The Thursday Primer

This is a (not-so) abridged history of the band Thursday, written by the two mods from thursdayarchive. It focuses on the most major moments, events, performances, music, etc. in Thursday’s near twenty-five years of existence. We created it primarily for people coming from the Bandom side of things and thus it will focus on Geoff and Tucker more than the other members, but this is a place to learn about all of Thursday! 

It turned out to be much longer than we had anticipated, so use the various interspersed headings to your advantage. If you have any questions or want to know the source of a specific piece of information (or more details!), send us an ask at thursdayarchive on Tumblr.

Loosely inspired by the Bandom primers of Livejournals past, such as this one.

DISCLAIMER: We are fans of Thursday but we are not experts by any means! We are just attempting to synthesize the various bits and pieces of info we've learned from interviews and writings about Thursday's fascinating history--so it's possible and likely that we've gotten details wrong, misunderstood what was reported, or reported attitudes expressed in the past that don't reflect the current feelings of people in the band. We also wrote most of this from October 2021-February 2022, so the content reflects what we were aware of at that time.

Any and all inaccuracies and oversights are unintentional but acknowledged.

 

BASICS

Thursday is a post-hardcore/emo/screamo band formed in New Brunswick, New Jersey in 1997. Its primary current members are Geoff Rickly (vocals; primary lyricist; b. Mar 8, 1979), Tom Keeley (lead guitar; backing vocals; b. Jan 15, 1979), Steve Pedulla (rhythm guitar; backing vocals; b. Apr 3, 1975); Tim Payne (bass guitar; b. May 4, 1979); Tom "Tucker" Rule (drums; b. Nov 20, 1978); and Andrew Everding (keyboards; backing vocals; b. Nov 13, 1979). 

Thursday is largely responsible for bringing the North Jersey hardcore scene into the international music spotlight, although they weren’t the first band to receive commercial attention. Thursday combined the sounds of DC hardcore, post-hardcore (such as Fugazi), and new-age goth (such as the Cure and Joy Division) with lyrics influenced by post-modernist literature (largely from Geoff’s own literary background and aspirations). Their most well-known album is 2001’s Full Collapse, which really embodies this. Thursday’s sound played a large role in defining the sound of second-wave emo and, arguably, created an “emo” that was mainstream. They were also widely considered one of the most captivating live bands to come from the New Jersey hardcore scene.

As we’ll be discussing at length later, many of the most iconic emo bands of the last twenty years owe their success directly and indirectly to Thursday and Geoff Rickly. 

Thursday in 2017. Photo by Justin Borucki.

 

HISTORY

Formation (1998)

 

Thursday had humble beginnings. It was born out of a shared love for music and the community around music, something that no one valued more than Geoff Rickly, its frontman. 

We’ve stated that Thursday formed in New Brunswick, NJ. More notably, Thursday formed in the punk house/basement music venue/beating heart of the tri-state music scene at 331 Somerset Street, where Geoff and his friends, most of whom were students at Rutgers, put on a fuckton of shows. You’ve probably heard of a lot of the bands that would play there. We won’t list them all, but here are a few: Midtown, Ink & Dagger, Saves the Day, Leatherface, Poison the Well. You get the idea. Geoff was a popular guy in the scene, because he was always willing to host bands and had made connections with booking agents in New York City, who knew they could rely on 331 Somerset as a venue and place of accommodation if something in the city fell through. The house treated bands well, feeding them and letting them sleep there, and tried to pay bands, though they had a policy of only asking for donations at the door (to avoid heftier fines). 

🕊️Sidebar re: paying for these shows: Geoff paid for bands to play in his basement through, among other methods of making money, writing for smut mags like Penthouse. You can find out more about that here, where thursdayarchive has archived a podcast clip about it. 🕊️

Naturally, since Geoff was super into the hardcore scene and knew almost nothing about music outside of his limited skills as a saxophone player, he decided that he needed to start a band. He recruited his friend Tom Keeley, who in turn invited a reluctant Tim Payne to join on bass. (Geoff accidentally tricked Tim into accepting after he met him at a show, and Tim tried to turn down Geoff's invitation by claiming to be joining Tom's band instead, not realizing it was the same one.) Tom recruited one of his best friends from high school, Tucker Rule to play drums (Tucker had just started learning a year or two before). Most of them could barely play their instruments enough to form a functioning band (it took Geoff around ten years after Thursday’s formation to shake the reputation of being a bad live singer), but that was enough in the DIY hardcore scene, and thus Thursday was born. 

The band name, by the way, was selected in the tradition of the Smiths: to be as ordinary and undescriptive as possible, so that listeners would have no idea how the band sounded just from hearing the name. 

🕊️A quick sidebar about Thursday’s first show for people who are sticklers about the details (you can skip this if you don’t care): as Geoff tells it, Thursday had three “first” shows, all at 331 Somerset. Chronologically, the first show happened when Geoff and maybe two of the other guys (not the full band, or even the first full lineup) played around two songs alongside the emo band Joshua at some point in late 1998. They were apparently not so successful. A few months later, on December 31, 1998, Thursday (under that name) played a few covers together, which went better. Apparently, Saves the Day and Midtown were both present at this show—and it was Midtown’s first. Finally, a little while after that, Thursday had prepared original songs, and played an actual, scheduled set. It was after these shows that Bill Henderson (who was the original rhythm guitarist) joined the band.🕊️

Thursday was beloved by the scene not just because they had an interesting, innovative sound, or just because Geoff was charismatic, kind, and generous, but because they had a captivating stage presence, even though Geoff couldn’t sing and most of them were amateurs at their instrument of choice. If you’d like to see what that looked like, you can watch an early Thursday performance here from June 6, 2001, right after the release of Full Collapse. 

 
 

Waiting (1999)

 

In Spring 1999, Thursday’s first record, Waiting, was the first album to be recorded at The Big Blue Meenie in Jersey City, NJ produced by Sal Villanueva. You might know Sal because he produced Taking Back Sunday’s Tell All Your Friends in 2001. He and Tim Gilles, who always worked alongside Sal to master the tracks, had worked with Geoff in some capacity since he was a teenager interning for Sal. They would later produce every Thursday album through Kill the House Lights (2007). 

 

🕊️ Sidebar: Waiting was just added to Spotify in 2021. It’s unpolished and edgy but so, so good. We recommend that you listen to Full Collapse and War All The Time before giving Waiting a try, to acclimate yourself to Thursday's sound. 🕊️

 

Tim, Geoff, and Tom performing on their 1999 Summer tour.
 

After recording Waiting, Thursday embarked on their first real tour in the Summer of 1999. Some of the best photos of early Thursday that exist come from this tour. They brought copies of their 1999 Summer Tour EP, which former guitarist Bill Henderson describes as follows: “We took copies of this EP (featuring some demo tracks and some unmastered songs from Waiting) on a short tour in the Summer of 1999... hence the name.”  Interestingly, Bill was not even on this tour, but instead their friend Cooper (last name unknown) filled in.  

 

Later that year on December 6, 1999, Waiting was officially released. The tour and the album was as successful as you’d expect for a small-time band on a DIY label, as Thursday gained recognition within local hardcore and post-hardcore scenes, and they started looking for ways to expand as a band.

