Andy Nelson (Paint it Black) Interview (July 2008)

I was thinking about breaking this one up into several different posts but now I simply don't care enough. This interview with Andy Nelson of Paint it Black is 5,081 words long and runs 10 single spaced pages in Microsoft Word. Out of all the interviews I've done I think this the best one. Andy seemed like such a genuinely nice guy who was more than happy to expound at length on anything I threw at him. It really does read more like a real conversation than a rigid interview. He was cool enough to hook me up with Yemin's phone number so I could talk to him and get two different takes for my story. Once this is posted up I'm going to start working on the actual writing piece for the website. It's probably going to be pretty fucking epic.

Bill: Like I said, you were with the band when you started. Do you think the lineup changes have influenced the sound shifts, because you guys have definitely had a little bit of a different sound with each record.

Andy: Absolutely. When we first started out it sounded very much like what it was; Dan had a fire lit under his ass to start a fast, hard band after he had a stroke and got together with a couple friends and enlisted me to play bass, and we just banged it out. The first record is what, 19 songs?

Bill: Yeah in about 19 minutes.

Andy: Yeah! For as long as it took us to get the record out, we sort of got together and learned the songs and recorded them just like THAT. I mean, there wasn’t much of a band input as far as what it sounded like. Dan wrote these songs that are really important to him and we just banged ‘em out. There wasn’t a lot of “writing” that went into it.

Bill: Yeah

Andy: And also at that point everyone in the band was really distracted with other stuff. Dave, our first drummer, at that time was still playing in Good Riddance. Dave Hause was touring full time with the Bouncing Souls, Sick of it All and whoever else as a roadie and he had his own band the Cursed. It’s been a recurring thing with our band that outside duties have forced people to leave the band. And in Dave’s case it was starting a family, Dave Wagenshutz’s case, which is awesome. In Hause’s case it was to do his own thing musically, also which is great. I mean we’re totally happy for him, The Loved Ones are a fucking awesome band. So when we got Colin and Dave we definitely spent a lot more time writing our second record as a band. It’s a lot more “us at the time” but again the amount of time we put into writing the record wasn’t anywhere near as much as we did with our newest one. I think this might not make sense to an outsider but I listen to the records and I think they sound like the people that were in the band at the time, you know what I mean?

Bill: Yeah totally.

Andy: Everyone who’s been in Paint it Black has left their musical mark on it in one way or another. I also think it’s an issue of spending… (pause) For the new record we spent fucking hours and hours and hours and hours a day working on it.

Bill: You can definitely tell with the new one that you took your time.

Andy: (chuckle) Yeah, usually when we approach writing, with the other ones we booked studio time and then learned the songs and then busted them out as quick as we could. When we went into the studio to do Paradise a lot of the songs weren’t even done yet. And I know that’s how a lot of bands work, but we usually don’t have enough time to record, to work like that. I mean I love how Paradise came out, but man, we broke the songs on New Lexicon down to atomic level and I think they’re better for it. It’s crazy. And we have actually already begun writing new stuff, a couple new songs already which is not how we used to do it. We used to finish touring then get to work, and I think now all four of us are really into pacing it.

Bill: And with the new stuff, I was reading some interviews online, and I actually always kind of noticed this too, that you guys jumped straight into making full length LPs after your demo. I think it was Dan that said this, that you’re just doing 7”s from now on? Is that a serious plan?

Andy: That is the plan. Dan and I weren’t even sure about making a third record before we went into make this one.

Bill: Oh.

Andy: Well only because… well I think it’s important to be your own most harsh critic. I personally think that most punk bands make maybe one good record (chuckle). And two, this might be pushing it, but I can’t think of any bands… well there’s a handful I guess, that make a real good third album

Bill: Yeah, only the real special ones.

Andy: And you know it’s been a long road with this band. We’ve gone through a load of members, you know? My only point is that it wasn’t a foregone conclusion to be like “oh alright, it’s time to make another record.” Is it worth our time and effort? Does the world really need another album from Paint It Black? I think we’ve been rejuvenated by the addition of Josh and Jared, and we were really curious to see where that would go. So we went for it, and this is my favorite thing that we’ve done. But I don’t know, a fourth LP seems like too much (chuckle). We were thinking that we’ve never really done a 7” before. Like, we did a 7” for our record release show back in January.

Bill: Oh that’s right, with the one exclusive song, right?

Andy: Yeah, the one song, screened, clear vinyl. We gave out 500 and that was that. I mean, my favorite format in music is the 7” and it seems silly that we’ve never done one. The idea was that once we were done with the third album we would just release 7”s. We haven’t really figured out what we’re going to do yet. We certainly have at least a 7” or two or material ready to go but I don’t know what the plan is really. We’ll do one on a couple different labels? We’ve been talking to Alap, who co-produced our new record, the guy from Dälek, about maybe just going up to his studio for a weekend and being completely insane and making some wild instrumental thing. I think there’s a lot more freedom in being like “yeah, you know, we’re going to put out a 7” and it’s going to sound ridiculous” and if people don’t like it, you know?

