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International pop-rock band As It Is â Patty Walters, Ronald Ish, and Alistair Testo â burst onto the scene with the Never Happy, Ever After in 2015 and followed with 2017’s okay. In 2018, they returned with conceptual and cinematic The Great Depression. The band boldly and ambitiously reimagined the entire album and released the songs as a series of four EPs in 2019. Having experimented with and perfected their blend of pop, punk, and rock over time, As It Is have truly found their groove with their fourth album, I WENT TO HELL AND BACK (Fearless Records). The new album came to life during a period in which each and every member questioned their life choices and wrestled with a world in a constant throng of chaotic uncertainty. The band also shifted to a three-piece lineup. Ultimately, these 14 tracks, including the anthemic singles “IDGAF, “ILY, HOW ARE YOU?,” “I LIE TO ME,” and “I MISS 2003,” are powerful, playful, and fearlessly chase the unexpected. Itâs the sound of a band still having fun â but they had to fight for it. It’s a sprawling collection of songs that explore the confusing, conflicting emotions of the past two years. Having garnered a cumulative stream tally nearing 130 million worldwide, and with global press praise from Rock Sound, Upset, Alternative Press, Idobi, Outburn, and beyond, As It Is are ready for their moment.
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âItâs so easy to make a safe record,â starts Patty Walters. The As It Is vocalist knows full well that itâs a bad business decision to gamble your career on an experimental record âbut artistic freedom is why this is exciting,â he argues. âWe didnât start a band to create a company and look at spreadsheets. We do this because being in a band is fun.â
âI Went To Hell And Backâ, the new album from the Brighton-based alt-rock group, might have come to life over a two year period where each and every member questioned their life choices and wrestled with a world in a constant throng of chaotic uncertainty, but the bandâs fourth album couldnât sound more excited. The fourteen tracks are powerful, playful and fearlessly chase the unexpected. Itâs the sound of a band still having fun â but they had to fight for it.
Walters formed As It Is in 2012 with âno expectations and very few ambitions. We were just hoping to have some fun and be part of the thriving punk scene here in Brighton.â Nine years later and the group are adored players in a global scene. âIâm so proud of the band weâve become.â
Their first two records (2015âs âHappy Never, Ever Afterâ and 2017âs âokay.â) saw the group compared to their idols in Paramore or Fall Out Boy with anthemic, heart-on-the-sleeve choruses that battled growing pains with unwavering optimism. 2018âs âThe Great Depressionâ was something off a left turn though. An aggressive, theatrical concept record told through the character of The Poet, it put the band in the same emo box as Twenty One Pilots or My Chemical Romance as they explored mental health with a little more depth than simply chanting âitâs ok not to be okâ. âPeople took us a little more seriously after that record,â explains Walters.
âWe wanted to treat our fans with the respect they deserve. Yes, a majority are young and impressionable, but they are intelligent. They know when theyâre being sold something that isnât genuine,â he continues. âWe just wanted to talk about mental health in a way that was true for us, and them.â
It was going to be followed up by an EP that the band started writing at the end of 2019, and were going to finish after tours of Europe, the UK and Australia. Lockdown had other ideas though. Instead of flying back out to Los Angeles, As It Is traded song ideas with producer Zach Jones over the Internet and soon found a virtual groove. Over the next year, that five song record expanded into an ambitious, rebellious full-length album. As the title suggests though, it wasnât that easy.
âWeâd be lying if we said we didnât all contemplate ending the band countless times during the pandemic,â says Ronnie Ish. Between the release of âThe Great Depressionâ and the recording of âI Went To Hell And Backâ, As It Is became a trio of Ish, Walters and longtime bassist Ali Testo.
Both departures have been amicable, people with different priorities after lockdown or chasing new dreams, but still, âthings have changed,â admits Walters. Rather than seeing that as a negative, he views it as a reflection of the world weâre living in. âThere has been no stable ground for anyone over the past two years.â
It was writing this record that kept As It Is together. âEvery time someone had a wobble, we spoke about finishing this record, giving the fans what they deserve,â explains Ish. Now, theyâre stronger and more determined than ever.
