The Revivalists Perform Live
[music]
Alison Stewart: This is All Of It in WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. If you've seen The Revivalists at Lollapalooza or Red Rocks or Jazz Fest then you know the New Orleans-based band radiates energy on stage. You can see that for yourself when the band swings to our area in support of their fifth studio album, their first in five years. It's called Pour It Out Into the Night. Before we hear, some members of the band perform live. Let's listen to a short clip from one of their new songs. This is Don't Look Back.
[MUSIC - The Revivalists: Don't Look Back]
I wake up in the morning
I don't feel so good
Same number
Same car
Same hood
It's not like this every day
But when it's raining it's pouring
I could throw it all away
Take warning
I think I should
Still got some killers in this neighborhood
The way we're living is understood
Take it back from the rich
Call me Robin Hood
So, look alive, look alive
When rubber meets road
Put the car in "Drive"
Look alive, look alive
Show me what you got
Put 'em all real high
Alison Stewart: The group was founded in 2008 and has since grown to eight members. Before they hit the road on a nationwide tour, today we're joined by the group's co-founders David Shaw and Zack Feinberg, a day before the release of the new album Pour It Out Into the Night. Thank you so much for being here and for bringing guitars.
Zack Feinberg: Thank you so much for having us-
David Shaw: Yes, thank you.
Zack Feinberg: -and offering this lovely tour of our music.
Alison Stewart: There's more to come. What are we going to hear first?
Zack Feinberg: This is Down In The Dirt.
Alison Stewart: All right. Let's do it.
[MUSIC - The Revivalists: Down In The Dirt]
My daddy was a lawyer who sold salvation to the church
Your money's no good in heaven, but it's great down here on earth
So let's get down in the dirt
Let's get down in the dirt
My granddad was a scholar in the school of heartbreak and hard work
He didn't believe in heaven or damnation being worse
He's laid down in the dirt
He laid down in the dirt
It can't be that we're the only ones
Born out of this ever-loving mud
It can't be that we're the only ones
That grew up from this ever-loving sun
My mama was no angel, she was more than just a nurse
She thought it was a charity to keep us kids from getting hurt
Can't stay clean in the dirt
Life is mean on this earth
I have no occupation, but I have some sense of worth
All the flowers blossom from what goes on in the dirt
So I get down in the dirt
Let's get down in the dirt
It can't be that we're the only ones
Born out of this ever-loving mud
It can't be that we're the only ones
That grew up from this ever-loving sun
They say that love is just the thing to save a man
It's not so shallow, you must dig to bring it out
So let's get down in the dirt
Let's get down in the dirt
They say that love is just the thing to save a man
It's not so shallow, you must dig to bring it out
So let's get down in the dirt
Let's get down in the dirt
Alison Stewart: That is from the new album, Pour It Out Into the Night. It is out tomorrow, from The Revivalists. I want to mention they'll be playing shows at Asbury Park on July 9th, Bridgeport in July 14th, and then back here around Brooklyn on August 10th. Zack, that song deals with some of the big questions about life, some family dynamics, and what you do with what you get. What was your mindset when you were writing that song? Where were you?
Zack Feinberg: The first verse came to me as I was walking my dog in the Bywater neighborhood in New Orleans, where I lived a couple of years ago. I had seen another band perform the previous night and the first line of their song was, "That poor boy was a lawyer with a necktie for a noose." I was like, "That is a great first line." My dad is a lawyer and he deals with organized religions as clients, so the first line popped up in my head like, if this were my song, it would be like this. That is as real as it gets for you.
[laughter]
Alison Stewart: Yes, for real.
Zack Feinberg: It just followed that, and so I talked about my grandfather, who was-- his father was an atheist until the end. Once I came on the turning the phrase of the down in the dirt, I was really excited. I was like, "Wow, this is really special." I don't know when I turned that phrase exactly, but that felt like I had something pretty special. I'm proud of where it all went dealing with all the big questions of the fleetingness of life and wanting to make the most of it. Sometimes that's not pretty, getting your hands dirty with everything. Try to keep it hopeful with the love, sort of sentiments.
David Shaw: Of course, really, it kind of brings it all together. It's an incredible song, brother. Seriously.
Zack Feinberg: Thank you.
Alison Stewart: When you're songwriting, Dave, does that happen while walking the dog after also seeing some music? Are you that kind of writer where something comes to you, you sit, you get your notes out, you write it down, or do you have writing time?
