NME sat down with Caleb Shomo from Beartooth to discuss moving to Los Angeles, Ariana Grande and positive perspective shaped new album ‘The Surface’
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00:00 For people who haven't listened to Beartooth,
00:02 but the last songs on all the Beartooth records,
00:07 they're always just kind of like a distillation
00:09 of exactly what the record really means
00:11 and what I'm truly feeling.
00:13 They're generally speaking incredibly sad
00:16 for every record prior,
00:18 but for this record, it's completely different.
00:20 - Hi, I'm Ali and I'm joined by Caleb Shomo
00:28 from Beartooth for the latest
00:30 in "Enemies in Conversation" series.
00:31 How are you?
00:32 - I am fantastic.
00:33 How are you doing?
00:34 - Good.
00:35 How have your, you've just done a couple
00:36 of festival dates in Europe.
00:38 How have they been?
00:39 - They have been outstanding.
00:40 Yeah, we've been out for about three weeks,
00:43 just going all over the place,
00:45 just rocking as hard as we can.
00:47 - And how have the new songs been going over live?
00:49 - They've been going really well.
00:51 We've been playing the three new ones
00:52 that have all been out, up the new record so far,
00:56 and way better than I could have imagined.
01:00 I mean, to be honest,
01:01 I feel like they've been getting the best response
01:02 of any songs in the set,
01:03 so that's gotta be a good sign.
01:06 - We're here today to talk about your new album,
01:08 "The Surface," which is out on October 13th.
01:10 I know you've done some planning ahead of time.
01:13 How much had you planned out and how far in advance?
01:16 - It kinda depends.
01:17 So I had the title of the record,
01:21 I've had the title down for probably four or five years,
01:25 maybe longer. - Oh, wow.
01:27 - Yeah, I don't know.
01:28 I like to kind of have the whole thing kinda laid out
01:33 as far ahead as I can.
01:34 But to be fair, the subject matter of the record
01:37 didn't really come up until it just kinda happened.
01:41 So the main thing I knew I wanted
01:44 after I finished the previous album, "Below,"
01:47 was I wanted "The Surface" to just be the polar opposite
01:51 in every way, shape, and form.
01:53 And I kind of at least vowed to myself
01:55 that "Below" would be the darkest,
01:57 kinda saddest record I ever make in my life,
01:59 'cause it was pretty intense.
02:02 So after that, it was about a year and a half
02:06 kinda process of writing all the songs,
02:09 and it really just sorta revealed itself
02:12 over that year and a half.
02:14 - And what made you choose "The Surface" as the title?
02:17 - I mean, well, really,
02:21 so our first five albums, and I guess the EP,
02:24 are all kind of one run-on sentence in succession,
02:28 but it's sick, disgusting, aggressive disease
02:30 below the surface, which to me is really the story
02:33 of what they're all about,
02:34 which is me dealing with what it means
02:38 to feel depressed and anxious
02:40 and the things that I kinda deal with
02:42 and some of the way my chemicals fire.
02:45 So "The Surface" was just the way it ended
02:50 and kind of like, to me, all I knew is
02:53 I really wanted it to be me bringing some new things
02:58 to "The Surface" in my own life.
03:00 And yeah, thankfully, those ended up
03:03 being some pretty cool things.
03:05 - Like you just mentioned that your work
03:07 has always sort of really delved into your experiences
03:10 with mental health and you haven't been,
03:12 like you don't shy away from talking
03:14 about the really difficult parts of that.
03:15 But on this album, you have a more positive outlook.
03:18 What kind of sparked that shift?
03:20 - I mean, honestly, the pandemic.
03:24 Like for most people, it was a really intense
03:28 emotional period in both directions.
03:31 And so, you know, below was like the period piece
03:35 of being in the depth of it.
03:37 And yeah, it was pretty sad.
03:41 And I had a really hard time, as I'm sure most of us did.
03:45 That being said, though, I don't know,
03:48 I kind of hit this point where I just realized
03:50 with my life, I had two very distinct paths in front of me.
03:53 It was continue on, you know, living a very unhealthy,
03:58 unloving, self-destructive life.
04:03 And who knows how long that lasts?
04:05 Probably not very.
04:07 And even if it does last, it's gonna be really painful
04:10 and unfulfilling and difficult.
04:13 Or I got to kind of, you know, look myself in the eyes
04:18 and make some very tough choices,
04:20 but choices that are gonna just be practical
04:24 to make my life a little bit better
04:26 and a little bit happier.
