State Champs Announce European Tour

State Champs will be commencing on a European tour this September, starting in the UK. Support is yet to be announced. Check out the dates below:

State Champs Release Video of Writing and Recording Process

State Champs drummer, Evan Ambrosio, has uploaded a video to his youtube channel which shows footage of State Champs in the writing and recording process for their upcoming album. He posted the video with this message: 

'Just wanted to make a video showing everyone what we've been up to the first part of the year. We've recently started writing and recording for our second album on Pure Noise Records. This video shows everything we've done up until drum tracking. I'll be posting more videos throughout the recording process.'

Check out the video below:

State Champs Release Video For 'If I'm Lucky'

Alternative Press have released State Champs' new video for 'If I'm Lucky'. The song comes from their recent EP 'The Acoustic Things'. Check it out below:

State Champs To Release Video For 'If I'm Lucky'

State Champs are releasing a new video for 'If I'm Lucky', a song which comes from their recent acoustic EP 'The Acoustic Things'. The video will be out next Thursday (Feb 19th). 

Pure Noise Records Announce New Albums For 2015

Yesterday Pure Noise Records released an end of year statement reflecting on 2014 and what would be in store for them in the new year:

"Hello Everyone, the end of the year is here. 2014 has been an insanely busy but fun year at Pure Noise. We've put out more releases this year than any year before. You can check out the list HERE. Thank you for supporting us this year. We've got some very exciting things in store for 2015 including a Pure Noise UK Tour & full length releases from Hit The Lights, Four Year Strong, The Story So Far, Senses Fail, & State Champs. Have a happy New Year. We'll see you at a gig soon."

So it looks like we can expect new albums from State Champs, The Story So Far and Senses Fail next year!

A Day In the Life of State Champs

Alternative Press have released a 'day in the life of' video which features State Champs doing their thing while they were in the UK on the Pop Punk's Not Dead Tour. The video features the guys performing an acoustic set in Banquet Records, a look at their tour bus and them performing whilst on PPND. Check it out below:

State Champs Stream Their New EP On Alternative Press

State Champs are streaming their new EP, The Acoustic Things, on Alternative Press. The new EP is officially out on October 7th but you can listen to it early here. 

State Champs Stream Song From New EP

State Champs are streaming a new song from their upcoming acoustic EP over at New Noise Magazine. Listen to 'If I'm Lucky' below:

State Champs Share Acoustic Performance of Leave You In the Dark

State Champs have shared an acoustic performance of Leave You In The Dark from their upcoming EP The Acoustic Things which is out October 7th. Check out the video here.

State Champs Stream Acoustic Version of Elevated

Kerrang! are streaming the acoustic version of Elevated from State Champ's new EP The Acoustic Things. Take a listen here.

State Champs Release New Song From Acoustic EP

State Champs have released a new song from their new EP, The Acoustic Things, which is released October 7th. Take a listen to Leave You In The Dark here:

State Champs Releasing Acoustic EP

State Champs are releasing a new acoustic EP on October 7th. The EP is entitled The Acoustic Things and will include five acoustic versions of songs from The Finer Things as well as two brand new tracks.
Track List:
1. Elevated
2. Deadly Conversation
3. Hard to Please
4. Simple Existence
5. Easy Enough
6. Leave You In The Dark
7. If I’m Lucky

State Champs Join the Pop Punk's Not Dead Tour

State Champs will be joining New Found Glory, Candy Hearts, The Story So Far and Only Rivals on the Pop Punk's Not Dead Tour this November. If you want to know what's in store for us this November, or learn some more about the Pop Punk's Not Dead Tour, click here.

The Dates for the PPND Tour are as follows: 
Sat 15th Nov: Birmingham Institute
Sun 16th Nov: Newcastle O2 Academy
Mon 17th:Glasgow O2 ABC
Tue 18th Nov: Nottingham Rock City
Thu 20th: Liverpool O2 Academy
Fri 21st: Manchester Academy
Sat 22nd: Leeds O2 Acadmey
Sun 23rd: Cardiff Uni
Tue 25th:Bristol O2 Academy
Wed 26th: Portsmouth Pyramids
Fri 28th: Londom Forum

Get your tickets here.

Less Than Jake, Motion City Soundtrack and More Added to Slam Dunk 2014

More bands have been added to Slam Dunk 2014. They include:

Less Than Jake

Motion City Soundtrack

State Champs

Hit the Lights

A Loss For Words

We are the In Crowd

Buy Tickets for Slam Dunk here.