David Shaw: Both. I'm always keeping my ears and eyes open for things. Always, we have our cell phone where probably we can always get down a little note or something. If you're not doing it that way, I feel like you're just going to lose so much. Sometimes these little gems will come in and it'll just be something somebody said like that or it'll just be something you heard on TV. It'll just come to you while you're having a run or whatever, but if you don't have your line in the water, you're not going to catch it.
Alison Stewart: Did COVID Change the way you guys write at all, considering you didn't have that input from the outside world?
Zack Feinberg: I think it changed everything. Just having that much time to be still at home changed. It was a blessing in disguise in some ways. Our album title is taken from you going out to your studio in the middle of the night and just singing your heart out and you've sort of arrived at that chorus, just doing just that [crosstalk].
David Shaw: Yes, exactly.
Alison Stewart: Late nights for you?
David Shaw: Late night, 2:00 AM, 3:00 AM. Sometimes I just wake up in the middle of the night with not a great feeling because we didn't know if we're going to be able to even do what we do anymore. That was just up in the air big time. It was just like trying to wade through those waters, and one of the ways that I did that was just singing through it.
Alison Stewart: So pour it out into the night. Just pour out it.
David Shaw: Pour it out it. Whatever you're feeling, just pour it out, sing it out, and it helps.
Alison Stewart: My guests are David Shaw and Zack Feinberg from The Revivalists. The new album Pour It Out Into the Night is out tomorrow. Tell me if I'm wrong because you know the internet. Zack, did you record the album in Vermont?
Zack Feinberg: Yes, we did two weeks of tracking in Vermont with a great producer by the name of Rich Costey. Some of his more renowned works include Muse, some of their big albums, and Death Cab for Cutie.
David Shaw: Obviously.
Zack Feinberg: He did an engineering and mixing for audio Slave and the Rage Against the Machine records. He worked with Rick Rubin for years. He's a heavyweight, and it was really cool to work with him in this getaway in Vermont.
David Shaw: Yes, it was incredible. He's a really special dude.
Alison Stewart: What did he bring out in you that maybe another producer hadn't tapped into?
David Shaw: One of the things I think he did was he understood who we were. That's really, really important in a producer because I think sometimes a producer can come in there and they got a vision for you. That's cool and sometimes it works really well, but it was like we've been established, we know what we want to sound like, and he was the guide. He was our spiritual guru in the studio, just pushing us forward in a direction that felt good and positive and felt true to us. I think he was a good choice.
Zack Feinberg: He also encouraged attention to detail in us, I would say, in that he is very fastidious about, as far as getting the sounds that he wants as an engineer and mixer and producer. We would take hours setting up a single sound on a tom drum or something like that. I think that encouraged us in some ways to advocate for the details and what we were wanting out of a track too. He was very open with that collaboration and committed to putting the time in on it, so it allowed us to follow through with our vision, I think.
Alison Stewart: What was the detail that you wanted to make sure was on the album, David? A sound, a word, a phrase?
David Shaw: Oof. Wow. Well, I will say that our albums, just from the beginning of time till now, it's like they're all over the place. I think that one of the details that we wanted to hone in on was -- we want to still have that because that's just who we are, but we need to have these small little things that anchor it together. There's many. I don't know if I can speak to just one of them.
Zack Feinberg: I can give an example, just little layers. There's so much ear candy. When you do a lot of pre-production like we've done with the demos, you know what adds a lot to a track. For example, in the background of Kid, there is a very subtle, what we labeled the track as eerie howl. It wasn't in the first five or--
[howling]
Zack Feinberg: That sort of thing. We know that little flair in the background, just the note, just brings a feeling that's just really sweet and really good. It's like you have to advocate for these little things that nobody else is going to remember except you.
David Shaw: You were really good at that, actually.
Zack Feinberg: Yes.
David Shaw: You are really good at advocating for little things.
Zack Feinberg: All the little things.
David Shaw: Yes, all the little things.
Zack Feinberg: In this part, [guitar sound] that little thing that happens the entire time, it's just little hypnotic things that are important, that are different than live. Because what we like to represent live is just like what you see is what you get, like this is pure, like you're not really running background tracks.
David Shaw: Not really. We are not.
Zack Feinberg: We're not.
[laughter]
Zack Feinberg: I don't know. There's all kinds of gadgetry sometimes I'm a little confused but--
[laughter]
David Shaw: No tracks.
Zack Feinberg: Yes. There's eight people on stage and we're playing live music. That's honest to me, and it's authentic. When I go to a concert, I like it to be like that. In the studio, I take a lot of pleasure out of crafting really exciting, unique sounds and playing with that. As far as the little details, like advocating for what we know sounds really good based on the time that we spent with it, and also trusting a producer to bring his expertise, which was incredible and [unintelligible 00:13:20].
