The Story So Far’s Parker Cannon on Processing Grief, Befriending Blink-182, eBay Deep Dives, and His ‘Weird’ Relationship to Music
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Michael Dubin
“It’s a goddamn sauna in here,” the woman behind me announced to no one in particular. She was wearing a faded The Movielife tee and I spotted boba-sized beads of sweat forming on the floppy part of her lobes where the gauges used to be. “Twenty years in this scene and I’ve never been to a show this hot before.”
Being of a similar show-going vintage myself, I can confirm: It was a goddamn sauna in there. That’s what happens when a band as big as The Story So Far—who opened for Blink-182 last fall on a European arena tour, and are capable of filling the 16,000-seat Prudential Center in Newark, as they’ll be doing next week—plays the 200-capacity Gold Sounds Bar in Bushwick like they did Thursday night.
The show was billed as a release party for I Want to Disappear, The Story So Far’s first album in six years, which is out today. All of the underground-gig signifiers—the microscopic venue; the $10-at-the-door tickets; the pungent dudes in drenched LONG ISLAND HARDCORE shirts; enough Vans Old Skools to fill a Journeys stockroom—were part of the point for the pop-punk quartet’s 32-year-old frontman Parker Cannon, who of late has been on a journey to “get back to what we loved as kids.”
Cannon has at times had an uncomfortable relationship with the runaway success of The Story So Far, which he formed in 2007 as a high-school sophomore in Walnut Creek, California. In 2016, after releasing three albums in a four-year span and touring them relentlessly to an ever-expanding audience, the band took a brief hiatus—and Cannon immediately fell into a lean-fuelled depression. “I just fell out of love with music,” he told Kerrang! about that period, shortly after putting out 2018’s Proper Dose, Story’s poignant fourth LP that was largely inspired by his efforts to get clean.
When COVID hit in 2020, though, Cannon found himself in a similar position. “Story was in a bit of a lull,” he says now. “It was really hard to go back to that band and think about anything new I wanted to do with it.” This time around, he found his way back to The Story So Far through the simultaneous joy of playing in No Pressure, the pandemic-founded side project Cannon credits with reigniting his passion for performing, and the pain of losing his father, who passed away in 2021 following a three-year battle with throat cancer. I Want to Disappear is a deeply heartfelt exploration of the latter—a richly-drawn meditation on grief that remains packed with punchy melodies and high-voltage choruses. “It’s honest,” Cannon says when I ask him to describe the record. “Powerful, fast. Also slow. Good. It’s really fucking good, man.”
The morning before the Bushwick show, over Zoom from his tour bus, Cannon and I spoke at length about crafting his band’s most raw and personal LP yet, touring sober for the first time ever, becoming friends with Mark Hoppus and Tom Delonge on the road, the deep-cut menswear he searches for on eBay, and why he’s “still in kind of a weird place” with music in general.
But on Thursday, in that cramped and steamy Bushwick bar, Cannon looked totally at ease, in the pocket. He floated about the stage, allowing his measured movements and outsized presence to command the room, often lowering the mic for long stretches to let the rabid crowd scream entire verses back to him. He appeared to be exactly where he wanted to be. “Fuck yeah,” he repeated in low tones, seemingly just to himself, a couple of times between songs. “Fuck yeah.”
GQ: This is the first new album from The Story So Far in six years. You started another band during the pandemic, No Pressure, which has become deeply beloved in pop-punk and hardcore circles alike in a short period of time. What has that outlet meant for you personally, and how has it affected the way you approach your work with The Story So Far? Did it open up new avenues for you creatively?
Parker Cannon: Yeah, definitely. Story was in a bit of a lull during that [pandemic] period—we had done a lot of touring, we had released so much music and we just hit this weird little lull creatively. For me, specifically, it was really hard to go back to that band and think about anything new I wanted to do with it.
What I really just missed was playing and going to the kind of shows that I used to as a kid coming up—specifically punk and hardcore shows. I really loved the camaraderie, the intensity, the overall passion involved in those genres of music, and I felt like I just wasn't getting it with Story anymore. Because as you grow as a band, it gets harder and harder to play intimate settings. I really missed being able to get in a room and play exactly what I wanted to play. Most of the No Pressure album was written with just me and [drummer] Harry [Corrigan] and [guitarist] Pat [Kennedy] all in a room together—I was playing bass, and we wrote a whole full-length like that, just jamming. And I think before we even started writing the full-length itself, we jammed probably over 30 Blink songs just from memory, you know what I mean?
