Shinedown - Episode 8 (Ei8ht)

Our Shinedown series reaches the end as we cover the band’s most recent studio album, Ei8ht.

In this episode, we explore the story behind Ei8ht, including the delays that surrounded the album's release. We discuss the themes and musical influences that run throughout the record but, most importantly, we will be highlighting and dissecting the Hidden Gems from Ei8ht. Those songs that are overlooked and underappreciated and deserve far more attention than they receive.

Keep your eyes out for the next series on the podcast where we will be covering another Hidden Gem Band. A band from the rock or metal world that is overlooked and underappreciated.

For any requests for future episodes, please email: RandM.HiddenGems.Podcast@gmail.com

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:40

Daniel Steady Welcome to Walter. We've got one thing, ladies and shiny. Welcome everyone. It's Rock and Metal's Hidden Gems Podcast. I'm Daniel Stucky, as I've already announced, and we are on the final episode on our Shinedown series. We've covered it all from Leave a Whisper, the debut release, all the way up to the most recent release that we're covering today, the album called Eight. This album literally came out 48 hours prior to me starting the first episode of the series. That means this episode will be a little different to the previous ones in the Shinedown series. And the reason for that is because this album hasn't had the time to bed in. It hasn't had the time to settle and find what is gonna be the popular tracks, what are gonna be the hidden gem tracks, what's gonna be the mediocre tracks. In terms of the metrics, the streams on the streaming platforms, they haven't had time to find their level, their root level. So it's hard to spot hidden gems when, based on the metrics, nearly every song on the 18-track album is a potential hidden gem. Obviously, there are some promotional singles, but even they in the modern 2026 era, it's a little different to how you would have done it in the 80s, 90s, early 2000s. I will talk about it when we get them, when we get to the start of the album 8 and start talking about the writing, recording, and the songs itself. But I just wanted to give you that heads up that it'll be a little bit different today. But as a result, we've got more hidden gems to cover than the norm. Usually we have two, maybe three hidden gems at worst one. This time we've got five. I won't go into them in as much depth as I usually do for time constraint reasons, but we will cover the main parts and tell you why they're a hidden gem and why you should start listening to them. And maybe then the metrics will go through the roof and these songs will no longer be a hidden gem. Who knows where this album will be in 12 months' time once it's had that bedding in period. But before we get to the album 8, there's a little bit of Shinedown controversy. We need to cover the happened. In the same year the album 8 came out in 2026. Uh, Shinedown was scheduled to play at the Rock the Country Music Festival in 2026. But they withdrew from the festival. They went the only artist band signed up for the festival that ended up pulling out of the festival. Uh, they had their reasons, we'll talk about them in a moment. But yes, they were signed, they were announced, advertised, they're all ready to go there, and then pulled out. Let's talk about why they pulled out. Well, the big reason that is 2026, and politics is very divisive at the moment in most Western cultures, but the United States of America is certainly up there towards the top of that list of divisive politics at the moment. It feels like, based on how the media and social media as well is pushing politics in that country, that you are either extremely left on a political spectrum or you're extreme right on the political spectrum. There's no room really for centralist politics being in the middle, kind of seeing uh points of view from both sides of the political spectrum. You're either extremely on one side or you're on the other. And if you do have those moments where, for example, you're on the left but you agree with something on the right, or you're on the right and you agree with something on the left, then you're kind of portrayed as this traitor. You know, you get out of here. If you don't stick with us, then you're not part of us, etc. etc. It's very tribal at the moment in politics. One of those people who I guess contribute to politics being so divisive in the country is rap, metal, country music artist Kid Rock. He's very much on the right of the political spectrum. He's very open, uh, honest, but also controversial in his views. He's offended many and doesn't really care about it either. Whether that's something you agree with or not, I'm not gonna go into it on this podcast because we are not a politics podcast, we are a music podcast. But the world saw Kid Rock as a controversial figure. You either agreed with him or you absolutely detested him. There was no middle ground there, and he was the person organizing the Rock the Country music festival. This is this Kid Rock, if you're not familiar. But then before that, for the like almost eight years prior, he was doing just full-on hip-hop rap like vanilla rice style, especially in the early, early 90s. And then after this rap metal phase, he went more country, which ultimately led to him moving in and organizing this Rock the Country music festival. It was his music festival, he wasn't just someone hired to organize it, it was his little baby. So Shinedown didn't like how it split the fan base, the Shinedown fan base and the backlash they were getting in the infighting. So they pulled up, but as I said, they weren't the only artist ludicrous. The rapper was another one I pulled out for the same political reasons. Uh, and Brent Smith had this quote to say We didn't want to participate in an event that believed would create further division. The band observed infighting they had never seen before and felt it was their job to step back and promote unity. So that's what they did. They pulled out, Ludicrous pulled out, and eventually the Rock the Country Music Festival didn't go ahead. Too many bands pulled out and it kind of collapsed before the event ever took place. That happened in 2026. What else happened in 2026 for Shinedown? Well, you could have guessed it given the podcast we're on and the episode were on as well. They released their eighth studio album called You guessed it. Eight. It came out on the 29th of May 2026. Now, I want you to pay attention to that because it's gonna come back when we start talking about the singles in a couple of moments. 29th of May 2026. Remember the year, remember the month. Because we are in this new era, the streaming service era of releasing music. I've talked about it in the previous Shinedown episode. I think I talked about it towards the end of the Nightwish series as well. How music is released and consumed is different today than it was, say, even just 10 years ago. You used to release a couple of singles from your album. The first would usually be that big banging single from the album, the one that you thought was push the album sales the best. Usually it ended up the first one being upbeat, heavy, higher tempo, and then the second one used to be the more chilled out a ballad, maybe just lighter in tone, depends on the genre of music you're really playing and how lighter in tone that went. But you'd release a single and it would come out a month before the album, maybe within weeks or days of the album release. Just enough to get some publicity, some momentum ready for the album launch. And then you'd release two or three other singles after the album's release to keep that momentum going, to keep those sales going, and to also help push the ticket sales for the tour that's gonna be coming up immediately after to help promote that album release as well. That's how it used to happen. We're in a streaming service now, it's easier and cheaper than ever to release new music. You just upload it to the streaming platform, and it's immediately in all of those platform consumers' hands. It's a click of a button away. They don't have to go to the shop or wait for a home delivery from the internet. It's there in your hands at that moment, and also I don't have to pay any more money to access it. I've already paid my monthly subscription fee, so I've got it right now. As a result, let me give you the date of the very first single. It was actually two singles coming in and one who was like a double single release for the album 8. They were the songs 365 and Dance Kid Dance. They were released on January 24th, 2025. January 2025. Remember the album 8 came out May 2026. There's a year and a half, 18 months between the album coming out and those first two singles coming out, which is huge. There are some reasons for that, but you also had multiple other singles come off this album months prior to the actual album release. They were trying to keep momentum, publicity, brand awareness going for the band Shinedown to help promote the live events they were doing, the tours, prior to the album release, because remember that's where bands get their money now. They get it less from uh physical media because they don't sell as much because people don't consume as much. There are some vinyl diehards, I still buy the physical vinyl, but the audience is far less than it ever was, and the main bulk of your income as a band now is coming from your live tour tickets. So they have to promote them, so they're releasing those singles as part of that. But also, in the case of the album 8, there's a little rumor that isn't officially confirmed, but there's a potential there, and that rumour is that they released 365 and Dance Kid Dance a year and a half before the album is released for two reasons. One, because the album wasn't even written at that point, they had those two songs, but not a lot else. And the other reason is because they wanted to test the waters, do consumer feedback to see if the sound of those two songs is something that Shinedown fans were resonance with. Is there something that they liked where you get positive feedback on the sound of those two songs? Shall we keep going in that direction then as we write the rest of the album? You could never do that back in the day, but in the streaming service world, that option does open up to you to release a song here or there, see if it's in the right direction where the band's fans want the songs and the album to be. If it is great, we'll keep writing in that direction. If it's not, if we're getting negative feedback, then we'll mix it up and try something a little different. Ultimately, it lessens the risk of annoying your fan base and giving them the quality product that they actually want. And let's be honest, record companies especially don't like risk. They like making money and surefire money that is under no threat to go away. Now, in regards to the long 18-month writing process for the album 8, we got some quotes from vocalist, main founding member of Shinedown, main songwriter of Shinedown, Brent Smith. Music has never left me. It has never left Eric or Barry or Zach either. And I've always talked about Shinedown as a living, breathing entity. It will talk to me when I need it to. Or let's write a song about this because we think it'll be a number one hit. The moment you start doing that, you've lost the authenticity and the audience can see right through it. So, with what we have been making, we wouldn't have been capable of doing it in three or four months. It doesn't sound like that. Anytime there's a fork in the road, don't just take the safe way. Go in the other direction and see what's down that road. You can always circle back, but don't turn back. I think it was important for us to understand that. So, in my opinion, what Brent Smith is saying in that quote is that he's reached that point in his career with Shinedon where he kinda needs inspiration to hit him. It's hard for him just to tap into that inspiration when writing new material for an album. And I can see that absolutely being the case, especially as someone who writes lyrics for these songs. I think when writing music specifically for new songs, new albums, it's not easy, but it's easier to kind of just pick a note on a guitar and just kind of see where your fingers take you. It's harder to do that with lyrics because you're writing physical words and then you're adding rhythm and melody to it afterwards. And it's hard to come up with so many phrases and different ways to say, let's be honest, the same kind of thing, which a lot of Shinedown songs are about motivation, being the best version of you, overcoming mental health issues, etc. etc. And they've been writing, well, up to now, eight albums worth of material where a lot of the songs in each one are talking about the subject matter. On top of that, there's a bunch of Shinedown songs that are written demoed that have never seen the light of day because they didn't make the final cut of that particular album. And as such, think of how many lyrics have been either recorded or just thrown into the bin because they never made the album. How many times can you say the same things over and over and over again? There's only so many words in the English language. So I can see why you would kind of need the inspiration to hit you at this point in Shinedown's career. You can't just go into the well and pull something up because you pulled most of it out already. I guess another way you could say it is basically writer's block, in a way. And I think that's kind of what the band members were going through, especially Brent Smith here. The other side to the quote that Brent Smith's talking about as well is not taking the easy option. Just don't just play the hits. Don't just play the regular chord progressions and go where the obvious takes you. Try something different, try something new, and try and think, ooh, what about this? What about that? Try new things and the song. You could write the song in an hour, two hours if you just played it straight. Or we can try all these different things. A lot of it won't make the final cut, but we can keep trying it, keep experimenting, and get the song in the best place it can be. And that won't take a few hours, that might take a couple of weeks, months, whatever. Depends on the song and how complex it is. Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't. But there's some quotes here now from Brent Smith on the sound of the album 8. I don't look at Shinedown as just being about rock music. It's pop, alternative, metal, country, idle contemporary, rap, hip-hop. We're inspired by it all. And we swim in a lot of creative oceans. At least we attempt to. That's a thing that allows us to say that Shinedown is everybody's band. And when talking about bassist Eric Bass, who also remember produces a mixes of Shinedown albums since the album Attention Attention. Eric was like, it should feel like a debut record. I know it's the eighth studio record, but we need it to lean in to what if this was the first thing we ever put out, you know? What are we influenced by? What are we inspired by? What rogues do we want to go down? And I think that circles back to the previous quote as well, where I was talking about that inspiration, reaching into the well one too many times and now needing inspiration to hit you. I think this is Brent Smith and Eric Bass kind of saying, we're struggling for inspiration here, in this case, both musically and lyrically. Let's go back to the well. Let's go back to when we first started getting into music as teenagers. What inspired us? This is our debut record, our first ever album. What would it sound like? Remember, the band members are very different today in Shinedon than they were back in that first album, Leave a Whisper. Only drummer Barry Kirch and vocalist Brent Smith are the same. Zach Myers, Eric Bass, they weren't part of it until The Sound of Madness, the third studio release. So let's go back and think of all the inspirations and influences we would have had as a band if the four of us were there at the very beginning doing this first record. But also, the first record came out in 2003. That's a long time ago from 2026. It's 23 years. A lot happens in pop culture, a lot happens with personal taste in that time. So you're taking the brain of 2026, Eric Bass, Zach Myers, Barry Kirch, Brent Smith, and you're trying to put it back into the body of the 2003 version, writing that first debut release. It's an interesting concept. The sounds are different in 2026 than they are in 2003, so you're not gonna get that new metal post-grunge sound you had on Leave a Whisper. You're gonna get a newer sound, but hopefully with the same writing techniques and the same creativity and excitement. Excitement being the key word I think the band were looking to go for here. Now, I mentioned there's a lot of singles to come off the album 8 because of the way music is released and consumed today. Even more different today is that I can get multiple different sources to give me different results on which songs were singles off the album 8, which ones weren't. So I'm gonna pick one I think is probably most reliable. I'm going to go with that. But bear in mind, if you do a Google search, you will find two or three other looking reputable sources telling you different singles that were released off the album 8 when I'm not convinced they were. But the first single to come off the album 8 was a two double-sided single, if you were going physical. Obviously, in the streaming world, it just meant they released two singles on the same day. The first of these came out, well say first, they both came out on the same day. They came out on the 24th of January 2025, as I've already mentioned, a whole 18 months prior to the album 8 coming out. And this is the one that I mentioned there's rumors and only rumors that this was released purely to see if Shinedown fans were digging the new sound. So the first of these two singles was a song called Three, Six, Five.

