2011 was a year of ups and downs for He Is We. The Tacoma, WA duo had a fantastic start with their album My Forever getting embraced by consumers and critics alike. The Aaron Sprinkle produced effort had a strong debut on the charts and the twosome got a ton of attention. They also had several tour opportunities lined up to get in front of more people and spread their music the hard way.
A big tour for He Is We was going to be a run of shows with All Time Low. But after only a few dates on the road they were forced to pull off the tour due to Rachel Taylor’s health issues. Respecting Taylor’s privacy, we won’t disclose Rachel’s condition, but she did say that it was both “frustrating” and “manageable.” The frustrating part has been the lack of being able to go out on the road and play shows.
“Due to my health and my sucky immune system we’ve been pretty much ‘f’d’ with the whole thing not being able to tour as much,” said Taylor in Alternative Addiction’s recent interview with the female vocalist. “This next year is going to be crunch time for us to get out there and keep ourselves busy.”
Crunch time? Possibly. But it’s worth mentioning the support that He Is We has gotten over the past year. Not only are they starting to get some TV placement, they’ve got a dedicated following. Especially when you consider their debut album has only been out for a little over a year. They’ve even got a fan site! (http://www.heiswefansite.com.) A fan page on Facebook, that happens. But a fan site? That just doesn’t happen for young artists anymore. When you’ve got that kind of following, it’s not exactly crunch-time. Still, because of the frustrations of last year, this year’s plan remains the same. Hit the road and play shows. They’ll do that behind their terrific debut album My Forever and behind their newly released Skip to the Good Part EP.
“When Trevor and I go into the studio we always end up recording something,” explained Taylor talking about He Is We’s Skip to the Good Part EP. “We had too many songs to put on to the album. We had all these extra songs. A couple of them we just rerecorded. Then a couple we finished writing the final touches and rerecorded them and decided enough that we liked them enough to put them onto an EP.”
The EP features those extra songs, but it also features two different versions of “Our July In the Rain”, and a rerelease of “All About Us” featuring Adam Young of Owl City. Taylor said the partnership with Young was a unique experience because Young understood the most important quality of the song.
“It was incredible to talk with someone who actually understood it,” detailed Taylor on working with Young. “When you write a song, it pretty much is what it is. It’s hard for me to look at someone and say, ‘I need you to put in emotion’ and that’s… you pretty much leave it at that…. -Put in emotion. But he got it. He understood the story when I explained it to him. And he asked me questions about it and I felt like he actually wanted to do it. He put forth the effort that I put into writing the song. He put forth that effort into performing it. It felt good that he whole-heartedly committed to making it the song that I wanted it to be.”
Young didn’t just help out with the song though, Taylor says he’s been a huge help to He Is We’s career.
“Before I make a big decision, I talk with him and kind of get his feelings on it. It’s cool,” said Taylor. “He’s a homebody, kind of like I am. We just kind of connected in that way where we get anxiety extremely easily. And we just talk about how we deal with that. It’s good though. He’s a very helpful individual. And he helps me kind of keep my head on straight.”
Maybe it is crunch time for He Is We, but it’s not because somebody is pressuring anybody into it; it’s crunch time because Rachel Taylor and Trevor Kelley want to reconnect with their fans on the road. When you’ve got people that are committed enough to build and follow a fan site… that makes you want to.