 

Tom, Tim, and Geoff ; Tom, Geoff, Tim, Tucker, and Bill Henderson (then-guitarist) on their Summer 1999 tour.

 
The most important events that happened the next year, 2000, are as follows:

1. Bill Henderson left the band. Bill liked what was happening, and liked the band, but wasn’t willing to put Thursday before his work and school obligations, which meant that he couldn’t tour as much as Geoff wanted them to. Thursday basically ghosted him after that. LOL. This kind of non-confrontational way of ignoring problems has been a recurring theme in Thursday’s history, and would bite them in the ass more than once.
2. Steve Pedulla, the older brother of one of their friends, joined the band, gradually replacing Bill at shows he couldn’t make and then permanently joining the lineup as rhythm guitarist. He was a few years older than the rest of the guys, and was the only one who wasn’t a student at Rutgers at the time, instead having attended film school. Steve regularly used his cinematographic skills throughout Thursday’s history. The story goes that Steve didn’t like the demo at first, but liked the guys, so he joined. 
3. The last house show happened at 331 Somerset (they were getting shut down much more often by the police, who were issuing expensive tickets), marking a transition in Geoff’s life towards devoting more time to Thursday. 
4. Full Collapse was recorded in November also at Big Blue Meenie by Sal Villanueva. Much of the lyrics were adapted from Geoff’s senior honors thesis (which he completed, though he never graduated). Their primary goal in writing Full Collapse was to create exciting new music, and by all accounts they had a lot of fun being creative. 

Around the later part of 2000/early part of 2001, Thursday started garnering the attention of several independent labels, who had much more resources and support to offer them than Eyeball did. Alex Eyeball himself encouraged Thursday to take a leave of absence from college for a year to tour under a larger label, as Eyeball could no longer offer the kind of monetary support that Thursday deserved. Geoff was in his last semester of school (he was a creative writing major) and had plans to be a teacher after graduation, but dropped out with the rest of Thursday for a “gap year”—though none of them ever returned to school.

Full Collapse (2001)

In early 2001, Thursday signed to Victory Records. They were initially excited about it; Victory had signed some of their favorite bands and they had a friend there. But within weeks of joining the label, their friend left her position, and almost every Victory band they ran into warned them that they’d just made a huge mistake. As they tell it, one of their biggest mistakes was the deal they made with Victory to fund their upcoming tour: Thursday signed away all of their publishing and merchandising rights for a $2,000 advance (nothing compared to what Full Collapse would later make Victory). 

A lot of the problems they encountered had to do with Tony Brummel, Victory’s president, who wanted Thursday to be commercially successful and marketable (despite the fact that few, if any, post-hardcore bands had ever achieved either thing) and paid them very little attention. Tony didn’t like Full Collapse (according to Thursday, at least; according to Tony, he loved it from the beginning, but he’s not the most reliable figure, in our opinion) and cared very little for how Thursday envisioned their career trajectory. Tony was not only neglectful of the independent goals and values of the bands under his purview; he was straight-up destructive to their success, even if it came at the expense of his own personal profits. There are countless stories from bands (Thursday and Taking Back Sunday, just to name two) about the kinds of things that he did, stories that include pitting bands against each other, being openly negative about bands’ talent, that sort of thing. 

🕊️ Another sidebar: The infamous Thursday whoopee cushion. Remember how we said that Thursday signed away their merchandising rights? This is the most notorious example of Thursday’s clash with Victory over merchandise that they felt did not represent them. In promotion of Thursday’s time on Warped Tour 2001, Victory released Thursday-branded whoopee cushions as merch. Thursday was not a fan of this, as they felt that the whoopee cushions did not align with their purpose and message. It was one small grievance among many, but the public latched onto it once Thursday went public with their complaints against Victory.🕊️ 

 

Steve Pedulla with one of the now-infamous Thursday whoopee cushion, released by Victory without the band's knowledge or consent.

Full Collapse was released on April 10, 2001 to generally favorable reviews but low sales. After its release, Thursday toured with a few bands who had frequented Geoff’s basement, including Saves the Day and Murder City Devils, in addition to a short stint on Warped Tour 2001. Their tour (especially outside of the northeast) sometimes saw very low attendance, even for the small, informal venues—basements, roller rinks, VFW halls—they booked. Near the end of their tour with the Murder City Devils, Thursday prepared to disband, using $1000 of their remaining advance money to make the music video for Understanding in a Car Crash, which Steve directed.

Geoff Rickly, Tim Payne, Tucker Rule, Tom Keeley, and Steve Pedulla of Thursday on their first western tour in 2002

Breakthrough

In late 2001, MP3s of Full Collapse started to gain online traction, and attendance at their tour dates began to pick up, although Thursday was touring so much that it was hard for them to comprehend this or to understand why. Their defining moment came at the end of the year in December, right after Thursday returned from what would have been their last tour, when the Understanding MV hit MTV2 and became so popular that by Christmas it was playing every ten to fifteen minutes. Insanity. Totally unexpected for a band on the brink of dissolution.

Suddenly Thursday was reaching a level of fame unheard of in the post-hardcore (emo) scene, and their label was much more willing to support them. Alternative Press called 2001, the year of Full Collapse's release, “The Year That Punk Broke Again." Thursday was constantly referred to as “the next Nirvana” (although Thursday preferred to think of themselves as the next Sonic Youth). Later on, the band would struggle to live up to these labels, but at least in 2001, they had surpassed all expected levels of success almost overnight.

🕊️ Extremely important sidebar: It’s hard to overstate how well-known Thursday was within the alternative music scene at this point in time. The popular narrative of emo/post-hardcore typically neglects their importance, but Thursday largely catapulted the genre— and their specific North Jersey scene— as it existed in the early 2000s into the mainstream. Thursday proved that commercial success was possible for their genre and their scene, and they weren’t even trying to be a marketable, digestible band. Since Thursday was successful, that allowed other bands who came from similar backgrounds— notably My Chemical Romance— to aspire to the extreme commercial success that they eventually achieved, since they were able to tailor their music and image to that goal. 🕊️

Tucker Rule in 2002. The band would often crash at people's houses instead of paying for accommodation; Tim Payne in the tour van in 2002. Photo by Justin Borucki.

In light of their success, Thursday put out another music video for Full Collapse, this time for the song Cross Out the Eyes. You can watch it here. 

As Thursday became more and more famous in the first half of 2002, their problems with Victory reached a boiling point. Tony was suddenly very interested in Thursday’s success, which they found discouraging since it was clearly disingenuous and based entirely on profit. Thursday were also bothered by Victory’s resistance to consulting them about major decisions concerning their future, including a possible deal in which Tony would have sold a portion of Victory Records (including Thursday) to MCA Records, which fell through at the last minute. 

They came to the conclusion that they needed to find a new label, but their contract was strict. After consulting lawyers, they identified a loophole within the wording that allowed them to move to another label as long as it was a major label— a decision that Thursday hesitated to make. Moving to a major label was the definition of selling out, and they were still clinging to their DIY values. But they needed out, and certain major labels had been expressing interest for months, and so they entered into tense legal negotiations with Victory in order to sign to Island-Def Jam Records instead. 