Bill: Yeah, it’s just one 7”, it’s not a full thematic, well I don’t want to say concept records with you guys but you can sense that there’s a… I’m struggling with how to say this but you get what I’m trying to say, right?

Andy: Well there’s a theme to it with all of our records, there’s an underlying theme. You can credit Dan for that. We all had input to the artistic vision of it but in terms of lyrics and stuff that was all Dan. But yeah, there’s a lot more freedom to it and I also like the idea of being able to have a quicker turn around rate in terms of connecting with the audience. I mean we generally go three years in between records, you know? It’s a long time to be writing a song, and by the time you start playing it live and people know it, you’ve been playing it for two years or whatever. I like the idea of being able to write a song, record it a month later and another month later have it out on vinyl.

Bill: Good for the fans too.

Andy: Uh huh. That’s the plan, I guess. (chuckle)

Bill: Ha, alright. One of the things I’ve noticed about you guys is that, for a hardcore band, you have a super, super wide appeal. I know people that listen to almost no hardcore at all but they love you guys, and the types that only listen to grindcore like you guys too. Have you noticed that? You seem kind of like a gateway band.

Andy: Well I don’t know. I think that when we first started out we were definitely toeing the line of being a gateway band, kind of in the same way… well at the time we were touring with a lot of other gateway bands like Anti-Flag, The Explosion or Strike Anywhere. We did it to say that I don’t think it was a bad thing per se, I think that people see gateway bands as a bad thing.

Bill: Oh definitely not a bad thing.

Andy: Oh yeah, I don’t think so either. I was thinking today about how when I was a kid I was into Nirvana, and they’re the ultimate gateway band for anybody, you know? I was into them in sixth grade, and if I hadn’t been into Nirvana, I wouldn’t have gotten into Flipper, Beat Happening, and Swans and all this crazy shit that a sixth or seventh grader should not be listening to!

Bill: (Hearty Chuckle)

Andy: So you know there are gateway bands like them. I don’t know what people would do without gateway bands. I guess if you’re talking about having a wider appeal, I don’t know. It can be a good thing and it can be a bad thing. I think that we often suffered until we built up our own fan base the last couple years, I guess, of kids that are just into us. It was hard for a long time because we were too punk for the hardcore kids and too hardcore for the punk kids. So we’d play all these shows and regardless of what show it was, people would just stare at us because they didn’t know what to make of us. The thing is, that is with bands that don’t color right in between the lines, is something they suffer from, it’s the pain of being too creative sometimes. If you don’t easily fit into some sort of genre classification and people have to think about your music…

Bill: Then they won’t think about it, they’ll just write you off

Andy Exactly, right, which is typical I think of a lot of punk/hardcore kids that say “oh, I’m into nothing but grindcore” and there are plenty of grindcore bands that you can only be into grindcore and have a large record collection. I don’t really care to be like that. But we’ll play shows with bands that I liked and their fans would fucking hate us. And then we’d play shows with bands I didn’t like where maybe the kids were a little bit more open minded, but I would feel out of place. It was weird for a really long time. I think we’ve forged our own path. And I think just playing our own shows helped that a lot; we stopped really taking support slots probably two years ago. Only in rare circumstances, if it’s a friend of ours, like Strike Anywhere we’ll play with anywhere. It kind of works, the pairing works and I love hanging out with them. But certain things you just realize are not worth it. I’d rather play to 200 kids that like us than 1,000 that don’t. But, I don’t know, as far as us being a gateway band, I mean we’re always trying to get younger kids into stuff they might not know about, other cool bands, or we’re trying to take out lesser known bands, stuff like that. Kids write to us a lot and just ask what records we’re listening to. Those are my favorite kind of correspondences.

Bill: How did you end up hooking up with Jeff Pezatti for him to do the vocals on the new record?

Andy: It was pretty easy actually. Dan came to practice with this part for a song and he was like, he prefaced it by saying “this might be a little too Naked Raygun, let me know what you think.” So we played it and I was like “Well. It’s definitely Naked Raygun,” which is not a bad thing; they’re one of my favorite bands. It seemed like one of those things where, we played this show last April, we booked it at this real tiny venue, announced it the day of and played new songs, just to try ‘em out live. We hadn’t recorded them yet; I think we were about halfway done writing the record. When we got to (“Shell Game Redux”) I remember being on stage and being like “I feel kind of goofy singing this!” Since then I’ve warmed up to it but it was new territory for us. We never had a song before that was like 16 measures of nothing but “woahs.” Somewhere in there I had the idea where it was like “you know?” We knew that J. Robins and Jeff were friends, and we were tracking with J. so I was like “you know, if we’re really going to put this on the record we should really just have the guy who in our heads is singing it, we should just have him sing it.” It seemed like a long shot but we asked J. if he call Jeff, and Jeff was totally receptive to it. A guy named Daniel in Chicago set a little Pro Tools studio in his house and Jeff just banged it out. And it was funny because we had finished tracking and it happened in between the tracking and the mixing, and I hadn’t heard until we got to the very final mixing.

