Success hasn’t always been easy for The Gaslight Anthem, especially in the years since they blew up after releasing 2008’s brilliant The ’59 Sound. An ode to beat-up old cars, girls named Maria, and summer nights in the band’s home state of New Jersey, it was a type of blue-collar, heartfelt East Coast punk rock that sits with you long after the record stops spinning.
The record rightfully claimed its position on countless end-of-year lists, with critics citing singer Brian Fallon’s earnest lyrics and impassioned delivery and guitarist Alex Rosamilia’s ability to eschew the genre’s typical power chords in favor of melodies that would be more at home on a Cure or early ‘90s shoegaze record. But with the trappings of praise came the inevitable comparisons to Bruce Springsteen, which seems to befall every artist who hails from the state save for maybe Glenn Danzig.
It was fun and an honor at first, but then became a bit of an albatross, primarily for Fallon, who had grown up idolizing The Boss but was also trying to carve out his own identity. Growing pains and a determination to avoid burnout led The Gaslight Anthem to take a few extended breaks. The first was in 2015, an indefinite hiatus broken only to celebrate the 10th anniversary of The ’59 Sound before resuming once again.
During that time, Fallon released a handful of solo albums and explored a much darker side with The Horrible Crowes project. He was also dealing with a lot of internal struggles, convinced his songwriting wasn’t up to par, setting the bar to unreachable heights, and getting perpetually frustrated and increasingly disillusioned.
The frontman saw a doctor about his crippling anxiety, got on some meds, and decided he wanted to resurrect The Gaslight Anthem – for good this time, he says – returning last fall with History Books, their first new studio album in nearly a decade. Reinvigorated and confident, it seems the ghosts of the past have been exorcised. Hell, bring on the Springsteen comparisons if you want, he even duets with Fallon on the goddamn title track.
Vanyaland caught up with Fallon for a 617 Q&A (Six Questions; One Recommendation; Seven Somethings) ahead of two New England dates this weekend, at The Strand in Providence Saturday (August 17) and Boston’s MGM Music Hall at Fenway on Sunday (August 18). He counts MGM Music Hall as “one of my favorite venues now that we do. It’s really nice and really well laid out and it’s such an easy time to be there whenever we go there to play a show.”
Naturally, there had to be talk about his diehard fandom for the New York Yankees as he’ll be in such proximity to the grounds of baseball’s greatest rivalry. But we also went deep on Fallon’s decision to open up about his mental health, why the Springsteen thing doesn’t faze him these days, and how it might be a good move for everyone to try quitting bread.
:: SIX QUESTIONS
When you come to Boston, is it hard not to mention your Yankees’ devotion?
No… I mean, I love the Yankees. I think just from being around it as a kid especially, and my first t-ball team when I was seven years old was the Red Bank Yankees, so that’s where it came from. But I’m not a Red Sox hater though – and the Patriots, too. I am one of those people who, if you’re a legendary team who’s obviously got tons of Hall of Fame players and they’ve been around forever, you got to just respect the team. So, I mean, a lot of the shows we do now are in the theater at Fenway. And to me, it’s cool to just look around and I just like it. It’s like old history of baseball.
It’s been two and a half years since The Gaslight Anthem reunited. The new album came out in October. Is it safe to say this time it’s for good, there won’t be any indefinite hiatuses coming anytime soon?
Yeah, I would think that. [laughs] I would say that there’s probably not any more time to hiatus or anything like that. I think we’re good now, so it’s good. [laughs]
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One of the things you talked about when you were doing your solo stuff, and even as you were getting ready to come back with Gaslight Anthem, was a lot of the mental health challenges you dealt with in the last decade or so. Despite the fact that it’s become much more acceptable and even commonplace for artists to talk about that sort of thing, was it still uncomfortable for you to put it out there?
Not really, because I knew that if I talked about it, it makes it a little bit easier for, I think, for anybody when they hear that other people are dealing with it too. It doesn’t even matter sometimes – it could be somebody that’s not even a fan of our band, but they could just say like, “Oh, well I know one other person that’s dealing with this.” And it sort of makes it seem like, “Well, if they’re doing it, maybe it’s not that bad and maybe I could deal with it, and maybe it’s not so impossible to work through.” So, I dunno, I think that if somebody sees you talk about it or hears you talk, it’s good for them and for other people to be like, “Well, I heard this guy went through this.”
Sometimes when you hear people’s stories that relate to your own struggles before you go through them, it’s a little easier. If you’re going to try and climb a mountain and you go talk to somebody who’s done that before and they’re like, “Yo, it’s possible, but here, look out for this and this and this” So it just makes you feel a little bit more confident. I felt like… not afraid because I was talking, I knew that there would be some positive outcomes from that, and also, I was relieved to not feel bad anymore.
The influences of yours have been discussed pretty much ad nauseum, but you’ve actually become friendly with people like Eddie Vedder, Greg Dulli, of course, Springsteen. Was there any part of you as you were coming up playing bigger festivals or going on bigger tours that was like, “I don’t want to meet any of my heroes and be disappointed?”
