Named after a Jonathan Raymond short story, Alex Reindl’s project Old Joy is about the idea you can never quite get back the joy you once had. Taking inspiration from classic college rock and indie-rock artists like The Replacements, Teenage Fanclub, and Elliott Smith, Reindl imbues his bedroom recordings with fuzzed-out guitars and a sense of hopefulness that comes from being wizened.

While Old Joy only began a few years ago, Reindl has been active in the Chicago music scene. He currently plays, tours, and co-writes with Sonny Falls, but he’s also played in bands such as Dogs at Large, Dan Rico, Faux Co., Bloom, and more.

Inspiration struck Reindl to write “Say When,” who said it “came out of me in a real quick burst while I was dog-sitting for my friend Josh Rodin (Jollys, Cel-Ray).”

The single contrasts his debut album he released last year, called Trash Your Life, which he said was years in the making. “I wrote it basically straight into a 4 track on his bed while his very cute dog Boris was watching me.”

Big Takeover is pleased to host the premiere of Reindl’s latest rock number “Say When,” a new standalone single before Old Joy releases more music later this year.

As for the video, Reindl says he and his friend Jacob Ernsberger wanted to create a callback to videos like The Replacements’ ”‘Bastards of Young‘” — where it’s just one long shot of a speaker playing the song — as well as parts of Elliott Smith’s “‘Coming up Roses‘” video, which features Smith and the band playing the song in an apartment living room.

Reindl added, “We took a bunch of different takes and drank progressively more beer, what you see is the last take and by then we had gotten pretty loose and goofy, hence Mike wearing a bike helmet and Elton John sunglasses and Robby occasionally playing a little mushroom man instead of his drums.”

Old Joy’s video is simple and straightforward, he says, but that’s also the charm and brings the song itself closer to the forefront. Check out Old Joy’s latest single before he releases a new EP later this year to follow-up his debut album.

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