Jimmy Eat World: A praise chorus

Jimmy Eat World is proud of its Futures

By Mike Prevatt

Asked whether he would get political behind the mic once his band Jimmy Eat World started its fall tour, singer/guitarist Jim Adkins is pretty blasé about the whole thing. "I don't know," he says, plainly. "I'm voting for Kerry. I don't think it's going to make front-page news--like, `Rock band admits liberal leanings.'"

He falls silent for a few seconds, and pipes right back up. "Now that I think about it, yeah. I don't know why we wouldn't be more involved in that."

Hard to believe a band--from swing state Arizona, no less--that just entitled its new album Futures would not have its eyes on the election and where the country was heading. But when it comes to that title, Adkins is as much the waffler that Republicans accuse Kerry of being. First he says the band just did the rock 'n' roll thing of making an album after the first song. Then he says the idea of naming an album after something that might sum it all up is silly. Then he says it can be read into several different ways. Finally, he allows for a personal opinion: "I like the kind of nostalgic yet hopeful vibe it sort of gives off."

It could be a subliminal tag. Like any good band, Jimmy Eat World has undergone many changes throughout its career. But this year, the Mesa-based modern rock act turned 10. And in the past three years, the quartet matured in the public eye, having scored its first commercial success with its fourth album, Bleed American--later retitled Jimmy Eat World to avoid post-Sept. 11 sensitivities--which sold more than a million copies in the United States and boasted four radio hits, including breakthrough single "The Middle" and "Sweetness." Adkins admits that somewhere in the album, the title's theme is present, given the circumstances the band has experienced over the past few years.

"We've been thinking about a lot of things in the past few years," he says. "People change and become different people in the time span of just a few months. Of course that will be reflected in the creative output. But I am amazed at how you think you've reached a place where you might end up not necessarily coasting, but...you're never really off the clock or as comfortable in how you operate. There's always going to be something that comes along and you have to readjust [and] refocus your entire creative method."

Futures is Jimmy Eat World at its most musically assured. It is less spastic and recalcitrant as previous releases, as its songs are fleshed out and more fully realized. Nearly every of its songs has an easy, instinctual tunefulness, from the rocker and first single "Pain" to ballads like "Drugs or Me."

The band felt the pressure of making the follow-up to a hugely successful record only because more people than ever were now awaiting a new record from it. "Not that we'd ever written music for one particular group of people, but we were definitely thinking, here's all these people that are going to be curious about what we did next, so we had to be absolutely certain we were proud of it before we let it go," says Adkins. "We've re-tracked vocals, re-cut songs from scratch in the studio...it got pretty ridiculous."

But Adkins is quick to note that Futures is the first record Jimmy Eat World has recorded on a major label's dime, and not all the resources available would still guarantee a hit. "There are only so many elements in the music business that you have no control over," he says. "So you might as well write it off and settle for being proud of the work you do. That's about the only thing you do control."