Yeah, you always have that fear in the back of your head, but I think the excitement takes over when you see somebody that you’ve really looked up to right in front of you, or if you know they’re going to be near you. I guess you have to be good at reading the room, because people are different. You can catch somebody at different times of the day, and depending upon what they’re dealing with, you’ll get a different version of them, which is everybody, because then some people are like, “Well, I met them and they were so nice,” and some people are like, “I met them and they were mean,” and, well, that’s everybody. It just depends on when you catch ’em.
If you can learn maybe to read the room a little bit…I try to do that. If I’m seeing somebody that I want to talk to, but maybe the vibe is wrong, I’m like, “Do I force my way into this conversation or do I just let it go?” I think the thing is that some people are like, “This is my chance,” but I don’t know if that’s really the best way to do it. Sometimes it ends up being a negative. That’s my experience from me trying to do it.
Two of your favorite bands that you’ve talked about a lot are Pearl Jam and The Afghan Whigs. What are your go-to records for each of them?
For Pearl Jam, it kind of changes a lot. I think that I listen to – I don’t know if it’s my favorite – but I probably end up listening to Vitalogy the most. But I wouldn’t say that that was my favorite record. And for the Afghan Whigs, I mean, I think Black Love is the best record that they ever made.
You’ve covered Pearl Jam’s “State of Love and Trust.” Have you ever thought doing one of [Afghan Whigs’ frontman] Dulli’s songs for a radio session or whatever?
Yeah, but I’ve thought about that a lot – but they’re not easy to do. There’s a lot going on in those songs and some of ’em are pretty hard to do. But, I mean, it could be done. And when he strips down, like, “Feeling of Gaze” or something like that on The Twilight Singers album, I don’t know. It sounds great. And I think I’m pretty sure it’s just him and a guitar. He’s great. You know, maybe. I think that maybe one day, I don’t know.
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You’ve had sort of a love/hate relationship with the Springsteen connection over the years, at least in the media, because there was so much talk about it, especially around when The ‘59 Sound was breaking, Now you’ve done a duet with him on History Books, on the title track no less. Is it safe to say you’re at a point where it doesn’t bother you anymore?
No, I don’t mind it now. I think that we’ve kind of established that we’re part of a thing and we’re part of a thing from New Jersey and Bruce’s thing. There’s no doubt about it that he’s the leader of the whole thing. But to me, I mean, he might tell you that Elvis is the leader, but to me he is, and Bruce is the leader. And we come from that lineage, so I don’t think it’s anything to be worked up about too much.
I think that in the beginning, it was much different because you’re a younger man trying to establish who you are, and people are trying to figure out where you fit in their world. And when you’re young, you’re trying to define yourself still. And no one likes that. No one wants to be compared to anybody when they’re young because they feel like maybe their story is still developing. They’re still coming out. Like Bruce with the Bob Dylan thing. Everybody’s like, “New Dylan, new Dylan, new Dylan.” He’s like, “I’m not the new Dylan.” “Yeah, you are.” But now he loves Dylan.
It’s not about loving or hating the artist, it’s just about being allowed the freedom to develop at your own pace. Some of the media are just, they just want to be like, “This band sounds like this band and this band sounds like this band.” They’ve lost some of the ability to describe things without saying, well, it’s a very whatever “esque.” You talk about the Mona Lisa or something and then they would say, “Well, that art is very Raphaelian-esque,” or whatever. And you’d be like, “Well, no… it’s Leonardo Da Vinci.” You know what I mean? It’s different. But that doesn’t describe it. Those are just the ingredients that I think went in there. I don’t know. It’s a thing that people do. They need to, especially in that time, everything needed to sound like something, which is fine, but it helped us find our thing.
Talking about The ‘59 Sound, what do you think it was that made that record such a breakthrough as opposed to Sink or Swim?
Well, I think when those things happen, it’s really a moment of time with people and culture who are ready for that thing, and they’re waiting for whatever that thing is. I don’t think you can write a song on purpose that’ll do something like that. It’s just the right thing at the right time. Like, no one could tell me, Chappell Roan would be famous 10 years ago. No one could have told you that. And it just happened to catch on because it’s the right thing at the right time. That’s the thing that’s sort of the X factor about it. It makes it really mysterious, you know? So, if you’re asking me why The ’59 Sound and not Sink or Swim, I don’t know, because it’s just the public… I think there was a void for that kind of band at that time, and we filled it. We kind of bridged that punk and rock thing, whereas other people kind of did it, but they didn’t bridge it in such… I think we had the most mainstream version of it.
I think some people were more on the punk side. Against Me! was close to it, but they leaned a little bit more punk than we did. And then even Lucero, they leaned a little more country than we did. But each of them filled different gaps that the public was looking for at that time, and then we filled the thing that was more like the classic rock meets the punk thing. I don’t really know. That’s the best kind of explanation I could possibly give. [laughs] It’s the people who like the Counting Crows and the people who like Rancid and Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan, they all were like, “Yeah, now this is for us.”
