When gold-certified industrial metalcore band Motionless In White unveiled their new album “Decades“ last month, much of the focus went to the collaborative new single with Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor. However, those who some familiarity with 80s rock likely noticed a very familiar song title featured amid that record’s 14-song track listing.
It’s since been confirmed that the 12th track on that record, “Sunglasses At Night“, is indeed a cover of the 1983 hit single of the same name from Canadian new wave rocker Corey Hart. A newly shared conversation with Craig Reynolds (ex-Stray From The Path) conducted at this past weekend’s ‘Welcome To Rockville‘ festival in Daytona Beach, FL found Motionless In White vocalist Chris Motionless explain that choice.
At first joking about wearing his sunglasses indoors for this interview, Motionless stated [transcribed by theprp.com]:
“We did a cover on our new album coming out of the ‘Sunglasses At Night‘ song. So this is realiastically just my press tour for the cover, like who cares about the album? ‘Sunglasses At Night‘ cover; I gotta play the part.”
He continued:
“[It’s a] full-on cover… With covers, I know that it’s very divided and polarizing whether you stick to the original or do your whole new thing, and this is straight up for me. This is actually the first time I get to talk about it. I’ve been talking about a cover that I wanna do more than anything in the world for, like, 12, 13 years now. I’ve said it, but I’ve never said what the song was, so this is finally the song.
I’ve always wanted to do it. I thought, ‘This song is like… I feel like Motionless should do ‘Sunglasses At Night‘.’ And it started out as just a fun thing to try out doing, and then it just eventually made its way on the album. And it’s very much for me. And if you don’t like it, I don’t give a fuck.”
When asked if it was heavy at all, Chris replied:
“We brought the guitars and stuff in, like a little heavier. I mean, it’s heavier than the original, but it’s not like… there’s no breakdown or anything, you know?
As for where his love for that song came from, Chris responded, “I think it’s the ’80s icon song. It’s got all the synths. It’s got the huge hook, the slick ’80s swagger.” When Reynolds asked if the band have the synths and everything in their version as well, Chris replied, “Everything. All of it, yeah.” “Decades” will be out on July 17th via Roadrunner Records.
