. I have to defer to you but I’ve got a guy”. They opened for us and we watched it. Hell, even Jared was there watching. The writing was on the wall. It was almost an audition with Jared there too. I mean, Jared gave the approval to move forward with Scotty. We didn’t need his approval but it felt good to have it. Scotty’s drummer at the time was Steven Pulley and it just worked. Saving Abel sold a lot of records and we’d built a pretty big name for ourselves so it was an intimidating gig for both Scotty and Steven just to walk into. I knew Steven was a great drummer. The fact that he was born partially deaf was a big deal for me because Memphis is the birthplace of soul music and arguably the birthplace of rock and roll so it’s not about what it sounds like, it’s about what it feels like. It’s supposed to evoke emotion and to me if you’re a drummer that literally can’t hear, what else can you do but feel it? I think that’s cool and I would like to tell his story. We’ve always been fans of underdogs; it’s no secret. So just to overcome that, wow. Also, to have the preexisting relationship with Scotty and those two coming in together was good. I got the chance to meet them both and talk to them and they’re both cool cats; they’re laid back and get it. They saw the opportunity and saw the potential and they went with it.
Metal Exiles: To release Blood Stained Revolution you guys formed Tennessippi Whiskey Records. Did you feel now was the right time to take things into your own hands? How is that working out for you?
Scott Bartlett: Tennessippi Whiskey, we think the name is brilliant because you’ve got a bunch of red necks thinking are we from Memphis, are we from Jackson, are we from Mississippi? I was like, it’s Tennessee or Mississippi and we formed the term Tennessippi and we drink a lot of whiskey so it just seemed natural to name it that. But as far as the label itself, we got a call from our manager telling us that the way things are in the industry right now, it’s like everyone is grasping at straws. There’s no model in rock and roll that isn’t flawed. It’s not how it used to be. He said people think that you guys have a hit and you charter jets and I know for a fact that you’re all broke. You guys are smart guys with a lot of friends in the industry that have come up touring under you and you guys should be looking for active talent. You’ve got this big name, Saving Abel, and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t own a fully functional record label. I thought dude, that sounds great but I didn’t know what the hell to do with that. The way that it ended up being the most beneficial was when we finished writing the record, all five of us were sitting there going I guess this is it because what are we gonna do now? Go ask the label if they need anything else from us? I mean, the five of us are right here, the entire board is right here. We just agreed then and there that we were going to put out all ten songs, no B sides, this was the album. This was the record we had time to write while performing 300 days out of the year. I’m really proud of that. As far as building a label, it does take time and we’ll see how beneficial or how lucrative it is. People say it all the time, but I don’t care what it pays, I care that we stand for something that can endure this shaky rock and roll time. Maybe we’ll find some cool young bands. If we get paid, that’d be cool. I don’t really see it happening for quite some time but I’d like to be able to help other bands. We also help each other with that. We all have side projects. If you buy our record, it comes with a companion CD with different music from all of our side projects so it’s just a cool outlet. If you and I have another interview a year from now, I’ll let you know how well the money making part of it went, or maybe one in the first quarter of the fiscal year, I’ll tell ya’ then. I’m an open book.
Metal Exiles: Right up to release date you guys were pre ordering the album on Rokbiz with 10 percent going to charities for the troops. You have done so much for the military in the past but where did this idea come from and what else do you have planned for our servicemen with this album and tour?
