In a smoky room behind the stage, personal chatter erupted from the room – along with light revealing the faces of Canton natives Lovedrug. The band played Monday night at Little Brother’s, giving its rendition of neo-emo alternative rock and sharing ideas of its passion behind the innovative music.
“We initially set out to write a bunch of songs we appreciate,” said Michael Shepard, lead singer and writer. “Music that we appreciate is very broad, and we wanted to create something that enveloped a wide scope of emotion so that anybody from any genre could appreciate it. That was our vision.”
The other band members – Victor Thomas, bass; Matthew Putnam, drums; and David Owen, guitar – sat quietly against the graffitti-esque backdrop of the Little Brother’s “green room,” allowing Shepard to talk about the vision behind the band.
“Our vision has been fully manifested in ‘Pretend You’re Alive’, and I think it’s going to mature more and more as we create more music.”
“Pretend You’re Alive” has an earthy, honest quality that accentuates a spiritual longing for truth. Many of the songs feature entities like “angels” and “demons” or “heaven” and “hell” that represent universal concepts of good and evil.
“These are themes that people can easily identify with,” Shepard said. ” I write them more in a fairy tale sort of way than biblical.It’s more of a personification or a lyrical expression.
The spiritual, etheral aspect of Lovedrug’s album, “Pretend You’re Alive” is a by-product of Shepard’s purist approach to writing music.
“Anytime you make something open enough, it becomes spiritual; that’s the case with Michael,” Putnam said.
This purist approach relies more on internal influences than external inspirations.
“The inspirations from our music are not specifically from other music, but we admire good writing,” Shepard said while explaining how he incorporates poetic literature into his writing. “We all listen to a lot of different types of music, but from a more purist standpoint.”
Shepard continued to share his view on why purism is so important to contemporary rock.
“At a time where music is so dependent on genres – the indie-emo thing – a lot of bands tend to sound the same. It’s important for the sake of originality- to bring about a change in music, to make something different from everyone else.”
Lovedrug’s ultra-emotional indie-rock ballad “Down Towards the Healing” is a clear manifestation of Shepard’s purist ideology. With a concentrated piano lead highlighted by Shepard’s boyish melodic vocals, the song closes with a heavy guitar uproar and upscaling passionate vocals, then everything resumes to the mellow piano-lead balladry.
“‘Down Towards the Healing’ is about stripping away all things in life- you have to hit rock bottom to become resurrected,” Shepard said. “Purification is an inherent theme throughout the record.”
