PropertyOfZack had the chance to speak with Balance & Composure not too long ago and it turned out to be a great interview! Jon Simmons and I discussed the band’s new record, Separation, time in the studio with Brian McTernan, touring with Dredg, future touring, beginning work on a new full-length, and more. Read up and enjoy, it’s a good one!

The band released two EPs from 09 to 10 that were sonically similar and created a ton of anticipation for the next batch of work, which is Separation. Were there nerves within the band to write the first record?
Obviously we wanted to write better songs, but it was really just about having more time to write them. The first two EPs we had a few weeks for and with this we had quite a few months to write all the songs. That helped more than anything.
 
That being said, Separation, while similar, is also a large departure from the EPs. How would you compare the musical shift?
I guess it’s more mature. I feel like they’re better songs and they’re better written.
 
Was it difficult to create a longer body of work for the first time?
It was definitely hard. There were times when we were drained, but we didn’t want any filler songs. We wanted every song to be good. That made it harder. For the most part, we worked together and we all got solid ideas and we made it work.
 
The record has been out for a week now. How has the reception from fans been in your eyes?
The reception has been awesome so far. It’s been pretty positive. We’re kind of blown away by it so far. We’re extremely happy with the feedback thus far.
 
You guys hit the studio with Brian McTernan in January. How was it working with him?
It was awesome. He’s a legend in our eyes, so we were pretty nervous and excited to meet and work with him. The whole experience was one of the best we’ve had as a band so far because he’s done so much and had so much positive input. We couldn’t be more lucky to have worked with him for our first record.
 
He’s sort of got his hand in this whole scene write now with you, Fireworks, Set Your Goals, and Transit. Is it rad to be able to be a part of that group?
Yeah, it’s cool. It’s cool that we’re working with someone who has done stuff with so many of our friends. I think he’s really excited too because he’s working with a lot of bands he likes and appreciates. It always makes a better record if the producer is a part of it.
 
Did he add much to the writing once the band was in the studio?
No, not at all. He threw suggestions at us and we took them and decided what we were going to do, but it really wasn’t much. He wanted us to do it organically and just do our own thing. He’d give input if he thought something really needed to be change, but they were minor things. We liked that because we didn’t want anyone to have control, but he got it and he knew what he was doing.
 
There are definitely concepts in the lyrics that you can pick up on pretty easily with the repetition of items like trees and rain. Can you just discuss all of that? You brought back “Always on your troubled mind” as well.
The theme for the record is that separation is brought up a lot with relations, but also about our separation from our peers. Everyone else our age is doing what they’re supposed to be doing and are going to school and getting jobs. It kind of freaked us out because we’re not doing that and we’re not making any money. We’re just playing for people in basements. We wanted to touch on that. The song “Echo” was about us coming home from the Bayside tour with Title Fight and it rained for days and we were kind of relieved to be home because we felt we accomplished our first big tour with our best friends. It was a huge relief that we completed that tour and we actually had hope.
 
“Echo” in particular is totally different from anything we’ve seen before from the band. Was it cool just musically to be able to create a song like that?
Yeah. We added the drums and stuff in the studio, but I wrote it in my living room. We always wanted to do a song like that, but we never had enough tracks to mess around with.
 
The tracking on the record goes from hard to soft to hard again. Was it great to just have enough room on the record to experiment?
That’s exactly what we wanted to do. We wanted to take you on a rollercoaster in some way. That’s exactly what we wanted and it was fun to experiment with that.
 
The band is on a pretty big tour with Dredg and The Dear Hunter. How has the tour been?
The tour so far has been great. It’s pretty weird. It started off weird because we weren’t used to this crowd, but we’re used to it and we really like it. We’ve become really good friends with The Dear Hunter. It’s been a good experience minus the two van breakdowns.
 
Will you put in some new songs into the set as time goes on?
We’re definitely going to keep writing. We’re going to keep writing for a second LP probably as soon as we get home. It won’t be done for a while, but we want to get some songs written and see what we can do.
POZ: Do you think it’ll be in the same vein of Separation?
Jon: We definitely want to expand our sound. We want it to be pretty different. We don’t want to put out the same record over and over again.
POZ: Have you guys thought of when you want to finish the writing by?
Jon: We’re going to be so busy this year, which is why we wanted to get a head start on getting the material together.
 
In terms of the live show, do you want to work in new songs into the set?
100% yeah. I think after this tour we’re going to bring in as many new songs as we can. We figured no one would know the new songs yet, so we’re going to play a lot of new songs on the torus coming up.
 
Are you guys stoked for the Touché tour?
I’m so excited. We cannot wait.
 
When will we see some more dates announced?
We’re doing Australia in August, which is insane and crazy. We’ll definitely do a fall tour or two. We’ll be around the whole year.
 
Would you like to hit Europe or the UK as well?
I think we’re going to shoot for winter, if we can arrange it. It’s not worked out yet though.
 
The band was in the studio with Vince Ratti. What was that for?
We went in to make a song for a compilation for one of my friends. It’ll be out in the summer I think. There won’t be an EP or anything. That’d be cool though.