Senses Fail Will Perform Its Certified Gold Album at the Ogden

When Senses Fail vocalist James “Buddy” Nielsen started the New Jersey band in 2001, he was a young man, not even old enough to legally order a drink. But he yearned for something else, to explore different ideologies. That’s one reason that the group’s moniker is a reference to how Hinduism approaches life on this mortal plane.

“In Hinduism, they believe that being alive is hell, and the only way to reach Nirvana is to ultimately have no attachments to anything,” Nielsen has shared in old Senses Fail bios. “So people go out and live in the middle of the woods and they don’t eat and don’t drink. They just meditate because they’ve reached such a high level where they’re not attached to love, relationships or anything. And if you want to reach the highest level of being and see God, you have to have all your senses fail.”

Similarly, Senses Fail’s 2004 debut, Let It Enfold You, is littered with philosophical leanings and anecdotes Nielsen cherry-picked from various esoteric materials. For example, the album title is a nod to a Charles Bukowski poem of the same name, throughout which the hard-living, street-smart poet grapples with the everyday trudgery and formalities that befall a broken man who’s looking for light at the end of the tunnel, even if it’s as simple as a friendly wave from the postman.

Then there is the ballad “Slow Dance,” Nielson’s ode to Taoism and pacifism, and “Irony of Dying on Your Birthday,” a song inspired by the writings of American mythologist Joseph Campbell. Even the cover art of a well-dressed man looking into a mirror that reflects back the hellfire he’s internally experiencing points to Nielsen’s mindset at that time. And as it turned out, a lot of other people were feeling the same, as Let It Enfold You went on to become certified gold and has since cemented its status as an early 2000s screamo classic.

Now forty years old, Nielsen admits he’s not the same brooding musician he was back then, but there’s a reason that Let It Enfold You is such a Senses Fail touchstone.

“The further away from the record I get in age, the more I realize it as a coming-of-age story or event in my life,” he shares. “That was the exact thing I was going through when I wrote it, and why I think it connected with so many people and still connects with people.”

Senses Fail – which also includes guitarists Gavin Caswell and Jason Milban, drummer Steve Carey and bassist Daniel Wonacott – is currently out celebrating the record’s twentieth anniversary. The crew plays the Ogden Theatre on Friday, November 29, with Saves the Day, another longtime New Jersey act that’s celebrating 25 years of album Through Being Cool. Narrow Head is also on the bill.

It’s not the first time Senses Fail has rolled out Let It Enfold You in full (this tour marks the fourth time the band has played it in its entirety), but Nielsen can still recall exactly what it felt like to blow up so suddenly back then.

Prior to the official full-length, there was a six-song EP, From the Depths of Dreams (2002), which resulted in Senses Fail landing a record deal with the now-defunct Drive-Thru Records and a subsequent reissue that included two bonus tracks a year later. That’s when Nielsen felt like the group he assembled via an online ad had a chance of being something. Then Let It Enfold You dropped, and everything changed seemingly overnight.

“It was really a whirlwind experience. I didn’t have much experience other than what I had already had, which was not much. We went from playing really small clubs to a small amount of people to larger packed theaters and then on to Taste of Chaos, which was in arenas,” he explains. “I think Senses Fail made it in my mind when we signed to Drive-Thru. I really had no expectations, and I still really don’t. I try to understand that this is sort of all a dream that I don’t really have that much control over.”

But Nielsen is most certainly awake. Senses Fail became a fan favorite on the Vans Warped Tour circuit and found itself with so much material left over from the Let It Enfold You writing process that sophomore effort Still Searching quickly followed in 2006. While the record isn’t as aggressive as its predecessor, the two are certainly kindred spirits.

“It is always hard to follow up success, because a lot of the reasons why it was successful have nothing to do with anything other than timing, and it’s not really repeatable,” Nielsen muses. “All you can do is try your best to be as open and honest as possible and hope that it connects with people.”

It’s safe to say Senses Fail continues to do just that. Even the latest album, Hell Is in Your Head (2022), continues familiar sentiments first introduced on Let It Enfold You. But that’s what Nielsen, the only original member left, does. At this point, he couldn’t imagine Senses Fail being any other way.

“I just love making music, performing and traveling. I don’t think there is anything else I could really do that would scratch the same itch,” he concludes. “I have slowed the band down in the past to try other things in the music industry…and I ultimately came back to Senses Fail, because the creative outlet is what I am most interested in.”

Senses Fail, with Saves the Day and Narrow Head, 6:30 p.m. Friday, November 29, Ogden Theatre, 935 East Colfax Avenue. Tickets are $52.