The Fray is a timeless band. Their soft, yet energetic, ballads attract fans of all ages, and their continued success has kept long-time listeners waiting for more.
The award-winning group is currently on tour with pop-rock group American Authors for their upcoming album, “Through the Years: The Best of The Fray,” to be released Nov. 16. The fall tour kicked off mid-October in Washington, and they will be playing at Boston’s Orpheum Theatre on Friday. It features three new songs in addition to everlasting classics.
Dave Welsh, guitarist for The Fray, told The Daily Free Press in a phone interview that his favorite part of this tour has been the intimate meet-and-greet sessions and “pretty theaters” at which they have been fortunate enough to play.
“It’s kind of putting an interesting lens on all of it right now,” Welsh said of meeting loyal fans. “It’s definitely making me appreciate some of it all in a greater context.”
Welsh spoke excitedly about the music on the forthcoming album, both old and new.
“We’re playing all three of the new songs on the greatest hits, and those are fun right now because it’s a 50/50 chance whether or not we’ll even play them correctly, so it’s actually kind of fun to play songs like that,” Welsh said. “Keeps you on your toes.”
One track from The Fray’s 2012 album “Scars & Stories” particularly speaks to Welsh. “Munich,” an upbeat ballad complemented by beautiful instrumentals, speaks to science, love and religion.
“Munich” was not originally on the fall 2016 tour set list, but Welsh explained that the group decided to trade it in for a different song at the beginning of the tour. He passionately described the “cinematic-y sounding” tunes and the feeling of reviving a song that “fell through the cracks a little bit” after “Scars & Stories.”
Evidently, the Grammy-nominated, Billboard Music Award-winning group has traveled down a long-lived, much-deserved path of success.
“I think it affected us quite a bit early on,” Welsh said of the group’s journey. “The challenge of making that second record was pretty heavy because I think we had the good fortune of making our first album under basically no pressure, in that it was way more successful than we thought, and so to follow that up.”
Now, Welsh said he believes that experience has led the band to “lessen the expectation side of things” in regard to how they view the reaction to the “Through the Years” album.
“I think we are all getting comfortable in our own skin, so to speak, in this environment,” he said. “[It] feels kind of good, like that we’ve maybe been doing it long enough where, like the Malcolm-Gladwell-10,000-Hours sort of situation, maybe we’re all finally getting there; we’re getting closer.”
Welsh also discussed his passions outside of the music industry. As the father of a 2-year-old son, he spends most of his free time occupied by family and cooking.
He further described that his family does not just support him in his cooking endeavors, but is a beacon of inspiration in his musical career.
“It sounds kind of cliché, but I mean, family will definitely keep you focused,” he said. “It’s good to have a baby to really emphasize putting food on the table.” Welsh stressed how privileged he feels to be living out his dreams with family by his side.
The group is relatively satisfied with the reaction to the approaching album so far, but Welsh said he believes the era of further greatest hits albums in the music industry is coming to a close.
“A ‘greatest hits’ is funny,” he said. “I think because [some fans] are relatively younger and they’ve grown up with music exclusively online, the greatest hits idea kind of goes over their heads a little bit. I think we might’ve had a slightly higher impact expectation for it, like, ‘Here we are, here’s our greatest hits,’ and people were like, ‘Yeah, cool, OK.’ Kids these days.”
With the excitement of a tour and the inevitable success of “Through the Years,” The Fray will be taking advantage of their holiday break following the tour to relax, enjoy time with their families and figure out what the future has in store.
“I think greatest hits is kind of a breath or a pause or something, and I don’t think any of us have any theories on what’s next, per se,” Welsh said. “We’re kind of like, trying to be old and wise and just experience this now, in the moment. We’ll see what happens.”
Great job. Very interesting and well written.