Geoff and Steve in 2002. Photo by Justin Borucki.

2002 was an incredibly busy year for Thursday. They toured practically non-stop while they dealt with their label issues, and spent only a handful of days at home off the road. Around this time Andrew Everding started touring with them (largely because his house burnt down and he needed somewhere to go), though he wouldn’t officially join the band for several more years. In May 2002, during Thursday’s only real break in touring that year, Geoff produced My Chemical Romance’s first album I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love. We will cover this process in depth in an upcoming separate post about the longtime relationship between those two bands, but you can see Geoff and Andrew in the behind the scenes footage of the recording process from 2002.

Geoff in the studio with My Chemical Romance. 2002.

As far as we can tell, Thursday released their official public statement on the situation with Victory and Island right after Geoff (and a few others from Thursday) returned from the studio with MCR. The statement, which you can read in its entirety here, was released on May 22, 2002, and outlined their grievances, as well as their hopes for their future on their first major record label. 

This is what they said of Island there: “One label, Island Def Jam, had been coming to our shows since we started touring full time. They had seen us at our worst, they knew at the time that we were not concerned with radio or huge record sales, and they understood that we just wanted to tour and play music.”

Thursday spent the Summer of 2002 performing to large crowds at Warped Tour, which was successful for them. There, Geoff met his future wife, an Australian woman who was working in one of the charity tents traveling with the festival. 

Thursday released their Five Stories Falling EP on October 22, 2002. The only new song, "Jet Black New Year," features Gerard Way in the background— you can hear them sing the song together at Hellfest 2003 here. The band reportedly discouraged their audience from purchasing the EP, which had been released in part as an obligation to release something under Victory, and to download the song instead. 


 

War All the Time (2003)

Things only got busier for Thursday from there. They had reached a level of success that was previously unheard of in the post-hardcore scene, and the pressure that came with that was starting to take its toll. They spent eight months in the studio working on their third album and major-label debut War All The Time, determined to perfect it. The only time they weren’t in the studio was when they were playing shows and taking short tours. It was an arduous process that lacked a lot of the fun and innocence that their earlier writing sessions had. The studio was windowless and without airflow, and Geoff took to secretly sleeping in a storage room overnight, where a stray cat would sleep on his chest—not only was Geoff sleeping poorly, but he was allergic to the cat, which only made the process more unpleasant. Tom (lead guitar) recounts spending entire weeks playing the same section of a song over and over with slightly different amp and pedal combinations, looking for the perfect tone, and Tucker (drums) had to record three flawless takes of every single song, rather than just one.

Meanwhile, their live performances were also coming under more intense scrutiny. Geoff had grown up ensconced in the DIY hardcore scene of New Jersey and New York, where community was valued above individual success and musical talent didn’t matter nearly as much as an emotional and sincere delivery. Though the other members of Thursday grew talented at their instruments remarkably quickly, Geoff began to face criticism for his admittedly raw and untrained vocals now that Thursday was headlining tours of 2000-3000 capacity venues. He even earned the nickname “Tone Geoff”—as in tone deaf.

In response, Island Records hired a prestigious vocal coach for Geoff. Geoff was initially resistant, because he resented the implication that the label was trying to change him or make him into something he wasn’t, but eventually ceded that he wanted to be able to sing better—he’d started to feel like he was holding the rest of the band back, its sole musically untalented member. The coach hired by Island was highly exclusive, which scared Geoff—he cost about $250 a session, twice a week, and had only four other students: PJ Harvey, Bono, Mick Jagger, and Christina Aguilera. Geoff had grown up listening to U2 records, and PJ Harvey was his musical idol, who he’d wanted to sing like his whole life. When Geoff struggled during lessons, the coach would tell him Geoff was his only student who couldn’t get it.

The vocal lessons did help Geoff’s voice improve, but also brought new difficulties—first, they were a blow to Geoff’s confidence, and, second, Geoff’s increased vocal range meant the songs on War All The Time were even more difficult to perform live.

🕊️ Sidebar: In July of 2003, Thursday’s tour bus was struck by lightning in the middle of their drive to a gig in Ohio. It scared all of them deeply, especially Tucker, who had been driving at the time, and Geoff, who referenced a lot of that emotion in the writing of War All The Time. This isn’t that important, or even an event that gets referenced a lot, but it does go to show the kinds of awful, near-death shit that always seemed to find Thursday.🕊️

Geoff, Tucker, and Tim in 2003. Photo by Justin Borucki.

War All The Time was finally released in September 2003, and by then Geoff had grown to hate the album. It was dense, claustrophobic, and packed tight with lyrics—at the time, Geoff regretted the wordiness, considering it poor writing that left no breathing room, but in hindsight he came to appreciate the album for what it is. He describes it as claustrophobic and dense, an album without any release. He attributes this partially to the arduous and uncomfortable time in the studio, saying, “when I hear the record I think there’s a quality of that. It is like a never ending struggle record.”

But then War All The Time sold 80,000 copies in the first week, and debuted at Number 7 on the charts. The band was utterly blown away; such a thing had never seemed within the realm of possibility for a band like theirs.

The high wouldn’t last long. 80,000 records sounded like a lot to Thursday—Full Collapse had eventually sold 100,000 copies, which was informally referred to as “indie platinum,” but Island’s expectations were much higher. Their album sales dropped off dramatically after that first week, and War All The Time ended up barely outselling Full Collapse despite having exponentially more spent on it.

With this hanging over their heads, Thursday hit the road. They toured extensively with Year Of The Rabbit and Death By Stereo, then Thrice and Coheed and Cambria. The year following War All The Time’s release, they played 300 shows, had maybe 50 days off while on the road, and just 7 days at home. Though the album underperformed commercially, the tour itself sold wonderfully, and audiences were very dedicated and often knew all the words—War All The Time, as it turned out, was in part an early victim of online downloading, before labels had figured out how to take advantage of downloading platforms.

On top of this rigorous schedule, the songs from War All The Time were more vocally challenging—though Geoff’s vocal lessons paid off on the studio recording, he began to struggle more and more on tour. On Thanksgiving, they were booked to play on the Late Night Show with Conan O’Brian—as Geoff puts it, this was “like, the biggest show you can play on Thanksgiving.” By the time the performance came around, Geoff’s voice was completely shot, to the point where it was painful to sing. Thursday played their single, the title track "War All The Time", and Geoff physically couldn’t hit the notes. It was a turning point. “It really did some psychological damage,” said Geoff, “and from that point forward, I basically started trying to break the band up over and over again.” You can hear him discuss the incident, and his experience with Island’s vocal coach, in this podcast clip.

Tucker, Geoff, Tom, Andrew, Tim, and Steve after an acoustic set at the Apple Store in SoHo, NYC, October 2003. Photo by Paul Hawthorne.

 

Almost the End (2004)

Spring and summer 2004 nearly destroyed the band and ended their careers. As they continued this incredibly demanding tour schedule, health issues and interpersonal problems began cropping up within the band. Geoff, in particular, faced major health scares, although he wasn't alone in struggling; he and several other members were battling drug addictions that their lifestyle only encouraged.

