Modern Baseball discuss growing up, their new EP, and the Philly music scene with Brooklyn Vegan

With a new EP out and a fall tour on the books, Philadelphia emo-rock faves Modern Baseball recently sat down for an interview with Brooklyn Vegan. In it, they discuss balancing school and “real life,” the growth of their sound and their upcoming full length Holy Ghost, and they also get a chance to discuss the Philly music scene.

Recently, the band’s co-lead singer, Brendan Lukens, opened up about his battles with anxiety and depression. The EP and the album are sure to reflect some of that pain and struggle. When asked about transitioning the band’s sound from being playful and silly to being deeper and a bit darker, Lukens responded:

…the playful, quirkiness isn’t something that we told the world about. It wasn’t like we were going out and saying, like hey, we’re Modern Baseball, we’re a quirky, silly band. That has never happened. We do silly things but that’s just how we are as people…. we started Modern Baseball to be sort of like a journal for us to get our shit out, for us to be able to just be honest with ourselves and the ones that we care about around us and I think it is still that today it’s just that we’ve gone through some shit.

Modern Baseball has admitted that their music will be more mature on this forthcoming album, but it feels like a natural transition, seeing as the members are maturing.There still is that dichotomy between carefree adolescence and real-world adulthood. Two of the band members are still working toward earning their bachelor’s degrees from Drexel University, having to take time off for up to six months every year to tour. And there is definitely something to be said about Drexel’s music scene. Of the experience with getting shows and getting involved in the scene, bassist Ian Farmer said:

It’s cool because everybody who’s going to shows also has a band or has a house or books shows or something. So everyone gets it, everyone’s friends, everybody puts on each other’s bands.

Catch Modern Baseball at Union Transfer on December 12th, and listen to their new EP, MoBo Presents: The Perfect Cast EP featuring Modern Baseball.