Ever since landing his dream gig as the vocalist of Saosin in 2004, Cove Reber knew he would have his work cut out for him. When former singer Anthony Green left the band to join Circa Survive, Reber was left with the task of winning over all of Anthony's die-hard devotees. Green, known for his larger-than-life stage presence and strong vocals, went on to work with the band Circa Survive, but left behind quite a few Saosin fans that weren't quite sure what to make of Reber's own performance style. Now with a string of dates at the Warped Tour under his belt and the band's self-titled full-length debut coming out on September 26, Reber may soon actually be shedding the title of "new guy." The latest album does contain a few songs that were performed in one incarnation or another in the Anthony Green era, but it also has its share of material where Reber acted as a main songwriter. Reber recently talked with Ultimate Guitar about how the new record was a personal and professional step forward for not only him, but for the entire band. 

Ultimate Guitar: When you first started with the band, I can imagine it must have been daunting trying to win over those who had been fans of Anthony. Cove: When I first started practicing with the band, I wasn't even in the band yet. When that happened, I was really nervous, as anybody would really be. At the same time, a day or two after our first practice, I was in the studio with them going over back recordings and old demos that the other singer had done. They didn't tell me until after I recorded that they were going to release it. So that made me more nervous! But as soon as I was in the band and it was set, I felt like, "Okay, they can't kick me out. I'm in the band." As soon as I got that confidence that, "Okay, this isn't like I'm still trying out. I'm actually part of the group" - it started to calm down a little bit.

Were you worried about the idea of replacing Anthony as a singer? Whenever you sing somebody else's songs, the way that I think of it is that you never sing as good as that person. Like guitar players never play a certain riff as good as the original guitar player. But when I met Anthony for the first time, he helped a little bit. Like on the first tour where it was like, "I'm not sure if I'm in the band yet." He just told me, "These songs are meant to be sung by you." I don't even know if he remembered that because he was kind of drunk that night! But after he said that, he kind of calmed me down. Right now, as soon as we were in the studio and we started touring again with Warped Tour and with AFI headlining, I feel so much more confident. These are my own songs now. This is my record. It's not like I'm singing somebody else's songs anymore.

Have you noticed a lot of diehard Anthony fans are now warming up to you as a vocalist? Yeah. Every time this question comes up, we pretty much always respond in the same way because we really want kids to know and understand. The way we look at it is that if you are an Anthony fan, listen to Translating The Name (the 2004 EP by Saosin with Anthony on vocals), listen to Circa Survive, listen to High and Driving, listen to Anthony's solo projects. Be an Anthony fan! That's great! That's awesome that you're an Anthony and you were a fan of the Anthony era. But it's no longer Anthony's band anymore. It's Saosin and then Anthony Green doing his own thing and his own side projects. And the band said, "Yeah, yeah. It wasn't like that. Half the time we didn't know if he was going to show up for the shows. We'd all arrive together and he lives with us, but he would just like meander off. We were just like, 'Okay, before we go onstage were just like is he gonna show up?" But now that we're a band and now that we have a Saosin that is written by all five members that play live, the confidence really has shot through the roof - and not with just me, but with everybody else in the band. I think people are noticing that more and more. If you read those site, kids are talking about my performance and our performance as a group saying, "Oh, wow! They look they're having way more fun now." If you watch any of the videos from the Anthony era, it's not like they were having fun. It's like they were stressed out playing. But kids have been coming up to me saying like, "Anthony who?" I take it as a compliment, but I don't really agree because I love Anthony as a dude and as an inspiration to me. But he and I are friends and we both wish the best for each other.

It sounds like you were already a huge fan of the band before joining Saosin. Had you met everybody in the band prior to auditioning? Basically what happened was I had never seen the band live. I was just fan that had never gotten to see them play. So I was really disappointed. But one day in my English class, a buddy of mine heard me singing "Seven Years." He was like, "You know the guy quit?" I think I said I had to go to the bathroom and I left. My house was right next to the school. I just ditched class. I went home to check online, and sure enough they had posted on the website that he had quit. This was like 6 months after he really did indeed quit. So I like started freaking out! I was like emailing everybody in the band, asking them questions. "You've got to hook me up! You've got to let me try out!" Apparently at that point in time, they were really sick of trying out people. They were, "Send in a demo." I was, "No, man! Just let me come try out!" And they were like, "No, send in a demo." So they gave me an address. I finally sent a demo in. They called me back after listening to the CD and were like, "Whoa, was that really you?" He kept asking me all these questions like, "Is it really you on that CD? Is it really you?" He was so like freaked out. He was freaked out that I was nervous to talk to him. He was like super paranoid. He called me and he was like, "We thought it was Anthony playing a joke on us! We just got off the phone with Anthony." He called Anthony saying like, "Why do you have to be such a prick sending us a demo?"

How did they finally realize that you would be the perfect replacement? So the day they called me up, they were like, "We're practicing tonight because we're going on Warped Tour in 2 weeks. We need you to come up tonight." And I'm like, "Am I in the band?" And they're like, "We're gonna try you out." So I go up - they're in Newport and I live in San Diego - and so it's like an hour drive. So I get up there to practice, and right as I get there, they're like finishing up practice. And I'm like, "What's going on?" Their old manager is outside and he's like, "The guys want to meet you and practice." So I walk in and they're like, "Oh, we're done. We just wanted to see how good-looking you were." I was like, "Are you being serious? I just went through all this gas? So I had to get up here just to be looked at?" They're like, "Yeah, pretty much." I was like, "Can we at least do like 1 song?" So they gave me like 1 song sort of to feel like part of the band kind of a deal, for my pleasure.

