Edge of Free is a modern day rock band produced by famed Alice and Chains producer Toby Wright. The band’s sound is described as Led Zeppelin with Chris Cornell singing. They have just recently put out their self titled debut, an album which mixes acoustic playing,heavy riffs and emotion and is a good breathe of fresh air in today’s rock scene. I was recently able to interview vocalist, Scott Sneddon on his band as well as the rock scene in general.
How would you describe your band’s sound?
I once heard us described as Zeppelin with Chris Cornell singing and I think I’ll roll with that. We come from a sorta Zeppelin, Bad Company, Queen style but a little heavier. Black Sabbath is one of my favorites. I used to call us Crosby, Stills and Nash mixed with Alice in Chains unplugged, but I love the Zep meets Chris Cornell one if I can live up to that idea I’d be a pretty happy camper.
Be a great person to be compared to. Sad what happened to him
Yeah. I got the text the morning I woke up in Nashville to prepare for a show and the first thing I thought was “This has to be a joke” since it was coming from Kevin our manager. I’m like “this isn’t very funny”. What a crushing blow it was, he was the last person to expect to have an issue and to find out it was suicide made it worse for me. I’ve been through depression, drug addiction all that. Half the reason why I dropped out of music was because of it. I always thought once you are past 30 it goes away, but no I see his death as a big red warning sign that once you got the disease it sticks with you. We lost the greatest voice of a generation.
Why did you decide to call your band Edge of Free?
Well I used to have a bit of a drinking problem and I used to just muse about the word free. You need things as a human so the concept of freedom is really bullshit. You listen to music, you get high, you go for bike rides, you meet girls, have relationships. Life in general seems to be this struggle to find freedom. That’s how I came up with the name since you are ironically being trapped and can never be a free being human.
I see your album is being produced by someone who has worked with big names such as Metallica. How were you able to get him?.
Toby also produced Jar of Flies which is a pretty acoustic record. The minute i heard his name I pulled out my record collection and that’s where I saw his name. We tested people with our track Higher. One of our friends suggested this guy who he said was perfect for us. His name was Toby Wright. Me and him had a good 2 hour conversation and that’s when I knew we had to use him. He had the right range to work with what we were going for. We sent him Higher to mix and his mix just blew us away.
What your thoughts on the state of rock today? Any bands you really like?
My favorite modern band is Temple of the Dog. I struggle to find good new bands nowadays. I don’t wanna mention names but to me it’s as bad as it was in the mid 80’s before GNR came and paved the way Soundgarden, Nirvana, Alice in Chains, bands that brought in heavy emotion. The 80’s were just getting so stupid with glam ballad after glam ballad and pop rock power chords and here comes these musicians from Seattle who say fuck that we are playing real rock and roll. And now we are in this similar state to the 80s. I feel we need another shift. Today’s music is like Mcdonald’s cheeseburger quality nowadays. Some bands out now like Rival Sons I can get behind but for the most part I tuned out and focus more on writing music that isn’t influenced by today’s trends. Nowadays, it seems like young people care more about pop and hip hop than rock and it’s cause nobody is doing anything that is real. We need more band’s whose sound is more organic. We have plenty of stuff out now that is ok but almost nothing is great.
