Jason Vena and Garrett Lunceford of Acceptance

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Recently I was able to schedule a Zoom call with Jason Vena (vocals) and Garrett Lunceford (drums) of Acceptance to discuss the importance of their debut LP, Phantoms, turning 20 years old this year. The band is currently supporting the anniversary of their landmark record with a fall tour and a great re-record of the album that features several incredible guest artists on it. Pre-orders for the Phantoms 20 vinyl are on-going here via Equal Vision Records.

Thank you both for your time today, it’s hard to believe that Phantoms turned 20 years old this year. What are your range of emotions as your debut LP is past that major milestone now?

Jason Vena: First, personally, my emotions are more centered around the band, unifying and just kind of coming together to do this. And I just feel like really, it’s just an opportunity for us to…it’s a record that has kind of allure to it, and this kind of story of what not to do as a band. And I think that story, along with being able to kind of reunite with the original members of the band, and I think being able to re-record it together as a group, it’s really redemptive. But it’s just really a fun opportunity for us to look back at something that was near and dear to our hearts. So I think ultimately, the feelings are really positive and and and redemptive, I guess would be the right word for me.

Garrett Lunceford: I don’t want to just echo everything Jay said. So for me, it’s exciting, because I didn’t get to play on Phantoms. I was out of the band at that point in time, and so when I first heard the record, I was like, “Oh, I’m glad I liked these songs when they got back together.” And so it’s been cool to play those songs live. And now it’s really neat to actually get to lay down the drums, and I try to be pretty dang faithful to what Nick played on the record. And get to put some of my own little flavors in there, while still not losing the stuff he made that made the songs really cool.

And do fans still give you a hard time about the whole “copyright protected” disc thing that Phantoms was plagued with via Columbia Records?

Jason Vena: I think it’s not that they give us a hard time. I think what it is is fans are more protective over the fact that the record didn’t see its fair deal, or whatever you would want to call that. I think what you find when you talk directly to fans is more of just this sincere…they just hold the record so close to them, and it’s so personal for them, and they’re more frustrated. They’re more mad at Columbia Records than we are. I think at the end of the day, when we were together, we’re just kind of in awe that still, that fans hold it near and dear to their hearts.

And it’s easy to see why. I mean, it’s a record that kind of had its own little “pocket” of fans who really cherish Phantoms. And the ones that love it, they really, really love it. And I’m one of those people that adores it too. So in honor of Phantoms turning 20, you announced a killer re-record of the album that features a ton of guest spots. As you can imagine, I was thrilled to hear that the tracklisting includes A-listers like Teddy Swims. I’m also a big fan of scene staples like Alex from All Time Low, and John from The Maine. So, how did your band shape up this classic tracklist with a bunch of artists that you guys all admired/wanted to work with?

Garrett Lunceford: I mean, it almost seems magical to me. Because from what I remember, it was just text threads of, “who would be cool to get on here?” And it was a wish list of artists and people that we knew. Either we liked them, or they were into the band. That’s kind of it. It seemed like a wish list of people, then we just kind of started reaching out.

Jason Vena: Yeah. I mean, when we all got back together, Christian, our guitar player, had gone on to play with Anberlin, and so he had stayed out on the road a bunch. I mean, he was connected to what was happening out there. And I think he really was the one who kind of brought to us this concept, like, “Hey, every time I go out and play concerts, more people want to talk to me about Acceptance and Phantoms than anything else…”

That’s a good sign!

Jason Vena: Yeah, and I think we just came along the way, and I had sung on a song with All Time Low a few years back, and then, out of nowhere, A Day To Remember, had done a cover of “Take Cover” when they did that acoustic record. And with those little moments, we were just kind of like, “Wow, these artists are mentioning Acceptance or talking about how it influenced their songwriting.” And so the concept was like, “Hey, I wonder if we could redo this record and do collaborations with artists that throughout the years we’ve either come in contact with or had some reason to believe that they had been influenced by Acceptance. So Garrett’s right, we did kind of start with a wish list, if you will. And what ended up happening is almost, I mean, if we took the original list, Garrett, probably 15 to 20 artists, at the end of the day that the 10 or 11 artists that are featured on this thing are pretty close to the original 15. We had a couple that couldn’t, we just couldn’t get it to work out, or the timing didn’t work out. But the people that are on this record are so talented, and they’ve done such an amazing job, we’re just blown away.

And kind of to that same point about working with all these people, was there certain goals you guys had in mind with, I really want this part to be sung by this person, versus obviously, you Jason, being a talented vocalist as well, did you feel like a little bit of almost selfishness of wanting to hold on to certain lyrics or parts? What’s your take on that?

