Q&A: Remember Sports Has Returned With a Short and Sweet ‘Leap Day’

Q&AMusic

Sep 23

☆ BY Frankie Tameron ☆

IT’S BEEN A WHILE SINCE WE’VE HAD A CHANCE — to hear new music from Philadelphia band Remember Sports, but after their recent hiatus the band has returned with their new EP, Leap Day. A quick internet search of the word “hiatus” explains that it allows creativity to stretch its legs and provides space for the birth of new ideas, and this is certainly what Leap Day reflects. In 2021, the band released Like a Stone but took some time off to “figure out their shit,” as Carmen Perry explains. After a hiatus complete with full-time jobs, school, and life, Remember Sports began working on Leap Day in early 2022.

Composed of Perry, Catherine Dwyer, and Jack Washburn, the band met up for a weekend in the Pocono Mountains to work on the title track as well as “Supervise.” They had not made music together since 2019, and that weekend, Perry says, was full of reminders of what makes her the happiest in life when songs started to come together. After setting down a foundation in the Poconos, Leap Day was recorded in Philly, Boston, and New York. Having a remote recording experience that stretched across spaces allowed the band to trade in the live immediacy of their studio classics to a sound that is reminiscent of their DIY roots.

Musically, this collection of songs offers the guitar riffs and bass lines that we’ve grown to expect from Remember Sports, while also layering in drum machines and experimentation to create new depth within the tracks. Influenced by Rilo Kiley and P.S. Eliot, Elliot Smith, and Fiest, Perry tells us she has finally gained confidence in what she sounds like and in the things she can create that feel unique to her. The last track on the record takes Perry out of her comfort zone and has allowed the EP to be what an EP is: a place to experiment.

The band dropped the music video for “Leap Day” on Sept. 22. In contradiction, the video was shot during a heat wave, despite the title track being based off a day in winter. The band set out to shoot something that showcased what they loved: being in nature and having fun with friends.
Read below as we chat with Perry about the “Leap Day” music video, who she’d like to cover a Remember Sports song, and the band’s next moves.

LUNA: Talk to me about the video for “Leap Day” — watching it feels like summer. What was the concept you were going for?

PERRY: Our friend Buzz made the video. I wanted to, I guess, just go out in nature. We went to this place called John Heinz in Philly, which is a really cool nature preserve kind of near the airport. Great bird watching and turtles. I was like, “Let’s just go there, run around, see what we can shoot.” For me, that's usually my style of video. We've made other videos that have more of a story or a narrative. Since this one was kind of last minute, it didn't really have that. This one was more like, “Let’s see what kind of cool things we can do,” so that's what we did. It ended up being kind of funny because it was shot in the middle of a heat wave and the song's called “Leap Day” — it is sort of based in the winter. But yeah, I'm pretty happy with it. I don't know, I've been very into being in nature since the pandemic, and I've gotten really into camping and hiking and trail running and stuff. So that was an important direction for me, I think just to be outside and having fun with my friends.

LUNA: What is your favorite memory from recording the record?

PERRY: I think the first time that we all met up and we knew that we wanted to make this EP — we wanted to have three or four songs, and we had two songs. We weren't really sure if we could do it. We were all super busy. I was working full-time and hating my life. Jack was in school. This was the only time we could find to meet up together. I think just when we started working on “Leap Day,” we got a drum loop that we liked, we got the guitars recorded. And then we just started playing with some other computer stuff. We added the vocals. And the first time that “Leap Day” felt like it was a song … I was like, “Yes, this is what I remember making me the most happy in life.” Like, “This is what I love doing.” That was definitely a really special moment. That was really affirming because we had been sort of on hiatus for so long and weren't really sure if we could do it.

LUNA: I have to know, why does “The One You Wanted” begin the way that it does?

PERRY: Catherine was sort of messing around with it and then realized that the chords are in the same key as “The One You Wanted.” Jack was into it immediately. The two of them ended up doing a really beautiful rendition of “Joy to the World.” An EP is a place to go off the rails a bit or [away] from what you usually do. So I was happy that we're gonna do a slower one. It is like… it's not what we do as a band. But I think for me as a songwriter, I do write a fair amount of like, slow, sad songs… We just make them faster. So it was cool to be able to just leave this one as it was because it's a very emotional song. And yeah, I'm happy with it.

LUNA: If you could pick any artist to do a cover of one of your songs, who would you pick and for which song?

PERRY: I think with covers there's, like, two different kinds of covers. It's like a cover that is really faithful to the original or a cover that is just completely different and cool in that way because it … sounds like the person who's playing it more than anything. I am a big Ariana Grande fan. I think she's got the best voice right now. I think she could do something really weird and cool with any of our songs and make them into, like, pop-dance anthems. So for a song of ours, I would pick “Out Loud.” That would be cool.

LUNA: What’s next for the band? Let’s manifest some end of year goals.

PERRY: So we're going on a big European tour in October. We're leaving really soon; we’re gonna be there for a month. This tour was just something we wanted to do because we were gonna do it in 2020 but then it got canceled. So to prepare we did some shows sort of dip our toes back in the world of playing and touring last month in August. I think hopefully we're going to try to play a full US tour for next summer. So we're slowly coming back. Nothing with us is ever fast. I mean, except the songs, but as people we’re very slow — really slow movers. So I think we'll probably be back next summer.

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We couldn’t be more stoked to have Suriel Hess as our new headliner for our upcoming LA show 🤩 🫶 Not gonna lie, us & Notorious Noise kinda went OFF with this line up & you’re not gonna wanna miss it - ticket link in bio 🎫