Alexisonfire’s Wade MacNeil on Sobriety

IT IS ALL GOOD –

Aug. 10, 2024 – MacNeil said his own mindset on touring has shifted in recent years, after he entered a rehab program in early 2020 to address his alcohol and substance abuse issues. The guitarist said his life is profoundly different than it was five years ago.

“Life has very much expanded since I got clean,” he said. “Touring is much more vibrant … I think maybe at one point I thought I was really, really living but the world felt pretty small just because of what I was doing to myself,” he said.

“And now I travel and I go and ride motorcycles and meet people and like, really try and soak up as much possible culture everywhere I go. It’s pretty incredible and very, very different than the way it used to be.”

MacNeil detailed his experience getting clean on the 2021 self-titled debut album for his solo project Dooms Children and said he will release another album of deeply personal songs “relatively soon.”

“It’s pretty heavy putting yourself out there in that way … I don’t want to shy away from being forthright in my songwriting,” he said.

“I kind of am questioning why I want to do it again with another record but it’s hard to not write personal songs.”