Sanctus Real’s new album Pieces of a Real Heart releases March 9^th and two of their crew found some time to talk about their new record and so much more.  Chris Rohman is the lead guitar player and Mark Graalman is their drummer. 

Nappy:  Pieces of a Real Heart, no disrespect to your past albums, but this lyrically my favorite album! What songs from the new album do you really enjoy playing live?

Mark:  I think we’re playing five songs live off the new album.  Probably at this point one of my favorites is still Forgiven, which was the first single off the record.  That’s the one we’ve been playing the longest and that’s probably why it’s my favorite.  It’s just a fun song to play live because there is so much unique instrumentation.  Pete plays the banjo on it live.  Dan actually plays like band bells, like from a high school marching band.  Being the drummer, rhythmically it’s something different for us; it’s fun to play every night.

Chris:  I agree with Mark.  It’s weird, with past records there have been songs that we play for the first time that just don’t feel good to play live.   Honestly, because of that there are some songs we just have not played live.  Some of these are my favorite songs.  Last record the closing track is Legacy.  It’s one of my favorite songs on the record and we never play it live, because every time we rehearse it, it just feels so awkward.  It’s shame because it’s great song.  But for the most part with this record, the songs have proven to be playable before we recorded them.  Overall instrumentation and groove were more priority to make sure they could make sense live.  Like Mark said, we’ve been playing five songs off the record and so far they all feel pretty good, which is a surprise to me; it’s not always that way.   My favorite so far, it’s not my absolute favorite, but we’ve been playing this song called ‘I Want To Get Lost’.  It feels like playing old school Sanctus Real but way more fun.  We’ve only played it three times lives but each time it feels like we’re playing “Say It Loud” but way cooler!

Nappy:  How do you think Pieces of Real Heart is different from past albums?

Chris:  You go ahead again Mark.  (laughing)

Mark:  (laughing)

Chris:  I like doing this on three way because I get to hear the answers too. I’m curious what Mark thinks too.

Mark:  Lyrically this record is a big step forward for us.  Matt always works super hard on the lyrics.  It’s his baby,  He makes sure that what he’s trying to say lyrically is coming across as clear as possible and is as much of an original language, if you will, that you can.  This time around, probably about half the songs, Matt actually teamed up with some other writers to do some co-writing and that was really a pleasure to see him dive into that.  He struggled with the idea at first for a while, but he gave it a shot.  He hooked up with a couple good guys who are known to write some really great songs.  Matt was able to take ideas that he had started but weren’t where he felt they should be to be on the record.  It was good for Matt because he was able to get in a room with these writers and just being to throw the ball back and forth with somebody who was good at that helped was just really good for him.  The songs came out really good. 

I think we’ve felt for the most part they’ve been solid albums, 90 percent of these are great.   But maybe after a couple of years you look back and think that songs could have been better and nit-pick at songs.   This time around we feel every song is really good.  Makes us feel proud because the song writing is a step ahead this time around.  Musically we just experimented quite a bit.   This sounds a little bit more mature than the last record, just overall a step further.   What do you think Chris?

Chris:  I totally agree.   We were talking on the back of the bus the other night.  We were on our way back from our video shoot for Forgiven.  Just talking about how we’ve never been those types of guys who self promote ourselves.  We don’t go around telling people ‘We have a new record out.’ or that ‘this last record got nominated for a Grammy!’  or whatever.  I don’t know why.  I went to some of these writing sessions with Matt where he had a good idea worked through them and they became great.  There’s more in the pot this time than a song that just came from us.  There is so much more influence and there was more time between sessions.  We had a lot of input on how the songs should go.  I’m deeply connected with the record, but at the same time it’s not just us.  So I feel I can go out and tell people this a great record.  I feel I could honestly go buy the record.   Before maybe that’s why I was never big into self-promoting ourselves because even though I believed in some of the songs and I thought they were good, maybe I just never felt they were good enough to go talk about.  But with this record I really do feel that way.  We were talking that night in the bus that we just have to start being those kinds of guys that believe in the message and what we do and in these lyrics and these songs and tell people about them.  If I heard Forgiven on the radio and it wasn’t us, I would go tell people, “I heard this song on the radio and it’s a great song.”  It’s kind of cool to be apart of that, five records in now.  We have a lot of faith in what these songs are going to do in people’s lives and we’re excited to share it.  So that’s definitely something different this time around I think. 

