Yellowcard triumphs over tragedy
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Brutal honesty … Yellowcard reveals the triumph and the heartbreak of the past two years on new album Lift A Sail.
Source: Supplied
YELLOWCARD frontman Ryan Key and his Russian professional snowboarder girlfriend Alyona Alekhina were happy in love and life when tragedy struck.
The pair had met in 2012 after a concert by the American punk band in Madrid and were engaged by the end of the year.
Key and his bandmates were recording their Ocean Avenue Acoustic album in April last year when his fiance broke her back on a practice run in California.
They would marry in an intensive care unit within a month and spend the next year in Denver where she was undergoing intensive rehabilitation in her mission to walk again.
The band’s seventh album Lift a Sail is not only a sonic account of their love story but also the dark times the pair endured after her accident.
Key had to ask himself tough questions about how much he wanted to reveal in his lyrics and how confronting the songs would be for his wife.
Dark times … Alyona Alekhina, the wife of Yellowcard singer Ryan Key, was seriously injured while snowboarding. Picture: Alyona Alekhina/Twitter
Source: Twitter
“On the surface it may look like what someone thinks is an amazing love story. The accident brought us together, tore us apart and we are still together,” he says.
“I tried to write about what was inspiring about the experience, what gave us strength, because I didn’t want to write a whole lot of ‘f— you’ songs.”
The album centrepiece One Bedroom is the ‘you and me against the world’ song, a tribute to love triumphing against despair.
“She went home for the summer to Moscow for this intensive therapy program and she was having a tough time and she rang me after she heard One Bedroom and said it couldn’t have come at a more perfect time. That was a huge thing for me,” he says.
True love … snowboarder Alyona Alekhina with Yellowcard frontman Ryan Key. Picture: Twitter
Source: Twitter
But Key reveals Make Me So, one of the album’s most powerful anthems, was about his weakest moment as Alekhina battled to defy the diagnosis she would never walk again.
It was tough to write, but even more confrontational to play it to his wife.
“Earlier this year I had a total freak-out, we’ve both been through those moments in this whole experience when it was completely overwhelming. And for a split second, I thought I was going to bail,” he admits.
“I wrote the song from her perspective, that while my weakness showed through for a second, whatever happens in her life, she is going to take it head on and conquer it and do what she wants to do.
“I was most nervous about showing her that song.”
Tough times … Yellowcard’s Ryan Key admits he considered “bailing” after his snowboarder wife broke her back.
Source: Supplied
Alekhina understood and gave him her blessing to put it on the record.
Key and Alekhina’s trials were played out just as violinist Sean Mackin completed his surgeries and treatments for cancer.
The band have had a rough trot, which may also partly explain Lift a Sail’s sonic departures.
While Yellowcard’s musical origins may be anchored in melodic punk anthems, the new songs are unashamedly made for stadiums running the gamut from monster guitar-driven singalongs to soaring, string-laden ballads.
Lift a Sail could polarise fans who would prefer they kept making a new version of their 2003 major label breakthrough album Ocean Avenue.
Key, Mackin, Ryan Mendez and Josh Portman wanted to make a rock’n’roll record. Even if that isn’t in fashion on the mainstream charts.
New approach … Yellowcard’s frontman Ryan Key is exploring new music.
Source: AFP
“As soon as we started writing for this record, we knew we weren’t writing a pop punk record and we had to be okay with that because that’s where our hearts are now or force it back the other way,” he says.
“I don’t give any credit or pay attention to negative criticism because at this point I do not need that in my life.
“It felt amazing to not be afraid of doing this. Sometimes it is okay to tailor music towards what this fan or that fan wants but this was the most exciting recording process because we said ‘Let’s just do it’.”
The band have already booked a return to Australia next July in support of Lift a Sail.
Whether the record will be the one to catapult them onto the bigger stages is impossible to answer and while the band admit to dreaming big, Key said they are just glad for the opportunity to play.
“I would be lying if I said I have given up on the dream to be that big, to be a Foo Fighters-sized arena rock band,” he says.
“But I am really happy with each new thing that happens to us. We keep getting great opportunities and we’re yes men. We’ll take it all.”
Lift A Sail (razor & tie/cooking vinyl) is out on October 10
Yellowcard tour pre-sale starts Wednesday 2pm at frontiertouring.com; general on sale October 10
WA: Metro City, july 4, Oztix
SA: Thebarton Theatre, July 6, Ticketmaster
QLD: The Tivoli, July 8, Ticketmaster
NSW: Hordern Pavilion, July 10, Ticketek
VIC: Margaret Court arena, July 11, Ticketek
