Last month we had the honor, privilege, and time of our life (pun intended) at the pop punk/emo/alternative rock festival that has taken the world by storm over the last three years – When We Were Young. The fest’s über-current presence in today’s music scene mixed with the appreciation-based nostalgia for the soundtrack of many of our youths is something we thoroughly enjoyed reporting on and something we are very, very, very thankful for.
Silverstein are not only celebrating 25 years as a band this year, but they are also en route to a monumental double album. Antibloom is set to release in February with Pink Moon coming later in 2025. As such, they are embarking on a 25 Years Of Noise Tour with special guests (and close friends of ours) Thursday. The tour will stop at Starland Ballroom on January 12 and The Paramount on January 15. It is a must-see. Silverstein were one of the most consistently great bands of the 2000s and are always dropping their best work. As they put their best foot forward with every release, it is clear they have never – and will never – phone it in. The new era is sure to be no exception.
The band played their classic record, Discovering The Waterfront, in full at this year’s When We Were Young Festival. They also played the record in sequential order so fans could really get the album experience. We had the incredible chance to talk with Shane Told, vocalist and songwriter of Silverstein, backstage in the midst of the alternative rock action.
How are you doing today, Shane?
I’m doing fantastic! I’m looking on your phone at all the different interviews, all the people you’ve talked to – New Found Glory, you just talked to?
Yes, just a minute ago!
Fun fact about New Found Glory: the first tour bus I was ever on was New Found Glory’s tour bus. My friend was romantically connected to one of the members. She was my friend and we went on their bus. It was the first time I was ever on a big tour bus! This was 2001, maybe? They were just popping off. It was probably around the self-titled record, but I don’t think Sticks and Stones had come out yet. They were really nice to me. I gave them demos of Silverstein before we had anything going on. It’s funny. I wonder if they remember that!
They blew up 2001 and you blew up in 2003, two years after them.
I was just talking to Cyrus [Bolooki, New Found Glory drummer] a minute ago. It’s cool to see these full circle moments happen. Not just for people like you and your fandom that turns into being a professional interviewer, but for me, too! From being a fan to doing this, it’s all really really cool. All of it is awesome.
There’s so many pinch me moments, especially at festivals like this. You just announced a brand new double album, as well! How are you feeling?
Feeling really good! It’s been a long time in the making. We were working on the record at the beginning of the year. It’s been done for five months, both records. It’s exciting to finally have songs coming out, records announced, and we’re ready to go. It’s really exciting. We had so many songs and so many awesome songs that we decided to put it on two separate releases, which we’ve never done before.
First time! How did you determine what songs go on which record?
I’m a huge sequencing guy with records. Quiz me – ask me a track number on a record!
Any Silverstein record?
Any record.
Give me… track for of This is How The Wind Shifts.
[Without skipping a beat] That is, “This is How.” It goes, “Sand Amid The Roar,” “On Brave Mountains we Conquer,” “Massachusetts,” and then “This is How.” On that record, the songs are paired on each side; the songs form a bigger title when you connect side A to side B.
That’s incredible!
So… I’m a fucking nerd. When we were putting this record together we had two songs that were great closers. “Well, we have to make two records now!” We really thought about which songs made sense with the flow and what we were trying to do with each record. The truth is, we had 25 songs done, like done done, completed, lyrics and all, everything was ready. We just couldn’t part with 13 or 14 with them to make an 11 song record. We couldn’t do it. We cut a few of these, and we still cut a lot of great songs, but we wanted to do something different. That’s how it came to be!
Did you have two openers where you knew immediately, “These have to be openers!”
Yeah, we do. There was one song we knew right away needed to open the first record. Then for the second record, I’ve been working on this little [piece] for years. I’ve been trying to use this one piece that I feel a certain magic is in it. This should open the second record going into what I think is the best song of our career. The record coming out in February, Antibloom – I love it so much, but I think the second one [Pink Moon] is even better. I think the second one has some of the definitive songs of our career.
When you say that, I believe you. After over 20 years of Silverstein, one of my favorite tracks is “The Alter/Mary,” which came out in 2022.
