Hawthorne Heights Without Casey

Fragile Future is Hawthorne Heights' third LP in the last four years, but making the album has been anything but a cakewalk. Imagine living your worst nightmare and you'll get an idea of the misery the band have gone through to get this record out.

After splitting with Victory Records, Hawthorne Heights sued the label for fraud, faced a counterclaim for breach of contract and libel, and finally settled on a partial win. Although the band still owes Victory more albums, they're free to record for other labels as well.

Then came the bombshell. In November 2007, guitarist Casey Calvert unexpectedly died of an accidental drug overdose from mixing anti-depressants, anti-anxiety meds and an opiate while on tour. Drummer Eron Bucciarelli says Calvert's death made them all take a step back and look at the bigger picture.

"It made us re-evaluate our priorities and not get into lawsuits and all that bullshit drama," he recalls. "It made us want to get back into being a band."

The title Fragile Future isn't only meant to reflect the band's head space at the time, but also the mindset of many Americans in an election year.

"In a broader sense, there's a lot going on right now in our country and a lot of issues going on in the upcoming election," Bucciarelli says.

"Musically, our songs aren't overtly political, but there's more of that on this album than any of our past albums for sure. As citizens, we pretty much need to know about the issues and that's why we're involved with things like Rock The Vote."

Of the 12 new songs, Bucciarelli says "Sugar In The Engine" and "Until The Judgement Day" are his personal favourites. He admits the disc isn't quite as heavy as The Silence In Black And White or If Only You Were Lonely, but he knows it's the band's best effort nonetheless.

"It's more melodic and part of that is because we lost Casey and his screaming. Musically, I think we're getting more into our rock influences and classic metal influences. There's a lot of melody, a lot of pop and a lot of hooks.

"We took a lot of time on this one. Every little detail is thought out and it's very much a piece of art that flows from one song to the next. We took a lot of production cues from The Beatles and the way they did it."

Calvert may be gone but he's definitely not forgotten. The band have said they'll continue to credit his name on all their albums.

Bucciarelli believes Fragile Future's release will help Hawthorne Heights see the light at the end of the tunnel.

"It's our most personal album and most thoughtful as well. It's our best material to date. We've been through a ton to finally get this thing out. I hope everyone can get a copy and listen to the whole thing because that's the way it was intended to be heard."

The slogan of their home state is "Ohio is for lovers," but if what the band do in their free time is any indication, they can be digital fighters, too.

"Right now, we're on the Projekt Revolution tour with Linkin Park," says Bucciarelli from Denver, Colo.

"We have a lot of new potential fans because Linkin Park has a lot of dedicated fans that we've never been exposed to before."

Every band has a way of fighting boredom on the road, and Bucciarelli admits the members of Hawthorne Heights are actually a bunch of video game nerds.

"Aside from the meet 'n' greets, interviews and work-type things, we play a lot of Halo 3. We split up into teams of three and it varies but Matt [Ridenour] and I are the best players so we're usually on opposite teams."