04:28 Some of those being just taking control of my mental health,
04:32 which is something I've always dealt with, as you've said.
04:35 You know, I've covered that for four records in an EP now,
04:39 and it hasn't all been great.
04:40 But yeah, I mean, just like for most people,
04:44 the pandemic, coming out of that,
04:47 I just felt like I had to do something different
04:49 and take advantage of the life that I've still been given.
04:53 'Cause when you kind of get a massive part
04:55 of that taken away, and you know, for myself
04:58 and for, you know, the entire music community,
05:03 you know, the live show was gone.
05:06 And even putting out records
05:08 and doing things that we do the same way,
05:10 it was just completely changed.
05:12 So yeah, you know, that really sparked a shift
05:17 and I was like, life is short,
05:19 I'm gonna make the most of it, you know?
05:20 - And when it came to writing the lyrics,
05:24 was it sort of challenging to translate
05:26 that outlook into the lyrics?
05:27 - I mean, I think I took a bit of a different approach
05:30 with the surface lyrically.
05:32 I really wanted to focus on the song as a whole.
05:35 And what I mean by that is like the lyrics
05:39 and the song as in, what am I trying to say?
05:41 Like, what does this mean?
05:44 You know, for most of the earlier stuff, almost all of it,
05:48 my process was kind of like, I would write the music first
05:52 and then I'd kind of write lyric and melody to that.
05:54 And then, you know, go back to the music
05:56 and kind of adjust it to the lyric and melody,
05:58 then maybe go back and forth, whatever, until it was done.
06:01 But for this record, the main thing
06:04 was what am I trying to say?
06:06 What am I really trying to get across?
06:10 And I would make sure that that was at the forefront
06:14 of everything.
06:15 And then the lyric and melody was written first
06:17 and the music kind of came after that.
06:19 And then, so that shift really just made like,
06:23 I don't know, the songwriting process
06:26 feel a lot more focused and just more focused
06:29 on what am I trying to say, you know?
06:32 And that made for a little bit of a different experience.
06:39 - And then how did that sort of more positive outlook
06:42 impact the music writing?
06:44 - It's wild that after so long of writing really sad songs
06:49 to have this kind of canvas to work around,
06:52 which is, for the most part, pretty uplifting lyrics.
06:57 And I'm really focused on hope and forward thinking
07:01 and just a lot of new things in my life.
07:03 So I think it made the music process just different.
07:08 Not necessarily easier,
07:10 but a lot more satisfying at the end of the day.
07:14 I mean, I went through some crazy periods
07:17 making this record, specifically with the music.
07:19 I mean, there was a while where I had kind of
07:21 most of the songs, you know, the lyrics, the melody,
07:24 what it's about written.
07:26 And yeah, I went through this whole soul searching,
07:29 like what am I doing?
07:32 How do I translate this thing for a few months?
07:35 But at the end of the day, when it all came together
07:39 and I just realized, like, just quit overthinking it
07:44 and just do what you gotta do, it was really fun.
07:47 And I kind of tried to strip the fear away
07:50 of what fits in a bare-tooth song,
07:53 what doesn't fit in a bare-tooth song,
07:55 and just write music that serves the lyric in the song.
07:57 So yeah, it was cool.
07:59 - And your most recent single is "Might Love Myself."
08:02 How did that sort of come together?
08:05 - I was listening to a lot of Ariana Grande.
08:07 - Oh, wow.
08:08 - Yeah, and it's all just like super empowering.
08:12 And I mean, she's just rad.
08:15 And those songs are crazy good
08:18 on another level of songwriting and the vibe.
08:20 And this whole record, like self-empowerment
08:23 is a massive, massive part of it.
08:27 You know, I mean, that song was really just about
08:29 like the moment that I understood
08:31 that I was starting to feel self-love for the first time,
08:34 like truly, which is a very overwhelming experience.
08:38 So I don't know.
08:39 Shout out to Ariana.
08:42 You're rad.
08:43 And you're empowering as hell.
08:46 And yeah, I don't know.
08:48 It just kind of happened.
08:49 I was like in that groove.
08:50 And I remember just listening to one of her records
08:53 while I was walking to get coffee.
08:55 And I was just really vibing on a groove.
08:57 And then like the whole thing just happened
09:00 when I got back to my studio.
09:02 And the lyrics just came and the melody and it all.
