Our Lady Peace Band Together

One thousand one hundred and sixty-five days were needed to record Our Lady Peaces latest album Healthy In Paranoid Times, a length of time most record labels would balk at, demanding results, that hit single or some filler album sooner. It definitely wasnt a lack of material that kept OLP, out of record stores for some two and a half years.

"After Gravity kind of settled down we went to Maui for a month, recorded 12 songs, all live, no overdubs, and we were kind of thinking, 'OK, this is what we want,'" frontman Raine Maida says. "Getting away from it for a couple of months we realized that this was a good first step but its not it. So we go back. Record for another month. Got away from that. And we kept going back, and weve never had that ability before, weve always just gone into the studio for like 14, 15 songs and thats it.
"This time, I dont know why the record company let us keep doing it, but they kept paying the bills and we just kept going back, recording and recording."
With a growing number of tracks, the OLPers quickly enlisted veteran producer Bob Rock to help them pare down and construct the album, a process the extra time allowed to be more in-depth than on Gravity.
"The reason why we went back with Bob was because we kinda just started scratching the surface of what could have happened," drummer Jeremy Taggart says. "I felt that we kinda rushed into Gravity and it happened so quickly that we could probably do some more great things."
Maida agrees.
"I dont think therere a lot of good producers out there anymore and Bob is like the old school still," Maida says. "He can pick up a guitar, he understands the artist perspective, he understands the business perspective and he knows how to balance it really well."
Though Maida's generally the principal songwriter, Healthy In Paranoid Times became a very distinct "band" album, with the extra studio time allowing for a slow and deliberate process of feeling songs out.
"On this record we really tried to write together," Maida says. "Its easy for me to come in with a song, say here it is, lets go record it and itll be done in a couple of days. But when you have to sit in your rehearsal hall and you wait for that magic to happen, well, it doesnt always happen right away, but that was the M.O. for this record and it worked."
With the album now out, Maida and OLP have already had some interesting opportunities. They opened for The Stones to a huge crowd in Ottawa, but being the warm-up definitely ain't where it's at.
"An opening slot is regulated to 40, 45 minutes and for us at this point of our career its impossible to show what this band has got in 45 minutes," Maida says. "We did, like, 55 shows with Van Halen on our first record, we did Page And Plant, weve played with The Ramones... everybody! It feels like weve done all those things and really, at the end of the day, theres nothing like being able to do our own show and play for two hours."

Source: Chartattack