A Conversation with O.A.R.’s Marc Roberge – HuffPost 8.15.11

Mike Ragogna: Hello, Marc.

Marc Roberge: How’re you doing, man?

MR: Pretty well. Your new album, King, is doing pretty well.

Marc R: Doing well so far, yeah. You know, it just came out. It’s a labor of love, so when you finally release it and put it out there to the world, it’s a whole bundle of nerves and all that stuff. But now we got over that hump and it’s just time to enjoy it.

MR: Good for you. I wanted to ask you about the song “King,” which features DJ Logic as well as Russell Simmons. How did this collaboration come together?

Marc R: Well, “King” was the first track I started writing for this album, and it was intended to be an intro, it was intended to be an announcement. I don’t know if you noticed, but it’s not a very standard song or anything. It’s just a continuation of a thought, and really was just intended to announce that we’re returning with a new album. Well, as I went along with it, I noticed that it was missing something. I wanted to have samples of the word “king,” so I called up Logic and just said, “Hey, man, collect a couple of records, come down to the studio and let’s work on this thing,” so then it became a little bit longer. Then I said to myself, “I really need an inspirational speaker on it, to kind of discuss what I’m thinking–discuss what this album’s about,” and sure enough, this speech Russell Simmons had made a while back fit perfectly. We sent over there through a mutual friend, an example of him in the song, and he loved it. So, we went back in and tightened it up and made it real nice. To have the support of a guy like that–with insight like that–and to put it on a record was amazing. You know, most people hear it and they think it’s just a random thing, but this is all intended to send a message about coming back from somewhere that you’d rather not go again. You’ve got to announce that stuff. I think that’s what Russell was talking about, making a change in your world, and that’s what we were talking about, so it all made sense. No one has asked me about “King” yet, so I’m really excited to open with it today.

MR: And it transits right in to “Taking On The World Today.” Let’s talk about that song.

Marc R: The attitude was that this is a song that’s basically not supposed to be precious. It’s an exciting song, it’s one of those moments when you really feel like you can do anything, and you really feel like you woke up on the right side of the bed and the world is yours for the taking. So, when we recorded the vocals for it, we just kind of went with it and said, “You know, let’s not take it too heavy in the booth. Why don’t we just throw some verses down off the top of our heads.” That was the whole attitude behind that song. I think it comes off like that, I think you can hear a little of that. You know, those giggles and stuff like that in the track? That’s all just ’cause something made me laugh and we just kept it in there. (laughs) So, that’s the whole spirit of that song.

MR: You have a few interludes weaving in and out between songs. Did you plan it like that or did it kind of develop as you worked in the studio?

Marc R: No, we went in making this record with the intention of having interludes and with the intention of having an intro, which was to be “King.” I wanted it all to make sense, because I felt as if, you know, it was time we went back to the way we used to make records–where they had a beginning, a middle, and an end. That was something we were really interested in for this project. Anyway, when we went into it, we thought, “Sure, we’ll do these interludes and we’ll have this whole idea, and it’ll be done in three months.” Fast-forward to a year and a half later, all the work that went into it…in our opinion, it really paid off. The specific interludes weren’t intentional, we had about ten different options, but decided on those three because they set the mood of that portion of the album.

MR: Yeah, the pacing was really well done.

Marc R: I really appreciate that, because it’s a difficult thing to do. In your head, you have a vision of what you want. As a fan of music, I just like to throw a record on and hear it from beginning to end. But that’s easier said than done, you know? Everyone has their own taste. Some people don’t want to hear that stuff, but we really felt like–because I sang a lot on the album–it was really important to have instrumental parts that didn’t have vocal or too many vocals, just to kind of take a break from that. They’re meant to interlude from track to track. They’re meant to take you somewhere else. It was a really fun experience.

MR: Let’s get to the single, “Heaven.”

Marc R: “Heaven” began a while ago–I’d say in September or October of 2010. I was in Santa Monica, and my brother-in-law pulled me into his car and he said, “Check out this beat. I think you could do something with this one day.” So, I sat in the car, we listened to it, and I sang over it–it was cool. He titled it “New O.A.R.,” just as a gag, because he thought it was funny. So, then we went back to the East Coast and continued to finish the record, and we were really at the tail end. We said, “We need another song that ties in the theme of this album. We have all these stories that are just touching on an idea, but no real statement has been made.” We wanted to make that statement. I was dialing through my little demos everywhere, and that one popped up–the beat, and me singing over it. I said, “You know what, there’s something here.” We spent the next couple weeks, as a crew, working on this song and it came together very quickly.

