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Maxwell Stern (Signals Midwest, Meridian, Timeshares) has been quietly working on solo material and has now unveiled 'Water Tower,' his first solo single on Lauren Records.

"I wanted to write a pretty positive song about the flickering moment upon waking, before you look at your phone, before you remember your responsibilities, before you wrap yourself in your identity that carries you through the day" said Stern of the track. "What would it feel like to harness that feeling and to be able to control it? That’s what the chorus–”When I turn it off, in the morning every silence is a song”– is about. It’s not a novel concept by any means, but I get really wrapped up in social media as the “comparison machine” and it tends to suck the joy out of a lot of what I do if I’m not careful."

In the decade-plus I’ve known Maxwell Stern, he’s never been one to stop. And I’ll go out on a limb and say that anyone else who has come to know Max—maybe from one of his several bands (Signals Midwest, Meridian, Timeshares), or perhaps sweating it out in the pit at a show at some point in time, or maybe from a ska message board in the early 2000s—would say the same thing. Max has this undeniable urge to create. It’s like an impulse, really; an uncontrollable desire to try and make sense of the thoughts and emotions and anxieties about the world that swirl around our heads at any given point in time—and funnel it all into a song. Maybe it’s a song that people can relate to. Hopefully it’s one that they can sing along to.