Jason Vena: Well, Garrett’s the only person in the band that’s on the entire record, in every part. <Laughter>

Garrett Lunceford: Not “Ad Astra”…

Jason Vena: Oh, yeah, that’s fair. Not “Ad Astra”, because there’s no drums in that recording, so he’s 99% of the record. And so we just totally went the opposite direction, like you’re on every part. I think it kind of naturally came together. And Aaron Sprinkle, who had produced every record with us, really was the connective line on this whole thing. He was really working with the band, he’s also working with the artists. Because, we were never in a room with any of the artists. So all of this is happening, and nowadays, that’s pretty normal, but very Postal Service vibes where we’re shipping sessions back and forth between artists. So we were fortunate, most of the artists sang almost the entire song, including my background vocals. So, we had a lot to work with. And I think people will be really excited. I was really excited when you heard these performances, and when you got a performance back from an artist who sang on your entire song and gave you all the background vocals. I’m just telling you, that is an indicator, it’s such a sincere indicator of how they feel about the band, because it’s hard to get somebody to prioritize this, and then get in the studio and then really put the love and the care into the performance. It was pretty amazing.

Absolutely! And out of the 12 songs that made the Phantoms 20 tracklisting, what song was the most difficult one to reimagine for this re-record?

Garrett Lunceford: I think that one that we struggled with as a band the most was just the Ad Astra one, which was funny because there’s no vocals. So it was like, “What are we gonna do?” I don’t know if there was a particular artist that was more difficult to nail down, it wasn’t Teddy Swims. He was so busy, but he did it still, and he did the whole song.

Jason Vena: That’s probably a good one. I think Teddy Swims, with his schedule, and just kind of what he’s got going, he’s probably the most active artist right now. And I literally got a video from him just out of nowhere one night, clips of him just singing the song in the studio. And I sent it to everybody, and I’m like, “He’s doing it! It’s happening.” Because, I met Teddy a few years back and we hit it off. And I had reached out to him to see if he wanted to be part of this thing, and he’s like, “Absolutely!” But, talking about wanting to be a part of it, and then ended up making it all happen with something, with once again just how busy Teddy Swims is…That was probably the most unique, just getting a video out of nowhere…And he did such an amazing job. And there’s a lot of different stories like that. Frankly, we had a couple artists that we kind of connected with towards the end, and they absolutely killed it, knocked it out of the park, but we had to turn down their song. I mean, we literally like, “hey, if we don’t get the song done this week, we’re not gonna be able to get the record done in time.” So there’s some cool stories in there.

And with these full cuts of these guest vocal performances still stored somewhere, are there ever gonna be future plans to release the full performances of these guest artists on Phantoms?

Jason Vena: I mean, anything’s possible. Most of the tracks on the record have the full performances from the artist. So you could definitely take some of that and come up with some different, really re-imagined version of a song, or, whatnot. But right now, we’re just feeling pretty excited that we just got this done. I can’t believe we got it done, quite frankly.

Definitely! What are some of your favorite memories from the original recordings of Phantoms, working with your veteran producer, almost sixth member, Aaron Sprinkle?

Jason Vena: When we made that record, it was going to be on an imprint, on Columbia. We weren’t going to be on Columbia Records, proper. We had signed the contract, but we didn’t know exactly what we were going to build. They were going to build up the band. It was going to be a process. So we were in Seattle, and this is our first time recording a full length album. I think we were just excited that we had a month in the studio. We thought that was an insane amount of time, but a month in the studio, this is going to be wild… And there’s some cool recording moments when we did “So Contagious” at the end of the song, there’s a part where I’m almost yelling. And what we did is, I was standing across the room. We mic’d up the piano chords of the grand piano that was in the room. So the mic is on the other side of the room, and we recorded the vocals reverberating off of the piano. And just kind of gave it this kind of cool, just a bit of this different vibe to that last part, which I think is a signature part of the record. I think the other one was just “Take Cover.” We ended up re-recording the entire song. We had pretty much finished the song. And I’m like, “these vocals, the melodies, are terrible,” in my mind. I’m like, “This is no good. This is not a great song.” And I just remember late at night going, we got to “Take Cover” and we’ve got to start all over. And Aaron, I give him a lot of credit, because I’m sure part of him was like, I don’t think we have to redo the whole song and, but the other part was like, “Okay, let’s go for it.” And we had kind of come up with, I think him and Caitlin were working on the intro, and kind of came up with the intro. And the intro really informed the feel of that song. It’s a really memorable intro now. And then I was able to kind of find a new vocal, and fortunately enough, that kind of, “she’s a liar,” line kind of came out. And just kind of this real, emotive kind of opening moment where like, “Yes! That’s it.” And then it kind of all came from there.