In January, they attended the Big Day Out Festival in Australia, where the band's dysfunction came to a head. Some band members were barely on speaking terms, although instead of fighting, they were all just complaining about each other behind their backs. Andrew Everding, who was their touring keyboardist but not yet an official member of the band, ended up taking on a second unofficial role as the band counselor, with everyone going to him to vent about each other and sometimes talk about quitting the band. According to the band’s A&R rep at Island, Ben Lazar, Thursday’s single worst problem and biggest threat was the way they didn’t communicate with each other.

🕊️ Sidebar—yep, another near-death experience: On this same Australian tour, the commercial plane Thursday were traveling on—along with other bands like The Mars Volta, Poison the Well, and The Flaming Lips—crash-landed by the runway. Nobody was injured, but the plane plummeted a good distance and approached the runway on its side, wing pointing at the ground—for a moment, everyone was genuinely convinced they were about to die. When they called their label to recount what happened, they were told, “It’s a shame you didn’t die, you would have been huge!” Given the label’s prior treatment of Thursday, Geoff took this to heart. Also, Tim was so shaken up by the event that he semi-quit touring—though he remains an official member of the band today, from this point onward he would often sit out their longer, farther tours. 🕊️

Thursday (L to R: Tucker, Steve, Geoff, Tim, Tom) at Big Day Out 2004. From Kill the House Lights (2007 documentary)

Then, most of that Spring, Geoff thought he was dying. He suffered through debilitating stomach pain, he bruised at almost nothing, and doctors discovered that he was bleeding internally. Singing, especially the screaming that Thursday’s song required of him, took a heavy toll on his throat, which was much more vulnerable to bruising and tearing than normal. The issue apparently stemmed from an intense allergic reaction to a medication for Geoff’s newly discovered epilepsy, although this diagnosis wasn’t discovered until later. A doctor even told Geoff he might have stomach cancer before they found the true cause. (This experience would later inspire the song “You Were The Cancer” on their fifth album, Common Existence.)

🕊️Sidebar: Around this time, Geoff started delegating most of the screaming to Andrew Everding, who was at that point only a permanent touring member of the band. This continued until Geoff started receiving vocal lessons from well-known screaming coach Melissa Cross. You can read about her here. 🕊️

These problems came to a head at Coachella 2004, when Geoff performed against doctor’s orders, despite coughing up blood and being in serious pain. They had to cut their set short after Geoff essentially collapsed. Here are some pictures from that set:

Geoff Rickly performing at Coachella 2004, before his collapse. Photos by J. Shearer and Barry Brecheisen, respectively.

That June, Thursday embarked on Warped Tour 2004. Another nail in the coffin came from above: Island's upper management changed hands, and this trickled down until the team of people that signed Thursday left the label—ironically, most of them for Warner (which, as you may know, My Chemical Romance had recently signed to). Thursday initially chose Island as opposed to other major labels because they felt like their team genuinely understood Thursday's values and message. With that team gone, Thursday was essentially stuck on a label that didn't know what to do with them. The new CEO, Antonio "L.A." Reid (he'll show up again later), came to see Thursday perform at Warped 2004 and was blown away by their performance. He thought Geoff was a true rockstar, and approached the band to tell them so, and that all they needed was to hire a songwriter. Thursday, deeply offended, rejected the suggestion. Not only was it disheartening to hear, but Geoff claims that from then on, the upper management of Island effectively withdrew much of their support and lost interest in promoting them.

Disillusioned with their label and beaten down by health scares, Thursday re-evaluated their priorities and decided that a semi-permanent hiatus might be the thing they needed to prevent their imminent self-destruction. Here’s what Geoff had to say about that in this interview with MTV: “All at once we realized that we hadn't done anything in our lives other than tour. Nothing at all. We hadn't taken care of friends and marriages and families. The band was having a lot of tension within itself.”

Warped Tour 2004 was supposed to be part one of their farewell tour. Several other bands that were close friends of theirs, such as My Chemical Romance, Taking Back Sunday, Piebald, and the Bouncing Souls, joined them on the tour. Deciding to quit was like releasing a pressure valve, so they could enjoy themselves again.

Warped Tour 2004. Photo possibly taken by Justin Borucki?

At the end of Warped 2004, Geoff got married to his partner Shelly. They were married on the last day of Thursday’s Warped stint by Elvis in Vegas, accompanied by a wedding party of the Thursday guys, My Chemical Romance, Taking Back Sunday, and the Bouncing Souls.

With that, Thursday left for part two of their farewell tour: supporting the Cure in the festival tour Curiosa, which Robert Smith personally requested they join. This was especially meaningful to a band that had taken such inspiration from the Cure and other goth bands.

When Curiosa ended in late August, Thursday officially took a break, but they were second-guessing their choice to fully break up. The summer had gone well, and without the pressure of performing at their best, or the anxiety of an endless future without rest from touring, Thursday found themselves able to enjoy touring and being creative together again. Once they decided that Thursday wasn’t over, the band officially asked Andrew to join as a permanent member of the line-up.

Thursday took the rest of the year off except to play their annual holiday show, and Geoff started to tell the world that Thursday was still on its feet. You can read that announcement here.


The Hiatus (2005)

The members of Thursday took almost the entirety of 2005 off to rest and recuperate from years of intense touring that exacerbated relationship and substance abuse problems. The 2005 hiatus was badly needed, and interviews from the time depict this time as successful in alleviating some of the internal strife caused by these unchecked issues. Of course, many of these problems went deep, and were only momentarily addressed by the hiatus before rearing their heads later on the band’s history.

Since War All The Time was such a stressful writing and recording experience, Thursday used their free time to not rush through writing their next album. All or at least most of the band lived together for a while in early 2005 to start writing and recording the demos for their next record.

 

A City By the Light Divided (2006)

The writing done during Thursday’s 2005 hiatus would later become A City By The Light Divided. Six of the demos from this time (including “At This Velocity”), by the way, surfaced on the internet prior to their official release when an iPod that contained the tracks was stolen.

Disagreements cropped up among Thursday about the direction to take the music in—half the band wanted to go in a more artsy, cerebral direction, and the other favored a more anthemic, heavy sound. Geoff wanted to get a bit wild. He had a plan to spite their major label by writing an insanely heavy record and giving it away for free. The rest of Thursday wasn’t on board with the idea, so Geoff formed another band in Thursday’s downtime—an experimental tongue-in-cheek punk/thrash band called United Nations, though they wouldn’t release their first album until 2008.

In the meantime, Thursday spent an entire year slowly writing their next record while they played a few shows and searched for the right producer. In the end, they decided to go for a more experimental, atmospheric sound, partly in reaction to the explosion of bands like My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy and the rise of so-called ‘mall emo,’ a subculture which Thursday was erroneously associated with by the people marketing their music. They wanted to create “the heaviest indie rock record ever.” They ended up working with Dave Fridmann because they were intrigued by some of his previous work, such as Sleater-Kinney’s The Woods.

