Arizona rockers The Maine teamed up with Taking Back Sunday and Charlotte Sands on their latest single “Loved You A Little,” a track that was always meant to be a collaboration.
LISTEN NOW: The Maine talk new single “Loved You A Little” with Kevan Kenney
John O’Callaghan and Jared Monaco of The Maine joined Audacy’s Kevan Kenney as they gave us a peek behind the curtain into the making of the song. “Full transparency when we first had the idea, we had the idea to have a song with features prior to even writing the song,” O’Callaghan said. The band hadn’t done something like that before, which presented itself with a new set of challenges.
“We went into writing the song kind of with the idea of, ‘what if we channeled [Taking Back Sunday] our own way?’” O’Callaghan said. He then called Adam Lazzara of Taking Back Sunday, who said that he agreed to be a part of the track because O’Callghan called him personally. “He actually wanted to do it and didn’t feel forced [to do it],” O’Callaghan said. “He’s like the Fonz, he’s the king of cool,” he added.
Charlotte Sands is also featured on the track as the two first got introduced to each other at a show in Boston this past summer. “We got to see her perform, we got to hear her voice live and it was like, full send, just kind of [a] no brainer. It just fell into place,” O’Callaghan said.
The success of “Loved You A Little” has seen The Maine get thrown in as part of the new Pop-Punk resurgence. The association isn’t something that bothers the band, but came as sort of a happy accident.
Earlier on in their career, the group was considered Pop-Punk whenever various outlets or publications were discussing their music. “You’re looking at on paper the genre that people are associating you with and Pop-Punk was the easiest way to classify it back then. But back then we didn’t know if that was necessarily, if that was ultimately what we were going to be,” Monaco said.
“Definitely in our brains we weren’t thinking that we were Pop-Punk,” O’Callaghan added. “We were put off by it in the very beginning because we still didn’t know who we were as a band,” Monaco said.
Listen to the latest from the world of Alternative on Audacy’s ALT New Arrivals
As their song “Loved You A Little” started to gain traction, it unintentionally forced the band’s hand into thinking about what kind of band they are.“Talking about ‘Loved You A Little,’ like, is this what people perceive us to be and is this what they’ve always perceived,” O’Callaghan said.
The band had conversations with one another about what direction they want to go in as the success behind “Loved You A Little” has played an influence on that. “It’s been such a great time for us. Putting this song out…. people seem to really be vibing it,” Monaco said as O’Callaghan then interjected with a laugh “do we just need to do this?”
Check out their full conversation with Kevan Kenney above.
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