Departures, spawned from the remnants of several North Jersey bands, sure seem to know their genre forefathers. Channeling the likes of such late great pop punk staples as Bodyjar (seriously, the spirit of Bodyjar is alive and well if their latest track “Thought Crime” is anything to go by) and all the best parts of the 1990’s pop punk explosion. By following this path without sounding like a rehash of their influences or simply mimicking the current crop of pop punk bands turning heads, they give a real sense of honesty to their sound which is quite refreshing. 
For Fans Of: Set Your Goals, The Swellers, Transit, Crime In Stereo, Strike Anywhere

How did the band come together? How have you grown since you guys started? 
We have a very long history.  In 2004 Steve, Mike, and Doyle played in a band called Mispent Youth. That band was one of the big local bands in our area and almost everyone who was into the scene loved them.  Christian randomly knew Steve through shows and mutual friends and would always come to Mispent Youth practices to hang out and eat Chinese food after. In 2006,  Doyle ended up leaving Mispent Youth and playing bass in another band for a few years. Mispent Youth continued on until their drummer, Rob, left to tour the world with The River City Rebels.  Doyle ended up rejoining the band in 2009 on drums.  About another year later and some more lineup changes, Mispent Youth’s sound started developing into what it is today.  In early 2010, Mispent Youth put out their last EP which is actually the first Departures EP. The EP was at first going to be Mispent Youth- “Departures”, but at the last minute we wanted to change the band name because it really was a completely different band.  A few months into 2010, Christian ended up joining us on bass.  He always jammed with us and he is the perfect fit. The funny thing is, he helped us write our song “Signals”, which is currently being exclusively streamed here, in December 2009. See, We told you it was a long story!

What do you have to offer that other bands don’t? What sets you apart from a lot of the other newer bands out there today?
We really dont think about things like this but I suppose it’s just our overall sound;  We are an accidental pop-punk band.  I remember being in the studio and saying to our engineer, “John, everyone keeps telling us we are a pop-punk band.  I thought we were just a punk band!” and he replies, “Wait, so you don’t know that you are the definition of an old school pop-punk band?”. Then we all laughed because we had no idea.  We thought we were just writing fast music with cool singing that we really loved. We really love incorporating a lot of vocals and ambient/instrumental parts into our songs.  One of our new tracks is completely instrumental.  We try not to let our genre limit us in any way.
 
How is the live show compared to the general sound of material that’s been released?
Well if we are talking about our self-titled EP, the live show is a lot different.  Our first release was really a completely different band; Christian and Doyle joined a few months after we released it.  We play one or two songs from that album but everything else is either unreleased or on our new EP being released March 10th.  Overall, our live show is extremely energetic and passionate.

More times than not, influences tend to bleed through. What bands are currently inspiring the music that you’re making?
 We get this question a lot and its probably the most difficult question to answer.  We’ll be at a show and right after our set people always come up to us and say something like, “You guys were awesome! I can totally see the Blink 182 influence!” or “You guys should tour with Man Overboard.” and honestly, we are all really shocked cause none of us listen to them. Steve is heavily into crust and street punk, Mike is all about classic rock and roll, Christian plays classical music, and Doyle grew up on Rush.  We all have our similar tastes in music, but I think we’ve let go of our influences and grew out of trying to be someone else’s band. All four of us come from almost opposite backrounds when it comes to listening to music but we all love fast, honest music.
 
What would you say the band has already accomplished and what do you have your eyes set on next?
Since we really got rolling this past May, we’ve done a lot that we are extremely proud of.  Our first show together was with Crime In Stereo, The Swellers, and This Time Next Year. That was an awesome show to start the band off with.  In August we went into Nada Studio with John Naclerio to record our new EP, “Without Fear”.  All of us are really looking forward to its release on March 10th.  In December through January we went on tour with our good friends Caleb Lionheart.  As of now, that tour is probably our favorite moment as a band.  As for right now, we are just getting all the work done for the EP and playing shows as often as possible. It would be totally awesome to get picked up by a label and have an agent do the hardwork for us but we actually love going through the grind and the whole DIY motions.  Simply, we plan to tour the country as much as possible and meet awesome new fans.

Thus far, what’s a favorite memory or something quirky that’s taken place with the band (in-studio, onstage, or elsewhere)?
Tour is easily our favorite memory.  Its just so awesome waking up every morning in a different city, wandering around, playing a show to brand new faces, and making a ton of friends.  If we want to talk about quirky memories… we would be here all day. We are all pretty goofy guys so the good times are usually endless.
 
Is there anything in particular that you’d like people to take away from listening to your music?
One thing the four of us have learned while growing up is that life gets fucking hard. We are all so passionate about everything we do and we really want the listeners to get that. To know that it’s okay to follow your dreams regardless of who supports you or what others may think. If you fail, you just have to get back up and learn from your defeats. You don’t want to wake up one day and say, “I really wish I knew what could have become of me”.  So, if there is anything in particular that we want people to take away from listening to Departures it would be, “It’s okay to be yourself and that you don’t have to cater to anyone else’s rules but your own.”

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