Nevertel guide us track by track through their latest album ‘Start Again’, out now via Epitaph Records.
Start Again (Interlude)
‘Start Again’ is sort of a concept record about the process of restarting and wiping the slate clean. The album starts the title track with the simple question, “Am broken ‘cause I can’t start again?” The record asks that question as it dives into stories and themes that show an awareness of issues and the need for change.
This song was originally named “criminal” before we wrote the song that became “Criminal” in Memphis with David Cowell. The demo of “Start Again (Prelude)” shared similar themes to “Criminal” and felt like the perfect somber opener to what is arguably the most energetic and catchy track on the record.
Criminal
From the moment we wrote this song, we knew it had to be the first song on the record. It felt so energetic and exciting. Unlike any song we’ve written previously. We wanted to come out swinging with what we thought was one of the best songs on the record right out the gate. “Criminal” explores a time where I lost control of who I was and was struggling to hold onto who I used to be. It’s a glimpse into how stress, anxiety, and unresolved feelings can change a person over time, making them act in ways they never expected and turning them into someone they don’t recognize.
This song was written in Memphis, TN with producer Dave Cowell. At the start of the session, we knew we wanted something energetic and upbeat as at this point the record was mostly mid tempo songs. Criminal was the second idea we started and it was a chorus idea Dave had been sitting on for quite some time. He sang it for us with an acoustic guitar and after me & Raul heard it, we knew we had to start working on it. After we finished it, it basically served as the focus track that we would build the rest of the record around. We wrote it in just two days while we watched Dragon Ball Z the whole time.
Did It All
An idea can be hard to kill once given life. We wrote this song about rumors and how they can take on a life of their own once they’re spread. No matter how untrue or half true some of the things people say about you might be, you may as well have done it all because few ever seek the truth. You have to make peace with the fact that not everyone is going to like you and some people might believe some things about you aren’t true, and that’s okay.
We wrote this song ourselves in Raul’s studio in Tampa, FL. After doing so many song writing sessions with other artists and feeling inspired, we wanted to take a crack at writing something with just the 3 of us like how we used to before we started doing co-writes. We wanted to put ourselves to the test and use all the skills and new tools we had acquired working with some of the best producers and songwriters we knew. This was the first song we worked on and it came together so quickly after we landed on the “did it all” tagline. It’s a song we wanted to make to prove we could still make a great song by ourselves at home like we used to, and I personally think we nailed it.
Break the Silence (Feat. Sleep Theory)
“Break The Silence” is a song about being fed up with constantly getting taken advantage of, stepped on, and overlooked. We all know or have known someone in life that has treated you like crap, made you feel small, or pushed you to the breaking point. When this happens with someone you love, it can be hard to address the problem out of fear you’ll be misunderstood or attacked. You end up in this internal war with yourself asking if it’s even worth it to talk about or not. But just like the song says, sometimes you gotta break the silence and put someone in their place to show them you can’t be cut down anymore. Sometimes the path with resistance is the only way forward, and it’s better to take it than to stay in silence.
This song was written immediately after finishing the instrumental for ‘Did It All’. We were listening to Meteora by Linkin Park and wanted a song that followed ‘Did It All’’s ending guitar pattern like With You did. Alec had the idea for a guitar riff and started playing the riff that starts the song. To help fully realize our vision and add the authentic Sleep Theory sound and polish we knew the song needed, we enlisted Sleep Theory’s co-writer/producer Dave Cowell. We flew to Memphis and met Cullen there to start working on the most ambitious song on the record. This song, unlike other tracks, did not flow as easily but once we landed on what became the song, everything was executed very quickly. It became a perfect mashup of both of our styles and personalities.
