Anberlin, an alternative rock band from Central Florida, will be returning home for the Warped Tour on July 10 at the Central Florida Fairgrounds. Metromix had the chance to discuss the band’s roots and future with lead vocalist Stephen Christian.
On getting back to Central Florida
We honestly have not been back here since February 10 when we left to go record in L.A., and then we pretty much went right on tour. We had a couple weeks off, but I stayed in L.A. to oversee the mixing and hang out with the producers and then start Warped Tour.
On the perks of being at home
Friends and family are the top two, and of course the shows are always amazing in Orlando. Ever since we started playing The Social and small clubs and stuff like that, the fans have always been incredible. They’ve always stuck by our side.
On your strongest following
Actually it’s not Orlando. Our strongest followings are in places like Seattle, San Diego and Detroit. But the reason being, in the first years of our career, we never toured in Florida. We would get big tours with My Chemical Romance, Hawthorne Heights, and Story of the Year, but no one would ever come into Florida because it is such a commitment to drive down here. We would skip it every tour, even our tour with Fall Out Boy we didn’t come down here, we did not even start playing here that heavily until 2005, but now we never miss it.
On building their fan base in Orlando
When we started getting big tours, people were interested and wanted to check us out. We started to play little acoustic shows at Park Ave CDs and we decided that every time we put out a record we would do a release show at Park Ave CDs, we’re even trying to do it for this record. Those always make for incredible shows because you just have a few people in a record store and its so intimate, even last time we played there we had just finished recording, we had just finished mixing and mastering, and we were playing a new set. I completely blanked on a song, because it had just been recorded and it was the first time we had played these songs in such a small place. But we love playing our newest material for the hometown crowd.
On their history with the Warped Tour
It is our second time on the Warped Tour. Last year, we only played three and a half weeks and we were on a small stage, this year we’re on the main stage playing all summer long, it’s incredible.
On the joy of playing the Warped Tour
It’s the fans. Even though you might not like our band or another band, hopefully we can expose you to other music. People will approach us and say man we’ve never heard you before and that was great. It’s just cool to see so many fans that normally wouldn’t come out to see an Anberlin show. I enjoy the camaraderie with the other bands. Afterwards we have barbecues and hang out and mess around on the buses. And that is a lot of fun because these aren’t bands we would probably ever tour with. Like Norma Jean, they’re hardcore and Anberlin fans normally wouldn’t be exposed to that kind of stuff. So much friendship and hanging out with really cool people
On being picked up from a small label to Universal Republic
It was the best decision that we had made. There is a lot of doubt with the major labels now, jumping ship is actually the riskier move because there’s so much volatility and instability and artists left and right getting dropped. It’s a really shady market, but Universal has been absolutely passionate about Anberlin, even before Cities came out they wanted to jump on board. There are a lot of opportunities that would never have been possible. Main stage at Warped Tour would never have been possible, the cover of Alternative Press would never have been possible. And the best thing to come of it so far is working with producer Neal Avron which would never ever have been a possibility had we continued with Tooth and Nail.
