Bruno from AWOLNATION Talks Tour

Bruno from AWOLNATION Talks Tour, Free Music, and Next Album
Over two years since the release of Megalithic Symphony, AWOLNATION is still touring in support of their smash debut album. The band will be on the road throughout much of 2013 but also hopes to have their highly anticipated sophomore effort written by year’s end. Frontman, Aaron Bruno, talked with Alternative Addiction about the group’s recent success, their growing fanbase, and why the band has decided to release many of their songs for free.

While Megalithic Symphony <a href='http://www.alternativeaddiction.com/advertisements/adserver/adclick.php?n=a87972ba' target='_blank'><img src='http://www.alternativeaddiction.com/advertisements/adserver/adview.php?what=zone:37&n=a87972ba' border='0' alt=''></a>dropped in March 2011, AWOLNATION actually released the Back From Earth EP almost a full year earlier which of course included the platinum selling single, “Sail.” And even though we’re entering the second quarter of 2013, Bruno commented that there are still new listeners that are just now learning about AWOLNATION. As a result, the group has been able to continue touring behind the LP for more than two years. “People are really still discovering the band just now. Of course we have very loyal fans that have been with us since day one but it’s hard to stop this process when it keeps going so good and we feel so blessed. If there’s a demand for us to play, entertain people, and make their day a little bit better it’s hard to say no to that – so we’re going to continue to go. At a certain point I’m going to have to decide it’s time to chill and go away for a little while. I think it’d be silly not to do that given the name.”
Considering AWOLNATION has been on the road for such a long duration, the fact of the matter is the band has not only been performing many of the same songs, but they have also been played some cities multiple times. Well aware of the circumstances, Bruno explained how the band always makes an effort to change up their shows because they never know which fans they may see twice – and surprisingly, Bruno even remembers specific faces in the crowd. “Sometimes I’ll see a fan I recognize in the audience and say to myself, ‘oh no, we better be doing something better and new since the last time they saw us.’ So I’m always aware of that. We just played in Paris actually and one of our fans flew all the way there from the states. I tried to think back to the last time we saw her in the U.S. and I think I nailed when that was; but we made sure to do things a little bit differently. I care what everybody thinks – not just a group of people.”
Though Bruno and co. have yet to hit the studio to begin work on a follow up to Megalithic Symphony, the guys have released a series of remixes and b-sides in the meantime. And as many fans already know, much of this material was actually made available for free by the band. “If you want to find my album for free you can. I think to fight that is silly; it’s the world we live in and you really have to find a way to utilize that. We gave away our EP with ‘Sail’ on it for free in certain markets when it first came out just to get the word out there. You can’t be too precious about stuff. I can’t imagine how many people have our record and it’s unaccounted for…you can’t fight it so you might as well stand out and give people music for free. I’ll sell my album because it’s the thing I care about most but anytime we have a couple B-sides to remix, I think that should be listened to for free. It’s kind of free advertisement for people to get into the album.”
With all the attention AWOLNATION has received over the course of the past year or so, there is no question there will be a significant amount of pressure surrounding the band when they begin work on their next record. Regardless, Bruno plans to go about his business just as he did for Megalithic Symphony; but still, even the vocalist admitted that there will be a lot more eyes (and ears) on the group this time around once they head into the studio. “One of the wonderful freedoms that I had is that I truly didn’t care too much about what people thought about the album (Megalithic Symphony) because I didn’t think anyone was going to hear it to begin with. I just thought my buddies would hear it and hopefully think it was cool. I’d be pretty embarrassed if everyone thought it sucked but I was pretty sure nobody was going to think that. At the same time though, I didn’t expect it to have the commercial success it has. I really had nothing to lose so I said f*ck it, I’m going to make the record I’ve always wanted to make and I made it. I’m going to do the same thing for the second one; it’s just a little different because people are anticipating it…I just want it to be the best it can.”