Next to Never
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Next to Never

Band Alternative Rock

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This band has not uploaded any videos

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The best kept secret in music

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Discography

Long, Lost Wednesday Ep- 2002
Next to Never LP-2004

currently "globe," the first single of "next to never" is in rotation at maryville college's radio station and at 90.3 new rock 90 in knoxville.

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Bio

For the past five years, a bullheaded juggernaut has been brooding in a stale closet out in the no-mans-land known as Maryville, Tennessee. Calling itself “Next to Never,” it has been waiting for the perfect moment to unleash blitzkrieg on a seemingly stalled music scene. This dream takes shape with a series of musically driven bends and slides pumped out by guitar players Jeff Maynard and Nathan Tipton colliding with Ty Newton’s complex bass riffs that seem to dance with the metric style drumming of Ross McCallum. An eclectic instrumentation also gives the music a unique and new feel unlike the recent recoil trend of simpler writing styles that seems to want to send music back to its dark ages. “I want to make music that I would want to listen to,” say Maynard.

The lyrical writing boasts a few lessons from songwriting greats, Simon and Garfunkel. “A lot of metaphor. Smoke and mirrors, if you will,” responds Maynard, followed by a deep chuckle when asked about how he writes a song. The intention is to describe a scene that may cause a relatable emotional response. The songs are rarely about girls and are never taken from a broken heart or some other general angst, which seems to be the trend in rock music of late. While personally affected by them, Maynard is not supposing a solitary link to their author; these songs are for everyone.

In trying to define a new genre, the band has taken traditional hard rock mediums and added their own unique twists. Rather than yell about personal problems with society, they try to narrate a localized view of a particular situation and the feelings equated to it. The song “Globe” describes the idea of seeing something beautifully catastrophic from a distance with images of a snow-globe. “I would call us narrative rock because the music seems to me like a sound track. Even without the lyrics, you can still hear the story we’re telling,” says Tipton. The music is written to act as a resonance of the mood involved with the story being told.

To the trained ear, it isn’t difficult to hear the influence of the band Hum in Tipton’s guitar style, as well as McCallum’s drumming, who also credits the Foo Fighters, Rage against the Machine and Tool. Bass players these days would do well to take note of Newton’s strumming style that could almost be heard as a lead in many songs, an influence taken partly from former Tool/Husk bassist Paul D’Amour and partly from Klaus Flouride of the Dead Kennedys. With influences like these, one would think the music produced would come out sounding like nu-metal. However, with the exception of a few fast paced and heavy drudges, the music takes more of a warmly melodic, distorted tone than a cacophony of angry noise, most likely due to Maynard’s love of bands Superchunk and the Pixies. Songs like “Basement” and “I’ll get one” bring to mind those comfortable moments just before sleep overtakes you. Following the pace of life though, they do, occasionally, get out of control like on the song “It never ends…”. Other songs, like “Message from Iowa” and “Vicariously” pull the listener from one emotion to another, at one point invoking solace and another pulling them into a fury of sound. Though strongly rooted in reality, the point is to send you, the listener, into some kind of dreamland where it is easier to stomach everything that is happening around you as you listen.

The name Next to Never, like so many band names, came from a night of drunkenly stammering phrases from a book of clichés, and “it just seemed to fit.” Since then they have become one of the first bands on the growing musical collective, El Deth Productions. With their list of bands ever expanding, El Deth Inc. hopes to bring a new face and feel to the Knoxville music scene.

Marks are hard to make these days, but Next to Never are certainly trying. With a three song EP in minor circulation, the band is eager to release their first full-length album around Christmas time. For those among us who are familiar with this Maryville icon, you can expect to hear some of your favorites like “Driver side” and “Long, lost Wednesday,” along with new songs like “I’ll get one” and “Vicariously” as well as some well-placed surprises. With a music scene lost in simplicity and mediocre rehashing, the ADD generation can rest assured that Next to Never will keep them on their toes.