Interview: Jayden Seeley of With Confidence on their new self-titled album!

Photo by Brandon Lung

With Confidence is back with a new incredible self-titled album! Based in Australia, the band consists of Jayden Seeley, Ini Del Carmen, Josh Brozzesi, and Scotty Mac. They recently released their third album, creating their own style of Alternative/Pop. As a self-titled album, it truly embodies how With Confidence constantly challenge themselves and grow as artists. We chatted with Jayden about the songwriting and production process of making this album!

Interview by Yising Kao & Kelsey Hyde

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This album has a very different sound than your last two albums, blending both Pop and Alternative. Better Weather is Pop Punk and Love and Loathing is more pop. What inspired you to take this creative direction with this unique sound? Were there any artists that inspired you while writing/producing?

The new album is definitely exploring new territory; It’s changing up the sound. I think we’ve just been a band for a while now and I don’t think there’s anything specifically that made us write an album that sounded different or that we were intentionally trying to do something different. I think we’re all just different people now and we listen to different things and we’ve grown as artists and musicians and with confidence has always been a band that just writes what feels good and writes what feels right to us. We've never been like, “Let’s write a pop punk song.” We just loved Pop punk and that’s what we were writing. So this time around what we were writing is this stuff. We don’t really overthink it, we just kinda let the creative process happen and it developed into this bunch of songs that became the third album

Kelsey: It’s a beautiful album!

Jayden: Thank you!

You guys recorded your new self-titled album in Joshua Tree. Since that area is isolated from the city, how did that environment affect your songwriting in any way than being in a regular studio?

We wrote a lot of the songs in Joshua Tree. It’s a crazy, creative place. I think its mostly the isolation - we got a place with a 360 view which basically around us, it was all juts desert. So it just felt like hyper isolation. When you’re just there with nothing around, there's like no distractions. You’re just there to do one thing and that one thing was to write music. We just stayed there for a couple weeks – we had the studio set up, the drumkit and the amps, and we’d just go over in the morning and jam the whole day and at night, we would just drink and hang out.

Photo: Jayden by Yising Kao

We noticed that Ini has more vocals on this album. How was your collaborative songwriting and recording process with Ini and how did you guys choose who sang which verses and harmonies?

A lot of the stuff we’ve done in the past has been like, whoever wrote the song sings the song. There are definitely exceptions to that and this time around we were just like, no exceptions so whoever wrote the song sings the song. I would write a song bring it in and everyone would put their thing on it and I would sing it. Or Ini would have an idea, he’d bring it in and he’d sing it. It was literally that simple this time around, we didn’t really overthink it. I think Ini is an incredible vocalist, he’s got such a great voice and we've always told him he should sing more. I love some of the Ini tracks on the album. “Paper” is like one of my favorite things he’s ever done.

Kelsey: We noticed that because we heard the first listen on the way to Vegas to see the Jonas Brothers. We were like “Oh my gosh, Ini has more than two songs, this is so cool!”

Jayden: Yeah, nice!

Yising: Hopefully he’ll perform them more.

Jayden: Yeah, that’s the plan.

Kelsey: We’re really excited about it.

Photo: Scotty by Yising Kao

We’re happy that Scotty Mac has officially joined your band! How did having him involved in the writing process change from what you usually do?

Yeah, Scotty became an official member of the band and we went to record this album. And he is just like a breath of fresh air. He has this like positivity that he carries with him. He’s always excited about what we’re doing, and he reenergized the writing process and the recording process for us. Having him around the studio was an absolute pleasure and he definitely did his part on all of these songs. You can definitely hear what Scotty brought to the table. And I think the album wouldn’t sound like the album without Scotty Mac; I don’t know if we would’ve gotten it done. It was awesome having Scotty and I’m so stoked that he’s an official member.

The trumpet in the outro on “Know You (708)” fits the song’s mellow vibes really well. Who plays the trumpet and what’s the significance of “708?”