Bill: Oh wow

Andy: Yeah, right. And then when he dropped it in and I heard it for the first time I just started laughing. It was just so ridiculous to me that we got Jeff to sing on one of our records. I remember being 15 and buying my first Naked Raygun record and then flash forward ten years or whatever and that same voice is on MY record! I met Jeff shortly after, I think it was after we recorded it. It must have been, it was down in Florida when Naked Raygun was playing The Fest and he was super cool. Actually, I filled in on bass for a Lifetime tour and when we played Chicago Jeff Peatti came and brought his son. I don’t get star struck but I totally was by Jeff Pezatti being at the show and I was too scared to talk to him, ha ha ha.

Bill: Was that the show at Subterranean?

Andy: Yeah.

Bill: That was a great fucking show.

Andy: Yeah it was a lot of fun.

Bill: My boss actually got kicked out for stage diving at that show.

Andy: Ha, oh really?

Bill: Yeah, when I first started working at this place we were talking and it was “so did you go to Lifetime?” He’s like “Yeah, I got kicked out,” so my first thought was “I’m going to enjoy working here.”

Andy: That’s great! Yeah, that was a great show. I’ve done a little time in Lifetime off and on when their normal bass player can’t do it and that was definitely one of the most fun shows I’ve played with them. But for example, there were all these other guys, like all the guys in Fall Out Boy were there and some other quote-unquote “famous” dudes were there and I didn’t give a fuck; Pezatti was there! Holy shit I don’t know what to say to this guy! So then like a year later, you know, somehow he sang on our record and he’s telling me stories about fighting skinheads in the 80s over drinks in Florida.

Bill: That’s awesome.

Andy: Yeah Jeff’s awesome, Raygun still has it, and I love that guy.

Bill: Yeah, I’m pretty sure they’re going to be playing this year; they’ve played the last couple, so it should be a good time.

Andy: I think we’re going to do a really quick East Coast tour with them in the fall.

Bill: Oh seriously?

Andy: I think in November.

Bill: That’d be a hell of a tour, it’s just a shame it’s on the East Coast. But back to what you said before about the Midwest, it’s been a while since Paint it Black has played here. It’s been three or four years?

Andy: (chuckling) Yeah.

Bill: Not to call you out or anything, but you know, was it just life getting in the way of the band, just couldn’t end up getting the time to do it?

Andy: Um. God, how do I answer this diplomatically? (laugh) It’s not meant to be an insult to the Midwest. We hear a lot from people that feel jilted in the Midwest. And every time we announce a tour or a set of shows or anything like that there’ll always be a dozen or so people that write to us “Heh. No fuckin’ Midwest shows again, you assholes.” The fact is that it’s just a matter of not having enough time to get there.

Bill: And economically with gas prices now and with some shows being spread out so far.

Andy: Yeah, like, we’ve really been having to make… we don’t make money off our band in any way, you know. Certain people in our band can’t afford to lose money. Even going to New York or Boston or something like that is a money losing venture these days, getting paid what we usually get paid. I mean I don’t really care about money but doing something like driving to Chicago or even worse Minneapolis, or any of those places can just be not feasible. We’ve thought about maybe flying out to do a weekend or something because we had some really amazing success doing something like that back in May. We flew to Florida for four shows in three days. Flying the four of us down there was OBSCENELY cheap compared to what we would have spent on gas doing a weekend of driving.

Bill: Were the Florida shows the Sailor Jerry ones or was that somewhere else?

Andy: No, the Sailor Jerry show was in Philly in April, I think.

Bill: Oh, never mind then.

Andy: The Florida ones were just four normal, Florida shows in Jacksonville, Gainesville, Miami and Orlando. Was it Orlando? Somewhere else. Tampa! And they were great, they were awesome, they were all places we’d never played before except for Gainesville. As far as the Midwest goes, it’s always been one of those things that’s been on our list. Like, I keep a list of places we need to and things we need to do and stuff. It’s always been one of things where, it’s been the most difficult place to play, for us anyway.

Bill: Yeah, if you’re not from here it can be a pain in the ass to get to.

Andy: Yeah it just becomes… (pause) and frankly, this is not meant to be a dig against any of the local scenes or anything like that. Chicago is always awesome, Minneapolis is always awesome, but in our history it’s always been kind of a mixed bag playing elsewhere. So if you play a show and it’s cool but if only 20 or 30 kids, you know? I think that even Lifetime in Detroit on that tour, and you remember how great the Chicago show was.

