to achieve, and their success
story is, in many ways, the stuff
music dreams are made of.
Adestria got its start serendipitously at a party when
singer Matt Anderson met up
with people who shared similar
musical tastes. Over drinks, the
initial talks began and a casual
jam session was arranged. But no
one had major expectations. “I
don’t think we had any idea we
were going to get as serious as
we have,” says rhythm guitarist
Brian Stump. But it happened,
and it happened fast. In 2010
the band recorded an EP, Oh the
Places You’ll Go, which generated
a ton of buzz almost immediately
upon its release and resulted in
Alternative Press magazine naming them the No. 5 unsigned
band. This led to a deal with
Artery Recordings in late 2011,
and they recently released their
full-length debut, Chapters.
Adestria’s brutal breakdowns
and virtuosic, effortless-sound-ing fretwork might give the
impression that these players
were child prodigies, but that’s
hardly the case. Keyboardist
Mikey Colasardo first picked
up his instrument upon joining the band, and it has taken
Adestria—whose members are
largely self-taught—quite some
time to develop their finesse.
“We all weren’t that great in the
beginning,” says Klein. “It took
a lot of hard work and practice
together to reach a point where
we were all at a mutual ability
that was good enough. Our older
music wasn’t nearly as technical.”
Stump echoes that: “The musicianship has come a long way
since we started, and it’s still getting better and better the more
and more we play.” Currently
on the road with the SoundRink
Tour, Klein and Stump discuss
their band’s evolving chemistry
and the art of keeping order in a
young six-piece band.
Chapters is like an epic odys-
sey—there are so many layers
and parts that come out of
nowhere. What’s your typical
writing process like?
Russell Klein: It always starts
off with some sort of riff for the
guitar, then we add drums, and
from there we add keyboards
and additional layers. We
modify it as we go, section by
section, and work on the parts
to make sure it’s not too long,
or we’ll move a part from one
place to another, or change a
note here or there. Lately, we’ve
been doing a lot of writing on
the computer.
Brian Stump: We’ll build a
foundation, then tweak from
there. Everyone’s opinion defi-
nitely comes into effect.
With so many people in the
band, do each of you have to
make a lot of compromises?
Stump: Yeah, it makes the writing process a little difficult at
times, but nothing good ever
comes easy. I don’t mind taking
the hard route.
How do you communicate the
riffs to each other—do you
write them out in tab or give
each other mp3s?
Klein: Brian and I just teach
each other how to play the
parts. Generally, we all write
together as a group. We prac-
ticed four days a week, so we
were all together during the
writing process.
Stump: I also tab-out riffs using
a program called Guitar Pro. It’s
an incredible app that I’ve got it
on my iPhone. When we’re on
tour, even if I don’t have my guitar handy, I can sit and bust out
a couple of riffs. I can do it over
and over, because god knows I’ve
got plenty of time on the road.
With two guitarists, a bassist,
and a keyboard player, it must
be easy to clutter things up,
sonically. How do you arrange
things so that everyone has
their own space?
Klein: There’s a lot to contribute,
and sometimes someone obvi-
ously has to take a backseat. Our
keyboard player holds a lot of
rhythm notes down and then
accentuates a lot of the lead notes.
For the most part, we haven’t run
into too many problems there,
because we have things designated
as “when we [the guitarists] do
stuff” and “when the other person
is taking the lead.”
Stump: Basically, Russell takes the
leads and we use our keys as less of
an in-your-face, techno, second-
ary lead instrument and more for
creating atmospheric textures.
