By: Darci Michon
CHICAGO— On April 19th, Long Beach-based band Chase Petra stopped in Chicago at the Cobra Lounge as a part of their first full headline tour. The three-piece band, consisting of Hunter Allen (vox and guitar), Brooke Dickson (bass), and Evan Schaid (drums), released their sophomore album “Lullabies for Dogs” this past March. A few weeks before their Chicago show, I had the absolute privilege to speak with Allen and chat about everything from the making of their new album, self-care, Shakespeare, and more.
Darci: You just released your new album “Lullabies for Dogs” and are about to set off on a headlining tour in support of the album, how are you feeling?
Hunter Allen: I am so excited. This is our first full headline tour, so it’s kind of a big deal, and we also haven’t toured in over a year. So, I’m also terrified, but overall I’m just really excited to get out and see all of the people we haven’t seen in like a year, and meet new people. I think also politically, economically it’s a really dark time in the country, so to be able to travel around the U.S., including parts of the U.S. like the midwest and the south that maybe are more entrenched in a scarier vibe, I am very much looking forward to hitting those pockets of queer people and people like us that believe in human equality, human rights and all of those types of things. I’m really excited to connect with people all across the country, and find some source of like connection and light in all of this.
D: Throughout your career as a band, your discography has always covered heavy themes. While it can be a good release, it can also be very mentally and emotionally taxing. How do you take care of yourself when writing about these subjects?
HA: First of all, I take Zoloft, or rather the generic sertraline and that’s a life saver. I go to therapy when I need to talk to a therapist, but I also think writing these songs is, not to reference our own album, but it is cathartic. Having a space to talk about these themes and discuss it with others…as much as it’s a difficult conversation to have, it’s important to talk about it because if we don’t, it festers inside of us. I think I would rather have these difficult conversations and express these difficult emotions, then let them rot me from the inside out.
D: How was the process of writing this album, and how was it different from your previous releases?
HA: Yes and no. The first album we did was very DIY (do-it-yourself). We didn’t know what we were doing. The EP we did, “4 o’clock in the afternoon,” was like, we flew to Philadelphia…best city ever, but we only had a week to record it. So, it was a very different experience, where we were in a professional studio and we had limited time. It (“Lullabies for Dogs”) was DIY in the sense that we recorded it all in our studio at home, but we just knew what we were doing, so it was kind of a mix of our first two experiences. We had this time to experiment; there was no deadline. We were doing it ourselves, but we had more of a direction, more know-how, and just a better sense of what we were doing.
D: Would you say that the process was empowering, almost like a full-circle moment?
HA: We came from DIY and we will always be DIY in part. Even though we have this incredible team that we work with now, being able to have this much control, but feeling more professional, we can make a final product that feels more polished…This is what we were riding for when we were kids, and now we get to do this in our adult lives.
D: What was your favorite song to write/record off the album?
HA: I think I had a really nice time writing and recording “Icarus.” It’s super short, but, in part I think it was because I didn’t make the song any longer, I didn’t add extra parts, I just wrote the song in one sitting and it felt like “okay that’s just it.” Then recording it was really nice because it was just such a simple thing. It was so easy and natural. I loved writing and recording all of the songs, but some of the songs you are wrestling with, and by the time you are done with it you are like “hell yeah we did it,” but Icarus was like the kindest to me.
D: What would you say inspired you the most when writing “Lullabies for Dogs”?
HA: A common theme throughout a lot of the album is literature. I was inspired by this line from Shakespeare and this book called…”Masters of Death.” I just feel very inspired by narrative, and by reading books. The only other thing would be the people in my life. I’m very much inspired by the experiences that I have with other people, so those were definitely the two main sources of inspiration.
D: The music video for “Have Faith, Horatio” was inspired by “Hamlet,” and you previously said that you are inspired by literature. Are you a big Shakespeare girl? Why Hamlet?
HA: Honestly, I am not a big Shakespeare girl. I know there are people much more into the history of Shakespeare and the conspiracy theories, and all the plays. I appreciate Shakespeare as much as the next guy that’s into literature…but it was “there are more things in heaven and in earth than you could dream of in your philosophy,” and I don’t remember where I read it or where I saw it but I was just locked in with that phrase. Sometimes that’s all it takes, just a line. Then of course…there’s so much to pull from in Shakespeare. Getting to know Hamlet and kind of digging deeper into that because I was inspired by that line was a really simple choice. Also, are you familiar with the film “10 Things I Hate About You”?
D: One of my favorites!
HA: One of the best films ever. It’s a retelling of “The Taming of the Shrew.” So, I’m not a Shakespeare guy. I don’t want to claim that because I don’t know enough about Shakespeare, but I have continuously been inspired by his work.
D: What music were you listening to throughout the process of writing the album?
HA: Some of these songs are super old, some of them are super new, some of them are like took months to write, so I was listening to a ton throughout the creation of this album. For example, in “Centrifugal Force,” one of the lines is, “I only listen to songs that pull my hair and degrade me.” I wrote that line when I was listening to Lizzy Mcalpine’s “Five Seconds Flat.” I was listening to that a ton and just being like “Why can’t you write like her? Ahhhhhhhhhh!!’ Which is not a fair question, but I was feeling feelings at that time.
D: How old would you say the oldest song on the album is?
HA: The oldest song is definitely the verses of “Catharsis”…That was a song that Evan and I were in a band in high school, and that song was written and recorded with a different chorus when we were 16 or 17 years old.
D: Why did you decide to name the album “Lullabies for Dogs?”
