Good Shade’s latest album, ‘Think Spring,’ is brimming with hooks and infectious choruses. Their sound, reminiscent of Bad Nerves, White Reaper, Lone Wolf, and Local Drags, channels the essence of Power Pop Punk. It’s great!

Shane Natalie has a few thoughts to share about it as well.

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Be sure to catch ‘Think Spring’ featured on the ‘The Best Power Pop of 2023‘ Spotify playlist.

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Could you share the journey of bringing this record to life? How did all the pieces come together to create the final product?

Everything that I do starts off as a little recording idea on my phone. I generally start to compile ideas that are anywhere from 5 seconds to 2 minutes, recording them as they pop into my head and then walk away from them. Sometimes they are full verses or choruses but rarely an entire song. I like to go back through the ideas and categorize them by key. That makes it easier to combine certain ideas if I can’t go back through and finish an idea if I’m stuck.

After I have a “finished” thought, I take it to the computer to lay down a scratch guitar track with a click track that is mapped out if there are any tempo changes throughout the song. I then go through the fun but the annoying process of miking all of the drums and lay down drum tracks to the scratch guitar and click track, trying to make it all the way through the song if possible without having to cut things up.

Then it’s time to scrap the scratch guitar and record rhythm through amps. Once those are done, I put down a scratch vocal track, then write and record bass that doesn’t clash with the vocal melody, redo the vocals, add lead guitars/synth, etc, backup vox, and then mix!

Takes quite a while when you’re doing it yourself haha.

Was there a particular moment or experience that struck you, signaling that you were onto something special with this project?

Before this project, I was recording everything with an M-Audio Profire 2626 interface with no outboard gear. It was just a computer, an interface, and a lot of plugins during the mixing process. I hadn’t been a gearhead and knew nothing about signal flow, gain staging, or really any of the ins and outs of incorporating outboard gear into a hybrid workflow.

During lockdown, I started to obsess over outboard compression, EQ, saturation, etc., and started reading a lot about it and texting my buddy Bobby about it a lot because I really wanted to try to incorporate these elements into the recording process. I started buying preamps, compressors, EQs, 500 gear, saturation boxes, etc., just experimenting with different things and selling what I didn’t like and replacing it with what I thought I could use.

After what was an excruciatingly frustrating process, I feel like I got to a comfortable place where I could seamlessly use this gear to record myself. That particular special moment was definitely spending all the time obsessing and tweaking knobs to a point where once something was recorded, I could play it back, and it sounded like it was mixed on the way in. That’s a really cool feeling to feel like, “Oh shit, this sounds better than anything I’ve done, and I haven’t mixed anything or added any plugins.”

Success can take on different meanings as time goes on. When envisioning success for this new record, what does that picture look like now?

I think when you’re a younger musician, it’s natural to think success is going to be when you’re making money on music and lots of people are really into it. Don’t get me wrong that would be a cool thing, but for me these days, success is just finishing a project and not hating it in the end.

When you’re doing stuff by yourself, I feel it is easy to get wrapped up in the subtle nuances that a general listener is never going to notice. You start being super picky about things, and there are limitless possibilities to what the end result could be. Getting to a point where you can say, “OK, this is good, and there isn’t much more that I can do to change this, AND I like it,” is to be a successful feeling. I have so many unfinished projects by myself and other people, so any finished product is a success.

As an artist, the act of baring your emotions to the world is profound. Does this vulnerability come naturally to you, or is it a constant journey of finding comfort?

Being lyrically vulnerable and frankly being lyrically proficient is something that I feel like I always struggle with as an artist. I do feel like this is the first time I have ever written and recorded lyrics that feel potentially relevant to other people and are mostly transparent.

I’ve always tried to hide behind lyrics, writing things that are cryptic and vague, meaning something to me, but other people may think, “What the hell are you even talking about?”. This is definitely a constant journey for me, and I hope with each record that, I become more confident in my lyric-writing abilities. I’m a pretty terrible reader, so I feel like, by default, my writing abilities suffer as well.

Among the gigs you’ve performed, which one holds an indelible place in your memory and why does it stand out?

Oh man, the gig itself was not great, but when I read this question, there was one particular show that came to mind, at least with this band. In 2019 we were on a month-long tour, and we came through Missoula, MT on a Sunday night. It was a ghost town. Nothing was open; no one was around. We had a show scheduled through someone I had randomly hit up through Facebook or Instagram who seemed to be involved in booking shows. The show was booked at a beautiful, huge Federation of Eagles hall that was built in 1899. The stage was red-carpeted, multi-tiered, and would be comfortable housing a Glen Campbell-style big band band with multiple sections camped on each tier. The only people there were a family who consisted of a couple that used to be married, had kids, and now are divorced but are still friends with each other and their new spouses.

