JIMMY EAT WORLD // Try, Try, Try Again

Ten albums in 26 years is no small feat, and with the release of Jimmy Eat World’s Surviving, drummer Zach Lind admits he still has pinch-me-now moments.

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“It’s a small detail but the room we recorded the drums in in Los Angeles is somewhere I’ve wanted to record for a really long time,” he says.

More than two decades of the seminal rock band and still making firsts, Lind treasures achieving what he calls the little goals. One might assume Jimmy Eat World have no intention of calling it a day or letting up, given the volume of work and ambition they’ve demonstrated over the years. Presented with the choice to achieve some more firsts, Lind’s bucket list covers a lot of travelling dreams. “It would be cool to go to different places and play,” he says. “We’ve never played in Alaska; we’ve always wanted to do a show in Iceland.

“For us it’s those kinds of things. In terms of career type goals, we don’t think a lot about that as much. We just make the music and put it out, one foot in front of the other. At this point I think our main goal is to make albums as best as we can make them and just see where it goes from there.”

The tenth album, Surviving, has received all kinds of feedback, generally positive. What’s interesting is the media’s focus has largely been on how personable an album this is for lead vocalist and guitarist, Jim Adkins. As the primary songwriter for Jimmy Eat World it’s understandable, and yet the consensus for the rest of the band remains favourable when it comes to getting on board with Adkins’ thematic ideas, ones they know they’ll have to perform them in the days to come. “Jim comes up with great material right off the bat, so there’s not a lot of difficulty in being on board with it,” says Lind. “But for this album, what I really appreciate is it’s so universal in a lot of ways. I think anyone who has gone through life to some degree has maybe wrestled with a lot of or at least some of what Jim’s talking about. It’s inclusive.

A recording is going to be around a while so you have to be proud of them–that’s the only outcome we have control over.
[ Zach Lind ]

“Maybe more than any other album it’s universally relatable lyrically. But it’s always been, as musicians, a lot of the time we’re more worried about playing the songs really well!”

Indeed, there are things presented by Adkins throughout Surviving that he’s said he’s been carrying for years, things that Lind says the rest of the band don’t talk about, preferring to discuss the music and leaving discussion of lyrics and thematic content to Adkins. “We just have to read between the lines,” he says, “but it’s pretty easy to read him on this album.”

For Lind to call the album a universal project, the understanding from the fans, he says, has been very positive. “I haven’t seen a lot of overly negative comments. It’s obviously always nice when someone says something good about something you’ve worked, but I think it’s a dangerous thing to get invested in all of that.

“Whether it’s a positive review or a negative review, in the end, those are all outcomes that you’re not in control of anyway. It can have the effect of taking your eye off the ball creatively, when you’re trying to do something you’re putting down to taste and it’s going to be something that lasts.

“A recording is going to be around a while so you have to be proud of them–that’s the only outcome we have control over. It has a lot of investment, so whether you have good reviews or bad reviews and positive feedback from the fans, in the end it’s not really important to fixate on it.”

So, what is the most important thing to Lind in what he’s doing? “At the end of the day, you look back on what you’ve made and obviously you see mistakes and things you could have done differently, but I try to look back and say ‘That was the best we could have done at that time.’ To me, that’s the most important thing. The other stuff, there’s not a lot of permanence.

“There’s a satisfaction in knowing what you made is something you’re proud of and you did the best you could at that point in time.”

Purchase/Stream Jimmy Eat World’s new Album Surviving here.