Premiere: Midnight Endeavor – “Say You Love Me”

Charleston-based pop-rock act Midnight Endeavor is one of the most buzzed about new bands in town right now. This is partially due to the fact theat they’re basically a supergroup, with members of Stop Light Observations, Rare Creatures, and Whitehall, but also because their music is infectiously catchy and well-produced.

This morning we’ve got the newest single from Midnight Endeavor, “Say You Love Me”, premiering for your listening pleasure. This is the third single released by the band since abandoning their debut EP, Beds Are For Sleeping back in February of this year, the first two being “Beds” and “Friends”. 

The single release party for “Say You Love Me” by Midnight Endeavor will take place this Thursday, November 29th at The Royal American. Joining Midnight Endeavor at Royal will be two other noteworthy new local bands, Eighty Seven Nights and Cry Baby. Facebook event for that show is here.

Stream the single below, and keep reading for an exclusive Q&A with vocalist and guitarist Joshua Davenport.

Were the tracks on the original Beds Are For Sleeping EP your solo recordings?

You could say that, I wrote everything except for a few drum grooves by myself and recorded it a little over two years ago now. I didn’t have anyone who would take me serious or play with me at the time so I just started writing alone.

What made you decide to scrap them?

That EP was solely my mind and creative vision, not OUR creative vision. I don’t want to be a solo artist with hired guns playing MY music, I want to be in a band playing OUR music. So we decided to scrap it, and rewrite all of it with everyone’s style and character added in, otherwise it wouldn’t be as much fun for them or me.

How would you say you’ve grown creatively since midnight endeavor begun?

At first I wasn’t experienced at all when it came to working with other people, it’s actually quite difficult to be in a band and it’s something you have to learn and get good at. I had a hard time at first writing with the guys, but I’ve actually started to realize that they add so much more to the uniqueness of this band, I’ve learned to trust and listen to the guys, and I feel like we’re finally at the point where we can write smoothly and work together at full potential without any of us being shit heads.

Tell me more about the recording process for say you love me.

“Say You Love Me” was one of the first songs I had written on the EP, so the hard part of the process was done two years ago. Will, Brennan and Logan took that demo and made it better by rewriting and adding new parts to it. We made another demo with all of the new parts before we went in to track it, and as usual things changed even more in the studio. We still primarily write everything out on a laptop and then go from there, I don’t think we’ve ever gotten in a circle with our instruments and started writing, instead we all circle around a laptop.

When can we except some news on the album?

Sometime early next year you’ll be hearing about it hopefully if all goes to plan, we’re aiming to release a 14 track album in 2019. You’ll get some more new music before that happens though.

What is your favorite thing about pop music?

I love how pop music is really melodic, I like other types of music but I’m a fool for a really good Melody/ballad. Pop music dominates that area for me as well as being super fun to play.

Anything else you want to mention?

Shout out to our amazing manager Taylor Flynn for picking up our slack and getting us to do shit we’d otherwise just procrastinate at. And also a big thanks to Elliott Elsey our producer and engineer for all those late nights he didn’t have to be there.