Camping in Alaska is the most significant Huntsville band most music fans here over the age of 40 have never heard of. The band’s songs — some titled all-lowercase, like “c u in the ballpit” — have been streamed millions of times on YouTube, a streaming platform that’s played a huge role in shaping youth culture the last 10 years.

Camping in Alaska’s known for being an influential emo band. Emo’s an apt descriptor for some material on their 2013 debut album “please be nice.” The debut was recorded back when Camping in Alaska founding members Austin Davis and Jacob Stewart weren’t even old enough to buy cigarettes yet. Notable New York hipster music blog Brooklyn Vegan included the LP in their list of “25 Classic Emo & Post-Hardcore Albums Turning 10 in 2023.”

But the band’s sound is often closer to the alt-rock of Modest Mouse or Jawbreaker than it is to early 2000s emo bands like My Chemical Romance and Panic! At The Disco that achieved wealth and Hot Topic fame. Adhesive vocals and guitar figures. Sunset grooves. Songs about skateboard halfpipes, parking lot hangouts and high-school blues. During their original run, Camping in Alaska released three albums, before disintegrating due to drug use .

Rebooted in 2022, the band’s current lineup includes singer/guitarist Davis and drummer Stewart, who first met in a taekwondo class back when they were like 11. They originally gravitated toward each other because they were more interested in talking about the Dead Kennedys songs than learning taekwondo.

For the rebooted Camping lineup, longtime member Eli Long has moved from bass to guitar. Davis’ partner Dani Fandre is now on bass, while Jacob Hill toggles between guitar and bass. The band’s early lineup included Ben Cape.

After releasing a 2022 EP called “Lost and Found” of acoustic demos, Camping in Alaska is prepping a new album with the very Huntsville title of “Eggbeater Jesus,” a reference to the large-scale hippie-vibe mural that adorns the city’s First Baptist Church’s exterior. The new LP will include freshly minted tracks as well as knotty previous single “Icarus.” A handful of comeback live shows the band’s done in markets like Atlanta and Birmingham have sold out.

For those unfamiliar, Huntsville is a north Alabama city known for its aerospace engineering legacy and currently booming development. After the world class Orion Amphitheater opened in 2022, Huntsville’s musical profile has increased significantly. In-the-know local tastemakers like Invisible City radio show host Brad Posey and Sluice Fest founder Ashleigh Jackson champion Camping in Alaska. But the band deserves wider recognition and bigger gigs in their hometown.

Earlier this year, I connected with Camping in Alaska for a video-call interview. Edited excerpts below.

Hey guys. What was the moment back during the band’s original run when you decided to put Camping in Alaska on pause? And what led to getting the band back together?

Austin Davis: I don’t think there was an exact moment we put it on pause. Really, our lives just all fell apart and we didn’t have time for music, you know? [Laughs]

When we put it back together is much easier to like pinpoint. We all started getting our shit together and these dudes, they were doing a documentary about you know, smaller emo bands in the DIY scene called “Finding Peace Through Hardcore.” You can check them out on Instagram, Spigot Pictures, they’re really cool.

And they wanted to interview us, and it got us all together and talking again. And we saw that everyone wasn’t as fucked up as they were, and we all had time, so we started playing music again. And then Sleepy Clown [Records] and Dive In Records hit us up and that’s when we really started getting serious about it. They helped us fund some record pressings and getting us, you know, back in the swing of things.

What’s the most interesting way in which Camping in Alaska puts together songs?

Eli Long: We just get in garages together and play. [Laughs]

Davis: It’s really fun to build from Jacob’s drumbeats. We just layered on and on until we were writing new parts to it and going out from there. Not all our songs are written like that. But my favorite ones are always written where all of us collabo like that.

Jacob Stewart: The coolest thing that we do to me is when he [Davis] has most of the source material and will have most of the song completely mapped out before we ever hear it. Then we have ideas for it, and it changes and eventually it’s something he didn’t have in mind in the first place. That’s when it’s the coolest.

Long: Austin has always been a great songwriter. It’s really cool to be friends with him and have him bring us a song and go, “You guys want to do this?” We all get to come up with ideas and fool around with it until it sounds like a Camping song.

Davis: Writing songs by myself, I usually don’t like the way they turn out. I need input from these guys.

Getting ready to talk with you all, everything I read described the band as emo. I’m an “old” so I don’t know what the cool underground stuff is anymore. But much of your music just sounds like what we used to call alternative rock back in the ‘90s.

Davis: All that emo used to mean back in the day was emotional hardcore. It came from the hardcore punk scene. It was adjacent to like post hardcore and grunge and alternative and 90s. Fugazi. Sunny Day Real Estate. And band like that are the ones we really take influence from.

