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photos: Moe Horta

Since their captivating debut at Chicago's Riot Fest in 2022 and the release of their exhilarating first album, Past Lives, L.S. Dunes has evolved into something truly magical. Born during COVID chaos and shaped by challenging time constraints, they have consistently defied the odds, expanding their fanbase with each new breathtaking track. They have become not just an exciting but an essential supergroup – featuring members of My Chemical Romance, Thursday, Coheed And Cambria and more – a journey we've all been a part of and can take pride in.

By any measure, the band's latest album, Violet, once again helmed by Grammy-nominated producer Will Yip, lives up to the legacy they continue to build. In many ways, it opens up an opportunity to rediscover L.S. Dunes in a different light. Where Past Lives takes its oxygen from the thrill of frenzy and impulsiveness, Violet breathes deeper with a more open and expansive palette. Whether it lives in the confident and steady pulse of a song like "Machines," in the rousing lyrical empowerment of "Paper Tigers," or in the way that "Forgiveness" forges itself as an anthem for love and unconditional acceptance in the face of our personal failures, this is a body of work that not only offers hindsight but also instills hope and a sense of magic. And isn't that what the world needs more of?

The Noise had the opportunity to chat further with frontman Anthony Green and guitarist Travis Stever about the magic of the album as well as maintaining a healthy work-life-balance shredding alongside fellow self-proclaimed “workaholics,” guitarist Frank Iero, drummer Tucker Rule, and bassist Tim Payne. 

Violet feels like a shift from Past Lives in terms of sound in some aspects. How would you describe the musical progression between these two albums?

ANTHONY GREEN: My perspective of it is so narrow from my vantage point, and I see a growth relative to our personal relationship growth. When we were writing and putting together Past Lives, we were figuring out how we operated creatively, and you got to hear that in real-time on Violet. With this album, I can't really speak to what other people would have experienced while listening to the first one, but I know that on this record, it feels like we know each other better, and I hope that comes across.

TRAVIS STEVER: I absolutely agree with everything he said. We also got to be around each other.

Anthony: Oh yeah. 

Travis: I mean, it's like a whole different language you speak when we're together. I have video footage that I was going through to kind of remember some of the stuff that we did, also to try and remember parts. But just looking at it, we had this one part that we were working on in Violet – okay, and I'm working on it, Frank's across, you can't even see him, but you see Anthony behind, and he's doing this smile. He's doing this smile and dancing, but then I hit this bum note, and he's all of a sudden, like, [makes cringe face].

Anthony: Haha, yeah, I remember. [laughing]

Travis: But you didn't mean it! The best part is that you did not even mean it! It's just the natural language of music that when something happens, it's inevitable, and I died laughing because I was like, "I would have done the same thing." We were like-

Anthony: You were just trying stuff out. 

Travis: Yeah, I was trying stuff out, but we had gotten somewhere where we were all excited with the melody, and he had already done some vocal melodies; it was just this exciting moment. And it was like, “That's how you work.” There are things, such as body language and everything that goes together in the studio. I mean, I love Past Lives, I love how it came about. There's some beauty to creating art like that, which was something new for all of us. It was like painting a wall from a distance. But this was doing it together.

Anthony, the lyrics on Past Lives were profoundly personal. As you know, many of the lyrics on all of the projects you have worked on together and individually feel like lyricism is a crucial aspect of the music. How do the themes of Violet compare to those on the debut album? Are you exploring new emotional territories or continuing from where you left off?

Anthony: Well, thanks for saying that stuff about the lyrics. I think that when I was writing Past Lives, I was sort of just kind of, you know, you're like “I can't help making things sort of autobiographical.” And I try really hard even when I intend to write a song where I'm like, "Okay, this is from someone else's vantage point, or this is about this story.” Or even there's been songs where I'm like, "This is inspired by a movie or something, and it still ends up becoming autobiographical.” There's my narcissistic nature or something, and how it just goes that way. But I feel like this stuff that came out for Past Lives, I was running and gunning in my life at that time, and it all kind of came out like that. There was stuff that even after it got written, I was like, "Whoa." I was desperate for connection at that point in my life, and when we were writing Violet, I really wanted to make sure that there was intention behind the songs and that there weren't these cliffs that you drop off of, you know?