Bill: Yeah, it was just apeshit packed.

Andy: The Detroit show was just totally bunk. It’s hard to make a decision like “yeah, instead of playing killer shows in Boston and New York and DC” where we come back with money or whatever, or not even that.

Bill: With people reacting.

Andy: And playing cool shows with people we know, we’re going to spend 50 hours in the van and lose hundreds of dollars. I don’t know, as I’m saying this I feel like an asshole.

Bill: Eh, it’s reality.

Andy: We can get to Chicago but we can’t get to Minneapolis in that some weekend. We feel really shitty about it and we’re definitely going to make an effort to come and hit some of those places this year. But with the Riot Fest thing we sort of thought well, now that even things like punk has become very destination based I think. There are so many festivals now that the die hards will travel to see you. I think we’ll play Riot Fest and then come back to do a proper tour. What’s that cool place in Chicago, Reggie’s? That place that everyone plays now?

Bill: Yeah, that opened up towards the end of last year. It’s a good 300 capacity room, it’s pretty cool.

Andy: I know that’s where The Loved Ones are playing.

Bill: Yeah, that’s where most of the smaller mid-sized punk bands are playing.

Andy: Who’s playing there?

Bill: Huh?

Andy: Who’s playing there?

Bill: Oh, you know, it’s where most of mid sized bands are playing now. Actually some of the larger bands are playing there now instead of playing the bigger club shows with barriers. It’s been kind of cool, they’re taking shows away from the bigger clubs which is usually fine.

Andy: Yeah, I think we’ve played Chicago three different times. We played the Fireside Bowl, we played the Bottom Lounge, and I can’t remember the other place.

Bill: Yeah, the Fireside and Bottom Lounge are gone now. I miss those places.

Andy: Obviously Fireside was cool, Bottom Lounge was cool, I just don’t know what’s cool there nowadays.

Bill: It was in flux for awhile where there weren’t many places for bands to play if they were too big for basements or they couldn’t bring in a thousand people. It really sucked for a little while.

Andy: Yeah.

Bill: There are a couple new places coming up. You mentioned that there are so many fests now and I was looking on your myspace page at the tour dates and it seems like you guys were playing almost every one! This is Hardcore, Sound and Fury, you usually play The Fest, and now you’re doing Riot Fest in the fall. What do you like or dislike about the festival atmosphere.

Andy: Well I actually, I don’t want to say that I hate the festival atmosphere but I always feel kind of overwhelmed by it personally. Like for example, we played another festival on the West Coast tour in Tacoma, Washington back in May, I think. And fuck man, we were playing towards the end of the day, maybe second to last or something, and it was 19 bands that day and it started at noon on a Saturday. And just that many people that are in bands at one place at one time and everyone gets twenty minutes or a half hour, I don’t know, it just seems like a commodification of what a show can be. In general, obviously a lot of fests are bigger than a normal show would be so I always get kind of anxious about all of the extra security, and often times we’ll be playing on a big stage with a barrier. And not that I mind that, sometimes it’s fun. But the upside to it is when the fests are good they’re fucking amazing, because you have the opportunity to play to potentially thousands of people. At their worst they can be a total waste of time. I don’t know, I mean certain fests, like The Fest in Gainesville we’ll do every year until we’re not a band, because they get it. And everything I’ve heard about Riot Fest is that you guys get it too.

Bill: Yeah it’s pretty cool.

Andy: I don’t know, I mean, my friend Timmy does a fest in Austin every year

Bill: Chaos In Tejas. I went to that this year, it was my college graduation present to myself and it was one of the most completely fun weeks of my life, it was amazing.

Andy: Yeah, I was there too, it was fucking awesome, and he does an amazing job with it every year. Just like I guess every fest does it gets bigger every year. But I think Timmy gets it right, The Fest in Gainesville gets it right, This is Hardcore is always cool. I think we only generally play fests that are run by people that we know and like. We’re doing one in August in Richmond called Best Friends Day, I don’t know if you know about it.

Bill: Yeah, yeah.

Andy: It’s basically the guys from Municipal Waste and some of the other crazy Richmond bands renting out a fucking water park and have a fest in it.

Bill: The beards take over.

Andy: Just drunken summertime fun with bands. It’s really super positive and non-corporate, no bullshit. I’m super excited to be playing that one. I think that festivals for us are a great thing and sort of a necessary thing because of how little time we have to actually tour. Often times we’ll do something fun, like last year at The Fest in Gainesville we played a house in the middle of the night, actually an apartment. In fact it was right after Naked Raygun played and that was our only stipulation. That band Shook Ones, you know them?

