Train frontman Pat Monahan on the band’s new album, longevity, and touring ahead of Wednesday’s Morton show
Train. // photo credit Jasper Graham
San Francisco band Train’s 2026 summer headline tour is called Drops of Jupiter: 25 Years in the Atmosphere, and celebrates two and a half decades of the band’s triple-platinum album and attendant top five single of the same name. Additionally, Train will release their 12th studio album, Mad Dog in the Fog, on Friday, August 28.
Named after a beloved San Francisco neighborhood bar, the album “celebrates the place, community, and spirit that have remained central to Train’s identity over the last three decades.”
As part of the tour, the band has been sneaking peeks at heretofore unreleased songs along with the singles “The Weekend” and “Pennsylvania Turnpike,” playing different ones every night.
Ahead of their stop at Morton Amphitheater on Wednesday, August 12, with support from Barenaked Ladies and Matt Nathanson, we spoke via Zoom with frontman Pat Monahan about the new album, the band’s longevity, and more.
The Pitch: The last couple of years have been pretty big for Train. You’ve got this new album that comes out at the end of the month. You’re celebrating 25 years of a classic album. You’ve added Butch Walker to the band as an official member. What’s it been like for you with all of these different moving parts and celebrations and new things?
Pat Monahan: There’s something happening right now that we’ve been trying to put our fingers on because we’ve never sold more tickets to shows and we’ve never had more young people. It’s obvious that there’s a shift that’s happening where nostalgia is becoming cool to young people who learned Train music from a car seat when they were kids. It’s not uncool to like your parents’ music anymore. I think- I think kids are past that phase of life, which is cool.
Speaking of nostalgia–and I don’t even wanna call it nostalgia, because I think it’s just a looking back on where you came from–the song and the video for “Pennsylvania Turnpike” seem to find you reflecting at a certain point in your career. Is that the case right now?
Yeah. The real story behind “Pennsylvania Turnpike” is I moved to San Francisco from Pennsylvania, but I was from Erie, Pennsylvania. And the Pennsylvania Turnpike does not run through Erie. But my dear friend Murray, who was my San Francisco friend–he just passed away a month ago–and he moved to San Francisco from Philadelphia, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike definitely would’ve been the route for him.
So, the song is really about if the two of us had made that journey together, where the loss of him was why I talk about that youth will soon be dead because we think we’re gonna be young forever, and then all of a sudden we’re not, and we look back and go, “Wow, where did it all go?”
The whole thing is a reflection, but also a story that reflects the great man that was my dear friend Murray.
It’s a beautiful tribute.
Thanks.
Your music has been featured in so many commercials and films and TV shows. What’s your favorite use of your music outside of what you might have originally intended?
Train music has done everything from sell refrigerators to highlight a scene in a movie. And there are certain songs that I wouldn’t ever allow to help sell a refrigerator, and there are certain songs that have gone viral on TikTok, like “50 Ways to Say Goodbye,” and you just never know what people will gravitate towards, but there are certain songs that are too dear to me to use in a way that wouldn’t be respectful to the song, like “Drops of Jupiter” or “Calling All Angels.”
There are a few of those that are a little more precious to me, and I’m not really a precious kind of guy, but there are certain things that I wouldn’t really want to be made fun of or used in the wrong way.
I love the fact that your Christmas album, Christmas in Tahoe, inspired a Hallmark Movie. I feel like Hallmark Movies have over the last couple of years become, if not respected, then enjoyed in ways that are other than kitsch. People legitimately enjoy these films. What was it like being involved in that?
My male friends will watch Hallmark Movies and blame their wives, of course, for having it on. But their wives are not making them sit through two hours of a movie. They do that on their own.
You’re out on tour, and you have such a vast catalog, but you also have this new album that comes out at the end of the month. How do you sort these new songs into the set in a way that makes sense to you but also to the audience?
We only put one new song in a night because I have too much love and respect for people who are buying tickets to come and see something that is familiar to them. I’ve seen shows where they do six or seven new songs and you’re like, “Guys, you got other songs that I’m not gonna be able to hear because you’re playing these new ones, and plus the album isn’t out.”
I just don’t think that’s fair to an audience. So we do a song called “Blue Brush Butterfly,” which might be my favorite song from the album. It hasn’t been released yet, but it will be when the album comes out. Everyone will hear it. And that one is going over really well. We do a song called “To Gloria” that has not been released yet that people seem to love. “Pennsylvania Turnpike,” “The Weekend,” and “Mad Dog and the Fog” just came out. So there are five songs that we mix in just one at a time.
What’s the song in the set where you can just feel the audience lock in?
There are a few. We’ll play “50 Ways to Say Goodbye” early, and that really gets people engaged. “Calling on Angels” really brings everybody together in a beautiful way. “Drops of Jupiter” is really a beautiful moment for everyone on and off stage. “Drive By” is really fun to play. I think people are really into “Drive By” and those songs really lock us all in.
You’ve got these great openers, as well. Do you do anything together as part of this, or is it all separate?
No, I love having everybody up. Matt [Nathanson] will come up with us, and then Ed Robertson from Barenaked Ladies will join us. We try to have special guests. My 14-year-old son is playing with us, and he’s definitely a highlight of the night. Tonight, our friend Keith Urban’s gonna come up and do a song with us. We try to make every show exciting for people that are there, whether it’s Chicago or Kansas City or St. Louis or Alabama or Seattle.
Train plays Morton Amphitheater on Wednesday, August 12, with guests Barenaked Ladies and Matt Nathanson. Details on that show here.
