Everything I Ever Saw finds the Menzingers entering a new era in what’s already been a storied career. The Philadelphia punk legends’ eighth album chronicles moments of significant change—the personal, the political, and the universal—while returning to the core creative principles that first put them on the map with listeners the world over. Twenty years in, the Menzingers have discovered that the wisdom gained with time’s passing is even stronger than the emotional armor they once wore in their youth, and Everything I Ever Saw captures the quartet embracing the here and now while strengthening the bonds that have held them together.
Work on Everything I Ever Saw started in earnest after touring behind 2023’s Some Of It Was True, as the group felt a re-energized urgency while their worlds changed around them. “It wasn’t something that we initially set out to do,” vocalist/guitarist Greg Barnett says. “We started writing immediately after our last record in a very fun, casual way—but we were going through really special moments that we wanted to document.” “We’ve been doing this for so long that it’s routine,” vocalist/guitarist Tom May adds. “Between this record and the last record, however, so much happened in our lives, and we always write about what’s going on.”
Indeed, the last three years have been plenty busy in the Menzingers’ world: while Barnett got married and welcomed his first child, May got divorced and navigated new emotional territory both in and outside of the band. “We’re no strangers to writing about breakups, but divorce is different,” he says. “There’s a weirdness to it that cuts so much deeper and hurts much more. The most devastating part is that you had a vision for your life that’s gone now, and you have to figure out how to navigate that while growing as a person. But through that suffering, I definitely became a better person than I was before. When you’re broken, you can put yourself back together in a way where you are who you truly want to become.”
“It was sad for him, but he became the person that he always wanted to be, and he found so much happiness in this way his life changed,” Barnett adds. “I’ll always look back on this record as living in the moment of these massive changes in our lives.” While working on the record in the band’s new studio space in the Port Richmond area of Philadelphia, the quartet—rounded out by bassist Eric Keen and drummer Joe Godino—engaged in some group camaraderie (and, yes, a couple of frosty beverages) to help their bandmate and lifelong friend navigate this particular era of growing pains in his personal life. “Those guys took care of me,” May says, “and I can’t even put it into words how powerful that was. It solidified our creative relationship, because they’re some of the few people that I can talk about these things with.”
It’s that sense of coming together that inspired Barnett’s lyrics on the charging “Nobody’s Heroes,” which opens with the glowing tick-tock of a drum machine before launching into the type of passionate burn the Menzingers have long been known for. “It feels like the story of the Menzingers to me,” he says while talking about the song. “I wanted to write about my experiences of trying to be there for him through everything he was going through. Then, the approach became the whole band rallying around each other, and an anthem for everything that we’ve been through, while shining a light on the connection that we have together.”
The Menzingers have always created as a four-headed unit, with all members throwing in their respective talents as part of the craft—but for Everything I Ever Saw, the group worked in creative symbiosis more than ever before. “The way we made this record feels the most like how the band was in the very beginning: Me and Tom coming to the band with the most basic element of a song, and the four of us shaping that,” Barnett says. “We had these really bare skeletons, and we’d all get excited and envision what the song could be.” “We’d huddle in a circle and try to inspire each other,” May adds. “Everybody’s listening to different music and bringing those influences over. We were trying to build songs that got us excited from an instrumentation point of view.”
Instrumental in building that excitement was locally centered and nationally renowned production legend Will Yip, who threw in with the Menzingers on 2017’s After the Party and their sonically expansive 2019 record Hello Exile. This time around, Yip once again became an unofficial Menzinger while the band crafted these 11 songs in their South Philly space. “Working with Will was like a homecoming,” May beams while talking about Yip’s contributions. “We’ve grown up together over these years, and we’re still incredibly close friends. He’s the best at gassing you up and making sure everybody’s on the right page, but he’s also so good at pointing out stuff that might not fit the vision without being a fucking prick. He’s the hardest working person that we’ve come across in the music industry, and he’s incredibly inspiring.”
His input played a crucial role in constructing the thick riffs of opening track “Chance Encounters,” which charges forward like a thousand rhinos from the very first second. “We couldn’t figure out exactly where it lived, and when we got into the studio, Will was like, ‘Just rock it,’” May remembers. “It ended up being one of the heaviest songs that we’ve put out in a long time.” Lyrically Barnett draws from the chance encounters he’s experienced in his own life amidst Truman Show namechecks: “I met my wife when I was 15. We were in line for a show in Wilkes-Barre, and now we have a child together. It’s those chance moments that set your life on such an insane course.”
Then there’s the infectious pop-punk gait of “Better Angels,” its title taken from Abraham Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address and its lyrical content set squarely on the various calamities occurring in the world, with an urgent message to better understand those around us. “Heaven’s not coming for us,” May says while talking about the song’s lyrical bent. “You have to create it on earth. The world feels unstable, there’s noise everywhere, and we live in a world that’s teetering on post-truth. The song is about trying to stay human when the worst parts of humanity are showing its face. This oligarchical, blatantly corrupt, and self-serving administration is costing people their lives and livelihoods, and there’s a division that exists. If we’re going to get through all this, we have to bring people in and see the humanity in someone else. Appealing to the part of yourself—that’s the better angel.”
And tending to those around you while drawing from the well of experience that lies within is a central theme that brought about Everything I Ever Saw. “This record is a turning point for us,” May reflects. “We’re starting to utilize and accept the wisdom that we’ve gained from all these years. We’re extremely conscious of what we want to do now.” “This has been a huge portion of my life, and everybody has dedicated so much to this band,” Barnett adds, before reflecting on his grandmother’s recent passing, and how watching family videos after her death drove home the importance of capturing the truly transformative moments in one’s life.
“I want to be able to appreciate, understand, and love everything that we’ve done, as well as where we’re going,” he says. “It’s going to define who we are for the rest of our lives.” Suitably, Everything I Ever Saw is the work of a band that’s never taken their foot off the gas finding a new fount of energy in their collective growth—the latest full-throated work from a band that keeps creating memories to last an entire lifetime and then some.