The Works of Sam Pura...

In the Bay Area of California, Fremont to be precise, lies The Panda Studios where otherworldly things appear to happen. Founded by Sam Pura in 2003, the studios have hosted a number of critically acclaimed names including Man Overboard, Polar Bear Club, Balance and Composure and The Story So Far. Not only does Pura mix, master, engineer and produce albums and EPs, he also started The Waiting Room in 2011 which is a live performance series intended to showcase the live talents of bands instead of just their abilities in the recording studio. Because of the sheer brilliance of Sam Pura's releases we thought we'd bring you a list of our favourite albums that have been recorded and produced at The Panda Studios.

1. The Story So Far - Under Soil and Dirt
Pura worked on The Story So Far's debut album Under Soil and Dirt which received a prodigious reception. Not only did he produce the record, but it was also engineered, mixed and mastered by him too. Pura has worked on TSSF's other releases starting with While you Were Sleeping and their split with Maker. He also recently co-produced The Story So Far's most recent release What you Don't See with Steve Klein from New Found Glory. In an interview with Casual Friday Pura stated that the reason The Story So Far keep coming back to the Panda Studios is: 'They always wanted to be a serious band and I think working together really helped them recognize their potential as a touring band... They know that I’m on their team and have a lot of respect for them as people and their music... The Story So Far is the perfect example of a band who comes to the studio to work real hard, but wants to have a good time and make sure their songs feel good'. 

2. Misser - Distancing 
Misser is the creation of Tim Landers of Transit and Brad Wiseman formerly of This Time Next Year. What started as a side project can now safely be called a band after a number of great releases. Pura worked on the band's EP which was a follow up to their debut releases Problems.Problems.Problems and Every day I tell myself I'm going to be a better person. Absolute Punk even said of Distancing 'I, for one, hope that Landers realizes that Misser serves as a much brighter showcase of his talent than does Transit' 



3.State Champs - The Finer Things
Pura engineered, mixed and co produced (with Steve Klein) State Champ's debut album The Finer Things. Tyler had this to say about Sam's work in an interview with Property of Zack: 'Sam was pretty involved. Sam engineered it. So a lot of the time, for the last week, me and Steve would be in one side of the studio working on leads, while Sam was doing something in the other room with vocals or rhythm guitar. A lot of the times it was just Sam like, “Hey. You’re not doing that right. That needs to be better.” Because he wants to put out a sick record too. His thing is that every record he wants to be better and better. I think he’s doing it. It sounds sick so far.'


4.The American Scene - Safe For Now

Alternative Press stated in a review that Safe For Now is'assured, confident statement with far greater musical and emotional depth from TAS's occasionally homogenized scene'. Pura produced, mixed and engineered Safe For Now and Jeff Wright commented in a interview with Already Heard on their working and personal relationship with Sam:  " Sam has been apart of our musician lives forever. Even some of our other bands have recorded with him and we’ve known him for a long time. He’s one of our really good friends and he’s a great engineer and producer. Recording with him is really easy for us because we’re just friends and he knows what we’re thinking so we don’t have to try and break it down for him." 

5.Basement - Colourmeinkindness

Under the gun called Colourmeinkindness 'an amazing adaptation of 90’s emo and a grunge-filled masterpiece that, while it may serve as the end of the band, is certainly the perfect way to say goodbye'. Although Basement broke up in 2012, Basement and Pura's work will never be consigned to an inadvertent memory. The band stated that working with Sam was a creative experience which pushed new things out from the band. Guitarist Alex Henery said of Pura: 'Luckily Sam Pura really understood where we were going with the record sonically and helped us enormously in creating the record we wanted. He gave us so many ideas and helped us explore new techniques in layering and texturizing the sound of the album.'

6.The Story So Far - What you don't see
Sam Pura co produced What you don't see with Steve Klein. Kelen stated in an interview with Alternative Press:  'We are all in such a close vicinity to each other, and it’s the team we’ve worked with since we started, so it’s just the functionality of it. We trust each other, so we have this little network to help our friends out and they can help us out. We know from our experiences recording with Sam [that it works]' 

7. Forever Came Calling - Contender
Contender was engineered by Sam Pura and co produced by Matt Vincent/ Sam Pura. Joe Candelaria said of Sam in an interview with Fuck Yeah Pop Punk: 'Sam is one of the hardest working dudes we have ever had the opportunity to work with. He told us “Hey, let’s work with a pop structure with this record. You have cool parts, let’s make a chorus so we don’t fuck up and make a weird minute long song with no chorus and it’s just one verse and a weird ending.” He helped us restructure a lot of the songs, as far as taking a guitar part that was awesome and making it into a chorus and repeating. The difference from other records is that we followed a bit more of a structured sound'.

