Three Days Grace now has two lead singers after original vocalist Adam Gontier returned to the band, joining longtime singer Matt Walst. “Mayday,” featuring the new vocal duo, topped the rock charts, their 18th number one on the Billboard Active Rock chart. As Three Days Grace prepare to embark on a tour with Disturbed, I caught up with drummer Neil Sanderson for a chat about the tour, the return of Gontier, a new album, his record label and other topics.
Chad Bowar: How did Adam’s return to the band come about?
Neil Sanderson: It really started when we were playing a show that was near where Adam was living and we were like, it’d be a cool surprise for the fans if he came up and did a song and, we’ve kept in touch. So we just started throwing around, imagine Three Days Grace and having another dynamic and other facets of the band, which would be having both singers, which is really great for the live show. Matt’s been in the band for 13 years now. We’ve had an almost equal amount of number ones with each singer. To be able to deliver it in a package and then, also create a record where we combine the two vocals…
And so we had that idea and we just decided to start by just getting together. And our guitar player Barry has a beautiful estate down in southern Indiana. And it was just acoustic guitars and campfires and he’s got a studio cabin there. And we just hung out just to feel the vibe and the vibe was great. It felt really natural for us. That’s how we started anyways, small town Canadian guys just playing acoustic guitar and writing songs and stuff. And then we ended up writing a couple of songs that naturally fit both singers. And we started thinking, look at bands like Pink Floyd and things like that, where they had two singers and they were uniquely different but they play off of each other. And it just adds another dimension to the band. So once we had a couple songs, we had the hangout going on. And we were just like, what would this look like if we really did this full on? And then we just pulled the trigger.
How close are you to finishing the new album?
We’re quite close. It’s pretty amazing to see our first single “Mayday” has been number one for five weeks now, which is amazing. And it also buys us a little bit of time. But we’re actually at the mixing phase for most of the record right now and planning for a release in a few months.
Has your songwriting process been pretty consistent over the years?
It’s stayed the same a lot. We’re very collaborative. Everybody at home comes up with their own guitar riffs, or maybe it’s just a lyric or a poem or, or a song title, or just something that they’re feeling in life that if we can put into paper on a paper and into song, then that’s a really powerful thing. And I think that’s what we’ve really stuck to, making sure that what we’re writing about is relevant to our own personal experiences as human beings. And when we’re honest with ourself, and the deeper we dig into our hearts and souls and brains, the more real it becomes for us, the more real it becomes for our fans. And I think that’s been a major connection with Three Days Grace over the years, we’ve been able to put into words what a lot of people are thinking.
I can’t count how many times people have come up to the band and said, “Oh my God, I thought I was the only person, I thought I was crazy for feeling the way that I felt about something. And then I heard your song, and it just resonates with what I’m going through.” And that a pretty powerful, gratifying moment as an artist. I suppose if you’re a painter, and you make a painting, and everybody looks at it, and they’re emotionally affected by it, then that’s the beauty in art itself. So we’ve really stuck to our guns with that. We don’t try to be something we’re not. We don’t try to make something for everybody. We really stick to that truth. And we have what we call the campfire test, which is, as we’re writing songs, no matter how heavy they’re going to be in the end, it needs to pass the campfire test, which is basically a guitar and a vocal. And that’s it. And if we can make each other feel emotion just with laying out the song that way, then it passes the campfire test, so it’s worthy for the album.
On “Mayday,” you have the two singers trading vocal lines. Is that the template for the whole album?
Yeah, it was funny because we didn’t really overthink it. At one point, I saw them rock, paper, scissors to see who was going to sing the next line. But yeah, most of the songs have a trade-off, and then harmonizing, and the guys said it went pretty naturally when they were making the decisions on what goes where, so it’s been a very organic process.
When you’ve had as many number one songs as Three Days Grace, you obviously can headline 100 percent of the time should you so choose. What is the benefit of going out on shows like the upcoming tour with Disturbed?
