Former Sunny Day Real Estate frontman Jeremy Enigk
Photo: Scott Gries/ Getty Images

Jeremy Enigk was reminded of the continued popularity of Sunny Day Real Estate when he occasionally played his former band's "How It Feels to Be Something On" while on tour this summer.

"It was amazing to see people's eyes light up when I started playing that song," Enigk said. "I couldn't believe the energy I was witnessing. There was one kid who just started shaking uncontrollably, freaking out."

Sunny Day Real Estate never saw the commercial success of Nirvana, but like their fellow Seattle rockers, SDRE's legacy has aged remarkably well. Since the band's most recent split in 2001 (see "Sunny Day Real Estate Boarded Up Again"), their fanbase has only multiplied, due in large part to their reputation as the forefathers of the still swelling genre known as emo.

The band's debut, 1994's Diary, came out at a time when grunge ruled the radio, but the album's melodic but urgent sound has had a clear mark on groups such as Dashboard Confessional, Taking Back Sunday, Thursday and countless others. "It's a huge compliment, one of the biggest compliments I've ever had in my life, saying that we are a huge part of creating a whole new genre," Enigk said. "But I don't buy into it. I don't believe it. Some of the bands don't sound anything like what we were doing."

Regardless, Enigk sees a "real hunger" for Sunny Day Real Estate to return. "It becomes tempting when I'm on tour and people are talking about it," he said. "At this point, I doubt it, but never say never."

Enigk does plan to reunite the Fire Theft, which included three-fourths of the original SDRE lineup when they debuted in 2003, but he's got other priorities first. In fact, it seems each of the founding members of Sunny Day Real Estate is keeping quite busy.

Here's what the bandmembers are doing now — and no, none of them are selling real estate:

Dan Hoerner
Guitarist/singer Hoerner worked in the A&R department at Atlantic Records for a few years, while also writing poetry and a book of short stories called "The Little Monkey Chronicles" and playing on Dashboard Confessional's So Impossible and Summer's Kiss EPs. In 2000, he launched the Art Conspiracy, an online art community similar to MySpace, and he's also a founding member of AppleBox Films with director Rohit Colin Rao, whose "Someone and Someone, Inc." he scored.

"I only play guitar for fun these days," said Hoerner, whose wife is expecting the couple's third child in February. "Occasionally I'll break out the old four-track, but that's about as far as it goes. I would love to play music with Sunny Day again, but I believe the chances of a reunion are less than zero. I've heard some of Jeremy's new record and I think it sounds fantastic. Perhaps someday soon the world is going to wake up to his talent. Looking at all the amazing, groundbreaking music he's created over the years, I feel very grateful to have had the privilege of playing with him."

Nate Mendel
Bassist Mendel was the only member not to join SDRE's first reunion in 1997, and for good reason. After their initial split in 1995 he joined the Foo Fighters and remains a core member. He's also played with Juno and the Fire Theft, as well as scored and appeared in the 2005 indie film "Our Burden Is Light." But his priority is with the Foos, who have an acoustic live album due November 7.

William Goldsmith
Drummer Goldsmith also joined the Foo Fighters, but quit over creative tensions while recording 1997's The Colour and the Shape. He played on Enigk's first solo album, in the Fire Theft and in side projects with Bill Dolan of 5ive Style, but he's currently drumming for Seattle electro-pop band IQU, recording a side project with keyboardist Michiko Swiggs and building a studio in his Seattle-area home.

Jeremy Enigk
Ten years after the release of the acclaimed Return of the Frog Queen, former Sunny Day frontman Enigk returns as a solo artist with World Waits, due Tuesday. "The general theme is growing and becoming more comfortable in your skin, as opposed to that young man's angst, which I think Frog Queen delivered, the broken heart or whatever," Enigk said. "It still has the heartache, but it's more about the political situation that the world is in right now."

The album's title is taken from a track Enigk describes as a love letter to the world. "As a human being, I'm affected by the choices our political leaders are making," he explained. "And I feel like people have a good idea of what the problems are, but no one seems to agree on how to change it. My question is, what are we waiting for? This is breaking my heart. Why is it we can't get together and make it a better place?"