Steve, Andrew, Geoff, Tom, and Tucker at Live 105's BFD Festival in California, June 2006. Photo by Tim Mosenfelder.

Despite their best efforts to not repeat their War All The Time experience, the writing of the fourth studio album was not always harmonious. They were once again having fun in the studio like they had during the recording of Full Collapse, but disagreements within the band regarding the sound never completely dissolved. This is why the first and second half, divided by an instrumental track, are quite sonically distinct. Geoff in particular clashed with Fridmann, who tended to bury Geoff’s vocals behind layers of instruments and distortion, a departure from the rawness of Thursday’s sound.

Again—as is a common theme in this band’s history—Thursday’s relationship with their label was struggling. They were largely left to their own devices to write A City By The Light Divided, and they felt like nobody there was really on their side.

🕊️ Sidebar: When the album was nearly complete, Geoff was called into CEO L.A. Reid’s office for a meeting. Geoff had been having major relationship issues with his then-wife, which the record deals with in part, and they’d started talking about getting a divorce. Reid asked Geoff to tell him about the divorce, and when Geoff started talking, opened up a copy of the New York Times so it shielded his entire face and began reading. Geoff trailed off into speaking nonsense and received no reaction; he believes this was the label’s way of telling them that they didn’t care what Thursday did or had to say, no matter how sincere, after they’d turned down the offer Reid had made at Warped 2004 to hire external songwriters. After having been told by their indie label Victory that Thursday couldn’t write a good single, and losing the team who they felt understood their mission on their major label Island, this was a major hit to morale. Geoff recounts wondering if Thursday would ever have a label that actually liked them. 🕊️

“Counting 5-4-3-2-1” was released as the lead single on April 11 (watch the corresponding music video here) to an overall lukewarm reaction. Many fans considered it too poppy, as if the band were trying too hard to write a radio single. At the same time, Thursday had to drop out of the Taste of Chaos tour as Geoff fell too ill to sing with a stomach flu.

A City by the Light Divided was released on May 2. Despite the rocky road, Thursday were very proud of the album they released, and though it wasn’t immediately embraced by much of their fanbase, its popularity has grown greatly in hindsight.

Unfortunately, Island didn’t agree. They were once again unhappy with its commercial performance—this time, it took a month to sell 80,000 copies. Two months after its release, Island essentially ghosted the album, considering it a failure. They no longer promoted it and they withdrew tour support for Thursday, leaving them once again struggling for money.

The summer of 2006, Thursday joined Warped Tour for their fourth and final time as a full band (Geoff would return later as a solo artist). The tour isn’t incredibly notable, except that this is when attendance at Thursday shows started to notably decrease, and that one of the most iconic pictures of Geoff was taken. In the picture, his nose is bleeding profusely, which happened after he hit himself in the face with his mic during a performance of Understanding in A Car Crash. See the picture, and watch the video of it happening here.

Geoff performing with a broken nose at Warped Tour 2006. Photo by Jesse DeFlorio.

Exit From Island

Thursday spent the six months following the release of A City by the Light Divided negotiating an exit from Island. They were sick of everything that came with being on a major label, and especially sick of feeling like their label didn’t like or understand them. In the end, Island finally said that they wanted to put out another album with Thursday, and that with a few changes to their attitude they could be as big as Fall Out Boy or The Killers (also Island bands), but that they were free to leave if they really wanted. They gave Thursday the holidays to consider the offer. On January 1st, Thursday unanimously agreed to ditch Island as fast as they could. After this, Thursday purposely remained label-free for over a year, wanting to leave behind the music industry and get back to their roots—being in a band because they loved music and wanted to create something worthwhile with other people.

Kill the House Lights (2007)

However, in a surprise move, Thursday actually returned to work with their old indie label Victory once more. They (briefly) reconciled with Tony Brummel to film and release Kill the House Lights documentary, along with an EP of the same name and various live recordings. You can watch the documentary on YouTube here, as well as some fun little behind the scenes bonus clips here and here.

On October 7, 2007, the music video for “Ladies and Gentlemen, My Brother the Failure”, a song from the Kill the House Lights EP which features Tim Kasher of Cursive, premiered. We’ve bolded it here, not because it’s particularly important in the grand scheme of things but because it’s a banger and you should listen to the song and watch the video.

Touring Issues (2007-2008)

In the period after Island dropped them and Kill The House Lights was released, Thursday could not afford to tour as much as they usually did with all the funds required to sever their ties with Island. In fact, they were so broke that they couldn’t afford to pay for a tour manager, so Andrew Everding assumed that role for around 2007-2009.

Thursday toured with My Chemical Romance for a few weeks in February and March of 2007, culminating in two sold-out shows at Wembley Stadium, before joining them and others for Bamboozle Festival in early May. After this, another short tour with Portugal the Man and Circle Takes The Square in late 2007, and Soundwave Festival 2008, Thursday found themselves at home for more time than they’d experienced since their brief hiatus in 2005.

In the downtime they had between short stints on the road, the members had to find alternate sources of income. Geoff freelanced, Steve made DVDs for Kid Rock and Simple Plan, Andrew did guitar tech for Panic! at the Disco (among other bands), Tucker toured with MCR (the Pacific leg of the Black Parade World Tour in January of 2008), and Tim painted houses for a high-end contractor (sometimes with Tom).

Signing with Epitaph (2008)

After over a year after their separation from Island and considering countless possible new homes, Thursday chose Epitaph Records as their new label in September 2008.

They were a strange fit for Epitaph, whose other bands at the time were mostly punk and pop-punk, and Thursday was going in a much more experimental direction, but its owner (and Bad Religion guitarist) Brett Gurewitz told Thursday he believed in their vision, and wanted them to be able to return to their socially conscious and politically outspoken roots. After years of bad experiences with labels who didn’t care what Thursday had to say, just how well they performed commercially, they accepted. They were really happy to be on an indie again and all really admired the work that Epitaph had produced.

Thursday/Envy Split Record (2008)

In November 2008, Thursday released a split EP with Japanese post-hardcore/thrash metal band Envy. You can listen to that record here. It was released on Temporary Residence, an indie hardcore label that Geoff had always admired, especially for their work with Envy. The story of the split goes that Geoff met the owner of Temporary Residence after an Envy show and, while they both helped the staff sweep the floor of the venue, told him he’d like to help out in any way he could. The owner was unimpressed, until Geoff revealed that he was in Thursday, and so they went on to organize a split. In the creation of the LP, the rest of Thursday took a step back and let Geoff control the direction of the music since he was still disappointed by certain elements of City. The Thursday/Envy split was generally well-received.

This year, Geoff also returned to working in earnest with his other part-band, part-art project United Nations. They released their self-titled album on Eyeball Records with a great deal of spectacle—starting with debuting as the number one artist on the MySpace frontpage, and culminating with cease and desists from both The Beatles and the real United Nations. It’s a great story, but one for another day.