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When you look at the cover of that record now, The ‘59 Sound, what do you see? Not just in yourself, but the band as a whole.
I see determination there. That’s what I see. I see really determined people. We didn’t have anything at that time.
:: ONE RECOMMENDATION
I think “eat less bread” is good. I’ve been doing that for the last two weeks because I did not know that I was allergic to it and I am. I stopped eating it and I feel like a different person. My advice is if you walk around every day and you’re like, “How do I feel bad all the time?” If you eat, and then you feel bad right after, try not eating any kind of grain. Because I stopped doing it, and I was like, “Wow, this is… I feel like a normal human being.” That’s my new thing that I just discovered is every time I would eat, my stomach would hurt, and it would swell up and I’d get tired… and not just gluten. It was more than that. And it was weird, and I felt weird, and I was like, “What? Am I dying?” And then like, “Oh, you’re eating this stuff that you’re allergic to. Oh! Okay.” Now I feel great and it’s good.
And take a little sabbatical from booze. That’s my other advice. Because some people, they’ll have even a beer every day – and I’ve done that. Just take a little break. Every once in a while. Don’t have to quit forever. Just say, “You know what? Not right now.” Then you could go back to it, but you should just try it. Those are my two big suggestions in life that have newly changed my, well…let me clarify. So, when I figured out I was allergic to the bread thing, I said, “Oh, well I probably shouldn’t have this booze, because the doctor was like, “Your body needs to just heal up for a minute from the bread. So if you do drink, just don’t do it for a while and see what happens and see if you feel better.” Turns out that most alcohol is made from grain, especially beer. So, it was tough. It was a little tough there.
Don’t get me wrong! Beer’s not bad. We’re not saying that. Beer’s good, still good. You just got to be careful. Maybe just once in a while just say, “I’m taking a little month off or something.” That’s all I’m saying. But other than that, beer’s great. And if we ever come out with a beer, you should drink it. Just not all the time. That’s what I’m saying.
:: SEVEN OF SOMETHING
New Jersey gets shit on so much. Give me seven things that make it great.
Well one, the music. It’s always good. There’s always a good band from New Jersey. Whether it’s Thursday or My Chemical Romance or The Front Bottoms or The Gaslight Anthem or the Bouncing Souls or any band you want to pick. There’s always something coming from New Jersey that’s cool. Like Halsey. Throughout time, Kirsten Dunst was from New Jersey. There’s so many different things. Oh, Scarlett Johansson? You’re welcome. From New Jersey. So, all this stuff. Bleachers? New Jersey. None of those Taylor Swift records would sound like that without New Jersey. What I’m trying to say is, one is always great music, constantly great music.
Two, [the] best pizza in the world is in New Jersey. Everyone can say that it’s from New York – it’s not. It’s been rated. Google dot com. And that’s the end of that. I would say you could also get great pizza… ready for this New York City? In Connecticut. Connecticut has great pizza. Sally’s is good, Frank Pepe’s? Killer. Nobody cares about Joe’s anymore in New York City. We don’t care. It’s been there for that long. We don’t care. You’ve had enough New York, your time has passed. Now it’s time for Connecticut and New Jersey to shine. That’s what’s up. We might even send some up to Massachusetts. And then what?
Joe’s just opened on Harvard’s campus.
Well, there you go. So, it’s happening. It’s happening already. Spreadin’ the plague, you know what I mean?
Pork roll, that’s third. That’s a reason in and of itself. You better believe it. Pork roll from New Jersey.
Number four. The ocean. The ocean’s great there. You can surf. It’s great. It’s beautiful.
What’s your favorite beach?
Man… I don’t even have one. I don’t care. I’ll just go. I like them all because the one by me is nice in Point Pleasant. The one in Asbury is great. I can’t pick a favorite one.
Number five, I could say that we have some of the most beautiful places in western, like northwestern New Jersey up by Pennsylvania, by the Delaware Water Gap? It’s some of the most beautiful woods and fall scenes that you could find. It’s magical up there. That’s another thing I would recommend about New Jersey.
Number six in New Jersey: Snow. Snow rules. And we get a lot of snow.
And then number seven, why New Jersey is the best? I mean – Bruce Springsteen, that’s why. That’s it. That’s all the reasons you need. That’s everybody’s reasons. So yeah, a great list.
THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM + JOYCE MANOR + PINKSHIFT :: Saturday, August 17 at The Strand Ballroom & Theatre, 79 Washington St. in Providence, RI :: 7:30 p.m., all ages, $46 to $75 :: Event info :: Advance tickets ::: Sunday, August 18 at MGM Music Hall at Fenway, 2 Lansdowne St. in Boston, MA :: 7 p.m., all ages, $39.50 to $69.50 :: Event info :: Advance tickets
