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For most bands, creating a debut album is a terrifying yet deeply exciting venture.
Tasked with making a definitive statement about yourselves, often there are no real expectations bearing down on you. An opportunity to experiment, working upon a blank slate and discovering new things about yourself and your creativity in the process, bringing that first full-length to life is sometimes the freest that musicians will ever feel.
The second album? Well, that’s an entirely different beast.
Philadelphia’s Sweet Pill couldn’t have anticipated a warmer welcome for their 2022 debut ‘Where The Heart Is’. A collection of powerful, stunningly crafted emo songs with a distinct melodic edge, it instantly resonated within the scene, capturing the complexities of healing and growing whilst the world around you falls apart.
Grabbing the attention of everyone from vocalist Zayna Youssef’s childhood hero Hayley Williams to fellow Philly pop-punk icons The Wonder Years, those ten songs sparked the beginning of a whirlwind journey. Playing shows across the world, sharing the stage with musicians they looked up to, and seeing fans connect to their music, it was more than Zayna could ever have dreamed. As the buzz settled though, one daunting question rang louder than ever in her mind… What next?
“We were stressed,” she starts, reflecting on the band’s headspace coming into album two.
“After ‘Where The Heart Is’ came out, we started touring immediately, and it was non-stop. We were so busy, and when we sat down to make a new record… I put so much pressure on myself. We achieved all of these cool things with album one, so how do we top that? It became this uphill battle of insecurity for me.”
That’s where the story of ‘Still There’s A Glow’ begins, an album forged from self-reflection, growth, and hard-fought determination. Burning it all down and rebuilding something meaningful from the flickering embers that remain, it’s a collection of songs that not only redefine their band from an outside perspective, but that have vastly reshaped how each of its five members see themselves. Proof that nothing worth having comes easy, in 2026, Sweet Pill are stepping into their most confident chapter yet.
THE SOUND
Writing during the briefest of spare moments found whilst on the road, Sweet Pill originally entered the studio with a batch of demos entirely different to those that would become the songs we hear on ‘Still There’s A Glow’.
Exhausted from a packed-out schedule and grappling with newfound expectations, a lot had changed for Zayna and her bandmates in such a short period of time. Having written the majority of ‘Where The Heart Is’ whilst graduating from college, the vocalist suddenly found herself approaching her thirties and creatively blocked for the first time. Repeatedly hitting a brick wall, a conversation took place which resulted in a fresh start. Scrapping all existing demos and writing as a five-piece for the first time, it marked a rediscovery of what their band truly is.
“We’re all different people, and a lot can happen in four years,” Zayna explains.
“This band started as a school project for me and Jayce [Williams, guitar], and when we were making ‘Where The Heart Is’ we had members coming and going. Going into album two though, we had a solid line-up with Sean [McCall, guitar], Ryan [Cullen, bass], and Chris [Kearney, drums]. When we were done touring, we knew we had to make an album, but none of us knew what we wanted it to sound like.”
The key to unlocking that realisation came from a conversation with The Wonder Years frontman Dan Campbell. Prior to the release of ‘Where The Heart Is’, Sweet Pill had next to no experience playing in front of an audience. Seeing their songs take on a new lease of life in the context of their live show, embracing the subtle shifts they would naturally make to maximise their impact, the band began to approach songwriting with a wholly fresh perspective.
“When we were on tour together, I remember Dan sitting down with me and saying, ‘When you start making new music, you’re gonna know which parts the crowd will chant’. That was in the back of my head when we were doing this record, and that’s how we ended up with ‘Slow Burn’, which is our circle pit song,” Zayna reflects.
“The music has changed though, and that’s because we’ve all changed. Jayce has matured in what he wants, Sean is writing these big anthemic parts, and both of them complement each other so well now. Chris has stepped it up too, and I didn’t even know that he could. There’s a song called ‘Holding On’ on the album where I just couldn’t believe that his hands could move like that.”
When you strip things right back to basics, what sits at the heart of Sweet Pill is five extremely talented musicians. Each with their own unique influences and quirks, ‘Still There’s A Glow’ sounds the way that it does because every one of them was given the chance to shine. Putting every lesson learnt on the road into practice and challenging themselves to be the best they could be, it’s a collaborative record in every sense, each track richly textured and bubbling with energy.
“Something that we leant into much more with these songs were the interplaying vocals between me and Sean,” Zayna explains.
“I love the dynamic of the two vocalists that bands like Tigers Jaw, The Anniversary and Lemuria have, and even bands like CHVRCHES. Sean brings something that I can’t bring to the table, and Ryan was singing more on this album, too. It reinforces the fact that Sweet Pill is the product of multiple voices. It’s never just about me; it’s about everybody making sure that every song sounds the best it can sound.”
