Never Loved

It Goes On with Never Loved

Interview by Ken Morton - Photo by Kayla Surico

name. It seemed like it kind of rolled off our tongue.

Alternative rock band Never Loved - featuring Cameron Knopp (vocals, guitar), Jay Gayoso (bass) and Shane O’Brien (guitar) - has just released their debut full-length album, Over It, via Equal Vision Records. Produced by multi-platinum producer Matt Squire and featuring co-writes by All-American Rejects’ Nick Wheeler, Over It is sure to garner Never Loved a good amount of fans all across the globe. A tour with Armor For Sleep was placed on hold due to the pandemic, but new dates have now been announced, including several in Southern California. Highwire Daze recently caught up with front man Cameron Knopp to find out more about this amazing band on the rise...

Is there any overall story or concept behind the album title Over It?

When you listen to the record, there’s not one main theme – but a common theme on the record is being Over It – facing adversity in different scenarios and pushing through. So, we felt that that was a nice way to sum it up. And the first track on the record was Over It and I remember thinking about an album name. We listened to the record – I was just listening through and trying to figure out what would be a good name. I looked down and Over It repeated back on and I thought “That rings nice.” I thought about it and brought it up to everyone else – and everyone was super onboard with that

Let talk about On And On It Goes and what was the inspiration behind that song.

We wrote that one with Nick Wheeler of All American Rejects. That was one of the later songs we did for the album before going into the studio. But that one was just about the ups and downs that you face in a relationship sometimes and talking about not seeing eye to eye with someone. It’s from life experience and past relationships.

What is it like doing a co-wrote with Nick Wheeler of All American Rejects? He’s like a legend to a lot of people.

I know! It’s crazy! It’s one of those things where we had a lot of material written for the album before going into the studio – we actually had a problem with what songs do we narrow down – and then from there narrow those down. But before we went into the studio, our management brought up the idea of working with co-writing people and I thought “Hell yeah!” It would be a great way to mix up the record a bit and write with someone else with a different perspective. And also, when you write with people like Nick, you learn a lot too as a writer – producing and all that stuff. Writing with Nick was amazing. It was like a situation where we did one session together – it went really well and we said “cool, let’s write some more songs for the record together.” I really like how we work. Which is kind of crazy, but he has a really

good chemistry when it comes to writing and we just kept writing with him. We wrote about three tracks for the album with Nick. He did come into the studio too to help us with some pre-production. We wrote On And On It Goes with him, Downpour – and he did help write some of Over It and Sorry with us too. Just getting that outside perspective and getting a couple of different flavors on the record is important – because you don’t want to write the same thing over and over. But Nick is great – he’s a phenomenal writer – it is great to be working with someone of his caliber.

One of the casualties of the pandemic was your tour with Armor For Sleep. Rescheduled dates have been announced. What are you looking forward to the most about finally touring with Armor For Sleep?

I mean, for starters, it’s Armor For Sleep. They’re like one of my favorite bands of all time. This has almost been like a long time coming. When we first showcased for Equal Vision like three years ago – like the first thing that came up – I was like “Holy shit, Armor For Sleep was on Equal Vision – they’re one of my favorite bands.” It was like every time I showed up to the (Equal Vision) office on tour, we’d walk through and our A&R person would always have a different Armor For Sleep memorabilia for me. And I’d always joke around – “yeah, when they’re getting back together for a tour” – and they didn’t even know they were going to do that. We kind of always joked around about it – and sure enough- our A&R was like “Yeah, they’re actually going to be doing a reunion tour and I mentioned you guys and everyone’s down.” And I was like “Holy shit!” So, I’m excited to see Armor For Sleep live.

I discovered them when they were already broken up – I feel like that always happens – I come across a new band that’s like broken up. So, I’m like “Fuck I’m never going to get to see them.” I remember when the announced that they were going to do the 10 year – that was in 2015 I think – but that was nowhere near Florida and I was not going to be able to make it and they all sold out. And I thought “Maybe I’ll see them on the 15th.” And sure enough, I’ll be seeing them like 30 fucking times which is cool! I’m excited to see them – but another thing too is just to be playing those kinds of rooms. We haven’t been a part of a tour like this size. There’s some amazing legendary venues on there. And also, too – fucking playing shows again! We all miss it. October of 2019 was our last tour, so it feels like an eternity. I’m excited to get back into that touring groove and playing music for new people too. It’s a lot of people going to those shows and I’m sure a good portion haven’t heard us before – so it’s going to be awesome getting that kind of exposure and opportunity.