HA: It was one of those things where the phrase just kind of popped into my head. So, we had been writing a lot of our songs in ¾ which just feels like a lullaby kind of time signature to me, even though a lot of the songs are not sleepy songs, and then I just love dogs. I have a tattoo on my ankle, it’s like one of the first tattoos I got. It’s a gravestone that says “There better be dogs,” which is so lame, but I love dogs. The loyalty of dogs, I feel like a dog, I don’t know, I just have a respect for them, and I feel like one.
D: Who’s dog is on the cover?
HA: That’s Henry. I love Henry. Henry is my dad’s pitbull. I lived with Henry, technically he’s my dog too, but I don’t live with him anymore. He is the best boy in the whole world. He likes when people bite his cheeks, just a fun fact about him. He’s like 80 pounds of just pure muscle and we love him so much.
D: What tracks are you most excited to play on this tour?
HA: Honestly, we haven’t dropped the setlist yet…but we are playing “In an Emergency Such as the End of the World,” which was one of my favorite songs to play back in the day. I would say one of the newer songs, but honestly, those are the songs that I am most likely to make a mistake on because we haven’t played them as much. So, I’m more excited I think for the old ones. Once I get used to the new ones I’ll be pumped.
D: As a long time fan, I have always been curious, why did you name the band Chase Petra?
HA: It’s another book reference. It’s “Ender’s Game” by Orson Scott Card. Orson Scott Card has views that are, ew, but “Ender’s Game” is a sci-fi and it was one of my favorite books when I was a kid…There’s this character named Petra in the book, who is like the only girl character in this band of boys fighting in this war against aliens. It’s a whole thing, but basically, I just really loved that book. We were sitting in a drive through, and somebody that I was with was like, Petra sounds too much like Paramore, and I was like “that is stupid” but fine, and we were sitting next to a Chase bank, and I was like “alright” Chase Petra.
D: The band has a very all-encompassing sound that is very hard to put your finger on. What would you say are your biggest influences?
HA: The thing is, it is hard to place us in a genre, in a festival, in a tour package…I think it’s because Evan, Brooke, and I, we write the music, and…our tastes overlap here and there, but we all have very distinct and different main sources of inspiration. My inspiration source is pop-punk, Brooke’s main source is more post-punk, Evan’s main source is kind of like folk singer-songwriter. So, I think it’s the fact that one of Evan’s favorite bands is Wilco, one of Brooke’s favorite bands is Warpaint, and one of my favorite bands is Enter Shikari. Very different vibes, and I think when we come together, by the nature of us pushing, and pulling, and working on new music together, it kind of becomes this like strange amalgamation of those general vibes…We have been playing together for so long that it like we do just kind of know how to work with each other and how to play around each other and that’s just something that comes with time.
D: How long have you guys been playing together?
HA: Well Evan and I started playing together when we were 14, so we’ve been playing together for almost 14 years. Brooke, I met her when I was 20, so we’ve been playing together for almost 8 years, and it just adds up, when you spend that much time together you just begin to click.
D: You have a very distinct pop-punk style of singing, and I have always wondered, have you trained your voice to sound that way or is it naturally in the style?
HA: It’s not something that I did on purpose at all. It’s just, when you spend enough time listening to something, you just do that thing, and like, I learned how to harmonize through Panic! at the Disco’s, “A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out.” I used to spend hours in my room everyday shining through every Paramore album with my karaoke mic pretending I was onstage, and when you listen to those things so much you just kind of start to mouth your words like them. So it was not a choice. It’s almost as if I developed an accent because of the things I listened to.
D: What is your favorite thing about being in a band in this day and age?
HA: The thing about being a professional musician is that it’s great, but it’s also so hard. I started experiencing a chronic illness last year…Before I got sick, I was very much like, “I’m dying. This is so difficult. How do I do this?” Then I got sick, and once I realized when I was sick I couldn’t do this, I wasn’t able to physically be in a band for months, and I thought I was never going to be able to do it again. So coming back, I am very much on the bright side. I’m very much in the silver lining, excited that I get to do this again. So shout out to chronic illness for that perspective, but I think the thing I like most about being in a band is the opportunity for human connection and freedom. Being in a band has given me the ability to choose what I want for myself over and over again in a way that being a part of corporate America would not allow me to do. Having that full time 9 to 5 is like, the stability is cool, but being in a band has given me the opportunity to see the world, meet new people, connect with people I never would have known, and that freedom I think is my favorite part, aside from obviously the music too.
D: What would you say to your younger self as the band was just starting out?
HA: There’s nothing I can really say to myself that I think would help because…I cannot be warned. I have to go through it. I have to do it the hard way because that’s just who I am as a person. So, I think the thing I would really offer myself would be comfort. I would really love to hug myself and just be like “Everything is going to be fine. You’re going to end up better, for all of these things you are about to experience.”
Chase Petra’s show at the Cobra Lounge was nothing short of a great time. While a lot of laughs were exchanged during Allen and I’s conversation, her, Dickson and Schiad’s humor had the Cobra Lounge bursting with laughter the whole night. While the band is hilarious, they are also so talented. Standout moments of the set included “Centrifugal Force” and “Because I Am My Own Dog.” However, honestly the entire set was truly rock solid. Throughout the night, the audience sang along to every lyric and hung onto Allen’s every word, which was such an incredible and impressive experience to witness. As a long time fan of Chase Petra, I have never been able to see them live, however, being able to speak with Allen and see the band do their thing was such a surreal and amazing experience.