That’s one of my favorite songs on the album. 708 is a house number. It is a house number that I actually met my now partner, Talia. So, it’s definitely more of a love song, but that house number to me was infamous. So many memories were made there, like my life changed in so many ways. So, it felt fitting to have that in the song. The trumpet kinda just felt right like, I was writing the song and I was getting to the point where I needed a bridge, and I was into the idea of having a saxophone solo for a while, but I feel like sax solos have kinda been overdone a lot lately. But I still wanted some sort of brass instrument and trumpet just made sense. And Scotty actually had a friend that played the trumpet; His name is Escaping Me. I believe he lives in San Diego and Scotty just reached out to him and we sent the song over and he just solo’ed a bunch of times over it and we picked our favorite parts and put it in the song.

Photo: Ini by Yising Kao

Did you go into the studio with any themes in mind for the album or did it all come together while you were writing?

I don’t think we went in with any intentional theme. I think it was just we were writing what felt right. The album is just a reflection of that point in time of us writing. Ini and me have this weird habit of writing kinda similar themes sometimes and when we come together and we put all our songs in the same group, we’re like, “Wow these kinda work together.” It’s something I’ve personally noticed in the first two albums. And I think it worked well in this album as well.

“Baked” is different than your usual sound since it’s more alternative. How did this song come together in the studio?

I don’t know the full story but Josh and Ini were hanging out one night and they came up with the idea and then they brought it to me at my old home studio. They showed me the idea and we basically recreated the demo and finished the song. I have my assumptions as to why it called “Baked.” But it is different, and I think it’s a reflection of what we listen to. We listen to a lot of The Strokes, we’ve always bene Strokes fans. I think I personally hear a lot of The Strokes in that song. I think we were listening to Microwave around that time; It is a little different.

Kelsey: Your vocals sound a little different in it, like the first time we listened to it, we were like “Is that Jayden?”

Jayden: Yeah, we just went with something weird with that one; it’s definitely an outlier but I love it.

Photo: Josh by Yising Kao

The album art is beautiful! We thought Ini took it but Josh actually did.

Jayden: I thought Ini took it!

Yising: Josh tweeted that he took it haha.

Jayden: When we were in Joshua Tree there were a bunch of cameras lying around so I guess Josh pick one up and took it. That’s hilarious, I feel like I’ve said Ini took it a couple of times.

Did you plan the creative concept or did it happen spontaneously in Joshua Tree?

We went through a few different ideas before we landed on the album now. I think it’s just a true reflection of the band doing what feels right and you know, it was organic and real. We took the photos and we were there; That’s where the songs were written, so it just made sense.

What made you want to choose “Big Cat Judgement Day” as the first single?

I love that song; I think we all love that song. We have an extended team that we work with, the label and management, and an extended network of friends and family. And I think in the liberations in the first single, using that giant network led us to “Big Cat Judgement Day” being the first single. It was a collective decision there for sure. It is what feels like quintessential With Con. It took out the Pop Punk elements but it’s fun, energetic, and positive. It has all the things that I think make with con with con. It has a very familiar sound to us but at the same time it brought some of the weird production and modern elements that the album is bringing. So, it felt like a good representation of what the album is. For all those reasons, it makes sense as the first single.

Yising: We were kinda confused at first about the lyrics when we first heard it but we looked it up on Genius and it made more sense.

Kelsey: A lot of the stuff on Genius it like quotes Ini from some obscure interview that he did

Jayden: I love that. Well, as we’ve learned, me thinking that Ini took the album artwork, maybe Genius is getting a few things wrong.

Was it difficult to choose which tracks you wanted on the album? How did you finalize the tracklist order?

It was hard. We actually went through it a few times and we ended up cutting two songs that are now completely recorded and done, that are now just sitting in a folder. I really love those two songs – I think we will maybe at some point release them, maybe as like a B-sides thing, I’m not sure. It was very hard to say goodbye to them. But this felt like the most concise representation of the album I think and for tracklisting, we went back and forth a bunch. Usually what we do is we’ll all send through our tracklistings, our perfect, idealized tracklistings and we’ll see what similarities we all have and agree on those. And in the discrepancies, we’ll just go back and forth and as long as the album feels like it flows nicely, we’re all happy, and we kinda landed on that.