09:05 And I remember just kind of like putting some chords down
09:09 just to record over and just hit record and it went.
09:12 And then yeah, that was it.
09:15 Kind of like first draft of the chorus was the chorus.
09:18 And then I just built around it.
09:20 But yeah, I mean, like feeling self-love
09:24 and being able to write about it
09:26 and like capture that kind of moment all at once
09:29 was very special.
09:31 I think it made for a pretty special song.
09:33 - Yeah, I was gonna ask about,
09:34 because I feel like even on "Blow"
09:36 and on this album too, there's a lot of pop influence.
09:38 I know on "Riptide" you had a lot of pop influence.
09:40 Were there any other like sort of pop artists
09:41 to influence the album?
09:42 - Sure.
09:43 NSYNC, way up there.
09:46 NSYNC rules.
09:48 I mean, Britney, I don't know.
09:50 I mean, the list goes on.
09:51 One Direction, huge one.
09:53 I've always loved pop.
09:56 I think that like pop writing, when it's done well,
09:59 is just some of the most impressive stuff to me.
10:03 Like a really, really good hook.
10:05 Great lyric, great melody.
10:07 It's just pretty mind-blowing
10:10 when it all comes together, in my opinion.
10:12 So yeah, I just, I wanted to like
10:15 let that part of me out more.
10:16 I mean, that's been around since the beginning of "Beartooth".
10:19 I mean, I think that's what, I guess,
10:22 makes the choruses what they are.
10:25 People have always, you know,
10:27 talked about the choruses in "Beartooth",
10:28 but I think it's just because, yeah,
10:30 pop has been such a big influence on me
10:32 in my life for a very long time.
10:34 So it's bled out.
10:36 But with this record, I wanted to just be
10:38 a bit more fearless in what I was doing
10:40 and more focused and yeah, it's like,
10:43 just let the pop out, you know?
10:45 Just let it go.
10:47 - It's still a heavy record, though.
10:48 I feel like there's a lot of like moments
10:50 of real heaviness sitting alongside moments
10:51 of like real lightness, like sunshine.
10:53 - Yeah.
10:54 - Whereas like, is there any concern
10:56 about like stitching those together, kind of?
10:58 - I mean, yeah, at first.
11:00 I mean, it was, when the record started writing itself,
11:04 or when I started writing it,
11:05 it started writing itself, whatever happened.
11:08 You know, "Riptide" was like the first one.
11:11 And then "Sunshine" was actually the second song I wrote.
11:15 And that song is very specifically about
11:19 just being stuck and like wanting to get out of that
11:23 and knowing, experiencing what that feels like,
11:27 that in the middle of this gigantic shift in my life.
11:30 Yeah, I wanted the music to kind of like capture that.
11:35 And it just sort of happened.
11:38 You know, the chorus, I wrote the chorus first,
11:41 and then like, you know, the verses,
11:43 like the lyrics all came after.
11:45 But musically, I thought the only way
11:48 was to just go completely all out in those moments
11:52 and how I was feeling.
11:53 So like, you know, it's kind of written
11:55 from two perspectives.
11:56 I wrote the song in Los Angeles,
11:59 which is where I live now,
12:00 but I've lived, you know, born and raised
12:02 in Columbus, Ohio,
12:03 which has notably horrific winters.
12:07 And I am not a big fan of the winter anymore.
12:12 And yeah, so like, the verses are supposed to feel
12:16 like kind of something from Bertie's first album,
12:18 when I was like stuck in this, you know,
12:22 cold basement in Columbus,
12:24 like trying to explore my, you know, depression
12:27 and what that feels like and what that means.
12:28 And then I wanted the choruses and all that
12:31 to feel like the brightness of when I landed in California
12:35 after I decided to move there.
12:36 And, you know, this like complete eye-opening experience
12:39 of like, okay, so like seasonal depression
12:42 is something I can kind of control.
12:44 And like, but it's gonna take a big,
12:46 kind of a big painful move.
12:47 So yeah, that long-winded response
12:51 is how "Sunshine" is what it is.
12:53 - Well, actually, I think one of the things
12:55 that is so great about the lyrics on that record
12:57 is that it's not just like,
12:59 it really talks about sort of,
13:01 even though it's a positive outlook,
13:02 like how much you need,
13:04 like how much effort it takes into like,
13:06 you know, being happy and loving yourself.
13:08 Did it feel sort of like cathartic to write those lyrics?
13:13 - Incredibly.
