Baroness’ John Baizley Details Progress of Band’s Next Album

To say the least, the last few years have been memorable for Baroness. In 2012, the band released what many consider to be Baroness' magnum opus to-date, 'Yellow & Green.' A gruesome bus crash sidelined the band shortly after, but Baroness pressed on. Now, frontman John Baizley has offered some juicy details on Baroness' next album!

During the nine months following Baroness' August 2012 bus crash, John Baizley went through grueling rehab to nurse major injuries suffered in the catastrophe. Guitarist Pete Adams was luckier, only enduring minor injuries which required no long-term care. Bassist Matt Maggioni and drummer Allen Blickle no longer wished to tour after sustaining their own injuries, forcing Baroness to continue on with a band that was 50-percent new.

Miraculously, Baroness were back onstage by May 2013, touring North America for a number of stunning performances. Baroness have been off the road for a while now, but in a new interview, John Baizley spoke with Steel For Brains about Baroness' next record:

We’re in the midst, and I think or I hope that we’re entering the second half of writing right now. I think we’re beginning to see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel as far as that’s concerned. It’s kinda like at this point we’ve been off tour since February. That’s a very long time for me. I haven’t been off tour this long in nearly twelve years of playing music.

But I’ve got family and everything, so it’s nice to have a break from touring. We definitely wanna get back out and do the things that we’re good at: travel and adventure, meet new people, play more shows, go places we haven’t been before.

As you and probably everyone else know, we had to go through a pretty significant lineup change last year after the crash. They didn’t want to tour anymore, and that’s fine. No hard feelings and no love lost. I still love those guys. But changing 50% of your band is a pretty big deal, and we were unsure how that would play out, and it’s taken a little time just to let it sink in and become a well-oiled machine again.

We definitely had the lag thing immediately. It took very little time to get that. When it comes to writing, though, it took a little while to become comfortable and for everybody just to be able to understand what writing in Baroness is like and what the band is ultimately going towards.

Fortunately that’s already happened and now we’re just kind of kicking ass and writing. It’s hard to say any timeline. I don’t feel like I’m talking out of turn or giving away an secrets, but we’re definitely not doing another double record. We wanted to do it once.

We knew the idea was preposterous, and we knew that it was asking a lot from people, and that was such a focus the last time we wrote. Now we’re kind of on the opposite end of the spectrum. It’s very much more focused than the last record. I think it’d be interesting if Baroness put out a record that you didn’t need to put on two pieces of vinyl if you were to press it, so we’ll see if that can happen.

As of a couple of weeks ago I was listening to some of the rehearsals and demos we’ve done, and I’m super amped on where we are now. The fact that we’re still writing music, and the fact that it’s still got that intrinsic Baroness sound to it despite or in spite of what we’ve gone through – I’m super thrilled about that. As always it’ll be interesting to see what happens when the record comes out. We’re happy we still have an audience.

We’re happy we’re still alive. We wanna keep playing. Artistically speaking I’m just trying to find the time to make things happen. I’ve got a couple of things including one big solo show that I’ll be talking about in four or five months, and as always I’m doing the Baroness cover which traditionally takes hundreds and hundreds of hours, so I’m just gearing up for that. [Laughs]

Are you as excited as we are??? Stay tuned for further updates on Baroness' next album!

Baroness' John Baizley on Life After Near-Fatal Bus Crash