Jackson United, the band fronted by Foo Fighters guitarist Chris Shiflett, have returned with storming new album Harmony and Dissidence, and the six-stringer is enthused to be finally getting the new music out to the public.
“We actually recorded it right before we made the last Foo Fighters record. At the time, I thought Foos would’ve taken a break like the one we’re taking now, and all of a sudden it’s a year later and it’s still sitting there unmixed, so I got the ball rolling again, and now it’s done and we’re happy to be out playing shows.”
Describing the album as being far more up-tempo than 2004’s Western Ballads, Shiflett says that the goal was to make something “less layered and a little more rock and roll,” with an eye on writing songs that would be a lot of fun to play live.
Having produced the album themselves, alongside Shiflett, the line up on the record also includes guitarist Doug Sangalang, and Shiflett’s brother Scott on bass, who due to touring commitments with punk rockers Face To Face is not joining the band on the road – and in keeping with the family vibe, has been replaced with Shiflett’s cousin, Charlie Ellis. And upon losing their drummer prior to recording, Shifflet had the kind of talent pool at his disposal that most bands would sell their grandmothers for.
“Things weren’t clicking with our drummer, so we remedied the situation by having Dave (Grohl) and Taylor (Hawkins) play on the record. It’s always very comfortable working with those guys, but I’ve never worked with them in this capacity before – I’ve never recorded drums with Dave at all, and I don’t sit there while Taylor’s recording his drum parts, so it was a little strange. But of course it came out sounding great.”
BELFAST PLEASE!