13:15 You know, it's always a cathartic experience
13:18 to write Beartooth records
13:19 with whatever kind of viewpoint they're from.
13:23 Some obviously being more painful than others,
13:25 but I mean, this, making this record truly,
13:30 I mean, it's just something I never thought
13:35 was going to happen in my life, candidly.
13:37 You know, I've talked about it in other albums.
13:40 I've talked about it pretty openly in interviews.
13:42 Like my, kind of the dark side of what I deal with sometimes
13:46 I felt like it's always been at the forefront
13:48 and been the most powerful energy in my life.
13:53 So to like learn, like you said,
13:55 like how to kind of put the effort in
13:58 to be able to control that and deal with it,
14:00 it just made for a really, really empowering experience
14:05 making this record.
14:06 Most of the time, you know,
14:08 I'd finish a song and be listening to it.
14:10 And I was like, I cannot believe I wrote this.
14:13 And I don't know.
14:15 I mean, Beartooth is like the most intimate experience
14:19 that I have with music.
14:20 It is really, Beartooth and me are just kind of one thing.
14:25 And you know, it's just me talking about
14:29 exactly what I'm going through
14:31 with no filters at that moment.
14:33 So to have 11 songs that are like all this story
14:38 about either wanting to learn to be happier
14:43 and put in the effort to, you know,
14:46 deal with mental health or physical health
14:48 or whatever it may be,
14:50 to have all of this in front of me,
14:52 at the end of the day, I look at that experience
14:55 and it's gonna be, I mean, probably the most,
14:58 one of the most important experiences I will ever have
15:01 because it really like laid the foundation
15:04 for me deciding that I'm going to put in the effort
15:09 for the rest of my life to try and live happier
15:12 and make the most of what I got
15:14 and just deal with the things
15:15 that I'm going to deal with forever,
15:17 which is, you know, depression, anxiety,
15:19 the things I've always talked about.
15:21 But I do believe there's a way
15:22 that I can have those things in my life,
15:25 but have a better toolkit to deal with them.
15:28 And yeah, so the whole writing process
15:30 really like brought that up.
15:31 - I also wanted to ask how you landed
15:33 on the pink aesthetic for the album.
15:35 - Uh, it was the vibe.
15:37 I mean, I don't know, there was a few things.
15:41 So for one, you know, below was like this really deep,
15:45 dark, like purple.
15:48 And it was just so brutal and sad and gruesome.
15:53 So I was like, all right,
15:54 let's go with this really bright, loud pink.
15:58 And also I just remember one of the first days
16:01 I was working in Los Angeles before I moved there.
16:04 I mean, there was just the most beautiful,
16:06 really bright pink sunset.
16:08 And yeah, I don't know.
16:12 It was just kind of like a no brainer.
16:13 I was like, this has to be it.
16:15 Like just the most obviously like good vibes, like happy.
16:20 I just want it to be completely different
16:23 than anything else I've done before, you know?
16:26 And yeah, pink was the color.
16:28 - Are there any songs on the record
16:30 that you're really excited for people to hear,
16:31 you're really proud of?
16:32 - Oh my goodness.
16:33 I mean, so many.
16:35 I don't know.
16:37 I'm excited for people to hear like the twists and turns.
16:42 The Better Me is a song that I am incredibly proud of
16:47 and the way it ended up, you know,
16:50 with being a feature with Hardy is wild.
16:53 I've never done a feature before on my record.
16:55 Like no one's ever, it's always just been all me.
16:59 And I mean, the songwriting process of that was all me,
17:02 but I mean, when he laid his vocal down,
17:05 it completely changed the energy of the whole thing.
17:08 So I'm very excited for people to hear that.
17:12 The thing I'm most excited about is the end of the album.
17:15 For people who haven't listened to Beartooth
17:20 and you know, go listen to them if you want,
17:23 they're not gonna make you feel good.
17:25 But the last songs on all the Beartooth records,
17:30 they're always just kind of like a distillation
17:31 of exactly what the record really means
17:34 and what I'm truly feeling.
17:36 And yeah, they're generally speaking incredibly sad
17:41 for every record prior.
17:43 But for this record, it's completely different.
17:45 Like I didn't wanna do that again.
17:48 And it just wasn't, it wouldn't have made sense.
17:51 So yeah, I just kind of like skipped the part
17:55 of doing that really, really sad, brutal ending
17:59 and just left it at kind of the most positive
18:03 and hopeful song that I've ever written in my career.
