Tyler Connolly of Theory Of A Deadman Rocks New Album ‘Dinosaur’ (INTERVIEW)

Tyler Connolly had been home almost a week when we spoke for this interview. For someone just coming off the first leg of Theory Of A Deadman’s Rock Resurrection Tour with Skillet and Saint Asonia, he sounds pretty spry. I guess with a rocking new album, Dinosaur, having just been dropped on March 17^th, getting to talk about some new music feels realr, really good. “It feels fresh but it also feels like home,” Connolly said upon the album’s release. “We were trying to amalgamate the old Theory Of A Deadman with a new approach. Our last two records were really dark. This one is tongue-in-cheek and banging right out of the gate. It’s a lot more fun. That’s what I’m personally looking for in life, and I think people need it as well.” 

With the pandemic shutting down touring, the band wasn’t really able to promote and tour 2020’s Say Nothing. What the time off did give them was a chance to reflect and regenerate. “I always want to progress,” Connolly told me during a 2012 interview for Glide. “But it’s tough and it all depends on where I am emotionally when I’m writing the record.” Connolly continues on his path of world-issue awareness, spouting off about the problems people can get into, including himself. “I’ve been given the opportunity seven times now and I just can’t allow that opportunity to pass anymore,” Connolly revealed about his broader-range lyrics upon the release of the band’s seventh album, Say Nothing. “I mean, I have talked about some personal stuff in the past, don’t get me wrong, a lot of stuff, but I think this is more topical, more current event-y. I dug deep.”

And Connolly continued to dig deep on album #8, especially with the title track. “Humans. We’re really selfish people, myself included,” said Connolly back in 2019. “We’re killing everything, we’re destroying everything. That’s probably the scariest thing, humans, I think. I mean, at the end of the day what’s going to destroy the human race? It’s not going to be the sun, we’ve got four billion years left with the sun. It’s going to be humans. I don’t think we all figured that one out but unfortunately, that’s probably the truth.” With tongue firmly in cheek but waving that no-no-no finger at us, “Dinosaur” rocks with a message.

Connolly, who didn’t think his musician dad was really all that cool until he himself started playing music, has found his perfect outlet in rock & roll with a harder rockabilly twist. Debuting in 2002 with their self-titled 10-song album, the momentum kept building until 2008’s Scars & Souvenirs threw them into an upwards trajectory. By 2011’s The Truth Is …, they could be called bonafide rock stars. 

With Connolly’s witticism regarding his own life adventures, Theory’s lyrics were bound to catch on with fans. “Every song I write is from something inside me,” the singer said in a different 2012 interview we did. “It’s like this huge rush cause obviously it’s your own song but it’s pretty amazing to be able to get it out, whatever you’re singing about.” But love and affection might be the hardest emotion for him to write about: “I’m a very stoic guy, so I think for me it’s very difficult to emote anything, to tell people how I feel – if I’m sad or angry. Honestly, it’s very difficult to tell people that you love them. Actually, it’s kind of embarrassing for a lot of guys, they have a problem doing that, especially me; like, just reaching out and telling people how much you appreciate them.”

For Theory – which also includes Connolly’s childhood friends Dave Brenner on guitar and Dean Back on bass, and Joey Dandeneau on drums – Dinosaur brought the band back to their roots and into a studio recording altogether. With longtime producer Martin Terefe at the helm, they headed to Sweden to record in ABBA’s old stomping grounds. “You can feel the history of Atlantis,” said Back. “I even got to play the ‘Dancing Queen’ piano.” With rock scorchers like “Medusa” and “Ambulance,” and the reimagining of the 1980 Grammy-winning R&B song, “Just The Two Of Us,” Theory is back on a roll. “This record is a U-turn back with a little more knowledge and experience,” reiterated Connolly. “With any luck, fans will say it’s exactly what they needed too.”

So with a few days rest, Connolly spoke with me for the fourth time since 2012 – “Let’s keep it going. Let’s get to five, let’s get to ten!” he said with a laugh – this time focusing on the new album, his lasting partnership with his bandmates and how humans are still messing up everything.

