Jeph Howard is beaming. Even over the phone, you can tell he is barely able to contain his excitement over The Used’s new album, Artwork [Reprise]. While Jeph understandably feels that “this is the best thing we’ve ever done”, he has set his sights even higher and looks at Artwork as “a new starting point for us. I want people to react to it as if they are hearing The Used for the very first time.”
While Artwork is undoubtedly a strong group effort, one cannot deny Jeph’s power in driving the songs as far as they’ll go. His playing is a combination of being brutal (Blood On My Hands, The Best Of Me), supportive (Kissing You Goodbye) and hook-filled (Empty With You, Meant To Die). Jeph utilizes a variety of overdriven textures throughout the album, courtesy of his AG 500, to bring out the intensity and nuances in vocalist Bert McCracken’s lyrics.
On a day off from touring, we had the pleasure to talk to Jeph about the Artwork album and how he crafts those raging bass tones!

How has the response been to the new album?
It’s more than we even expected. With this record, we wanted to make more of a sing-along – It’s a very anthem-y kind of record. Every single show, everybody sings along for the entire song and even on the older songs, it seems like it sparked something in everybody and it’s turned into a chant.

The album is very bold sonically.
There was a lot of experimenting with sounds… that’s what we tried to do because we wanted more of a live, dirty sound; more sitting down and thinking it out as a live band as opposed to us sitting in a studio and trying to come up with parts that meshed well together. We wanted it to be a more raw rock record.

You get a different bass tone on every track.
That Aguilar overdrive kicks ass (laughs)! I pretty much use it for the entire set on stage. I love that grind-y sound and it’s got enough bass to it - it’s the best overdrive I’ve ever used! The Aguilar rig was on the entire record.

Do you find that the distortion blends well with the guitars?
Oh yeah – it blends perfectly; I can’t believe it. It still has that bass to it so you can hear the bass part but since it has this grind-y overdrive, it makes the guitars sound so much bigger. And the sound really locks in with the drums so for me, it blends perfectly. I’ve also been using it on songs where I used to use clean tones. I’ve started moving this overdrive sound into it more and more like building up the choruses and just kind of making it a little bit bigger than normal, you know?

What Aguilar gear are you currently using?
The AG 500 head - two of those – the DB 750 and two DB 810’s.

Artwork is such a powerful album – everyone really shines on it.
We’re very lucky. Our band dynamic… each person just does what he does and we sort of drive each other.

You and Dan Whitesides (drums) are a force to be reckoned with!
He actually brought so much power to our band as far as “rock” because he’s more of a heavy-hitting rock drummer. Just bringing that into the band has changed our music dynamically. I think he’s pushed everyone in a way – he’s pushed me musically for sure; he’s one of my favorite drummers.

How was it getting used to a new drummer?
You know what? It wasn’t tough at all, it was very smooth and even writing feels easier for some reason. I just think our dynamic together makes the writing process easier and more compatible.

What are your plans for the near future?
We’re on a headlining tour right now, which we haven’t actually done in three years, so we’re really, really stoked on this tour! We’re out until just before Christmas and then well into 2010. Yeah, we’re feeling great!

Thanks for talking to us today Jeph and best of luck with the new album!

For more information on Jeph Howard and The Used, click the following: http://www.theused.net/ or http://www.myspace.com/theused
To follow the band on Twitter, click here: http://twitter.com/wearetheused