Fresh off the recent premiere of their new single “New Ways” in NO ECHO, Miami based post hardcore tinged alt rockers THROUGH SAND are back with great new single “Grapevine”, which we’re stoked to give you with a special commentary from the band. Spiced up by artwork by Jeffy Scott (Lucky Bird Tattoo – Annapolis, MD) and animation by Thomas Crawford (Hack Frame Media), the video can be seen above. Check it out, see a bunch of interesting insights below and scroll down to see THROUGH SANDS’ special list of Songs to Write Songs to!
Formed in 2016 and inspired by the late 90’s alt-rock bands like Hum and Far, THROUGH SAND previously self released two EP’s and features ex-members of Gouge Away and Shai Hulud. The band will release their debut 4-tracker on tape on February 19th, 2021.
“Grapevine was the last song we wrote and was intentionally written to be a big, fun, sonic antidote to the more somber tone that threaded the other songs together.” – says bassist Peter Allen. “A few years prior, my friends Jason Perez and Eric Verporter (ex-Centuries) showed me some demos for a project they’d worked on. There was one song with a cartoonishly huge riff in it that replayed in my head like a broken jukebox…it sounded like a herd of angry rhinoceros (rhinoceroses? rhinoceri?) colliding at full speed with a second herd of larger, angrier rhinoceros. I already had a history of asking friends to “borrow” riffs from their unreleased demos (Chad is still getting a yearly penny royalty for the riff he let me use in a previous band) so I was thrilled when Eric gave me his blessing to use it for the bridge, and even more psyched when he heard it and gave his seal of approval.”
Peter says that for the lyrics, Chad wrote what became the final version of the song.
π»ππ ππ¦ππππ π‘πππ π πππ‘π‘ππ πππ‘ π‘π ππππ€ ππ ππ ππ’π‘ πΌ ππππ ππ πππ£π π€ππ‘β π‘βπ π€ππ¦ βπ ππ₯ππππ π ππ π ππππππ’π πππππππ ππ π πππππ π πππ βπππ π€ππ‘βππ’π‘ πππππππ π‘ππ πππ πππ‘π πππ‘βππ.
“Juxtaposing that kind of vulnerability against a crushingly heavy backdrop made perfect sense to me as a fan of hardcore bands that often had an “open diary” approach to lyrics.”
“Once we finished the song it went months without a name, and while I can’t remember the jokey working title that we kept threatening to use permanently, I offered up “Grapevine” and it fit perfectly; it wouldn’t allow a listener to have a preconceived notion about the song’s sound, and it summed up the personal experiences described in the lyrics without telegraphing them either.” – concludes Peter.
“Vocally, the song came together quickly in comparison to the rest of the songs I got tasked to write; the chorus melody was locked in after hearing the demo for the first time.” – elabroates vocalist and guitarist Chad Kishick.
“I tend to get attached to specific vowel sounds for melodies, which forces me into words and phrases that might not fit the theme I’m writing to. Thankfully, that wasnβt the case here; the first ideas I wrote out fit the exact tone we were looking for.”
πβπ ππ¦ππππ ππππππ π π‘βπ ππππ‘ππππ π‘βππ‘ π π‘ππ ππππ ππππππ ππ π’πππππ’ππ‘ππ πππππππ βππ πππ/ππ πππππ‘ππππ βππ.
“Specifically, the guilt that results from taking action, and the envy of wishing you too, could care less. Most of the lyrics that Peter and I write could be labeled from an outside perspective as caring too much about a particular subject or situation, but during a time when I hope that everyone would care more about the world and people around them, we’re happy to take that label.”
Continued below. Scroll down to see the band’s special Songs to Write Songs to!
Grapevine // Lyrics
Tell me when you know
Break the glass this time
Offer up today
For the end is such a shameCollapse to let you walk away
Guilt and envy
I couldnβt decide which hold to breakCouple years gone by
Another change with the times
Keep your judgement locked up tight
Verity wonβt corrode your mind
You wonβt take the blame
Buried up under your mistakesCollapse to let you walk away
Guilt and envy
I couldnβt decide which hold to break
Spotify Playlist – Songs to Write Songs to
Peter and Chad recently put together a playlist of songs that they listened to during the writing of the New Ways, 4-song tape, as well as the other songs recorded during that session. Here are a few of those songs.
Tracy Bonham – Tell It To The Sky
I remember hearing this album all the time when it came out and was transfixed by how raw and powerful the sounds were, specifically the chord progressions. The 90’s alt-rock sound has this awesome quality where the songs are often written in this gorgeously ugly space between major and minor keys, never quite being one or the other, where a major chord can elicit sadness and a minor chord can feel joyous. Tracy Bonham is such a force of nature throughout this record and though she had bigger singles that charted, this song was always my favorite. – PA
I first heard Far from their cover of Jawbox’s Savory, which looking back, feels like everyone had their own rendition of in the late 90’s. Mother Mary, Waiting for Sunday and In 2 Again are all all-time greats of this era, and they’re all on this one record, but I always go back to this track for being such a great opener. I love how it feels like its constantly on the edge of breaking into a massive chorus, just to keep that tension with this dizzying, overly simplistic chorus that just kept building. The ending releases that tension in the most straight-forward, heavy alt-rock type of way, and I’m all for it. – CK
Poison the Well – Apathy is a Cold Body
These guys were the hometown heroes that made it out of the swamp. You Come Before You totally rewired my teenage guitar-playing brain forever, and this song’s chorus will still make me tear up under the right circumstances (read: most of the time). Geoff Moreira already had one of the best voices in the history of hardcore and heavy music and then ran up the score on everyone in the game when he started singing melodically. Musically, Ryan Primack’s approach to songwriting has always been inventive and powerful, and I don’t think any other guitar player has been a bigger influence on how I play guitar or write songs. – PA
Barkmarket is THE perfect rock band. Period. It wasnβt enough that they had the chops, the insane vocal range, and the thickest grooves across every track on L Ron, but to top it off, Dave Sardy’s production is god-tier. The guitar tones here are dripping with grit, and every drum session I’ve ever been involved in starts with comparing the snare tone to the holy grail that was tracked on this record. I could go on, but I’m gonna go listen to this record now instead. – CK
While we certainly sound nothing like them, Mew’s “And the Glass-Handed Kites” had a massive impact on the way I think about, write, and listen to music. The big stadium-like sounds were kind of a faux pas for the part of me that was too punk to enjoy a big production, but they won me over in no time. Their use of syncopation and off-kilter rhythms, combined with a refusal to be any kind of predictable, instantly made them an all-time favorite. The feeling I get when the chorus hits is the feeling I strive to recreate for other people whenever I write songs. – PA
This song is such a great end of playlist/record, “closing up shop” type song. If I’m being honest, it’s barely a complete song; its sounds as if they tracked a demo, added a guitar layer or two and some vocals, but the authenticity of that approach is what keeps me coming back. Damien Moyal has a polarizing voice and vocal style, but I absolutely love it, so much so that we asked him to sing on our song “New Ways”, and we’re very thankful that he obliged us. – CK