The bands were just different iterations of these folks playing anything from Rancid covers to rockabilly love song covers for each other. We still had a great time and sold some merch to these folks but come 8:00, it was closing time. We figured the guy who booked the show would let us crash at his place, but they had promptly left, leaving us nowhere to stay. Missoula is extremely close to Glacier Ntl Park (which we had been to earlier in the day), and it being July, it was peak tourist season. That being said, we looked up hotels that were a minimum of $400-500 for one night which was not going to happen if anything was even available. While we were loitering, killing time, not knowing where to go, some random guy came rolling up to us on a skateboard, asking if the show was over. He said he had been watching a feed on Facebook live and decided to skate on down to the show. Seeing that it was over and we had no place to go, he offered for us complete strangers to come and eat and stay at his house that night. It was this random act of kindness that really stuck out to me more than any show I’ve played. Such a random night.

Defining a song’s completion can be elusive. How do you determine when a composition has reached its final, ready-to-record form?

Elusive, so true, haha I’ve honestly never had the opportunity to record in a studio, have someone else say, “That was good, let’s move on,” or had a timeline for completion on anything I’ve done. I think these parameters would probably assist in feeling like you HAVE to finish something and probably push people to try their hardest for time and money’s sake.

I feel like anyone who records themselves understands that there is a mind-numbing amount of time and energy going into constantly changing things throughout the process, and the key has to be just knowing when to call it. For me, there is no “ready to record it” form since it’s generally all going in recorded as its first form.

I don’t sit around my house playing the songs as I maybe should; instead, I just start throwing things into my phone and computer and see where the process takes me. The hard part is knowing where to stop, but I do think having outboard gear and settling on the mindset of, “ok, I’m going to obsess on what it sounds like going in, and whatever happens, I’m keeping that” prevents that burnout of relying on polishing a turd down the road. That’s where you can really lose the magic of creating music.

Lyrics often carry profound meaning. Are there particular lines you hope listeners will always remember from your songs? If so, what’s the significance?

I don’t really have specific lines that I hope people will remember as much as I hope that by becoming more confident with my lyric-writing abilities and by being more vulnerable, lyrics will resonate with people and be as meaningful to them as they are with me.

Performing music before an audience holds a unique allure. What aspects of this experience contribute to the excitement and enjoyment for you?

To be completely honest, playing shows causes me more anxiety and fear these days than joy and excitement. Don’t get me wrong, I still like doing it, and maybe if I did it more frequently, those feelings would subside, but pretty much any time there is an upcoming show, I am freaking out beforehand and can’t wait for it to be over with. I would ultimately love to have more frequent practices and another guitarist playing live in order to create a more in-depth live performance and not just a fast, 3-piece punk set.

Among the compliments you’ve received, is there one that remains etched in your memory? If so, what made it particularly unforgettable?

I think one of the biggest compliments an artist can receive is when people are singing along to your songs because they’ve taken the time to engage with the lyrics, and it must mean something personal to them in order to be chanting them back at you while you’re playing. This is such a small, under-the-radar project that I can count on one hand how many times this has happened, but whenever it does, it is such a cool feeling that I appreciate so much.

Studio moments often hold a touch of magic. Could you recount an instance that stands out as the most enchanting during your creative process?

After spending years learning how to navigate all of the outboard gear I’ve accumulated and learning how to patch everything together, gain stage it, combine it with other gear, and experiment with different sounds, it is truly rewarding to be able to listen back to something you just recorded and feel like it is sonically ready to be put out into the ether. So much of my previous recording processes were spent on thinking, “I’ll fix that later,” and while I don’t think having outboard gear is necessary with today’s technology and emulation software, it’s fun to use, and I feel like it gets one to a finished product closer without the reliance on plugins.

Where do you see yourself situated within the broader landscape of the music industry? How do you perceive your unique role and contribution?

I currently see myself more as someone who would rather assist others with their projects by recording them. I’m going to keep recording my own music, but I don’t have much interest in grinding and grinding the way a lot of people are out there doing it in order to reach some kind of musical success. I’m happy with my music and am always open to growing and expanding the audience of who hears it, but I’d like to do so in a way that is honest and feels right for me.

With the record completed and the music released, do you believe the pinnacle of enjoyment has been reached, or is this just the beginning of an exciting phase?

That’s really hard to say. I go back and forth sometimes about this because that’s just kind of the nature of the beast. I feel stupid about it, but sometimes I think, “Man, I spent so long on that, and no one gives a shit about it,” but then again, I’ve received some really nice feedback from people that I either don’t know or people that I know and respect their opinions more than anything.

My initial thought was disappointment based on numbers that I can see in relation to streams, audience, etc., but I think I need to remember that the enjoyment should be in the writing and recording process, not who hears it.

That being said, I can say that I feel really lucky and grateful to anyone who has been kind with regard to this record, and there are hopefully some cool things to come in the not-too-distant future 🙂

Looking ahead to the next couple of months, what exciting plans or projects are on the horizon for you?

I’m currently working on some demos to give out to someone who has expressed interest in hearing what I’ve been working on next. I would love to see where that takes me if they are interested in the new material, but at the end of the day, I’m just excited that they are interested in the recording and want to hear more. It can feel deflating when you finish an album, but this puts wind in my sails, and I’m excited to just keep rolling with my music endeavors.