Nickelback Discuss ‘No Fixed Address’ Album, 2015 Tour + More

Nickelback are back in a big way. The group's 'No Fixed Address' album is out now and they just announced a massive 2015 North American tour. Loudwire had a chance to speak with the full band at the recent announcement of their tour. Check out the chat below.

Looking at this record, you basically went all over the place to record this album. Did you have an idea of what you wanted to do for this album and was that always part of the plan?

Chad Kroeger: It wasn't until it we were three quarters of the way done when we started realizing this is working. Originally, it was like -- can we just do a few weeks where Mike lives, he lives in Maui. Can we do a couple of weeks in Vancouver? I was in L.A. a lot at the time, so we'd do a couple of weeks in L.A. We just kept bouncing around, we had done a bunch of -- we had a portable rig with us in Europe and we were coming up with a lot of ideas and recording stuff there. So, it really added to the schizophrenia of the album, which I love. It's got so many different sorts of themes, there's heavy stuff, there's melodic stuff, we've got some funky stuff. We've got a horn section, some female background singers, we've got a rapper (Flo Rida). It's all over the map, and I love that. Those are my favorite Nickelback records to make.

The three songs I've heard so far are very different from each other.

Mike Kroeger: Those aren't even -- it really does go all over the map.

Let's start with 'Get 'Em Up,' which kind of has a bluesy vibe to it. You want to talk about that?

Ryan Peake: 'Get em Up' has that awesome slide guitar in there, that kind of Southern delta blues thing going on. It's pretty cool.

And a little bit on where that song came from lyrically?

Chad Kroeger: I've always wanted to write a song about a bank robbery. If I couldn't be involved in a bank robbery, I gotta write a good one. My band members still haven't figured out that this is a metaphor from an instant early on in my life.

ALL: [Laughter]

Chad Kroeger: But I thought, instead of it being this a scene out of the movie 'Heat,' a very serious thing. I pictured these two guys who come up with this plan and it's just going to be fantastic. There's going to be machine guns, and they're going to roll up in this hot muscle car and they're going to kick the front door in and they're going to get the money and they're going to get away scot free and then they're going to head to Mexico or whatever. That's what the planning stage looks like, then once they get there they can't find a place to park. They drive around the block a half a dozen times, or twelve times or whatever I say in the car. Then they finally get parked, get out of the car, start walking towards the bank and start practicing what they're going to say when we get in there, that whole thing. They go to kick the front door in and it's Sunday. The bank is closed. There are two cops standing across the street and it just turns into this -- and I picture almost the 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,' absurdity of it.

Mike Kroeger: I really do like the comedy of that twist, I like that. I think it's great, its a little lighter.

Chad Kroeger: It's cool to have a story song, not just a mood or something. It was cool.

I dig the story songs, especially ones that have a sense of humor to them. I love that you guys do that. Guys, can you talk about your reactions to when Chad throws these things in there or the conversations that go into writing?

Mike Kroeger: If it's a song about sex, usually it's just fear.

Daniel Adair: We're just goaltending, a lot of the times it's "that's too far." [Sarcasm]

Ryan Peake: We had a song, it was the last time we were putting together, it came together the last couple of days, it's called 'Million Miles an Hour.' I had this stupid line, I said finally I can hear the speed of sound. I know it doesn't make any sense, he gets in the booth and he's like -- you're the speed of sound! Then the riff goes down, speed of f---ing sound! [laughs] just as a joke, I'm laughing my head off. I'm like, we're keeping that. We tried to replicate it again, do more takes, nope. First one, awesome.

Mike Kroeger: I can elude to take some of the serious edge of "speed of f---in sound" right now, I just mentioned a few interviews ago but when I play songs for my kids, I get some honest feedback. There's a moment in 'Million Miles an Hour' and my son, he stops the track and goes, 'Did he just say 'trippin' balls''? I was like, 'Yeah son. Yeah. Your uncle just said trippi'n balls right there.'"

Chad Kroeger: "Turn off the phone so no one called cause you and I are trippin' balls."

Mike Kroeger: He loved that line right away.

Daniel Adair: It's about a gymnasium. I hope you like that tune.

'Edge of a Revolution' is doing well for you guys. Topped our Loudwire video countdown for a couple of weeks. Let's talk about the song and video.

Mike Kroeger: And those of you who haven't heard the song or seen the video, hilarious ending! Hilarious! [Sarcasm]

Chad Kroeger: 'Edge of a Revolution' -- I came in with this line, and said, "What if the tag line was 'standing on the edge of a revolution'? Then all we had to do was turn on CNN and just start watching this, that and the other. That's what was really going on in the world, all the conflict and all the uprisings from around the world. People just fighting for a decent quality of life and trying to getting rid of dictatorship and have a decent government to represent the people, just the whole world was in uproar. It feels like it still is. So, I feel like the timing of it -- I felt like the song was very immediate. We got together and just started spitting out all the different topics we wanted to touch on. Everything that was going on with the NSA at that point.

Mike Kroeger: The outrage factor, as it were.

Chad Kroeger: And all of the bonuses that had been handed out after the crash. Wall Street just stealing everybody's money and winding up with bonuses at the end of it. We touched on all kinds of different things. It just felt it had a nice aggressive feel to it, it was fun and we've been practicing it over the last few days, I think it's the second song we'll jam tonight.

Mike Kroeger: It's fun to play.

Chad Kroeger: It's also really cool because we'd never really touched on such a political -- we had never taken such a political stance before.

Mike Kroeger: It's ironic, talking about income equality. Because we're uh ... loaded.

ALL: [Laughter]

Chad Kroeger: I laugh when people say, "Oh they talk about the NSA, what do they know about the NSA? It's just the States." It's a little more far reaching, ask Germany about that. It's a little more global.

We're here today for the big tour announcement. Can you talk about 60 dates coming up?

Chad Kroeger: It's very daunting when you say it like that.

You must like each other a lot if you're doing this.

Mike Kroeger: That's why we do this, we don't like each other [Sarcasm].

Chad Kroeger: I don't like to think about 61 days, I like to think about, "OK we're just going to go on tour and somebody showed me, i think Brian (manager) showed me the video that they're going to play before we go onstage today and the dates start scrolling by and it took so long for the dates to end I started getting butterflies. It was fear. I'm like how are we going to survive this?

Mike Kroeger: That's just North America. Coming broken to a city near you.

Ryan Peake: Day off, day off, two days off! Day off.

Mike Kroeger: Dialysis.

Our thanks to Nickelback for the interview. You can pick up the 'No Fixed Address' album here. And be sure to look for Nickelback on tour next year at these locations.

Watch Nickelbacks 'Edge of a Revolution' Video