That rules.
It was more about just getting back to what we loved as kids, doing the real raw and honest work in that way. Not trying to really prove too much, not trying to reinvent the wheel by any means, just trying to just get back to what we love. I really missed being able to just play a 200-cap show or 300-cap show and not have it be this big deal and not have people come to see a specific version of me that they wanted. I could really just be myself again.
It felt really, really freeing to be able to go play with that band and do that. It still is. And I think that most definitely helped me come back to Story and be like, "Okay, I have gotten this feeling out of me now that I had been searching for. How can I use that to further progress this band's sound?" The vision was just lacking, especially in light of my dad getting sick. That really just took me out of everything—[along with] a bunch of other different, real-life adult problems that we all go through as we get older.
So [No Pressure] really did help me come back to Story and do this record, because I really wasn't going to do one prior to that. And [Story bandmates] Will [Levy] and Kevin [Geyer] and Ryan [Torf] were really, really supportive of me too. They were like, "Yo, we understand that you're unhappy and Story's in a weird lull right now, and we want you to be happy in the band. We don't want you to just write things that you don't like or do things that you're not cool with, so if that's something that you need to go do, go do it." I give a lot of credit to them for being okay with it, because if that wasn't the case then Story wouldn't have really continued.
You mentioned your dad's illness. This album really explores your grief and unpacks the experience of losing him. When did you know that was what you wanted this record to be about? Did all those emotions just start spilling into your songwriting naturally?
It was something that just progressed naturally through the sickness, as it got worse and worse. It got to a certain point where he knew himself that he wasn't going to make it anymore. He chose to go out on his own terms. For so long, I had been trying to express my emotions through anger and resentment or just anything involving relationships and trust or anything like that. And I had definitely hit a wall with trying to continue that narrative [in my lyrics]. I was like, "Well, what else can I say?" I've tried to do my absolute best for four records, and I feel like I did. So I was like, "How can I progress my writing and change the subject matter?"
And then it really did hit me after he passed. There was this huge elephant in the room that I didn't really want to talk about at first. I was really, really angry. That was probably the biggest stage of grief that I went through, because I feel like that was the biggest emotion that I always resonated with as a kid.
Once he passed and I had a little bit of time to think about it more, it just started to flow. When I would go do the demos and try certain phrases or anything like that, it just started to flow more naturally and became what it is. And I'm not even sure if I really intended the record to be about my grief. That's why it feels so special and I'm so proud of it, because it is such an honest body of work in that way.
You’ve been really personal in your lyrics before, but this feels like a new level of vulnerability. Does it make you feel nervous at all to put these songs out into the world?
Yeah, I mean, being on the precipice of putting the record out, I'm very nervous. I'm very apprehensive, for sure. It's a new territory for me. I hope that people not only like it, but resonate with it. I hope that anyone who has experienced any sort of loss like that can relate and ultimately like it, because I haven't really tried to gain anything from music besides the respect of my peers. And I think that is really what has made Story such an honest band and has given us that longevity that we have.
Around the time that Proper Dose came out, you spoke publicly about how you had fallen out of love with music, and it was bands like Oasis and Alice in Chains that helped reinspire you and show you a path forward for Story. This time out, were there any specific bands or artists that helped shape the sound of this album?
Honestly, not really. I think doing No Pressure allowed me to open my mind again to how I wanted to progress Story's sound, specifically. And this time around, there weren't really any bands that I looked to as paragons or influences in any way. I just went back through our library and studied our past records and honed in on the sound I really like about the band, and then chose to push it forward as far as I could without being too contrived or anything. I just wanted to take our sound and make it better and keep it honest. We don't have anything to prove. We just want to make a good-sounding record with honest lyrics, because that is ultimately why people, I hope, love our band.
This is the first Story record to come out in your 30s. You went through some growing pains with fame and feeling boxed in by the genre earlier in your career, and I’m curious if you feel like you’re in a more comfortable place now both with yourself and the place in the culture your band occupies.