SPEAKER_05 20:53

So everyone's five.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

Obviously, a play there, and the fact is 365 days in a year. And the song is basically about how each band member Life, how they have evolved and changed so much in the previous 12 months. Now, the next single song did come out on the same day as 365 in January of 2025. It's more of a political song than 365 is, and it's worth mentioning as well. These two songs are the highest stream tracks on the album 8, but they've also been out 18 months longer than most of the other tracks, not all of them. So it's no doubt they would be the highest stream tracks on the album. 365 is the highest, uh, 25 and a half million, and it's a bit of a drop then to the next single, which we'll get to in a moment. But as I mentioned, it's more of a political song. And if you remember from our previous episode on the album Planet Zero, that was the first time Shining Down as a band really explored political subject matters. This one is another one, and it's called Dance Kid Dance. There, the song Dance Kid Dance, came out in January 2025 as well. That one, it's worth mentioning, is also kind of what they've based the promotional material of their tour on, is the song Dance Kid Dance. So I think the band Shine Down C that one probably is the main single from the album eight, but it's the second highest stream behind the other single released on the same day, 3659. In terms of that political meaning behind a song, I got a quote from bassist Eric Bass for you here. Uh that song is about how, as a society, we put kids on a lot of pharmaceutical drugs. At least in America, we do, for sure. A lot of antidepressants and rattling and things like this. And by the way, that's one place I was fortunate as a child. I was diagnosed with what was just termed as ADD back in the 1970s when I was diagnosed with it. But there was no H in ADHD, but they wanted to put me on Rattling, and my mother said no, which I'm really happy she didn't. And at the time, me being a kid, I wasn't sure how to navigate those waters. And I apologize to Eric Bass there for the tone of voice and the accent I chose to represent him. It's nothing like he is in real life. He is American, and that's about the only connection there, really, to the accent I chose. But I do this in all the podcast series and episodes. I pick a completely unrelated accent I think is fun to do and listen to to represent each character. And that's Eric Bass's voice. Brent Smith's voice you hear, which sounds very much like Hulk Hogan, is nothing like, or Brent Smith sounds like in real life either. But that is the kind of message behind a song. It's about basically current culture around pharmaceuticals and mental health diagnosis, etc., and how they're just drugging and drugging and drugging rather than sometimes trying to get to the root core of the problem or just trying to help them navigate waters with whatever mental health issue they got. In this case for Eric, it's ADHD. You know, sometimes you just gotta learn how to manage and live with a mental health condition like that, or a neurodiverse condition, I should say, rather than just trying to drug them into the hills. Because sometimes they have side effects, and I need drugs for the side effects, and you need drugs for those side effects, and suddenly you're in a downward spiral of taking multiple, multiple pills every day. Now let's move on to the third promotional single. There's five in total according to the source I'm sticking with. Uh we covered two of them already. There's three others. One of them I'm going to hold back though. One of them was released last, and based on the streams it's currently got, I think it's in hidden gem territory, and therefore it could be one of my five hidden gems for this album. So we'll leave that one till last. It's the last promotional single anyway. So we'll go on to the third promotional single. We'll cover the fourth before moving on to our hidden gems. The third promotional single from the album 8 came out in July 15th, 2025. So still a whole 12 months, a whole year before the album's official release. A long, long time. There's no coincidence of the first four promotional singles, the two I've already covered, DanceKid Dance 365, and the ones I'm going to cover shortly. There's no coincidence they are the four highest stream tracks on this album as of recording in 2026. That's what I mean when this album hasn't had the time to bed in. These songs have been out 18, 12 months before the album's release. They've had many, many more months to get those streaming numbers up. And that's why it's hard to do the hidden gems on this album, but I'm happy to give it a go nonetheless. So let's get into it. This one came out July 15th, 2025, as already mentioned, and this song doesn't have an obvious core meaning. The band have even said that themselves. They want people to have their own interpretations on the meaning to the song, and it's called Killing Fields.

