JUSTIN PITT of SILENCE THE CITY: Forever Moving Forward
An interview by Sarah Kidd.
Auckland band Silence The City understand the definition of relationships; having been working together for almost a decade it is a topic that they have not only each individually experienced but one that they have shared as a whole on both a friendship and musical level.
Tomorrow sees the release of their latest single ‘Go It Alone’ from their debut album Resilience (with the music video being debuted tonight right here on Ambient Light), a stunning collection of distinctive rock tracks overlaid with the unique and instantly recognisable vocals of Justin Pitt.
On the eve of this highly anticipated release I sat down with Justin to discuss the thought processes behind ‘Go It Alone’, the new addition to Silence The City and future plans…
Thursday sees the unveiling of Silence The City’s latest single ‘Go It Alone’; the band must be pretty psyched to finally see that happening?
“Absolutely! 100%. We have had this song recorded for a little while now. We got funding from NZ on Air for a music video, so we put everything on hold till that was all sorted. We shot the video two weekends ago and it went really well. So yeah, we are all really pumped to get it out there.”
Now the song is about a relationship breakdown and the intense emotions that this process can involve. Obviously, it is a topic that will speak to many people; love and all its intricacies being a quite universal topic.
“Yeah totally!”
Was that subject matter the intention when going in to write the track or was it more that relationships and the subsequent breakdown of them is something that every one of us will be involved in at some point of our lives, so the topic became a natural fit?
“I think with any relationship you go through those rough patches where there is that glimmer of doubt and you ask yourself ‘Is this the right thing for me?’ ‘Do I hold on and just suck it up and live through the crap?’ or ‘Is it too much – do I just need to dig deep and push for an exit?’
So, it’s about that inner turmoil, when it comes to making those decisions. That is what the song is inherently about. It’s about having the courage to say ‘No, enough is enough, I’m walking out’.”
Indeed, because it can be a hard call, especially when you have already invested a few years of your life…
“Exactly. Sometimes that’s the thing, you look at it and think ‘Oh, well it’s been six years – or however long – it would be a shame to throw that away’ but [laughs] sometimes the grass is greener on the other side of the fence … potentially.”
Looking at this single, was it a collaborative project, with each member adding something from their own personal experiences of relationships? Or was it based on the experiences of just one – it’s ok, you don’t have to name names!
[mutual laughter]
“Primarily one member; being the vocalist of the band I write the bulk of the lyrics. What typically happens in the song writing process for us, the guitarist will come up with a riff and we will jam it out, so the band will sit around jamming to figure out a basic structure and then I will work out the melodies.
Once we have a part of the song done – it might just be a chorus and a riff, or a chorus and a verse – I will start to develop some lyrics and honing those melodies. I will then bring that back to the guys and we will hone that again, fine tuning everything. Sometimes we will change the lyrics or change the melodies but certainly musically it is a collaborative thing, but I do write the bulk of the lyrics myself.”
Choosing to write it from a first-person perspective again makes the track far more relatable; again, was this a conscious decision or something that developed naturally as the song came together?
“I wouldn’t say it was deliberate, it was just the way that it came out. So, I guess, on a sub-conscious level, the music spoke to me and that was what needed to come out. Sometimes I will listen to something and it will be a sort of third person perspective or even more abstract than that.
But with this one it wasn’t a goal to have it that way [first person] it’s just what happened. It’s natural, it’s all natural” [mutual laughter]
Being a song about relationships do you hope that on a deeper level that it may help someone to make a difficult decision in their lives, or see things from a different perspective? Or is that a little too much pressure!
“That’s a lot of pressure! I’ve always used music as an outlet for myself, you know going through things I will listen to music, and I will listen to a certain style or tone of music depending on how I am feeling about whatever is going on.
So certainly, it would be awesome if the song spoke to people on a heavier level. But at the same time, I don’t want to be solely responsible for ending someone’s relationship!” [laughs]
Silence The City are certainly no newbies to the music scene having formed almost a decade ago – you certainly have some notches on the belt…
“Yeah, makes me feel old” [mutual laughter]
… but do you find that that longevity that you have, that that benefits both the song writing and the music writing process?
“Most definitely! We always had a motto, when we started writing ten years ago, when we write new stuff, it’s kinda like … if something is new, we chuck out an old one. We don’t just keep playing it and increasing the backlog, we just go ‘Sweet, we are moving onto this and this is what we do now.’
Because we ourselves know that this is much better than what we used to do. And that just comes down to experience and doing it over and over again, as well as having a bit of life experience and being better musicians ten years down the road. It helps us write what we are writing today.”
