An interview with Joe Boynton of Transit
By Megan Fair


Transit is a pop punk band with a pinch of indie flare born out of the city of Boston, Massachusetts. Vocalist Joe Boynton opened up about Transit’s roots and what writing music means to the band. Although Boynton has a soft speaking voice, he definitely has a lot to say.  

Boston is a very musical city. Was it easy to break into the scene, or did you have to make your own way?

We started local, started really as a punk, hardcore band, and that was our “scene,” the North Shore scene. Basically everyone knew each other or met each other through friends or friends of other bands, and we’d play shows in VFW Halls, YMCAs, church basements, houses, garages, wherever, you know. That’s kinda where it started, everyone in the band, a lot of us have been going to local shows and supporting our local scene for about ten years, and that’s how I grew up. I grew up going to shows in Salem, MA, and I got to see a lot of bands that were my age at the time, when I was fourteen or fifteen, and that kind of influenced me to do this and be a part of this whole thing. That’s where we broke into it, and we really worked our way up from the very bottom. Our first tour, we drove our bassist’s SUV with merch boxes on our laps and equipment across everyone all stuffed in there together.

There must be a good band relationship when you can be crammed in there together and still get along!

We’ve literally been through it all, we’re like a band of brothers. We’ve been through everything together.

Your sound has definitely evolved on Listen & Forgive. Is this a direction we’re going to see on later records?

You’re never going to know the direction. It’s kind of like, we look at every record like it’s a movie. When you have a sequel to a movie or the next season of a show, the person making it doesn’t want to tell you where it’s going. We want it to be a surprise, we want the people who like the past records to also grow with it, it’s not like we’re trying to create a record and throw everyone off so they’ll be like “What is this, it doesn’t even sound like the same band!” but we just know that we kind of have to follow where it goes. We all listen to different bands, we all have different tastes in music, and we’re very influenced by what we listen to and watch and even the season and the temperature of where we’re living at the time. It’s like a big mass of just randomness, and it kind of just comes together and we follow where it’s taking us. We don’t really have a direction. We have a plot in mind, but the music makes itself and we’re just a part of it.

Listen & Forgive was very well received. Was this what you were expecting, or did you expect some high brows or different fan responses?

I don’t do it for other people, really. It’s not to sell McDonald’s or Burger King, it’s not Target brand, I don’t mean to shit on anyone, but this is what we do, and the music we write is just a representation of us through sound. It’s not like we’re specifically trying to do anything in particular. Like I said before, it’s like where our musical taste is going into and what we’re listening to at the time, so I’m really psyched that of all the albums we ever put out, this one has gotten the biggest response. We’re psyched on that! We want to share what we have to say with the world, and the more of the world we can share it with, the better. We’re very surprised and very blessed and lucky to have the opportunity.

What has been your greatest challenge as a band? 

Being away from family and friends and missing my life at home. Tour takes a big toll on you as a person, and I think that when I’m home I feel out of the loop. I have a cat at home, and sometimes I won’t be home for too long and it won’t remember me. You know what I mean? (Laughs) It looks at me like I’m a stranger. Tour is really hard on a person, especially when we came up and we’d all be driving the van and pulling overnight drives, not sleeping, not eating well, only really having fast food and truck stops to eat out of at the time. It’s been getting way better since the past few tours we’ve been doing, but before that it was hell. But we know this is what we want to do, so we just keep doing it.

On this tour, what can you not survive without?

Powerade, Gatorade, Pedialite, protein drinks, protein shakes, sun block, and pretty much just building up an arsenal, that’s why I always have this back pack with me.

If you could set up a dream tour that Transit would be a part of, who would you put on it?

This would never happen, and it doesn’t make much sense, American Football, Suicide File, which is a punk hardcore band from our area, Death Cab For Cutie, Rocky Votolato who’s an indie/folk musician from Seattle, he’s one of my favorites, and probably Cursive.

What can we expect from Transit in the next year?

We already started writing, we’re six songs deep into the next record, and I don’t want to tell you anything about it, really! I want it to be a surprise. We’ll be on the road a lot, and we’re putting out a video for “Skipping Stone,” the full band version recorded in the UK. We’re really excited about putting that out. And we’re putting out an EP, a  two song EP, which is the “Skipping Stone” full band and a remix of a song called “I Never Told That to Anyone,” but it’s going to be called “Told You So.” We’re just gonna be writing and constantly on the road until the winter, and then just putting out videos.