Common Existence (2009)

After legal battles and the withdrawal of support from Island, followed by their jump to Epitaph, Thursday still got back in the studio in 2008 to start writing and recording their fifth studio album. Though Geoff was hesitant to do so, the rest of Thursday convinced him to work again with Dave Fridmann, who had produced A City By The Light Divided. They rented a warehouse space in North Bergen, NJ to start recording Common Existence. They later described this recording process as really intense, “marked by six-day work-weeks and lengthy practices, which tested each member’s individual level of commitment.” This was typical for their writing and recording process but it was an approach they would abandon for their last album.

On February 17 2009, Common Existence was released on Epitaph. Its reception was generally positive. The sound is a little darker than past albums. The content of the lyrics was a little less introspective than Thursday’s past music, focusing on the theme that people everywhere share fundamental experiences. As one reviewer put it, “every event in our lives that is unique to us has already been experienced by someone else, somewhere in the world. Our trials, our love, our failures are all common to humanity. This is our common existence.”

Here’s what Geoff had to say about the album: "I just liked the idea that the record is about the shared existence of people in general. It's not so much 'me, me, me and my personal story.’ I feel like so much punk rock right now is turned inward and it's like an outgrowing of emo becoming mainstream music. I really wanted to say it's just the same thing everybody goes through — that's 'common existence.' That's what life is. No one needs to get worked up about it." (Source)

In conjunction with the album, Thursday released one single, "Resuscitation of a Dead Man,” for which a music video was produced and released on December 9, 2008. You can watch that here, and a fun behind-the-scenes clip here. They also released a music video for “Circuits of Fever,” which you can watch here.

At thursdayarchive, we love Common Existence, though Geoff does not look back on this period of Thursday’s history fondly. He remarked that he felt that the album was them trying too hard to be people that they weren’t and associates it with “how fucking horrible I felt about being in Thursday.” (Source)

Because Geoff likes to keep himself busy, he also started a label of his own, called Collect Records. He had previously helped run an Eyeball imprint called Astro Magnetics (alongside Alex Saveedra and Marc Debiak, whose brother Dave is now in Electric Century with Mikey Way of MCR fame. New Jersey hardcore is a small world.), so he had some experience in the business. Given Thursday’s difficult history with their labels, Geoff put a lot of work into creating the most ethical, artist-first label he possibly could. United Nations also began playing shows this year, starting with one on the day of President Barack Obama’s inauguration.

Taste of Chaos (2009)

After months of nonexistent tour support and meager show offerings, Thursday was by all accounts excited to embark on Taste of Chaos 2009, which they were headlining.

This optimism didn’t last long. Other bands in supporting positions on the tour were Bring Me the Horizon, Pierce the Veil, Cancer Bats, and Four Year Strong. Such a lineup essentially set Thursday up to fail, as they did not match the other bands stylistically, nor did they reach the same audience. Thursday struggled to compete with their openers. Particularly Bring Me the Horizon and Pierce the Veil had amassed an incredible audience online, mainly of young people who had not been around for Thursday’s heyday to understand that their name on promotions meant anything more than the day of the week.

Andrew, Tom, and Geoff with members of Pierce the Veil, Bring Me The Horizon, Cancer Bats, and Four Year Strong at a meet and greet in Florida at Taste of Chaos 2009. Photo by Christine Gunn.

Members of Thursday on multiple occasions described the tour as one of the most disheartening, soul-crushing, and humiliating experiences they’d ever gone through as a band. During many shows, most of the audience cleared out before Thursday’s (the headliner) set. The younger members of the supporting acts talked openly about Thursday’s influence on their music, though (according to Geoff, at least) they had only taken shallow inspiration from Thursday’s musical sound, completely sidelining the literary intentions behind their lyrics or the values guiding their actions. Even more humiliating was Thursday’s contractual obligation to sit in a Denny’s for hours after each mortifying performance and do meet and greets with people who had no idea who they were.

Here’s a quote from Tom about the psychological impact of that tour (source):

“It was literally worse than the worst nightmare I've ever had about being in the band. By far. I have a lot of anxiety dreams about being on stage. Gear breaking, At the beginning of a song there's all these people, and part way through the song half the crowd leaves. There was shows on that tour where literally 90% of the crowd would leave. It was terrifying. Such a bum out. We talked to Kevin Lyman about it and he said ‘I wanna teach that band about respecting their elders’. There is no respect for them to have for us after seeing that happen. What's the point? We wanted to flip-flop so bad. Everyone thought doing Taste of Chaos would be a great idea around the time of Common Existence. Ended up being one of the worst ever presented to our band.  At the end of the day, we made it through and took a bunch of months to be like ‘I'm never doing that again.' "
 

Thursday barely toured the following year, 2010. Most members were too busy with their day jobs, which were necessary after years of struggling financially in Thursday, especially now that some members were married and having children. Geoff, for example, worked part-time in food service and retail jobs while also remaining busy with his other band, United Nations, which released another controversial and provocative EP and did a brief tour.

No Devolución (2011)

After years of almost quitting and getting sidetracked by various disasters, Thursday entered the studio in mid-2010 knowing that the album they produced during this session would likely be the last they made all together. This prospect was both relieving and devastating to a band that had spent over ten years, and almost all of their adulthood, writing and touring together.

The members have described their last studio session together as liberating and terrifying and emotional. Once again, Dave Fridmann produced the record. In past recording processes, Thursday approached writing like a nine-to-five job, spending long hours in the studio for weeks and months on end to perfect their vision (by which we mean Geoff’s vision) for the music. This time, however, they decided to shorten their writing process significantly.

Thursday tried to reschedule their initial studio session with Fridmann because they hadn’t been able to write and had no songs prepared. Fridmann gave them an ultimatum: enter the studio with him at the initial agreed date, or he wouldn’t work with them. They felt betrayed, and Fridmann explained that they were the most chronically over-prepared band he’d ever worked with, and told them they sucked all the life out of their songs through perfectionism before even entering the studio. So they agreed, and ended up writing the entire album in just two weeks—the band would jam in the morning, break for lunch, and in the afternoon there would be a full song for Geoff to take away and add lyrics to. After that, they’d record it. Geoff says it and Full Collapse remain the two albums he’s most proud of, in the end.

Notably, Andrew played a larger role in the writing process than he had for past albums. He wrote the music for three or four full songs that made it on the record, and the others followed his lead in transforming what he’d written into fully developed songs.

This record became No Devolución, and it was released April 12, 2011 to largely universal critical acclaim.

The sound of the new record turned out darker and more atmospheric than the music they had produced in the past, which pleasantly surprised many reviewers. The lyric content surrounds themes of devotion, legacy, and home, largely inspired by Geoff’s recent divorce, which had finalized after a five-year process around the time that the album was recorded.

Most reviewers commented on the total transformation of Thursday’s music, which had a lot to do with the radical difference in their approach to the music writing process. Notably, Geoff relinquished the control he had traditionally had over the music and let the rest of the band write and record the rest of the music themselves.

Here’s what Tom had to say about that: “At first it was jarring. I kinda felt like he was giving up ownership of the record. Which wasn't the case. There was moments when I had heard when he said that and thought ‘Oh so this is your way if the record flops you can wash your hands of it and not be responsible of what we're making?’ He tends to think he is a detrimentally neurotic element in our band. It's no more true for him then anyone else in the band. I feel like we are all on par with each other. He said to me ‘I just don't want to keep you guys naturally growing musicians because I'm scared of something.’ Which is strange because I think he's such a fantastic artist.”

