Rock n' rollers Lynam has been around for while now and while they have been through a lot they will push it to the limit never having anything to stop them. Drummer and vocalist David Lynam discusses their first ever EP debut "Halfway To Hell" and plans for the future.1. Introduce yourself, tell me what you do in Lynam? How long the band has been together?
David: I'm David Lynam. I play drums but I feel like more of the mascot for the band. We've been together for 13 years at the end of next month.
2. Why did you want to call the band Lynam? Did you ever notice that spells out "manly" if you look at it backwards.
David: Truth be told I was a horrible drummer in the formation of this band. We never planned on being a band and the band agreed that the band was going to be called Lynam as a ultimatum to me to either get better as a drummer or drag my family's name through the mud. And honestly, since we didn't plan on being a "band" we really never named the band. I just did the booking and the clubs said, "I'm putting down Lynam til you come up with a real band name." THAT'S house serious we were about this band in the beginning and though we treat it more seriously now we never have been accused of taking ourselves TOO serious.
3. Tell me about your new EP.
David: Our EP … well, lets see. It's our first studio release in 4 years. We were REALLY itching to get into the studio and do something. It took us forever to record but not for the normal reasons that bands take forever to record. We just couldn't line up time when we were off and our studio was available. FINALLY it happened. It's 6 songs. One of the songs, Wrong Side of the Grave, was a song not used on the Adler cd so we used it. It's actually a demo. THAT song we never got around to re-recording, thus the sub par sound quality of the mix. Dead Man's Parade was written by Lonny. It's been a lot of people's favorite. The other songs were written by Jacob. We're planning on completing this EP into a full length sometime this year and re-releasing it.
4. Is there any story or concept behind the Halfway To Hell title?
David: Well since it's not a full length album and just an EP we decided to go with Halfway to Hell. All the Way to Hell might be the full length album release name. Haha.
5. Select two songs from Halfway To Hell and what inspired the lyrics.
David: Two? TWO??? I can't even tell you ONE! I mean, I know all of the songs. I can play them in my sleep. I know my harmonies. I know the words I'm supposed to be singing … but what they mean? Man, I couldn't tell you. I can tell you that Jacob writes about broken hearts a lot. He writes about death a lot too. So if I were you I would start from the beginning of any of the songs he's' written on this EP and look for one of two meanings, heartbreak and/or death. I reckon you'll crash head first into one of those topics. I don't know if you're like me but some bands I just don't pay attention to the words. Eric Church? Sure I know what he's singing about. Motley Crue, I can usually guess it's either pussy or partying but I couldn't tell you specifically on most songs b/c I'm a melody guy, not a lyric guy. I'm listening to other stuff while the song's going. I know a million songs on drums but if I had to sing one of 'em I'd have to have an Ozzy teleprompter.
6. Who produced Halfway To Hell and what was it like working with them?
David: Jason Elgin. It's all I know. I've never really recorded with anyone else. I mean I've gone in and cut drums a couple of times for other producers but I've never sat there and gone song by song, doing full length albums with anyone else but Jason so I only know that experience and it's great. It was tough in the beginning b/c he's tough on everybody but he's REALLY tough on drummers. He has bad ass drummers fly in and do projects in there (Synchromesh Studios) ALL of the time so when a hack like me steps in he's not in the mood for any wishy washy b.s. He wants all of the pre-production, song arrangement, on the rhythm end, DONE and TIGHT. The final product is all worth it though. You can go back through our catalog and all of the stuff sounds amazing.
7. Who did the cover art for Halfway To Hell and how much input did you have on it?
David: Lonny did the artwork. Alan Matthews did the photography. My input on it is literally this. Jacob held up his cell phone when Lonny did the final draft of it and asked, "You dig it?" I replied, "I dig it, looks great." I think I was asked if I preferred playing cards or tarot cards and I said tarot. So there … that was my contribution. Really huge, huh? Remember, I'm only the drummer.
8. How does this release differ and compare to your previous releases and how has the sound evolved between them?
David: Well, first off, we've never done an EP before so there's that but the songs are different than anything we've done before but ya' know? I've listened over and over again and I can't really put my finger on it. I mean, Cold has that HIM, "Wicked Game" sound and Store Bought Halo is VERY hard to sing. Puzzles me that Jacob writes a song that's that high and STAYS that high the whole song. He must be masochistic. A lot of the songs are quick though. Most of them you're in and out before you even know it.
