Even if artists start with a particular band on their journey in the rock scene, there are always other opportunities to follow. For some, it is the best decision to bop around and try new things to figure out what kind of artist they want to become, whether they want to stay or leave. For some, on the other hand, it is only a brief moment of dipping their toes into another band and immediately realizing that their original band was always their calling in the industry.
As artists try to find the right path for themselves, they sometimes regret their decisions, whether it’s an association with a particular band that doesn’t represent them or the albums and tracks they wrote that would have been better for their original band. In this case, frontman Gavin Rossdale shared one of his regrets about an Institute album that should have been a Bush album in the first place.
Gavin Rossdale is not known for his scream or belts, but he embraced a heavier singing style in Bush’s latest record. It also presented a heavier side of the band, showing itself in the riffs. “So we’d often play songs like ‘Loneliness Is a Killer’ from 2014’s ‘Man On the Run’ or ‘Disease of the Dancing Cats’ from 1999’s ‘The Science of Things,'” said Rossdale to Guitar World about the tracks he would deliberately pick to show off the heavy riffs and get the audiences attention.
Although the singer doesn’t choose to regret any of his choices anymore, there was a time when all he did was regret a body of work that should have been under Bush’s name. He said, “I don’t believe in regrets. F*ck regrets. I don’t believe in them. There was a time in my life when I did, and it just caused pain. There’s no function for regret.”
He continued, “When I made that Institute record in 2005, I had regret because it probably should have been a Bush album.” The Institute record ‘Distort Yourself‘ that came out in 2005 was Rossdale’s passion project. After Bush went on a hiatus after their ‘Golden State’ studio album, Rossdale focused on that body of work that made it to the charts and gained recognition by fans with powerful guitar riffs that captured the attention of many. However, the band released only one album and went on a hiatus indefinitely, and after several years Bush decided to reunite again.
“I missed playing those old songs,” shared Rossdale about the heavy songs from Bush’s catalog, which is why he decided to bring the sound back with their latest album. “Ultimately, I just decided to go for it and bring the band back. This album feels like Bush 2.0, 3.0, 16.0, or whatever you want to call it. The music feels very vital.”
Rossdale has turned his regret into an album that revitalized Bush into a more modern-sounding band. So, with the new album and the tour with Alice In Chains, the frontman is more comfortable showing off the band’s exploratory side instead of relying only on the greatest hits from their albums, which is a refreshing decision he made.