Scott Bartlett: I think that when our first record hit in 2007-2008, we actually had a fan that sent back a video of soldiers reuniting with their families with “18 Days” playing in the background. This was back in the Myspace days. There was no budget but it was mood evoking. It would put a lump in your throat if you had a heart. They put it on our Myspace page and a lot of troops were commenting on it telling us that our music was so inspiring so we accidentally became the poster child of this rock and roll movement that actually cares about the military. We knew we should just do whatever they wanted at all times and all five of us unanimously made a pact to follow through with it. We all have family members that are over there fighting. I honestly can’t stand it when bands talk about it and then they don’t follow up on it. I’m not trying to talk about any of them but I know plenty that won’t go over there because they say it’s scary. I’m like, what do you mean it’s scary? You have to believe in democracy and you have to believe that the government is gonna keep your faith. We decided then and there that we were always put the troops first. We once declined a Motley Crue tour to do three shows in Iraq, Qatar, and Kuwait because it was the right thing to do. I don’t know why it irritates me as much as it does. I should probably just calm down. I’ve been saying it for so long. I hear bands open up giving shout outs to the troops and then if you’re talking to them after the show and they’re drinking whiskey, it’s just transparent that they don’t know what they’re talking about or even care. They’re just trying to sell records. I don’t like that. I’m like, you should put your money where your mouth is and you should actually do something. So if we’re able to generate any income off of this record, 10 percent of it can easily go to a charitable part of any branch of the military. It’s so awesome how much they all love each other but there are rivalry’s between the different branches so when we’re on a base, you never know what’s gonna happen so we often times try to make sure we don’t accidentally give a shout out to the Army if we’re on a Marine base and such. It’s really funny because they obviously love each other and our military really is the best on the planet. Just to be able to say that we’ve played for them. I’ve played in the Walter Reed Hospital. I’ve played “18 Days” for 20 year olds that just came to realizing that they’re not going to walk again. It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I believe it builds character and I’m proud to say that my band is a part of it. It seems like somewhere along the way, it got to be like supporting the troops was the cool thing to do and I hate that too. I would just prefer people do it for the right reasons and just prove it. You don’t have to talk about it because you want to impress someone. You have to do it to be an American. You have to do it to support everything that this country was founded on. We say it all the time; I don’t care if you support the war, if you support the president, that’s your right as an American but you better support the troops because they’re over there fighting for democracy for your name, for your legacy.
Metal Exiles: (Leslie Rogers) I know that I am not selfless enough to put everyone else before me so I thank God that he created people that do. I thank the men and women fighting for ME and for my rights every day. These men and women take that oath that whether or not they ever see battle, they are fully aware that they might and they are willing to endure that battle for me and sacrifice themselves for all of us who are not so willing and for that we are all blessed.
Scott Bartlett: My mom used to always tell me that if there was ever a draft, she was going to shoot me in the foot. There’s an old story about Gregg Allman from the Allman Brothers, something about getting his pinky shot off or something. I know it isn’t true, just good ole’ folklore. I think doing that Walter Reed thing honestly changed me and going to the burn unit. There’s certain things that we don’t see. I mean, we see footage on CNN and stuff but when you go in and really see. There was this one guy in particular, a lieutenant that they built up. His acclimades were outstanding. He’d won this medal for this and that but he hadn’t come to terms with the fact that he was probably never going to walk again. All he wants to do is get back over there and fight for his country and you guys are his favorite band. So we go in there, and it’s a kid, I swear half my age. He looks like he’s about 17, 18, 19 years old. I was like “What”? To play “18 Days” for him while he was crying right there with his parents, it was the hardest things I’ve ever done. It’s one of those things I will never, ever forget. So it’s this cyclical thing where we publicly talk about how much we love our military and they publicly talk about how much they love us and it’s just very real. That’s why I get so angry when I hear bands talk about it because it’s like “do you really know? What do you REALLY know”? I’m not going to call anyone out because I’m very thankful that bands do continue to do things for the troops and I know bands that do. I just don’t like how if we’re on a bill with six bands, every one of them goes out there and gives like a three gun salute and it’s like alright guys, really, come on now. I don’t mean to put that negative spin on it because it’s overwhelmingly a positive message. It’s just one of those things. Like I told you, I’m an open book and it’s just one of those things that really irritates me.
Metal Exiles: You guys made a comment that losing Jared gave you an opportunity to write and record the music we've always wanted to. What was Jared holding you guys back from doing?