The intention of it comes from me seeing someone real close to me close to not making it. And when you look at someone that perfect, and the idea that they might not get into that “heaven,” then it really just became not important to me to worry about tomorrow. I understood that we do have these days to live, and I’m not going to worry about getting into the fancy club–I’m just gonna be me. If that’s not good enough, fine. So, I kind of learned that while sitting next to someone who was dealing with a very tough time. I wanted to spin it in a positive way, and say “We have the opportunity to build our own heaven right here, and it’s not a religious thing at all,” it’s merely appreciating our surroundings a little bit more, and doing more with that. So then, making that that statement tied in the album and it tied in a lot of that self worth and pride that we should all take when we’re in hard times. It made sense to me at the time–and with the beat, it all just came together. So, it does sound a little bit different, but it’s intentions where just that. I wanted it to be a little different. I wanted it to stand out.

MR: My favorite line is, “I don’t wanna go to heaven if I can’t get in.”

Marc R: Yeah, you know, it’s like when you get to the gate of this club somewhere and they’re like, “Man, your jeans are not expensive,” and it’s like, “Well, you know, if I’m not good enough, then I don’t want to come into this place.” It’s a metaphor for life in general. I just feel like, if you’re living up to your own standards–and they’re high–you don’t need to live up to somebody else’s.

MR: Beautifully said. Now, O.A.R. has had hits, especially with “Shattered,” but King is the #3 digital album on Billboard, and it also charted at #12 on Billboard‘s album chart. Marc, what do you think of that?

Marc R: Well, first of all, when you come up in this business, you’re watching charts every once in a while. And when you see a band you like that’s not necessarily a part of popular culture break onto those charts, it’s exciting as a fan because you feel like you’ve invested a lot of your time and your intention in this band and you’ve won something along with them. That’s kind of where we come from–we consider ourselves an underdog in a lot of situations. Some people might not think that, and that’s fine, but we know what it took to come up, and how much work went into this. So, when we see things like that, it has nothing to do with the other artists. It has nothing to do with being ranked or anything like that. It’s more of recognition of the time and the hard work we put into this, because these days, nobody’s knocking down your door to spend tons of money on promoting your album. You have to find people who believe in you. And that’s what’s going on–nobody wants to spend money unless they believe in it. I think that it’s just a testament that we’ve worked hard and the people around us have been willing to work hard. That’s the kind of message we’re trying to send to people with our music, that you can accomplish things, but nothing’s going to be given to you. You’ve got to work for it, and that’s life. When we see something like that, it’s not about being ranked. It’s really about feeling like you are going in the right direction, and it’s an honor as well just to exist in this business, you know?

MR: O.A.R. has existed quite a while and you have quite a few albums and singles. “Shattered (Turn The Car Around)” from the album All Sides was a hit here in the U.S. Isn’t it tempting to use that success to back a social cause or something you believe in?

Marc R: Well, all along, our main message has been not to lead by example but to just be who we are. If people can connect themselves to how we approach this business and just life in general–that it’s something you have to work at and that it’s okay to mess it up and it’s okay to fall as long as you keep getting up–that’s great. So, when you have a hit song or something, it just provides you with more of a platform or a bigger stage to continue to live that life or continue to be able to play music the way you’d always dreamed you could. A lot of people misconstrue that or they’ll look at that and say, “Hey, you had a hit song, so now you’re going for a different avenue or you’re changing.” But in my opinion, I feel like this whole thing. Music and everything you do is all about evolving and changing. When you have something like that succeed, it only opens up another couple years of opportunity to find where the next change or the next door is. You know, “This road’s really fun to stay on, but I wanna take a right up there.” So, with the song “Shattered”–God, it was so great to experience something like that, because it just enabled us to continue to play songs and to continue to have our songs out there. Did it inspire me to speak up? No, it just inspired me to continue doing what I was doing and get better at it. That’s what a hit song is to me–it’s an opportunity for you to get a little more time or a little more space. It buys you a lot of those opportunities to continue to work, where as when you don’t get those things, you really are always shooting for that as a musician, to have more people hear your stuff, and that’s just a great way to do it.

MR: So, that being said, what advice do you have for new artists?

