Comeback Kid’s Andrew Neufeld talks about Sights & Sounds

When I caught up with Andrew Neufeld of Comeback Kid on Sept. 30 to interview him for the CBK article that appears in this week’s issue of The Uniter, he was in Gibsons, a small coastal community in southwestern B.C., with his other band, Sights & Sounds.

The band was there recording their first full-length album with renowned metal musician and producer Devin Townshend (Strapping Young Lad, Lamb of God, Misery Signals).

“He’s sick of metal, so he’s doing this,” Neufeld said with a laugh, adding that the band had been in Gibsons for a month and was a week away from finishing recording.

“We have the end in sight right now and we’re just trying to put all the pieces together.”

Formed on a whim in 2005 by Neufeld (on vocals and guitar), his brother Joel (drums) and friends Adrian Mottram (guitar) and Matt Howes (bass), Sights & Sounds released a six-song EP last year on Winnipeg’s Smallman Records. Rooted in the band’s shared punk history, the songs also incorporated acoustic guitars, piano, MIDI and choir-like vocals. The result was an atmospheric sound that at times recalled Mew and at other times, Blink 182—two of the band’s influences.

Of the full-length, Neufeld said, “It’s way, way, leaps and bounds beyond the EP. The EP was a demo we did ourselves, and we never really intended for it to come when we [recorded] it.”

Neufeld said the band has recorded 12 songs for the full-length, and that Smallman Records will release it in Canada. The band is currently trying to figure out who will release it outside of the country.

If things go according to plan, it will be released in either March or April, giving the world an idea of what Sights & Sounds can really do.

“Hopefully it will properly represent our band, which we don’t feel we’ve been able to do yet,” Neufeld said.

You can check out a blog entry from Sights & Sounds’s MySpace page about the recording in Gibsons here and read an interview with the band from the Sept. 20, 2007 issue of The Uniter here.

Photos by Jess Baumung, courtesy of Smallman Records.