THE LYRICS
Laden with references to fire, flames and destruction, the overarching theme of ‘Still There’s A Glow’ was decided upon before a single lyric was penned. Back in March 2024, the band were driving past Kings Cross station in London when Zayna told her bandmates about her idea for their next chapter. The following day, she shared a screenshot from her phone’s notes app to Twitter, which read the following:
‘The new album should be about themes of fire, melting, cooling off, being dimmed, hot hot anger, bursting, burning down, burnt out, extinguished, hot air, floating, energy, hot sand burning feet, seared, helplessness, giving in, impermanence, ashes.’
That direction had been set in stone before the band even hit the studio, but the album’s lyrics were one of the final pieces to come together. Largely forged within the pressure of their final two weeks of recording – with four songs actually written over the course of the last two days alone – it led to some of the most visceral lines ever to come from Zayna’s mind.
“The lyrics are exactly what I was feeling at the time. It’s anger, and it’s real,” she says.
“It’s been over a year since I started therapy, and I had so many unresolved feelings before. It’s amazing to look at yourself from a third person perspective, because there’s a lot of stuff that you just don’t admit to. I had a lot of admitting to do, but I also had to learn to be kind to myself.”
“There’s a lot of self-deprecation in this record, but overall, it feels pretty positive to me. As hard as something might get, and as close to hitting rock bottom as you feel, there’s always a path to get out of it. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, and no matter what happens there’s still that glow. With a glow, you can always start a fire again. Honestly, I think I needed to hear that more than anybody.”
THE COLLABORATORS
For Zayna and her bandmates, there’s a magic that can only come from working at The Gradwell House. Located approximately ten minutes from where the vocalist grew up in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, the recording studio is co-owned by audio wizards Matt Weber and Dave Downham.
Next door to a spot where the band could grab a refreshing water ice (a regional snack Zayna describes as “somewhere between a slushie and a snow cone”) whenever they pleased, it was there that ‘Still There’s A Glow’ came to life.
“It really does feel like Gradwell House has grown up with us,” Zayna smiles.
“They have been with us every step of the way, and both Matt and Dave are so patient with us. They care so much about having a great final product, and they really respect the local scene.”
Even without those two extra hands though, ‘Still There’s A Glow’ is easily the most collaborative project Sweet Pill have ever worked on. Their first release written fully as a group, and with their current line-up, the songs on this album are the product of all five members of the band, each of them adding their own unique touches along the way.
“What I love about this record is that it’s just the result of all of us being in a room together,” the vocalist says.
“We took a couple of secluded cabin trips during the writing process. I made sure there was a hot tub, and we just went and made noise there together for a week or two. It’s the sound of all of us writing together, which we’ve never really done before.”
THE ARTWORK
Whilst some musicians may treat artwork as somewhat of an afterthought, for Zayna it’s an integral part of an album’s story. Approaching established painter Kerry Dunn once again, the Philly-based artist created the dreamlike surrealist image of a burning house being sucked into a human mouth that now graces the album’s cover.
“I had just finished writing the lyrics in the studio, and it was the first time I had to really explain what I thought the album meant,” Zayna recalls.
“One of the lines that stuck out to Kerry was ‘My mouth is a torch’ from ‘Smoke Screen’, and he explained the idea of the image he had in mind. I could talk about that album art for hours, and I love how space-like and distressed it is.”
“To begin with, the rest of the band didn’t love it as much as I did. They didn’t think that the image looked like the album sounds,” she continues.
“I’m a graphic designer, and I make designs for people to use for their businesses. Usually, they have expectations based on other things they’ve seen. When you’ve never seen something before, you immediately label it as ‘weird’. It’s a different album cover, but eventually everyone else came around to it. When you have five people in a band, nobody’s opinion is wrong, you just have to talk it out.”
THE FUTURE
When we ask Zayna what the process of writing this album has taught her, her mind is taken back to a conversation she had with Mannequin Pussy’s Marisa “Missy” Dabice. Having watched the punk band tear up a live show, Zayna complemented Missy on her confidence as a performer, which led to her being asked a simple question: ‘What is the point of a Sweet Pill show?’
“I didn’t know, and I have been thinking about it ever since then,” Zayna reflects.
“With this album, I’ve come to some conclusions. Sweet Pill is for everybody. It’s not just music; it’s a place you can go to if you need it. When I was younger, I would spend months looking forward to a show. There weren’t any people like me at my school, so it meant so much to be in a room of others with similar interests, all being unapologetically themselves. I just wanted to be a part of that.”
“Sweet Pill really isn’t about reinventing anything, it’s about carrying that torch. It’s about creating a space where people see you and believe in you,” she finishes.
“I remember being younger and seeing how Hayley Williams dressed. That gave me the confidence to wear bright yellow skinny jeans in sixth grade and not care that people didn’t get it. With Sweet Pill, our job is to be as confident as we can be, and hopefully that inspires others. There’s nothing for us to change, we just have to continue to preach what’s come before us.”