18:06 And that is really, really exciting for me.
18:09 - Are there any songs that you think
18:10 are gonna surprise listeners?
18:12 - So many.
18:13 (laughs)
18:14 My goodness.
18:16 From the get go.
18:17 I mean, yeah, I think "The Better Me"
18:19 is definitely gonna be a surprise.
18:20 I think, I mean, if people haven't heard it yet,
18:23 "Might Love Myself" is definitely a bit
18:25 of a departure for us.
18:26 "Look the Other Way" is definitely a bit of a surprise.
18:29 Having more of kind of like a stripped down,
18:31 like acoustic song in the middle of the album.
18:35 That's very different for Beartooth.
18:36 My new reality is a completely different vibe.
18:39 I worked with a guy named Story
18:42 who does mostly pop and hip hop.
18:46 And yeah, we like really dove into that.
18:50 And then I kind of flipped it into a Beartooth song,
18:53 but yeah, that's a way different flavor.
18:56 I mean, the ending I think is a way different flavor.
18:59 Almost the whole record,
19:01 other than maybe like track one is pretty different.
19:04 Yeah.
19:05 My new reality is really interesting
19:06 'cause I feel like that one starts off
19:07 kind of like more pop leaning
19:08 and gets like progressively heavier as it goes on.
19:11 Absolutely.
19:12 Yeah, that song was really, really cool.
19:14 And so the important thing for me
19:17 at the ending of the record is that it is me
19:20 like really manifesting a new reality for myself
19:25 and for lack of a better term and to be extra corny.
19:28 But yeah, that song specifically,
19:31 that's why I wanted to work with somebody
19:34 who is in the hip hop world
19:35 because that is so like, I am the shit.
19:40 And like, that's where you come from
19:42 when you write those songs.
19:43 And I've never in my life written a song from that place.
19:46 So it was cool to work with a lyricist on,
19:50 we'd kind of come up with ideas
19:52 and I'd try and say something.
19:53 He's like, no, that's not how you say that.
19:55 And like, there's a way cooler way to say that
19:57 and like how to deliver it.
19:59 And it really ended up being a way
20:04 of being something super special,
20:05 way different for a record.
20:07 And yeah, it's just all about empowerment.
20:09 And I found a lot of empowerment
20:12 working with somebody else who's like,
20:14 that's kind of like what their career is more built on.
20:18 And I'm here for it.
20:20 It was rad.
20:21 - And you're coming up on 10 years of Beartooth
20:23 being a band.
20:25 - Yeah.
20:26 Wow.
20:27 - That's crazy.
20:29 - What are your goals for the next 10 years?
20:31 - I mean, the main goal is just be present
20:35 in what's going on.
20:36 I think it's been very tough to do that sometimes,
20:41 but to me, that's just what I want to happen.
20:47 Wherever we go or whatever we do,
20:49 like I have ambitions
20:51 and I think we're gonna do some really cool shows
20:53 and we already have and we've done stuff crazier
20:55 than I could have even imagined.
20:56 But for the most part,
20:59 I just wanna be there while it's happening.
21:01 It's so easy to look at until we achieve this thing,
21:06 until we headline this festival, this show,
21:08 this whatever, sell this many records,
21:11 then I'll be happy.
21:12 It's so easy to get lost while that's happening.
21:16 And I mean, I can say I've played,
21:17 I think over like nearly 2000 shows in my career
21:22 or something and I have not been there for all of them.
21:26 A lot of them they're done and I'm like,
21:28 what just happened?
21:30 Even I've had really big important shows
21:33 that I barely even remember because I had so much stress.
21:36 I was thinking about other things.
21:38 I was thinking about the future.
21:39 I was so worried about the past, wherever it may be.
21:41 So my main goal for the next 10 years
21:44 is to just be present when I'm on stage,
21:49 just experience the whole Beartooth thing as it happens
21:54 and just try and have a really good memory of it.
21:58 But yeah, who knows what happens?
22:02 I really don't know.
22:03 I mean, usually it's been about every two years
22:06 I make a record and they all seem to be
22:09 pretty wildly different.
22:11 So we'll see what happens in two years.
22:13 But as long as I'm happy and I'm present,
22:16 then I'll be content with whatever I'm doing.
22:18 - Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk today.
22:20 - Yeah, thanks for having me.
22:22 It's been awesome.
22:23 (upbeat music)
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