Few songs have cast a longer shadow over the present-day emo scene than American Football’s downtrodden 1999 gem “Never Meant.” Yet somehow, Gordon Withers was admittedly late to the American Football party. Closely affiliated with the Dischord label and best known for his work with Jawbox’s J. Robbins, Office Of Future Plans, Zach Barocas’ New Freedom Sound and numerous other projects, Withers has spent decades carving out a place for his unconventional string arrangements in the guitar-driven indie-rock space.
“By all accounts, I should’ve been listening to American Football right from the start,” he says. “After all, I grew up immersed in the post-hardcore and second-wave emo scenes. I was even into similar clean-tone groups at the time like Ativin, Karate, the Letter E and Tristeza. But American Football somehow occupied a complete personal musical blind spot.”
When Withers finally got around to listening to “Never Meant,” he naturally heard an intricate sonic architecture awaiting his cello. “It’s such a deeply unusual song to have become a generational anthem,” he says. “It’s beautiful and heartfelt, but also incredibly complex in its interlocking layers, odd time signatures and how it repeatedly phrases sections in measures of 10 instead of eight.”
Strings can serve as a unique vehicle for understanding these “complicated geometries,” says Withers. “After seeing how strongly American Football fans embraced cello riffs from ‘Never Meant’ on social media, a full arrangement of the song felt inevitable.”
We’re proud to premiere Gordon Withers’ cover of “Never Meant.” He’s dedicating his installment of Sweet Cheetah’s “Covers For A Cause” series to the Southern Poverty Law Center. Every digital purchase supports the organization’s ongoing civil-rights work.
—Hobart Rowland
