RIVER OAKS // The Heights of Misunderstanding

Somehow, amongst the constant tours and regular releases that occupy his main project, Silverstein vocalist Shane Told managed to find time to embark on a solo project, releasing his debut EP under the moniker of River Oaks.

While existing in a similar world to Silverstein, River Oaks takes place on a completely different hemisphere. Stripped back, and largely powered by an acoustic guitar, River Oaks is a vulnerable, and exposing project for Told, who only took it out on the road for the first time at the start of the year.

Hysteria: I can tell you that reporting from On The Ground in Australia, we’re all very excited for you to return under River Oaks. So, it’ll be super interesting to hear how it’s all going? So this thing is so fresh.

Shane: Yeah, that’s right. Actually right at the end of last year between Christmas and New Years I decided to do five shows, I guess it was. And, yeah, I just did a little circle in the US, just by myself, just seeing how it felt to get up on stage alone, and I really enjoyed it a lot. And then decided to do five more shows on the West Coast of America. And that went well too, and I did it with JT from Hawthorne, opening for me solo. So, we had such a good time together he asked me to come over, and play with Hawthorne over in Australia. And I jumped at the chance, because I love playing solo, I love JT, and I love Australia. So, it literally just worked out, just really perfectly.

Absolutely. What, a three for three, that sounds like a no-brainer. So, how’s it going down with the fans? I’d be really interested to hear how the feedback you’re getting. Because obviously, I imagine many people followed you from Silverstein, but of course, there’s a different edge to River Oaks, which probably would have attracted its own little following. What’s the feedback been like so far?

I’ve really had this project on the back burner. I recorded the songs a while before they came out. I’ve put them out on a seven inch. I didn’t do shows right away, I chilled out on it. I feel like that’s kind of my vibe. It’s really like this is a passion project for me, this is something I really enjoy. And it’s not something that I want to really make feel like a tone of work for myself. You know what I mean? And I think that, that to me makes it more special.

And I think that people now are complaining, “Oh, where’s the full length man? Aren’t you ready to put out a full length?” And I’m like, “You know what, I’m not going to rush this.” Because this is my thing, this is all on my own, I’d do this by myself. And I want this to be really special, and I want this to be the best I could ever do.

So, the feedback is so scary when you go it alone. You put out music that you have no-one else to blame if you get a bad review or someone thinks it sucks. It’s all on me, I wrote everything, I played everything. And the feedback was really, really great right off the top.

That’s great.

I was surprised that a lot of people were like, “Oh it something, something, Silverstein.” And I’m like, “Whoa, it makes sense.” But, you know, I think of Silverstein as a heavy band. I’m up there running around, screaming my head off, yelling and going crazy. And this I’m playing guitar on stage, and I’m just singing. I’m never going to be here doing any screaming. So, that was the one part of the feedback I got that I was surprised about. But overall it’s been very positive, and people have been very supportive, and excited about it.

Surely the EP hasn’t been even out long enough for dust to settle on it yet. I can’t believe these kids are already demanding an album. It’s like, “Chill, chill, let the man create.”

It has, it really has, it crept up me too. If you’ve read any Silverstein interviews lately. It’s pretty well documented I had a pretty rough year, kind of right after I put out the River Oaks EP, personally. So, I really wanted to write some stuff for River Oaks, but I needed to put it on the back burner and kind of clear my head a little bit. And now that I’ve taken some time, and we’ve made probably the best Silverstein record we’ve ever made. And I’ve really put a lot of time and work into that. Now that, that’s out of my forefront of my mind, now is the time I’m like, “Okay, this is great. I can go over there, I can do some shows, I can see how the Aussies are feeling about River Oaks.” And come home and write some more tunes, and really get this project firing on all cylinders again.

You put out music that you have no-one else to blame if you get a bad review or someone thinks it sucks. It’s all on me, I wrote everything, I played everything.
[SHANE]

Do you find yourself tapping into the same creative well for this project as you did with Silverstein? Or, do you have to go somewhere completely different to get some inspiration for River Oaks?

I don’t know if this is the answer you want, but it’s the honest answer. The difference is this. When I’m writing Silverstein songs I like to plug in my guitar into a Marshall Stack, and I like to let it rip, and I like to play it loud. And I like to really excited about loud, heavy guitars that I’m writing, and cool rifts and stuff. And that’s kind of where the songs are for Silverstein start. Whereas with River Oaks, I’m more sitting in my living room. I got the TV on in the background, and I’m strumming, and I’m singing along. So, River Oaks comes from a place of less aggression, I guess, and more of a reflectiveness. With Silverstein stuff I almost always start with a guitar rift, or a guitar part, and a musical idea. And with River Oaks, not always, like sometimes I’ll just strum a cord and I’ll hum something out loud, and it’s a little bit more vocally driven, melody driven I guess. It’s not so much, “Oh this rift is sic, now let me write a song around it.”