Thank you! That’s important to us and thank you for noticing. A lot of bands, I hate to say this, their records get worse. Sometimes it gets embarrassing. It gets to the point where the bands don’t even play any of them from their records, they don’t even really support them. They put out a record to go on tour and play old stuff. We don’t want to be that band. We want to put out new music that we love and new music that our fans want us to play live. Of course, how that works, if you really focus on a record at a given moment then every time you tour those songs are still important over your career. If you’re only playing songs from your first and second record, all that shit gets lost in the shuffle.
At that point, why keep doing it? You know what I mean?
Yeah! Other bands even say to us, “Wow, I can’t believe how much new stuff you play,” or “Wow, your fans want to hear it?” Yeah! You have to keep supporting it. You have to keep making sure it’s good. One thing I did for this new record that I’ve never done before is work with co-writers. I’ve only written by myself in my own fucking bedroom. This time, I moved out here to Vegas. I’m only 4 hours from LA. Our manager is like, “Would you be down to go out to LA and work with some people?” At first I was like, “I don’t know.” Then I went and did a couple of sessions. “This is kind of awesome!” The people I’m working with, most of them are younger than me, most of them are fans of my band, they know what I’m trying to do, and they’ve got great ideas. Now all of the sudden I’m not in my room. “I’ve got an idea but I don’t know what to do next,” then I go watch a hockey game, play some pinball, next thing I know I’m like, “Eh, I don’t know.”
It’s collaborative.
It keeps you driven! I think that’s the reason why we have so many songs and great ideas. Usually it’s like, for this record maybe I have four or five solid ideas. The other guys have stuff like that, too. For this one, I had a whole record myself. That was really important.
Going back to what you said about when you play live, I remember seeing Silverstein in 2020 and being like, “Oh, they played ‘Burn it Down,’ but they didn’t play ‘Stop.’ On the new one, they played ‘Alter/Mary,’ but I’d love to hear ‘Our Song.'” You want fans to be hungry for it.
That’s something we tried to do! For the 2025 tour we’re doing next year, we’re going to play at least one song from every album. We’re going to have the fans vote on that. The fans can vote for one song per record and then we’re going to play that song. It’s going to be a definitive setlist of our whole career. For the other songs? It’s true. You said a great example. From A Beautiful Place to Drown, we were playing “Burn it Down” for a while, then we stopped playing that. Then we were playing “Bad Habits” for a while. We tried to switch up the songs from the eras. Some bands you see them – without naming names – and I could pretty much write you what they’re going to play and be 90% correct.
I do want to highlight, you’ve played boat shows before, including the headlining NYC Silverstein Boat concert. How was it?
It was cool. We’re going to do it again. You think of a show on a boat, you think of some luxury or something. This was literally a VFW hall on a boat. This was punk. It was rough – not the ocean. It was great, really intimate, and an absolute blast!
It’s like a mosh pit, but you have the waves back and forth, so it’s like a triple mosh pit.
Yeah! There were definitely a couple of times where the boat moved a little bit like, “Whoa!” I’m sure that happened in the pit. At one point the boat shifted quite dramatically; it had been pretty calm, and I watched the crowd… you know when you see the pit at a festival and people lean? It was like that, but boat-aided.
I’m thrilled to hear it went well!
It’s definitely something we want to do again! It was a beautiful night. The weather was perfect. It was like 70º [Chef’s kiss motion]. The boat takes you under the Brooklyn Bridge and then around the Statue of Liberty. Then it comes back. Just a sea cruise, baby!
Today, you’re playing Discovering the Waterfront in full. Tell me how you’re feeling about that and playing here at When We Were Young Festival?
We did it two years ago and it was awesome! It’s really cool that bands are doing albums. Albums are so important for that time. I still believe albums are important. Obviously a lot more things are single driven now. Back then you didn’t listen to a single on a playlist, you listened to the whole fucking CD. Nowadays you have a song on a playlist and right when the song’s over, you remember what the next song on the CD was. Today, that’s what will happen. I love that feeling and memory. I’m really excited for the format.
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