Bill: Yeah

Andy: They were playing in an apartment and they were like “oh you guys want to hop on and play” and we’re like “yeah but only after Naked Raygun is done playing.” So I guess they finished playing their set and they started texting us asking “Where are you guys?” and we text back “in the front row for Naked Raygun!” As soon as they were done we ran down and played, and obviously the cops came, busted in and grabbed us while we were playing, I think the floor caved in. It made the papers the next day.

Bill: That sounds pretty awesome.

Andy: They give us the opportunity to give us cool stuff in conjunction with them too. I mean, I like fests, you get to see a lot of cool bands all at once, and I don’t know who’s playing Riot Fest this year, but…

Bill: It’s going to be… actually, T.S.O.L. is going to be playing, they’re coming out. ALL with Scott Reynolds is playing, Raygun’s going to be playing one night, Mighty Mighty Bosstones are playing. I’m trying to think of some other ones.

Andy: Someone told me originally Hot Water was playing and he mentioned Cock Sparrer but they seemed real hard to nail down.

Bill: Yeah Cock Sparrer fell through, that was almost guaranteed but then at the last minute something came up and they’re like “oh, nope, sorry!”

Andy: That happened to Timmy too! He was going to get them for Chaos in Tejas and they were all set to come but then no. I don’t know what their deal is. I guess they don’t need money or whatever.

Bill: They really must not, I mean from what I know from this, they’re getting offered… they’d be taken care of if they were to play these shows. It’s their loss I guess.

Andy: Yeah. Well that all sounds cool, I’m excited. I’m excited to hang out in Chicago. I’m coming out there in a week or so to hang out. It’ll be real fun.

Bill: Yeah it’ll be cool. There are still a couple of things that are a little up in the air, but I think the official announcement is going to be made on Thursday, I want to say.

Andy: Oh really?

Bill: Yeah, it’s coming up soon.

Andy: Great.

Bill: I only have a couple more quick questions. You know, everyone knows what Dan does for a living, the whole “Doctor Dan” thing, but what do you do for a day job?

Andy: Well I book shows shows in Philadelphia for R5 Productions and I also do independent design work. Those sort of keep me afloat to live a very meager lifestyle. I don’t own a car or a house or anything like that but it’s fun and it gets me by. It’s nothing as crazy as being a child psychologist but its fine. It’s pretty cool to make money by booking shows and playing them, and then my supplemental design work on the side.

Bill: That’s cool. The shows in Philly, they’re usually at the Unitarian Church, right? That’s the one it is?

Andy: Yeah that’s mostly where we book out of.

Bill: I’ve heard a lot of reports that it’s really awesome. One day, you know?

Andy: It’s great, it’s where I’ve grown up, I’ve been going there since I was a young teenager. It’s weird, I don’t feel like my connection to the scene or in terms of the operation of it is any different now than it was when I first worked there.

Bill: That’s cool, that’s a good feeling to have.

Andy: Yeah it’s really nice. It’s total DIY, there’s a very direct connection between the people that frequent it and the people that play it. I think everybody that works the door, like Liam from Dillinger Escape Plan, Tony from R.A.M.B.O., all these different people are the ones stamping your hand or setting up the PA and then a week later they’ll be selling the venue out. It’s really cool and I think that kids who come to the venue know that too, they’re aware that the people playing are the people taking their money at the door or helping you find the bathroom or cleaning up your vomit.

Bill: I’m out of questions so do you have any last words or thoughts that you want to speak your peace on?

Andy: Nope. I hope that Chicago doesn’t hate us and that they don’t throw tomatoes at us when we play.

Bill: Ha, that won’t happen, the couple of people I’ve told are like “holy shit, Paint It Black are actually coming? Yes!” And that’s not a dig at you guys, it’s not.

Andy: (laughter) Yeah, I hope that it turns into a… kind of a… Best case scenario it’s like (sheepishly) “hey, it’s been awhile” and people are stoked, not booing and telling us to get the fuck off. Regardless, I’m excited and hopefully it’ll open the door to us coming back on a more regular basis. Even flying in and out wouldn’t be a crazy thing to do because it’s not super expensive to fly to Chicago, so I don’t know. I think it’ll be great; I’m excited for the fest. I can’t wait.

Dan Yemin (Paint it Black) Interview (July 2008)

Try to guess, if I were given the option of re-doing this interview, which question I would take out. I'll give you a hint: it's the last one. This thing took awhile to set up but once it was finally done I think it came out alright despite the constant phone problems and the pretty much constant background noise on Dan's end. Seriously, you should hear the tape and then you'll know how much of a pain in the ass the transcription was. I've never seen Paint it Black before and I'm pretty excited that both Dan and Andy (interview posted soon; I think it may be my favorite interview I've ever done) are dead set on coming back to the Midwest more often. Once again this was done for the website but I haven't started to write that piece yet.

Dan: Hello

Bill: Hi Dan, this is Bill Molloy, do you have time to do the interview now?

