Artist Interview: Gerry Windus of Stand Still

Posted: 27th July, 2022 by The Editor

Last Wednesday, Long Island’s Stand Still dropped In a Moment’s Notice, their second EP. Where most of last year’s A Practice in Patience existed in the realm of catchy melodic hardcore, the band’s latest nearly strays into pop-punk territory, featuring sky-high hooks at breakneck paces. There’s a continuity between the two releases, though–especially as the back half of In a Moment’s Notice features three live takes of tracks off A Practice in Patience. It’s a perfect soundtrack to this heatwave weather, and it cements Stand Still’s place as one of the best young bands around. We caught up with vocalist Gerry Windus to discuss Stand Still’s latest EP and plans for the rest of 2022.

From my understanding, the three new songs on In a Moment’s Notice were recorded at the same time as the Practice in Patience songs. Am I right on that?

Yeah, so those songs and the first single we put out were all tracked at the same time. We did nine songs total, and we liked them all. We didn’t wanna completely drop any of them, so we decided some of them had certain characteristics that linked them together. These three songs have more melodic, hooky parts. I guess they’re on the pop side of punk, whereas the others were more thematic. That’s why we put those out when we did. We were gonna do a split but ended up just putting them out. We felt like enough time passed.

It’s interesting starting with “Free My Mind,” then the last EP, and now this one, you guys get a lot less heavy and a lot more melodic as you go. 

Yeah. I think that’s a testament to the amount of stuff we’re influenced by. All five of us have different corners of music in general that we grew up listening to. We’re all into the same stuff to some extent, but I think a lot of these songs have some of our other influences present. I didn’t even really come into the picture until at least six of the nine songs were written. I came in, wrote lyrics, helped finish them, but in terms of songwriting I didn’t do them all, but in terms of our collective effort, I think we had a pretty diverse set of songs to work with, so we wanted to put them all out in their own batches.

Have you been writing for a next release yet? I know that might be premature.  

We have a bunch of songs written right now. We’re gonna start pre-production for an LP probably this fall. Hopefully we’ll have LP1 out summertime, fall next year if we can make that happen.

It’s probably not fair to assume the full-length will be more melodic in line with this EP. 

We don’t have all the songs we want finished, so I can’t say how it’ll sound, but what we’ve been writing is probably our most -core yet. I don’t know if that’s a backwards progression, but I’m into it.

You’ve got these three new songs and the live ones. Why did you decide to package the live tracks with the three new songs?

We wanted to do a formal release for the live tracks. We thought they were too high-quality to just live on YouTube and have that be their lifespan. We wanted to bring them into something. When we talked about putting out these songs, we wanted to do a 12″, but three songs didn’t justify that. So we decided side A would be the EP, the new songs, and side B would be the live tracks. I feel like when people hear this all grouped together maybe they’ll hear where we were at when we tracked them together. It’s cool to let them exist together on one release.

I agree. I think having songs like “Id” and “Loose Ends” on one release together, you can hear a sort of continuity. 

I definitely think those two songs specifically are my favorites that we have now. People might not group them together because they’re different songs, but I think they have similar energy.

Do you have anything else planned for the rest of 2022 for fans to look forward to?

A bunch of shows coming up. Our first headline tour starts the 30 with Bent Blue from California. We’re doing a show in New York, then Florida, Chicago. It’s like nine days. It’s a lot of places we haven’t played. I’m interested to see how we draw in places that we’re new to. I think that’s one of those–I don’t wanna say hazing, but it’s one of those things every band has to go through, taking risks, going to new places.

There’s definitely a resurgence, with Stand Still, Koyo, Private Mind, of that ’90s, 2000s Long Island melodic hardcore sound. I know you can’t speak to bands you’re not in, but what do you think explains that?

Obviously it’s bands we all grew up listening to, TBS, Glassjaw–at least those of us who grew up in Long Island. But if you dig into the history, all of it comes back to Token Entry, Silent Majority, Gorilla Biscuits. Even bands like Crime in Stereo, Movielife, those guys listened to that stuff. Long Island, I think, has the most influential bands per population. I always say that. I think the reason a lot of these kinds of bands popped up during the pandemic is we all wanted to make music while the world was locked down, but it didn’t make sense to start bands that had breakdowns. It was also an opportunity–at least for my band, we did the Silver Bullet sessions because it was a way to perform music without putting people at risk–it was an answer to “what are we gonna do?” We could do this kind of thing and have it be true to form, could respect the past. Practice of Patience was kind of a play on the lockdown. It wasn’t about that, but it was more so us translating our feelings about it through other things, other perspectives. I think a lot of those bands sprouting up at the same time–I think once shows started coming back, people came to these shows and realized this was something we’ve missed, that Long Island kind of show. It clicked with me when we played AMH with Crime in Stereo. That was true to form. You won’t find that shit anywhere else. There’s no real answer I can give, but I think there’s merit to the argument that it is not coincidental.

I didn’t realize you’d played with Crime in Stereo.

We did AMH and Middle East with them. They’re the best dudes. Getting the stamp of approval from them is all the justification we need to keep doing this.

What’s one artist you think Stand Still fans will be surprised to hear you like?

I’m into a lot of electronic music, and I always have been. I grew up on Death Grips, Aphex Twin. That was my shit as a teenager. I devolved into hardcore and metal later on in my teenage years. Growing up–I mean thirteen and on–my favorite band was Bomb the Music Industry! They were my shit. I love all those records to this day. The rest of us–Bryan has a Red Hot Chili Peppers tattoo. Mat’s favorite band is Daft Punk, if you call them a band. Andre really likes Porches. I like Porches. I went to Purchase, like Porches, Mitski, all them. Steve listens to Led Zeppelin. I don’t know. I just like talking about music. Music is all I do for career, hobbies, all of it. That’s exactly how I want it. I’m really grateful for all the shit that’s happened in the past couple years. To answer the question: yeah.

If there’s anything you think is important, say so now. 

Our record release show is AMH on August 13, and I’d like everyone who can to go to that show. We’re doing a Triple B showcase in Brooklyn with a bunch of awesome bands. Come to some shows and come hang out. Anyone who does come should say hi. I’d also, real quick, like to thank Triple-B, NMZ, all those dudes. They’ve been the backbone of what we do. Without them we’d have nowhere near the amount of opportunities we’ve had.

In a Moment’s Notice is out now through DAZE.

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Zac Djamoos | @gr8whitebison

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