SPEAKER_05 27:44

It's just the two cameras!

SPEAKER_01 28:17

The third promotional single there, Killing Fields, track 14 on the album. So whereas 365 and Dance Kid Dance are right at the top of the track listings. Dance Kid Dance is track number two and 365 track number four. So Killing Fields track number 14 on an 18-track album. That's well down left, but that's a great little song. Out of the three singles I've shown you so far, that one is my personal favourite. If it wasn't a single, it could easily have been a hidden gem for me. Great little track, and it's currently the third highest streamed track on the album. As I said, it's basically the order these singles are released is where they are on the top of the streaming platforms, if that makes any sense in terms of the metrics. One's released earlier have the highest streams. This one is released third, therefore it's the third highest stream track on the album so far. We're gonna move on now to the fourth promotional single from the album 8. This one also came out well before the album's official release. This one came out on 18th of November 2025. Remember, the album came out in July 2026. We're not even in 2026 yet when these songs are coming out. They came out well before the album's release. Uh, this one was originally a ballad, but Brent Smith wasn't really feeling it when they were trying to record it, and so they changed it and turned it into effectively a country song. This one is called Search Light. But they added those country elements to it. Here's a quick quote about that by Brett Smith. The fact of the matter is that Searchlight during the writing process was a different song to what it is now. It was a bit more like a power ballad, and that's just not what it said to me it wanted to be. So I went back in with everybody and said, Do me a favor, just pull the acoustic track up and let me resing this. Then the great thing about Eric is that he then said, That's the way you hear it! Well, if you're going to do it that way, I think we need a banjo. And I think we need a pedal steel guitar. And that song, Searchlight, also helped them play the Grand Olyopary, the world's largest running live country music radio broadcast from Nashville, Tennessee. And I'll be honest, I don't know much about the Grand Ole Opry, but from what I can read online, it seems to be basically the biggest festival for country music uh the United States of America have. It's both a radio show and also a live stage show you can attend. So quite a big achievement, really, for Shinedon to play that gig. Um, Searchlight helped them get there with that country music influence. And the band are introduced by country music legend Carrie Underwood. Now, the next promotional single from the album 8 is the one that I mentioned is going to be my hidden gem. So we'll come back to that later. That one for contact was released on the 17th of February, 2026. So we finally made it into the same year as the actual album's release. The record company Atlantic Records almost realizing, and perhaps Shinedown themselves as well, that it's been too much of a gap between promotional singles and the official album release. So we'll release another one. And a sixth promotional single was released for the album 8 with kind of like a little music video to go along with it that's only available really on YouTube and certain streaming platforms like Spotify being an example of one. This one came out not even closer to the album release, but basically the same day, the 29th of May 2026. This one dropped the same day as the album, which kind of makes me question whether it's really a single, other than having an official music video to go along with it. Is it really a single when it's only kind of dropped as part of the album? I mean, it was released the same day it was going to be released anyway, and we the things are only released in streaming services now, everything's digital. Doesn't really feel like a single to me, other than the fact it has a music video to go along with it, which is why I kind of didn't include it at first. But I'm going to now because it's not a hidden gem. Spoiler, it's eligible for hidden gem territory based on the streams, but it isn't one, and that is track number five on the album, it's called Young Again. Life is mysterious and the sixth promotional single for the album eight there, the song Younger Again. A nice little song. I quite like it. I don't dislike it, I don't think it's average, I think it's a bit better than that, but it didn't make my hidden gem territory, even though it was eligible based on the streaming numbers. And I still question whether it's really a single. Yes, there's a music video, but Shinedown social media at this point, they're not saying, hey, look, we got a new single, Young Again, go check it out. Here's the music video link. There may be the odd post doing that, but the majority of their posts is gonna be going, hey Shinedown fans, the new album ain't just been released. Go check out the album and then check out the tour that follows. That's what the majority of the posts were doing, likely to be doing. I remember that's what the majority of the social media was doing when I started this podcast. So I don't really consider it a true, true single, but there is a music video for it, so technically it does count. But a good little song nonetheless. Now we are coming into our hidden gem territory for the album eight. We got five to go through. As I said at the start of this episode, for time reasons. We're not gonna deep dive every single one like we usually do, where we go through little sections and dissect them. We will be playing you the main sections of each one and giving you the chance to see if you think it's a hidden gem yourselves. I'll also obviously be playing at the bits I like most about the songs. We will be going into them in more detail than we just did for those promotional singles, but it won't be as deep a dive as we have been doing in the previous episodes. As I've said already on this episode, the reason for that is just ultimately these songs haven't had time to find out whether they're going to be a hidden gem or whether they're gonna end up being a popular track. It just hasn't had enough time to breathe. The album's only been out, say 48 hours prior to me starting episode 1 on this series, or on episode 8 today. So it just hasn't had enough time to find where it lands in the placement of Shinedown's back catalogue. So these songs I'm covering today, they're hidden gems as of recording, but they may not be in the future. And my first hidden gem from the album 8, as a Shinedown fan, as a hard rock fan, metal fan, whatever you are, you will either love this song like I do, or you will absolutely detest it. Because, in terms of musical style, it's different to what you know Shinedown for. It's polarizing, and it's different to what Shinedown have done in the past. This is my first hidden gem from the album 8. It's a great, great track, and it's track number three on the album. You know what it is. It's burning down the disco. That's right for our first hidden gem on this album eight. We're burning down the disco. As I said, you will either love this song or you will detest this song because you just don't like disco or dance music. You don't even have to like disco or dance music really, but just having that fusion with the hard rock, I think it's a groove, and I do like it, and it's why it's my first hidden gem. I'm gonna play another short snippet of something we just listened to there in our first verse for Burning Down a Disco. Because I love how Eric's bass comes in midway through that verse and just really kicks off the groove of the verse with his bass guitar part. Let's have a quick listen to that little snippet. I feel up until Eric bass comes in in that verse, you've got some of that dance disco-ness to it with the guitars with the dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan dan. That comes in on the intro, and it will come back in in a moment as well with the chorus. But it kind of drops for the verse, and then you kind of lose that groove that disco n us about it a little bit. But then when Eric bass kicks in midway through with that groove on the bass guitar, it starts building again. And then we're gonna hit it with the four on the floor in a moment when the chorus comes in with Barry Kirch and the drums. Four on the floor, if you're wondering what that is, if you're a non-drummer just aren't aware of the term, that's basically using the bass pedal and the bass drum on every one beat and our four-four time signatures just boom, backup, every one, paco, which is synonymous with dance and disco music, because it's all about the dance to the groove and the beat to dance along, too. Now you might be wondering why Shine Down the Band chose to go with a disco hard rock fusion for this song, and it's because of the song's meaning, and you can kind of get it with the title burning down the disco. They're using the disco as a metaphor effectively for conformity, uh so ordinary social structures, traditional industry gatekeeping, and it's basically saying burn that down. Don't be like everyone else, don't just copy the disco. You cannot achieve unique success without sticking your neck on the line. And there's lines in the song like no one's taking credit without taking the risk. Good luck with your decision when you're choosing your dose. So it's quite straightforward, the meaning of the song, and if you're gonna be using the disco as the metaphor and the main hook of your song, then the song's gotta have a disco fusion in terms of musical style, right? You can't have a black metal organ-inspired vampire sounding music song that then has the word disco used throughout. It's just a disconnect. You gotta bring it in, gotta connect the dots, and that's exactly what Shinedown are doing here. We're gonna listen to the chorus now. Pay attention to the four and the floor, tap your foot, because you will be, or banging your head. It's got a groove, it's catchy, and this is the chorus for burning down the disco.

