Chicago based pop punk band Marina City is debuting their latest EP, "Terminal," on August 11th. In preparation for the upcoming release, I got the chance to ask the guys some questions and review the album. They hinted at Terminal as "an end or extremity of something, in particular. A point of connection for closing an electric circuit," but Terminal means so much more than that. Whether it's taking you to a new destination or bringing you home, you're waiting at a Terminal. You'll find that just like train station terminals, Terminal has something for everyone.
The five song EP starts off with "Man In The Mirror," a fast paced tune you'll find yourself dancing along to without even realizing it. Up next is "Royalty" which will leave you feeling like you actually are royalty. "Better Weather" takes us to the middle of the EP, and gives major Panic! feels. Lyrically, this song will resonate with the broken-hearted and the music carries you to another place where there's promise of better weather. "Thieves" is a heavier song that showcases their musical talents and uses their musical influences to create a masterpiece. The final song, "Dreamers Never Die," which is also the latest single, encourages its listeners to march on and to keep their dreams alive. Just as the song is about to fade out, you can hear the chant, "the future is ours." And, what's more uplifting than that?
Throughout the whole EP, I kept finding myself trying to pinpoint who it was they sounded like or what it reminded me of. Honestly, while they do resemble Panic! At The Disco and Fall Out Boy, Marina City has been sure to create a genre all their own, and they truly do own it. This definitely is not like any of the music that's playing on the radios today, and that's a great thing.
Read below for the exclusive interview and don't forget to follow them here.
1. How did Marina City come to life?
Marina City started off as Ryan being a solo artist and a couple of the current members backing him up. Eventually, we felt as if we weren't very passionate about the idea anymore and decided to just be a band. After a final show as Ryan Alan, we began the construction of what would become Marina City at the end of 2011 and released the project in 2012. (Brian Johnson | Guitar/Vocals)
2. How did you choose the name, Marina City?
Marina City is iconically known for the two honeycomb towers in downtown Chicago. We drew inspiration from them. When Bertrand Goldberg explained his ideas of building and creating Marina City, Chicago thought it wasn't a great idea and was widely believed that he would fail. Goldberg ignored this negativity and after many years of construction created two of the most memorable structures in all of Chicago. Like Goldberg, being in a band, and being taken seriously, is very rare. What we wanted is what he wanted and that's to show the world that we can make this project work and become a musical staple in Chicagoland. And that is why Marina City makes sense for us. (Brian Johnson | Guitar/Vocals)
3. What has been your favorite memory with Marina City?
My personal favorite memory was standing in the streets of New York and getting a phone call from Ernie Ball telling us we were the winners of the Warped Tour Battle of the Bands. I've never felt so happy and accomplished being in a band until that moment happened. It felt as if we were finally being recognized for all the work, time and passion we put into this band. Truly amazing. (Brian Johnson | Guitar/Vocals)
4. Do any of you have musical influences that you carry into writing music for Marina City?
I try and take anything that I like, and implement it into Marina City writing. I have a pretty heavy soul vocal influence, and a new found liking to electronic/sample based music so I try to take those genres and put them in a pop rock light! (Matthew Gaudiano | (Keys/Vocals)
5. How would you describe your music?
That's a tough one, with this next record we are definitely gravitating towards pop rock. We're still moody in our lyrics, and our show will always be explosive but our music is definitely something I'd like everyone to love! (Matthew Gaudiano | Keys/Vocals)
6. What is the inspiration behind your new EP, Terminal?
Since the end of 2015, we wrote over 60 songs for this record, not to mention all the different edits we did to each song. This past year has been life changing for us. We've grown as musicians, and as people, through the wild experiences we had in 2016; like doing Warped Tour, Riot Fest, So What!?, working with John Feldmann, and Craig Owens, making a live acoustic EP and playing 150 shows. 'Terminal' can mean death and illness, and honestly, we went into this record thinking this may be our do-or-die record, but we are using the other meaning of 'Terminal', which is the end of one thing and the start of another. If you have been with the band from the beginning you will notice a different sound than the previous but that's because this is a new era of the band. (Ryan Argast | Lead Vocals)
7. What do you think makes you stand out from similar bands?
I truly believe I sing in a band with some of the best musicians in the scene. I'm very lucky to be able to create with these guys so I definitely think that helps us stand out amongst the crowd. We aren't afraid to grab influences everywhere, we honestly don't care for being called Pop-Punk and we never wanted to put a name to our "genre," we listen to Rock, Alternative, Pop, Soul, R&B, Metal, Jazz, Industrial, Punk, Electronic, and Hip Hop so we are going to put that in our music if we see fit. (Ryan Argast | Lead Vocals)
8. Have there been any challenges to having 3 vocalists in the band?
Not really, each vocalist has their role and understands it. It's been more of a blessing and an advantage than anything else. (Ryan Argast | Lead Vocals)
9. Favorite lyric from Terminal?
“I found the deepest corners of my mind where you used to roam. A projection plays the night when we buried the rest of our hope. Now you found somebody else while I’m looking for myself. When you kiss him do you ever think of how my lips felt?” The first verse of "Better Weather." (Eric Somers-Urrea | Drums)
10. How do the songs from Terminal differ from your previous work?
I feel like if you've been sort of tracking the stylistic trajectory of Marina City from the beginning then the sound of Terminal shouldn't be a big shock. Signs have sort of been pointing us this direction musically for a while and when we were writing it sort of brought us to this cliff. Do we fully jump off from the "pop-punk" world we started in and totally commit to something new? As much as we've tried to walk and dance on that line these past few years this time around we made a conscious decision to make that jump into new uncharted waters for us. We've all been closeted fans of pop music for a while; jamming Bruno Mars, Bleachers, Maroon 5, Lorde, Twenty One Pilots, etc. in the van for years. So with those influences in mind, we set out to try and write a record we'd really want to listen to. We want to dance and have fun but also get wild and crazy but also break it down and make you reflect on life. We really hope we achieved that with Terminal. (Eric Somers-Urrea | Drums)
11. Dream tour lineup?
Currently, our dream tour lineup would probably look more like a dream festival lineup but it'd probably look something like Bruno Mars, Twenty One Pilots, Panic at the Disco, Paramore, and us? Though I think we could definitely die happy with just one of those. (Eric Somers-Urrea | Drums)
12. What’s something most people don’t know about your band?
Most people do not know that all six of us write our music in the notorious "Matt's Basement." We get together 3 days a week and collectively work on our music, rather than having one main songwriter or "the guy." ( Todor Birindjiev | Lead Guitar)
13. You have a few headliner shows coming up! What are you excited for the most with these?
We are most excited to finally start playing our new music! We will be performing a few new songs for our fans on these headliner shows and preparing for the release on August 11th. (Todor Birindjiev | Lead Guitar)
14. Have you ever been compared to Fall Out Boy/Panic!? Because when Man In The Mirror and Thieves came on I got serious flashbacks.
Yes, all the time. Fall Out Boy and Panic! are actually some of our biggest influences musically and vocally especially with our new music we're about to release. Definitely take it as a compliment when we do get compared to these great artists. (Aaron Heiy | Bass)
15. What’s next for you guys/anything in the works?
Just preparing to release Terminal, with writing as much as we can to always be prepared for our next release and also to just keep the writing going. Touring as well, trying to tour on this new record as much as we can. We will be going on tour with The Funeral Portrait and Awake At last from August 12-August 25! We are also headlining Emerson in Indianapolis on August 10th and The Wire in Berwyn IL on August 11th. There are tickets left at marinacityband.com. (Aaron Heiy | Bass)