That’s a great story! Can you think of any celebrities that have come up to you, or either through Instagram DMs or whatever, that said a Phantoms was such an influential record for them?

Garrett Lunceford: Demi Lovato posted something. She said it’s so influential, but I was like, “Oh, that’s cool!” And Joe Jonas was someone, I almost went up and talked to him. I was at a pinball place here in Seattle, and he was playing it, and the <brothers> were there, but he was with the ladies… <Laughter>

Jason Vena: I’m sure there’s many artists that have had influential people follow them or be inspired. I think the cool part for us is just whenever we’re finding out that there’s an interaction with people that are influential. It’s cool to feel like we had an influence on them. I think that’s probably at the end of the day, as an artist, you’re trying to influence people. And I think our existence, especially this current formation of Acceptance, our existence is to influence people in the positive and to create a better place. So when you have people listening to your music, and it makes them feel good, and they’re like, “Wow, this is something that is inspiring.” I think that’s kind of a really unique, cool thing that has happened. So, when it’s Joe Jonas or somebody like that, that’s crazy. I think you’re just like, “wow, that’s cool that you could have such a broad musical taste that you were able to connect on such a broad level with people,” and these are just moments in time that are like time stamped, and when you can get that feedback, you’re like, wow! So we always, as a band, it’s a very humbling experience for us when these moments happen. We are usually texting each other, and we’re typically still at this point of our lives, we’re still taken back and really, sincerely grateful that we have had any impact.

That’s awesome. And talking about some of your other records, Colliding By Design, was my favorite album that came out of 2017. I wrote you guys at one point before I was writing for Chorus, and you guys thought that was so cool. I thought that was amazing for you guys to even acknowledge me at that point. And then 2020’s Wild, Free was a great effort as well. What did you find were the major differences in writing for these last two records?

Jason Vena: Garrett, tell him about the Colliding By Design rules.

Garrett Lunceford: I don’t remember hardcore rules. No cymbals. <Laughter> As far as recording and writing that was vastly different, because Colliding By Design, I think I was alone. No one from the band was there. It was, scheduling-wise, so nuts. And so I recorded the drums kind of in a weird vacuum, but in a fun way. And there were a couple songs where it was literally, very Jeff Lynn style, where I only did the kick drum, and he’s like, do everything separately. So I think the song, “Colliding By Design” is one of those ones where it’s separately tracked, the toms, the snare, and the kick drum, the stuff I can’t actually do live on there, and Wild, Free had a way more of a vibe. We were in the studio together, and a lot of those songs got written in the studio.

Jason Vena: We were at London Bridge <studios> for Wild, Free so we had just this kind of, really huge kind of feel, for two different types of records. With Colliding By Design, we really wanted to make something that was a little bit more. It wasn’t a thought out process. It was something where everything’s gonna be purposeful. Every movement’s purposeful. If a guitar parts there, and there’s hardly any rhythm guitar in the whole record. There’s hardly any cymbals, that kind of stuff, and with Wild, Free, completely opposite. We were really harnessing some of the American Rock n’ Roll kind of feel. And so now it’s just like, it was like, “Okay, let’s try that out.” And so now it’s all guitar-driven and drum-driven and just one or two take vocals and stuff like that. So kind of a really different process, for me vocally, a way different process. Because with Phantoms, every line, I’m obsessing over every single piece. And with Wild, Free, I was like, “Nope, that feels good. Let’s go!”

<Laughter> And I think that’s kind of a scary moment too, with a major label for one, and also debut album and for part two of that, for Phantoms, did you feel an enormous amount of pressure out the gate?

Jason Vena: I don’t think we felt pressure. I think we just wanted to write the greatest record of all time. I think we were, just once again, so caught up in what we were trying to accomplish, and what we wanted to do. We were on our third A & R guy, and maybe that was more frustration, feeling like we were up against a wall with the label, but I don’t know that we ever felt the pressure as much. We did feel like we wrote a really good record, and we felt passionate about that. And I think we felt the same way about Colliding By Design. I mean, we still will talk about these records…I’ll still text Caitlin every once in a while, but Colliding By Design is the best record we’ve ever written.

I mean, I can see that from my perspective. A lot of people point to Phantoms, obviously first, but Colliding By Design is also my favorite of yours.

Jason Vena: It sounds really good, and it’s fun to go back. I mean, all three of them are different, right? Now, we’re kind of romanticizing Phantoms as a band, so we’re in that space right now.