Dan: Yeah.

Bill: Alright, cool. This shouldn't take more than 15 or 20 minutes.

Dan: Ok I might have to stop at a couple points just for a second; I'm on call tonight. That cool?

Bill: That's fine.

Dan: Hello? Are you there?

Bill: I'm still here, can you hear me?

Dan: Yeah now I can.

Bill: Ok. You and Andy are the only guys who have been with Paint it Black through its entire existence; have you noticed that the lineup turnover has influenced the sound at all?

Dan: Yeah, we got better. It's definitely influenced the sound; Jared's a very different drummer than Dave. I mean Dave is fantastic and probably one of the best hardcore drummers out there but Jared's just very different and very musical and I think the drumming really fits. The drumming is almost like another melodic instrument in the band in some ways. Also this lineup has above and beyond the best work ethic of any band lineup I've ever worked with, and I've worked with a lot of lineups.

Bill: Ha, yeah.

Dan: There was so much work put in getting ready for this last record. We had always been a bit under prepared when we got to the studio, and I think most bands are, but we really got every detail and every nuance before hand because we put so much time into rehearsing.

Bill: Yeah that's what Andy said when I talked to him, that there was WAY more time put into rehearsing this record than any other one.

Dan: Say again?

Bill: That's what Andy said, that there was WAY more time put into rehearsing and song crafting for this one.

Dan: And that has a lot to do with the lineup; people were so willing to put all of their time and put everything else to the side. Can you hold on one second?

Bill: Sure.

(Dan takes a medical call for two or three minutes. I drink some water and look at Punknews)

Dan: Are you there?

Bill: Yeah I'm still here.

Dan: Sorry about that, I'm on call tonight so I got paged and had to answer it real quickly. It's all good now.

Bill: No worries, it's fine. You were talking about how this lineup has the best work of any of the bands you've been in...

Dan: You're cutting out. Hello?

Bill: Hello?

Dan: Yeah I can't hear you at all.

Bill: Is this better?

Dan: I'm sorry?

Bill: Is this better?

Dan: Alright, now I gotcha.

Bill: How did you end up hooking up with Jeff Pezzati and getting him to sing on New Lexicon?

Dan: That was a fantasy that we somehow made reality. We're all crazy huge Naked Raygun fans. You're from Chicago so you know that Naked Raygun is like The Clash of Chicago.

Bill: They're disgustingly huge here.

Dan: Ha, I would hope so, they should be huge everywhere. If there were any justice in the world, if people liked quality instead of bullshit, Raygun would be the biggest band everywhere.

Bill: You're preaching to the choir here.

Dan: But, you know, people like bullshit more than they like quality; they're such an amazing band. Every time I wrote a "woah woah" anthem part I'm thinking of Naked Raygun. Even more than 7 Seconds, I'm thinking Naked Raygun. We had that song, "Shell Game Redux," the last song, I wrote the vocal part and we were joking in practice about how awesome it would be if Pezatti sings it. It was just a joke we made because we all love Naked Raygun, but I was like "You know, maybe this does not have to be a joke" and Jeff's in that band The Bomb, and we have two degrees of separation on them. One, J Robbins, who records us, recorded The Bomb's last record.

Bill: Yeah, Indecision.

Dan: And then Jeff Dean the guitarist is an old, old friend of mine. I met him on the first Lifetime tour in 1992 in Las Vegas and he had a Lifetime tattoo on his arm. He was the first person I ever met with one. That’s a huge thing. I mean we were a young band then with only a 7" and an LP out but he had a Lifetime tattoo. That was a huge moment for me, like "Wow, I've done something that has such an impact on people that they marked themselves with it for life." That was one of the first steps for me taking this really, really seriously, showing how much heart you've got to put into it. So Jeff (Dean) I've known forever and I called Jeff (Dean), called J. and asked "What do you think, would Pezzati do this?" and they were both like "Yeah, probably, go for it!" Then a couple days later I had a voicemail from Pezzati and I was like (in high pitched voice) "OH MY GOD I'M NOT GONNA DELETE THIS VOICEMAIL!"

Bill: (laughter)

Dan: I came home, and my wife's from Chicago, and I was like "You're never going to guess who left me a voicemail today" and she was jokingly like "What, Jeff Pezzati?"

Bill: (hearty chuckle)

Dan: I was like "Thanks for ruining my surprise!" She said "Oh really? I was kidding!" One of the first things we ever, now this shows how important this is to me, one of the first things my wife and I ever bonded over was our mutual adoration for Naked Raygun.

Bill: That's awesome.

Dan: In the voicemail he was like "Sure, tell me what you want me to do." We recorded the song and I had Josh sing the part as a reference, we burned the track onto a disc and sent it off to Chicago. A friend of Jeff Dean's has a studio and they did it there. He did it in a couple of takes and that was it. We got it back and we were freaking out it was so good. It sounded like my adolescence.