There are newer bands in the scene that we like, but a lot of the bands that took the label emo went into a direction that’s not at all like it used to be. And it’s all based around like math-rock twinkle-riffs that all sound the same to me, and I’m I just I’m not into it. Even though back when I was 17, I would say our first album is a lot like that. But we’re trying to move away from that and do some more interesting stuff.

Another thing I thought was interesting about Camping in Alaska was the role of YouTube. Your band has gotten some really nice bumps from YouTube. Like, 1.9 million views for your song “c u in the ballpit” and a million for “dragon ball z budokai tenkaichi.” That’s a lot of views.

Davis: Well, honestly, we got lucky with the YouTube thing. When I was 14 and 15 and me and Jacob had just recorded our first demo in my mom’s garage, I was uploading it to Bandcamp or SoundCloud, places you could upload music online. And I wanted to upload it to YouTube. But for some reason, I guess my shitty computer couldn’t do the YouTube uploads very good, you know. And I met this guy online [with the all lowercase username of] jommeez.

We were just talking about the emo subgenre that we both really loved, and he found out I was in a band, I sent him a demo and he really liked it. And he has quite a following on YouTube. [More than 16 million subscribers.] Everybody that listens to emo online knows his name, just because he uploads like every band, whether they’re major or underground, he uploads all the good emo bands.

So us being posted on there, I think that’s really how that thing all started. So shout out to jommeez, he’s a great dude and he gave us a chance when a lot of other people wouldn’t. And that’s why we’re here.

When Camping in Alaska regrouped in 2022, Dani joined on bass guitar. Can you all talk about what kind of energy that brought to that band? And Dani, what have you enjoyed about playing music with Camping in Alaska?

Dani Fandre: I played with them a little bit before, when we were in high school, just doing vocals and be around for recording. That was fu, but I had to go to college. And then Austin and I started making music at his grandma’s house together in like 2019. Then it just kind of fell into place. We decided a second guitar would be something that would sound really good on a lot of our new material. Eli’s a really good guitarist, so he moved over. And I had a bass for a long time but had never put in much a concrete effort until I had a reason to do, which that [joining Camping in Alaska] was my reason.

Davis: She learned bass faster than anyone I’ve ever seen, man. It’s crazy. She went from like not being able to play hardly to playing a show with us after like three months.

Stewart: And doing a great job.

Jacob, where do you draw inspiration from your drumbeats? On the track “BACON” [opening cut off 2016 album “WELCOME HOME SON”], the groove goes from hip-hop to alt-rock. A band’s only as good as their drummer, I think.

Stewart: Yeah, I agree with that. I think that you can have a good drummer play with mediocre or even bad musicians …

Davis: … and that’s how we work! [Entire band laughs]

Stewart: There are punk bands that have punk bands that have great drummers and that’s the only person in the band that can play, and people are like, “Holy shit, it’s different this time!” The reason is because the drummer is good. But that section [on the song “BACON”] you’re talking about? It is like a hip thing, for sure. When we’re working on stuff, Austin usually has riffs and I know these two parts go together, whatever I’m hearing in it. Or just what I’ve been listening to at the time — like, how would this drummer play this song? Which for the few last years has been Jimmy Chamberlin from Smashing Pumpkins. I mean, I even quote him directly sometimes. And John Stanier from [the alternative and experimental rock bands] Helmet and Battles, big influence. And there are some unlikely one. I’m really unashamed that I like Carter Beauford from Dave Matthews Band.

Why do you think more people in Huntsville haven’t heard of Camping in Alaska? Notable music outlets like Brooklyn Vegan have written about you all. You’ve done better than any Huntsville band I can think of as far as streaming goes. And your band is just really f—ing good.

Davis: Dude, they’ve always hated us. I don’t know why.

Long: That is a really good question. I think it has a lot to do with scene here which is mostly like punk and hardcore. And we were not that, especially back then. More people here listen to hardcore than there are people here who don’t listen to hardcore. I joined the band in 2013 and I’d never heard of Camping until I played a show with them doing a folk set I do.

Davis: Well, people wouldn’t book us. We had to play things like acoustic outdoor shows because nowhere would book us. It’s weird. I mean, we were younger at that at those points, but even after we got older it was hard to find shows — and even after we started getting you know a decent amount of YouTube views in like 2014, 2015. Even after we had a million plus views we still couldn’t book shows. I don’t know. And we can book shows fine up North, you know?

Stewart: And we can down here, now.

Where have been some hotspots for Camping in Alaska to do shows outside of Huntsville?

