Three Days Grace Drummer Talks Band’s Kinship With Seether

The recently wrapped up Rockstar Energy Drink Uproar Festival boasted a who’s who of some of today’s hottest rock and metal acts on the bill adding to its diverse appeal, but Shaun Morgan from Seether recently said he was feeling kind of like the black sheep of the tour sound wise.

With their friends and frequent tourmates Three Days Grace also on the bill, we asked drummer Neil Sanderson what he thought about it: “At the end of the day we’re all here for the same reason, it’s about the music. That’s one great thing about music, it’s open to any interpretation and different perspective so you’re going to have people that play differently and have different styles."

Sanderson offered up some further explanation and commented on his kinship with Seether: “One thing that we share with Seether, that we respect a lot and consider very important, is that neither of us run any backing tracks.” Both Seether and Three Days Grace have built their rock ‘n’ roll reputations on delivering raw and in your face rock shows.

Regarding bands that do use backing tracks, Sanderson had this to say: “People would be surprised and it’s a bit of a drag how many bands rely on computers and backing tracks to play live and fill in their sound.” That’s another common thread between Three Days Grace and Seether, “I know with TDG and we’ve spoken with Seether many times about this, we believe that people are looking for something real now more than ever.”

Sanderson continued to explain his band's effort to keep things real, “There’s so much contrived stuff out there that we’re proud to say we may sound a little more rough around the edges than someone using something artificial to support their sound, we prefer to do that – keep it real and be true to ourselves.”

Sanderson believes that sometimes the best sounds are made by a truly organic approach, citing classic acts like Led Zeppelin. ”I’m a huge Led Zeppelin fan where you’ve got three guys and a singer and it was all about the space in between the music and listening to the other musicians and giving each instrument their own chance and space to push out. That to me makes it sound larger than life rather than just layers and layers of stuff.”

While Three Days Grace get ready to work on their new album, Sanderson commented on their general writing process: “We trust our own musicianship and not so many bells and whistles. We’re always really cognizant when we go into the studio, if we can’t pull it off live, we’re not doing it."

Read more from Sanderson about Three Days Grace in our recent in-depth interview with him here.