When Marianas Trench bassist Mike Ayley heard that the venue in Regina had been upgraded, the first thing he thought of was the last time the Killers were on tour.
“It was like, oh, you guys are supposed to be playing at this venue and then they upped the size and upped the size two times before they got to town. I was like man, I can’t imagine how it exciting it must be to be in that band right now.”
Hitting the road for a sold-out, cross-Canada tour, it’s a good time to be part of Marianas Trench.
With a gold record under their belt and a loyal and growing fan base, things are going well for the Vancouver natives who arrived on the Canadian music scene in 2006.
“We weren’t really overexposed and didn’t get too much hype with the first record,” Ayley said. “But it’s good because the people that found us got a lot of our attention and I just feel like we built a real fan base, which wasn’t based on as much media as possible. It felt really natural and makes me feel like there’s still a future.”
A loyal fan base is something Ayley said has been important. Despite spending a lot of time touring in support of their first album, two years without producing new material is something Ayley said is a gamble even for well-established bands.
“I’m not going to actually compare us to the Beatles, but I remember an interview with Paul McCartney saying, when they were in the studio recording Sergent Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club Band that people were like, oh my God, they’ve been in the studio for a year, they’re out of material, they have nothing and he was just sitting there like, oh I can’t wait for them to hear this” he said “It was kind of like that—we were like, oh these songs are turning out so well, we can’t wait for everybody to hear them.”
The result is a concept record that Ayley said flows much better from start to finish then the first. It’s something he attributes to working with different producers, like Raine Maida and Dave Glenn.
“The first album was really good, there was a lot of great stuff but there were a lot of ideas crammed into songs and a lot of them were very similar sounds so we wanted to make this one fresh and unique,” he said. “It’s a lot less idea overload, you know?”
Feedback has been good, too, both from the fans and from professionals.
“After the last album, there was a lot of pressure,” Ayley said. “The last album was really a rock album, and we were worried there would be a bit of a backlash with this one.”
“So it’s nice to know that our fans are loyal enough to wait it out and spend 12 dollars on the CD because if they don’t get bought, we don’t get to record another one.”
But thinking about the next record isn’t something Ayley is ready to do just yet.
“We just finished making the video for ‘Beside You’ and we’re hoping to get a couple more singles off this album. So hopefully there’s another year before this one isn’t being played on radio anymore,” he said.
“Maybe next summer when we wind down touring. But for now, I don’t think it’s a good idea to look at that task yet. For the sake of sanity.”
