Rainy Day Crush, a dynamic and scrappy indie pop trio, is excited to be sharing their debut single off of their upcoming EP I’m Still Alive.
Rainy Day Crush’s newest single, Heartbreak (And How To Get Over It), is the inspiring and catchy post break up song everyone has been waiting for. The band said that this song has become their latest battle cry. Heartbreak stands as an anthem to challenge adversity, reminding the trio that it’s up to Matt, Mike, and Derek to keep putting up a fight.
Rainy Day Crush’s upcoming EP, I’m Still Alive makes a promise to their fans that the band is poised and ready for a comeback. The EP captures the essence of Rainy Day Crush, fusing unbelievably catchy hooks with vibrant & honest lyrics to tell the band’s story of tenacity and determination. I’m Still Alive is out June 9th.
We managed to catch up with the band as they talked about their latest single and more!
So how has the release of your single Heartbreak (or How to Ger Over It) gone so far?
The release has gone very well so far! We’re getting a lot of positive feedback, which is incredibly exciting! It took a lot to get these songs out into the world, and we’re just happy that we’re finally getting to share them.
Tell us about the single.
The first single, “Heartbreak (or How to Get Over It),” was literally years in the making. I’ve had this riff hanging around for a long time. Last year, as sometimes happens, the lyrics just started pouring in. Mike, our drummer, was a big fan of the riff, and once I had some lyrics, the song just took off. Right before recording, there were some things that still just weren’t working. So the three of us sat down at my kitchen table the night before we were scheduled to record, and we just hammered out all those amazing lines Mike sings, and stitched the last bits together. Some of Mike’s vocal lines still give me chills every time I hear them! And I absolutely LOVE Derek’s bass line, especially with the main riff. It’s just so much fun, and is musically brilliant.
Lyrically, we all kind of rallied around this song. It has become our anthem, and our battle cry. That’s why we decided to release it first. We’re pretty proud of the fact that we’re still here, making music, playing gigs, and putting some positive vibes out into the world, and “Heartbreak” reflects success in the face of struggle.
How pumped are you for the release of your EP ‘I’m Still Alive’?
On a scale of one to ten with one being ambivalent and ten being we can’t sleep most nights because we’re so excited, I’d say we’re roughly at like an eight..ty one, eighty two, somewhere around there. The recording experience was so much fun, and we want to share that fun with everyone!
What is your favourite track from the release?
Probably “Bonfires.” Everything just fell into place with “Bonfires.” The accordion, the toy piano, the beach sounds, the mix… I could go on and on! You know how sometimes you meet someone, and you automatically just seem to speak the same language with each other, and it feels like you’ve always been friends, and you always will be friends? That’s what this song was like. It was like meeting someone you’ve always known.
It’s the slowest song on the EP, so it wasn’t our first choice to promote as a “single,” but in a lot of ways, this song helped us figure out a lot of things. It’s a pretty special song to us.
So it’s been five years since your reunion, how good does it feel to be getting out there again?
It feels freaking incredible! It feels like we cheated death. It makes us appreciate how amazing it is to be able to create music. We have this beautiful opportunity in front of us, and we passed on it once, but we won’t pass on it again.
If you could work with any band on a new song, who would it be and why?
I think all three of us have different answers for this one, and all of our answers would probably vary depending on the day and the song! For me, though, I think Dave Grohl would be towards the top of the list. He’s always collaborating, and it always seems to be about the big picture for him. I get the feeling that he’s the guy that cares more about the song and what he can add to it, as opposed to those guys who just want to show off. He just seems like a really creative guy, and I love being around people like that.
Also, I have a well-documented fever for Jimmy Eat World. I would absolutely love to play some piano with them.
What has been your funniest moment recording the EP?
Without a doubt, the funniest moment was the “Great Shuffle Debacle of 2017.” Mike was absolutely convinced that one part of one song needed the drums to “shuffle.” I was absolutely convinced that a shuffle would ruin that part of the song, and didn’t fit the overall song. After a lot of good-natured debate and trying the song both ways, we all decided as a group that we’d leave the shuffle for another song.
We get to the studio, and I was tracking some vocals. Our engineer (Steven Servi from Eisley Creative, who was AMAZING to work with), asked me about a part we were working on, and Mike made a crack about it needing some shuffle. Which is incredibly funny, right? We had to pause for a couple minutes to regain our composure. As we were gaining control, I said, “F**k your shuffle!” So from then on, whenever we were brainstorming, Mike would suggest a shuffle, and I would laugh and say, “F**k that shuffle.”
When we got our first rough mix back, we’re listening to it, and right in the middle, Steven had remixed the song to include a shuffle. None of us could believe it! And then, to top things off, he had (unbeknownst to me) recorded me saying, “F**k your shuffle,” and added it on repeat three octaves up to the end of the song. So when the song gets intense and the chorus repeats, all of a sudden we could hear this chipmunk voice over the mix saying “F**k your shuffle! F**k your shuffle! F**K your shuffle!” over and over and over again!
To this day, we can’t listen to the song without half expecting to hear electronically altered profanities.
How much does it mean to you when you hear fans listen to your music?
It means the entire world. It is everything. It’s why we do this.
Our last show, a woman came up to us, and told us how much our songs have meant to her and helped her get through some things. One of my favorite memories in life (not just in the band) is the first time an audience sang our lyrics back to us. You can’t purchase those kinds of responses. All the studio editing and slick press photos and expensive promotions in the world can’t force a song to mean something to someone. When a song means something to you, it is like a direct and personal interaction. It can’t be faked or bought, and that’s what we’re after.
Will there be a tour to coincide the release of the EP?
There won’t be a tour in the traditional sense of us climbing in a van and playing a string of dates in a string of cities, but we are definitely looking to book as many gigs as we can in all the places and with all the bands that will have us. Our EP Release Party is in Racine, WI, on June 9th.
