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NEW MUSIC MONDAY:
Stream The Skeptics’ Debut Album and Read Their Track-By-Track Commentary
When The Skeptics started playing in a bar in Chicago eleven years ago, they would not have predicted their future. Now, they’ve signed a record deal, released three EPs, and are heading for another sold-out nationwide tour. We were lucky enough to sit down with the band and get their thoughts on each track of Make Me a Believer, their first album on Island Records, which you can listen to in full here.
“FEEL LIKE THAT”
This was my choice to start the album! It felt like a good way to give people an idea of what to expect from us as a band - guitars, harmonies, really driving drums. Of all the songs on the album, we agreed production-wise it was the most Skeptics song. I actually helped co-write this song - I helped Shane figure out the verse structure and came up with the melody for them. The chorus is the best part (obviously) but I think the whole song works really well. If there are any people checking us out for the first time through this album, it’s a perfect taste of what’s to come. - Zack Evans, Keys
“SPARK”
This is one of our older songs. We’ve been playing it for about four years - Shane wrote it in a day one summer, and it got a good response when we debuted it at the Innertown. It’s got a clap section - that’s Brent and I, and it was hard for Brent to keep a straight face while we did it. The group vocals also feature all of us singing - when we perform it live, it’s just Shane, Zack, and TJ, but we wanted to make it sound a little fuller for the album. That’s the only change from stage to studio, and I think it’s my favorite. - Mark Celestino, Bass
“10,000 WEIGHT IN GOLD”
I fought to have this song on the album because it showcases our whole band - there’s a great bass groove in the bridge, there’s a beautiful piano melody woven throughout, the guitar is given the space to be beautiful, and the drums build as the song goes on. It’s not our “normal” style, but the guys killed it with this one. Maya Murillo, who produced it, made it sound so incredible - this is a standout on that side of things for me, personally. I wrote it over the course of a rainy weekend one fall in Chicago while I was unemployed and missing my partner, and the song reflects how bummed out I was feeling. I still love it, though. - Shane Madej, Vocals/Guitar
“VAGABOND”
This is my favorite song on the album and if you listen to it, you’ll get why. It was one of the first songs we ever wrote as a band, way back when we were in college! We were young and just in it to have fun, and it definitely sounds like a totally free-spirited rock song if you ask me. We use it as our final song in our encores because it’s exhausting to play under stage lights and we normally need to drink a ton of water and sleep afterwards. We recorded it all in one take to keep that kind of live quality to it, and I think it’s one hell of a party. - Brent Bennett, Drums
“SWEET DISASTER”
I finished this song shortly after I started talking to my partner - it’s a little hesitant, a little sweet, a little longing, and we kept it stripped down instead of changing it up for the album. TJ, Zack, and I sound really good on the choruses - the harmonies were their ideas, and I’m in love with how they sound. We also kept Mark’s bass electric and added in some synths, just to make it sound unique. The song’s still the same as the one we debuted at the Innertown, but we updated it a tiny bit to sound a little more modern - hopefully older fans of the band and the basement demos will hear that the song hasn’t changed that much and appreciate the new details. - SM
“MOSCOW”
This song was the one I thought should open the album - it’s very straightforward and upbeat, which I think classifies it as a classic Skeptics song. I can’t remember any fun stories about how this song got written, but I do remember the first time Shane went over the chorus with me to teach me the harmony and I couldn’t get “ it’s not hard, with you I have an alibi/you don’t care the reason why I misapply” out without stumbling over it. There are still some days I flub it on stage and just babble at my mic in the right tune. Shane’s just got crazy-good diction, and this song’s chorus shows that off. - TJ Marchbank, Guitar
“MILLION BUCKS”
This is the second newest song on the album in terms of when it was written. I moved out to Los Angeles when we signed our record deal, and I’d been so convinced for so long I’d never feel at home in southern California - Chicago’s so different, and I’d lived in the suburbs of it for my whole life. But I was lucky enough to have my partner out here to move in with, and that helped me adjust - they love it here, and spending time with them opened my eyes to little details I would’ve missed otherwise. We ended up in Santa Monica one night, right after one of my first big interviews for the band, and we spent sunset on the beach together - the way they looked in the light and how they smiled really got to me, and this song came together over the next year or so. I really can't believe it took that long, but I'm pretty sure it did. Anyway, it’s my second favorite on the album, so take that as you will. - SM
“WANDERING STAR”
This was a big change stylistically for us - we tried to make something that sounded huge in scope. Instrumentally, it’s not anything like any of our other music - it’s mostly me and Zack and Brent. The guitars take a back seat to the synths and bass and vocals, and it makes it sound almost dreamy. It was my favorite day in the studio, even though I had to record my tracks over and over. We also kept this song hidden until the day the album released, so the person it was written for would be surprised. There’s a lot of love in this song, and I hope it comes across. - MC
“LOVE HER”
I wrote the chorus to this song about my fiancée, but that’s all I had aside from a melody. I refused to throw it away, though, even though it felt like it’d never be anything, and when I played it for Shane, he loved it. He came back a few days later with the verses, and I threw together a bridge. It’s stripped down and intimate, just three guitars and some snaps and a shaker. This was one of the songs I was most concerned about sharing with the world, because it’s so new and so different from everything else we’ve ever recorded. Hopefully the response is positive, because I love what we ended up with. It sounds just like I wanted it to. - TM
“HONEY”
This was one of the most fun songs for us to record! Shane wrote this eight or so years ago, I think? We played it a few nights in a row at the Innertown, and the staff there started adding backing vocals while they worked, so we incorporated them into the song itself. We actually had Kelsey, Daysha, and Joyce fly out - we paid for their tickets and let them crash with us - to record their parts. It’s as close as we could get to the way it sounded at the Innertown Pub in Chicago before we even recorded anything. It’s like a little piece of our band history recorded forever. Also it’s just a damn good song - it’s probably my favorite song Shane’s ever written. - ZE
“YOU GET WHAT YOU GIVE”
Shane’s partner suggested this as the last song on the album as a joke - it was apparently the first song we played the first night they saw us. But it’s a really good song to tie the album together? It’s another straightforward rock song, kinda upbeat and fun to play and sing along to. I could probably play this in my sleep - all of us recorded our tracks in three takes just to give Maya some options to work with. I think if we had to point at any one song in our catalog as the essence of our band, it’d be this one, and it wraps Make Me a Believer up super well. - BB
“PENNY DREADFULS”
When I was a kid, I would love finding albums with hidden tracks. It was like a free bonus on top of all the other songs I would inevitably love, so when we were working on putting Make Me a Believer together, I fought for us to get a hidden track. I didn’t want to put a song people had heard before, even in concert - there was a stupid thing I’d half-written when teasing my best friend about how easily scared he was, and one afternoon in the studio, we had a half hour of spare time and I started singing it. The whole band played along, making up verses as we did, and that’s what you’re hearing. You can hear TJ and Zack and I laughing while we sing, and we got everyone in the studio - Kelsey, Daysha, Joyce, Maya, Andrew, Curly, and Ryan, I think? - to sing along at the end. It was just us fucking around and having fun, and it’s our little love note to our friends and families and fans. Thanks for sticking with us ‘til the end. - SM