Riff Wood Tap Green Day Producer Rob Cavallo for New Album
Riff Wood, a three-piece band from Davis County, Utah, have released their second full-length album, Butterfly In Black And White, working with producer Rob Cavallo — the longtime Green Day collaborator who produced 1994's Dookie. Members Carson Groves, Hyrum Russon and Shredder spoke to NME in a recent video interview about the album's shift in sound, the story behind its cover art, and their take on "positive punk."
A band that started with Dookie
The trio originally got the idea to form a band after watching the Netflix musical comedy series Julie And The Phantoms, but it was hearing Green Day's Dookie for the first time that set their direction. Groves said "Basket Case" was the song that pulled all three of them into rock music — watching live footage of the band, he said, "they just looked like they were having so much fun" on stage.
Russon added that they were still learning guitar at the time, and Dookie's lack of Van Halen-style shredding, with its simple structures, made them feel like they could do it too — pulling them further toward pop-punk acts like Green Day and Blink-182. Shredder said he had mostly been listening to hip-hop and pop before that, and the album was "completely different."
Butterfly In Black And White: on duality
Where last year's debut, Tough Luck, was straightforward pop-punk, the new album pushes the sound elsewhere. Shredder called it "more advanced, more mature," while still built on the same Green Day-inspired foundation as their debut. Groves said the band is always finding new influences from other albums or live shows, then reshaping them into something more distinctly Riff Wood.
The cover art comes from a photo Groves took of a milk spill Russon made before a rehearsal, which — after editing — resembled a butterfly. The three looked into the symbolism of black-and-white butterflies; Russon noted that some cultures see them as good luck, others as an omen of misfortune or death. "The whole album is about duality, the positive and the negative," he said.
Life beyond Utah
Riff Wood toured outside Utah for the first time in 2025, and completed their first shows outside the U.S. earlier this year. Groves said the experience made them want to bring their music to more people — "not for the numbers," but for the value of connecting with an audience, a feeling he said only grows stronger with bigger venues.
Asked about the most memorable live shows they've seen recently, Russon pointed to Green Day's stage presence, while Groves cited Paul McCartney's "Get Back" tour — songs written in the 1960s sung back by an entire crowd in 2025, with fans in their eighties standing alongside kids younger than the band members themselves. In the full NME interview, the trio also discuss falling in love with Oasis, their experience working with Rob Cavallo, and what they've observed as a Gen Z "rock revival."