I feel like this antenna when I'm working, and after a while, when you're tuned to a certain frequency that's very negative, you find yourself in this loop. So this record for me was a lot of trying to break out of that loop and find silver linings in the worst, most destructive aspects of the things I've created in my life to keep moving forward.

Let’s circle back for a second about band chemistry, working through the pandemic, and now working together post-pandemic, which feels silly to say because I feel like the world is still kind of burning. But anyway, with Past Lives being your debut, how has chemistry within the band evolved since then? You went from working on an album during a global pandemic to now having free reign once restrictions were lifted. How has the way you've worked together changed, and in what ways have you all bonded as a band to create this stronger cohesion in Violet? 

Travis: I don't know if this answers your question, but it was very clear from the moment that we were all in the same room that no matter what, if we started playing any melody, then we were all off to the races. It's very hard to find that in a group of people where everybody's not afraid to jump in and start creating together, and that's what we have. That's the one [thing] I've never experienced with this band where there's no hesitation in starting to create when we're around each other. You know what I mean? We can lean on each other if one person's pretty burnt out.

For instance, I remember coming back from Australia and meeting up on the last Dunes tour, and everybody was working on something in sound check. I just felt so burnt out, and I didn't know if I could do it, and they all comforted me and made me feel like I was safe to hold out, wait for it, and then they worked on it. And when I came in to work on it, it was like, "Oh, wow, I could just jump right in. It'll be okay. I'm okay here. I'm not like failing everyone, right?” When we give each other that, probably because of what we've been through before it, not throwing shade at any of the other bands we're part of or anything like that. It's just we grew up playing music. We have a maturity that hopefully, or I assume, we all bring to this, that I don't know, it's just it makes a different kind of scenario coming into it that perhaps it's hard to even bring to the other things we're part of because we're so used to the roles. But we can come here and say, “Oh, this is how we started this, and this is what we do for each other,” the trust thing, you know, we do that for each other. So, how has that differed? It's gotten better, consistently better, and even in the distance, like from the long-distance writing, it's constantly happening. We've already been doing that, and I know [Anthony] already has millions of melodies, everything that we send, and that's what we do.

That's great to hear.

Travis: That's my take on growing, you know?

Anthony: Maturity was a cool word that stood out to me. We were saying that whatever our intentions were in building this – it was like how people get together to have a club, how people will play sports, or like a group of dads getting together to play music. Most of the challenges have come from, like, "Okay, how do we share this with the world? How do we make this more than just like, what it is for us and allow other people in and do it like a band,” you know, maybe like a real band. And getting to know each other, getting to have each other's back in situations where it's like, "Yeah, we're gonna do a tour. We're gonna do things." Ultimately, I think that, at the core, we want each other to be happy. Because we know if we're happy or taken care of, we're gonna make something really fun together. Having that be the nucleus, everything's built around it, and it makes it very challenging, and again, this doesn't bring anything that other projects are lacking. I just think that this is a new thing that exists outside of certain pressures that we all have, you know?

Travis: Well said, that's it.

There's a lot of instability in the industry right now, where artistic expression feels more like a survival tool than a form of catharsis. So many artists seem pressured to release music just to get by. What do you think about this shift?

Anthony: I think with this project, we all cross-pollinate with whatever else we're working on, you know? I know that as soon as I'm done writing a Dunes song, it keeps your creative muscles strong and to have something where you can always just express yourself and know that there's a bunch of people that are gonna be like, "Fuck yeah, that's sick."

Travis: It's interesting, and watching him answer that and say it like that, I just can't wait to work on new stuff. 

Yeah?!

Travis: Already! That's what's hilarious. It's like, we get together and work on stuff in the room together, but also, like, work on all the things that we have already, you know, like, there's --

Anthony: There's a bit of enabled workaholism in this group. 

Travis: Oh yes, totally.

Anthony: All of us, I think, are like dealing with different, you know – I've definitely had my experiences with, like, compulsion and addiction and all that stuff. And I think a lot of it for me has been finding things you can put that same energy into that aren't as destructive. And, like, there's a little bit of workaholism in us that probably isn’t healthy. But we’re wrangling it in together as a group. When you like what you do, it can be very challenging to know when to stop.