Bill: Ha, that's a really cool story. Now with this record, how would you say... Is your writing process any different from what you did with the last Lifetime record versus what you did with the new Paint it Black? I've noticed that there were a couple parts on New Lexicon that seemed kind of Lifetime-esque to me.

Dan: Kind of what?

Bill: Lifetime-esque, especially the end part of "Past Tense, Future Perfect."

Dan: Well I'll tell you about that song. I wrote that song for Paint it Black, and then when Lifetime got back together everyone in Paint it Black was worried that I'd make Lifetime my first priority, but I swore to them that Paint it Black was going to remain my first priority, because I want it that way. I love Lifetime but Paint it Black is like my baby. By all rights I should have moved that song over to the Lifetime record; the whole song I think could be a Lifetime song if you just listen to the music and take away the obnoxious screaming!

Bill: Ha, true.

Dan: So I told the guys in Paint it Black, I'm like "This song, you need to hear this song and it proves that Paint it Black is my priority. This song would make perfect sense on the Lifetime record but I'm keeping it where I intended it to go." I guess Lifetime has always kind of crept in. Originally when I started Paint it Black I wanted straight up thrash, I wanted to sound like Los Crudos, another Chicago reference.

Bill: Legends.

Dan: But the thing is that I could never keep the melody out. If you think about what you've asked me and then go back and listen to the first records you'll hear more Lifetime than you thought. "Pink Slip," the second song on Paradise is very Lifetime.

Bill: Well that one definitely.

Dan: There are definitely a couple moments on CVA. (pause) I think the process is different only in that it was liberating to share, to give the band, the other three guys so much freedom with the songs, you know? I write all the music and typically I've been a real control freak about it; this time I demoed everything on my computer and sent it to everybody and then do with it what they will. There were a lot of practices where I didn't show up until the end.

Bill: Really?

Dan: Yeah, I'd work until 9:00, they'd start practicing at 6:00, I'd show up at 9:30 and they'd say "Well, we've made some changes, tell us what you think." And at first I could see they were playing the songs and looking at me out of the corner of their eye to see what my reaction would be but with almost everything they did I was like "that's better actually." I gave them total freedom to rearrange the songs, and that was a first. It's about trust and learning to let go. It was really liberating for me and hopefully for them.

Bill: Is that something you don't think you could have done with any of the older lineups?

Dan: Well I don't know really; for whatever reason I didn't.

Bill: I noticed in a couple of other interviews you were mentioning, and this is something I noticed myself, that you jumped straight from your demo to recording full length LPs, and is your plan just to do 7"s from now on?

Dan: Well yeah, I would like to. I believe in never saying never, because I every time I say never I end up eating shit, you know? As recently as three years ago I said you'd never see Lifetime play again so I learned my lesson I think. What I think is that there are very few hardcore bands or punk bands that ever made it to a third LP. Usually by the time they do they're a fucking joke.

Bill: Either they've changed their sound or they're just not as good.

Dan: Exactly. I wanted three albums. That was my aspiration, because each of my other bands broke up in between recording a second album and it being released, both Lifetime and Kid Dynamite. I reached my goal of not only doing three records without breaking up but also I think that the third one is above and beyond the best one. That's so rare and kind of at this point… I've always been so obsessed with albums, but at this point I'm thinking "let's have a go at the format that kind of is, well it's the best format for hardcore."

Bill: Oh yeah, I agree completely.

Dan: A six song 7"? Awesome. I don't want to say we'll never do another album but we're really stoked to do some 7"s.

Bill: Well if it's a 7" you can screw around a little bit, you can try some new things out. It's not as huge of a deal as with an LP.

Dan: Yeah, although I don't think we can really try too many more new things than what we did with New Lexicon.

Bill: Make an EP of all ambient noise with no actual punk rock, that'll screw with people's heads.

Dan: I want to do a re-mix 12" actually, like have different people do re-mixes of stuff.

Bill: That'd be interesting to hear.

Dan: Yeah it's one of my fantasy projects; let's see how long it takes to happen.

Bill: The other guys into that idea or is that something just you want to do?

Dan: No, everyone else is totally into it too. Everybody in this band is into a really wide array of music. Jared's iPod is crazy, I haven't heard of half the stuff in there. There's a lot of avant-garde, experimental, international stuff. He studied music in college, composition and jazz. He's really well versed and into everything. If anything I think I'm the most musically conservative out of all of us.

Bill: One of the things that I've noticed about Paint it Black is that you have, for a hardcore band, you seem to have a lot people that are into you but they'll say "I don't like hardcore but I really like Paint it Black." Do you see Paint it Black as kind of a gateway band to get into more hardcore stuff if they're coming from the more melodic side of things?