David Shaw: Exactly, and helping us also push it forward because sometimes it's easy to get lost in those little details, and it's like, "All right."
Zack Feinberg: Sometimes it doesn't matter. [laughs]
David Shaw: Exactly. You just look back in the whole big picture and be like, "All right. Actually, this is really great." Listen to it in six months and tell me how you feeling.
Alison Stewart: Yes, let it go. Let it out. Let it go.
Zack Feinberg: Sometimes you're wrong.
David Shaw: Sometimes you're wrong.
Alison Stewart: That's what producers are for.
David Shaw: Absolutely.
Alison Stewart: I was interviewing Rick Rubin, and I said, "What do you do when you don't like something Jay-Z's laid down?" He said, "It's not about my relationship with Jay, it's about, 'This doesn't work,'" and that's okay because that happens in creative process. Sometimes something doesn't work.
Zack Feinberg: Yes. It's humbling being a musician, honestly. Nobody is perfect. You listen back, and it's like, "Oh yes, I sound not good there. I'm rushing," or I'm one thing or another. It never stops. That's the truth of it. You can be probably one of the best musicians in the world, Yo-Yo Ma or something, I'm sure sometimes during playback-- I'm sure he doesn't do everything in one take.
David Shaw: Yes.
Alison Stewart: Can we hear another song?
Zack Feinberg: Yes, sure.
Alison Stewart: What are we going to hear?
Zack Feinberg: Let's do Kid.
David Shaw: Let's do Kid. Let me make sure I'm in tune here.
Zack Feinberg: Yes.
David Shaw: Close. Close enough.
Zack Feinberg: See? Even David Shaw needs to tune his guitar sometimes, people.
David Shaw: [laughs] All right, here we go.
[MUSIC - The Revivalists: Kid]
I walked downtown to get my fortune read
She took one look and this is what she said
Hey, kid
Just sing the songs that wake the dead then
You keep them ringing in your head, yeah
You gotta get it off your chest
Don't worry 'bout the mess
I must confess I took a hit, I'm in a bad condition
With all the chatter, where's the truth?
I find it hard to listen
They want it loud, they want it now, they want it now
Just get it out, just get it out, just get it out
Hey, kid
Just sing the songs that wake the dead, then
You get that darkness out your head, yeah
You had it with you from the start
The lightning in your heart
Yeah, it's gonna take me out
Yeah, it's gonna bring me down
But I'm just living for the spirit now
I'm out of luck on the floor, every siren's ringing
It's not the same anymore, I hear them trumpets singing
They want it loud, they want it now, they want it loud
Just get it out, just get it out, just get it out
As much as everything changes, everything stays the same
I've been going through phases, turning the page in my brain
That glow up ahead in the distance, it's never looking the same
I'm going through changes, going through phases
Walking through mazes, wrecking my brain, so
Hey, kid
Just sing the songs that wake the dead, then
You get that darkness out your head, yeah
It's the blessing and the curse
The dying and the birth
Yeah, it's gonna take me out
Yeah, it's gonna bring me down
But I'm just living for the spirit now
I'm just living for the spirit now
I'm just living for the spirit now
But I'm just living for the spirit now
I'm just living, I'm just living
[howling]
Alison Stewart: That was Kid from David Shaw and Zack Feinberg of The Revivalists. The new album, Pour It Out Into the Night is out tomorrow. They'll be in our area, Asbury Park on July 9th, Bridgeport on July 14th, and then in Brooklyn on August 10th. The story goes with that song that you wrote that on January 6th, 2021?
Zack Feinberg: Yes, a lot of it.
Alison Stewart: Morning or afternoon?
Zack Feinberg: Day.
David Shaw: Kind of afternoon.
Alison Stewart: Afternoon?
Zack Feinberg: Afternoon, I think, yes.
Alison Stewart: What was the vibe? What were you doing? Did you call each other up? Did you say, "What's going on? Let's--"
Zack Feinberg: I was at his house.
David Shaw: Yes. We'd already had it planned. It was to write.
Alison Stewart: Oh, it was on writing day?
David Shaw: It was on writing day, yes.
