The Copyrights have a new record and a new label home. The band has announced that Alone in a Dome will officially release on Oct. 22 via Fat Wreck Chords.
The band shared a new song and video too.
Check out "Halos!" and, below that, a quote from the illustrious Larry Livermore.
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Alone In A Dome track listing:
1 Part of the Landscape
2 Halos
3 Stuck in the Winter
4 Pretender
5 No Dissertation
6 Tell Molly
7 Before Midnight
8 No Such Thing as Grownups
9 That One Week
10 Brush Off
11 Enemies
12 On Division
A chilly, dimly lit bar in the backstreets of pre-gentrification Jersey City wasn’t my first choice for where to spend a Friday night, especially in the snowy depths of midwinter.
But there I was, with a dozen or so fellow fanatics who felt it was our duty to support a struggling local music scene. Whether it was struggling to be born or just to stay alive remained to be seen, but there were plenty of nights like this, where, if a handful of us didn’t show up, there’d be no scene at all.
I walked in as the touring band, some young guys from Illinois called the Copyrights, were setting up. Anyone who’s been on tour knows what it’s like to drive a thousand miles in pursuit of a dream, only to wind up playing for a tiny or nonexistent crowd in the middle of nowhere. After a couple experiences like that, most normal people scurry back to the comfort and security of their hometown, where they can regale their grandchildren with tales of “That time my buddies and I thought it would be cool to go on tour, ha ha.”
But normal people don’t generally form great bands, let alone stick with them long enough for that greatness to become obvious to the masses. I’d been lucky enough to be there at the beginning for a number of bands like that, and for a few magical years, was able to walk up to them and say, “Hey, would you like to make a record?”
But that day was long gone. Lacking a time machine to take us back to the East Bay’s pop-punk heyday, where I knew they’d quickly become one of Lookout Records’ biggest success stories, the best I could offer the Copyrights was compliments and best wishes. While their talent, energy and enthusiasm were obvious even under those less than ideal conditions (which is when it really counts the most), I feared they’d have a tough climb to get the recognition they deserved.
One thing about being from the Midwest, though, is that adversity comes with the territory, so much so that it gets built into your operating system. Coping with tornadoes, blizzards, dilapidated Rust Belt towns, and the indignity of being smirked at by Left and Right Coast sharpsters who dismiss your whole region as “flyover country,” you don’t give up easily. Or, in some cases, at all.
Fast forward to 2006, and our fledgling music scene had grown big enough to put on a three-day fest in Baltimore. One of the headliners was the Copyrights. Their new record was just out, and I knew it was really, really good, but still wasn’t prepared for the absolute frenzy that kicked off with their opening song. “We are the cashiers, we are delivery boys,” it went, but my friends had jokingly sung “We are the captains, we are the Livermores” at me so many times I was beginning to think those might be the actual words.
This was a band at the peak of its power, and I’ll admit I mentally congratulated myself for having spotted their potential at that long-ago bar show. “You guys are really on your way now,” I told them a couple years later, after watching them tear the roof off the joint at an Insubordination Fest now drawing crowds in the thousands.
Unfortunately, I was feeding 20th century advice to a 21st century band. I’d been out of the business long enough to have forgotten that making brilliant records and playing great shows no longer guaranteed instant fame and fortune the way it once had. But the band who’d called their first album We Didn’t Come Here To Die wasn’t here to quit, either.
The records kept coming, each reaching new heights of excellence. Tours took them across North America and Europe more times than I can remember, and maybe more times than the band themselves can. Enormous credit goes to Toby Jeg’s Red Scare Industries for helping keep them on the map all these years; now they’re stepping out onto a bigger stage with Alone In A Dome, their first full-length for FAT, out Oct 22nd. If it seems like it’s been a long time coming, I can promise you one thing: it will have been worth the wait.
Larry Livermore
August 2021