Good Intentions
Have you ever felt like you did all the wrong things, but for the right reasons? When I was rewatching the League of Legends show Arcane, I found myself empathizing more with the mad scientist Dr. Corin Reveck, aka Singed. While the character did unspeakable and horrific things that defied nature and his own morals, I felt like I understood why he did it. I found myself in some small way relating to that story. At one point or another, I feel like a lot of us can relate to acting out of character or doing things we normally wouldn’t to save or preserve something we love. However flawed our logic might be in hindsight, sometimes those emotions can feel so strong and can convince you to ignore even the biggest of warning signs.
This was the last song we wrote for the record and we wrote it in a day. We were in LA shooting music videos for Criminal and Some Things and hit up our good friend and collaborator on most of this record, Gianni Taylor. We had one day and we were able to write Good Intentions in those few hours we had. After recording and sending the song off to be mixed, Dan Lancaster actually had his own idea for the chorus and sent it back to us. We loved it so much that we used it instead and left in Dan’s background vocals to give it a different feel.
Sacrifice
This song is about learning what it costs to sometimes do the things you love. For us in this instance, it’s music. The life of a musician doesn’t come without its share of struggles, both internally and externally. It sometimes causes us to regularly burn out and lose relationships because of how much of yourself you have to give in order to do what you want. This track reflects on those things and the realization that comes with understanding sacrifice.
‘Sacrifice’ was the first song written and recorded for the record before we even knew it. Originally intended to be a single, we recorded this song back in 2023 at Cleartrack studios in Clearwater, FL. Writing and co-producing the track with our good friend Kenny Garcia definitely makes the song stick out a bit more than the others, especially in the dark trap and hip-hop heavy verses.
Losing Faith
Sometimes the person you’d die for wouldn’t even lift a finger to help you when it comes down to it. That’s what losing faith is about. It’s about realizing that some people in your life aren’t really there for you out of love, but instead out of self interest. Do the people in your life really have your back when things get tough? Or would they turn their back on you and watch you drown if it wasn’t in their best interest to help you?
We wrote this song at a beach house in Clearwater, FL with our good friend and collaborator Gianni Taylor. We came in with the instrumental ahead of time and wrote all of the vocals and a majority of the lyrics right there on the spot. As soon as we finished it that day, we knew we had another track and single for the record ready. We recorded this song at Cleartrack studios as well before we even had a clear idea of what the record would be at this point.
Miles Apart
We wrote ‘Miles Apart’ about that feeling you realize you’re so far away from the person you thought you were or wanted to be. A cognitive dissonance that cuts you to your core as you pick up the pieces of the broken mess you’ve made. It’s the moment of vulnerability you have when you finally reach the end of everything you’ve been running from. All the questions that had answers you didn’t want to hear or problems that had solutions you were too scared to face. It’s about knowing you need to change but not knowing where to start.
We wrote this song in Memphis, TN with co-producer David Cowell and collaborator Gianni Taylor. We were originally trying to make a closing song for the record. Something that felt power and wrapped up all the themes the record had into one song, and we accidentally stumbled onto ‘Miles Apart’. It started with a simple chord progression and some melodies. Then, as we went around the room and talked about our own experiences with change and growth, the song started to write itself. So much so that we were able to finish it that day.
Some Things
Sometimes love is letting go. This is the clearest message on the record and one that came from first hand experience. We had to ask ourselves when writing this song, what is love? Can it truly conquer all? Or sometimes is it more selfless to let something go when we know it’s no longer working the way it should? It’s about understanding yourself and being in tune with not only what’s best for you, but what’s best for others as well. Sometimes it’s not us. Love is understanding and caring for something so much that you put its needs above your own. And sometimes, love looks like letting go of what we can no longer hold.
We were in LA doing some songwriting sessions in 2023 trying to find some sort of direction for the record by working with a lot of different producers. We wrote ‘Some Things’ during one of those sessions on our first day working with Joshua Landry (Lo.Spirit). The song started out as a conversation about how we were feeling and what we wanted to talk about, then took shape as we sang those words with an acoustic guitar. After we laid down some chords with lyrics and melodies there, we brought it home where Raul produced the rest of the track and wrote the rest of the instrumentals.