Prior to the full release of No Devolución, Thursday released three singles: “Magnets Caught In A Metal Heart,” “Past and Future Ruins,” and “No Answers.” “Magnets” got its own music video, referencing the paper art used on the album cover. You can watch that here.

🕊️Sidebar: In honor of the ten-year anniversary of Full Collapse, Thursday toured for a few months at the beginning of 2011, playing that album through. They revisited this concept for the ten-year anniversary of No Devolución in 2021, which coincided with the twenty-year anniversary of Full Collapse. :) 🕊️

After the release of No Devolución in April 2011, Thursday embarked on a fairly robust tour, their first extensive tour since 2009, and their last until their reunion in 2016, knowing that this tour would likely be their last. Notably, they provided support for My Chemical Romance’s World Contamination Tour in the Spring, and for Taking Back Sunday in the Summer before playing at Soundwave Fest in September.

Thursday opening for My Chemical Romance on the World Contamination Tour, May 2011.

First Breakup (2011)

They announced their breakup in November 2011, which had been a long time coming. Everyone was a mess—Steve recounts randomly breaking down in tears during rehearsals. One rehearsal, Geoff stopped and said into the microphone, “This isn’t working, is it?” Just like that, it was decided. At the time, Geoff was the most fatalistic about it, and genuinely didn’t believe the band would ever play again after their breakup tour, though other members like Steve recount an immediate sense of relief after the decision, like a burden was off their shoulders, and they were able to appreciate their final shows together.

Tom, Lukas Previn (regular tour stand-in for Tim on bass), and Steve on tour in 2011. Photo by Dave Summers.

They played their last American show together on December 30, 2011, almost thirteen years to the date since their first real show in the basement of 331 Somerset on December 31, 1998.

Geoff at one of Thursday's set of final shows at the Starland Ballroom, NJ, in December 2011. Photo by Keeyahtay Lewis.

In 2012, they played a final scattering of shows, most of them in Australia, before they officially disbanded in the Spring, citing burnout and personal health issues as primary factors.

The Interim Years (2012-2016)

Thursday broke up, but its members all kept themselves busy with their families, with side projects, and with their various day jobs. We won’t go into detail in the interests of keeping this (relatively) short, since Thursday has…a lot of members. We’ll focus mainly on Geoff, since his career has been the most public-facing, and he has spoken at length about his experiences in interviews. Also because his life is pretty messed up.

Geoff

Alright, buckle up.

Geoff continued to expand his label, Collect Records. He had big dreams for it, and interest from a lot of exciting artists, and recruited Norman Brannon from Texas Is The Reason as a business partner. He just needed the money to get the label on its feet, since his artist-first ethical business model wasn’t exactly profitable. In fact, Geoff was struggling to even make rent, and was simultaneously dealing with an addiction issue.

In mid-2013, he was mugged and robbed at knifepoint while walking alone through a Brooklyn park. The mugger took basically everything Geoff had to his name. To make rent, Geoff put some personal items up for auction, including the acoustic guitar he originally wrote Full Collapse on. He was contacted on Twitter by a wealthy fan who offered to buy the guitar for $10,000. This was a lifeline for Geoff, and he met up with the fan over coffee. One thing led to another, and he ended up becoming a silent investor in Collect—he had no hand in the actual business and received no return for his investment, letting Geoff do whatever he wanted as long as he continued working with cool artists. In all, he donated about $700,000 to the label, and Geoff had plans for a year of big flagship releases in 2016 that would earn that money back so he could get the label standing on its own two feet and stop relying on these donations.

In the meantime, he spent a while touring his solo acoustic record, including Warped Tour 2012, where he got in a bus crash where, miraculously, nobody was seriously injured. You can hear about that on this podcast clip. He also continued working with United Nations, playing a few shows in early 2013, then releasing another full-length record in July 2014 and touring with it.

Geoff Rickly on his acoustic tour in 2012. Photo by Keeyahtay Lewis.

He also started planning a new band, No Devotion, along with most of the former members of Lostprophets, who had severed ties with their previous vocalist following his arrest. We won’t go into detail here, but the band was extremely shaken up as the allegations against him came to light (you can read about it here, but beware of triggering csa content), and knew they could either forge ahead immediately with a new band or never be able to face playing again. Following his incarceration, they chose to continue with No Devotion, and played a few shows in the United Kingdom in July 2014, to positive reviews.

Following some turbulence with tours canceled due to illnesses and lineup changes due to the personal circumstances of band members, they got back on their feet in 2015. They completed a UK tour and announced their first album, which would be released on Geoff’s label, Collect Records. In August, they headed to Germany, and stepped off the plane into the airport to disaster.

No Devotion. Notably, Stu Richardson (top left) is Thursday's current touring bassist.

Remember that wealthy fan who was a silent investor in Collect? Yeah, that was Martin Shkreli—you know, the “pharma bro” who very famously hiked the price of life-saving AIDS medication by 5000%. Not long after, the news dropped that he’d invested in Collect, a label founded on punk ethos, and most of the artists signed to the label (understandably) walked out. Though it ruined him financially (he’s still paying off debt related to the dissolution of Collect today), Geoff gave them his blessing—given Thursday’s terrible experience on Victory, he’d written into every artist’s contract that they were allowed to leave with full ownership of their records at any time.

And because this wasn’t enough bad luck for Geoff, days after the Shkreli situation made international headlines, Geoff was roofied, mugged, and robbed (yeah, again) in a bar in Germany. He ended up in hospital and No Devotion canceled their show that night. Their album dropped in September, and though it received positive reviews and even won the 2016 Kerrang! Album of the Year award, its release was overshadowed by the Shkreli news. It eventually disappeared from streaming services including Spotify, though you can listen to it on Bandcamp, and it is intended for a re-release soon.

Tucker

Tucker kept himself busy as a touring drummer and occasional studio drummer. Notably, shortly after Thursday disbanded and he was in need of cash, he got a call from his friend about auditioning to be a touring drummer for a British band called The Wanted. Assuming this to be some kind of punk band, Tucker enthusiastically agreed, only to discover he was actually auditioning to tour with the boy band of “Glad You Came” fame. Tucker, unpretentious as always, was unbothered by this (not to mention pleased to have an actual stable salary), and said he greatly enjoyed the experience and remains close friends with the band. You can see him play in the background of numerous television appearances, such as this one.

He also toured with a number of other bands, including Yellowcard and iconic punk band Murphy’s Law. He also joined rock band I Hate Our Freedom in 2012 (for which Steve directed a music video), and then Frank Iero and the Future Violents in 2018.

Tucker Rule performing in I Hate Our Freedom in 2014. Photo by Ashley Nicole.

Steve

Steve, who is the only member of Thursday who had already finished his degree before the band took off, returned his focus to film. While in Thursday, he’d filmed and/or directed numerous music videos and live recordings for bands, and after Thursday ended he worked on a number of TV shows as a cinematographer and cameraman, mainly HGTV food programs.