Scott Bartlett: It wasn’t just Jared and it wasn’t really Jared at all. It was the years leading up to his departure. It was funny. It was sort of this weird poetic justice because we were so tired and we were so worn down by everything that we’d been through within the infrastructure of this industry that as soon as we left our last label and everything was ours, it was kind of a dark period of “what do we do now”? It kind of put a halt to everything. Jared wanted to have his second child and be home for that. What can you say about that? We all understood that. Then it just turned into a long hiatus followed by him saying ‘I’m staying at home guys”. We said “That’s cool but we can’t stay at home too. We’ve gotta keep going, not just for us, but for the fans, so we can’t wait on you”. So some tears were shed but it was an amicable departure and when that happened again, my sentiment was we own this and it’s going to be an uphill battle for a minute while we reestablish from losing one of the better singers that I’ve ever met. If nothing was holding us back except for ourselves, then why not do everything that we never could get away with? So that’s why this record is a little bit grittier; a little bit edgier. Coming from a lead guitar player’s standpoint, Jason and I are guitar players and brothers and we love each but we hate each other. We have that mutual appreciation and he pulled me aside and said this was the best I’d ever played in my life. Then Scotty came in and said ‘yeah, I’ve heard all three records man, and it’s like you’ve been taking guitar pills”. All I did on that record was that I went in and had fun with it. I didn’t think my solos. I just kind of drank whiskey and I took my first take and our producer thought it was bad ass. It just sounds like a rock record and it’s not very pro-tooled out. I read a country quote from an old country guy that said “man, back in my day, we didn’t have pro-tools, we had pros”. This record, there’s no copy and paste the chorus and just fly it over there. If the chorus came out a little differently because you were playing it a little differently, it was a reflection of who we were and the sound we were trying to establish. It’s just less produced. You can tell we’re not looking to have hit after hit, which is what we always were. We were a radio rock band that was always a little friendly. It was hard enough to keep people bobbing their heads, but safe enough to have one or two tracks crossover to top 40. A lot of that comes down to how a record is mixed nowadays. A&R guys build careers off of just doing top 40 remixes. All that really means is you’re stroking their ego feathers and turning the guitars down. We didn’t analyze. We wrote rock and rock literally from our brains, our hearts, and our balls. All of us overdid it at one time. There was a time when we were topping the charts, there were about seven bands that were always playing on tour together. We were all buying for top five the entire time. How could we be competing to sound the same but expect to have chart topping hits. It turned in to cookie cutter rock and roll and it sucked the soul out of it and we were stuck in the middle because we were involved with record labels that, well. I love a good record label. I really do and being on Virgin Capital was one of the best experiences of my life, but ultimately the artist needs to be the one to have all that passion. We’re the ones that are artist minded that you have to extract that from. So when you start grasping at straws saying “why can’t you make it sound like this because this was just at number one”? I’m like “you really just missed the entire boat. That’s’ what you did”. It became status quo for that to happen and we just played into it and all of a sudden we got labels telling us that we’re rock stars and telling us that everything was really good, merchandise was really good and life was really good and we fell into the pitfall that everyone falls into. I’m glad that we got away from it but again it’s a squirrely time in rock and roll and I’m just glad that fans are embracing it because I was really nervous that it was gonna be too far gone for people to remember what real rock and roll sounded like.
Metal Exiles: What do you think is different about Blood Stained Revolution from the past aside from what we’ve already discussed with it being less “produced” in sound?
