Like the “beach goth” term The Growlers coined to describe their music, the name Chinese Fountain was there before the band found the meaning behind the words.
The Growlers’ fifth album deals a lot with notions of luck and good fortune, with songs that get a little philosophical about the band’s out-there lifestyle, their years of making music together and their commitment to just keep going.
“Seeing things growing and getting bigger around us, at some point you have to realize that a lot of this music industry stuff is based on luck,” says the band’s lyricist and vocalist, Brooks Nielsen.
It’s the first time The Growlers have brought in an outside producer and engineer, and the added polish blends well with their more focused songwriting. But Nielsen says the only thing calculated about this new album is the band marshaling its experience to make the record their best music yet.
“Everything around me is asking me, ‘What do you think is going to happen with this record? Is this the one that is going to break you?’” Nielsen says. “We’ve never had that thought going into making a record, and we’ve never had it afterwards. I just can’t think that way. If we did that, it would kill the band. We’re just trying to make good songs.”
Chinese Fountain had its roots in The Growlers’ displacement after a firework accident left them without a home or a studio. The band’s home base in Costa Mesa, Calif. was what Nielsen describes as a “boat warehouse-type spot,” with a big parking lot and retro RVs around it.
“We were reckless at the house, basically non-stop,” he says. “It was a haven for every misfit around, so there was constant partying and raging and fireworks going off everywhere. A friend of ours threw a firework that found a bad spot to be in and lit the place and burned our studio down and part of our house. We had to pack up what we had. We were leaving on the road three days later, so we threw our shit in storage and bailed. When we came back we didn’t have a house.”
So The Growlers set up temporarily at a friend’s place in Topanga Canyon and began writing songs to follow up 2013’s Hung At Heart and Gilded Pleasures EP.
“We didn’t have a plan. We never really have,” Nielsen says. “That’s how we’ve always worked. We have to make a record and everyone gets really excited, and we just have to start from scratch. We get into a spot where we can sit and work for two weeks.”
“We’ve always wanted to have a plan, but it never works out. For a second we say we should go in a direction, like when reggae hit England and mixed with early punk, or something like that. But we can’t stick to it for more than five minutes,” he says.
The Growlers have always worked fast, with guitarist Matt Taylor feeding songs to Nielsen to flesh out lyrically, while the other musicians—Scott Montoya (drums), Anthony Perry (bass) and Kyle Stratka (keyboards, guitar)—add in their own parts.