Jason Darr -- vocals, guitar & programming Paule Sperman -- bass Jerrod Maxwell-Lyster -- guitar and backup vocals Rob Shawcross -- drums
Blatantly, brutally honest, Out Of Your Mouth frontman Jason Darr is a rarity in the see-no-evil, speak-no-evil Canadian music scene. As vehement and unapologetic as their creator, the songs on the Calgary band’s Vikrecordings/BMG Canada Inc. May 18th debut, Draghdad are an intense build of hard rock, industrial reinforcement, stand-out lyrics, and big, catchy, killer choruses.
From the heavy crunch of the lead track, “Thanks For Nothing,” through to the self-explanatory “Wank,” the stalker situation of “Stray,” and self abusive snobbery of the melodic “Beautiful When You’re Mad,” Out Of Your Mouth offers a no-words-barred cathartic attack for the band and all who listen. “I want to reach people the way music reached me when I was young,” says the singer. “I want people to be able to identify with this – whether it’s love it, hate it, smile, frown. I want people to feel it.”
OOYM is good old fashioned aggressive, in-your-face music that doesn’t neglect knock-out hooks. Simple yet irresistible “Bla Bla Bla” and “Kaboom” are a perfect kick-off to the “twisted freak show” that follows. We warmed your ears up with “Thanks For Nothing” at radio. Now we’re walloping your senses by a torrential downpour of adds at radio for the official first single, a fiercely frolicking cover of Madonna’s “Music” and an in-your-face heavy add at MuchMusic right out of the gate. The dark, yeah sometimes disturbing video, shot by TWO THREE FIVE FILMS’ harv (Something Corporate, Closure, Live), is but the tip of the iceberg with what Out Of Your Mouth has in store for this country.
The story of Out Of Your Mouth is filled with twists and turns, potholes and landmines, producers and record companies and oh… did we mention a few name changes. It began with the Flu, a Calgary band that garnered attention from U.S. and Canadian record labels. Winning a local songwriting competition at C-JAY92 with “Beautiful When You’re Mad” from its second independent album, Peculiar, Flu was awarded a showcase spot at Toronto’s Canadian Music Week 2001.
A showcase in a Toronto club proved the band had its chops. Business cards flew at them in droves, drinks flowed like a kid’s nose at a skating rink. A&R execs from south of the border and Canada salivated at the chance they saw before them. Not soon after, a showcase in New York landed major label demo deal in their laps and studio time with David Ogilvie (Skinny Puppy, NIN). Like a page out of the ‘rock n roll’ textbook, a full recording never resulted and the band was at the market shopping again.
Never timid, Zomba Canada felt something in the bones of the music they’d heard, flew to Calgary and signed the band in 2002. Enter producer Gavin Brown (Three Days Grace, Billy Talent, Thornley), and there was light. Headstrong and self-contained (he plays nearly every instrument), lead singer Jason is keen enough to succeed to listen to words of wisdom. “Gavin musically produced the shit out of this band,” Jason says. “I had no idea that we could improve that much musically. I was that fat-headed and arrogant. I thought we were great. I thought, what the f#@k do we need a producer for?”
A slight issue with trademarking the name Flu sent the band back to the chalkboard and another round of ‘Name That Band’. Lists and lists later, Jason settled on Triple Six just to get going on the album. Confused yet? Add to it a line-up change, replacing all but one other member of the band. With Paule and Jason remaining from the zygote known as Flu, Triple Six entered the studio with Jason on vocals, guitar, programming and bass; Paule on drums and Jerrod Maxwell-Lyster on guitar and vocals
And into the studio they went. All the songs were written, but with Gavin’s help they became less sound-based and complicated, and more song and vocal-hook based. In fact, “Beautiful When You’re Mad,” “Ugly” and “Bug” were on Peculiar, but in pre-production for Draghdad evolved into brand new renderings. “We took the best part of each song and wrote new songs,” Jason says.
With everything on track, the band completed their debut, Draghdad, adding at the last minute, a ballad called , “The Dream”, that Jason had written and recorded on his own in the basement as a tribute to his mother who had died in Feb 2000. He also added some expletive-heavy original phone messages, as a “bonus,” and humorous closing to a heavy album.
Just two more changes – The band hated the name Triple Six. They really did. So before the album was mastered, and after Zomba joined the BMG team (and the band became a BMG signing), Triple Six stuck it’s head in the oven and lit the match. After tortuous rounds of once again ‘Name That Band’… one of the members cracked, screaming out “I can’t believe that came out of your mouth.” And Out Of Your Mouth was born and christened.