Enigk is promoting the record with a monthlong trek beginning October 31 in Tempe, Arizona, opening for Cursive. He's performing solo, unlike the band tour he did over the summer. "The record wasn't out, but it was out there over the Internet, so I'd see people singing and I'd look at them and they'd stop suddenly, like they got caught," Enigk recalled, laughing. "But it doesn't really bother me that much."

• Sunny Day Real Estate

Sunny Day Real Estate
Photo: Time Bomb Recordings

The space on the musical landscape once occupied by emo pioneers Sunny Day Real Estate is once again a vacant lot — at least for the time being.

The Seattle-based quartet announced their indefinite split Friday via their official Web site, according to their manager, who cited the need for a break as the dissolution's main reason — a phase becoming somewhat commonplace for the group. Sunny Day Real Estate fans know the band's proclaimed disintegration doesn't necessarily mean they're gone forever. After breaking up in 1995, they reunited two years later — albeit without original bassist Nate Mendel, who opted to remain with Foo Fighters, the band he joined in the interim — to release 1998's How It Feels to Be Something On. Live followed in 1999 before the group dropped what was to be their finale, The Rising Tide, in 2000.

Having formed in Seattle in 1992, Sunny Day Real Estate forewent the locally popular grunge style for a more melodic sound filled with just as much woeful angst. SDRE's 1994 debut, Diary, established their ethos, while singer Jeremy Enigk honed his soon-trademarked whine on its 1995 followup, LP2. Enigk released his solo debut, the orchestral Return of the Frog Queen, in 1996 after the first breakup.

The principal bandmembers will continue pursuing musical endeavors, their manager noted, hinting that fans have definitely not heard the last from the SDRE guys. Enigk and drummer William Goldsmith are collaborating on a new project, while guitarist Dan Hoerner is fielding offers from other musicians interested in starting a band.

• Sunny Day Real Estate

The holiday season has brought both good news and bad for Seattle post-grunge rockers Sunny Day Real Estate.

The bad news is that guitarist Dan Hoerner said the band has cancelled a one-month European tour, which was to kick off in February. Hoerner said the band had to use funds earmarked for the tour to wrap up a legal matter involving a management firm SDRE had considered hiring but never signed with.

Putting a positive spin on the news, Hoerner said the band is ready to begin pre-production work on a new album, and the cancellation allows the group to start on the project sooner than expected.

On a personal note, Hoerner got more good news last week — he and his wife welcomed their first child, son Rowan Jude Hoerner, born December 17.

Hoerner also recently delivered a new book via his publishing company, Clearly the Underdog. Hoerner's "The Little Monkey Chronicles" — which features illustrations by Chris Thompson — is available through www.danhoerner.com.

• Sunny Day Real Estate

With sales of its critically hailed new album, "The Rising Tide," approaching the 50,000 mark, Seattle's leading emocore outfit, Sunny Day Real Estate, will kick off its fall tour on Tuesday night with a gig in Santa Cruz, California.

During the spring and summer "Rising Tide" shows, Sunny Day Real Estate played some of the longest sets in its eight-year career, with most shows clocking in around an hour and 20 minutes, a far cry from some of the brief concerts the group would perform during its fledgling years.

"We started out doing six [songs] and no encore," guitarist Dan Hoerner told MTV Radio. "No matter how much [audiences] freaked and no matter what they did, we wouldn't come back out."

added drummer William Goldsmith.

"We'd play six songs," Hoerner continued, "and most of the time would be spent tuning our guitars."

"Well, our thing was that we didn't want to bore anybody," Goldmsith said, "so we'd go, 'Let's just play for 30 minutes.' I guess we were the rock band with the lowest self-esteem."

Audience response to recent Sunny Day Real Estate concerts should easily bolster the group's sense of well-being, as the band has been playing to fervent, sold-out crowds that Hoerner thinks are some of their most attentive and energetic to date.

Hoerner said. "It's a very different kind of crowd. Sunny Day has a really unique following. They don't beat the sh** out of each other --"

"And that's really cool," Goldsmith interjected.