So I think that they come from different places. Maybe that’s part of why I was so surprised when people were like, “Oh, yeah, Let You Down just sounds like My Heroine.” I’m like, “Dude, I don’t hear that at all.” I wrote My Heroine because I was like, “This is a really cool riff.”

With Silverstein, you’re supported, you’re backed, and often it could be said, disguised and protected by loud instruments. The drums are right there, distorted guitar screaming, as we talked about before. But with River Oaks, ain’t no smoke and mirrors there, it’s literally, yeah, your voice and the guitar. There’s no distractions, there’s no smoke and mirrors. So, what has that taught you about story telling, have you learnt some surprising things?

So, the feedback is so scary when you go it alone. You put out music that you have no-one else to blame, if you get a bad review or someone thinks it sucks. It’s all on me, I wrote everything, I played everything.Well I tell you, when I started doing the River Oaks shows right away, even, I want to say like in the first one or two songs I played I was thinking to myself, “Oh, I’m playing a little fast. Okay, I’m going to slow down. I’m having a little trouble with this riff, I just need a second to just compose myself.” I have that little thing where I can concentrate on what I’m doing.

Whereas, when you’re playing with a full band you can’t. I can’t all of a sudden slow down a song if I think it’s too fast, or whatever, right? There’s just little things that happen.

So, when that started happening I realised how much I’m able to improvise when I’m by myself. And I mean that from changing the set list in the middle of the show, saying different things between songs. Saying whatever I want between songs. Going off on a story where I can tell a three, four minute story about something that sparked me from playing the song, or something that I thought of.

You talk about story telling, when you’re up there by yourself, it’s all eyes are on you, and it’s up to you to really be the one that’s conveying the message, the feeling, the emotion. That every show’s different, every venue’s different, and you have to go with that, and just go with the flow sometimes.

For example, I played in San Diego, and I played probably five minutes of a Metallica acoustic medley. Literally just off memory of playing those rifts from when I was a kid. I had no plan of doing that, somebody said, “Some Metallica?” I said, “All right, I know some Metallica.” And here we go. And that was a cool moment that I’ve had people email me and talk to me about, “Oh, that was so cool. When are you gonna cover Metallica?”

So, it’s literally like these things that happen, can happen so organically in a project like River Oaks where I’m a boss unto myself. That couldn’t really eve happen with Silverstein, at least not in the same way. So, I really relish those moments, and I feel like that’s something that has really taught me a lot about performing, and about being an entertainer.

You will be coming down with Hawthorne Heights. This is a huge tour for us, for all Australian fans, we normally miss out on these milestones or anniversary tours.  You would have a really different perspective on it all, because as opposed to Hawthorne Heights, they are your contemporaries, your peers, your colleagues as it were. Do you revert back to a fan stage when they bust out some of those classics?

Well they’re actually a really weird case for me. They were friends, and they were kind of like this annoying new band when I met them. They came to our show, Casey and Matt came to our show and they were like, “Hey, we just signed to Victory Records, we’re called Hawthorne Heights.” And they gave us this demo, which were really poorly recorded versions of the songs on Silence In Black And White. And we were like, “Oh, this band’s never going to go anywhere.” And they’re nice guys.

And we were at the Victory office in Chicago one day and we were all there, and we heard their record, and we were like, “Oh man, I think this could be something.” And sure enough Victory did an amazing job promoting the band, and those songs really resonated with people, and the band got huge. And they were blowing up on tour with us. We didn’t want to take them on tour, Victory pretty much forced us to. And Victory told us we didn’t have to pay them. And Victory had taken off the night to be on the tour. And I just remember every show people coming out, and singing those songs and we being like, “Okay, something’s happening here.”

And that’s what I remember most about them as my friends, and then, of course, they returned the favour when their record went gold. And they took us out on tour, and we’ve been friends ever since, and stuff. But it’s funny to me. I am a fan of some of their songs, and I definitely think they have some great songs on those first two records, for sure. But for me I look at it as a completely different perspective. Because I heard Ohio’s For Lovers was the worst demo version you will ever hear!

Listen to the entire interview with River Oaks on Hysteria Radio!

Catch River Oaks on tour with Hawthorne Heights from next week, tickets available here.

Mon Aug 28, Amplifier Bar, Perth WA (18+)
Tue Aug 29, Fowlers Live, Adelaide SA (Lic/AA)
Thu Aug 31, Corner Hotel, Melbourne VIC (18+)
Fri Sep 1, The Small Ballroom, Newcastle NSW (18+)
Sat Sep 2, Bald Faced Stag, Sydney NSW (18+)
Sun Sep 3, The Zoo, Brisbane QLD (18+)
Mon Sep 4, Miami Tavern, Gold Coast QLD (18+)