There was a great deal of confusion, admits Todd, but it never really bothered him. Besides, he was doing his own thing at the time, making a film. "But there was never any question with us about the future of Age of Electric," he insists, especially since the band had signed a deal with Mercury and Universal prior to Limblifter taking off. "We knew we had to deliver an Age of Electric record. There was no question that we would all end up in the same room together putting songs together."
Ryan confirms that he and drummer Kurt always knew where their hearts were. "Everybody took a break and got some air, you know," says the guitarist. "I think it helped us a lot. A lot of people have never seen Age of Electric. It has a lot to do with the fact that we've always been an independent band. We were always doing our own records, and we've never actually had a full record come out that was on a real label."
Make A Pest A Pet, AOE's fifth record, is being released silmultaneously on Universal in Canada and Mercury in the US. "We signed to Mercury first," Ryan explains, "but we were always talking to Universal in Canada. We wanted to stay involved here because we did all the work in Canada. We signed to Mercury in the US, and we said we wanted to keep Canada free because Universal really likes us, and they were really cool about it. I think if any label in Canada would really work for us, it's them. To the Americans, it's like there's as many people in New York state as there are in Canada, so they didn't care."
John says there was a much more tangible reason to keep the home market distinct. "We felt like we developed this market on our own," says the bass player. "Nobody really helped us. So we figured we do a licensing deal with Universal. Why should we give it all away? The bottom line is that if you have a record deal in the US, you'll probably never recoup. So this is a way for us to make money in Canada."
The band operates their own God's Teeth Ethel Records, named after the Kerns' grandmother, Ethel. ("Grandpa wasn't allowed to swear in the house," reveals Todd. "So if he hits his knee or something he'd scream 'God's Teeth, Ethel!' because he couldn't curse out loud.") Unlike Sloan, who also have their own label, murderecords, Age of Electric aren't too eager to become label bosses for other artists. "We have so much stuff to do that we can't sign other bands," confesses Ryan. "Jay (Ferguson) in Sloan spends a lot of time doing stuff for murderecorders. It would take one of us all our time to be doing that. You don't want to rip off bands. I mean, we could of released Bloody Chicletts (now on BMG Music), but the thing is none of us have enough time to work on it, and it would have been a ripoff to them."
Keeping control over their own career is more than enough trouble for Age of Electric. Todd, a showman if their ever was one, disdains the frontman-as-rock-god approach to marketing in favour of four-way band solidarity. "A lot of people will see band photos and wonder why John or Ryan is our front," he says. "I've never really thought that just because you're the singer that everyone has to stand behind you, like it's the law of rock & roll or something. I just don't see it that way. With this album, I think the label's been trying to 'Gavin Rossdale' it up by sticking me out front. I'm not interested in it. I love to sing and play music - that's what it's all about to me. It doesn't matter if I'm perceived as the hired kid with the cheek bones or if someone thinks I'm a musical genius."
While Limblifter were busy lifting limbs, Todd starred in independent film-maker Kirstin Clarkson's feature, Horsey, in which he plays a junkie. "I was walking down the street and somebody said to me 'Hey, you've got black hair and you're skinny and pale,'" he recalls. "They didn't even know that I was in a band." The acting thing, he says, kind of fell into his lap and tapped into a whole other side of himself that he didn't really realize was there. "It gave me a whole new perspective on music and myself as a performer. As an actor, your job is to go out there and do it really well - actors rarely ever write their own lines. With me it was, well, if I haven't written these lyrics then I have to go out and sell them as if I did. I'd hate to think of myself as some kind of actor on stage singing music."
Writing Make A Pest A Pet was very much a collective effort, Todd says, and he is forthcoming with praise for the quality of his bandmates' new compositions. "Regardless of who writes the song, the creative input by all four members is definitely there," he says, "especially in terms of production. That's why we always have a production credit for the band. There're three other members who I trust more than any other outside producer. Ryan tends to write in a direction that all four of us feel comfortable in. It just so happens that Ryan manages to come up with songs that sound like the Age of Electric."
Ryan confirms this, but adds, "we all wrote together in all different ways on this record. We spent a year writing and figuring out who we were as a band, rehearsing all the time. I'd bring a lot of songs and then maybe somebody else would bring a song, or Todd and John would have something."
Todd reckons he was involved with probably half the songs on the record, including 'Mad at the World', 'My Mistake', and 'I Don't Mind', while brother John wrote the music for 'Unity or Grenadine'. All agree that it's the teamwork that makes Age of Electric stick it out. "I know that when all guns are firing, it's definitely a lot stronger," says the singer. "It's always better when all four of us are working just as hard. That's what we really focused on with this record. Regardless of who wrote the song, it was just a matter of really getting in and making it work."
Because of all the work they've done, this brother act isn't ready to give up control to just anybody. "When it's your brothers," says Todd, "you just don't need to talk about some things. It's like 'uh-huh'. No words spoken. It makes it a lot easier in some ways, and some ways it's a lot harder. Owning our own label as we do, we control everything, so nothing gets by without us seeing it and having a discussion about it. We had taken so much control over our career that it seems wrong to just hand it off to someone else. This way if we make mistakes - and we do make mistakes - at least we have no one to blame but ourselves."