One of our favorite new artists to arrive on our radar in the past year or so is the Christian Lopez Band and we were lucky enough to sit and talk with frontman and West Virginia-native Christian Lopez (and band member Chelsea McBee) for an exclusive interview from producer Dave Cobb’s Low Country Sound studio in Nashville. The band is in town tracking their debut full-length album (they released the band's EP Pilot earlier this year through their label Blaster Records).
RoughStock: How would you describe working with Dave Cobb?
Christian Lopez: Dave Cobb is probably one of the most one-of-a-kind producers, that I’ve ever heard of.
RoughStock: There’s quite a bit of analog equipment here…
Christian: Oh yeah, we track everything live. We do it like we were in the 60s or 70s. It makes the experience extremely pure and how recording is and how it always was…
RoughStock: Before the Apple MacBook and microphone days?
Christian: Exactly. He doesn’t do a lot of things that many producers do these days because his focus is on getting the songs to be the best they can be, with the best musicians possible. He said the other day, “People always say they love music live the most, so why not track it live?” So that’s what we did.
RoughStock: What have you learned from Dave Cobb?
Christian: The way recording should be. He’s a pretty hands on guy and has dissected everything to be the best it can be. Song structure and the way he approaches them and remold them and make them be the way they can be. He’s really good at that.
RoughStock: Are these new recordings going to be an addition to your debut EP release?
Christian: We’re actually tracking 10 new songs and we’ll pull two from the EP but the original plan was to do another seven or six songs to complete an EP but we decided to go this route instead, and I’m really happy about it.
RoughStock: How did you go about selecting the songs you’re recording for this new project?
I’ve had a lot of these songs done, especially when we did the EP but it wasn’t too much of a brainstorming thing for me. I had them ready and a lot of them I’ve played live and then others I’ve saved for this experience. IT was fairly simple and I have them set aside and it was a pretty natural feel for what I wanted to do with the new songs recorded with Dave.
RoughStock: How have fans been reacting to the material live?
There’s been a lot of growth recently and this band has been going for about three years but when we got with Blaster Records and Rock Ridge (the band’s management), we really felt like a fresh start and growth. I can tell how the fans have been relating to the songs…
RoughStock: Yeah, and then they change meaning for fans than for what maybe you originally wrote them as, like the song we premiered last week.
Yeah, and that song, “Man I Was Before,” It was eye opening and has taken off to levels that weren’t even seen with “Will I See You Again.” It’s been a very rewarding experience, being able to see peoples views of the entire record and I feel that a lot of these fans are hardcore music fans.
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You can buy Christian Lopez Band’s debut EP Pilot now through his website or iTunes. The band’s upcoming full-length debut album will be released by Blaster Records in 2015.
Ellen Watson
Great music from a great band. I feel Christian Lopez will go very far in the music world. He has a great future in the music world. Go Christian.