So Tyler, you’ve just come off of some touring

Yeah, I got home on Sunday night, which felt good (laughs).  We’re off till about the 23^rd or 24^th of April and then we’ve got some shows with Disturbed up in Canada, and those are some big arenas, and we’re really looking forward to those. It’s kind of a shorter tour but we really got to show up, got to have the energy (laughs)

Have you toured with them before?

No, I don’t think so. I have seen them live. I’m pretty sure we’ve played some festivals with them in the past but it’s the first legit tour with them so we’re really looking forward to meeting them.

I understand you guys recorded Dinosaur over in Sweden. 

Yeah, the last two records we did in England, which was such a great experience. It’s definitely a different vibe over there, making a record over there is completely different. So this time our producer Martin said, “You know, the next one we should do in Sweden.” I think he was half joking but I hit him up and was like “So you want to go to Sweden?” and he was like, “Let’s go.” He owns a studio there. He actually bought the old ABBA studio, Atlantis, which is this beautiful famous studio over there and it has the ABBA piano in there, which we used on the record that they used on a bunch of their hits. I should be fluent in Swedish by now from just being around so many Swedish people (laughs). I’d live there if it wasn’t so far away (laughs)

To you, what is the connective tissue that runs through these ten songs? What have you had on your mind?

They were written kind of in a short period of time. We were kind of coming out of the covid era of not playing shows so I think I had a minute to really think what kind of music we really wanted to make with Theory going forward. It definitely felt connected. I definitely think it feels congruent, it all works together so well. I was saying in another interview today that it’s really hard to do to make a record that feels connected, you know. How we did it, I don’t know. Sometimes that’s just lightening in a bottle, sometimes it’s a lot of work, sometimes it just feels good.

We have talked before about how humanity is killing the earth and you’re dealing with that again on the title track. So what do you think will be the human race’s “meteor?” 

Unfortunately, it’s ourselves. I’m still confused why there is still war, still confused by people but I guess at the end of the day it’s not confusing, it’s money. So I guess that’s the answer – it’s money, the obsession and overindulgence.

In “Medusa,” I know you’re talking about someone but you could also be talking about some thing.

I could. I mean, it’s a good song and I really had to make sure the song wasn’t an evil song, that it wasn’t about someone that was bad or wicked. It was about someone that I couldn’t keep my eyes off of; somebody that I was so attracted to that I knew wasn’t going to work out and I knew it was a bad situation. The person isn’t bad. I remember watching Clash Of The Titans and how you had to look Medusa in the eye and you’d turn to stone. That’s kind of the idea of the song. But yeah, it’s definitely about somebody that I’ll never reveal (laughs).

“Sideways” is a very honest, revealing song. What do you think is the most poignant line in that song?

You know, it’s about how sometimes you’re just so out of sorts, whether it’s anxiety or just life is too overwhelming. I really like the “Smile on my face but it’s getting dark in here,” which is almost like I’m putting on a happy face when I really know nothing is good. I think we all do that once in a while. We have to do that, take a deep breath and go to work. You have to go out there and do what you got to do but you’re just having a really tough time. I think we all can relate to that.

Which song changed the most from the original version when it was written?

“Two Of Us,” that one went through so many changes, to the point where we were like, should we just delete it? I think we really, really were struggling to find how that song was going to turn out. Even when we finished in the studio and we all went home, we kept getting different versions of the song from the producer. And they were all really good; some of them were so good but really dark and evil sounding and we were like, no. Then I tracked some guitars at home for the choruses and all of a sudden I think we figured it out. We knew there was such a great song in there from the beginning but we just had to figure out what the production was going to be.

Whose idea was it originally to do that song?

I don’t know. I guess it all comes from the ether, you know. It’s not like I was listening to the song but I might have heard it in the mall or a store or something and then I like went for a walk or something and then I just started singing it and I just changed the lyrics in my head, just changed it to, (singing) “We couldn’t make it if we tried.”  And I was like, that’s really cool (laughs). That’s way better than the original I think (laughs) And I just turned it into a Theory Of A Deadman song, made a relationship song that goes awry, you know, when you spend so much time with someone during lockdown and you’re working from home and you realize you really don’t want to be around this person twenty-four hours a day and it goes from bad to worse.