SPEAKER_07 41:03

And it's gonna be for the fortune of the game.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

It's catchy, right? That chorus for me, it carries such a groove, it's got the disco about it, and I I love the fusion with the hard rock style as well, the shine down style mixing with that disco theming, and it creates a unique song for the band in their catalogue. There's nothing else in their back catalogue that sounds like burning down the disco. It's unique for the band, which is even more great considering the song's meaning of having to have a unique approach to life to create your own unique success instead of just following the disco as a metaphor they're following. So, really, really cool song for me, that chorus. You'll either love it or you'll hate it. I don't think there's uh an in-between there of uh an indifferent opinion. I'm sure there will be a few of you, but I think that's a really standout track on this album. It was when I first spun this album, that was probably the track that got stuck in my head the most and stood out for me more so than the promotional singles that Shinedown chose. And considering the streams it's got, um, I'm surprised it hasn't got more, to be honest, when this album released. I appreciate it's not long been out, the album eight, but I still thought it'd be in terms of comparisons to the other tracks on the album that haven't been out for months and months and months as promotional singles, I thought it'd be further up there. Now we're gonna get to the breakdown next of Burning Down the Disco, and we'll probably close out the song as well with the final chorus. As I said, I'm not gonna deep dive into these hidden gems as much as I have on previous episodes because some of them in the future may not be hidden gems anymore once this album has a chance to settle, and the bigger, more popular songs have a chance to spring up that leaderboard in terms of streams, but also because we got five to get through and there's time constraints here. We don't want to be here for four hours. I don't think any of us want that. So we are gonna get to the breakdown. Before I do, I want to highlight um a guitarist from another band, uh, Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine. I'm gonna play you a little clip of Tom Morello's guitar playing from their biggest track, probably uh Killing in the Name of because it gives me vibes here in what Zack Myers is doing in burning down the discos. Uh, Tom Morello is known as being one of the most creative and influential guitarists uh in rock of all time, really. He's not influential in like an Ingve J. Malmstein sense or a Jimi Hendrix sense, where he's just playing all these crazy things or doing all these flashy stuff on stage of playing guitar strings with his teeth, for example, or playing behind his back, or just playing these ridiculously fast scales and arpeggios, etc. No, he's influential in terms of the different creative sounds he can get out of a guitar, playing with the different Effects and guitar pedals to create unique sounds and doing unique things with the plectrum on the strings and the different dials on the guitar itself to create something that hasn't been heard before. Tom Morello is known for that. So have a quick listen to Tom Morello's guitar solo in Killing in the Name of a Rage Against the Machine, and then I'll come back and play you the breakdown of Burning Down the Disco and see if you can find or hear the similarities. Let's now listen to the breakdown and Zach Myers' guitar solo in Burning Down the Disco. Listen to how the songs are very different, but listen to how the guitar effects are similar, in my opinion, to what Tom Morello did. And I'm sure Tom Morello was a huge inspiration for Zach Myers here. Let's listen to Burning Down the discount. Love that song. I am a sucker for four on the floor. I'm not going to lie. I say it's synonymous with dance and disco, and it is, but you'll also hear it in rock and metal as well, I think. Ramstein is an industrial metal band. It does it a lot. Their most famous track, Do Hast, is definitely an example of that. I mean, for example, let's play a bit of Dohast for you now. But it happens in other Rammstein songs. It happens in, for example, Powerman 5000 is another one that does a lot of 4 on the floor. Rob Zombie, another one again, there's a lot of it in metal as well. So it's not just a disco and dance thing, but I am a sucker for it nonetheless. It's just very groovy, very catchy, and it's an earworm from my ears. Now we're gonna move on now to our second hidden gem from the album 8. This one was inspired by some letters or social media posts by Shinedown fans sent into the band that were stories from those fans in terms of how Shinedown has helped them overcome mental health struggles or just the struggles they're facing day to day. And the band really resonated with that because they're members of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, but also because multiple band members in Shinedown, for example, Brent Smith, being the most obvious example, have struggled with mental illness in their past. So they relate to these stories, they can understand them, and they're probably very proud that they can help these people by writing songs from a personal place, their heart, uh, that can truly resonate with the people that are also struggling the same way they struggled before in the past. And there's a quote here from Brent Smith that's uh touching upon the song we're gonna cover next, but a few other songs on the album as well, because there's two in total that kind of come from the same place, if that makes any sense. But quote from Brent Smith This is all coming from a very real place. Yes, we're writing songs, but we're writing them from within real-world scenarios, so you have a responsibility to lean into that. But truly, I just don't think we have a choice. I just think the bar was so high, and it's hard in life. You're going to have to do hard stuff, you're going to have to go through life, and it's not going to be a cakewalk. But there are a couple of things you can do when you come up against a brick wall. You can negotiate with it, but it rarely works. You can go over it, under it, or around it. But sometimes it deflects you. Sometimes you've just got to go through it. And when you go through it, you're going to get banged up. You're going to get cut up, beaten. You're going to have to have some battle scars. You've got to accept that. Quote from Brent Smith then. Let's go into what our second hidden gem track is. I haven't said the track name or title yet, so let's do it right now. Our second hidden gem from the album eight is track number seven. It's called Imposter.

SPEAKER_03 49:49

Think I need a doctor. Taking on a monster that left me for dead. If I could get my head fixed, fuck all of the bullshit. Maybe I can learn how to function again.

SPEAKER_01 50:19

The start of my second hidden gem there, the song called Imposter. Now, in terms of the meaning of the song, I think it's quite obvious what it's about. I told you where the origins of the song came from. But it's just basically about kind of imposter syndrome. You know, that feeling of looking at yourself in the mirror and feeling like either a fraud or just a fake or a stranger not being your true self, being an imposter, putting on that mask and being what others want you to be, not being your true self. It's a typical Shinedown subject matter. They love writing songs about it. Imposter is another one. Now I chose this as one of my hidden gems from 8 because it sounds like Shinedown. It sounds like a Shinedown song. It's in that hard rock realm, but with a dark overtone and a singing style that makes it feel like something new, something different from Shinedown's back catalogue. It's not as different as burning down the disco was. It's very much more of Shinedown's usual realm, but there's still something about it that kind of gives me a different tone. There's a little bit of a pop hook there in the way that theme of that vocal melody, which is accentuated and harmonized with the guitar melody as well. They're all added, all the instrumentation. But when Brent Smith's going, I feel like an impostor, think I need a doctor, taking on a monster that left me for dead. That is a common, common little simple, basic melody that is used as a theme throughout Imposter. That in itself having that little hook that's repeated as a theme, that's something typical with pop music, but it's brought you in more of a hard rock setting, but instead of a dark, depressing overtone. The song is about mental illness and feeling like you're not good enough or you're not being your true self. It is a dark subject matter in a way, and the music reflects that, which is something you would not get in pop. Now, if you take Brent Smith off this song, Imposter, and replaced it with someone, for example, like Gerard Wade from My Chemical Romance, had him sing this song with the same vocal melody that Brent Smith does. I think you basically get a My Chemical Romance song here. I can see My Chemical Romance or an adjacent emo band that sits alongside My Chemical Romance. I can see them doing a cover of the song or writing it for themselves, and it's sounding exactly like what they would do. I feel like Shinedown has taken some inspiration here from the emo world with bands like My Chemical Romance and brought it into the Shinedown sound. I feel like this is another fusion of musical styles. Bringing down a disco is more obvious, and it was disco, such a contrast from hard rock that it's obvious when it's done well. This one, emo and hard rock, they're closer aligned, they're more related than disco and hard rock, and therefore it's not as obvious. But I can still hear that influence and inspiration here in this song and those fusion of musical styles for me. The biggest difference is just how their vocals are delivered. Brent Smith sticks in that rock vocal realm. You bring in an emo vocalist like Gerard Way, as I mentioned, who would amp it up a little bit with more of the higher tone pitch singing, but singing in the same melody, I think it would sound like a My Chemical Romance song. Now, some of you listening will detest My Chemical Romance and Emo as a subgenre. I'm not personally a fan myself either, but I can respect the art, respect those bands and the success they've had, and I like it when bands like Shinedown try something new. They don't go to the same well every time. Every now and then they'll go a mile or two down the road to the next village as well and get water from there and try something new. Or they'll have a half a bucket from one well and half a bucket from another well and create this musical fusion, which I really like. It makes it sound different, makes it stand out, makes it sound new. Let's get back into it. Let's listen to some more imposter.

SPEAKER_06 54:47

When does this get bad? You think that I'm happy, but I'm just really acting, just like the great acting.

