Rock band Story of the Year is currently celebrating the 10-year anniversary of its debut album "Page Avenue" while out on the Scream It Like You Mean It tour this fall. The State Press sat down with drummer Josh Wills to talk about the anniversary, touring with newer bands and writing new music for 2014.
The State Press: Story of the Year is currently on the Scream It Like You
Mean It tour, which is a 10-year anniversary celebration of “Page Avenue.” The
band did something special for this record. Can you talk about that?
Josh Wills: For the 10-year anniversary of that record, we wanted to do something a little more special other than a standard remaster or remix of that record, because that record, in itself, sounds a certain way, and we didn’t want to just kind of redo it. We wanted to do something with the songs to make it a little bit more special that people would want to go back and listen to and see that record from a different point of view.
It’s kind of an acoustic record, but I can’t really call it an acoustic record, because it’s a whole lot more than just acoustic. There’s a lot more percussion and keyboards and strings and programming and things like that. We went a little crazy with everything, but we’re really stoked on it and can’t wait for everybody to hear it.
SP: How did it feel to go back through that record and explore it in a different format?
JW: It was cool. We’ve more or less been playing all those songs for 10 years now, one way or the other. It was cool to really go back and pick apart that record and realize now, 10 years later, that we’re older and smarter about music. It was cool to go back and see how we did certain things back then. It was cool to go back and dissect everything.
SP: How does it feel to know that the fans are still excited about these shows, especially with the 10-year anniversary element?
JW: It’s really cool and it’s a good feeling, because we have taken a lot of time off in the states. We haven’t toured the states proper in almost three years. It’s a really good feeling, because it’s scary nowadays in the music industry. You have to put together these … packages in order to have a successful tour, unless you’re Muse or somebody like that who automatically sells out arenas. To sum it up, it’s a really awesome feeling that everybody wants to come see us again. I think the goal of taking some time off was achieved with this. We’re all really excited; it’s going to be fun.
I just read something (on Facebook); we had people post memories of that album. It was really cool to go back and read. I read through about 200 comments, and it was really cool to see and read what that album meant to other people, because it means the world to us. To be able to create music that affects so many people in so many different ways is an awesome and humbling feeling.
I’m excited for people who haven’t seen us in a long time or who have never seen us, because it’s going to be a really special night. We have a lot of cool, special things planned, and it’s going to be really fun.
SP: Are you working on any new music?
JW: We haven’t yet, but we will be. I know Ryan and Dan have been writing and a while ago they sent a few demos to us. We haven’t actually started writing yet, but we will. I think that’ll be one thing that we try to do on this fall tour. We definitely want to put a new record out next year, hopefully earlier in the year. It just depends on when we can get time locked down to really write it. We want to, we’re going to, it’s going to happen, we just don’t know when yet!
Reach the reporter at okhiel@asu.edu or follow her on Twitter @OliviaKhiel
