Taking Back Sunday vocalist Adam Lazzara on fatherhood, regrets and country music…
Adam Lazzara of Taking Back Sunday is a wise soul, as well as a fantastic family man. But before that, he almost became a dolphin trainer...
“My friends will get in the car and ask me, ‘What are you listening to?!’ But I love the production quality. I also love watching CMT, which is basically MTV for country music, when I can’t sleep, because the videos remind me of the grandiose rock ones I’d watch when I was younger!”
“Even now I find myself calling my dad for ‘grown-up advice’, but learning to be patient was invaluable. I still struggle with it, as I expect a lot of people my age do, but especially in the music industry there’s so much waiting involved, and you could go crazy if you’re not careful…”
“There’s a lot of doubt involved, because you don’t want to mess this person up, and it’s a constant work in progress, but a wonderful one. I have three kids now, and I wouldn’t say it gets easier with each one, but I think I’m doing okay.”
“If you’re out for weeks at a time it’s easy to burn out quickly, and taking the phrase ‘everything in moderation’ to heart is essential. It took me quite some time to learn that, and we had our bad times, but I think we’ve all learned from that.”
“I loved the idea of being a dolphin trainer, which would have meant going to school and getting qualified. It was more that I loved dolphins than anything else, though I was always interested in science. When I discovered rock’n’roll everything changed, and that got forgotten!”
“I couldn’t believe how heavily in favour of the labels things were divided when it was time to get paid! I think it was good to see that stuff at the age we did, though, so moving forward from there we had a vivid point of reference to work from.”
“We were in all of these amazing studios and around some amazing people, and I wish I’d been more open to learning from those situations. But we were 21 and only thinking about what we were doing, and it’s a shame we didn’t seize the opportunities before us.”
