When we sat down with Leisure Hour last November, they were still in the middle of it — dropping singles one by one, talking about Muncie like a liminal space, figuring out what it means to have a million views on Instagram and fifteen people at the show. Now “…and to think” is out in full, and the picture is complete. Three people from Muncie, Indiana made a record about the damage loved ones leave behind, released it in the most unconventional way possible, and somehow came out the other side nodding their heads going — yeah, we kinda rock.
“…and to think” is the second LP by Leisure Hour — Grace Dudas, Raegan Gordon, and Isaiah Neal — out now via Counter Intuitive Records. Eleven tracks of midwest emo and pop punk that sound like the middle of summer dropped into January. Bright melodic lines, clever guitars, lyrics that swing between funny and devastatingly honest. It’s an easy record to underestimate on first listen and a hard one to shake after three.
The backstory matters here. Their debut, “The Sunny Side”, didn’t land. At all. Isaiah Neal doesn’t sugarcoat it: “We put everything we had into our first record The Sunny Side and it failed miserably. It didn’t make sense to do that again.”
So they changed the approach entirely. Nine singles dropped over twelve months before the album came together. Neal admits the strategy sounds unusual: “We released …and to think with 9 singles over 12 months which is pretty whack, but it worked way better.” The songs were all recorded during the same era, so folding released tracks alongside new ones on the LP didn’t feel forced. “Now that they are all together we are very happy.”
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The tracklist runs from “Not Done Begging (Yet)” through to “Jenny“, passing through stuff like “If I Could Kill You (I Would)” — a title that does exactly what you’d expect — and “Ode to Muncie”, a love letter to their hometown. “Jobs”, “Validation”, “Chicago”, “Roku City” — each one pulls from a different corner of personal experience. The band describes the record as “a collection of our traumatic experiences played loud and fast.” Three writers, three sets of stories, one shared energy.
A key shift this time around: drummer Raegan Gordon stepped into writing and singing. Neal is blunt about the impact that had on everything.
“Raegan decided they wanted to start writing/singing songs for this record, and they are an INCREDIBLE musician who brings amazing material to the band and improves Grace and I’s material seven fold by both adding some inspirational competition and bettering our compositions.”
That internal push shows. The songwriting across “…and to think” feels more confident, more varied than what came before. Neal credits time on the road and their producer Gary Cioni — who also engineered and mixed the record alongside Steve Perrino — for showing them “how to be a band.” Jordan Vickers handled additional engineering and mixing, with Logan Schroeder adding extra guitar. Artwork and design came from Ethie.
“We listen to these songs hella more than our first record. We’re finally at a point where we can listen and nod our heads and say, ‘Huh, we kinda rock?'”
And the live thing — that’s not an afterthought, it’s the whole point. Leisure Hour toured “The Sunny Side” for over two years, playing roughly 200 shows behind a record only about 2,000 people ever heard. They describe themselves as “a very ‘band’ band” — the kind that exists primarily to play rooms and connect with whoever shows up.
“It means everything to take this record on the road,” Neal says. “‘…and to think’ is something we are proud of, and something we think can truly help people, and to be selfish, the only way we can really feel that is by playing these songs live.”
That’s the thing with this record — it processes grief, anger, regret, the whole mess that comes from people you love hurting you, and it does it without turning any of it into a brand. The freedom, as the band puts it, comes from telling those stories “as raw and honest as possible” while leaning into the sounds they fell in love with at fifteen. Midwest emo and pop punk as emotional infrastructure, not nostalgia.
Honestly surprising this one hasn’t broken wider yet. Eleven songs, all killer energy, smart writing, and enough heart to fill a van on a Tuesday night somewhere in Indiana.
“…and to think” is out now on Counter Intuitive Records. Vinyl and merch available at counterintuitiverecords.com.
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