Gearing up for the release of their 8th studio album ‘Warpaint’ (Read Our Review Here), Buckcherry frontman Josh Todd took some time out of his busy schedule to talk to Metal Wani to discuss the album, influences, and the band’s upcoming touring schedule.
Beginning the conversation by discussing the band’s excitement at releasing a new record and whether or he still gets excited to release new music, Todd reflects back on his career and remarks “20 years in the game is pretty significant and to have that kind of longevity in the rock game is impressive and I’m very grateful, but I’ve also worked hard for it”.
Todd then discusses the process involved in whittling down a list of 30 songs to the albums 12 tracks. When pressed on how hard it was to bring the list of songs down, Todd remarks that the process wasn’t difficult because “The good songs always win, they always come to the surface”, before further expanding on how the band came together to cull down the tracks. The discussion then shifts to Buckcherry’s attempts to get more radio-presence with Warpaint, where Todd notes that it is part of the competitive nature of his own, but also an important prospect for the band, even though it might not be as important as it used to be.
The conversation then focuses on the band’s lineup changes over the years and whether this had an impact on the writing process for Warpaint, before settling into a discussion about the musical and visual style and direction of the album and how the band came up with the album title.
When discussing the finer details of the album, and the thought process behind track Right Now, Todd notes that “At the end of the day, there is no past, and there is no future”, before taking a more introspective look into his philosophical way thinking and how that has influenced this track before remarking “I don’t want to have regrets, I don’t want to be living in the past, because that’s a really painful way to live, to be waking up every morning and regretting lots of stuff”. They then discuss the track No Regrets, and the influences that Todd had in music growing up and how that imprinted itself into the track.
They then finish off by discussing the track placing an order on the album, something which Todd acknowledges he puts a lot of time into and is appreciative that it doesn’t go unrecognized, before touching on the bands touring plans for 2019.