SPEAKER_01 55:52

You heard it in the chorus with the way Brent Smith singing it. He's just singing it with more oomph, with more instrumentation behind him, giving it more power. But it's the same vocal melody he was using in verse one. Nothing different there, except now you've got the extra layers on top from the rest of the band members. Barry Kirch on drums, Eric Bass on bass guitar, Zach Myers on lead guitar. You've got all of them coming in, plus some extra sound effects. I'm sure there's a keyboard there in the mix as well. They're all coming in and making it louder, thicker, and making it feel like a chorus rather than a verse. But the melody and the hook is still the same, and that's typical of pop music. Most pop music will have the same four chords or the same little one riff hook played over and over again. And the difference between the verse and the chorus with pop music is the chorus has more layers added to it. Take those layers away then for the verse too, and it just feels like you're dropping it back down before bringing the layers back for the chorus when it's repeated. They're doing the same thing here, but in a hard rock setting. And that hook is further emphasized in post-chorus when Brent Smith stopped singing other than just saying the two words function again. And Zach Myers is now playing it on guitar as well as in the chorus. You had this keyboard effect kind of doing it alongside Brent Smith. This hook is throughout the song, and it's catchy in my opinion. Is it the most complicated original hook in the world? No, it's not. But it still really works well with that ambience and atmosphere, the darker tones that are coming into the song overall. Which me personally and my tastes, I kind of gravitate towards those darker tones. The ultra happy songs. I can like a few of them, but it's not my go-to. Those darker, more emotional, meaningful songs is what my natural taste gravitate towards, and which is why imposter is my second hidden gem from the album 8. Now, this song, it kind of has the same act repeated. So you get this softer start with the verse, and then we slowly, slowly build and build and build until the chorus when everything's coming in. And you even have this section, which is very my chemical romance for me, that inspiration coming back, where it's more going la la la la la la la la, bringing everyone together for this little chant section, which I've heard before from My Chemical Romance, and before there, loads of bands have done it. It's not tied to a specific band. But when I'm comparing this song to that band, My Chemical Romance, there's just another nod there which I wanted to call out, which we're gonna listen to in the next little clip. But as I was saying, you get these two acts. So act one is a slow start. We're gonna build and build and build, get to the chorus. Act two, it's basically the same thing, it's just that's how the song is structured. Most Shinedown songs, like most songs in the world, is that follows that usual verse chorus, verse chorus, breakdown interlude section, guitar solo maybe, into the final chorus. In this one, you've got the act, which then repeats, and then you get a little outro. It's a little different to what Shinedown normally do. So we're going to listen to the final part of what I'm gonna call act two, even though it's really a repeat of act one. We're gonna listen to the final part of act two, basically the final chorus, leading into that quieter outro, and then we'll finish the song. Our second hidden gem from eight imposter. The song called Imposter. Now, the outro, as I called out earlier, is a little different to what Shinedown normally do. It's almost as if the main parts of the song is almost that panic, frustration, anger that I am the imposter, the fraud, the fake, whatever it is. And then the end of the song is that calm realization that it's okay to be an imposter. We're all imposters. Just be your true self. It's that realization that not all is as bad as it feels. At least that's my takeaway from it, anyway. Before we get into the third hidden gem track from this album eight, I just want to cover off a track that wasn't a promotional single. It's actually the second highest stream track on this album as of recording. That's like the best of the rest. So the highest stream tracks, as I've mentioned, they're the singles because they came out months and months, and in some cases, even a year and a half before the album's release with all the other songs dropping. So they've had more time to build those streams. So as a result, the highest stream track in this album, as I've already mentioned, is 365, followed by Dance Kid Dance, followed by the other two singles, uh Killing Fields and Searchlight. So the singles are the highest stream tracks, but out of the rest, the non-promotional singles, the ones that were only released when the album officially dropped on the streaming services, etc. Out of those songs, this song is the second highest streamed out of that pack. And I hate this song. I'm not one for negativity usually on this podcast, but I have to call this one out, especially since it appears the other Shinedown fans don't back me up on very much disliking the song. I find the concept of the lyrics extremely cheesy. The delivery of those lyrics are also very cheesy. The song as a whole is very pop, and it's got some of that kind of hip-hop inspiration behind it as well, in the terms of how some of the lines in the chorus are delivered. I'll play you a quick clip. I'm curious if you are in the realm of my tastes and finding this overly cheesy pop and very much disliking this song. In my opinion, it's literally one of the worst shining down songs, in my opinion, in the catalogue. But the streaming numbers say people disagree and think otherwise. More power to you if you do. But I'm curious which side of the line you guys fall on. So I'm gonna play a quick clip from this song that I detest. It's definitely not a hidden gem. And this one's track number six, it's called Dizzy. I feel a little dizzy. That's the part of the song I truly detest. Absolutely loathe. I find that very, very cringe and cheesy, but obviously I'm seem to be in a minority based on the streaming numbers, the metrics, so more power to you if you like it. But that's where the hip-hop influence came for me. I can imagine a rap song having that in the chorus, for example, that every time you're with me. Yeah, it's not for me. And since this Shinedown series on the podcast kind of yes, we're here for the hidden gem tracks on each album, and that's what we do, that's our concept. But I like to think with these long deep dive series on each band, that if someone didn't know anything about Shinedown and they wanted to learn everything about Shinedown, they could come in in episode one, listen all the way through the series, and even know everything they need to know about Shinedown. The main songs, the story of the band, how they formed, band members leaving, any controversy, and of course those hidden gem tracks, the ones that you probably wouldn't find if you're just following the mainstream coverage of the band trying to learn from that way. So if I'm going to tell that entire history of the band, I gotta call out what I think is their worst song. Hence giving a little bit of coverage on Dizzy, especially when the metrics don't really back up my opinion, but I still feel strongly about that opinion. I hate that chorus. But more power to you if you do like it. Now let's leave Dizzy behind and move on to our third hidden gem from the album 8. This song touches upon the same emotions and themes that most Shinedown songs do about mental illness, mental health, bettering yourself, overcoming all of that kind of uh themes, subject matter. Except this one has a different origin story. This isn't about their uh personal journeys or journeys of fans that have written in to shine down the people they've helped. No, this one is about grandfathers. So Brent Smith, Eric, Bass, they were having a conversation and they were talking about both of their grandfather's experience fighting in the war during World War II. While having this conversation, they both learned that both of their grandfathers' experiences were very similar to each other, and therefore they chose to write a song about it. And that song is my third hidden gem from the album 8. It's called Machine Gun. It comes in, it's got that punk alternative rock kind of energy, especially with Barry Kirch and the drumbeat he's bringing to this song. And I think it needs that energy. You don't need another ballad about this kind of subject matter. Because although the whole theming and the subject matter of World War II is a very emotional thing, of course, if you're a soldier fighting in that war, there's a lot of emotions going everywhere, and certainly not happy emotions, but a ballad is often a slower tempo, uh calmer in tone almost. And there's nothing calm about war, especially one on a scale of World War II. There's nothing slow about that lifestyle of a soldier in World War II either. You're on the go, you're always moving from one place to another, even if you're not actually fighting, there's still lots to do in the war effort. So I I like the creative choice to come in with this more up-tempo kind of punk style rhythm beat going along. And also that punk thing comes back. Punk is all about not being told what to do, fighting back against authoritarianism, etc. etc. And that's what this kind of song is touching about. It's talking about their grandfather's experience as a soldier during World War II. But neither grandfather are voluntarily loving this experience. Um, I'll read some lyrics out for you in a moment, but basically, the story of this song is them wanting to come home from war. They're not enjoying it. They feel they're too young to die, they don't even know what the war is really about. They say the lines, this ain't a revolution, for example. We're not fighting for a specific cause. It's almost as if they're only really a soldier in the army fighting this war because they were told they have to be. So they're just doing what they are told. Rather than it being a cause that is passionate for them that they choose to do, to join, to fight for. I'm gonna read some of the lyrics out for you now to kind of better demonstrate this. The opening verse is the lyrics I'm focused, I'm not fragile, yeah. The bombs are on their way. I'm too young to be finished, doesn't matter what they say, because every man's ambition is another man's decay. I promise you. And then the pre-chorus that obviously repeats is Is this a holy war? Is this an institution? Is this the only thing we know? It might be a renaissance, it could be a revolution. Is this the only thing we know? And what I quite find interesting is that when that pre-chorus is repeated for the second time, those lyrics they seem the same, but they ever so slightly twist. So the first three lines are the same, but the last three lines change. Whereas before it was might be a renaissance, could be a revolution. Now it's might be a renaissance, but this ain't a revolution. This is the only thing we know. It's like almost now they're not questioning anymore. They've joined the army, they've seen it with their own eyes, what is happening in this war, and now they don't think it's a revolution, they think it's a travesty, and then you got the chorus then, uh, which is basically saying, I can't stop this, but I should. If I could miss you more, I would. But instead of you, I'm holding a machine gun. Instead of you, I'm holding a machine gun. So basically, yeah, they want to come home back to their families, back to their loved ones, friends, family, and they don't want to be in this war, but they're almost being made to. And that's where I think the punk energy comes in. They don't want to be here, they don't want to conform to what they're being told to do by the government, by the state, by the country. They want to come home. They just don't have a choice, but they want to fight and rebel against it nonetheless. Now, let's get back into it. Listen to some more machine gun. We haven't even played you that pre-chorus and chorus yet, so let's do just that machine gun. I like the way it sounds to my ears, I like the vibe, I like the energy. It's all bringing into me, and I just I just like that song and the chorus. The pre-chorus and chorus, they feel like they link so closely together that you kind of need to listen to them together, which is why I didn't dissect them individually. I feel like one easily builds and builds and leads into the other with all of the group vocals coming together as well, showing that inclusion and that harmony that we're all feeling this together, which is what Zach and Brent found when they talked about their grandfather's experience. They found out that both of their grandfathers had the same feelings, same experiences, and therefore other grandfathers probably did too. And this is them coming together in this chorus, for me at least, anyway. I'm gonna play a bit of verse two now, only a snippet, because I want you to pay attention to Eric bass and a bass guitar of his. In verse 1, bass guitar is there, but it's lower in the mix, it's doing its own thing. In verse 2, it's higher in the mix, it's more prominent, you can hear it easier and more clear, and it's clearly trying to do like a machine gun effect with the rhythm. Still playing the root notes, playing the note that the bass is meant to be playing at this point, but it sounds like a machine gun was trying to, and because of how much lower in tone a bass guitar is compared to a normal electric or acoustic guitar, the sound sounds a bit more warped when it's played on those lower notes. A repeated machine gun rhythm on the same lone note like Eric Bass is doing. And that for me, knowing a song is about the experiences in World War II. If you're in the trenches in World War II and there's gunfire and explosions left and right, your hearing goes a little bit. You're gonna start hearing things a bit more warped, and that's kind of the feeling and the imagery I get just from that bass guitar coming in. It's very subtle, but it's definitely by design more clear in the mix in verse two. It's obviously a creative choice Shinedown have gone for deliberately, not just because it sounds cool. So let's listen to a little snippet of that in verse 2, and then we'll come back. I hope you, the listener, were able to make it out in that clip because I really do feel it's a subtle creative choice Shinedown went for, especially when the song's called Machine Gun about War and World War II. It feels like a no-brainer from them, and they do like to do these subtle little things. Either that or I look too artistically into some of this creative choices. Maybe they just thought it sounded cool, but I really do think that was deliberate by Eric Bass and Shinedown. Now we're gonna play the last minute of the song just to round out the third hidden gem machine gun. This will be the breakdown going into the final chorus and outro. So let's listen to the end of our third hidden gem from the album 8 Machine Gun.

