Listen to a New Song from Frontier(s), Featuring Ex-Members of Elliott

For most of his life, Chris Higdon has been an integral member of the DIY community. His early 90s band Falling Forward was one of the first nationally visible hardcore bands within Louisville and the southeastern United States, and then he started one of the best emo bands of the 90s, Elliott, with Jonathan Mobley and Jay Palumbo.

So no one would blame Higdon or the other members of Frontier(s), who themselves have been members of excellent bands such as Mouthpiece (New Jersey) and Stay Gold (Seattle, WA), if they just rested on the combined 70 or 80 years combined between them and let the kids have fun. But luckily for us, they aren’t.

Frontier(s)’ new five-song EP White Lights is a heavy, melodic offering that takes the best of late 80s and early 90s indie rock, contemporary punk bands like Banquets, years of listening to Steady Diet of Nothing and the pedigree of four grown up hardcore kids, and it is one of the most outstanding rock 'n' roll records released so far this year.

Noisey is pleased to premiere the final track on the EP, “Bare Hands," and we spoke with Higdon about the new record, his old bands, and out-of-body experiences in both the Netherlands and the delivery room.

Noisey: So I’ve never really understood the extra “(s)” in your name, so I looked it up to avoid the “what does your band name mean” question but it just brought more questions. Did you really name your band after a French horror movie about Nazis that only has a 6.3 on Rotten Tomatoes?
Chris Higdon: So, our original drummer is a huge horror film fan. Frontiers was on a short list for band names and he mentioned how [the movie] was spelled. It really just came down to aesthetics. We didn’t think it would get distribution over here. I’m not sure had even seen it before, but it’s not a great movie. We had thought about leaving the vowels out for a while, I guess it was just a design choice?

I guess it’s better than calling your band “Human Centipede II” or something.
Yeah, right, we were looking for something simple with the name. I was really hoping it was going to be a good foreign horror film but we had no such luck.

It’s been about four years since your first couple of releases (There Will Be No Miracles Here and a two-song seven-inch, The Plains). What’s happened since then?
Life, I guess. We did a small European tour and some dates around the east coast. We just move at a glacial pace. We have continued to write and play local shows the whole time. I think the band has been designed this way. Three of us have families, we wanted to have a band that could work around that. If people want to see us, we play a show. If someone is willing to put a record out then we release an album.

With your songwriting, it’s always felt like a natural next creative step rather than some kind of forced attempt to reinvent yourself. Has the songwriting process changed at all for you since you were in Falling Forward and Elliott?
I first thought it might with this band. Immediately after Elliott, I wanted to start this band with Bryan, our bass player, and make records with a rotating cast of players but it's just not who I am. I work best in a band environment where we all feed off each other’s ideas. I'm not a band leader by any means, I'm a musician by default. I just do my best to surround myself with talented people. With us, melody comes first, and everything else follows, if that means anything.

Has playing music, or being in a band in general, changed at all for you as you’ve gotten older?
Yeah, there are stories. I was hard to be in band with, I think. I wasn't a control freak, but I had way more ambition than talent. That meant we had to work twice as hard to get everything done. Now, hopefully I'm more laid back, maybe to a fault. Sometimes I think Matt wishes he was in a band with me back in the day when I would make everyone practice three to four days a week, eight hours a day. That’s just not going to happen again.

I wouldn’t worry about that. Honestly, as a gigantic Elliott fan, I think Frontier(s) is up there with some of the best Elliott releases.
Thanks, I feel things have gone full turn now. Things are closer to what being in a band was like when I was 17. We aren’t trying to make a living off this. We record in three days, not three months.

How do you feel about the explosion of bands getting back together and doing reunion shows and stuff like that in recent years?
That’s a hard thing to answer. I understand why people do it.

Any chance of Elliott or Falling Forward reuniting?
You spend more time with bandmates than probably any other relationship you have creating intense memories. I would hate to ruin anyone’s memories of seeing us in the past. It would not be the same. There’s always a chance of that happening but everything coming together at the right time is unlikely. It's been talked about. We would have way more fun doing it now for sure. It would be like looking back on vacation photos from a trip that was rewarding but hard.

I know I and a lot of other people would be extremely excited about an Elliott reunion, for what it's worth. Moving back to the record, what’s this song, “Bare Hands," about?
That song to me, in short, is about starting a family. I had this crazy out-of-body experience with the birth of our first son. And some of the imagery is pulled from that. That’s why I like to leave meanings up to the listener, because mine are a little off some times. Just our connection to each other through heritage, time and space, the land we call home. That’s why I like to leave meanings up to the listener, because mine are a little off sometimes.

Holy shit. If you don't mind me asking, what happened in the out-of-body experience?
I'm sure people can explain it away easily, lack of sleep, stress, etc. I'm not a hippie guy at all. I'm middle-of-the-road as much as anyone. But my wife and I had a natural birth and on my part, being involved created another state of mind, a vision of sort. Sounds crazy, I know.

Not crazy at all. Unless you were on shrooms, but I think there's another Vice section for stuff like that.
That’s what I felt like. I've got an Elliott story about shrooms I could tell you sometime. Probably a very common story for bands that play in Rotterdam.

I’m all ears.
It's really not that great but I've had people come up to me here in the states and say we sounded really strange at that show. It's what happens when everyone but one person in the band is on something.

I’d kill for a live recording of that. Elliott: The King Diamond Show.
Yeah, I can’t remember which way it went. I was straight, but everyone else was not. They were very happy and playing very fast, but thought they were playing slowly. I'm sure it was a mess.

That’s amazing. So this new EP stuck out to me as way heavier and more riff-focused than first couple of records. Was that a conscious decision on the band’s end or something that just kind of happened?
Just the way we are writing right now, it will change I'm sure. It's my dueling need to be in both Fugazi and ELO at the same time. I'm heavily influenced by 70s pop rock and late 80s/early 90s hardcore. I think that’s just what comes out.

Do you have any plans to tour for White Lights? What's next for you and Frontier(s)?
We play in Louisville quite a bit but we have a week’s worth of shows coming up in August on the east coast and plan on touring Europe hopefully early next year, with a new seven-inch as well.

Hell yeah. Any last words?
I just hope people come out to the shows and enjoy what we are doing. I appreciate what it takes these days to go out and support live music, or buying records for that matter. It takes effort and that’s not lost on us.

White Lights is out on June 24 via Tiny Engines. Pre-order it here. And catch their limited tour dates:

AUG 12 - Louisville, KY @ Haymarket

AUG 13 - Lancaster, PA @ The Seed

AUG 14 - Philadelphia, PA @ Boot & Saddle

AUG 15 - Brooklyn, NY @ St. Vitus

AUG 16 - Garwood, NJ @ Crossroads

AUG 17 - Washington, DC @ DC9

Paul Blest is on Twitter - @pblest