Yising: I really like how it opens with “What You Make It” because that’s such an upbeat song and it’s the perfect opening track.

Jayden: Yeah, I think it brings the energy straight away, which is what I believe any album should start with. I think it’s kinda like watching someone play live. Like you want the band to come out and start strong, you don’t want them to come out and play a ballad.

Kelsey: It’s really interesting to transition from “What You Make It” to “City” ‘cause I feel like it’s like two sides of a coin

Jayden: Definitely, it's an interesting transition for sure.

Photo: Jayden by Yising Kao

You produce for other artists as well. What’s one of the most challenging parts of producing? Do you have any advice for aspiring producers?

I've been doing production for a lot of artists; I’ve been writing for a lot of artists as well. I think production specifically, I would say that remember that a good song is a good song and don’t waste too much time thinking about all of the specifics of production, you know? Sometimes things can get very technical, and you can start worrying about the wrong things. But at the end of the day, a badly produced great song is gonna do better than an incredibly produced bad song. So, remember that your job is to just write good music or produce good music. And if a song is being written around you, make sure you're in that part of the creative process and you're making sure and facilitating that rather than getting caught up with all of the other little stuff that you can worry about later.

Your music videos for this album’s singles have a DIY style. What was your creative process like planning these music videos? What are some challenges you faced since you weren’t all together?

Yeah, that was the biggest challenge, not being together. For obvious reasons, we had to work around that, and I think we work with an extended team and every time we would do a single we had a general idea about what it was about. Like “Big Cat Judgment Day,” obviously we wanted to include cats. We would call out for different directors and their ideas, and they would come to us with some ideas. We’ll pick the ones that we really vibe with and kinda go back and forth until we were all feeling stoked about it. I think “Anything” was a really fun one because we were able to incorporate everyone in the video in a way that felt fun and creative, you know, having them on the TV screen was cool; That was a weird one. We definitely had our challenges, but we worked it out in the end.

Kelsey: Did you ever stab yourself when you were doing the knife scenes?

Yes, a couple times. It was a little blunted, but it definitely did a little damage. It was worth it in the end, like looking away from the knife and going for it. I definitely got more right-in-the-middles than I did hitting my fingers, so I was stoked for that.

Photo: Josh by Yising Kao

RAPID FIRE QUESTIONS

What’s your go-to Starbucks order?

Grande iced caramel latte with soy milk

Yising: Did you try the new Apple Crisp Macchiato?

Jayden: I did, I really like it but I feel like the syrup keeps going to the bottom so you have to keep stirring it.

Did you pick up any new hobbies in quarantine?

I definitely dived more into production and writing, like I built a studio and I work out here everyday now.

What’s your favorite Disney movie?

I don’t know if I can pick. I love Disney, I grew up on Disney. I feel like they’re all my children; I love them all for different reasons so I can’t pick one.

If you had to rule your own planet, what would you make the first law be?

Go vegan!

Kelsey: That’s a good one – that way, we can learn how to cook too.

Jayden: Definitely, I got way better at cooking since I went vegan, to be honest.

Kelsey: I set my kitchen on fire recently, so I need to get some new skills.

Jayden: Well you learned a lesson and you’ll probably never do it again, so you're still growing as a cook.

Kelsey: Yeah, I learned how to use a fire extinguisher.

What’s your Favorite Olivia Rodrigo song?

I would probably say “Brutal.” “Brutal” is really sick. “Good For You” obviously. But with “Brutal” I think she took a risk. Her and her producer Dan just kinda went for it and it's like a perfect blend between the heaviness of Punk and Rock but also the prettiness and edginess of where Pop is in 2021. I love that song; I think that’s an incredible song.

Photo: Ini, Jayden, & Josh by Yising Kao

Photo: Kelsey, Yising, & Jayden