Scott Bartlett: Jason had a good quote. We weren’t done with the record but we had just finished cutting the title track “Blood Stained Revolution” and we had a rough mix of it and we’re sitting there listening to it in this RV we’d bought that’s literally so old fashioned that it’s got a tape deck with the adapter that can go into your iPhone. Remember those? I was the session guy for a while and I was always told that the mix needs to sound good in your car stereo; that’s the true test. I believe it. For whatever reason, if it sounds good in this run down, freaking, beat up system, literally having to change formats in order to listen to it with a cable we bought at Walmart for $9.99, then there’s got to be something to it. We’re not tweaking it, we’re not EQ’ing it or anything. We just turned it up, dimmed the lights and just closed our eyes and the first mix we were all just looking at each other. I remember when we wrote ‘”Addicted”. The first time we heard the mix, all five of us; it was Blake, Eric, Jason, myself, Jared, and our producer Skid, we were all looking at each other like “this is the future of the sound of this band” because it was the last song we wrote on the first record. We knew we’d just created something. We didn’t know what it was but there was just something to that track. I’m not saying that “Blood Stained Revolution” will have the same traction that “Addicted” did. Lightning rarely strikes twice and with “Addicted” lightning struck like 17 times. So, I don’t know, but I know that the same sentiment was there at the end of that mix and we were all looking at each other and even though it was a different line-up, it felt very much like you said earlier, organic, and our thought was “we just did this”. Anyway, nobody wanted to comment on what it sounded like and all of a sudden Jason goes “man, it sounds like Saving Abel’s back and we’re pissed off”. I thought that’s amazing, I mean it’s not like we’re pissed off, like whiney bitch pissed off. I mean pissed off like we’re going grab the world and show them what rock is about. That’s’ what we do. I’m just really proud of it. That’s the tone that the whole record took on. It’s Scotty’s voice and even in a ballad, he sounds angry. I like it because one of the ballads is a really kind one. It’s one of those love, sort of sappy ones but Jason loves the 80’s power ballads. For me, lyrically, and he and I argue about this til’ we’re blue in the face, but for my ballads, and maybe this is why they don’t make that many records, the guy doesn’t get the girl. The guy ends up drinking whiskey in the corner writing a song about how he screwed up everything. Maybe that’s why I live in Memphis and I like the blues. I don’t know. Even when Scotty sings “I think about you even when I’m with you”, he and I were trying to change it to “I think about you even though I hate you” and Jason was like no man. We were gonna make a spin on it and do the “I love you but I hate you too” kind of thing and Jason was just like “why can’t y’all just be nice”? He said it’s a beautiful song. I said it’s gonna edgy enough because Scotty is singing the damn thing. If you listen to that track and close your eyes, it’s not perfect. We were worn down when we wrote this record. Scotty was like “I’ve just sung ten days in a row and now have three days off and you want me to spend them in the studio”? I said we didn’t have a choice. We literally made this bed. We have to lay in it and then get up and kick ass every morning. That’s the only way we can do this. You can hear it in the record. It sounds like rock and roll and that if weren’t just a bunch of ass kicking red necks, it would be tired and dead but we’re gonna fight it. I can hear it in the record. I hear it all over the record and I’m happy about it.
Metal Exiles: What is the significance behind the album title?
Scott Bartlett: Yeah, what we were saying before about people that would rather just bitch than to actually do something. I can’t stand the Facebook hiders that just want to talk about what’s wrong with the world all the time, all over Facebook and then blog and argue it with people for hours on end. There’s something better you can be doing with your life than (1) ruining other peoples’ lives and making them think it’s okay to just sit at home and play on the computer all day on a blog about what’s wrong with the world. Go be pro-active about it. Go do something. Go start a revolution. We didn’t used to be this complacent and dead as a society. We used to speak out. I mean, there’s a negative side of that too, especially after what went down last night with people asserting power, and I don’t want to get into all of that but the world has de-evolved into a very negative and dark place. I just think that this country in particular was founded on hope and the American dream and yet, the hope seems to be gone. For me, my hopes and dreams came true when I signed a record deal after having four bad ones; after working my ass off in this industry, almost giving up and then I got lucky, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. I’ve worked my ass off to get where I am. I’ve been playing 300 shows a year since I can remember so for me, I know hard work can pay off but if you’re gonna sit at home on the computer all day, nothing is going to happen for you. It seems like the hope is gone enough that it’s like a whole generation, and without literally, a revolution, I don’t know how it’s gonna happen. We don’t have that much of a voice, but Saving Abel has a platform so we’re here to speak our mind about it.
Metal Exiles: With the album done and you guys running the show, is life on tour different now and do you feel things are better for you guys as a touring act?