So from then on it was a done deal? They didn't say anything like, "You're in the band." But on the way home they called me back and they were like, "Hey, come up tomorrow and we really want to practice with you." So I was like, "All right. Cool." It was quite funny!

Are you writing most of the lyrics for the newer material now? The melody comes from both Chris and I on track 10 ("You're Not Alone"). Then on "Follow and Feel" I wrote like all of them, the melody and the lyrics and what not. But lyrics, I have the final say. Normally it was like a group effort between Chris and I, and then Beau sometimes. My favorite song on the record is number 8, "I Never Wanted To."

Wasn't "I Never Wanted To" sort of a newly recorded version of "No Angel"? Yeah, it used to be called "No Angel," then we called it "New Angel" because it was like this refined version of an old demo we both sang on. Then we refined it again and actually made a chorus to it and all that stuff. I had those lyrics, and Beau was like, "The song, it's not working for them." So I'm like, "We'll change it. You've got to do something now. We're recording the song tomorrow." And he came up with it, and I didn't like what actually made the record. But still I started tracking it. They're like, "Track it, track it. It's gonna work!" And I'm like, "No, it sucks! It's gonna suck!" You know, like all anal and overanalyzing everything. So finally it came together and that's my favorite song!

What was it like writing with the band, considering the rest of Saosin was used to working with Anthony? It was definitely a learning process because none of us really knew how to write with each other. So Beau would write something and then he would like wait for forever to show Chris. Chris would do the same thing. And when it was time to show each other, it was like, "Here. See it? Here, hold it." Then Chris would walk away with it. It was kind of like an art project. If Beau, he would create picture, it's like Chris would take the picture home and secretly draw on it. Then he would give it back and Beau would be like, "What's this? Where did all this come from?" That's just how it worked for the longest time. It took until 3 years literally to get to where we are right now and write a record like we did. We wouldn't have been able to do it had it not been for Howard (producer Howard Benson, who worked on the latest album), to be honest.

What specifically would Howard suggest or add to the recording process? He would only sit down with the drum track and the vocals. This is one thing I want everybody to know - the guitar players, if they think the guitar part sucks, they can take it out. They got to do whatever they wanted. They got to make whatever noise they wanted. If there was a riff in there that they played but Howard took out while he was working on the vocals, they could be like, "Yo, we want that riff back in there because we're going to be playing that stuff live." He worked with the arrangement of the drums and the tone and all that stuff. Then he went in and straightened the vocals with me. Howard really opened my mind up to when we would go in and do lyrics. I would come in with a sheet of lyrics and we would sit down together, just him and I. I was singing to him and he'd be like, "Okay, I don't like that. We've got to change it." He would kind of tidy it up and then he would send me over to the vocal booth. He helped me sing differently on different parts, and he made sure that we weren't selling out. He made sure we were doing everything that we wanted to.

Did he have influence in the songwriting? He made sure that we did what we wanted to do lyrically, that we weren't writing like a cheesy song. I'd say that "You're Not Alone" sounds like that cheesy song on the record. That was something that I wrote like really late at night. I was really stressed out. It was feeling that sense of being alone and that's what came out.

One of the things that makes Saosin so unique is the incredible use of harmonies. Did Howard help out a lot in the area or was that decided more by the band? Justin (Shekoski, guitarist) was like a huge of fan of harmonies beneath the main vocals, like when Jimmy Eat World did that a lot. During the process of the harmonies, Howard basically showed him, "No, that's not the way it should be." So that's why with a lot of the harmonies, I did. It was like a joint thing between Chris (Sorenson, bass player) and I and Howard. Howard did help a lot on that. There were like a lot of jazzy-type things that normally wouldn't be heard on our record basically. We came in with every harmony idea that's possible so that Howard didn't have to do it. But if he felt the need to like bring it up, he'd be like, "Okay, you guys are gonna do that." So we did a lot of high harmonies. We did a lot of harmonies beneath the main vocal. He wasn't stoked on it, but we did it anyway. Sometimes it even worked! Howard was an incredible help with that. And the cool thing about the harmonies is that over half of the harmonies on the CD were done by Beau and Justin.

I can imagine that your fans will probably appreciate that you're able to express that honestly. None of us our negative dudes. If you get to meet us and hang out with us, we're positive. So something that I've really picked up on was Beau (Burchell, guitarist) was like, "You've got to write song lyrics that are dark and stuff." I'm like, "No, dude. I'm not a dark dude. I want to write a good, positive record." Hearing Underoath put out like that new record and it's really positive, it made me really stoked. But at the same time, when we were writing the record My Chem (My Chemical Romance) was really huge and they had that "I'm Not Okay" song. I love the song. It's one of the best like alternative pop-rock songs that I've heard in a while because it's so catchy. I want when kids hear a song or see a song on TV, or like hear us on the radio like the do My Chemical Romance - should we ever get to be that huge - I want them to hear something that's positive and that's making a statement. You don't have to sit in a corner in your room after you get home from school and cry because you have no friends. You're wasting your time. You should be listening to your favorite record and getting happy and learning something about how to far better appreciate life. We've all been through that. I mean if I get emails from kids that say, "Hey, I was really bummed out. I just moved to like a new city and I'm a senior in high school and I have no friends. But "You're Not Alone" made me feel like I was a part of something." If they can say that to me someday or send me emails, that's the kind of impact that I want to make on kids. Ultimate-Guitar.Com © 2006