Last November saw the release of your debut album ‘Resilience’ and I have to say I was most impressed by the fact that you basically restarted the whole project back in 2016 and re-recorded tracks such as ‘Brave’ and ‘Identity’ – to me it showed a level of maturity that is often missing from a lot of bands…
“We had written these songs, but we were in a bit of a limbo due to the state of music now days and being predominantly digitised and geared towards singles rather than albums.
We’ve always wanted to do an album, like a full-length album. So, we started off tracking these singles and some of the stuff we had tracked in the past – well we just wanted to do them justice so that they could be part of the album. They represent a real piece of who we are and what we can achieve.”
And this drive to produce the best representation of yourselves; I am assuming that in many ways this is what has kept Silence The City going for the past decade?
“Definitely, definitely. We are a group of four guys who just enjoy hanging out and spending time together. It’s an outlet from our day to day lives so it’s a bit of a treat really to get to go and get together once a week or however often we do it and just get creative.”
Now on a personal level you are obviously a man who is quite passionate about several causes – most notably Sea Shepherd Conservation Society – many fans having seen you perform in one of their shirts several times.
“Oh yeah [laughs] it usually gets a bit of attention that shirt!”
So obviously a topic close to your heart?
“Yeah for sure. When we released our single for ‘We are the Voice’ for the music video we actually did a collaboration with Sea Shepherd. We got in touch with them – that’s when I got that shirt that you are speaking of – and they gave us access to their archives.
We just wanted to get that message out there, because while they have been gaining heaps and heaps of traction, it’s still such an awesome cause and we just wanted to do our part, to say ‘Hey look, there is some terrible stuff going on out there to these beautiful creatures that didn’t ask for it and can’t do anything to defend themselves’.”
I really admire that!
Stepping back into the musical realms, for you personally what would you say are some of your musical influences?
“Aww, tough question! Sometimes it changes depending on the day of the week! Sometimes I will wake up and I’ll listen to some heavy stuff, like not so much the screamo kinda stuff but more of the post-metal stuff. I really love that, I always have.
But then again, I sometimes love just getting down to the roots and listening to some old blues; I’ve got my record player and I’ve got a massive collection of genres. Basically, anything that’s got me humming a tune afterwards – for days! I don’t care what it is – just anything with a good tune, a good melody and a good hook – I’m into it.”
You’re genre-fluid! That’s a great thing to be!
[laughs] “Well last time I brought records I went up to the counter and the guy was looking at them like ‘Oh yeah, oh yeah…wait…what the hell is that??’ It was such a contrast because I had like an Elton John album in there with a bunch of metal records and the guy was like ‘What the fuck?’ [laughs]
But I was like ‘Hey, there’s a fuckin good track on that record so …’” [laughs]
Hey, ‘Bennie and the Jets’ is an Elton John track that you just cannot go past. Ever!
Well here’s a slightly harder question then – what New Zealand bands do you think people should be checking out right now?
“Good question. There is a bit of a lull in New Zealand rock at the moment. Obviously, there is the usual like your Devilskin and Shihad that has always been around, but in terms of new, fresh emerging stuff there’s not really a lot going on…
I mean there are a lot of bands out there like Dead Favours – we’re all mates, so those guys for sure. And the Dead Beat Boys – I really like those guys, especially live. They are good friends of ours and I can’t wait to hear new music from them.”
Dead Beat Boys I certainly concur with your statement about their live performances – they are just fantastic!
“Yeah, give them a year or two and they will be putting out some really impressive stuff.”
Going back to what you were saying earlier – I like the fact that Silence The City are always looking forward with their music. So right now, at this current moment – how would you describe Silence The City’s sound?
[laughs] “I would like to say just modern-rock [laughs]. We have a new guitarist – Chris Starkey is no longer with us, so Andrew Kerr from I am Giant has joined the ranks and that does bring in a new flavour to the band.
We are working on new stuff at the moment and again it’s progression from our last body of work. We are continuously moving forward – so in a way I guess you could call it progressive-modern-rock.” [laughs]
I was just about to ask that actually; with the debut album now out for almost a year and the next single being released tomorrow, what’s next on the cards for Silence The City? But with Andrew joining the band I would assume the answer would be ‘working on new material’ [laughs]
“Yeah, we are working on new material; in particular a couple of new singles; potentially an EP in the works, but again it’s still all early days…
We’ve got a few songs that we have hatched out, but at the moment we just want to get some new music out there and play some big shows!”
Silence The City will debut their new music video for ‘Go It Alone’ at 5pm tonight, right here on Ambient Light. Their debut album ‘Resilience’ is out now and can be purchased below.
![Resilience [DIGITAL]](https://i0.wp.com/www.ambientlightblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/BandcampSilenceTheCity.jpg?resize=300%2C157&ssl=1)
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