What Separates Me from You
What Separates Me from You is the fourth studio album by the American rock band A Day to Remember, and their third and final for Victory Records. Originally planned for release in late-October 2010, the album was delayed by a few weeks until mid-November. What Separates Me from You was released on November 15, 2010, in the UK, and on November 16 in the US. The album, which was recorded mainly at The Wade Studios in Ocala, Florida, from May to July 2010, was the first to feature guitarist Kevin Skaff. The album was produced mostly by Chad Gilbert, with help from Andrew Wade and the band's vocalist, Jeremy McKinnon. "All I Want" was released as the first single. It reached number 12 on the U.S. Alternative Songs chart and number 25 on the Rock Songs chart.
The album debuted on the U.S. Billboard 200 at number 11, and number 1 on several charts: Top Hard Rock Albums, Top Independent Albums, Top Modern Rock/Alternative Albums in the U.S. and the Rock Album Chart in the UK. The band played two songs from the album on their national TV debut in January 2011, and then went on The Game Changers Tour to help promote the album; shortly afterwards touring worldwide in support of the release. Two later singles off the album charted: "All Signs Point to Lauderdale", released in May, reached number 32 on the Hot Modern Rock Tracks chart, and radio single "It's Complicated", released in October, peaked at number 34 on the same chart. What Separates Me from You was met with generally favorable reviews, with critics praising the album's sound. The album was certified Gold by the RIAA in March 2016, and "All I Want" was certified gold in August. The album was certified Silver in the UK by the BPI.
Background
While the band was touring Homesick, a line-up change occurred when guitarist Tom Denney wanted to settle down. Four Letter Lie guitarist Kevin Skaff was added in his place; Denney, however, was retained to work with the band behind the scenes. All of the songs for What Separates Me from You were written while the band was touring in 2009 and 2010, and as early as March 2010, vocalist Jeremy McKinnon stated that A Day to Remember already had "all of the pop/punk song ideas written And we're then going to write five heavier songs".Music and lyrics
Styles and amount of material
Musically, the album has been described as pop-punk, post-hardcore, and metalcore. Guitarist Neil Westfall said in a 2010 interview with Alter the Press!: "We've written a few jams, we're always constantly writing, like I think we wrote some parts the other day." Westfall also said once the band returned home from touring, they were "going to drop everything and start writing and doing pre-production full time." At this point, the band had ten songs and was trying to condense them into five, then planning to write five more. Westfall said the band completed the final "few songs when we were back home with Tom and Chad." On the pace of writing, McKinnon said: "It seems like a really fast thing that has happened but we've been constantly working on it the entire time." On the songs themselves, he said: "the pop-punk stuff has a darker edge to it. I wrote it like that, it's still pop-punk but with a darker edge". The album was influenced by Finch's What It Is to Burn. The album "came together song by song" as McKinnon mentioned, with the band coming up with 15–16 song ideas. McKinnon stated in an interview with Rocksound that there's songs "that didn't make this record that we're saving." There is a track on the album that was previously written for Homesick.When asked about how he comes up with song titles, McKinnon said: "I've got my iPhone, and I go on my notes and every time I see something I like I write it down, so a lot of the time titles are something that mean something to us only, or to someone I know only." He called What Separates Me from You "the slowest for stuff like that", when referring to song titles. Westfall said that the album's title and the songs' subjects were about "Separating your self from your peers and really coming into your own." McKinnon said What Separates Me from You was "a lot more personal and darker" than Homesick, and that it was "a natural progression of what we were doing" with "the same core" as the band's preceding albums. Asked whether the album reached new heights, he said it "was definitely the next step" for the band. However, the band originally had no idea on how the album would turn out: "It was a little bit all over the place, because of me coming in, Tom leaving and all this new stuff that was going on", as stated by guitarist Kevin Skaff. Skaff said that McKinnon originally really wanted to name the album Always the Hard Way, but later realized that the hardcore band Terror had already used that title for an album.
