For Shinedown's most recent album, "Attention Attention," the rock band decided to get really personal, and no song was more vulnerable than "Get Up." Front man Brent Smith penned the anthem after watching his friend and bandmate, bassist Eric Bass, struggle with clinical depression.
At its core, the song deals with empathy. Smith's lyrics reflect a shared experience. While he may not have endured the same struggles as Bass with depression, pain can — unfortunately — be a universal human experience and that sense of unconditional support and solidarity for his friend is the driving factor behind the song.
Remarkably, "Get Up" was not pre-planned. Bass created the music for it, and Smith did not share the lyrics or motivation for the song until they recorded it. Yet Bass knew instantly who the song was about once Smith laid down the vocals.
On a short break from the band's world tour, Smith and Bass spoke to Salon about "Get Up," mental health, addiction and how showing vulnerability strengthened their relationship with their fans.
Let's start talking about "Get Up." Tell me about the single, the song and the message.
Brent: It was like lightening hit both of us with inspiration at that time, because I was so afraid of crossing the line with our friendship – because I had never done something this personal before in regard to me and him – that I didn’t want to offend him. And I didn’t want to upset him, because I love him. He's my partner, and he's my bandmate and we create together. This was a very personal thing that I just expressed to him. And he wasn’t upset at all. I was so afraid to cross the line with him, but Eric just removed the line.
That song was such a sounding board for the rest of the songs that became "Attention Attention." I mean, "Get Up" was a huge pivotal moment for not only us, but just in the making of the album. It was a very powerful moment.
Eric: We feel like "Get Up" just basically unlocked this record. Brent and I had conversations prior to that song about some of the subjects that we had begun to write about – which was substance abuse problems – and some of the things we had been through with each other over the past couple of years, dealing with that and dealing with my depression.
We've fallen apart, we put ourselves back together again. Let's write about it, but it took a song like "Get Up" to make it OK to do that. Here's something that's been really personal for me. My wife, my close family and my bandmates were really the only people who knew anything about my severe depression issues.
We took the shackles off at that point, and we said, "Let's just write honestly. Let's write the story of what has happened to us over the past few years and make the record out of it." People are going to identify with that. People love honesty, especially our fans. They love the fact that we've written something that is so personal, yet they can find a piece of themselves in each one of this songs – especially a song like "Get Up."
Eric, were you ever scared to let Brent write this song or to publicly open up through music about your struggles? It's a very vulnerable position to be in.
Eric: It is a vulnerable place to be for sure. I wasn't really scared of it. I didn't know what I was going to say to other people. I think more than anything, more than being scared — I knew that, because it was going to come to light, that this is what I go through, and a lot of people go through the same things — that I was going to have to engage people in conversation. And they were going to engage me in conversation, asking questions about it. I'm always scared that I'm not going to have the right answer for them. You know, because I'm not a therapist. I'm dealing with this just like they are. And, so, really for me, the only apprehension I've had with it is: What happens if somebody is really reaching out to me, and they really need help?
I was never worried about any sort of stigma or anything with it to be honest with you. It's actually been quite a relief to be able to articulate some of these things and talk to people about the things that I was scared of talking to people about. I don't always have all the answers for them, but just engaging them in conversation about it and having a dialogue, even if it's for three minutes in a meet and greet, that's actually been very therapeutic for me.
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I want to talk about some lyrics from the song. "I'm on the bright side of being hell bent / So, take it from me, you're not the only one/ Who can't see straight." They're pretty powerful.
Eric: They're actually some of the coolest lyrics in there, and they're very personal to me actually.
I love the fact that Brent – when he wrote the song – he wrote the first verse really just about the two of us. And I remember that being something that just kind of really grabbed me and was very emotional for me, actually, because from the first verse out of the gate, I know he's writing about me when he's talking about "clinging to the light of day" and "medication doesn't do much, it just numbs your brain." Then he turns it on himself and says, "guess you might say I'm a little intense/ I'm on the bright side of being hellbent/ So, take it from me, you're not the only one/ Who can't see straight." He's talking about himself.
Brent is a super-intense guy, and he's been down some really hard roads. He's talking about struggling with his addiction issues and knowing that he has to respect that – just like I have to respect my depression. And that's why he's saying, "You're not the only one/ Who can't see straight." I know I'm not alone when he says that. I always loved that line in the song.
I'm interested if your relationship or your connection to your fans has strengthened or transformed because of the honesty of this song.
Brent: The amazing thing is that, whether it's someone that has been with the band since the very first album or they're just kind of finding out who Shinedown is – especially with this album, and these songs – the important thing to do with the audience, really, is to let them talk. We've written the material, but we want them to be able to talk about it, because they may not have ever talked about it.
We meet a lot of people on tour, and a lot of times they just want to tell you their story or what they've been through. And, really for us, it's about listening to them and giving them our time. We sometimes don't even have to say anything to them, because they do talk about the lyrics, and they talk about the music and they talk about the songs. They know that it's extremely genuine from us, because we can't pull songs out of thin air. It has to be real. So, a lot of times, it's just allowing them to talk. That's what we try to do as a band – and to give them a platform – just as much as they've given us an amazing platform.
Eric: The success of Shinedown is exactly what Brent just said, is the fact that it's honest. We don’t ever make anything up. That's also been the success of rock 'n' roll music, and a lot of people will say rock 'n' roll music is dead. But Kurt Cobain was being brutally honest, as well – it got inside of people. People latched on to what he was saying. Shinedown is a completely different band then, that we have a completely different message. But we're not writing songs for the club – we're writing what we know. We're writing our experiences down and performing them through music. If a kid can listen to our song and go, "He's writing about something that he knows that he's lived through, and I've lived through the same thing," it gives them hope.
What do you think is important for people to remember and acknowledge as we continue to try to remove the stigma around mental health?
Eric: The important thing for people to remember, who never suffered with any sort of depression issues, PTSD, mental health, anything like that is: The people who have the problem don't understand it any more than the people who don’t have an understanding. You feel sad. You don't know why you feel sad.
My wife, who thank God doesn't suffer with any of this, who's been with me for 24 years. And she to this day doesn't understand anything I go through, but she understands that it's real to me. When she sees that I'm down, she doesn’t go, "What's wrong with you? You have no reason to be depressed!" and start listing the reasons why I shouldn’t feel the way I feel.
It doesn't discriminate. It doesn't matter what your age, race, social economic status is, it gets you. It will bring you down and when you're having an episode or when you're down and out, it doesn’t matter. None of that stuff matters. You can't even give people a reason why, because you don't know why you feel the way you feel. That's kind of the saddest thing for the sufferer and the most frustrating thing for the person who is watching them suffer.
It's important to remember they can't help this, and for God sakes, the worst thing you can do is start giving them reasons why they should be happy. They need to go seek help, they need to find people who can help them out of this situation they're in.
We just need to create a more sensitive society — create more of a narrative, more of an environment where people feel like they can go talk to someone about this. I'm living proof that talking about it — not even talking with someone in particular — just articulating what I'm going through has helped me a lot in the past few months. I can actually feel a difference.
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