The return of Chris Leone

(Credit: Mark R. Sullivan)

When the rockers in Wicker Hollow celebrated the release of their debut album, "Live Like You Know What You're Leaving," with a release party last year at the Starland Ballroom, they drew more than 800 fans to the Sayreville venue.

On Saturday (Dec. 20), the band will return to Starland to celebrate the release of its sophomore effort, "Wake-Up Call," and lead singer Chris Leone isn't intimidated by the band's draw from a year ago.

"We're trying to top that this time," he said.

Leone, the Howell-based rocker who first caught Jersey music fans' attention as the frontman of the pop-punk outfit the Youth Ahead, spoke with Metromix Jersey Shore about his history in the Shore music scene.

There seems to be a sort of Howell rock scene coming up, with bands like you guys and Status Green. Is that something you've been noticing?
Yeah. I think that there's always been a fair amount of bands in Howell/Freehold -- definitely some in Howell, but it seems, maybe within the last year or two, that a couple of us have really been rising. I mean, when I first started really playing out and putting out records, we were pretty much one of the only bands from Howell; there was nobody else yet. I mean, this was with previous bands I was in. But, within the last two years there's definitely a pretty healthy rock scene going on now.

You've been involved in a lot of local bands in recent years, like the Youth Ahead. How do you think Wicker Hollow differs from some of your other bands?
Well, the Youth Ahead was a huge part of my life. Between that and the band MatchMaker I was in after that, I was able to see the country and other parts of the world because the Youth Ahead had a run where we were doing incredible for a while. We were selling out Birch Hill, we were packing Starland Ballroom, we were doing things that nobody else was doing, but basically our time just kind of ran out; we only got so far with that. We got to the major labels with that, we got the interest, we got flown out, we got deals played around with, but we weren't able to seal the deal.

I think Wicker Hollow is just a more mature version and a little bit funner version of it. ... I know what it takes, I know what's got to happen in order to get to that spot and to get to the next spot after that. So I think, basically, the previous bands have opened the doors for something bigger.

Do you think your style as a writer and as a performer has evolved or matured over the years?
Yeah, absolutely, it's definitely matured, definitely evolved to the point where I have certain songs that I don't bring to the table because they don't fit. But then they're things that I never would have written before, whereas growing up (I was) just trying to write the most punk rock song or the fastest song or the most fun song. Now, it's just like coming up with the most heartfelt song in a mature way but also bringing the fun into it. It's basically this collaboration of things when I put a song together. I don't just (think), "Oh, this sounds cool," I put time into it.

Of everything your music has done for you so far, taking you to playing Starland, Warped Tour, touring -- what has been your peak moment so far or the moment you're the proudest of?
Our CD release for the first Wicker Hollow album was awesome, it really was. We did not expect that many people to come out and support. It was us, and we had four or five local bands open up for us. ... That was a big highlight for me. But, just for anything, playing Bamboozle in front of 26,000 people was insane.

I mean, I've had a lot of good runs. For all the local bands around here, even the ones that are doing really well, I can honestly say that I've done all of it already. If everything were to end for me right now, it wouldn't be a great thing, but there's no way I'd be able to say I didn't do anything. Pretty much, it's all been a highlight.

Yeah, there are a lot of bad parts, too. that every band runs into, but for Wicker Hollow, every single time we play, even when we feel like we did a bad job or it wasn't a good show, we just come out on top. People are buying our record, and we don't know what it is that we did that was right, but we're just gonna keep doing it.