RIOT A RO C K A L BU M I N F LU E N C E D BY S I M O N E D E B E A U VO I R ? W H Y N O T. O N THEIR NEW ALBUM, THE DEVIL WEARS P R A D A’ S M I K E H R A N I C A E X P L O R E S H I S L O V E O F L I T E R AT U R E . W O R D S : H E AT H E R M C D A I D .
CRAFT WORK transition
noun 1.the process or a period of changing from one state or condition to another.
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his is the road on which The Devil Wears Prada sits. Eyes ahead. Band evolving. Always. The process has been accelerated since 2013’s ‘8:18’, their own appetite to evolve teamed with the departure of drummer Daniel Williams and guitarist Chris Rubey. No reasons offered, just amicable statements aplenty. It’s enough to throw some off track, but not them. Forward they continue, with the theme of transition at the core. “It feels fluid to me,” says vocalist Mike Hranica, on these shifts in the band. “It feels quite natural. I think that as we have gotten older and gone from being 16 years old to 27 years old, there’s been so many changes and we have always done our best to adapt.” The Devil Wears Prada are a band who have barely considered even
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“I TRY TO CRAFT THINGS WITH DEPTH.” tapping the brakes, whether it’s the EPs between albums, or the way in which they zone directly into topics to handle. ‘Transit Blues’ is a triage of transition, separation and mourning, the inevitable process of growth and change as people move, drift and settle in a new part, or place, of life. They locked themselves away, living and working together fully for the first time. “This is the first we have Kyle [Sipress, lead guitar] full on actual being in the band on guitar,” explains Mike. “He demoed so many songs, and then we spent two-three weeks out in the middle of Wisconsin on a farm. “Then it was sort of the same thing early this year in Michigan, we were in a vacation home where we set up all the gear. The goal was to write without any guideline or restriction, no travelling between our place of stay
and our actual band space. So, we had the freedom and liberty to be able to write with confidence.” The writing skirted closer to Mike’s own preferences than usual. Their ‘Zombie’ and ‘Space’ EPs were clear in their theme, but both could be held at an arm’s length. They were never his ‘thing’. For him, the distance gave them more to toy around with, but here it felt natural to delve into his own interest: literature. A dip into Mike’s library has given classics such as Lolita a fresh and ferocious new life in their album and sparks a real, and surprising, delight for someone who said he never would – even mentioning literature is met with more fan-like enthusiasm than most other topics of influence. “I mean I could go on about songs forever,” he laughs. “I try to craft things with depth and much intention as to what each song is and each song’s identity. I feel like it’s an important part of my growth.” P The Devil Wears Prada’s album ‘Transit Blues’ is out now.