ICON
“In a Circle Of Nothing.” ICON. Like many songs on this record, this song was written with our good friends and collaborators David Cowell and Gianni Taylor back in 2024. We came to the session with the instrumental for ICON already pretty much worked out, but we needed lyrics and melodies. With a clear direction for the album at this point and the themes at play, we wanted to dive deeper into the fear of failing. Wondering how much longer you can keep repeating the same cycle of redemption and failure before it’s too late for you? At first listen to the second verse, some might think we’re taking out our frustrations on someone else. Pointing the finger away from us and avoiding accountability. But the line just before the chorus reveals that the finger we’re pointing at is actually the person in the mirror: ourselves. With the record sort of being a cycle of starting over again and again, this song is the voice inside us asking “How long until I screw it all up again?”
Playground
Probably the most unexpected song on the record. This song is unlike anything on the record and that’s by design. We wrote ‘Playground’ back in 2022 just playing around with different styles and genres for fun. It’s a song about someone messing with your head. Treating it like their own personal playground, using the threads that tie you together to get whatever it is they want from you and wishing you knew how to stop it. When you really care about someone, it can blind you in a sense. Making it hard to see the manipulation and abuse for what it is. Even harder to walk away when you still hold space for them. This song is a desperate plea to them to just cut the strings and let it end.
Fun fact, the solo is actually me (Jeremy) singing. I just used my voice to mouth out what I thought the solo should sound like and how it should be played. We ended up trying to play it on guitar, but it just never hit the same level. So we kept the solo I did with my voice.
Starting Over
This was by far the hardest song on the entire record to finish. This song, originally titled “Infamous”, was written fresh after our record EVERYTHING IN MY MIND in early 2021. The demo came together very quickly, but it took us a very long time to land on a bridge/breakdown for the song and an even longer time to finish lyrics for this song. We knew the lyrics needed to be anthemic. “There’s fire in my blood; What am I becoming” was always the start of the chorus and the theme of the song even as early as 2021. But to put it simply, we were just stuck. It was this song that pushed us to collaborate with people outside the band and get us having fun again.
We met incredible collaborators like Gianni Taylor, Josh Landry, Dave Cowell, and Jon Lundin. All people that had their own unique approach to songwriting that made us rethink the way we work and gave us better tools. So it’s fitting when we came back to write this song for the last time, it was about Starting Over and wiping the slate clean. Being so sick of your old ways, tendencies, and bad habits that you burn it all down and start again. This song put us on the single most important journey of our career and taught us so much, so it’s very fitting that it helped inspire the name and theme of the rest of the record once we started putting the pieces together.
Ever After
Originally intended to be the first song of a record when we wrote it, ‘Ever After’ ended up being the perfect closing track to close the chapter that is ‘Start Again’. Written in Clearwater at a beach house with Gianni Taylor while watching The Batman trailer, this song is about life. How sometimes no matter what you do or how hard you try, you don’t get a “happy ever after”. Life isn’t a scene from the movies where the credits roll and all of your problems are solved. It can be viewed as a pessimistic way of life, but I actually think it can be a comforting thing as well. Sometimes, there is no “happy ever after”. But the story still goes on, and you have to learn to make peace with things not ending the way you wanted them too.
All of our lives have taken such insane twists and turns throughout the 4 years of making this record. There were times where I didn’t think I’d ever get my “happy ever after”. Moments where I felt burnt out and like the end of the world was at my doorstep. But just as the story wasn’t over for me, the song cuts abruptly before the word “after”, not resolving fully. This is so the cycle of the record can “start again”, just like we do when we feel like we’ve reached the end and there’s nowhere else to go. We just have to pick ourselves back up and start again. This song, this record is about the moments in life where we feel everything is falling down around us, we lose someone special, or we fail spectacularly at something we’ve worked so hard for. It may be the end for those things, but every end starts a new beginning full of endless possibilities. A fresh start and a chance to start again.
