BUCKCHERRY Frontman Says 'A Lot Of The Bands Sound The Same' On Active Rock Radio

Front Row Joe of That Just Happened conducted an interview with BUCKCHERRY frontman Josh Todd prior to the band's April 17 concert at Culture Room in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. You can watch the entire chat below. A few excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On teaming with guitarist Stevie D. on the songwriting for the band's latest studio album, "Warpaint":

Josh: "I'm heavily involved in the writing of BUCKCHERRY records, so nothing changed for me. Stevie and I got the opportunity to make a great record before this record. We did the JOSH TODD AND THE CONFLICT record, 'Year Of The Tiger' and that was a lot of fun, a real labor of love for us. Stevie and I have known each other since I was 19, way before he was in BUCKCHERRY. He's got so much talent and he didn't get the opportunities in the past because of the politics in the band, and this time he got to shine and it really shows. This is one of our best records, for sure. We're really having a good time playing these songs."

On why he feels "Warpaint" stacks up to 2005's commercially successful "15":

Josh: "It's just reminiscent of the '15' cycle. Before '15', we had lineup changes. It was a long time since the last record that we had put out since 'Time Bomb'. Whenever this band is kind of put in a situation where we got to make our best work, we always rise to the occasion. We did so on '15', and this is very similar, the writing process. We worked really hard on it. We started writing in November of 2017. We wrote about 30 songs for a 10-song record. It goes to show you how thorough we were. Just wanted it to be song-to-song, just something amazing. We're very proud of it."

On BUCKCHERRY being "sonically relevant":

Josh: "Active rock radio — it's got this formula, and I'm not necessarily fond of the formula. A lot of the bands sound the same. There's not a lot of dynamics. [Producer] Mike's [Plotnikoff] really good — we wanted to fit in that formula for radio and still carry the integrity of BUCKCHERRY and I think we did so on a few songs. We also made traditional BUCKCHERRY-type rock songs as well, but that was kind of the goal."

On including their cover of NINE INCH NAILS' "Head Like A Hole" on "Warpaint":

Josh: "The cover conversation comes up in every record cycle. It's always talked about. I think every band has to deal with it. I just wanted to come in with a song that I thought would be great with my voice and my vocal range, and also something I could own and kind of make my own. I really like the lyrics in the song. I love the 'Pretty Hate Machine' record. I like what Trent [Reznor] stands for. I think he's really stuck to his guns and created his own world his whole career, and that's really impressive to me. So, we were set up to record and I just said, 'Hey, let's try this song. It might be cool. Let's see how it goes.' We jammed out 'Head Like A Hole'. We didn't know Mike Plotnikoff was recording us. He told us to come in there. He threw up a rough mix and he cranked it up and it was, like, 'Bam!' It sounded like a BUCKCHERRY song. We were, like, 'We gotta play this for our team and see what they think because it's really special.' It just kept hanging around and finally made the cut."

On the fact that BUCKCHERRY's self-titled debut recently hit the 20-year mark:

Josh: "It's bizarre. I don't really think about it because I'm always thinking about the next step. That's what you do when you've been self-employed for 20 years. You're always thinking about, 'Okay, how can I make this better? What can I do? Where's the next song coming from?' Yeah, looking back, it's like… it's actually what I dreamed about when I started this thing. I wanted to be in one band for my whole career and make a catalog of music and really put my mark on the situation. I think we've done that. BUCKCHERRY's never been a mainstream rock band since we started. It's very hard to have longevity in rock music and we managed to do that, and really create a sound, a rock sound, that is very unique. When you hear a BUCKCHERRY song, you know it's BUCKCHERRY. I'm really proud of that."

"Warpaint" was released in March via Century Media/RED Music. The 12-song disc was produced Plotnikoff, whose previous collaboration with the band was the platinum-certified album "15".