Photo Credit: Jodi Cunningham
The wait is finally over, as LostAlone make their long-awaited return with their new album The Warring Twenties. After surprising us with their comeback earlier this year, the rock trio swiftly followed with dates supporting My Chemical Romance, capturing those special moments in a music video for Enduring The Dream. We caught up with the band’s frontman Steven Battelle to discuss the single’s themes, the writing process and stories from behind the scenes.
Can you give us your quick elevator pitch on this track?
It’s the opener to the new record and, as with all our albums, it touches on everything that’s about to happen sonically and lyrically over, in the case of The Warring Twenties, the next nine songs.
Why does this one standout for you?
From this record it’s the song I would play to people to introduce them to our band. It has elements of everything we do and the best example of us doing them.
How did you tackle the writing process for the song?
Since the band last made a record I’ve made two solo albums and I now write songs for/with other artists as my “day job” – so I have to really compartmentalise and schedule my brain to not allow LostAlone songs to jump out at inopportune moments. So when the time does come that I’m fully focused on the band, I’ve many ideas dying to get out and onto the guitar.
Was there anything unique about this track compared to your usual/previous approach?
I heard the chorus walking on the top deck of the QM2 in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean halfway to New York. It was fully intact as it appears on the finished song and I knew it was LostAlone, though at that point the band wasn’t a band. Along with a couple of other songs from that same trip, it definitely became a catalyst to make a new record after some time apart.
Can you tell us how the song’s theme came about?
No lyric sums up my tenure on this planet as “Ambition’s an affliction every moment is a mission” does. When you’re so relentlessly bound to a life that you can’t not lead then its more of an endurance than living, and I think I poured that sentiment into this song.
Tell us about the video, do the themes of the single transfer to the video?
Having made the record, including this single, in lockdown without anyone knowing we were a band again, but with the knowledge that the songs I was writing would potentially make a set-list to be played in a stadium…. it feels epic that this little dream of a song that I imagined opening a stadium set actually now has done this and is documented in a video. So although I’d say thematically the video isn’t massively relevant to the lyrics, musically I think the song was subconsciously built to end up on those huge stages and, in turn, this video.
Do you have any behind the scenes stories from the video shoot?
The video was made using footage from our recent shows supporting My Chemical Romance in stadiums, so for me its like a perfect visual diary of what at the time felt like a blur. It’s all about memory preservation for me.
Anything else you’d like to add for our readers?
I hope if you listen to our music you do it in the dark, preferably with some great headphones with no distraction. Oh, and I hope you’re all well and having a good 2022.
LostAlone‘s new album The Warring Twenties is out now via Dharma Records, available to stream or purchase HERE.
See the band live at one of the following dates:
December 2022
Fri 9th – LONDON – Boston Music Rooms
Sat 10th – BRISTOL – The Lanes
Mon 12th – MANCHESTER – Star & Garter
Tue 13th – GLASGOW – Classic Grand
Thu 15th – LEEDS – Key Club
Fri 16th – DERBY – The Venue