Walters believes that As It Is are still here because âthere was more to say.â Yes, he questioned the future of As It Is but, as you can hear across âI Went To Hell And Backâ, he questioned pretty much everything. âIt hasnât been easy. There have been a lot of battles, mainly with myself, but Iâm proud of the outcome.â
Avoiding another concept record (âtoo predictableâ), âI Went To Hell And Backâ is a sprawling collection of songs that explore the confusing, conflicting emotions of the past two years. âWe’ve encapsulated the loss, grief, disparity, anxiety and depression on this record,â says Ish. âAll we’ve ever wanted to do was to write records and to tour and we worked our asses off for years to make that happen. Then something completely out of our hands removed our ability to do those things, which left us in a dark place. We, like most people, struggled with our identities in the pandemic.â
âThereâs no metaphor or poetry to hide behind in a lot of these lyrics,â explains Walters. âI needed to say things bluntly, and angrily, just because of how sad and hopeless I was feeling. For a long while, I was just trying to survive. If I got out of bed, that was a great day.â
Written back in 2019, lead single âIDGAFâ is one of the oldest songs on the record. âThereâs always been a certainty with that song,â explains Walters of why they chose that burst of snarling nihilism for their comeback. Viewed by the band as âthe next logical step following âThe Great Depressionâ,â they wanted to offer a sense of familiarity going into this new era.
The record draws heavily from punk, rock and emo but songs like âIâd Die 1000xâ and âIâd Rather Dieâ see As It Is lean into their pop and dance influences while the title track is a haunting, electro number. Written at a time where Walters was having such a hard time, he wasnât even talking to the rest of the band or their producer, he used that song to tell them exactly what was going on with him. âItâs me saying âIâm not doing wellâ. Listening to it now, you donât necessarily know that there are tears in the eyes of the person singing it, but itâs a really special song.â
Elsewhere there are tracks like âILY, How Are You?â, written by Ish during one of those sessions where Walters was absent. âItâs about how weâre conditioned to tell people that weâre doing fine, even if thereâs a storm going on in your head. Even your closest friends donât know the exact demons youâre battling. It was my way of saying to Patty âI love you, how are you really, really doing?ââ. Because they were working in different timezones (Walters and Testo in the UK, Ish and Jones in America) Walters woke up to the song, nearly finished. When Ish logged on the following night, Walters had sent him âIâd Rather Dieâ, a lyrically sombre song with an uplifting chord progression.
âThis record means the world to us,â says Ish. âI truly believe weâve done something magical. The pandemic took us the furthest weâve ever been from each other, but now weâre the closest weâve ever been. âI Went To Hell And Backâ put into focus what this band is, and what it means to us. It scrubbed the jadedness away that comes from relentless touring and losing band members.â
The album is about âgrowth and not losing sight of that faint glimmer of optimism,â Walters explains, before admitting âitâs not always easy.â
âAs profoundly pessimistic as this record sounds on the surface, it isn’t all doom and gloom,â he promises. âFeelings like sadness and hopelessness will eat you alive if you let them. I hope this record is there for anybody feeling as lousy or as inadequate as I was. â
âI donât relate to happy music â never have, never will,â he continues. âSad music, it reminds you that youâre not alone. It isnât going to fix things but sometimes itâs enough to know that other people understandâ.
âWeâve never been a cool bandâ admits Walters, but As It Is are an authentic one. 2021 has seen guitar music return from the shadows and while the group were inspired by the success of Travis Barker, Yungblud, Machine Gun Kelly, Bring Me The Horizon, Halsey, Nothing, Nowhere and Kennyhoopla, âI Went To Hell and Backâ isnât a nostalgic pop punk record. Sure, itâs full of catchy choruses, sugary melodies and pop excitement but rather than recreate whatâs come before, As It Is are looking to push things forward. âWe wanted to pay homage to what was, while also trying to create something new,â says Ish.
âItâs been a long time since thereâs been this much excitement in the alternative scene. Weâre excited to contribute but also, to put our own, unique stamp on things,â adds Walters. âThere is a huge ambition with this band.â
Walters hopes âI Went To Hell And Backâ feels like âcatching up with an old friend. We can talk about all the good and terrible things that have happened, and how weâve grown from that. Weâre not the same band and Iâm sure our fans arenât the same people they were last time we put out an album, but I hope they havenât forgotten why we were friends in the first place.â
âI Went To Hell And Backâ isnât a safe record but As It Is are definitely a band you can rely on.
âWe’re about to release the best record of our career and we’re going to tour the absolute hell out of it in 2022,â says Ish. âWe don’t know what’s going to happen in the future and right now, I think the cool part is we don’t have to.â