You’re still doing “Wicked Game” and that was a song you didn’t overhaul into a Theory-like song. Why did you keep it so faithful to Chris Isaak’s version?

It might have just been that. I think originally the demo that I had done of that song was very similar, a very good kind of ode to Chris Isaak, and our guy said no, no, no, we need to make this a single, we need to make this a rock song, and I think he sent us a couple of examples and when we got them we were kind of soured on it. We were like, this is a bad idea. It’s like forced and I don’t think we should be in here trying to make it sound like something. So our producer was like, “Let’s just do the opposite, do something that sounds completely different but keeping the vocal intact and not trying to make it like a heavy rock song.” We love it and I think it’s a great dynamic part of the set and that’s why we play it every night. It’s me and the piano. We have the same publisher and our publisher sent that to Chris Isaak and he really liked the version we did, which was really cool, that Chris heard that song.

You’ve been making music with Dave and Dean for a long time now. How do you keep the chemistry there and not hate each other and the music still be so creative? That doesn’t always happen.

Yeah, I mean, we love what we do. I think we don’t take a lot of it too seriously. We just go in there, and we’re serious about making a record but at the end of the day it’s just rock & roll. I don’t lose sleep over this thing, it’s kind of silly. But we have a lot of the same interests and we really are like brothers. So I think it’s communication. We talk it out if someone is in a bad mood or something and we don’t have a problem saying, “Hey, what’s going on with you? What’s the deal?” 

I talk to guitar players and bass players and they are always chasing something musically, like tone. What are you after?

I don’t know. Like there’s always a musician’s bucket list but I’m kind of over all the technical stuff. I could care less about stuff like guitars or tones or amps and pedals. I think fifteen years ago I was like, I don’t care as long as it sounds good (laughs). But I think mine is more I just want to go places. I think for me it’s more travel, touring. We’ve never played South America. I’ve been to Russia but we’ve never played Eastern Europe, the Mediterranean. So yeah, I think for me it’s more about going places.

What was the first song you obsessed over as a kid?

Well, as a kid, my dad was always into rock, a little country, and I used to listen to my dad play music so it definitely started there probably. Like my dad would play music at home, he had a band and he always played so loud. As a kid I used to hate it. I used to go to bed at 7:30 or something like that and my dad would have band practice and was so loud and the house would stink like smoke and beer and the next morning be like, ewwww (laughs). But yeah, we used to play rock & roll, anything from Elton John to CCR to Van Halen, Beatles, stuff like that.

Which one of your songs is the epitome of a Theory love song?

There’s a couple that we don’t play live that we get all the time, so I would say “Easy To Love You.” A ton of fans say this is their wedding song; or “Wait For Me.” A lot of people ask me, “Will you play ‘Wait For Me’ tonight?” “No” (laughs)

Why don’t you play it?

I don’t know. I mean, we can. There’s no reason we can’t. I think sometimes it’s just the time. We have so many songs, if we throw in one of those we have to take out something else.

You still don’t play “Love Is Hell” either

That’s a good one, that’s a fun one. We’ll have to start sneaking in sleepers. Sneak in a different song every night. That might be kind of cool to do.

Do you know where your ancestral roots are?

Yeah, so Connolly is from like a rural farming area in Ireland. I think it’s called the Monaghan area. I went over to Ireland and found our family crest and there’s this great company called Aran, a sweater company. They have certain ways of sewing so you can get sweaters sewn a certain way. I don’t know how it works but that’s my background (laughs).

So what is the rest of your year looking like? 

Lots of touring. We have the Canadian tour and then we have shows over the summer, no tours just one-offs and state fairs and festivals and stuff like that. Then we go overseas to the UK and Europe and then in October we’re going to do another American co-headlining tour with Skillet, the Rock Resurrection Tour Part II. I don’t know when those tickets are going on sale but I assume probably in the next couple of months. So yeah, a busy year of touring and I’m looking forward to all of it. It’s going to be great.

Band portrait by Jimmy Fontaine; live photo by Leslie Michele Derrough