In the Studio (And Begging for a Paul McCartney Cameo) With Taking Back Sunday

Rock Daily recently visited the Manhattan recording studio where Taking Back Sunday are finishing up their fourth LP — the Long Island group's first with new guitarist Matt Fazzi. Though they're known for their emo-leaning lyrics and sound (see their last huge single, "MakeDamnSure" from 2006's Louder Now), Fazzi and lead singer Adam Lazzara say TBS are consciously pushing out of its comfort zone for this record by doing things like incorporating bassist Matt Rubano's vocals for the first time.

"I think a lot of people who hear the record will recognize the songwriting has grown a lot, but we haven't lost any of that fire that a Taking Back Sunday fan loves about the band," Lazzara explains. He credits Fazzi's addition (the band's fourth lineup change) with creating an excitement the band hasn't felt since their first record, inspiring the upcoming album to be called New Again.

Click above to watch Fazzi and Lazzara talk about recording the album (which is slated for release early next year) as well as their attempts to secure a Paul McCartney cameo and their possible future career on crazy kids' show Yo Gabba Gabba.

• 
  MUSIC Exclusive Live Chat With Linkin Park and Incubus
• 
  MOVIES & TV Peter Travers: 'The Avengers' Has it All
• 
  POLITICS Matt Taibbi: Jon Corzine Is the Original Zimmerman
• 
  VIDEOS Exclusive Premiere: Tenacious D's 'Tinnitus'

Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

More Song Stories entries »

Twitter