"And they don't show their t**s," Hoerner noted. "They come to watch us play and love it and be into the music. There's something about having 1,500 kids riveting their attention on you. I say 'kids,' but we have a very wide range in our audiences. That's just kind of my generic term for 'audience.' But yeah, the intensity of the energy and the focus of the crowd is incredible this time [around]." [RealAudio]

Dates where you can see Sunny Day Real Estate over the next few weeks:

• 9/26 - Santa Cruz, CA @ The Catalyst
• 9/27 - Sacramento, CA @ Crest Theater
• 9/29 - Los Angeles, CA @ John Anson Ford Theater
• 9/30 - Pomona, CA @ Glass House
• 10/1 - Las Vegas, NV @ Sanctuary
• 10/3 - Denver, CO @ Gothic Theater
• 10/5 - Columbia, SC @ The Blue Note
• 10/6 - Memphis, TN @ Omni New Daisy
• 10/7 - Nashville, TN @ 328 Music Hall
• 10/9 - Columbia, SC @ Elbow Room
• 10/10 - Charlotte, NC @ Tremonts
• 10/12 - Norfolk, VA @ Norva
• 10/13 - Charlottesville, VA @ Trax
• 10/15 - Baltimore, MD @ Recher Theater
• 10/16 - Old Bridge, NJ @ Birch Hill
• 10/17 - New Haven, CT @ Toad's Place
• 10/18 - Providence, RI @ Lupos
• 10/20 - Boston, MA @ The Middle East
• 10/21 - Rochester, NY @ Water St.
• 10/23 - Pittsburgh, PA @ Metropol
• 10/24 - Cincinnati, OH @ Bogarts
• 10/25 - Columbus, OH @ Newport Music Hall
• 10/27 - Grand Rapids, MI @ Calvin College
• 10/28 - Chicago, IL @ The Vic
• 10/29 - Urbana, IL @ The Canopy
• 10/31 - Madison, WI @ Barrymore Theater
• 11/1 - Iowa City, IA @ Union Bar
• 11/2 - Lincoln, NE @ Knickerbockers

• Sunny Day Real Estate

Sunny Day Real Estate is set to return with its new record, "The Rising Tide," the Seattle band's third album in three years -- an incredible wealth of output considering the group had only released a pair of albums prior to its temporary breakup between 1995 and 1997.

"One," the first single from "The Rising Tide," is getting massive airplay at college radio across the country, and the track has already cracked the Top 10 of the "CMJ" Radio 200 charts after only three weeks in rotation.

Sunny Day Real Estate guitarist Dan Hoerner talked with MTV News about "One," a track he thinks offers a more hopeful counterpoint to some of the darker material on "The Rising Tide."

"'One' is a big one," Hoerner said.

"That's totally what 'One' is about," Hoerner continued. he said, "then you're going to be wringing your hands and wondering what went wrong. 'One' is all about trying to understand that very sentiment: that you are a part of the whole, and that it's all about a positive feeling and trying to take control of yourself and your life and live it in a good way and a way that is ultimately more rewarding." [RealAudio]

Sunny Day Real Estate's "The Rising Tide" will be released on June 20, the same day the emo-core band will kick off its extensive summer tour with a hometown gig in Seattle (see "Sunny Day Real Estate 'Rising' With New LP, Tour").

• Sunny Day Real Estate

Perhaps best known as Seattle's preeminent emo-core band, Sunny Day Real Estate is preparing for the release of its fourth studio LP, titled "The Rising Tide," due out on June 20.

That same day, SDRE plans to kick off a summer tour in support of "The Rising Tide" with a hometown show at The Showbox, and dates are currently scheduled through a July 31 date in Portland, Oregon.

"The Rising Tide" is Sunny Day Real Estate's follow-up to last year's "Live" album and 1998's "How It Feels To Be Something On," the latter of which marked the group's first record since reforming in 1997 after a two-year hiatus (see "Sunny Day Real Estate Reunites").

For the new album, the band slimmed down to a three-piece consisting of frontman Jeremy Enigk, who plays bass on "The Rising Tide," guitarist Dan Hoerner, and drummer William Goldsmith.

Hoerner recently talked with MTV News about how Sunny Day Real Estate was purposefully patient in cutting "The Rising Tide," an album that grew out of lengthy jam sessions with the record's producer, Lou Giordano.

"We really took our time with this one," Hoerner explained. "I think we all wanted it to be the best record that we've ever made. After having done 'How It Feels…,' which was us trying to figure out how to get back up on our feet after having broken up, we went into this record wanting it to be something that we had a chance to try and complete every vision with. [RealAudio]

"The producer, Lou, came over to Seattle and we basically just jammed and wrote for a month," he continued,