SPEAKER_08 1:15:36

If I could miss you hold on, but instead of you I'm holding a machine gun. Instead of you I'm holding a machine gun. Instead of you I'm holding a machine gun. Instead of you I'm holding a machine gun.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:05

Probably not the outro and the final chorus you're expecting, right? The breakdown is very short and subtle. You could probably say it's not really a breakdown, it's just some group vocals kind of leading into the next action. More of a bridge, maybe. But then the final chorus, it's nowhere near the same as the previous time you hear the chorus, or the second time you hear the chorus, which I didn't play for you. It's more toned back, it's more subtle. You just got this acoustic guitar and this keyboard effect, and Brent Smith singing. And he's singing very toned back, very sombra. It's the realization that he's still in this war, or the character in this song is still in this war, still fighting, wants to be home, but is still here holding a machine gun. And you've got those war explosions going on in the background as well to kind of set the scene for the listener, and then it kind of fades out because the war is still ongoing and they haven't returned home yet. I like the artistic approach in that song. The main thing that drew to me though wasn't necessarily the artistic approach, that's what kind of gave it an extra gear for me. What really drew me to that song was the energy. I like the chorus progression, especially in the verse when it's kind of just going just going upwards, ascending. And then I do like that pre-chorus as well. I like the chorus, but the pre-chorus really I found more catchy, and the chorus just kind of like gives you good feel vibes for me with the group, everyone coming in, singing together, the inclusion, the harmony. Yeah, I like I like the song, I like Machine Gun. Now we're gonna go on to our fourth hidden gem from the album eight. And remember, we still haven't touched that single that was released closer to the actual album launch than the other singles, therefore has the lowest streams and still just about gets into the hidden gem territory. I'm gonna close out with that one, and there's a reason for it. So that's to come. That's my fifth and final hidden gem. The fourth hidden gem off the album eight is track number nine, and this one's called Outlaw.

SPEAKER_07 1:18:51

If there's no more to be, we will then be the first value.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:58

The start of Outlaw There. Now, you might be thinking on that short clip with the first verse there, why is this a hidden gem track? Doesn't seem all that original to me, just sounds quite generic. And I wouldn't disagree with you based on that short clip. It's a very calming intro that goes on for about 15 seconds before the drum kicks everything in, and Brent Smith comes in immediately with the drums and with the verse. There's no big build up there. We're getting to the chorus though. This song is one of those Shinedown songs. For me, it's all in the chorus. I find the chorus powerful, catchy, and we're going to listen to it in just a moment. Before we do, though, uh Brent Smith has described this song outlaws, a stylistic shift for the band Shinedown. Specifically, he was saying that he was trying to make a modern noir western built to evoke a vivid, like no country for old men movie vibe in your subconscious as you listen to it. So No Country for Old Men. If you didn't know, is a movie by the Cohen brothers. Uh, it was nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars. I think in Lost Out to There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day Lewis. This one, No Country for Old Men, starred Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Tommy Lee Jones, Woody Harrelson. And basically, it's like a I wouldn't call it a modern day Western because it's certainly not set in today's time, but it's a Western set in I would say maybe the 1970s, 1980s, somewhere around there in America. So it's not quite your old wild West Western. It's a bit more modern than that, but it's a great, great, great movie. Man finds uh a briefcase full of, I believe it was diamonds, but if not diamonds, then something certainly valuable in what look to be uh a drug heist gone wrong, uh, or drug deal gone wrong, I should say. Uh Javier Bardem's character, then he's like a psycho, quiet, silent hitman who's going after Josh Brolin's character who's kind of stolen the goods, if you will. And it's a great, great cat and mouse chase of movie. Do recommend checking out. Based on the book, if you're into your reading, maybe you'd prefer the books if you haven't read it. But that's no country for old men, and that's the kind of movie vibe that Brent Smith was trying to give off on this song, Outlaw. The actual song's meaning, um Brent Smith hasn't come out and said in an interview, neither have any other Shinedown band members, so it's out for interpretation this one with Outlaw. But the idea with the lyrics and doing some digging investigation, social media forum posts, it seems to be about basically rebellion and pure freedom and kind of you seeing yourself as the outlaw and breaking through those social norms again. That's what Shinedown loved to write songs about just with different iconography and imagery to convey the same message effectively, to get that message across to multiple different people and viewpoints. Now, let's get back into Outlaw and listen to that chorus I bigged up. It's the reason why I like the song. So, Outlaw. That is the pre-chorus, chorus, and post-chorus for the song Outlaw There. I picked it up. I hope you liked it like I did, the reason why it became my little hidden gem. You've got this epicness to it, and it helps with our rhythm that bum bum ba-da bum bum bum ba da we got all this texture and thickness from all the other instrumentation going on, providing the chord progression, little textures here and there, little bits of melody here and there as well. It makes it feel epic, and Brent Smith, I think his vocal melody line is uh spot on and great as well as his delivery. I really, really like it. And in the post-chorus, then you've got this like orchestral string synthesizer effect going on. I think it's probably being played on some kind of guitar, but with all of those synthesizers kind of being merged into a compressed mix, you get this nice little melody from it. The Brent Smith on the vocals then feeds from. He then uses that with the Where is the Outlaw on you? And it works nicely together. It's not quite question and answer like it has been in other Shinedown songs, but you do feel like Brent Smith is feeding off that melody to kind of accentuate this little line of the song that you're trying to get across as this lyric, Where is the Outlaw in You? Now I got a quote from bassist Eric Bass on the song. Remember, he produces and mixes the Shinedown songs albums ever since Attention Attention. So this one, album eight, is obviously included in that being the latest album. And he's got um a quote regarding this song Outlaw, especially that chorus and how it came about. Now I could do my silly little accented voice for Eric Bass and do it that way for you, but I've got an actual YouTube clip here I can play and you can hear it with Eric Bass's own voice. This is a clip from YouTube of Eric Bass in an interview, I believe, with Spear Talk about the mixing and production of that chorus in Outlaw.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:53