Songs
It was important to the band that "Sticks & Bricks" opened the album, as it was an "in-your-face" song. McKinnon said in an interview with USAToday that the opening lyric was "100% directed at everyone who ever doubted our band". He stated that it "is one of the meaner, heavier songs that we've ever done as a band." "All I Want" is "about being in a band", according to McKinnon, and was one of the final songs written for the album. The song came about from an idea by McKinnon that he expanded on guitar in the middle of recording for the album, and wrote most of it in one night. A rough version was recorded between McKinnon and producer Chad Gilbert before the band had arrived at the studio. McKinnon said the song was more of a "singing version" of the band's song "I'm Made of Wax, Larry, What Are You Made Of?"."It's Complicated" was written while the band were abroad in Amsterdam; the original version differed significantly from the final version. Andrew Wade flew out to the band in an attempt to work on the song immediately. "This Is the House That Doubt Built" was one of the first to be written for the album, written almost in one sitting while McKinnon had his acoustic guitar with him, while the band was abroad. "2nd Sucks" was about people who viewed being in a band as being a sort of competition.
"Better Off This Way" was one of the first written for the album, and re-written "at least 3 different times". The song was the final one finished for the album. The title for "All Signs Point to Lauderdale" came from an occasion when McKinnon and bassist Joshua Woodard were in a rough neighborhood in West Palm Beach, Florida. A piece of the song came from a recording session for Homesick when Gilbert said he had an idea for the melody, which McKinnon took a while to write over: "Chad had a cool idea, vocally, for something". In an interview with PopCrush in 2011, McKinnon said the song was when you get the "feeling like you're stuck in a place that's leading you nowhere" and "standing up for yourself and taking charge of your life." "You Be Tails, I'll Be Sonic" was written with the band's former guitarist, Tom Denney; the song was made up of several separate pieces from different song ideas, with a chorus McKinnon had re-written 4 times.
Referring to "You Be Tails, I'll Be Sonic", Skaff said that the song's title—a reference to Tails and Sonic from the video game series—had "really came out of nowhere." McKinnon said the song is a "more personal song It discusses how the choices I've made to put my best foot forward in my career, in a sense, have really done damage to my personal life." Both "You Be Tails, I'll Be Sonic" and "Out of Time" talk about "how I feel like I'm doing what I want with my life, but I think, "Wow, I just did something that really affected me."" "Out of Time" was also one of the first songs written for the album, and was written while the band was in Australia. McKinnon said the song was the most personal on the record. Skaff had a major hand in writing "If I Leave". The song describes "different things you got through being on the road" and "a relationship ending when you're not really around enough to actually take care of it in person." On being asked whether he knew it would be the final song on the album, McKinnon said "It just felt right seemed like a good ending".
Recording
Before showing the songs to the band, McKinnon and Skaff worked on them alone. When the pair had all of the song ideas, they worked on them as a full-band, with pre-production being undertaken in, as Skaff commented, "a makeshift studio" by Andrew Wade. Woodard commented that the band had "been going in from 11am until 9pm and all we do is sit around and play." Between demoing the songs, and their final forms on the album, Woodard said "crazy things were happening – verses became choruses", with Chad Gilbert assisting the band with arrangements and writing. As the band thought they were getting better as songwriters, Woodard stated, "it's getting more heavy and more pop." One song that the band recorded was "screwed up really bad and it didn't make the record", as Skaff comments, as the group recorded it at a fast pace and when McKinnon tried to "sing it was like rap music. And we were like 'that's not good'." Asked if the band would use it as a possible B-side, Skaff said "its possible might use it for the next record or something like that."What Separates Me from You was recorded from May to July 23, 2010, in three locations, per the album booklet: The Wade Studios in Ocala, Florida, The Back of a Bus with No AC in Germany and A Closet in New Jersey, the latter of which being where the backing vocals for "All Signs Point to Lauderdale" were recorded. The album was mixed by David Bendeth and Dan Korneff, and produced by Gilbert with assistance by Wade and McKinnon. Wade also produced the band's previous album, Homesick. It was the first album featuring Skaff on guitar, following Tom Denney's departure after Homesick. "All I Want", "It's Complicated", "This Is the House That Doubt Built" and "If I Leave" were mixed by Bendeth, while the rest of the album tracks were mixed by Korneff. Mastering for the album had taken place at Sterling Sound by Ted Jensen.