Phantoms all the time, every time, right? So while you guys didn’t get the tour much during the promotional cycle of your latest LP, Wild, Free due to COVID, your band appears poised to have a big 2025, with a short stint of tour dates in support of Phantoms 20. So what are you mapping together for these 20th anniversary shows, from the production to everything else?

Jason Vena: Garrett’s mapping the click tracks in the practice session, right?

Garrett Lunceford: Well, as far as the setlist, definitely all the songs on Phantoms, and then a sprinkling of Wild, Free, and Colliding by Design, and a sprinkling of Black Lines…

Jason Vena: I think there might be some. We’ll see if there’s a <guest> appearance, the appearances are going to kind of be an organic thing right here. I think there’ll probably be some appearances. It’s just kind of right now, we just want to make sure that we can actually play the set. I mean, literally, the first time we’ll all be together will be the night before our first show.

Wow! So if I see a delay in the tour dates, and that’s the reason why, right? <Laughter>

Jason Vena: <Laughter> Yeah, and I think it’d be cool to be able to get a song from all the records, including Black Lines and just have everybody, our fans be able to get the Black Lines stuff too because I think it’s a cool little nugget with Garrett and I on this talk. Just remembering the very first time Garrett ever stepped behind the drum set in practice, because he was our guitar player, and so one time he gets behind the drum set, he starts playing, and Caitlin and I look at each other thinking, “how do we make it to where this guy is the drummer?” He was so good, and it was such a different vibe. And eventually it ended up just naturally happening because our original drummer had decided to move on. But, it really influenced and really changed our music, our dynamic, and how we sounded, and the trajectory of the band once we were able to do that.

Garrett Lunceford: I would say, when you moved from bass, because Jay was in the band in high school, and it was Jay who was playing bass…And so I think that also freed you up to do just cool stuff live, and maybe more complicated vocal stuff. But yeah, Black Lines was a trip.

Jason Vena: I think both those things, just going back memory lane for a minute, without those moments, we don’t…who knows what the trajectory is, or the banner of what we sound like, and what happens. So, it will be fun to play a song on Black Lines. And just whenever I’m thinking about that, it will be fun to tap into that moment of our journey, if you will.

Absolutely! And with all the different artists you’re putting together onto this Equal Vision-effort of the re-record. Are there ever any future plans to return the favorite to some of these artists, if they would invite you onto one of their albums? Is that a two way street, if you will?

Jason Vena: Absolutely. I would love it. We would love it, whatever it might be. I think, when this is all said and done, I think it’s going to be a unique thing. Martin from Boys Like Girls, has been posting a bunch of stuff throughout the world on their site. He just posted something today of him singing “Take Cover” in the studio. And I’m not super active in what’s happening every single day in our scene, but I follow enough people to think that I haven’t really seen something as unique as this. By the time it’s all said and done, it’s going to be 11 or 12 artists in our world, with an open conversation about this experience.

And I think everybody knows each of these artists too. I mean, these are big names in our scene, for sure!

Jason Vena: Yeah, so I think it’s just like fun and a unique thing. And it will be fun to see how people interact with it. And I’m excited for that. And if we can pay it back at any level with these artists, whatever they want, let’s go. I’m just texting them, “thank you guys, thank you all.” It’s such a positive impact, when you get to hear this music, it’s emotional.

Garrett Lunceford: And I’ll play drums for Teddy swims if he wants it! <Laughter>

<Laughter> That’s awesome. So the last question I have for you guys is, given the new excitement in your fan base and renewed interest in Acceptance in general, are you guys rejuvenated by this process to possibly put out a new record soon?

Jason Vena: I think we can both speak for ourselves, but real quickly, I’ll say my son would like us to do Brazilian Funk. I guess that’s a thing right now he’s really getting me into Brazilian Funk. So, I’m sure that’s up your alley… <Laughter> I think just like anything, the people that embrace this release will dictate what happens next. We love music. We love making music. We love being together as a band. We’ve had nothing but fun being together and making these last three records together, which is crazy to say that we’ve made three records now since we kind of reunited back in 2015. But if people want to hear more Acceptance music, then there’ll be more Acceptance music. And if they’re happy to ride off in the sunset with Phantoms 20, then we’ll ride off with them

That’s awesome. I can’t wait to see what comes next from you guys. And this has been a lot of fun for me as a fan and also as a writer to connect with you both.

Garrett Lunceford: We always have fun when we get together, and it’s not often we get to have a whole band together. So this is a fun excuse to have some tomfoolery and shenanigans, and play music for people.

That’s awesome. I hope the tour gets extended forever, because I saw there wasn’t a DC date yet…Anyways, have a great rest of your day!

Acceptance: Thanks, Adam!

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