Scarlett O’Hara Unleash Friction Onto The World

Scarlett O’Hara Unleash Friction Onto The World

Scarlett O’Hara is a legend within the underground metalcore scene whose landmark album Lost In Existence from Rise Records is celebrating it’s 10 year anniversary.  A follow-up entitled Welcome Back To The Brodeo announced their grand return – and now with the unveiling of a brand new single entitled Friction, Scarlett O’Hara present a raging modern rock sound that is receiving not only great fan support but Billboard chart action as well.

Highwire Daze recently interviewed guitarist Logan Burns to find more about the amazing Friction, working with esteemed producer Erik Ron (Godsmack, Bush, Black Veil Brides) right before the commencement of a worldwide pandemic, their new vocalist Moises Lopez, and more news directly from the Scarlett O’ Hara Brodeo.  Read on…

Is there any overall story or concept behind your new single Friction?
The main inspiration was just kind of the pressure we felt to come up with a solid song that the audience would enjoy under a really strict timeline.  We actually had ten days to completely come up with three tracks from scratch and record then all within that given period of time over at Eric Ron’s studio in Hollywood.  So, the general gist of the lyrics and everything are just talking about endure and persevere, and kind of the weight of external forces and everything that may cause stress or weigh down on somebody.  That’s where we got the line “Friction” from – kind of rubbing up against you causing a sort of Friction.  And we kind of just came up with it on the spot.  We were all really nervous – we were working with such a high-level producer and everything – and we just really felt pressured to give the audience something good, while at the same time being able to do it in a quick amount of time that was given to us.

Friction is pretty much all clean singing.  Is this a different direction for the band?
Definitely.  We’ve been doing the metalcore Scarlett sound now since 2008, so we really wanted to just shake it up a little bit and utilize Moises’ vocals to his full extent.  Although he’s an amazing screamer and can do anything needed, whether it be low ultra-heavy vocals or the really high screaming stuff, he has a crazy good clean singing voice – and we wanted to do something that he was comfortable with, as well as something that was a bit different that could be marketed to different audiences that we traditionally weren’t able to reach while staying strictly in the heavy metalcore scene.  We kind of want to break out into that active rock market and take a shot at radio, so going to Eric Ron was really a calculated decision, because that’s what he’s known for.  He’s worked with all sorts of bands that have a ton of success, and we thought he’d have a lot of knowledge and suggestions to give us while working in his kind of wheelhouse that he’s comfortable in.  So, it is a different direction, but we do have some elements that we’re traditional known for.  We are still doing heavy guitars and everything – Arnie’s still blasting away at drums.  We did sneak in a couple of screams in there – they’re just kind of hidden behind the vocals, so the vocals could be the most prominent aspect of the new sound.

Eric Ron – his credits are massive.  How did you have Erik Ron involved with the recording process?
Our manager Jesse Barton from Pin-up Artists Management – he suggested that we try to work with Erik, so he gave him a call – he’s had some other bands work with him before and thought it would be really beneficial to us if we tried to schedule something in with him.  So, we got everything going initially with Erik’s manager and found out that there were going to be some dates like the next week from when we actually called. It was a whirlwind.  It was really kind of a shocker – you can imagine.  We didn’t have any material prepared or anything like that to kind of go in.  And that was the first time we had ever done that.  We’re normally a band that does a lot of pre-production and then has things that we’ve already been working on ready to go, but just due to the time constraint and everything, we went in there with a complete blank canvas and really got in there and worked with him to create the next couple of songs that we’re going to be releasing.

Logan Burns of Scarlett O’Hara – Photo by Jack Lue

What has it been like to write, record and now release new music in the middle of a pandemic?
It’s definitely been different.  When we last saw you in 2019, we were on the road every other month and were doing the whole touring thing.  And we had a bunch of stuff planned for 2020 – it was actually going to be the 10^th Anniversary of our 1^st album Lost In Existence, so we had some stuff planned for that as well – a little tour going on as well as some other tours that were already confirmed with other bands.  But as soon as that happened, it kind of put that all to bed for a long time.  When we were in Hollywood at his studio, that’s when the actual quarantine lockdown hit, so we really lucked out by getting in there the time that we did, otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to for a long time.  But yeah, it’s been different.  We’re used to putting out music and then being to tour right after or at least do some shows – but just due to this it all has to be done through Internet and social media and everything.  So, it’s definitely been something that we’ve had to navigate – but at the end of the day, we’re really happy with the product and the reception we’ve been receiving from everything.  It’s been doing great.  It’s all over the radio stations nationally and we were recently added to Octane Satellite Radio, so that’s just been a dream come true.

