NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

It was the beginning of a rough year. In January, my favorite band from when I was in high school announced they were breaking up by the end of the year. I was in the middle of a hellish teaching contract in South Korea, and it looked like I could never see Anberlin perform again live. Before disbanding, the band would release their seventh studio album, Lowborn . Of course, the break up didn’t last and Anberlin got back together only four years later to play a reunion show and began touring the year after that. Then in 2022, the band released Silverline , a 5-song EP; another EP, Convinced , last year; and will release their eighth studio record, Vega , on August 2nd, which will be a combination of Silverline and Convinced with two new songs featuring the band's new touring vocalist, Matty Mullins . I FOUND PEACE IN A FOREIGN ATONEMENT.  At the end of 2013, lead singer Stephen Christian told his bandmates that he would give Anberlin a year to say farewell. Christian talks about

In 2016 ,  Yellowcard  called  it quits, echoing many other bands in a changing music industry. Best known for their fourth album,  Ocean Avenue , Yellowcard headlined Warped Tour and were at the top of the genre thanks to  MTV 's  Total Request Live  and placements in video games. But the band that had once been played on pop and rock radio, soon saw waning promotion, particularly in their later years. With albums underperforming and internal conflict in the band, they released their self-titled final album in 2016. They have only reunited in a  controversial lawsuit  against rapper  Juice WRLD , which the band later dropped after the rapper died in 2020. YOU TOOK MY EDGE, SHARPENED IT IN CASE.  My experience with Yellowcard was much like most of their fair-weather fans.  Ocean Avenue  was novel and fun. It was a time when bands could experiment with the format of a rock band to include something like, say, an electric violin on every track substituting for guitar leads. Their sec

The best music doesn't happen in isolation but rather comes out of a community movement. I would define community, when it comes to music, as a mixing of artists who bring different ideas together ideas from various genres. The result of a musical community is stronger musicianship by all those involved. Collaboration, the meeting of minds, happens naturally. Throughout the course of my blog, I've talked about various communities.  Tooth & Nail , Christian Rock, and evangelical communities are definitely the biggest themes. Tegan and Sara grew out of the Northwestern Canadian/American Indie Rock community in the late '90s, and by 2013 became pop stars.   HERE COMES THE RUSH BEFORE WE TOUCH.  Many fans may have been introduced to  Tegan and Sara  when Meredith Grey and Christina Yang danced to their early acoustic,  angry girl music in  Grey's Anatomy ' s earlier seasons.  The musical duo of Calgary-born identical  twins  Tegan  and  Sara Quin  started on the aco

  We all have to pay the bills, and musicians are certainly no exception.  Randy Torres  formerly of  Project 86  works in sound design.  Dan Koch  of  Sherwood  writes music for adverting.  Stephen Christian  is a music pastor. All of these examples, though, have kept the band separate.  The Fold  released two records on  Tooth & Nail Records , but never achieved the greatness of their label-mates, save a Grammy nomination for the packaging of their sophomore record. Though having a smaller fanbase than other Tooth & Nail bands, The Fold started partnering with brands, writing theme songs, most notably Lego's  Ninjago ,  for which they performed exclusively for seven years.  I SPENT A LONG TIME BUILDING LADDERS TO THE STARS.  Today’s song comes from The Fold’s 2013 independent record,  Moving Past.   “ Live Forever ” is the album’s fourth track. The themes on the album are somewhat humanist and somewhat Christian. The subject of “Live Forever” is not about one’s eternal re

I magine being a new band in 2019, releasing your first EP which has earned enough hype to put you on a big tour with a veteran band, only to have that tour canceled because the industry came to a halt with the pandemic. That’s what happened to brothers Sam and Ben Taylor and their friend Nathan Beaton of Paradise Now . The Welsh band did not tour with Disciple in 2020 as planned, however, they released an extra EP called Lockdown Mixtape to lead up to their full-length debut, We Never Die , both released in 2021. The band's social media has been quiet since the release of the LP . IT’S GETTING OLD. In 2019, Tooth & Nail Records revealed that they had signed a new band. The label posted a photo of the band's silhouette and asked fans to guess who had been signed. I commented " dc talk ?" which got a few laughs from the community. Sometimes when a band is signed with Tooth & Nail Records, listeners know who the band is. Often it's a band connected to the

In 1996, David Josiah Curtis and friends formed a punk band called Side Walk Slam . The Southern Illinois-based band released an independent record, Rock Anthems from the Midwest , in 1999 before signing to a small label, Boot to Head Records , and releasing Two Steps Forward, Five Steps Back the next year. Then in 2001, the band signed with Tooth & Nail Records and released three records between 2001 and 2003. Little by little, the bare-bones punk rock band started incorporating more and more production on their records. By their 2003 record, And We Drive , the band even included a piano. It was after releasing And We Drive, that the band decided that Side Walk Slam had strayed from their Punk Rock sound so much that they decided to change their name, rebranding with a new sound and retiring the expectations that the band would sound a particular way.  YOU’LL HAVE YOUR UPS AND DOWNS. Run Kid Run released their debut record This Is Who We Are three years after Side Walk Slam

  In 2017, Aaron Sprinkle released Real Life , his last release on Tooth & Nail Records . The legendary producer had released solo work sporadically since the ‘90s; however, being the go-to producer for some of the most successful bands in Alternative and Hard Christian Rock was time-consuming, and Sprinkle felt that producing great records was more successful than trying to promote a solo career. Sprinkle’s production always felt cutting-edge when he recorded, whether for Anberlin , Acceptance , Demon Hunter , Falling Up , or a host of other bands. Real Life, however, feels very 2017. Today, let's explore the album, track by track. 1. Invincible kicks off the album with that 2017 electronic sound. Featuring Poema ’s Elle Puckett contributing a spoken-word/ rap part, the song sounds nothing like what you’d expect from either artist. The lyrics seem to be the speaker coming to realize that he is not invincible. Puckett tries to convince the first speaker that he never needed