Credit to Alternative Press, Absolute Punk, Already Heard, Casual Friday, Fuck Yeah Pop Punk, Property of Zack, Under the Gun for interviews.

The Works of Steve Klein and Chad Gilbert...

You know when you listen to an album and it’s really great? Well, we've come to the conclusion that some of our favourite albums have one common factor; they were produced by the offspring of one pop punk’s greatest asset's, New Found Glory. Even though Steve Klein recently parted ways with NFG (full story here), we thought we'd bring together a compilation of albums produced by Gilbert and Klein. Both have worked with a number of bands including Set your Goals, Fireworks, The Story So Far and Man Overboard to name a few. Obviously, the producers are the aren't the only factor that make an album great, you have the band themselves which is a pretty big one too but nevertheless we thought we'd bring to you our favourite albums produced by Chad and Steve.

Chad Gilbert:

1. This Time Next Year - Drop Out of Life
Absolute Punk said of Drop Out of Life 'Enlisting Chad Gilbert’s services was a good move in two ways. First off, it gained some attention for this record...Secondly, Gilbert absolutely kills it in the studio'. Unfortunately, This Time Next Year parted ways in 2012 but for anyone who's listened to the album will know how incredibly underrated it is. The band said of Gilbert in an interview with Property of Zack: "He is a really talented guy, especially when it comes to our genre". Gilbert's influences can be heard throughout the album especially with stand out tracks 'Get it, Got it, Good' and 'My Side of Town' which accolades New Found Glory.   

2.Fireworks - All I Have to Offer is My Own Confusion 

All I Have to Offer is My Own Confusion (The title was taken from a quote by author Jack Kerouac) was recorded in 2008 and released the following year. Gilbert not only lends his production skills to the album but contributes to the backing vocals and plays additional guitar. Dave from Fireworks said of Chad: Well first of all,[AIHTOIMOC] was created with Chad Gilbert, and that was really cool because we’d never had a producer or anything like that before. It was something new to us and it was a cool, collaborative process working with Chad'. 

3.Set Your Goals - Only Right Now and I'll Walk it Off

Gilbert recently recorded two songs with Set Your Goals which were only released digitally. Gilbert also performs vocals on Set Your Goals's song Our Ethos from their album This Will Be the Death of Us. The band's next album which will be released in 2014 is also being produced by Gilbert. 

4. A Day to Remember - What Separates Me From You

If you want to see Chad Gilbert in the studio with A Day to Remember please click here. Homesick, ADTR's previous album was also produced by Gilbert. More recently, Gilbert has also produced A Day to Remember's latest release Common Courtesy. 

5.Candy Hearts - The Best Ways to Disappear

This EP was released on Gilbert's own record label Violently Happy/Bridge 9 Records. In an interview with Alter the Press, Gilbert stated that the first time he heard Candy Hearts was when his band mate Steve was listening to Tongue Tied. He had this to say about the band: "I think what I love about the band is that, I feel like the punk rock/emo scene is filled with singers that sound very similar. They go for that one sound. When I heard Mariel’s voice, I was like, “Finally a singer that doesn’t stick to this formula.” She’s got her own sound and a unique sound". Gilbert's aim in producing the EP was to get Candy Hearts closer to their 'potential' as a band, tour and be promoted to reach as many people as possible.

Steve Klein:

1. Man Overboard - Self Titled

Man Overboard delivered Klein with his first producing gig which resulted in their self titled record. In an interview with Property of Zack Klein explains how he swapped numbers with Zac and ended up going producing for them. In the interview he stated: "It just came together with Man Overboard; Zac and I started talking and then the band stayed at my house and we vibed on the ideas. I told them that I wanted to get into producing and it was cool that they gave me my first gig. I’m really excited about how it came out"  

2. The Story So Far - What You Don't See

The Band's name came from the track The Story So Far from New Found Glory's album Sticks and Stones so it was inevitable that the TSSF/ Steve Klein mix would work in everyone's favour. Kelen Cappener stated in an interview with Alternative Press: Yeah, he came in to see what we were working on and gave us some pointers without hurting our integrity or trying to take over the creative process. He’s just an extra set of ears on the outside so he can advise us in certain ways. He has experience we don’t have, so it’s a good element in the process, as far as developing these songs.

