At 22, Vacaville, Calif., native Tobin Esperance has more life experiences under his belt than many guys twice his age. He joined Papa Roach as their bass player when he was 13 years old, and has spent almost 10 years dedicating himself to making the band a success. During a formative period when he could have easily been led astray by the temptations and vices that call out to so many young men, Esperance didn't waver in pursuit of his goal. He was lucky enough to have vocalist Jacoby Shaddix, guitarist Jerry Horton and drummer David Buckner with him, as all three shared his determination.
    "We're one of those bands with a work ethic, and we treat people the way we want to be treated," Esperance says. "We came from nowhere, there was no scene, and we started a scene in our small hometown. You've got to do it yourself and make it happen for many years and still try to maintain that hunger and passion. We all grew up together and came from nothing. It wasn't like the Los Angeles music scene, where people are hired and fired and hook up along the way."
    Prior to being signed by DreamWorks Records, P-Roach worked diligently at carving a name for themselves by gigging relentlessly and releasing four independent albums. Their major-label debut, Infest, sold 3 million copies, paving the way for their latest release, lovehatetragedy. Along the way, Papa Roach made the transition from the insular world of playing music to the reality of the business of music.
    "It's like, when you start off, you're just doing things to play and jam and have a good time," says Esperance. "Then we saw that we could make a career out of doing what we love, get paid for it and travel the world. You have to learn the business side, and it's stressful because it's a game you have to play right to survive. You have to have people watch your back. I try to concentrate on the music, but if you want to strive for longevity, you've got to play your cards right. Time will tell.
    "I'm ready, always ready, to rock. I've got ideas in my head and they're backed up like stored memory. Fortunately, I have a lifetime ahead of me; I want to keep it going. I'm the youngest one in the band; they were 16, 17, 18 when we got together. This is my life, my passion. I eat, sleep and breathe music. I'm just getting started and it's trying to understand and see and hear things in a different way, a new beginning."
    After two years of nonstop touring, Esperance admits that the band needed a break. "We came home from the tour beat from this demon hell ride and we needed to take time," he says. Instead, they only had a couple of weeks, and "only by accident. We had to cancel the last leg of our headlining tour because Dave had to see a doctor and get therapy for his wrists. So it was an excuse to go home, take a breather and collect ourselves.
    "I like being on the road, but when I have a bad day and get tired, I want to go home, and when I'm home, I want to be on the road. Now that we all have families and all that, we try to balance things. It's a love/hate relationship with [touring], but I'm not complaining, because I love it for the hour or whatever time we're allotted onstage. We spend most of the day in 'hurry up and wait' mode, and I go put down ideas."
    The majority of lovehatetragedy was written while the band was on the Ozzfest tour. "We were fortunate enough to have a second bus with a Pro Tools rig and that helped to stimulate the creative flow," says Esperance. "Then some stuff came naturally during pre-production. We plan to do it that way again on this tour—have a second bus with Pro Tools." The band went into the studio during the latter part of 2001 with producer Brendan O'Brien, cut 17 songs, selected 13, and 55 days later they had a new album. "We try to get an overall vibe," Esperance says, "and select songs that fit together and maintain the dynamic to capture all the different elements. We had a lot of good songs to choose from and we held a couple for the next record. The Pixies cover ["Gouge Away"] is an added bonus.
    "We weren't pressured during writing or recording. We just got into the creative flow on tape and got the ideas out. We were all on the same page and the ideas came together. Brendan knows his stuff and keeps the pace going, so we didn't overanalyze. We just got the most natural, organic, powerful tones we could. The way this album came together, the cover photo represents our rebirth, kind of like we're looking at the world through an open mind, like a newborn baby."
    While instantly recognizable as Papa Roach, lovehatetragedy represents a leap forward for the band as they ease away from rap overtones and concentrate on bringing out their diverse musical influences. Shaddix does a lot more actual singing on the disc, and he's backed by fuller melody lines and complex rhythms.
    "It was definitely a natural progression," says Esperance of the new album, which he describes as less polished and more raw than Infest, "but it was also constant. Coby wanted to become more challenging as a singer, more melodic, because it adds more mood and emotion and broadens our range, so instead of screaming and rapping, like on the last album—if you listen to every album we've done, we've always evolved and changed and tried new things. With Infest, people said we were another rap-metal band, but that's limiting; we're much more than that. We've always had straight-up rock and roll, a rhythm that's
groove-oriented and melodic. We definitely make emotional, aggressive music, and we continue to change because we never plan on making the same record twice."
    "When we first came out, we didn't expect anything—the success or the record taking off. It exploded, and so we got a strong roller coaster ride that we enjoyed, and we tried to take control the best we could. Now we expect things. The pressure is on to live up to expectations, and the creative challenge is to try to emulate [the new album] onstage and try to get the sounds right. It never sounds the same onstage as on the record, but that's the difference between live and studio. They're two totally different things. We try not to stress over pressure. We just write good songs and do a good show. But we have to always top ourselves and continue to try to progress and do things and have a good time."