Marc R: You know, when I’m asked that question–again, I’m probably repeating myself and beating a dead horse–I do give them that cliché answer, “Well, be willing to play anywhere and work hard and believe in yourself.” You know, these are cliché’s for a reason, because they’re true. (laughs) That’s the advice I give. Regardless of people coming at you and wanting you to be what they want you to be, the most important thing that will set you apart from everybody else is just to do it your way. But don’t be afraid of the hard way. Don’t take the easy way out. Easy routes are very few and far between these days, but every band will get to that point where they either compromise or they don’t, and whatever your version of not compromising is–even if that means picking apart what part of this business you can do what in–it’s only elongating your career.

I’m always telling these young guys, “Yeah, be willing to play anywhere.” I’ve played in churches, synagogues, houses, apartments, people’s living rooms–I don’t care, because it’s just an opportunity to get yourself to more people. It’s all relative…if you’re doing really well in the local scene and continue to do really well in the local scene, then make that your world. And your world will change–it will get a little broader and a little broader. That’s what it is–it’s just working hard. It’s a really easy answer, but it’s so much easier said than done.

MR: You’ve had songs in a couple of movies here and there, and one of them was “Love Is Worth The Fall,” which was in Twilight.

Marc R: Yeah, how this went down was I remember I was on tour with Ozomotli and I got a phone call that said, “Could you come out to Los Angeles and sit and watch some of this movie?” It didn’t have music really yet, and it hadn’t been treated. There were a lot of scenes filmed, but there were green screens and you could see all the stuff. They said, “Let’s see what you think and maybe write some songs, because this guy has written a score and we want a song inspired by it.” This was a first thing for me, the first time that I’d been asked to do that, and it was a really amazing experience. I, up to that point, had only written songs based on video at home just for fun. So, to have a project to really write this before it was huge…I mean, the books were huge, but the movie hadn’t come out yet.

What I had to do was just write to a visual, and it was really just an amazing experience. I got to sit there with the director and talk about it, and I did some demos. I don’t think they used it in the spot that they had intended to, it ended up being an extra and all this stuff. But it was so awesome just to be involved in something that eventually became so large. I think that there’s a reason certain things reach that multitude of people, because it’s a really good story. It’s an age-old story, and it sticks around because it’s good. So, writing a song to it felt like something that came very easily, but we never knew that it would be a huge thing. I had no idea. I didn’t know any of the actors when I looked at the stuff, I didn’t know anyone, and here we are now saying, “Wow, that was pretty crazy to have been involved.”

MR: And let’s not forget your contribution to the Kyle XY soundtrack–the song “Wonderful Day.”

Marc R: (laughs) That was one I’d never seen or heard of or anything, and they said the song fit really great, so I checked it out. I think they used some other songs as well in different scenes. I watch, like, the same three shows on TV over and over again, so whenever I see our stuff in a scene, it just makes me feel like a kid. I gotta be honest, you can’t take it so seriously, you can’t be so damn precious about this whole thing and think that you’re the greatest thing since sliced bread and that your music can’t exist in someone else’s picture. I love it–I love seeing what other people envision our songs accompanying. I just think it’s super cool, in every show and at every level of movie or TV, you gotta take some sort of honor out of that, you know?

MR: Oh, yeah. By the way, Kyle XY was a great series, so of course, ABC Family canceled it and didn’t even give it an ending. Real classy, ABC, way to go caring about fans who watched your station and your product-placed Sour Patch ads for three years. Hate that. (laughs) Anyway, are you guys going on tour to support this album?

Marc R: Yeah, we’re on tour right now. We’ve been out since we did some Dave Matthews Band Caravan dates in Atlantic City in June. Now we’re coming up here on the last week of touring, and then we’ll end the month with the Dave Matthews Caravan up in New York. Then, we’ll go out in the fall and do it in Texas and Florida and all over the place. We just keep on rolling, man. Like I said, I get up everyday and I’m just thinking, “Damn, it’s pretty cool to just do what you like to do.” Each album buys you that opportunity a little further.

MR: Well, thank you very much for your time today, Marc.

Marc R: Oh, man, it’s my pleasure. If you can deal with the ramblings of a crazy person, that’s great.

MR: (laughs) Actually, there were no ramblings by a pretty sane and good guy. All the best on the road and with the new album, Marc.

Marc R: Alright, man. Thanks so much and have a great day.

Transcribed by Claire Wellin