“We didn’t want to make a record about all the negative sides of the past few years, especially when there’s been so much positive that’s been going on,” Thomas told HuffPost. “We didn’t want to talk about the isolation. We didn’t want to talk about the division. We didn’t want to talk about rage.”
Paul Doucette: We were going to tour in 2020 and obviously the COVID-19 pandemic had other plans. 2021 came, still no tour. 2022 came, and … there was a general sense that we were letting people down. Prior to that point, there had been conversations about doing a new song or two. I was busy doing other stuff, so I was like: “You guys go ahead and do that, and I’ll see you on the road.”
Rob Thomas: We were never, like, we’re going to make this kind of record or that kind of record. But there’s enough cynicism in the world right now. There are songs on the album about love, loss and the dark side of relationships, but for the most part, I don’t think there’s anything that’s been done with any sort of cynicism.
When you come from a 1990s rock band — a ’90s alt-rock band, which is what we were when we started — you realize that a lot of what you’ve done in the past is manufactured angst. At the time, you feel like it’s real, but when you go back and listen to it, you’re like: “Wow, I wasn’t really that angry. This is what I felt I was supposed to be doing.” As we’ve gotten older, we don’t have that in our tank anymore.
Thomas: The difference between a solo song and a Matchbox song that I write is just that a Matchbox song is a song that the guys like. That’s the only difference. When I write a song, I have to believe in it when I sing it, so I just do a bunch of those when I’m writing, and if the guys like them, they wind up on a record.
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