Gob Were Dying To Release Another Album

10/25/07 5:30pm

by Quinn Omori (CHARTattack)

Gob fans received a pleasant surprise recently when they turned on their radios. The Vancouver band unleashed "We're All Dying" on Sept. 13, giving Canadian ears a taste of their long-time-coming new full-length, Muertos Vivos. The album — out on Aquarius Records on Oct. 30 — is the band's fifth studio LP and marks the end of a three-year silence for the quartet.

"We were pretty burnt out," says guitarist Tom Thacker, explaining part of the reason for the layoff.

That feeling was compounded by the fact that Arista Records, the band's U.S. label at the time, was bought out, leaving them without any support a mere three months into the promotional cycle for their 2004 release, Foot In Mouth Disease. But after taking a break to work on a few other projects, they headed back into the studio refreshed and ready to tackle a new Gob record.

"[Guitarist/vocalist] Theo [Goutsinakis] and I produced and engineered the record," says Thacker of the group's most eclectic album to date. "When we did the drums we had help from engineers, but basically we did it ourselves."

"I can't wait for everyone to hear this new record," says Goutsinakis. "I think it's a turning point in the Gob legacy."

"There's heavier stuff than before," adds Thacker. "There's classic punk stuff. There's softer stuff than before. It's a little more diverse than anything we've done in the past."In spite of that diversity, there are still some unifying themes on the record, one of which ties in well with the album's late October release.

"The lyrics kept leaning towards death or dying," explains Thacker. "It seemed fitting to have a title that lent itself to mortality.

"I also really like Day Of The Dead art, and there's an artist, Jose Guadalupe Posada... We just made our artwork out of that sort of stuff."

With a record in the can and a single on the radio, the band are set to release a video for "We're All Dying" that they shot in Vancouver over the last month. If that news has you glued to the TV, don't expect any sort of literal interpretation of the lyrics.

"Most of the time, if I see a video like that I hate it," says Thacker with a laugh. "The whole idea was to have a group of people and a march going on. That's sort of the way it sounds, with the drums and bass and the gang vocals."

Here are Gob's tour dates:

Nov. 9 Ottawa, ON @ Maverick's
Nov. 10 St. Jean, QC @ Metric Bar
Nov. 12 Hamilton, ON @ Casbah
Nov. 13 Barrie, ON @ Foundation
Nov. 14 London, ON @ Call The Office
Nov. 15 Oshawa, ON @ The Dungeon
Nov. 16 Toronto, ON @ El Mocambo