Talk about fumbling around until you fucking find it. Like that song started out, so that song was originally written by Dave Bassett and Brent. I came in and heard it, and I thought the chord progressions were wrong around the melody. So I literally literally left the melody and the vocals exactly how they were on the demo. Didn't change anything, and I rewrote the music around it to be more dynamic and more what I thought was more epic. Um the the post-chorse, the that whole melody with all the big epic strings and guitars and stuff doing that. Dude, I fucked around with that for weeks, you know, until I landed on and I finally just decided that was the one. There were a couple of different things, a couple of different versions of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:40

Bassist Eric based on the chorus and post-chorus for Outlaw. Interesting that he used the term making it more dynamic and epic. Because I think he achieved that the terms I use as well, the word epic. I think that's what I get from this chorus. It is definitely more dynamic in that sense. If it didn't have that dynamism, that epicness to that chorus, I don't think it certainly wouldn't be a hidden gem for me, but I don't think it even then makes the final cut of the album. Remember, Shinedown like to write more songs than they actually need for the album. They just pick their favorites and the rest just get dropped and no one ever hears them unless there's some bonus edition down the road where they include it then. I don't think Outlaw makes the album eight unless you have that dynamic epicness, as Eric Bass described it in the chorus. That really is a stand-up part of this song. Now, remember what before I played the song, I mentioned how Brent Smith wanted this song Outlaw to subconsciously bring you towards that movie No Country for Old Men and that kind of theming and vibe. From what I've played to you so far, I'd be surprised if you got that subconscious of that movie. Even the Western theme in general. I'll be surprised you've got if you got that, other than the fact they use the word outlaw. You get a little bit more in verse 2. So let's play verse 2 for you now, so you can get those more western y feels. Outlaw.

SPEAKER_05 1:27:13

Open the plants, let me show you what you need to see. Everything's shiny, but nothing is happening to believe.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:37

So notice in verse 2 we get a sliding steel guitar coming in the background, adding these accentuated little sliding notes. That gives you the western feel. That gives you that little bit of no country for old men vibes, as well as just the fact the song is called Outlaw, and that's uses the iconography, the imagery for Brent Smith to convey the message. He's trying to convey on this song. I'll be honest, that's about it for me. I don't think this song goes far enough into that no country for old men, wild west, western theming vibe for me to really make the comments in the media to say that this is what the song's designed to do. Obviously, you can say what you intended, but when it doesn't really go far enough in that realm, like burning down a disco is all about the disco beat, that's there's obvious. You can make that claim. This one doesn't really feel that Western to me, other than really that sliding steel guitar in verse 2. So it's very subtle, it's not obvious, and in my opinion, they could have gone further with it, but they've still got that chorus, it's still a great song. We're gonna play the breakdown for you next and the final chorus all the way to the end of the song. And listen out here for Brent Smith as well, with his vocal delivery. He's always been great, let's be honest. But I like the passion he kind of puts in towards the end. He's not belting out notes like I've talked about in previous episodes, where he does it in songs like 45 and simple man, where he's really showing off that range. He doesn't do that. I've talked about before how in more recent albums he tends to come away from that and serve the song more. Whether you think that's the right or wrong decision, I'll leave up to you. I do like it when he belts out in those older albums. But he does put a bit more passion here towards the end. So have a listen out for that, and let's listen to the end of the song. The end of our fourth hidden gem track, Outlaw. Now, we got one more hidden gem track to get to, and I told you that this one was technically a promotional single, but because it hasn't been out for all those months, like most of them, for this from this album, it made it, based on the Spotify stream numbers, into our hidden gem territory. And along with burning down the disco, if I'm honest, it was one of the first ones I chose. But there is a deliberate reason why I've kept this one back until the end, and that's because it reminds me of older Shinedown. And this is our last hidden gem of the entire Shinedown series. This is what we're closing with, and I think it's poetic for this to kind of keep bringing the full circle round. It's on the final album, it's a hidden gem track, but it reminds me of those earlier Shinedown albums where we started this whole podcast series journey from it brings it full circle for me. This song came out as a single on the 17th of February, 2026. So about three to four months before the album's official release. And this one is my final hidden gem of the album, our final hidden gem of our Shinedown series. This one is track number 10 on the album. It's called Safe and Sound. The start of Safe and Sound there, my final hidden gem on this entire Shinedown series. As soon as it opens up, it sounds like a slightly more modern take on a song you would find on the first album, Leave a Whisper. It sounds like something that would have made the Sound of Madness album. It would have fitted right in there if it was sandwiched between two other songs on that album. I think this is typical classic Shinedown. Going back to the earlier days of Shinedown, and part of that is that hard rock riff you got coming in there. In the verse, when Brent Smith comes in with the vocals, you've got this great little part by Zach Myers on Guitar Ways playing. It's a cool little rip with harmonics thrown in as well. Harmonics being the hierarchical pitched notes that they're playing, and that harmonic sound with a hard rock riff in the background, rhythm, all of it. It's so synonymous with that early to mid-2000s vibe. That kind of new metal post-grunge vibe. That Shinedown, in my opinion, started this whole story from the evolved into their own unique thing, becoming this monster hard rock band with all these different musical influences coming in and styles, these fusions. But they started off in that post-grunge new metal wave. And I feel this riff, this song is bringing some of those old roots back. Should we get back into it? Should we listen to some more safe and sound? I think there's a chorus to be listened to. Let's do it safe and sound.

SPEAKER_04 1:33:56

I created the illusion.

SPEAKER_05 1:34:01

Look at that! You can't do it!

SPEAKER_04 1:34:09

You can't help yourself. Keep running your mouth!

SPEAKER_01 1:34:12

Now I quickly cut it off before the chorus. Sorry, apologies, but I just didn't want to play too long a clip because I want to play a little bit after the chorus without interruption. So I thought that was a good time to cut it there so I can tell you about the meaning of the song, safe and sound. And it's not one of those ones that has a true deep emotional meaning, really. This is kind of one of those songs that's about basically sticking it to your critics or your competition. Basically, they're running their mouth, they're telling you you're this, you're that, you're worthless, not as good as you think you are. And you're saying, well, find out we're gonna prove you wrong. You're not safe and sound either, because we're gonna come twice as hard and put you in the dirt just by being great ourselves. If that makes sense to you. That's the meaning I get from it, at least anyway. And before I play that chorus, can you hear the comparisons in the sound with that older Shinedown sound they used to have in those early three to four albums? I certainly can. It brings that nostalgia back a little for me. The Shinedown on a latest album has kind of gone at least for one song, anyway. I like their new stuff as well, but I do miss that older stuff. The original leave a whisper, us and them, the sound of madness, sound of Shinedown. It's great to just hear them kind of go back to the well one more time. Let's us go back to the well one more time. Here's the chorus, the safe and sound. It's a great hard rock chorus, right? Love the energy. I love that higher pitch guitar sound playing the tremolos in the background. Love that. And the whole chorus just sounds really epic and grandiose. It sounds dramatic and I love it. And there is some swearing in the chorus. Not the first time Shinedown have ever sworn. I called that out on a previous episode when I happened. I believe it was on the Amaryllis episode, but it's certainly not something Brent Smith and Shinedown do often. It's something they save and reserve for those key lines in those key songs that require it. And obviously, this is sticking it back at the critics at the competition. So you kind of want to have that bit of aggression behind it. And hence the chorus has the F word in it, and Brent Smith isn't shy about saying it. Great, great chorus for me. It's very catchy. It'll get stuck in your head. Um, there's a few songs in this album where the chorus can get stuck in your head, depends which one you listen to last before you move on and do other things. If it's this podcast, this is gonna be the one because I'm not playing any other song after this one. So likely safe and sound will be stuck in your head. But it's a great, great chorus. Let's get into the verse two for a moment. Because verse two starts the same as verse one. You get a little sneak peek of it there in the last clip at the end, but then goes off into something slightly different, not dramatically, but enough that it warrants calling it out. So we'll play that before we come back. This is safe and sound.

