LostAlone: A Deep-Dive of the Mind
Eight years ago, LOSTALONE revealed the heart-breaking decision to break up and play their final shows. Their statement said, “events have transpired that make it impossible right now for us to continue the band we love,” and although their fans just wanted the best for them, it was a devastating announcement. So, in March this year when the band’s social media posted just an updated headshot, it was clear LOSTALONE had officially reunited. On the outside, it’s simple: The much-loved rock trio were back, with new music and even more shows. On to the inside: there’s a lot more to it. Luckily, frontman Steven Battelle is more than happy to tell the whole story.
There are two things that have been very clear from the beginning. Firstly, LOSTALONE never really wanted to break up. Secondly, and more importantly, they stayed friends the entire time. Of the time after the break-up, Steven explains, “it was mostly business problems and the awful stuff that can happen in this industry. We just remained best friends. Unlike Alan [Williamson, bass] and Mark [Gibson, drums] who went off and begun lives, I was like well now I’m a songwriter and a solo artist. It’s more of an effort for me to not write the songs, and the time LOSTALONE wasn’t together I struggled a lot to stop. Like I didn’t pick up the guitar and write the songs that were going on in my head, because the band wasn’t there.”
While Steven knew for a long time that he felt lost without the band, it was one specific time that made him realise he had to get them back together. He says, “I won a cruise to New York, and it was ridiculous. I was in the middle of the ocean for seven days and seven nights, and that’s when I decided to get the band back together because for that time, I felt like everything was possible. I was the youngest person on there, by like five decades, and I had all the top deck of the QM2 at night when none of the old people went out. I could walk around at night with the stars, and I started hearing the songs that have become this album. When I got to New York I messaged the guys with, ‘the band is back together!’ and they just replied with, ‘wicked!’”
The music industry, like any kind of business, brings complications and difficulties to something that is intrinsically very simple. The band knew that if they wanted to reunite and make music again, some things would need to be very different. Steven says, “the key thing when I got off that ship wasn’t like, ‘let’s do an album, let’s tour, let’s do anything’. It was, “I wrote some songs, wouldn’t it be fun to do them’. I think that’s why the guys were into it. With the musical industry, and the effects it can have on your mental health, they were happy to be out of it. What feels different is the rules we set ourselves, and the rule is that it has to be fun. The music is serious, because we’ve always been serious about our music, but we have to have fun because at the end of LOSTALONE, it stopped being fun. We’re always in self-therapy, and it’s like if somebody doesn’t want to do something, we don’t. If it isn’t fun, let’s part as friends but there’s no point working together if it doesn’t click.”
The world works in mysterious ways, and it’s typical that right when LOSTALONE began really writing their first album since their release, the UK went into lockdown because of the pandemic. Steven recalls this time, saying, “because I have asthma, I didn’t leave this apartment for six months. I think that’s what fed it. All of the songs I wrote before that I wrote by walking and travelling. This one was written here, so I had to go more internal. This is probably the most internal I’ve ever gone, it’s just each song laid out like my life. The verses are like ‘here’s what I am’, and the choruses are like ‘here’s what we could be’.” Because Steven had to write The Warring Twenties almost completely in isolation, it allowed him to make it incredibly emotional and powerful, and although the circumstances were difficult, the pay-off was worth it. Steven explains, “I think my lyrics are messages to me six months later, that I understand more now than I did when I wrote them.” When asked why he chose the name The Warring Twenties, he says, “I started this album in 2020, and it was the dawning of a decade. We wrote the title track on January 6th when we were watching the insurrection in Washington with all that chaos, and it looked like America was in civil war. It was also about the warring twenties actually in my mind. I got obsessed with climate change but also visualising the planet being my head, it’s full of metaphors.”
The next step for the band is a UK tour. There’s a high chance there are new fans of the band out there, so Steven tells us what we should expect from a LOSTALONE show. “I want people to leave and be like ‘what was that?!’ It’s an intensity, it’s about bringing the songs to life, in people’s faces. I’m gonna be taking it out on the audience big time.”Now that LOSTALONE are back and better than ever, they’re showing absolutely no signs of slowing down. “The key thing really is, we’re not going to stop realising music because I can’t stop writing it now. The band’s going to be around doing stuff, either playing live or new music is going to keep coming. That’s the key.”
The Warring Twenties is out now via Dharma Records.
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