Nappy:  Can you believe it’s been five albums already?

Chris:  No, I can’t believe it at all.

Nappy:  The Winter Olympics are finishing up, what would it take to get “Rocking Out” to become an Olympic sport? 

Mark:  I would have to get in a lot better shape for that.

Chris:  Some of the sports they have on there are pretty random, I think it would be cool if they had it.

Nappy:  It could just be another judged event, right?

Chris:  I think you’re on to something man!

Mark:  I totally agree.   Think about it.  Rocking out is the biggest thing in the video game world with Guitar Hero and Rockband and we have TV shows were people get up on stage and sing there little hearts out.  Why not make it an Olympic event?  I think you are onto something for real!

Chris:  2012 summer Olympics man!

Nappy:  Summer sport then?

Chris:  I think summer; you have to be outside on the stage.   Like true rocking out.

Mark:  Yea!

Nappy:  Braving the elements outside, nice.

Chris VS Mark – Who would win?

Nappy:  In a Game of Connect four, best out of seven?

Chris:  Probably Mark.

Mark:  I don’t know, Chris is a pretty quick thinker. 

Chris:  There is an inside joke though.  The better question would be Mark or Mark’s son versus Chris?

Mark:  (Laughing)

Chris:  His son is half Korean and we always joke that Koreans are great at games,  (Laughing) little inside joke there.

Mark:  (Laughing).  It’s absolutely true though. 

Nappy:  So with Mark’s son, Mark wins.

Mark:  Ok, I’ll take it.  As long as my son is helping I’m good.

Nappy:  Next challenge, who would win in a game of Mini-Golf?

Mark:  Oh man, that's going to be a Chris one for sure.  Games like that, mini-golf, bowling, or ski-ball.  I have these left-handed issues.  Chris rocks at all that stuff.

Chris:  I might have to take that one too.  Mark is a coordinated a drummer, but not when it comes to extracurricular sports activities, although last year he did surprise us.  We were playing catch with a baseball.

Mark:  (laughing)

Chris:  He really came through because he switched it.  He threw right-handed but thought he was lefty.  But I would have him in mini-golf and bowling while we’re at it.

Nappy:  Who would win in a Seinfeld trivia challenge?

Mark:  I’ve watched some Seinfeld in my day.   I don’t know.

Chris: I’m not a Seinfeld guy unfortunately.  I think Dan would beat both us.

Mark:  That is true.   Dan would.

Chris:  Dan and Pete.  They would really argue that one out!

Mark:  That would be a great argument!

Nappy:  We’ll give that one to them.

Mark:  All right. 

Nappy:  Who would win in a cooking contest!

Chris:  ohhh

Mark:  Oh man.

Chris:  It would probably be terrible both ways. (Laughing).

Mark:  Is this microwaveable cooking by any chance? (Laughing).

Chris:  Maybe some macaroni and cheese, but that’s about it.

Mark:  If we got our wives to do it, that could be a bit of a challenge.

Chris:  Yeah.

Mark:  We’re better at standing there watching them cook.

Nappy:  We’ll consider that wash then.

Chris:  Perfect!

Nappy:  Final one, who would do better on a 6^th grade math test?

Chris:  Are we going for speed or accuracy?

Mark and Chris:  (laughing)

Mark:  I think I’ll have to concede again.  It’s a little embarrassing but I didn’t get too far in math in school.

Chris:  Sure, I’ll take it.  It’s not my strong suit but our road manager is really good with numbers so I’d leave it to him.

Nappy:  Any chance there is a hidden track on the new album?

Chris:  No unfortunately, but there is going to be an exclusive iTunes deluxe edition.  I think there will be five more acoustic tracks from the album.

Nappy:  I was hoping that there would be a cover of a Fresh Prince song?

Chris:  You need to A and R, man.  You should be the guy at the record label that tells bands “Hey you should this, you should do that.”  You have some good ideas.

Mark and Chris:  (laughing).

Nappy:  Anything else you would like our CMSpin readers to know?

Mark:  Catch Sanctus Real on tour in a city near you this spring, and summer and fall and probably for the rest of our lives.

Chris:  Just the usual.  New record.  It’s only the best record we’ve ever done.  So if they want to pick it cool, if not, whatever.

Be sure to check out more Sanctus Real at www.SanctusReal.com.  Their new album Pieces Of A Broken Heart comes out March 9^th.