This ‘It: Chapter Two’ actor modeled on Saves The Day’s album cover
James Ransone joined the Losers Club alongside the likes of James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain to portray an adult version of Eddie Kaspbrak in It: Chapter Two, but this won’t be the first time the scene has seen the actor.
Ransone may have appeared in The Wire, the Sinister series and Prom Night remake, but nearly 20 years ago, he also became part of the booklet for Saves The Day’s Through Being Cool.
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The cover of the band’s 1999 sophomore effort features the then five-piece hanging out on a couch as a party rages on around them. That’s cool and all, but the real breaking news here is that Ransone is sprawled across the same couch on the back cover.
The band and Ransone aren’t the only recognizable faces as Cobra Starship/Midtown frontman Gabe Saporta also pops up and has since commented on the experience.
“On the CD is a photo of me kissing my girlfriend from college,” Saporta reveals. “One of the other kids on that [cover] is an actor now, James Ransone. He’s the guy on the couch, passed out.”
Frontman Chris Conley and Bryan Newman, who was the band’s drummer at the time, revealed there was a concept of using the band to ironically tell a story but that it didn’t go as planned.
“We wanted to do something a little kitschy, but we probably weren’t clever enough to really pull that off,” Newman says. “It didn’t quite have the ironic quality that I think we intended.”
Despite the icon status of this classic album cover, Equal Vision records head Dan Sandshaw revealed there was a lot of debate over the artwork at the time as the label felt it wasn’t the right impression for them to give.
Once it came out, Newman revealed they somewhat regretted the artistic direction especially as the band began receiving backlash.
“At the time, the hardcore world was so anti-rock star,” Conley says. “People said, ‘Look at the album cover; you guys are selling out,’ because it was this glossy image and we have our faces on there.”
Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz chimed in on the topic, saying “I listened to a lot of hardcore bands at the time, and it just didn’t look like any of that. The way it read to me was an invitation to this party. An invitation into this world.”
Saves The Day superfan and Say Anything frontman Max Bemis also revealed he went into the record not knowing what to think. “I remember looking at the artwork, seeing that these dudes were super young, clean-cut looking,” Bemis says. “I didn’t know what to expect.”
Saves The Day’s last release was 2013’s self-titled full-length, but Conley has since teased new material. You can catch Ransone in It: Chapter Two, which hits theaters Sept. 6, 2019.