Also, not long after Thursday broke up, he came out to his bandmates, after years of being closeted to everyone but one or two close friends. He credits this as part of the reason he was “such a mess” before the band broke up, because it had built to a point where it weighed over everything. He says he often found his situation a little funny: he was in a band that openly espoused LGBT rights, singing backup vocals for songs like Paris in Flames that actively addressed homophobia, but none of his bandmates knew he was actually gay. Steve is private and taciturn by nature, and the rest of the band genuinely assumed he just wasn’t interested in dating. He and Geoff discuss this with Norman Brannon on this episode of Geoff’s podcast, where they both look back and laugh on Steve coming out to the band during a meeting after they’d agreed to break up, as if it was a note on the laundry list of things they needed to address that day. In 2016, Steve returned to music, joining a band called States & Kingdoms.

Tom, Tim, and Andrew

These three got grouped together because their post-breakup activities were much less in the public eye than Geoff, Tucker, and Steve. During this time period, they all continued their music to an extent and otherwise focused on their families.

Andrew, for example, had gained a reputation for being a talented multi-instrumentalist while in Thursday. In 2014, he accompanied Neil Finn while he was touring Dizzy Heights, an album Andrew had helped Dave Friddman produce. You can see him play with Neil Finn and his band here.

Neil Finn, Dave Fridmann, and Andrew Everding at Tarbox Road Studios, 2012.

Reunion (2016)

Despite Geoff believing it would never happen, Thursday reunited in 2016. It started with them just getting together in rooms and spending time as friends again—as they often say, Thursday’s members are even more of a family than is normal for long-running bands to be. Tim married Steve’s sister, and Tom named his son after Tucker (with whom he had been best friends since high school). Having taken some time apart to reevaluate their priorities, they were able to come back and be a band again.

This time, a few things were different: first of all, Geoff got clean after several attempts and a stint at an experimental rehab program. While he was in rehab, the rest of the band got together and hired a new tour manager, Paul Clegg, which Geoff credits as “the best decision we ever made.” And, perhaps most importantly, they all agreed that Thursday would no longer be their top priority. Everyone agreed that Thursday wouldn’t be their “day job,” and that they would all have a reliable alternate source of income, so nobody was financially dependent on the band’s success. They also started writing together again occasionally, but they agreed to not put pressure on themselves and only do it for enjoyment, and still have no plans to actually release new music.

Their first reunion show was an aftershow at the Wrecking Ball festival in Atlanta on August 13, 2016. It’s an absolutely incredible performance, which you can watch here. They played a handful of other festivals, as well as returning to their old tradition of playing holiday shows around New Year’s Eve in the Starland Ballroom in New Jersey.

Geoff and Jeremy Bolm of Touché Amoré (a band whose career Geoff helped establish), and Tucker (background) at Thursday's 2016 reunion show at the Wrecking Ball festival. Photo by Elena de Soto.

Reunion Tour (2017-2018)

Thursday continued on their extensive reunion tour throughout 2017 and 2018, albeit with a touring lineup subject to slight change (Tim, for example, was replaced on bass at most dates by Stu Richardson, Geoff’s No Devotion bandmate). They played a bunch of shows with Touché Amoré, an LA band who grew up idolizing Thursday and had since befriended Geoff, who was instrumental in getting their careers started and had released some of their albums on his label (Geoff considered them his protégés, and the final track on No Devolucion, “Stay True,” was addressed to them). Later in the year, they also toured with bands such as PUP, and lots of old friends like mewithoutYou, Frank Iero and the Patience, and Pianos Become the Teeth.

2018 saw them heading overseas for the first time since 2012, as they toured Australia with Quicksand, a band they’d always idolized (Tucker, in particular, essentially taught himself to drum by playing along with Quicksand records). They played a couple of European dates, and then in October 2018 announced a second (this time amicable) breakup, following a final string of shows that continued into 2019 where they would play their two most “iconic” albums, Full Collapse and War All the Time, in full over two nights. Their 2019 tour also featured a few dates with Frank Iero and the Future Violents.

Geoff at one of their shows performing Full Collapse in full in San Francisco, January 2019. Photo by Shawn Robbins.

In late 2019, Thursday was asked to join their longtime friends in My Chemical Romance and open on December 20, the first show of their reunion tour. MCR didn't consider anyone else  to open for their show besides Thursday, who had played such a major role in the start of the band. Thursday was technically still "broken up" at this point but were honored and immediately agreed. According to Geoff, this show was a departure from all previous shows, as they weren't there to win over the audience, but to hype them up for MCR. This was fine by them; even after everything, Thursday still values community through music above all.

They envisioned this to be one of their last shows together.

Second Reunion (2020-present)

Thursday weren’t intending to reunite so soon, but in the wake of the music industry being completely shaken up by the COVID-19 pandemic, they felt like they wanted to give something back.

First, they converted all their recent unsold merch into facemasks to donate and raise money for businesses affected by lockdowns. In early 2020, they announced that they had signed to a new independent label, Velocity Records (along with Geoff’s other band, No Devotion, who now have their second album ready to be released once the worldwide vinyl shortage starts to improve).

They also announced three livestream concerts (on August 19 2020, December 29 2020, and May 14 2021) where they released a certain number of tickets and merch items for free for those who were unemployed during the pandemic. Each livestream was more elaborate than the last, with the second one including a number of special guests like Frank Iero from MCR, Travis Stever from Coheed and Cambria, Norman Brannon from Texas Is The Reason, and Walter Schreifels from Quicksand, and the third one featuring the first ever full playthrough of their final album, No Devolucion, in honor of its tenth anniversary.

As pandemic restrictions began easing across the US, Thursday tentatively announced short tours, with vaccination and mask requirements in place, beginning September 2021. Stu Richardson continued filling in for Tim Payne on bass, and Norman Brannon is still currently filling in for Tom Keeley. They played at a few festivals and then went on tour briefly with Taking Back Sunday. Their traditional New Year’s Eve holiday show was postponed after Tucker tested positive for COVID, but they hit the road again soon with Cursive, The Appleseed Cast, and Nate Bergmann.

Unfortunately, since one thing we know about Geoff is that he rarely catches a break, in San Francisco in February he fell off the stage while singing “A Hole in the World” and badly broke his foot. He finished the show sitting down, and then left directly to hospital, where he postponed the surgery he needed to play the next couple of shows as scheduled. He got surgery after returning home to Brooklyn, and within 48 hours was back on stage to perform their rescheduled holiday show (which you may have heard about because it featured Frank Iero on “Jet Black New Year”).

Left: The guitarist line-up at the annual holiday show at Starland Ballroom (postponed from December 2021 until Feb 27, 2022): Frank Iero of MCR, James Bowman of Against Me!, Norman Brannon of Texas is the Reason, and our own Steve.
Right: Tim, Tucker, and Frank Iero backstage at the Starland Ballroom.

As we post this primer, just after Geoff’s 43rd birthday, he has just been forced to cancel the last few shows of their current tour to get the recovery time he desperately needs following the surgery. Send him some love.

Norman Brannon and Geoff, performing with his leg propped up on a trolley in a cast. Photo by Lindsay McAndrew.