My Darkest Days Members Talk ‘Sick and Twisted Affair’, Touring and Serious Partying

My Darkest Days are gearing up for the release of their sophomore album, ‘Sick and Twisted Affair’, which is due out today. You can listen to the album in its entirety on their official site and it's available for purchase here. My Darkest Days are also doing a live chat at 6PM EST, which you can check out here.

The band is also set to serve as support on a massive trek called the ‘Here and Now’ tour headlined by their pals Nickelback and also features acts Bush and Seether staring April 10 in Moline Ill.

Loudwire got the opportunity to catch up with My Darkest Days frontman Matt Walst and guitarist Sal Costa who spilled the beans on the new album, touring, partying and much much more.

What inspired the title ‘Sick and Twisted Affair’ what does it mean to each of you?

Matt Walst: Well ‘Sick and Twisted Affair’ is the first song off the album. It’s kind of about dark love, vampire-y love, it’s kind of about an addiction that you can’t get away from.

Sal Costa: Everyone’s gone through a relationship like that where you’ve had someone you’re kind of addicted to.

MW: Yeah, you just can’t get away from them, they almost make you feel alive, without them you’re not happy.

SC: But it’s like poison at the same time.

How would you compare ‘Sick and Twisted Affair’ to your self-titled debut album?

SC: It’s a lot heavier and we got to do it way quicker. The last album took years in making, right?

MW: Yeah, the first album was over a span of like almost 10 years of writing, we had a lot of material that we chose from. On this album we had a lot of leftover stuff that we didn’t even use, we kind of just went ahead and started writing new material. So I feel it’s really relevant for now and all of the songs kind of sound alike in a production sense.

SC: Yeah, we toured with a lot of heavy bands on the last record and we started to see the audiences we were relevant to -- we’re playing with bands like Avenged Sevenfold, Three Days Grace. At the time we were trying to make some of the songs we had on the record a little bit heavier, and now it’s just a way heavier record so I think we have a lot more material to offer.

MW: Before we didn’t really know what we were going for and we had a lot of Hot AC kind of songs, like in Top 40 kind of song. That’s when rock was still crossing over, we wanted to have those kind of tunes and heavy ones too. Whereas with this album we only have two softer songs and all the rest are pretty heavy.

Did the bands you toured with and the audiences you saw have any sort of influence in the heavier direction?

SC: Tons, we just found that we were opening for Sevendust, 10 years and other heavy bands, so we wanted to be able to make the crowd rock like they do.

The single ‘Casual Sex’ the message is clear, but what was the inspiration for that tune?

MW: Oh wow, it’s the road. It’s a pretty personal experience, but that’s the thing when we write songs we want the message to be clear. A lot of songs today it’s very unclear, like "what is this song even about?” Where we really focused on “what is this song about? This song is about this,” it’s very clear in that song.

SC: Yeah, you’ll never meet my mom, it’s just straight up in your face.

It’s definitely not about a relationship, but in that sense it’s also universal. You don’t have to be on the road to necessarily have a meaningless encounter.

SC: A lot of people are kind of having casual sex and it’s easier now. Today it's okay to talk about those kinds of subjects whereas maybe 10 years ago it would have been very taboo.

MW: You have ChatRoulette now, you have Facebook… [Laughs]

You guys are teaming up with Nickelback, Bush and Seether for a massive tour. How would you describe your relationship with Nickelback and the rest of these bands?

MW: We toured with Seether for a couple months - really cool dudes. Dale [Stewart] is awesome super cool dude, loves to party with us and hang out. Bush, I got to meet Gavin [Rossdale] we played one show with them, STP and Bush, super cool dude - can’t wait to get to know him more, he seems really nice. Our relationship with Nickelback; we’re like their little brother and they help us out. Chad [Kroeger] has taught us so much about writing, how to party, we’ve seen a lot of fun stuff hangin’ out with him.

SC: He can host a party man, he’s a really good host. That tour actually got extended an extra month but it’s going to be without Seether in July. It’s going to be us, Bush and Nickelback. It’s going to be cool, even cooler ‘cause now we’re direct support to Bush.

MW: It’s pretty cool too because I was such a huge Bush fan. I think actually one of the first songs that I ever sang when I started singing and playing was one of theirs. I started playing but not really singing and his voice was actually in my range and I could mimic his voice. He was one of the first guys that I could sit down and play his songs, it’s really cool to be on tour now with one of your influences.

SC: That’s actually crazy, I didn’t know that ‘cause the first song I ever performed in front of an audience ever was ‘Swallowed’ by Bush at a music recital.

What does the rest of the touring schedule look like for My Darkest Days after the trek with Nickelback?

MW: We have no idea, it’s up until July now.

SC: Possibly a headline run with Jaigermeister, but yeah nothing’s been confirmed after that.

MW: Four months with Nickelback.

SC: It’s sounds like a badass gig. [Laughs]

Now you said a possible headline run, what are a couple of bands you would want to open up the show?

SC: Nickelback, Motley Crue… [Laughs]

MW: We have a band called Citizen Hollow that we’ve been working on; kind of taken under our wing and developing. A band called Kopek, they’re from Ireland.

SC: Yeah a really really good band.

MW: They have a song called ‘Cocaine Chest Pains.’ They were a lot of fun to tour with.

SC: We’ve toured with a lot of good bands, a lot of good up and coming bands.

You guys have collaborated with Chad Kroeger of Nickelback and Zakk Wylde. Who would you guys love to collaborate with that you haven’t gotten a chance to yet?

MW: Katy Perry would be one, I love her voice, she’s so good.

SC: Jay-Z.

MW: Yeah Jay-Z would be awesome.

SC: Jay-Z would be unbelievable especially after what he did with Linkin Park.

Would you guys like to do a remix album like he did with Linkin Park?

SC: That would be cool, if you know him just put in the word.

Your fans did some serious rallying and you guys made the Cage Match Hall of Fame by beating out Red Hot Chili Peppers, Shinedown, Seether, Blackstone Cherry and Pop Evil for the win. How does all of this support from your fans make you feel?

SC: Well just that we’re way bigger than the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

MW: [Laughs] Yeah we have a lot of support online, we’ve built that up and we keep in contact with our fans. When I’m on my own personal site I respond to people and talk to people, it’s good because you make friends on there. They’re not just fans, they become friends and they’ll fight for us and they’ll get other people to vote - everybody they know.

SC: We see these other bands and their site is completely run by their label and management and we do a lot of that stuff on our own. It’s funny because we’ll be at gigs sometimes and people will be at the merch line and we’ll be signing stuff and I’ll be like, “You’re Kristie,” and it’s just like, “What?” Because we actually respond to these people all the time, we create a relationship with our fans. We would be absolutely nowhere without those people, so it’s really really cool to have their support.