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There probably aren't many people in the underground hardcore scene that would be more qualified to simply hang around and talk about it with. A man who's only thirty and has spent his life's passion since twenty-two with the same band, the same five guys, can be depended upon to be real, forthcoming, honest - and gravel-voiced.
Ladies and gents, Stretch Arm Strong vocalist Chris McLane is that man. But what a lot of people won't know is that he hasn't always been the frontman for Stretch, as natural as it looks on him. The band actually played its first show with Lagwagon and NOFX around 1992, three years before McLane became the new sheriff in town. "I joined the band in '95 and played bass," Chris remembers in an alley behind an Ottawa club, where his quintet headlined a show also featuring With Honor and Haste. "Then our singer quit, so I moved to singing, and then we got Jeremy (Jeffers, Stretch bassist). All from Columbia, South Carolina." A place of noble character, to be sure, and immortalized in a song from SAS' third album that begins, "I'm not exactly proud of the place I'm from/but I've been here my whole life, so I guess I'll call it home/in South Carolina a flag still shows the enslavement of our minds/but in South Carolina I learned from all the times" ('For The Record')
Since forming eleven years ago, the band released one full-length album on Arise Records back in 1997, and upon signing to Solid State(Tooth and Nail Records' heavier sister label) put out 1999's Rituals of Life, 2001's A Revolution Transmission, and their latest, a fantastic new record called Engage that pummels through ten tracks of now-standard great, positive hardcore. Longtime fans have called it a return to the band's roots, influenced by the likes of Sick Of It All and Verbal Assault, especially coming on the heels of Transmission, an album that met with a lot of criticism for apparently going too far into melodic experimentation and pop-influenced songwriting. Engage is straight-up and straight-ahead, and the riffs within are timeless, bruisingly heavy and, well, engaging. Plus, c'mon, Thursday's Geoff Rickly lends backup vocals on 'Miles Apart', while Ian Larrabee, formerly of Boston greats Reach The Sky, does likewise on lead-off song 'We Bleed'. You can't beat that.
McLane himself is a laid-back kinda guy, the somewhat-stereotypical antithesis of the guy one sees wrecking stage during a legendary Stretch set, and though it's not readily evident, he's educated and focused; after all, his previous career was teaching, as was guitarist David Sease's. "I don't really miss teaching," he says. "I think David misses his job; he had a really good situation and he's a good teacher, but I'd been teaching for eight years, and I was just to the point where I was burned out." High school students will do that to you. McLane and his wife have chosen to send their daughter to a Christian elementary school, and when it's brought up that this writer's father runs one such school and does tuition in the U.S. run the same exorbitant numbers as in Canada, Chris laughs. "Well, my wife teaches there, so she gets a bit of a deal," he says with a grin. "But no, I don't miss teaching. I enjoy doing what I'm doing...I miss my family, but I love doing what I'm doing."
'What I'm doing' consists of a touring grind that would awe the most hardened road warriors; Stretch have been on the road almost without exception since May of '03, following a successful tour opening for - get this now - New Found Glory and Good Charlotte. And it's not like they're playing lots of shows opening for other bands, with one notable exception. "We've been headlining since right after the May tour with New Found Glory," Chris muses, "and we really wanna support other bands and play to other audiences, 'cause we really have been touring in the U.S. a lot." The Good Charlotte slash NFG jaunt was sponsored by Honda, supporting whatever new Civic that company was pushing at the time, and Mister Chris McLane, kids, no joke, drives a Honda Civic four-door LX. That's right: four doors. "There were four bands that rotated through the two months [of that tour], so we got in where we could," McLane says. There was no mention of Stretch Arm Strong anywhere on the full-page ads Honda paid for in magazines like Alternative Press, but hey. "We were just psyched to be on the tour, so we were like, 'Where's catering? Let us eat and let us play.' It was awesome."
And the 'notable exception' alluded to earlier? That would be when Stretch hit Europe and opened five shows for legendary Bay Area luminaries Rancid. "Amazing," Chris says flatly. "I love that band, and they're awesome guys. And they play an amazing show, too." As big as Rancid is worldwide, it stands to reason that it might be a little intimidating to go to Europe and risk getting booed out of the building, but Stretch found out that they too had fans. "Those five shows were all about Rancid; it was like, 'Stretch who? Get off the stage!!'" Chris laughs. "But we sold stuff, so they enjoyed it. The Rancid fanbase is so rabid, man. They love the band. We were playing to their crowd, which I think is great, and I love doing it - I love winning them over - but their fanbase is just so strong."
An interesting facet of Stretch Arm Strong is that they're a band who have gone out of their way - or have been forced out of their way - for years to explain the fact that they're not a Christian band - and yet they presently record for an openly Christian label. "It's a personal thing for us," McLane says on the topic of faith, "and we don't, like, change things depending on where we play. "There's my personal beliefs, and then the guys in the band. My beliefs are very personal to me; I'm very open to talk to about it, I enjoy talking about it, but it's not something we do from the stage, and we never have." In a way, it's refreshing to talk to someone who's spent even a little time in the Christian side of the scene/market and hear that it really isn't that big a deal. "It wasn't something we tailored or altered for any reason," McLane continues. "I find it's something specific to each person, and if they wanna talk about it one-on-one, that's what I do. Not just blurting out things [onstage]. Myself, I'm a Christian, and when we're home my wife and I go to church, but the guys in my band aren't all Christians. And I'm straightedge, but we're not a straightedge band. I'm a white Southerner, but we're not a white Southern band." Point taken, but Chris isn't done yet; it's time to set the record straight once and for all. "We got into this band long before any issue of who was what or who was where, you know, and it's been put out there by some people who want us to be a Christian band, and then there's the kids who hate us because we're not a Christian band. We've been doing the same thing for the last eleven years. It's a long time. It's either really dedicated or really stupid."
Actually, it's been really rewarding - for those listening. You would have to look real hard to find someone willing to say an unkind word about Stretch Arm Strong, and their body of work is almost universally respected, a fact McLane deflects with characteristic Southern candor. "There's a lot of good bands out there, and it's flattering that a lot of bands have cited our early records," he says. "Like, Thursday, we're friends with those guys, and I know on their first record they tried to have their guitars sound like our first record. Those guys are a great band without us, obviously, but we've been around a long time and it's nice to hear someone say, 'Your sound influenced us' or, 'We saw your band'. It's cool." And who, pray tell, are the artists Stretch are copping from, as the saying goes? Every band, no matter who or how talented, still construct their sound around a sound learned from those who came before. "We all love Hatebreed," Chris enthuses. "We all grew up on Verbal Assault and Sick Of It All, and there's rock influences that we like, and a lot of the new bands. Like, I'm a huge New Found Glory fan. I like Thursday, Thrice, Boysetsfire. It's really eclectic. All five of us came from different backgrounds, and we kinda just bring it all together."
Love 'em or hate 'em....well, no. It's pretty much just 'love 'em' at this point for Stretch Arm Strong. They're still on the road as you read this, pounding pavement in support of Engage, and with that album being the fulfilment of their contract with Solid State, it remains to be seen where they'll go to record their next platter. Either way, they'll come out on top, as they have for eleven years strong.