3.State Champs The Finer Things

Albany natives State Champs started work on The Finer Things in a practice room at home in New York. Eventually the album was recorded with Steve Klein and Sam Pura at the Panda Studios in Fremont California. Tyler Szalkowski commented: 

“Working with Steve Klein and Sam Pura was amazing because they both have so much experience under their belts, they helped us make the best record we could possibly make.”

Credit to Alternative Press, Property of Zack,Alter the Press and Absolute Punk. 

Things to Look forward to in 2014

1. Neck Deep Releasing Wishful Thinking 

Despite being a band for little over a year Neck Deep already have two killer EPs under their belts' (Rain in July and a History of Bad Decisions). Not only this, the band recently signed to Hopeless Records, home to bands such as The Wonder Years, All Time Low and We are the In Crowd. Also, on January 14th Neck Deep will be releasing their debut album Wishful Thinking and if the two singles already released from the album are anything to go by, we get the felling this album will definitely be one not to miss. 

2. The Return of Set Your Goals

After Jordan broke his ankle and the departure of drummer Mike Ambrose, SYG have been uncomfortably quiet over 2013. But fear not people, it looks like they will be returning next year. In various tweets posted to fans, the band stated that they will be returning in 2014 and have 12 demos in the works. Next year will also mark the band's ten year anniversary. 

3. The Wonder Years, State Champs and A Loss for Words Tour

2013 has been a great year for all three of these bands. The Wonder Years released The Greatest Generation, A Loss for Words released Before it Caves and State Champs released their debut The Finer Things. Now, luckily enough for the UK all three bands are coming to play for us next May. (Check tour dates here) Although The Wonder Years and A Loss for Words have had the chance to play the UK before, this will be the first time that State Champs will have stepped foot on UK soil. So make sure you don't miss it. 

4.Slam Dunk Festival 2014

Slam Dunk has had a number of great bands appear over the years. Some of which include Four Year Strong, Man Overboard, Fireworks, Handguns, Set Your Goals, Save Your Breath and Me vs. Hero to name a few. Although there has been no announcements so far, we're hoping that Slam Dunk festival continues to perform and announces an impressive line up for 2014.

5. Handguns Recording New Album

Early January, Handguns will be heading into the studio to record their new album which will hopefully be out sometime next year. 

6. Neck Deep Tour

In the lead up to the release of Wishful Thinking and after, Neck Deep will be playing a handful of shows throughout the country. The band will be supported by Eastbourne's Roam who recently released their EP Headdown. Not only this, the band will also be on tour with label mates We are the in Crowd into February with support from fellow Englishmen Save Your Breath. It sounds like a pretty hectic start t the year for Neck Deep make sure you don't miss them (tour dates here) 

The Wonder Years Announce Tour with State Champs and A Loss for Words

The Wonder Years are coming to the UK next May with support from no other than State Champs and A Loss for Words. 

 Dates:

May 6 - Solus 2 - Cardiff, Wales

May 7 - Institute - Birmingham, UK

May 8 - Scala - London, UK

May 9 - Corporation - Sheffield, UK

May 10 - QMU - Glasgow, Scotland

May 11 - Fibber Magees - Dublin, Ireland

May 13 - Academy - Liverpool, UK

May 14 - Rescue Rooms - Nottingham, UK

May 15 - The Haunt - Brighton, UK

Soupy had this to say: “We wanted to bring the same family aesthetic and complete bill that we try to create with every US tour to overseas audiences. So, in keeping with that tradition, we decided on long-time friends and genre mainstays in A Loss For Words coupled with one of most exciting new bands in the genre – State Champs. We’re planning on shows that get crowds involved and excited from the first note of the night to the last and believe that this tour is going to bring just that.”

Stream The Finer Things on Rocksound

It's here! A week before it's official release, Rocksound are streaming The Finer Things. Get to it!

Stream The Finer Things

State Champs Release New Song

Check out State Champs' new song below: 

The Finer Things will be released on 8th October via Pure Noise Records.