9. Can you tell me about the song and video for "Cold"?
David: You know we listened to this EP over and over and we just decided that whether or not Cold would be picked as a single it was our favorite song, collectively, as a band so we definitely wanted to do a video for it. We're long overdue for video.
10. What are your songs about? (What specific themes do they cover?)
David: Like I said before Jacob writes what he knows about … being homeless. No, I'm joking. He writes about stuff we all go thru. I mean, you'll never hear him write a song about being winning a heisman trophy or ice skating in Alaska. He's a skinny white guy who's ALWAYS cold. That's why I think there's funny irony in us having a song called Cold b/c the guy keeps every hotel room we stay in at 400 degrees. He eats like it's an olympic event too. OK you see how I get sidetracked. To nutshell the answer most of our songs are about relationships with other people whether it be romantic ones or friendships or enemies.
11. Do you write your own songs? (Discuss the songwriting process in detail.)
David: Yes. Jacob's forte' is song writing. He primarily writes everything but on this EP we took a song Lonny wrote and Jacob co-wrote Wrong Side of the Grave with someone else. Jacob writes in a weird way. Melody, lyrics and music all come to him at once for the most part. It's very rare that you see someone write songs that way. A lot of people's shortcoming when it comes to songwriting is that they come up with several cool parts and they try and crowbar them all into one song. Song structure is something that's pretty identical. Few songs stray the path of song arrangement. As long as you don't stray too far from that recipe and have the ability to write chord progressions that move people your way ahead of the curve in regards to most song writers.
12. Who are your musical influences?
David: Listen, this band has CRAZY influences. Jacob really loves bluegrass. Some of his favorite bands are Dada, Cinderella, Ricky Skaggs, Mute Math and anything Mutt Lange. Mark's a HUGE Steely Dan, Zeppelin, Hall and Oates fan. I love The Cult, U2, Chromeo, Eric Church, Brad Paisley. My favorite drummer has to be a buddy of mine, Zoltan Chaney. Look him up on Youtube. Great guy, great, entertaining drummer. He's the kind of drummer you get mad when the singer or guitarist wanders in front of him.
13. What are your upcoming touring plans and plans for 2014?
David: We're doing a tour we'll announce soon. We'll be hitting a few festivals this summer. We're really looking forward to hitting some markets we haven't been to in 4 years. We might even be playing Hawaii this year so we're really excited to get out and support this new EP; especially with Lonny in the band now. We're going to have a blast.
14. How do you promote your band and shows?
David: Shamelessly, I'll tell you that. We don't give a DAMN. We have friends in show business and we get them to wear our shirts all of the time. One of our buddies is a stand up comedian who worked as a correspondent for Jay Leno for a year or two and we had him wear one of our shirts in one of his bits. In this day and age you have to be like that to get your name out there. Why back in the day when we didn't have a show at one of the big festivals in town we'd book a show at a club semi close to the festival AFTER the festival and we'd have folks walk around with huge poster boards promoting the show. That kind of looney activity had every home town show sold out for years.
15. Describe your show, visual and musically for us.
David: We like to call it bar-ena rock. We've played bars for SO long that we've kind of acquired that term. It's arena rock show crammed into a bar. Very intimate fun show with lots of audience participation. Look, we didn't get the band all together, travel that far and set up all of that equipment not to have a good time.
16. What advice would you give to fellow bands, who want to do what you're doing?
David: You've got to find guys you can get along with. Guys who can handle rejection and not do a bunch of finger pointing. Guys or girls you can get along with. We're a band who has been together 13 years one our success is relative. We're lucky to do a lot of the things we've done but we've also worked our asses off really, really hard. You've got to understand some core things if you're just now starting off. Play anywhere, everywhere, for any amount of money. Do it b/c you LOVE it. Do it b/c music saved your life and you owe it to music to make your own. DO NOT let people persuade you to give up on your dreams however DO listen to people that teach you shortcuts and the wrong things to do when trying to take your band to the next level. Always remember, there's plenty of other bands who want it just as bad as you. Work together. We're all in this game together. There's enough room for ALL of us.17. Do you guys have any new music in the works, in terms of a follow-up release, when can we expect another full-length album?
David: We'd like to cut four or so more songs and re-release this EP as a full length and just set it up on iTunes where you can click "Complete album" and finish downloading the rest of the CD. We'll see what our touring schedule allows in the way of recording.
18. Any final words of wisdom?
David: Don't give up. Don't EVER give up. -Jimmy Valvano. RIP
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