Neal Schon Shares His Feelings About The Release Of Journey’s New Song, ‘The Way We Used To Be’

According to a post by the band Journey‘s official Instagram page, the band has released a new track titled ‘The Way We Used To Be’ along with a music video, and Neal Schon has shared his feelings on the post about the release and the process of producing the song.

As is known, Journey hasn’t released any new projects for ten years since their last album ‘Eclipse’ which was released in 2011. Thenceforth, the band’s original lineup has changed as the drummer Steve Smith and bassist Ross Valory were fired and bassist Randy Jackson, drummer Narada Michael Walden and keyboardist Jason Derlatka took their place.

The band’s new track also marks their first work to feature their new and current lineup. Moreover, it is also known that the band has 11 songs prepared for their next album. Apart from those, Journey will also appear this year at Lollapalooza and iHeart Music Festival along with a pre-Lollapalooza club show.

As seen in the Instagram post of Journey, Neal Schon has commented on the song and the progress of producing it. He stated that he worked on the song during the pandemic lockdown, as he was trying to utilize his time while keeping fans in touch. After that, he said that he sent his sample to Jonathan Cain, and he came up with great lyrics, melody, and a catchy chorus which made Schon think that they have still got it. He then considered the song as a new beginning for the band, with many more songs to follow as they are working on new music, having written over 26 new songs.

Journey’s Instagram post featuring Neal Schon’s note read:

The first song ‘The Way We Used To Be’ came out of 1 of the many loops I’d written while the long downtime continued with the pandemic we all had to deal with. So utilizing my time and trying to keep fans in touch I started posting many jams and loops I created very quickly most every day. On ‘The Way We Used To Be’ I laid down the keyboard loop with over-dubbed rhythm and a little blues lead guitar and sent it to Jonathan. He sent it back very shortly after with demo vocals and lyrics and I said to myself with a smile – we’ve still got it!

I felt Jonathan nailed the lyrics and melody with haunting chorus ‘got to get back’ – ‘to the way we used to be.’ So this was the complete new beginning chapter for Journey – many more follow the same sequence with all of us collectively writing and working together. We now have over 26 songs that we’ve written and whittling it down to 10 or 12. We are very excited by all the new musical endeavors we’ve created together looking forward to getting back on the road to you.”

You can see the photo posted on the band’s Instagram and the official music video which was recently released below.

Photo Credit: Journey – Instagram