Singled Out: Nightjacket's All Of My Friends

Los Angeles band Nightjacket just released their new single "All Of My Friends" and to celebrate we asked Andrea Wasse to tell us about the track. Here is the story:

"All Of My Friends" came to me in pieces, which is usually the case, but it took a minute to get all of the pieces together. The first verse (lyrics and melody) was in my head for months before I brought it to anyone else to flesh out. It was near the end of the pandemic (or the middle of pandemic... what is time?), when the world was starting to open up again but nothing felt the same by any means.

"Echoes of loneliness bouncing 'round the concrete jungle, all of my friends left the city and I really should have followed" was running through my head on repeat as I navigated the 'new normal'. A lot of friends had left the city for various reasons, restaurants, music venues, bars, movie theatres I'd frequented had closed down under the weight of trying to stay afloat when the world had shut down... nothing was the way it once had been.

When I brought what I had to Jordan (Wiggins, guitarist extraordinaire), we fleshed it out and found the chorus together. In the chorus I found the words for what I was feeling after months of forced self reflection and a re-entry into a word so unfamiliar.

I missed the old days- the ones right before lockdown, and the ones even further back, when I was in my 20s, freshly landed in L.A. with proverbial stars in my eyes and a devil may care attitude. Myspace, flip phones, meeting new friends, getting wasted on the Sunset Strip, making sure to be at the right parties... when life didn't feel as serious. I felt nostalgic and wanted to go back in time, press pause, relive THOSE days.

"All I wanted was time to stand completely still, was that too much to ask for?"

The forced moment of stillness and self reflection during the pandemic (let's call it Pandemmy for levity) brought up a lot for me, as it did for a lot of people. Some changed careers, moved out of town, got into relationships, broke out of relationships... It really forced us to figure out what was important to us. I *think* my midlife crisis coincided with the lockdown crisis we were all feeling, so it was a double whammy. I couldn't play shows, couldn't get into studios with friends, was forced to just work at home and do co-writes over Zoom (which I hated)... I wasn't able to do what I've been doing since I started my first band at 15.

I definitely had moments of "wtf have I done/am I doing with my life?", "do people even care about my music?", "should I have chosen a more stable career?", "all of my friends are out there buying houses and raising kids, why do I feel like I missed the chapter in the life book on how to be an adult?" etc, etc.

All of these mini (and sometimes not so mini) freak-outs lent themselves to this song, and what my bandmates brought to the table musically fits so well. A slight nod to Wilco, some Teenage Fanclub-ian harmonies. It's just swimming with nostalgia.

Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen and watch for yourself below and learn more here

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