Exclusive Interview with Pop-Punk Band Last Night Saved My Life

Hailing from Mid-Michigan, Last Night Saved My Life seamlessly darts between pop-rock gems and edgier, driving pop-punk influenced tracks. Wilson Shaner, Justin Burns, Riley Hupfer, Ryne Weber and Eric Cousins achieve a heart-on-sleeve honesty without delving into the angstier, rawer realms of the genre. Their upcoming debut LP Cherry is a superb debut full-length from a band ripe to emerge from the periphery of the pop-punk scene.

I got the chance to talk to the band about how the band came together, where the name Last Night Saved My Life came from, their new LP Cherry and so much more! Keep reading to see what they had to say!

For those who might not have ever heard of y’all, can you give us a brief history of the band and how it culminated into what it is now?

We are 5 friends from Saginaw, MI who have been playing shows together for years. It took us quite a while to put out our first album, but now this is a fresh start for us. We have great chemistry together since we are really good friends and have been playing together for years. Now, we finally have an album of songs that people want to listen to and come out and see us play, so we are really just starting to get our feet wet. 

Where did the name Last Night Saved My Life come from?

Last Night Saved My Life is the idea that no matter where you are or where you’ve been, you can find something that will drive you forward and keep you going. So many people are on the brink of giving up, but you never know when something will come along and change everything. Last Night Saved My Life is all about finding something that keeps you going.

I’m always genuinely curious about what artists want to convey to listeners with their music. You guys classify your sound as pop-punk, but if you had to describe it without using genre names, how would you describe it?

Catchy, fun, honest, engaging. It sounds like early 2000s vibes mixed with modern day production.

Kind of going off of that, who are some of your musical influences?

Yellowcard, Fall Out Boy, The Starting Line, Blink 182, Lauv, Maroon 5.

Let’s talk about your new LP, Cherry. Why did you want to name the project this?

Cause this is the cherry on top of life. It sounds fun, catchy, and gave us something to brand.

What was the recording process like for this project? How long did it take for this to come together from start to finish?

Making this album was an amazing experience. Working with Seth Henderson for the second time at his studio in Indiana was really awesome. We work with him really well and he is just so great at what he does. We started writing songs for this album in July 2018 and we wrote up through January 2019. Then, we recorded in January and February of 2019 and we got the final masters at the end of May. We released it at the end of June, so it was pretty much a full year project from start to finish.

The most recent single from the project is “Waterfall”. What inspired this song?

We wanted to make a super honest jam. This song is really just about being totally transparent with someone and not hiding anything; letting them know that there will be great days, but also tough times. It basically says, “Hey, I won’t be perfect but I am going to try my best”.

What was the songwriting process like for this song specifically?

This song was demo’d out at Wilson’s house before going to the studio and we knew it was going to be a candidate to be one of the singles right away. We pretty much wrote the whole thing in one weekend. When we got to the studio, Derek [DiScanio from State Champs] had some great ideas for the song. We essentially rewrote the chorus in the studio, changing a lot of the lyrics and melodies. It was a super fun one to work on and we are stoked with how it turned out!

What made you guys want to include a feature on the song and why choose Derek DiScanio?

Since Derek was there with us co-producing the album, we thought it would be really cool to have him feature on a track. Honestly, we can’t think of anyone that we would rather have feature on a song, since his vocal style works really well with our sound. This one seemed to be the most fitting for a feature, especially since Derek helped a lot with reworking the song. 

Was there any major changes to “Waterfall” that happened once you guys got into the recording studio, whether it be in the lyrics or something sonically?

Aside from the chorus, the lyrics and the vocal melodies pretty much stayed the same. We did change up the chorus lead guitar as well to go better with the new vocal melody. 

As a band, what are some music industry-related goals or benchmarks that you’re aiming to reach in the next couple of years?

Our upcoming goals are to be a supporting band on a national tour for a bigger band and then to come out with our second full length project! We would [also] love to have that bad boy chart on Billboard.

Last question — we’re called Talk Nerdy With Us because we all have an inner nerd so what is something that you’re currently nerding out about?

At the moment, Wilson is writing a pretty nerdy fantasy novel. But we are all big nerds. We nerd out about Game of Thrones, Stranger Things, Lord of the Rings, old video games, and Settlers of Catan all the time.

Make sure you follow the band on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.