Shaun Cooper - Taking Back Sunday "I Really Believe in This Record and I Think It’s Very Special."

It’s been a great year so far for the pop punk fans among us, from My Chemical Romance finally making it out to Australia, to Fall Out Boy releasing a new album.Not only this, but we also got a mega release from Taking Back Sunday in 152 (our review here), who also announced that they’d be making it back to our shores this December as part of the Good Things Festival lineup and a handful of side-shows!Ahead of the festival, we were thrilled to chat with bass player, Shaun Cooper about 152, their return down under, their infamous suits and more!Well first off, how’s your morning been? Or rather, how’s your day been?Yeah the sun's going down! It’s funny, I was just on the phone to my sister, she lives in Melbourne, so right before I eat dinner she’s going into work, and we can chat while she’s in the car. But it’s the same thing, all the time she’s like have a good day, I mean, night! She married an Aussie, and then in 2019 they moved back to Australia and they’re doing great and living in Frankston with my niece and nephew.Are you going to be able to come out early before Good Things Festival and spend some time with them?I can’t get out early because our Thanksgiving holiday is before that, and then we leave to fly to Australia, but I think we’ll have a good chunk of time to spend together just hanging out in their pool and catching up.Well hopefully the weather holds up while you’re here so you get plenty of pool time, it’s been pretty cold and rainy here the last couple days! I was listening to 152 and may have listened to it twice from top to bottom. Would you think it’s fair to say that it’s a bit of a melancholic record?I think there are some songs that you could say that about, but I think that there’s a lot of hope in the record too, lyrically. I think I kinda goes back and forth depending on your mood, it might be the weather, but I think we covered a lot of bases and a lot of ground on this and spanned a lot of emotions. I’m really proud that it’s a pretty diverse record and I feel really good about it and about people getting to hear it. Do you have a favourite song on the record at the moment?No! Right now, it kinda like, as the singles come out I’m like oh I love that one, and I love that one. I was so excited about ‘S’old’, and then we had the video for ‘Amphetamine Smiles’ come out so I was really excited about that. I love ‘The One’. When we were putting this record together and compiling it. I was like, there’s no fat on this record, I don’t want to trim anything off. This is, there’s no songs on this I want to skip. Every time I listen back to it, I’m working on playing the songs and stuff, like I want to hear the whole thing as a whole thing. I don’t know if it’ll ever be a single but ‘Lightbringer’ the lyrics Adam (Lazzara, vocals) wrote to that were just spectacular and it really connected with me on some sort of level and I’m so proud of that one. I’m avoiding your question by naming every song on the record essentially!That is so fine! I’ve had people liken it to being asked to pick their favourite child, and you just can’t do it. I think my personal favourite is ‘Quit Trying’, it makes me feel some type of way when I listen to it.It’s funny too because I know people who definitely have a favourite kid and they’re not scared to mention it which is hysterical. That song just grooves, I really like the drums on it and how it’s kinda laid back and stuff and then just takes off.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5ZCUHcs88YI know some bands like to write all the music first, and then all the lyrics and everybody writes separately. What does that process look like for Taking Back Sunday?Everyone works on ideas separately. Our drummer Mark (O’Connell) not enough people knowhe’s constantly plugging away on his phone on Garage Band, he creates masterpieces just on his phone. I don’t know how he does it! I don’t have the technical know-how to do that. He’s taking samples from different sounds and putting them in the keyboard and making all these things. So he’s coming in with these very complete ideas that he’s bringing to the band, and you know we’ll be like that’s so inspiring let’s work on that now. I write a little more simplistically, I’ll record ideas on my computer, some guitars and some bass, maybe some drum ideas, loops, and I’ll bring that and see if the guys like it. John (Nolan, guitar) is really good at fleshing out songs and knowing where they’re gonna go with lyrics and guitar and stuff, and Adam does that as well. Adam’s amazing at just hearing one of our pieces of music and saying ‘you know what I’ve got lyrics for that’ and he’ll go in the booth and sing something and comes out with some crazy stuff, so it’s entirely collaborative. We do start off separately and then we present the ideas, then whatever everyone is excited about that’s the direction we’ll go for that particular day.Do you already have some titles in mind at this point, or do they have working titles and then you decide later?Always working titles at first! Something simplistic like ‘piano idea’ or ‘guitar idea from January 2021’ things like that.So it’s like ‘let's work on Jan ’21', and it means nothing to anybody. As lyrics start to come together then we start pulling titles and stuff, or we’ll just be talking like ‘that ones ‘Lightbringer’ because we think it’s funny, stuff like that.It’s the first full length Taking Back Sunday release since 2016, what was it about now that made it the right time for a record?That was the quickest we could do it if you can believe that! [laughs]What happened was, when Tidal Wave came out, we knew we wanted to take time touring the globe on that, playing as many shows as we could because we really believed in that record. We did full album plays of that record, then eventually we knew that would lead into a 20^th anniversary of the band tour in 2019. We wanted to tour so extensively to celebrate that milestone, and we knew it would be very difficult to write and record a record in that span of time so we said okay, we gonna tour a whole lot, but 2020’s gonna be the year that we’re really gonna work on this record. We’re gonna take a couple months off after all the touring, we need to reset our brains a little bit then we’ll be pumped to get into the mode of writing this record. Pandemic hits, we couldn’t be in the same room for about a year and a half and that was just the weirdest thing in the world so that really took the wind out of our sails. World