Davis: Well, we just played The Masquerade [a long-running and eclectic venue] in Atlanta. We’d never had a greenroom before, and they got us $200 in snacks. It was wild, man.

The Masquerade’s an iconic Southeastern venue and a glorious gig for an underground band to get. But what the most awkward gig Camping in Alaska’s ever played?

Stewart: One time we played at this kid’s house. He was like, “I’m having a party and having all these bands play and come play in my house.” It was way out in the country. So we go there. We set up our gear. And he’s like, “People will be here soon or something.” And no one ever showed. It was like him and three of his friends and they drank and smoked weed on their back porch while we played in the living room.

The upcoming Camping in Alaska album is titled “Eggbeater Jesus.” Most locals know that church mural as a landmark. But strangely, I’m not aware of a local band that’s made an album with that name.

Davis: We named it that because one night I didn’t have anywhere to sleep, and I slept out in front of that church all night. It was like 30 degrees, and it was f—ed up, so that’s why we named the album that. [Laughs]

What does the new record sound like and what else can you tell us about it as far as number of songs, key tracks and whatnot?

Davis: Well, we were aiming for 13 originally. It might be a little bit less than that now. It just depends. We’ve got 10, for sure — front to finish we know where they’re going. Favorite standout tracks … You guys what to go?

Stewart: There a song on there called “Turncoat” I like a lot.

Jacob Hill: “Comeback Kid.”

Fandre: Yeah.

Davis: And there are live videos [of some of the new songs on YouTube.

Long: We’ve got one we haven’t played live yet called “Needle Mouth” that I think a lot of people are going to love.

Davis: Most of it’s pretty chord-y and big, you know, like electric big rock sound. There will be quitter moments and there’s definitely some experimental parts too. But I think most of the album is punchy, powerful riffs, distortion, in your face kind of shit.

What are some of the lyrical themes of this record?

Davis: Well, I guess we’re going to have to get into this at some point. A lot of us in the band have dealt with bad drug addiction in the past, and a lot of it [lyrically] is about getting clean and dealing with all that and all the fallout from being an addict for so long, which is also the reason we didn’t play music for so long. I think there’s a lot of interesting things we have to say about our perspective. I know there’s a lot of rock songs about heroin, but I think we have something new to say. Especially with the epidemic the world is facing with opioids right now, I think it might resonate with people.

Long: There’s a lot of songs about it [heroin addiction] for sure, but I don’t think there’s a lot of people our age playing music about it. It’s not something you hear about a whole lot anymore like you did back in the ‘90s and stuff. I think that us being from a different age group will have a different perspective on it. A different experience with it in a different time I think a lot of people will hopefully pull something out of.

Jacob Hill, you’ve been pretty quiet so far. What’s special about playing music with Camping in Alaska? What do you like about this band?

Hill: I like how we just kind of do what we like to do. We don’t try to conform to a certain genre — I mean, we do but it’s not strict. And it’s cool that I’m good friends with all of them.

The track “c u in the ballpit” is one of Camping in Alaska’s signature songs. What do you remember about the genesis of that song?

Davis: Well, something that everybody online who digs into us knows is that we hate that song. [Laughs] It’s like, everybody has their “Creep” [Radiohead’s big hit], you know what I mean? And it is what it is. But that song, when we were 17, we had bought $900 worth of studio time to do our first album. We had extra time after everything, because it went smoother than we thought. And so we had like half a day left and we’re like, OK, well, let’s not waste it. So I wrote a song in two hours on a notebook and then we jammed it out. That song is very simple, lyrically and musically, because we wrote it so quickly. But I think that’s why it resonated a lot because it’s simple and poppy and clean and the melodies are easy to get stuck in your head.

I think it was weird because of the gruffness of my voice, which is how it was back in the garage and show performances with tons of distortion and not very good vocal mics, because I would scream really loud and shred my voice. And that with the really clean production that we didn’t necessarily want made it stand out.

How much money has the band made from the 1.9 million YouTube views for “c u in the ballpit”?

Davis: It’s probably made $300. And that’s not just that video it’s all our videos on jommeez’s channel.

Stewart: It’s absurd.

Long: We’ve made way more on Spotify than YouTube, so everybody go listen to us on Spotify.

Davis: Spotify also f—s artists, but at least the money comes straight to us.

Camping in Alaska is on a four-band June 24 bill at Huntsville hotspot Gold Spring Coffee. The show will celebrate local hardcore band Heel Turn’s new album and latest issue of Huntsville zine Sluice. That show starts at 8 p.m. Tickets are $15 via eventbrite.com. More info at linktr.ee/campinginalaska.