Buckcherry – An Xperience Interview

Buckcherry – An Xperience Interview – by Liam Sweeny.

The late ‘90s / early ‘00s were a major period in American history, a time when we had to see ourselves, our country, and our technology in a different way. But one thing that stayed true was music, and one band that held the banner of Rock and Roll has been kicking ass ever since. Meet Joshua Todd, frontman for Buckcherry.

RRX: Buckcherry is coming here, and you’ve been here before. What do you like about this area? What about this particular area is memorable to you?

JT: The East Coast, in general. We sold the most amount of our records on the East Coast. So we always remembered that. That was big when we were starting out, you know. So that’s what I remember the most. When “Lit Up” started on the radio and started picking up momentum, we were actually in Europe opening up for KISS, and we didn’t know what was going on until we got back. And I think Albany was one of the first places that we played, and it was sold out. We were like, “We’ve never even been here, like, why the hell is this happening?” And it was all because we had a hit on the radio, and people were buying a lot of records in that area. So, that’s something I remember.

RRX: Buckcherry has kept a really hard rock groove going for more than a couple of decades. I know the classics, like “Lit Up” and “Crazy Bitch.” But when I was on your website, I was jumping back and forth playing your songs off all the albums and all the songs on your Spotify. I’m just randomly jumping back and forth playing them. What I really like is that they’re all really good. They’re all different, but at the same time, they’re still rock and roll. So the question I have for you is, do you think there’s any boundary, musically, when it comes to rock and roll?

JT: No, I don’t think there is. You know, that was the charm of those early rock records, and that’s how we try to do it. There’s a charm to Buckcherry and what we do, and there’s not a lot of bands that are continuing to keep that old school rock and roll tradition going. They have records that are mid-tempo and hard rockers and ballads and everything. We have over 100 songs out there. It’s pretty cool because there’s very few now that are putting out rock and roll records.

I’m talking about what we do. I haven’t heard any records like that. The genre of rock music is mostly active rock, you know, bands … they don’t sound like we sound for sure.

RRX: I’m a young Gen X. I’m like right on that border of Gen X and millennials, so I was all about Seattle grunge in the ’90s, but I don’t think a lot about the 2000s. But Buckcherry was rocking in the 2000s, and I remember that. Do you think that, as a decade, the 2000s didn’t get the credit that they deserved culturally?

JT: I think that the rock genre took a turn in the 2000s, and it became active rock. That was what was on the radio, you know, and to me, it’s very bland and every band sounds the same, and rock just kinda started fading into oblivion, as far as being any kind of mainstream music. Like, it started not becoming any category in the award shows. Anything, you know … rock just started disappearing, and now rock radio is almost gone completely from terrestrial radio. It wasn’t a good thing, and that’s been the only gripe, you know. We have to embrace all forms of good rock, good rock songs. So, yeah, that’s what happened. And I think that’s why the 2000s were forgettable.

RRX: Alright, so now you said active rock. I just wanna make sure I understand what the difference is between active rock and say what you guys do.

JT: There’s classic rock and then there’s grunge rock. And there’s ‘80s rock, you know, and then there’s active rock. I mean, it all sounds different. When you hear a grunge song, you know what era it’s from; it’s grunge music, you know, it’s because it sounds a certain way … The kings of active rock were, like, Creed. And then it just started getting muddy, where there was like a lot of average active rock bands, and they all just started sounding the same. And in my opinion, that’s how it started fading out into oblivion.

RRX: And that’s pretty much why I stopped listening in the mid-2000s.

JT: I don’t know if that’s the reason why you start or you stop listening. There could be a lot of reasons … you know what I mean? Maybe that you just weren’t listening to a lot of rock but now it’s like different. Everybody is streaming music, so young people that have discovered Buckcherry on Spotify come to our shows and they’re instant fans, but they also listen to hip hop and pop. The average listener doesn’t just listen to one genre of music anymore at all.

RRX: No, that’s been a big thing. I’ve noticed that when I grew up, like 13-14 years ago, it was metal. I listened to nothing but metal. That was all I ever did.

JT: Yeah, exactly like that, but not anymore. You can’t be, though. There’s still people like that, but you just can’t be like that. I listen to everything now.

RRX: Being that the band has been together for so long and has put out so many albums, has a decision to put something new out ever just come down to having that itch? Like, were you ever all fighting but still threw a jam together out of thin air?

JT: I’m never affected by the creative process. I have the itch already, and you know, “Roar Like Thunder” hasn’t even been out a year, and I’m already ready to make new music. So, it’s just something we’ve just always done. We’ve never bickered about it. Once we crack it open, it’s go time, and we just keep writing until we find some good stuff, you know. And then we accumulate a body of work that we feel is ready for the public and we start laying it down for real.

RRX: When you’ve been around together for that long, it’s probably just hand in glove at some point.

JT: Well, I mean, I’m still very inspired. I love building something from nothing. Like, once you do this, and you start doing it, you start making money at it, and you start doing it for your living. I spent so many years laboring over songwriting and performing and everything where I wasn’t getting paid a dime. I was going through my hard knocks, and I was figuring it out … what makes a good hook, what makes a good melody. I write all the lyrics, so figuring out how to put words together really right and clever and in a way that a lot of people can relate to. Because that’s what songs are; they’re short stories, they’re emotions. You have to be aware of all that, and that takes a lot of practice. So once you get to a point where you start figuring out what works. I know now when we have a bad Buckcherry song. I just know, we all know, and we’re just not feeling it, and we can talk about it. “Hey, what’s not working in the song?” Because I like the verse, but the chorus isn’t, like, knocking me out, or vice versa. Or the music could be better, whatever. And we just figure it out. We come up with new parts, and we put it together until we have something that we’re like, “Now, this is undeniable.” I can put this on from beginning to end, and I’m never bored.

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