Yeah, definitely. Coming into my 32nd year, I definitely am in a much more comfortable place with who I am, where our band has gone, and where it's taken me. For a long time, I wasn't really comfortable with that identity. Like I said earlier, I feel like people were coming to see our band to see a specific version of me that they resonate with. It always irked me that people would either say things to me or treat me in a [certain] way when they didn't fucking know me, you know?
Even though I had [shared] so many personal things in the music, I still felt like I was being typecast and just thrown into this pigeonhole with a lot of other bands. I hated that. Ultimately, at the start of the lull that I talked about, I was so over it. I didn't want to be who I was anymore. I wanted to restart and revamp and get back to being myself.
What were some of the things that people would say to you? What do you think their image of you was?
I can't really say specifically because it was a long time ago. But people would just be like, “You got me through such a harsh breakup. I love how you hate women like I do." And I was like, "That's just not true. You’re missing the point." Just shit like that. It felt like I was on some weird pedestal that I couldn't get down from.
So now, I definitely am a lot more comfortable with who I am, my role in this band, and my role in music in general. It feels much better than it did—and I feel like it'll hopefully come across in this record when people listen to it.
What is your relationship to music like now? Are you in a good place with making it, performing it, listening to it, engaging with it in general?
Honestly, I'm still in kind of a weird place with it. With playing, I'm in a much better place with Story and being around live music. But I guess I'm still in a weird place with listening to it—I'm not listening to music every day like I used to. So it's still in a strange place, I think more of a healing phase, taking some time away to get back to it.
But I still listen to so many of my friends' bands—so many different hardcore bands that maybe only have a demo or two little seven-inches or anything like that. That stuff really gets me inspired, too. All my friends who play music truly to play it and to commune over it and not gain anything from it and not really play the rat race, that really inspires me to stay in it and to do my best and to be honest.
I'm not sure if it'll ever get back to how it was when I was younger, when I was listening to music every day. Maybe it will. It's hard to say right now, because I'm a day before putting out the biggest record of my life, so maybe it'll change.
Are there any specific songs on I Want to Disappear that you feel especially proud of?
Yeah. I would say the ninth song on the record, which is "White Shores." It was the last song that I recorded for the record, and it's a deeply personal song about... The whole record is about my dad, but that song specifically is probably the deepest that I got and the most visceral that I got. And I feel like it is also the progression of Story's sound. We don't really have any songs that sound like that or, in my opinion, as good as that one.
You’ve spoken about how your dad would always give his very honest opinions on the music you were making and how big of a role he played in getting you into music in the first place. As you were writing the album, were you ever picturing what he might’ve thought about the songs?
Yeah, of course, man. Of course. It did make it twice as hard because he wasn't there to give his opinions. He was always stoked, he was never a hard-ass on me or anything. But just not having the clarity of the feedback he gave me because of how well he knew me—that was hard. So I pushed through to give what I thought would be the best body of work that I could show him.
That's really beautiful. What is touring in your 30s like now, compared to the days you’d bomb around the country in a van? What's your routine like these days?
It is crazy different, man. When we first started touring, it was all no parents, no rules. You can do anything you ever wanted with zero accountability. You can just go for it. And it did take a toll on my health and my mental health, because all we really did was just smoke a bunch of weed all day long, drink almost every night. We just partied. We had fun. And now, this is the first tour that I've ever done sober. I've been sober six months now.
Congratulations.
Thanks, man. It's fucking hard. It goes against every principle of touring that I grew up on, everything that I learned, which was just having it at all times. So trying to find a routine is definitely more difficult. It's a lot more boring, I'll be honest. It's definitely not as fun, but ultimately I feel better. My personal health, my lungs feel better, my throat feels better, my head feels more clear.
My days now just revolve around trying to work out every day, whether it's a lot or a little—just doing something. I read a bunch. I'm really into fantasy. I'm reading Warhammer right now. I'm fucking loving it. I'm on my second volume of it, so I'm really diving into it, and just trying to be more present in every hour of the day as opposed to trying to remove myself for many hours of the day [the way I used to].