Scott Bartlett: Here’s the thing on that…we were blessed to be on tour with Nickelback for about a year. People can talk all they want about Nickelback but I love the guys. Talking bad about them got to be the cool thing to do and that’s just thoughtless, spineless, mindless people. It makes me upset because I have a degree in music and a degree in composition and when people tell me “oh everything they do sounds the same”, I’m like, “It’s the same four guys. What do you want them to do”? They created a formula that worked for them and by the way, it’s a pretty bad ass formula. They kind of literally reinvented the wheel. I could get into the nerd side of it and kind of talk you through it from the composition side but they deserve all of the success they got. Anyway, we were on tour with them at the height of their career so that was this multimillion dollar production every night. We were on tour with about 20 buses and 25 doublewides. It was hedonistic beyond my wildest dreams and it was AWESOME. It was everything I thought rock and roll was and could be because everybody was about the music but everybody was about the after party afterwards and that’s the way I grew up in my basement dreaming about working on scales, hoping one day I’d get to experience this. Cue in right now, we’re playing small clubs that oftentimes don’t have dressing rooms and we’re fine with it because we feel that it’s our rite of passage as far as reestablishing our lineup. We wanted our fans to know that we didn’t just jump into amazing clubs with perfect hospitality; that we sweat and bled the same way we did when we started this thing. We didn’t want anybody thinking we were coming into a new gig and were just going to be rock stars overnight. After work, we delegate responsibilities. I do interviews even when we’re off, as you know. We work. We’re a working peoples’ band and we’re proud of that. I really think the public gets it. The quality of life is way different but we’re all a little older and know how to squeeze a dime a little further and we’re all happy. Granted, we have bad days. Wives and kids don’t like us being gone 300 days out of the year. It’s hard and it’s hard work. That’s what our song “Love like Suicide” is about. This music thing, “She’s got love like suicide”, “SHE” is music. We got bitten by this bug years ago and is it slowly killing us? Probably, but we are choosing to do it and we need our fans to know it and they do know it because we’re on tour relentlessly, living in pretty unrealistic conditions but we make it work because we get to play music for a living. It’s not glamorous. I will tell you that. You should smell the RV.
Metal Exiles: What does 2015 see for Saving Abel?
Scott Bartlett: I can tell you what I’d like to see. That would be us doing this for one year, and the way we’ve been touring it’s almost like dog years; one year is about seven years equivalent. We’re pretty beat up so we’ll have time to recharge our batteries. We finally got a week off for Thanksgiving and then we’ll get a week off for Christmas. I’ve seen the tour dates. We’re actually going out with Saliva; our friends from Memphis, which makes sense. We’re just gonna go with some old friends that are doing the same thing we’re doing, so we’re gonna pair up the package and maybe get in some bigger rooms. We may or may not have to take a little bit of a pay cut, we don’t really know. We have a great team. I’m very proud of our agent and our manager and our publicist because we need them. Just because we run a label doesn’t mean that’s it. There’s certain things that have to be fulfilled on this end. We’ve really built and cultivated an understanding team of people and the band knows we make all the decisions, the five of us, as a democracy and then we just delegate responsibilities accordingly. We are in on everything that happens. We’re in on our Facebook. We’re in on every little nuance, we know about it. That being said, for 2015, we just want to see the slow climb again. You can follow it in the charts. You can follow it with album sales. I want to see 2015 the year when we come back out heavy, back on the charts. I certainly don’t want to miss the festivals this year. We missed them last year on purpose. We didn’t really feel like we were gonna be ready with the new lineup just expose everybody to what we were working on. Now we’re just a tight, tight rock band. I texted Lajon from Sevendust drunk the other night that I hoped we get to open for them because we are going to kick their ass. He was like “yes, I can’t wait”. It was just one of those moments, I’m so proud of what we’ve built that I’d put us up against anybody. The public has been great. Our fans have been great. Even the haters that you are going to have when you undergo a change like we did, even they came around. You can see it when you go back and follow our Facebook page, people were talking about this just isn’t the same and now they’re saying things like “hey guys, just wanted you to know I’m bringing you some Jack Daniels this time” and stuff like “it was great last night”. That’s amazing because we just told people if they hate, we respect their opinion but give it a shot. This is a different band. If you come hear “18 Days”, you’re not gonna hear Jared Weeks because there’s only one of him, but there’s only one Scotty Austin too so just give it a shot. I feel like we’ve weathered the storm and “2014 was the year of the transition but 2015 is the year of domination”! You can quote me on that.
And there you have it guys. It doesn’t get any simpler than that.
Watch the title track video @ http://youtu.be/oCaZ_OS61zc
Band website: http://www.savingabel.com/
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