Disturbed, they’re really good friends of ours, and there’s a lot of new things for us with being a five-piece. So just to go out there, we feel like this tour is a really good audience for us to get up and running, and get full force. And then we are making plans for lots of headlining after that, and of course a lot of big rock festivals, and we’re planning a big U.S. tour. We’re going to Europe as well, and going to headline across Canada.
When it comes to putting together a set list, even in a headlining show, you literally cannot play all your hits. How challenging is that?
Sometimes we listen to the fans. If you look online enough, you’ll find out what people want to hear. And so we’ll try to put in some of those, and we’re going to mix it up a little bit, but it really comes down to the energy. We’ve played all these songs for so many years in front of the crowd. We know which ones are the most reactive, but then we want to mix it up a little bit as well. So we’re going to do a little bit of both, but there’s some songs I think we’ll be playing forever.
After all these years, is there anywhere else left to play live that you haven’t been able to get to yet?
We’ve never played France. I’ve been to France, but we’ve never played one show in France. I think it would be cool to play Paris.
You’re also involved in Judge and Jury Records. How did that come about?
I’m a partner with producer Howard Benson. We had been working together on Three Days Grace for many years. We started getting creative together working on some other albums as a producer duo, and then that grew into a full-fledged record label. We have some great stuff in the works right now. We’ve signed Butcher Babies, and we signed Saliva, and we just have a lot of material coming, and it’s a great outlet for me to be creative, because we are a label, but we’re more of a producer collective, so we’re always cooking songs, and trading songs, and working on stuff, and it takes up the rest of my time. It’s really exciting. The music industry changes, and it’s a really moving target how business is done, and if you can be agile to make the right decisions, and believe in the music that you can carry all the way to the end zone and release, it’s a lot of fun.
We have a band called Silos, a newer band that is doing really well in Los Angeles, and we just worked with Trevor McNevan from Thousand Foot Krutch. Every day is a different task, but it’s great. If you tinker with something, and throw it up in the air, and it flies, it’s the best feeling in the world, and I feel like that, where you can work on it, and you just tinker, and then just release it to the world, and it’s a great outlet to be creative. It’s almost therapeutic for me sometimes.
When working with other bands, do you ever learn anything from them that you’re able to take back to Three Days Grace?
All the time. Different approaches to being creative and making records, it’s great. I want to be a sponge, and even with drumming, seeing other drummers, how they approach the drum kit, I’m always trying to learn. I always want to have curiosity and wonder and growth in music. I think that that’s really the part that’s most exciting anyways. And my partner Howard Benson, he’s produced 150 albums, he’s sold many, many records, from Kelly Clarkson to P.O.D., to Daughtry to My Chemical Romance and Skillet and us, so I was lucky that he took me under his wing, and I’ve learned a lot from him as well.
Drummers obviously physically take the biggest toll of anybody in a band. How is your body holding up after decades of drumming?
Good. It’s a lot of cardio and just making sure that you’ve got the gas for it. It’s one thing to play in an air-conditioned arena, but it’s another thing to play a festival in Florida when it’s 105 degrees. That’s when the test really comes. But yeah, hydration and sleep and all that stuff, as we get older with this band, water and sleep becomes more important every year. I guess 20 years ago we were thinking about beer.
Do you have any outside of music interests, hobbies, things like that?
I absolutely love gardening, and I could see myself when I’m too old to play the drums, that I can just manage a big greenhouse on my property. My wife and I just recently purchased a house in Costa Rica, and half my heart is down there now, I just absolutely love it. It’s right on the ocean, and it’s right in the jungle, and people seem to really celebrate life down there, and it’s just the ultimate reset for me when we go down there. There’s a lot of Canadians who, they call it snowbirding, where four months of the year you don’t live up here, and we can certainly see ourselves participating in that. I consider myself a surfboard owner, but I cannot call myself a surfer yet, because that shit’s hard, but I’m trying, so I’m trying to surf.
(interview published February 25, 2025)
Watch Three Days Grace – “Mayday” Video