One of your songs Goddamn has over 800,000 plays on Spotify. What does that number mean to you as you start to approach that one million point?

I mean it’s insane because we’re still really such a brand-new band. We only had an EP and then did one year of touring and then Covid kind if paused everything. But it’s really cool. I remember when we released that song and that EP, like no one had any idea who the fuck we are. I mean, we’re still in the boat. But I remember when that song came out, we had 11,000 streams on Dead Inside. But that was the second song we ever released, but it is kind of crazy seeing it approaching that milestone. I check the Spotify artist app and see how some many people listen to that song a day – and it’s crazy to think that “Man, I created this” and people just put it on and enjoy it the way that I like to listen to music too. It’s really cool to see it like build up. It’s kind of insane because every time we release a new song – an album or a single, we see Goddamn jumping way up in listens. It’s like a snowball effect right now – it’s cool!

What do you hope the rest of 2021 brings for you, for Never Loved, and just for the music world in general?

First and foremost, seeing all shows come back – people being able to get vaccines and not having to worry about catching a virus if they want to go out and enjoy live music at night. Hopefully in general I would just like to see shows resume back to normal and bands being able to play music again – venues thriving and not having to worry about being shut down – and people who are in touring production getting their jobs back and making a living again. For us, we’re kind of set up for the rest of the year luckily. We just came back home from writing with Nick. We just released our record and we’ll be busy with that. Our first tour date with Armor is in August and that tour basically extends off until the end of year. For us, I just hope to get on the road and play this new record for people – meet some new faces, make some new fans, and keep growing as a band. We are recording some new stuff ironically in October too. I think it’s just to set ourselves up to have a great 2022. So, to do great on this tour and set ourselves up next year for success.

neverlovedmusic.com

A Note from ANSON

Interview by Ken Morton - Photos by Erica Vincent

Meet Anson, solo artist on the rise who has presented one of the most compelling pop punk/emo albums of the year. A Note For You To Find is availanble via We Are Triumphant, jam-packed with catchy songs and introspective lyrics. Highwire Daze recently interviewed Anson to find out more about the songs from A Note For You To Find and releasing his debut full length in the middle of a pandemic. Read on...

First of all, is there any overall story or concept behind the album title A Note For You To Find?

When I was writing this album, it took so many years to write, it was kind of like my last will and testament. For me, I was in a dark place when I wrote a lot of these songs, so the whole A Note For You To Find is like the finding of a suicide note. So, the whole concept is this is what I’m leaving to this world and it’s a note that you’re going to find. It’s a lot of imaginary conceptualization of what I would do if I got to that point, which at the time I was in a very bad space – so I kind of honed in on that and just let the record be what it was supposed to be.

Let’s start at the beginning of the album – tell me about the song Inside My Head.

It’s actually kind of interesting, because I have this tendency to write songs that predict the future sometimes. I actually wrote this song in my senior year in college. Is started off as being this fictional story about your dating this girl and this girl tells you that she cheated on you – and you’re like this is a terrible thing and I wish that this was all inside my head – that this whole thing didn’t happen – but it did. And as the years passed on, it actually happened to me – the whole entire story – which freaked me out. I don’t like being a fortune teller of my own life, especially that way! I had it as an opener because I thought it would be a good way to intro the album – as this is the vibe of what you’re getting yourself into. It’s an interesting love story – I guess it’s a lust story –of someone who you thought that they loved you, but didn’t. And you wish it wasn’t that.

Tell me a little but about Runaway, which is also a video.

Runaway I wrote after being extremely pissed at my day job. I understand in the world you need a day job and art is one of those things that comes and goes – it’s a fleeting moment in the spotlight and then you’ve got to go back in the trenches and keep creating to fulfill and continue. At the time when I wrote that song, I was just fed up with the corporate job and