If It Rains are among the many bands that have emerged over the past couple of years, aiming to make their mark on modern hardcore.
Drawing on ’90s acts like Turning Point, they put their own spin on the sound. The style has seen a resurgence this year, with bands like Turn of Phrase and Feels Like Heaven, among others. I’ve been digging it, and I’m glad If It Rains are back with their new EP, All We’ve Got, following up 2025’s How’s It Going to End?
I reached out to my friend Evan Stein, vocalist of If It Rains, to talk about All We've Got, its unlikely influences, and writing (hardcore) love songs.
Hey Evan, what’s up? First off, please introduce yourself to anyone living under a rock. Mention the bands you play or have played in.
What’s up! I’m Evan. I sing in If It Rains, play guitar in Neolithic, and have played, or currently play, in a bunch of other bands that kind of only exist. Those are just the important ones.
So, for starters, who is If It Rains?
If It Rains is a New England hardcore band. I sing, Nick plays bass, Josh plays drums, and Changhwan, Olin, and Clifford play guitar. We try to sound like 2000s melodic hardcore — Have Heart, Count Me Out, American Nightmare, etc. — but who knows if that’s actually where we end up.
If It Rains hasn’t been a band for that long, yet you’ve done quite a bit release-wise. Back in 2024, when you released the demo, did you plan on being as active as you are?
Definitely not. I think something exciting about this release is that it feels like we achieved what we set out to do. When we started this band, we talked a lot about New England bands that belonged to New England. Bands like Hammer Bros were huge in New England, but a lot of the country wasn’t hip to what they were doing. California hardcore people from that era have no idea who that band was, but people from New England talk about them like the Beatles.
Not to say that’s the degree to which we’ve grown, but I would say we are a local staple now. Every show we play in Massachusetts and Rhode Island is awesome, and just about everywhere else we’ve played has been... fine. After our last record, How’s It Going to End?, I felt like we'd become the local staple we were aiming for.
As for releases, I had no clue we’d make it this far. I blow out my voice every show, so the fact that we still exist is a miracle.
What were you aiming for with this EP?
I had a lot of fun with How’s It Going to End?, writing a concept record. The songs are long, and most of them are about the same thing, so I wanted to push that further.
All of these songs are about love. I think love and the loss of it are things we all relate to, and I thought having a hardcore record that is open and vulnerable about that could be really cool.
I spent a lot of time this last year, post-breakup, talking with a friend who could kick my ass with one hand tied behind his back. We got very open and honest about our emotions in a way that I truly appreciate. My goal was to make something for that guy. I want to make the toughest dudes in hardcore feel something.
Beyond that, I wanted to make something that felt really cohesive. I have a habit of my releases feeling hodge-podged together sometimes. I had a list of a few records that, to me, feel like one long song, and I wanted to emulate that with this.
Some of those include:
- A Love Supreme — John Coltrane
- We’re Down Til We’re Underground — American Nightmare
- Hypochondriac — Brakence
A Love Supreme... nice. I also hear a lot of Turning Point, Fiddlehead, and even FREE sprinkled throughout your releases. What were you guys listening to leading up to recording?
I mean, so much. Our home base is always early Have Heart and 110-era Count Me Out, but there’s a lot of other stuff in here. I try to keep the hardcore parts feeling like hardcore. There’s a lot of Youth Crew influence in here, but it also brings in a lot from outside of that. Parts like the end of “In Another Life” were probably inspired by some embarrassing emo shit that I don’t even want to acknowledge still influences me.
Lyrically, almost everything I was drawing from was not hardcore. I wanted really raw and quirky stuff to influence it. I reached for a lot of Cameron Winter, The Microphones, and Field Medic. All just quirky, quiet stuff that I wanted to take and put to hardcore.
Let’s talk about the killer album art for a bit. Who designed the cover, and whose idea was it to use abstract art?
Alex Allen did the art, and he completely crushed it. Nick and I were talking a lot about the art and really couldn’t settle on anything. Eventually, one night, we were spitballing, and Nick suggested we do something like a Rothko painting — just color that captures emotion rather than typical hardcore art. I took it one step further and threw out the Miles Davis Sketches of Spain art because, to me, that felt like a Rothko with more character.
We’ve been friends with Alex since around 2022 and have always loved his art, but his typical style didn’t really match the vibe of If It Rains. More recently, he started posting more abstract stuff, and it was incredible. As soon as we had the idea for the art, we knew he had to do it, and I think he knocked it out of the park!
What’s next for If It Rains?
I have no idea, honestly! I want to play off this record as long as people care. Some days, I really want to kill this band because I get sick of showing up to work with no voice. Some days, I play a show and get a high like no other. So I can see this being our last release, or I can see us doing more. Who knows!
We’ve got a show with Have Heart this weekend, a Halloween cover set of Green Day the following weekend, a show with Haywire on Nov. 1, and we’re working on a release show for the record. Outside of that, we’ve got no plans!
Thanks for the chat! Any parting words? Shoutout Peter Stein!
Shoutout to Peter, always. Nick and I started this band with the intention of doing everything that was “out” in hardcore. Melodic hardcore and long speeches between songs are all part of what If It Rains is.
It feels like most hardcore lyrics are about scene politics. No hate to those bands — many of them are my favorites in hardcore! But I wanted this band to be personal and emotional. All of this is to say, start a band about something real and put yourself out there. You’ll be more proud of yourself if you do!
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All We’ve Got is streaming now, with vinyl copies available for preorder through Delayed Gratification Records.
If It Rains on social media: Instagram
Upcoming shows:
10/23 - Cambridge, MA @ The Middle East w/ Have Heart
10/30 - Providence, RI @ Studio 39a (Green Day Cover Set)
11/1 - Providence, RI @ Alchemy w/ Haywire and Product of Waste
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