SPEAKER_05 1:37:53

Guilty of a vengeance, just be the leader, broad.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:09

So as I said, verse two starts the same as verse one, but halfway through you get this just be cass with Brent Smith and the vocals. That kind of leads you into the second half of verse two, where now you get this extra of the bum bum bala bum. And on top of that, Barry Kirch on the drums. It seems like he adds an extra snare hit to the rhythm, but he also hits it twice as hard as every other beat within that verse. So you kind of get this boom, boom, boom feeling on the rhythm that's building you up again and again and again, this time to the second chorus. Now, we are gonna skip now to the breakdown of safe and sound, and like we have done with the other hidden gems on this episode specifically, we are going to play until the end of the song so you hear the final chorus one last time. So let's get into it and finish off our final hidden gem of the album eight and our final hidden gem of the Shinedown series, safe and sound. Before we wrap up that particular hidden gem, though, want to call back to that breakdown because I love the higher-pitched guitar noise you get there in that breakdown. I'll bring it back and play as a short clip in the moment. And at the end of that breakdown section, I love the way it bridges back into that final chorus. That guitar sound I talked about and joined just two seconds ago, that holds a really long held note that adds tension to the piece. Brent Smith comes in with his vocal line, and then bam, we're into the chorus. Let's play that little tiny like 10-second section one more time for you. Let's go! Such a great song, one of my favorites on this album, eight. And to be honest with you, one day I think all the Shinedown fans will consider that one of their favorites on the album, or one of their favorites of Shinedown's back catalog in its entirety. I think if there's any of the hidden gem tracks I've shown you today out of the five, Burning Down the Disco, Imposter, Machine Gun, Outlaw, I think Safe and Sound is the one that over time will spike up and no longer technically be a hidden gem. My predictions, burning down the disco, I think, is the other one in the running, just because it's so different. But in terms of that core shinedown sound, safe and sound is it for me. I think those group of people who were shined down fans early on, but maybe fell out of love with the band when the sound evolved into what it is today, when it got a more influence from like the pop world. I think those people who fell away after Sound of Madness and Amarillas, if they heard safe and sound, I think they wouldn't be pulled back in necessarily, but I think safe and sound would certainly be pulled in to their personal playlists. I think it's a great, great song and a great, great way to finish off this podcast series on Shinedown. It's been a blast. We've gone through all eight studio releases. My thoughts on Shinedown as a band is they came out of the blocks with an excellent, amazing vocalist in Brent Smith. The earlier sound with the original lineup of the band, so those albums leave a whisper and us and them. I like it. It's my jam, it's my era, that 2000s, mid-2000s sound. But it does sound a bit dated if you were not part of that era, if it's new to your ears, if you're a younger listener. I can see why you may not be a particular fan of that. You may think it's like your dad's music rather than something you would want to listen to. I get it. But the third album, The Sound of Madness, is an absolute classic. I think that one's timeless. I don't think that's dated at all. I think so many classic Shinedown songs on that record alone. I don't think there is a bad song on the album, In Perfect Truth. Even the ones that are more in a pop realm, like Second Chance Singler did the most success for them as a band. Even that one I like, and they still play that live to this day. And Brent Smith still nails every note to this day. Great, great album. Amaryllis is also a good album. It's just stuck in the shadow of its predecessor. So you get standout songs on the album talked about rather than the album as a whole, in my opinion. We've talked about Threat of Survival on the episode. Go listen to that one to get my thoughts there. In my opinion, it's the weakest one. But since then, since Attention to Attention, you got Planet Zero, you got this album eight, they've just come full circle and they're coming back into the highest quality stuff they're releasing. It's not the same as what was on Sound of Madness and Amaryllis or before that. It's a new sound for Shinedown. More influences, more mature, more what they're going for in this era of their life and their life experiences and their connections with the band as well, the chemistry. Everything evolves and changes, and that's just what happened to Shinedown's songs. But I think the song writing and bringing some of the hard rock elements back in the more recent albums, I think has done them a world of good from what was on Threat to Survival. And I said it's not what was on Sound of Madness, it's not exactly the same style other than the odd song. They come into their own Shinedown DNA, their own sound, but the quality is still up there for me. They're a great hard rock band, and they're a band more than ever today. When they started out, it was the Brent Smith Project in different name, effectively. As things have evolved, you've got bass historic bass doing all the production, the mixing on the album. You got Zack Myers contributing songwriting credits as well. And Barry Kurt has been there from the start. He's a staple of the band, now a founding member. So they are now a more cohesive band than ever before. I don't see them ever breaking up, I can see them releasing music and touring until they get too old to do it effectively. But I will say, if Brent Smith ever was to leave, there is no shine down. Nothing revolves around him. He's the main songwriter. Yes, he works with professional songwriters, like on this album, eight, he works with Dave Bassett, like he has on previous albums when I called it out originally in those episodes. But the lyrical subject matter being talked about is one very close to Brent Smith. It's definitely one he influenced earlier on, and it's become that stereotype for Shinedown, the band. On top of that, if you took Brent Smith's voice away from Shinedown and tried to put any other voice in its place, it's no longer Shinedown. He is that core piece, a strand of DNA that is needed for this to still be a Shinedown record. Otherwise, it's a different breed of band, it's a different type of animal. What it isn't is a Shinedown. And that's been the case from the very beginning since the first album. Remember, Atlantic Records, the company that have signed Shinedown since the very beginning, did so only because they like Brent Smith's voice. He had to tell his friends in Dreve that he's no longer part of that band, Dreve, and he has to go to Florida, Jacksonville specifically to start a brand new band, or he loses that record deal with Atlantic Records, which is only on the table for him personally and his new project, which ended up being Shinedown. Great band. I don't think around the world globally they get the respect that their commercial metrics say they should. They've sold an awful lot of records. They are the record holder for the most number ones on our US mainstream rock chart of all time in terms of singles. So clearly, commercially, they're an extremely successful band, but you still don't see them headlining rock festivals. You see them, they played things like Download Festival over here in the UK, but they're never even near the top of the car. They're usually third, fourth, or fifth away from that headline spot on the main stage. So there's still room to grow there. And I'm surprised to be honest, because they clearly got a lot of fans, especially in the United States, with all this commercial success. But those fans are around the world in other countries too. It just doesn't feel like they get the respect from those festival organizers to be seen as that headline band that will draw the crowds in. And until that happens, I think Shinedown will always be seen kind of like a second-tier band in the rock realm behind those bands that do headline those festivals, like a Lincoln Park, like a Green Day, for example, a Fallout Boy, etc. etc. That brings us to an end on our Shinedown series on Rock and Metal's Hidden Gems podcast. Hope you've enjoyed it. We'll be back very shortly and soon with our other format where we target the Hidden Gem Band. And we will be going more metal for that one. I won't tell you the band's name at this point. You'll get a surprise when the episode drops, but it will be more on the metal realm than this particular podcast series was. And it's gonna be, spoiler, a European band. So we'll see if you get any clues from that. Germany! Deutschland! More clues there again. After our hidden gem band format, we will be back in this format following that mega successful band, covering their story, all of their studio releases in chronological order, and picking out those most importantly, hidden gem tracks and dissecting them. No spoilers yet though on who that band is going to be. Again, you're gonna have to wait until the first episode of the series drops. I hope when it drops, you tune in and you enjoy, like hopefully you have on the Shinedown series. Now, if you enjoyed this format, we do have the two completed series in the back catalogue. The first on Iron Maiden and the second on Nightwish. So do go check those out if you're interested. The Nightwish one, especially, I would recommend checking out. Great story behind the band in Nightwish, how it was formed, the different band members leaving, joining. Great story there, even if you don't like Nightwish as a band, but I also think most people in the world will enjoy at least a song from Nightwish there. An extremely talented band with amazing songs that I think are more undiscovered than underappreciated. I think people just ha either haven't heard Nightwish or they've heard the wrong song. So I do recommend go checking that out if you're a Nightwish fan. Even better, right? This has been Rock and Metal's Hidden Gems Podcast with your host, Daniel Stuckey. Thank you so much for listening. It truly is an honor, and I hope to join you on the next one. And thank you for joining us for this whole Shinedown series. See you on the next one. Goodbye.