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Rain City Drive aren’t here to hang about. In the mere five years since their inception, the quintet have established themselves as one of the most exciting break-out acts in the alternative rock scene. High-profile touring alongside the likes of Dance Gavin Dance,  Set It Off and Memphis May Fire have underlined their credentials as an incendiary must-see live force; forthcoming album Things Are Different Now, already the band’s third full-length, speaks to their inexhaustible creative energy.   

Fate may have brought Rain City Drive together, but their destiny is one that they and they alone will control.

The story of Rain City Drive’s formation, 4,000 miles from their Flordian home in Manchester, England – a city from which the band take its name – has entered scene folklore, and is definitive proof that necessity is indeed the mother of invention. It’s a journey writ large across their first two albums: 2020 debut LP To Better Days a toast farewell to the respective musical pasts that brought them together on the other side of the world, and its 2022 self-titled follow-up a titular underlining of the quintet’s ever-developing bond, onstage and off. Their connection with the wider world was undeniable, too, tracks such ‘Talk To A Friend’ and ‘Heavier’ contributing to the amassing of over 150 million streams and 1.5 million monthly Spotify listeners, bolstered by extensive playlisting support and the backing of key tastemakers including SiriusXM Octane. 
Things Are Different Now, by extension, finds Rain City Drive in a very different place, both literally and spiritually, their eyes set on an unwritten future of limitless possibilities.

It was in the studio that bassist Colin Vieira first credits Rain City Drive – their members’ preceding reputations shorning them of the formative years’ toil in garages and empty venues, and instead throwing them straight in at the deep end of immediate touring to an expectant fanbase – with becoming a band for the very first time. And it’s in the making of Things Are Different Now that vocalist Matt McAndrew credits his charges with discovering the truest version of themselves yet: a journey that has seen the expansion and deepening of Rain City Drive’s slick pop-rock template, imbued with ever-heavier influences. The album’s 11 hook-laden tracks explore every inch and corner of those ever-shifting boundaries.

At the core of that sound sits the open-heart vocals of McAndrew, which explore themes of heartache, morality, grief, growing up and getting older. "I've been writing songs since I was 15 years old, so I think in many ways it's always been how I've helped to understand myself and the world," he explains. "I've had people throughout my life say, 'Wow, kudos for being so vulnerable,' but I've never known anything else. 

"Songwriting for me is exploratory. It's kind of like I'm wandering around my subconscious, grabbing at thoughts, questions and emotions. I'm building a puzzle in real time, but there's no picture on the back of the box to guide me. It's often not until it's complete that I am able to stand back from it and really understand it.”

Inspiration strikes from anywhere, at any time. Things Are Different Now single ‘Neverbloom’, a nakedly poignant anthem, was sparked from its title, the phrase stirring up such strong emotions within McAndrew that it led him to write about the death of his father a decade ago for the very first time. Album opener ‘Lose My Composure’ similarly sees McAndrew write about the loss of a close friend, after a memory returned to him as he gazed out of the car window on the way to the studio. Elsewhere, ‘Elusive Dream’ began with McAndrew’s experiences of a “sort of sleep paralysis I suffer from; a hallucinatory state between being asleep and awake I often fall into”. A recent breakup, meanwhile, gave him “enough material for 10 songs alone”, the vocalist laughs. “Every day of life can be song worthy,” he nods.

Unlike his bandmates, McAndrew’s teeth were cut not on the biggest stages of the alternative rock scene, but in front of the TV cameras on The Voice, where McAndrew’s music theory education blossomed under the tutelage of Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine. His success on the show brought him an “illusion of fame”; millions of people would watch him on TV every week, with crowds turning up to greet him at airports. “I had all of the fame, but none of the success,” says the New Jersey native, who grew up more accustomed to a life lived on the beach, surfing and skateboarding, than in any kind of spotlight. “I was very proud of my accomplishments because of the show, releasing my own music and playing some wonderful shows in huge venues, but the trajectory of that experience by its very nature is downward. When that bubble burst, I was left to pick up the pieces. And I didn’t have a moment to waste.”

Inspired by a diverse range of songwriters – a lifelong love of Bob Dylan and Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brook, coupled with a fascination for the “world building” of Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and the “emotional inflection” of Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes – McAndrew uses Things Are Different Now to exhibit the full scope of his craft, spinning lyrics that boast cut-through relatability and vivid imagery, wrapped up in enthralling metaphor. Set to Rain City Drive’s shapeshifting blend of pop melodies and rock hooks, Things Are Different Now delivers fascinating depth to match its ear-worm immediacy.
“No idea is off the table when it comes to Rain City Drive,” says Vieira. “There is definitely a sense that the five of us challenge each other, with the different influences and ideas that we each bring, in such a way that pushes us all to try new things. Every day, that makes us a better band and reinforces what Rain City Drive is. It’s incredibly inspiring. I’m such a fan of every single person in this band, and Rain City Drive wouldn’t sound how we do or be who we are if it wasn’t for that creativity and freedom.”

“I think we learn more about what Rain City Drive truly is with every song and every album,” McAndrew adds. “We’re always stretching ourselves further, growing and revealing a new side to us.”

All of which means that Rain City Drive’s time is now. And for McAndrew and Vieira, that comes not a minute too soon. Things really are indeed different now – and, ever more sure of who they truly are, the idea of looking back and pausing for breath is anathema.
“The different journeys we’ve all been on in our careers have brought us to this moment, to Rain City Drive, to each other,” the vocalist says. “And we’re playing to win.”

Rain City Drive is Matt McAndrew (vocals), Colin Vieira (bass), Weston Richmond (guitar), and Felipe Sanchez (guitar).