But yeah, it feels good. I don't know if I'll be sober the rest of my life or anything like that, but my big goal was to prove to myself that I could do a tour like this, so that's what I'm going to try and do.
That's really rad. You mentioned that when you started with No Pressure, you guys jammed out a bunch of Blink songs from memory, and you’ve covered “Josie” live a handful of times. What was it like going from playing those songs in a tiny room to heading out on a massive European tour with Blink last fall?
It was incredible, man. It was a dream come true in every sense of the word. They were so cool from day one. Mark [Hoppus] and Tom [Delonge] both would just come into our dressing room unannounced, like, "What's up guys? What are you doing? How are you doing? Are you stoked for this tour? It's going to be sick!"
I had been on tour with other bigger bands, and that kind of stuff never really happened. It was a little bit more removed and you felt the division. But with [Blink], it really felt like I was finally just meeting the dudes that I had on my wall on posters when I was growing up.
And Mark has told me, "Dude, I'm such a big fan of No Pressure. You guys made me fucking stoked when I was going through my treatment and helped me find some passion again in music." And he told me that they were even listening to it in the sessions when they were writing their new record. I was just like, "You can't tell me these things. This is too much for me." It was incredible. But not once did it feel like he was just saying that—it always felt like we were just bros talking, and for them to treat me like that was just everything I could ever ask for.
And Tom, too… I think it was the second or third show, and we were still getting used to playing these big-ass arenas. The flow wasn't quite there yet in the setlist. Tom came in and was just like, "Yo, let me talk to you real quick." And he just gave me a little game on, like, "Maybe switch around a couple songs and get it going faster, because you guys are a fucking punk rock band, and that's what's fucking sick about you. Don't be shy about it. Show people who you are. Show them what it really means to be you, and be proud of it, because you guys are fucking good." And I was just like, "Man."
It was really cool for him to do that. And Mark, too, I talked to him about my dad going through treatment and he really, really understood and was there for me. A couple nights it was hard for me to go on stage, and I came to him because he had a part [on stage before] “Adam's Song” where he talked about [going through cancer treatment]. A bunch of those nights when I watched the set, it wrecked me, just hearing it. So I would come to him and be like, "Dude, my dad went through the same thing and he's not here anymore, but I'm right here standing in front of you, and if he could see that, then it would just be really special." And he was like, "Dude."
Wow.
It was incredible, man. And Travis kept to himself a little bit, but he wasn't rude or anything.
Sure, that seems like his personality.
Yeah. He’s a very busy man, as people know. He was doing his own thing the whole tour. But I think it was the second-to-last night, and I thought, "I can't let the whole tour go by and not say something to him." And I was like, "Hey, bro, I really appreciate you having us out. This is our dream come true. There are no bigger Blink fans than myself and those dudes in the room." And he was like, "Yeah, dude, for sure. It's been fucking sick and you guys killed it," and dapped me up and that was that. So for them to just be normal like that and to be cool was everything I could ever ask for.
I wanted to switch gears really quickly and just talk about style, because I’ve heard you’re really into clothes. Around the Proper Dose era, when you were first getting into Oasis, I did notice you started wearing these very sick, Liam Gallagher-y parkas on stage. Has he been a big influence on the way you dress?
Oh, for sure. No shame in admitting that. He is one of the most stylish dudes of all time. And he built his style off others before him, too. It's sort of that casual culture world that revolves around English football, Spanish football, which are also two of my biggest loves besides music. That's what I did before music: I played just endless amounts of soccer. It was my whole life.
So I really had an affinity for it before even diving into Oasis. And I've always been a fan of good-looking clothes—I think ever since fifth grade, I showed up to school in new clothes, and was like, "I want to look fucking good. I want to wear shit that no one has." I [always wanted] to put something on and hear, "Damn, that's sick. Where'd you get that?" And I've always admired people who [make me say that,] too. So I love it, man. There's so many different areas of it, too, that I love.
You’ve got a Palace hat on right now. Are they a big brand for you?
Yeah, definitely. Growing up, if I wasn't playing soccer, I was skateboarding. Skateboarding itself has always been at the height of coolness, no matter what era, so I've always taken a lot of style direction from skating. And brands like Palace and Supreme have always just done such a good job, in my opinion, of making good-looking clothes that are cut well and take risks without being too over-branded.
