Dallas Green wants a vacation from Canadian hard rock icon status, but he won’t
get one anytime soon.
It’s part of the reason why the Alexisonfire guitarist cut second solo
album Bring Me Your Love under his Juno-winning moniker, City And Colour. And a
change is as good as a rest: After a year and a half of playing the crooning
Jekyll to co-front man George Petit’s screeching Hyde for their tour of the
post-hardcore outfit’s hit LP Crisis, Green is cleansing his palette with a more
gentle and romantic acoustic sound for the Feb. 12 release.
Even though Green is proud of the new work, noting, “It’s a broader
subject matter than stuff about girls who upset me,” the reluctant star is his
own worst critic, claiming he can’t bear to hear his own voice played back to
him.
“I hate listening to myself,” the St. Catherines, Ont., native said. “The
hardest thing for me to do is write songs, it tortures me. It’s part of the
reason I didn’t want to call City And Colour ‘Dallas Green.’ I look at Bruce
Springsteen and Bob Dylan putting out stuff and I thought, ‘Dallas Green’ and I
didn’t feel comfortable doing it. But as far as distancing myself, writing
acoustic folky stuff gives me a rest and makes me appreciate the heavy stuff
more.”
With his latest C&C project in the can, Green and his bandmates began
putting pen to paper a scant two weeks ago for Alexis’ upcoming fourth release.
But salivating fans will have to wait: Green predicts the album will drop in
early ‘09. The CASBY winners will abandon their damn-the-torpedoes in-studio
style, he says, opting for a slower, more considered approach.
“This is something we feel strongly about,” he explained. “We won’t just
get home from a tour and write a few songs and record them. I guess it depends:
After a month, we might have twenty songs, but we want to take our time with
this one.”
In the meantime, Green strives for some semblance of a normal life beyond
the bright lights of Canadian alt-rock — as normal as one could possibly get,
anyway, given the situation — living with MuchMusic VJ Leah Miller.
“I’m fantastic, and she’s fantastic,” he said of domestic life while
sweeping out his house. “We go to Home Depot and stuff. Things are good. We’re
happy.”
