It's about time we've heard from you, The Ready Set.His fourth studio album, The Bad & The Better, was released on May 27 and the one-man band himself, Jordan Witzigreuter, got on the phone with us to give us the 411 on why it took four years to get it to the public.
C: Why the long wait after your 2010 album, I'm Alive, I'm Dreaming, for The Bad & The Better?
JW: "It was pretty much entirely out of my hands, which was a bummer. The label that I was on before, it just became obvious they didn't want to put the album out. But the moral of the story is that that kind of a gap will probably never happen again. I imagine I'd have new stuff out probably less than a year after this."
C: Did it take you four years to complete the album?
JW: "I wrote a ton of songs over that time period and a few made it onto the album, but most of them didn't because it ended up being stuff I didn't really want to or it didn't feel like me so most of the new album was written pretty recently. There are like three songs from the past couple of years that I ended up using and the rest of it was new. But I've had the album done for like six months."
C: There are so many different sounds on The Bad & The Better, what was the inspiration behind it?
JW: "That's what I always end up doing. I don't know if I really do it intentionally, but I just always want to do different stuff all the time. It's borderline random, but I try to maintain my style of writing. I like to try to apply my style to a bunch of different stuff and see how it goes rather than making everything sound like one thing."
C: What's the biggest difference between this album and your past ones?
JW: "Over the past couple of years I got to write with a lot of people, a lot of producers who are really good and really successful. I did stuff with RedOne who worked with Lady Gaga and I did stuff with some of Dr. Luke's people. I kind of went to songwriting school everyday. I learned so much from those people, how to edit myself and make the best part of the songs stand out. It was almost like relearning how to write."
C: Is there a song off the album that means the most to you? And if so, why?
JW: It's called "Are We Happy Now?" It's about the idea of always chasing after one big massive goal and kind of losing sight of the things around you - like not stopping to smells the flowers and missing out on life cause you're so focused on one big thing happening. It's about seeing things in perspective and not taking things for granted."
C: You're hitting the road for Warped Tour this summer, are you ready?
JW: "I've only done one, in 2011. It's a really crazy lineup this year too. But we're even more excited this time because we know what we're getting into."
