This past Easter Sunday, InqPOP! was given the chance to join an intimate press conference with Switchfoot, a couple of hours before their show at the Bonifacio High Street Amphitheater.
Together with select members of the press, we were ushered inside the band’s backstage dressing room where Jon Foreman, Tim Foreman, Drew Shirley, Chad Butler, and Jerome Fontamillas candidly shared their thoughts on their career, music, and surfing.
Jon Foreman on what keeps them coming back to the Philippines:
The Pinoy culture is so warm and welcoming. You just hear a lot of laughter. It’s pretty beautiful. It’s incredibly warm and welcoming.
Jon Foreman on what has remained constant over Switchfoot’s 20-year career:
There are a couple of things I would count as constant. First of all, there’s so much changes. We’ve experienced so many changes. [Secondly] I think God’s grace has been consistent. The third thing is the friendship we have has remained constant. I think that’s probably the rarest thing, to actually — and thoroughly — enjoy and love the people you’re with for 20 years. When we first started out… I was still writing songs in my dorm room. We’re all married now. Now we have kids and family.
Drew Shirley on what it’s like having kids:
My daughter was really into Tchaikovsky for a while so she’s been listening to The Nutcracker, like not just Christmas, but all year round. I try to have them listen to The Beatles and Led Zeppelin and stuff like that, but Taylor Swift, you know, she’s just so pervasive — she’ll find her way in.
Jon Foreman on their latest album Where The Light Shines Through:
I think this is a unique album in several respects. For me, when you’re making an album as opposed to just writing a song, you’re trying to find these themes that galvanize the entire collection or group of songs together. We were listening to different songs and I think the most difficult thing about it was finding a theme. And then the theme of hope kind of emerging [sic]. Something like hope deserves an anthem. That became the phrase that was like, okay, that’s the theme of this record. Every album [is] a little different, but I think hope has been a consistent theme for us.
Jon Foreman on the band’s love of surfing:
Surfing is great. It is this incredible [thing where] you’re riding waves. Music is… you’re creating sound waves. You’re interacting with sound waves in a different way. With surfing you’re actually riding waves, you know. It’s just a different form of the same expression. There’s a rhythm to it. There’s a harmony to it. There’s dissonance.
And I feel like any chance you get to experience your own mortality, to feel vulnerable in a postmodern society, is a great thing. To know that you will one day die, and to be in the hands of this ocean, that feels like… wow this is bigger than I am. I think that’s a beautiful thing. If that doesn’t inspire a song, I don’t know what will.
Jon Foreman on the role surfing plays in his songwriting:
The great thing about surfing is that you’re out in this environment thats completely unlike what you’re doing every day. I think any time your brain gets disconnected from what it’s doing every day, you’re forced to figure the world differently. So sometimes you’re out in the water and a song just comes to you. Sometimes it’s a ridiculous song. You know, Girls Just Want To Have Fun or something. Two hours later, you’re like, “Why am I still singing Girls Just Want To Have Fun?” Other times, it feels like a melody that comes to you from somewhere else. I feel like the best songs are the ones that don’t necessarily have our finger prints on it that you connected with.
Drew Shirley on listening to other artists’ music:
I listened to the new John Mayer album on the airplane several times on the way here. I really like it. I’m a guitar player, so obviously he’s one of the best. He has great tones. I wasn’t alive during the era of Led Zeppelin or Eric Clapton’s peak years. I listen to a lot of few things with my kids and I’m getting to the point where my kids are helping me discover new music which is really fun. More pop music. I have four girls so these songs, they have to be upbeat with a cute guy singing it, like Justin Bieber or other guys like that.
Jon Foreman on Switchfoot being the band they want to be:
I think we decide that every album. I mean, you look back at 10 albums and hopefully not make the same record every time. We’re changing. Everybody changes. There’s been a few moments throughout our career that feel more like were taking an inward look at who we are and where we’re at as a band. We cut ties with the major record companies. We built our own studio in San Diego and we kind of took a long break to decide what kind of band we want to be. And we emerged from that season with this renewed sense of purpose, realizing we wanted to be a band that sings songs of hope. It’s almost like a rebirth for us. Rediscovering what we love about each other.
Tim Foreman on the band doing things their way:
There are a few moments that galvanizes who you are around something, and you’re face to face with an issue. The biggest decision you can face is to say no to something. Those are the times where you go, “No, we’re gonna do this.” It’s so easy to say yes and move on with the tide, go downstream, you know? But I think it’s harder to be, “No, we’re gonna be this kind of band. No, we’re gonna do it this way.”
I think as much as we love Led Zeppelin or John Mayer, there is no band we look up to where we go, “Oh, we wanna be that.” Defining Switchfoot… it’s this internal thing. It’s where it’s just like, “Who are we today? Who are we gonna be with this new record?” That’s a beautiful thing. We’re still learning what it means to be Switchfoot. Each album, we’re continuing to learn and grow into who we’re supposed to be.
Jon Foreman on covering God Only Knows by The Beach Boys:
Obviously it’s a beautiful song. I’m driven by: “Oh, that’s a great song, let’s play it.” I remember, my friend gave me Pet Sounds when I was in high school. I was like, “My gosh, this is incredible.” I think The Beach Boys is one of those things that everyone knows as “California.” Fender guitars and The Beach Boys, you know?
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Switchfoot Live At Walkway 2017 was brought to you by Church Simplified. For the past nine years, Church Simplified has been reinventing the traditional Stations of the Cross with an interactive and creative exhibit through Walkway: Reflections of the Cross, a modern re-telling of the Passion of Christ, told through art installations that brings a fresh lens to Jesus’s death and resurrection.