Zack Feinberg: Yes. We had the bed of the music pretty well established. I think we were trying to put together some verses and some layering stuff. We were in a great flow, in a really good place with the song. I was feeling really amazing. It felt like it was a really productive day up until that point, and then we started getting some messages, and we were like, "Oh my, God. What is going on? This is crazy." I was just like, "Yes. This sort of thing happened in Michigan." I was like, "Let's keep focus on this because this is more important actually to us, I think, than--" I mean, just a crappy situation.
David Shaw: Yes. Bad stuff. I think some of that crept into the lyrics a little bit, for sure, because there's always going to be things that take your attention. We've got the computer in our pocket. There's a lot of negativity in the world and there's a lot of negativity on social media, but there's also a lot of beauty. We had something beautiful in the room and we felt like it was, if we focus on this, what are we going to do? We're not going to stop this.
Alison Stewart: You wanted to protect what you had made.
David Shaw: Yes, we wanted to protect what-- Absolutely. It was just like, "Let's focus on this. Some of that is going to get in there." We're always fighting the good fight, so what we're going to do is going to do it. It's work in other ways.
Alison Stewart: Yes, I know. You guys do a lot of pro-social work.
David Shaw: Yes, sure.
Alison Stewart: I'm curious about, so you sing with your guitars. When you guys play live, it is fantastic mayhem on stage in the best way.
Zack Feinberg: We've got eight musicians typically, yes. This is two of us in here.
Alison Stewart: Eight of you. It gets sweaty. There's dancing. I think the first time I saw you guys was in 2014 in a big field in New Orleans.
Zack Feinberg: Nice.
Alison Stewart: It was just like a dance party from the beginning to the end. It was just great. It was sweaty. It was messy.
Zack Feinberg: Amazing.
David Shaw: Was it Jazz Fest?
Alison Stewart: It was at Jazz Fest.
David Shaw: What?
Alison Stewart: I was in for work doing something else and I just walked down the street and I was like, "What do I hear?"
Zack Feinberg: Oh, at French Quarter Fest maybe?
David Shaw: It might have been French Quarter Fest. Also, it might have been Lafayette Square. One of those.
Alison Stewart: That was it.
Zack Feinberg: Oh, yes. That was one day at the square.
David Shaw: One day at the square.
Zack Feinberg: Nice.
David Shaw: Those are kind of some legendary shows.
Alison Stewart: Those are legendary shows.
Zack Feinberg: Those are fun.
Alison Stewart: [laughs] When you are on stage, when you're seeing your audience because your audience really gets into it, how would you describe that exchange of energy, Zack or David?
Zack Feinberg: Anytime that we go to play and we know it's being consumed by a larger audience, I feel a charge. Even about to play on the radio, my body feels different than David and I playing in sound check. It's a psychological-
David Shaw: Oh, yes. [unintelligible 00:22:01], baby.
Zack Feinberg: -or like a quantum phenomenon. When you're being observed, it changes it. To have a ton of people giving you incredible energy and expectations positively charges the experience.
David Shaw: There is a connection that happens that is-- It's an unspeakable thing. Just like right now, I feel like we have a really good energy going. Sometimes it doesn't happen like this. Sometimes it's super awkward and super weird. It just doesn't happen. We're not naming names.
[laughter]
David Shaw: No, it's for real. It's like, at some shows, you always try to get there and it doesn't always happen. We always get up there and play our songs. We're giving it our all, but when that crowd comes with that ferocious, just that raw power, we feed off that. The more the crowd gives us, the more we can actually give, I feel like. It really turns into something special like really, really.
Zack Feinberg: I would like to comment as from an observer. I mean, not an observer, I'm in the band, obviously, but you're the frontman. There have been years where it's not always like there's a large crowd ready to cheer you on. Sometimes you got to win them over in the early years. There's 10 people, 12 people, or 5, just 3 people in a room. From my experience, it has been remarkable from day one, how you put your all out there into every performance and very consistently always deliver a very energetic, amazing performance.
David Shaw: Oh, thanks, man. Oh, boy, thank you.
Alison Stewart: There you go, so fully transparent. We're going to have you play one more song. We may not make it to the end on the live broadcast, but we'll keep playing and we'll make sure it makes it to the podcast.
Zack Feinberg: Sounds good.
David Shaw: Cool.
Alison Stewart: Is that good?
David Shaw: Great.
Zack Feinberg: Yes, let's do it.
Alison Stewart: What are we going to hear?
David Shaw: You're going to hear a song called Alive.
Alison Stewart: This is David Shaw and Zack Feinberg of The Revivalists. The album Pour It Out Into the Night is out tomorrow.
David Shaw: Make sure I'm good here. Okay.
[MUSIC - The Revivalists: Alive]
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