What are some other brands that you’re really into right now?
Dude, I'm really stoked right now on Engineered Garments. I think they make some great pieces. I picked up the Uniqlo collaboration they did, and I actually wore that coat in the "Letterman" video—that's got to be one of my favorite coats I've ever had. It just fits great. They always do such a good job of taking militaria influences and bridging it into casual fashion, so I love that.
And in the same vein, I love Stone Island for doing that too. Massimo Osti is one of my biggest inspirations in terms of trying to find cool bridges between militaria and casual menswear and making it applicable to any situation and looking cool.
I love C.P. Company, too, for the same reason. And then [in terms of] high fashion, I've always loved Burberry, which goes back again to the English influence. I love Prada, too—there's some really fucking sweet men's Prada pieces, specifically from '90s.
Oh, and one of my favorite designers is JJJJound from Montreal. I love his stuff, man, the way he applies such good materials to something so casual. I think it's fucking awesome. I have almost every pair of the Reeboks that he's put out—I even have the gray ones. I brought a pair of the new suede ones that he did on this tour, and I wear them every day. That's one of the most perfect everyday shoes ever made, in my opinion.
Are you an eBay guy at all?
Oh, yeah. I'm a massive eBay head. I've spent untold amounts on eBay. It's not okay.
Another one of the brands I've always loved is Polo Ralph Lauren, and when I'm bored some nights, I will go on a deep dive of vintage Polo Ralph Lauren and try to find some sweet Stadium pieces or P-Wing pieces or any sort of Cookie pieces. At one point, I had this crazy Polo Bear tee collection. I almost had every single Bear they ever fucking did.
That’s incredible.
My saved searches right now I would say are Stone Island, C.P., Engineered Garments, and I think that's it because if I want to do a Polo search, I'll do a specific one, but I keep my saved searches on deck and I always browse and try to see what I can find. I love vintage Stone pieces too.
You mentioned that you're a soccer fan. Do you have a Premier League club that you support?
My stance is… I'm asked this by so many people in the UK and in Spain, where it's a big deal to support a club. I don't take it lightly. So in my opinion, since I'm not from there, I don't have a true allegiance to any club.
That's fair.
I grew up really loving Manchester United in the Beckham, Giggs, and Scholes years. Even through the Cristiano Ronaldo years, too. I loved that team because I really admired Sir Alex Ferguson greatly as a coach and a manager, so I'll always have an affinity for them. I love West Ham, too. They're just an incredible working-class club.
And then if I had to pick a Spanish team, I got to go with Real Madrid because I loved the Galacticos when I was younger, too. Zidane and Beckham and Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos—they were larger than life, and I thought their white uniforms were so cool, man. They looked so good. I've always loved any football kit, really. It's funny how now that is such a trend, too…
Blokecore.
That's what they call it? Blokecore? That's pretty funny. But it speaks to how well those jerseys were designed. I've always loved any sort of kit, so anytime I come across an older kit like that, too, regardless of what team it is, I'll pick it up. I used to love the old Inter Milan kits, too, when Ronaldo was playing for them. Yeah, man. I love it all.
One last thing: You made this great connection with Mark and Tom from Blink. You’ve gotten to work in the studio with Chris Conley from Saves the Day. You’ve toured with New Found Glory, whom you named your band after. What have you learned from folks like that about continuing to grow and having longevity in this industry?
I would say it's just staying true to yourself and what you like and what you want to do. Don't write things for other people. Write it for yourself. A big example of that is when Blink did their self-titled record. That record was really polarizing at first for a lot of Blink fans, because it was so different. It was a tumultuous time for the band, and they just didn't shy away from that aspect of things. They were just like, “Yeah, it is a crazy time, and we're going to write the most progressive body of work that we've ever done, and we don't necessarily care if you like it or not. This is who we are.”
So seeing them doing that—and seeing other peers I've had in music not do that—has showed me how to stay the course and how to stay true. Hardcore music has done that a lot for me, too, just in terms of staying true to yourself and to your friends and playing as well as you can. Knowing that any show, really, could be your last show. You never know.
Originally Appeared on GQ
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