How did Moises from The Sight Of Impact wind up joining Scarlett O’Hara?
Initially after we recorded Welcome Back To The Brodeo, we had our previous vocalist, and he just wasn’t in a place in his life where he’d be able to dedicate the amount of time and everything that’s needed to do this full time and professionally.  He had a lot of stuff in his personal life that was keeping him grounded over here in the Valley.  We had known Moises just from the scene that we have down here.  We’ve always known that he’s been an amazing vocalist.  I’ve always been a fan if his, so mid-2018 we started talking about maybe just having him do some live work for us – not 100 percent replace the vocal spot – but once we started working more and more together, it became super clear.  He fits with us so well, we have such an amazing band, and it seems like he’s been with us for years.  All the signs pointed towards the obvious.  It was just asking him to be in the full-time position and he’s been an official member ever since.

As you mentioned, Lost In Existence just celebrated it’s 10-year anniversary.  What goes through your mind knowing you have a recorded CD out that’s 10 years old?
It kind of makes me feel a little bit old, you know.  (Laughs) But here I am – I’m 29 – and I have to remind myself that we recorded that when we were all of 18-19 years old.  Our drummer was actually 17 at the time.  So, it’s definitely a blessing.  When I look back at it, it’s crazy how much the scene has changed since then.  There’s been multiple sound changes as far as what the trend is in whether you want to call it metalcore or scene music – just heavy music in general.  You can definitely see the era of it progress into something that was way different than it used to be – and that’s just the natural order of things.  1985 dudes were playing like Motley Crue and everything and then in 1995 it was completely different – and they still call some of that stuff heavy metal, you know?  It’s s a lot different now, but we’re just really grateful that we’re still able to do it and that our original fans still come out to the shows and everything.  I haven’t played one show yet while we were out on tour where we don’t hear somebody say “Play Swordfish” or “Play Earthworm Jim” one of those songs off our early album or even off our EP in 2008 while we’re trying to tour our 2018 Welcome Back To The Brodeo album.  So, it’s definitely something and I’m really grateful that we’re still around after all of these years.

What do you hope the rest of 2021 brings for you, for Scarlett O’Hara, and the overall music scene?
As far as Scarlett O’Hara, I want these new singles to bring us a number one on Billboard or something.  We debuted initially with three Billboard chart positions – one of them being a number 3 slot.  And we kind of lost number 1 to Five Finger Death Punch and number 2 to Chevelle, so we were totally cool with that!  Those guys are juggernauts and no complaints on that end.  As far as for the actual Top 100 for rock, we debuted at number 40, so we hope that this coming week we’re going to find out that we’re number 20 and then hopefully get down to that Top 10. That’s ideally what I would like.  One of my big goals as well was to get on Octane, and we’ve kind of gotten that already, so that was a lifelong dream come true.  I’ve been listening to Sirius XM since like 2003, so that was always a real big thing of mine to finally get that.

As far as everything else, I want the fans to kind of understand what we’re trying to do with this new direction and everything.  It’s not always going to be 100 percent a change or anything.  These are just some singles that we’re releasing.  I think the Lost In Existence fans are really going to enjoy this next one that we have coming up here in the Summer/Fall period – that’s something that you would definitely find on one of our earlier records that’s not such a drastic change as maybe Friction is.  So definitely that – and as far as the music scene in general, I hope shows come roaring back pretty soon.  I’ve never taken a break this long from music ever since our hiatus – but even then, we were always keeping in contact and writing stuff. So, I definitely want to see shows come back in the same amount of touring that we’re used to before all this Covid stuff.

Scarlett O’Hara is:
Arnie Bernal – Drums
Logan Burns – Guitar
Moses Lopez – Lead Vocals
Alek Samodouroff – Rhythm Guitar

(Interview by Ken Morton)

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