Exit - Sound In The Signals Interview
First, thanks for the interview.
Andrew: Of course! Thanks for having us.
TJ: Thanks you!
Will: Good to be here.
Can you tell me how you got together and formed the band for anyone who may be unfamiliar with the band?
TJ: Andrew, Will, and I were actually all friends for a long time before Exit - we grew up playing with each other’s bands in CT, until we were eventually working together on different music projects. I joined the band after “Familiar Ground” came out, and here we are.
Andrew: I’ve known Will & Teej for 10+ years now. I met them both when I was still in high school - we were all playing in different bands at the time. We always got along really well and I think we always had a lot of respect for each other, so coming together to make music as a group was an easy & natural decision for us.
Will: It’s legitimately been a decade that we’ve all been scheming together in some form…..TJ and I were touring together, then it was writing for Andrew’s project, then one of us would make a solo record and want input from the rest….or I’d be developing an act, and TJ would be in the backing band. It was just one thing after the other.
You took a break between your last album and this new song. What have you been up to since then? What sparked your return and new music?
Will: Exit has always been something organic that we do when it feels right. After the last record we were a little tired, but now it feels right.
TJ: We went into the studio a few months before the pandemic, so we had already gotten the ball rolling. But once everything went into lockdown, we all had a lot more time to play with different ideas and keep our minds occupied. It’s been a nice outlet.
Andrew: Yea I went about a year without writing music after we released “Too Little, Too Late”. I’m not sure if I have a great answer as to why that was, maybe it was fatigue or stress, but in a weird way taking some time away from it reminded me how much I love it. When I finally sat down and started working on music again during quarantine, I felt very excited and refreshed.
Will: Andrew made the mistake of texting TJ and I late one night, saying that he missed the band and making music together. When he woke up, I had already sent emails to book the studio time. Careful what you wish for!
Your new single “You’re On Your Way, Kid” was released recently. Can you tell me about writing and recording the song?
TJ: This song was actually the first we started working on in quarantine, and it just fell together really naturally. Andrew had most of the song written, so it was a lot of fun to fill in the blanks and write in the missing pieces.
Will: We did it all remotely. It’s crazy that records can be made that way now. We shot a whole video about the “making of” if you’re interested...
Andrew: This was the first song that started to shape up during quarantine. The instrumental came together pretty quickly, and from there it was a lot of sending files and ideas back and forth. We’ve always lived fairly far away from each other, so it definitely wasn’t the first time we wrote / recorded this way.
Why did you feel this was the best song to release after your hiatus?
TJ: It was one of the first songs we finished for this record and it just felt like a good reintroduction to who we are as a band. It had those classic “Exit" moments, while branching out a little from what we’ve done in the past.
Andrew: I think this is such a fun, loud, & energetic track, so i wanted it to be the first thing people heard from us after our break. Right off the bat, this is a song the three of us felt really excited about.
Will: It definitely doesn’t re-invent the wheel, but it does say “We’re back!” - and it came together quickly, so we put it out first. We’re saving the more experimental stuff for later.
You were recently featured on Spotify’s ‘Pop Punk’s Not Dead’ playlist. What does it mean to be featured on something like this and to be featured so highly?
Andrew: It’s very cool - the people at Spotify have always been great to us, ever since we put out our debut single “Familiar Ground”. It’s definitely a rewarding feeling seeing our band next to some of the bands that inspired us to get into music in the first place.
Will: Playlist culture is interesting….but that’s a conversation for another time. The short answer is that being on “Pop Punk’s Not Dead” is awesome. It’s good to know that fans of Blink-182 and New Found Glory also like our music…that was the goal.
TJ: We all grew up listening to, and playing pop punk- so to be featured alongside bands like MxPx and Bayside, with Travis Barker on the cover, is pretty fun to think about.
Are there plans for more songs or perhaps an EP or album soon? If so, what can fans expect?
TJ: I don’t know how much I’m allowed to say, but we have some plans for the coming months - so keep your eyes peeled.
Andrew: Absolutely, coming very soon…
Will: We have an album, so buckle your seat belts.
I really like your album ‘Too Little, Too Late”. Can you tell me a story from recording that album that you’ve never talked about before?
Will: There are so many stories….I remember that we went through 5 or 6 different iterations of artwork with multiple graphic designers before we ended up designing the cover ourselves. Also, at that point, we were making records semi-remotely. So sometimes we’d e-mail stems back and fourth, but I remember for “2005,” Andrew came into the studio in NYC. We worked out of an awesome spot in Union Square where bands like Fall Out Boy and Panic! had done demo work. I laid down a guitar part there.
Andrew: I essentially jumped right into working on that album after “Familiar Ground” came out. It was a fairly long process - I actually started writing it when I was still in college. I worked on that album in so many different rooms / studios, and got to collaborate with some really cool people. Teej started to write / sing on that record, and I think he's definitely a bright spot on the album.
TJ: I actually heard some of the demos for this record even before I was in the band. They had asked me to fill in on guitar for Emo Nite at Webster Hall, and after one practice we went to Chipotle for lunch. Andrew was playing his ideas for “Here I Go” in the car and I just remember feeling so excited about that song and secretly wanted to be a part of it. Some time after that, he asked me to help write a couple parts for that song that he was stuck on, and I eventually became part of the band.
Speaking of ‘Too Little, Too Late’, is there any chance that any of your discography will be pressed on vinyl in the future?
TJ: We’ve never really talked about it, but I would love that. I have a collection of records but have never actually had any of my music make it to vinyl. If I had my way, I’d vote yes!
Andrew: That would be very cool and is something we would love to do at some point in the future!
Will: To your point, that is probably the album we’d get pressed. We just need more people like you being vocal about it! I don’t know if this is a known thing, but there’s a big supply & demand issue in the US surrounding vinyl production. There aren't enough vinyl plants to service the resurgence. So when you order an LP online, for instance, it may have been scheduled for production a year prior.
Thanks for taking the time to answer the questions. Do you have anything else that you would like to add?
Andrew: Thank you so much for having us and to everyone who has supported us over the last few years. We’re very excited for the future!
Will: Listen to our new song “Bad Intention (w/ boyband).” By the time you read this, it will probably be out. And we collaborated with a hip-hop artist! Who would have thought!?
TJ: Just want to say thanks to you and everyone who’s checked out our band. We’re lucky that we still get to make music together and that people are listening, so thanks!
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