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SPOCK’S
BEARD
Feeling the Trim
By Liam Savage
If you had hypothetically said to fans of Spock’s Beard about
five years ago that the band could move on without main songwriter
Neal Morse, they probably would have laughed at you. The bulk of
the band’s creative output came from Morse since their inception,
and up to last year’s release of Snow. But after Neal found
God and jumped ship from the familiar progressive waters he’d
navigated for so many years, it was decision time for the band regarding
their future, a future that has been written on their new album
Feel Euphoria (Inside Out). Full of a punchier rock atmosphere without
alienating the prog-rock worshippers, it definitely has laid to
rest any thoughts of the band being any less memorable in their
second phase, now as a four-piece.
Taking over the helm for the vocals and a good portion of the writing
is original drummer Nick D’Virgilio. And while talking with
him from his home in sunny California, he’s confident about
the new avenue that the band has the opportunity to travel down.
So the obvious first question has to be if the group had any thoughts
about going in a totally new direction, or staying true to their
winning formula.
"Kind of a little bit of both. You know, we didn’t want
to piss everybody off with something completely new, but we wanted
to experiment a little bit and try to please most of the fans we
already had. So we wanted to make them happy and us happy at the
same time. [The album] didn’t really have any expectations.
We just kinda went for it and waited to see what came out on the
other side."
Looking at the overall current sound, it exhibits more of a musical
expressiveness from all members, especially keyboardist Ryo Okumoto
and guitarist Alan Morse. It must have been a different experience
to be able to write music that wasn’t so controlled, like in
the past with Neal Morse.
"There was a freeing aspect about that, at least for those
guys as far as the parts they were playing. I really didn’t
tell anyone exactly what to do, at least not like before. Neal was
very specific about a lot of stuff in the past, and Alan wanted
to be able to come up with a lot of his own parts."
So did you see this as a barrier in the past with Neal controlling
the writing aspect?
"Not really. We just kind of went with what was working at
the time. I mean I’m pretty sure Alan would’ve liked a
lot more freedom, but that’s because they’re brothers
and stuff, so that had something to do with it. It was different
for me being the drummer because I just got to play like myself
anyway, because it’s different playing drums as opposed to
a melodic instrument where you have specific lines in the music,
but I mean Neal was just very specific with the music and it wasn’t
a really big deal."
The recording process, also delegated on all past albums by Morse,
must have had a new feeling. Was it any more comfortable than before?
"We had to get used to it. But after the initial recording
it was fine. Everybody was into it, and I don’t think we all
knew what to expect, but once the sounds started coming out of the
speakers we had much more of an idea because we were more confident
with it. In the past, Neal would send us a boatload of material
and we’d all pick what we liked and then learned the songs
and went in and recorded them, knowing what we were going to do
from the first day on, at least with the songs. Like this time I
had ‘A Guy Named Sid’ written at the beginning, so we
went in and recorded that first, because it was done for the most
part, and some songs were half-finished and some weren’t, so
we just went for it. And then we took a break and came back a few
weeks later to do another round of sessions at the studio with a
few more songs written, and we also wrote some songs on the spot.
So in the latest case it was different."
In closing, I ask about the Genesis references that both fans and
critics have made regarding the recent changes. Since some people
don’t even know Peter Gabriel was a part of Genesis originally
and Phil Collins brought them to a new level, does Nick see the
same happening with the Beard?
"I can only hope. I mean, if we can get as successful as those
guys did then I don’t have to worry about paying my bills anymore,"
he says with a laugh. "A lot of people are worried that we’ll
start doing commercial pop tunes and start dancing on stage and
that kind of stuff, but we just have to keep making the music. I
mean, believe me, I want the band to become bigger, and I’m
trying really hard to make this a career instead of just a hobby,
and we can’t make a living off of it unless it gets a lot bigger
than it is now. But it’s close; it’s just a matter of
getting out there and playing and getting more fans on board. I’m
a rocker at heart, so turning completely pop or commercial probably
won’t ever happen for me."
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