opens up again and we have to go back out on tour. We were excited to do all of that, but there was a lot of stopping and starting. We would write in between and record in between different tours we were on and work it out that way, which was, we like to get things done in one fell swoop and we just weren’t able to do that due to circumstances so that just took a long time to get it all done. But it also got us into the mindset of working better on the road, like on days off we’d go into the studio and do things there. We have a friend in Buffalo, New York and we’d work there on a day off, our friends The Maine have a studio out in Arizona, we’d go in there for a day and work on a new song. So, we just wanted to keep going and get as many ideas down as we could as quick as possible. So unfortunately, that was a ridiculously long amount of time.Is there like a whole other album’s worth of songs written, or did you kind of go, we’re gonna write x amount of songs for this record?We wanted to write the most potent record we could, so there was a lot of songs that fell by the wayside because for whatever reason we didn’t get them done. Usually it’s because they weren’t inspiring us in that moment, or they needed something, and that a better idea took over. There’s a whole lot of unfinished songs that might be 75% there, we have hard drives full of things. There is a lot, but we didn’t have any B sides for this record. It was the first time we said let's hold off on that idea, this time around we got very good at putting things on the backburner then bringing them back and breathing new life into them. So I’m excited to revisit those at a later date and see where we’re at. I know Adam’s thinking oh yeah, remember we had that one song for the guitar did this thing, and I was thinking what if I say that. He’s getting that stuff kind of going and he’s getting some ideas so we’re gonna go back to those.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCJ5FprgAKsYou guys are coming back to Australia in a couple months, and it’s been a little while since you were out here. It was pre-pandemic right?It was January 2019, so a year pre-pandemic. That’s right! You guys played Unify Festival and I think you got rained on because it was pretty wet!It was so chaotic! I remember we were scheduled to play very very late. We’re used to, we’re all dads and stuff, we’re in bed by 9, 10 o’clock when we’re at home. So, we were initially scheduled to go on at midnight and it just kept getting later and later and the weather was miserable. I remember it was freezing and my hands were so cold when we were on stage, but it was a really crazy time. I think we got back to the hotel at like 5am when the sun was coming up, That was a wild time think’n back to that.So glad to be coming back in the summer and playing during the day and sideshows this time then!Yeah! We’re so pumped it’s gonna be great to be thereWhen you play shows can you see the crowd, and notice people you recognise and know their faces?Yeah that happens all the time and it’s the most intimidating! If it’s a stranger I don’t really care, I’m just doing my thing, but if I know they’ve seen me before and we’re friends I’m like ‘I gotta work harder!’. I always want to do a better job if I know there’s been someone I’ve seen more than once, I can’t phone it in if someone’s watching me and judging me and will call me out on it later!Well I’m sure nobody’s judging you!Yeah it’s all just in my head. All this whacky rocker ego stuff.Have you enjoyed shooting the music videos for the record? I know it was a probably little while ago.We started end of April, beginning of May, we’ve shot everything in different time frames. It started with, the first thing we shot was ‘The One’, then we did ‘Amphetamine Smiles’ the very next day. So that we knew was gonna be the third song and we did ‘S’Old’ about a month ago. So it’s been really cool, we’ve had a very quick turnaround with the way technology moves nowadays, it’s so much different than when the band started. You can have a full video ready the very next day after you shoot something, then it has to be in the system about 2 weeks before it goes live on YouTube. So, it’s super tight and super short, and we’ve really been utilising that idea to get things done in a really timely way and it’s been a really fun process. We’ve involved our friend Djay Brawner who’s been the creative director on everything we do and he just has a great sense of the visual he’s envisioning for everything we do.[gallery type="square" columns="2" ids="https://wallofsoundau.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/unnamed-1-2.jpg|,https://wallofsoundau.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/taking-back-sunday-sideshows.jpg|"]I really enjoyed the matching suits, it’s a good look!Thank you! That was a trip we took with our buddy Djay, we went into this one shop, and they had all our sizes, the colours a little weird but they got it all for us and it’s a really good fit, I feel good in it. I think this might be our thing, let’s go. Can we expect to them on stage later this year?I think so! They might be a little wrinkly by the time we get them down there, but they get ironed out really quickly when your body gets hot. Like, the material gets hot and they’re machine washable!Machine washable? Even better!Yeah, they don’t get too stinky. We sweat a lot so it’s not easy!Well, you’re definitely going to sweat a lot outside in Australia in Summer.Absolutely, and we’re used to it. We’re primed and ready to go. Lastly, what’s the one thing you want fans to know about 152?I’m incredibly proud of this effort and I’m sorry it took so long but it’s definitely worth the wait. I think this is, it merges the songwriting you’ve come to know from Taking Back Sunday with a whole new element from our producer and you’re gonna see us in a new light and I think it’s gonna be very enjoyable. If you’ve gotten to know our band before it’s gonna connect with you, and if you don’t know us I think you’re gonna take something cool away from it. I really believe in this record and I think it’s very special. Thank you so much for your time Shaun and I hope you have a lovely rest of your evening!Interview by Kelsey Trevan (@kelsey_139)

152 is out now via Fantasy Records. Get it here

Taking Back Sunday – 152 tracklisting

1. Amphetamine Smiles2. S’old3. The One4. Keep Going5. I Am The Only One Who Knows You6. Quit Trying7. Lightbringer8. New Music Friday9. Juice 2 Me10. The Stranger

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7gJWZcxNPY