Dan: I think so. And I think not just from the melodic side but also... (pause) We're about substance, we're not about bullshit, we're not about brutal breakdowns. We don't write songs for people to beat each other up to.

Bill: And thank you for that.

Dan: Ha, I mean I'm all for moshing and stage diving and stuff. I'm against violence and unnecessary brutality. I don't like seeing people dance in a way that scares me; I don't like all that karate bullshit, which scares the crap out of me. But circle pits and stage diving, and old 80s style moshing I love. I think people sense that we're a hardcore band that is for everybody. There's no hard guy attitude, no egos. There are anthems, politics that people can relate to. I think a lot of hardcore gets written off almost as the Harry Potter of underground music.

Bill: What exactly do you mean by that?

Dan: You know, you're reading Harry Potter and your more literary friends are like "I can't believe you're reading Harry Potter, isn't that a children's book?" I kind of feel like hardcore is like that in the independent music world, where a lot of grown folk are over it or don't take it seriously. I think kids know that we're the band that's hardcore, but anybody who likes non-mainstream music can take us seriously. I think in a lot of ways, at least in the cities where we're most popular it's almost like Avail was in 1995. That was the band for everybody, the ultimate populist punk band. Straight edge kids, militant vegans, crusty punks, mohawk kids; everybody went to see Avail. I aspire to be in that kind of band.

Bill: That's not a bad ambition to have. I never made the connection with the Harry Potter thing either but it is pretty accurate. It's been a couple years since Paint it Black's been to the Midwest, at least four or five years. Are you excited to hit the region again?

Dan: I'm so excited. We're going to come out again later and do Detroit, Cleveland and Chicago a few months later down the line we think. We've really neglected the Midwest lately. For the first three years we were a band we kept jumping on tours with friends that were short Northeast and Midwest tours, so the first few tours we went on were Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Minneapolis, Indianapolis. So for three years that was all we did except for playing at home. So after that we went out of our way to go to the West Coast a bunch of times, Europe a bunch of times, get down to Florida a bunch of times. And in doing that, in being really deliberate about it we realized that we've really neglected the Midwest the past couple years. It's nothing person it's just been logistical, but we'll get there. Chicago's one of my favorite cities; it's the only city not on a coast that I would live in. It's also one of my favorite scenes. I've played the Fireside Bowl too many times to mention. I love Chicago.

Bill: Yeah we were all super bummed out when the Fireside closed down a couple years ago.

Dan: Heartbroken.

Bill: There was nowhere else to go for awhile. Ugh. Are you guys still really active with Shirts for a Cure?

Dan: We'll every time they ask for a new shirt we give them one. We defintely support them in that way, we've played some Shirts For A Cure shows. Whenever they have a show we play it. Mark's an old friend of mine. I love him and I back the cause.

Bill: That's cool.

Dan: Yeah definitely.

Bill: One of the things I noticed after looking through the tour dates posted on your myspace page is that you seem to be doing a ton of fests; Riot Fest you're obviously playing, the Fest in Gainesville, This Is Hardcore, there was some other one in Washington State. How do you feel about fests as a whole?

Dan: I love the energy of all these people coming for a whole weekend to be stoked about music and nothing else. You see old friends, meet new friends, find cool places to eat and drink and see just a TON of bands. I love the energy, it's just this concentrated feeling of exhilaration, it's kind of in the air and palpable. I love playing all kinds of different fests, like we're playing a few straight up hardcore fests, we're playing Best Friends Day in Richmond which is totally drunk punk, we're playing Fuck Yeah Fest in LA with NOFX, Circle Jerks and Fucked Up, we're playing Riot Fest, Gainesville Fest. I like playing all different kinds of fests. Some of them are really one dimensional and some are really diverse; I like both kinds.

Bill: Now this might be kind of strange but I've always wondered where the bare feet thing came from, I've seen it referenced...

Dan: You're cutting out again.

Bill: Sorry about that, I just had this phone replaced and it's kind of shitty. One of the things I noticed as a superficial, this is kind of funny thing, you always seem to play shows without shoes. I've always kind of found that curious.

Dan: Oh admit you think it's adorable. Ha, I'm just kidding, it's only in Lifetime.

Bill: It is?

Dan: In Paint it Black I wear shoes because I'm getting old and my back hurts, my ankles hurt, my knees hurt and there's no reason to do more damage than I've already done. Jumping around in just your socks is really bad for you.

Bill: See that proves that you need to hit the Midwest more because I've only seen you with Lifetime and I've made an ass of myself.

Dan: Ha, I'm sorry.

Bill: Ha, whatever. I'm out of my pre-prepared questions so do you have any last words or anything you want to say?

Dan: I'm really flattered that we were asked to play Riot Fest and we're so, so stoked. That's all.

Bill: Alright, thank you very much for your time.

Dan: Thanks for supporting us.

Bill: Not a problem at all. Talk to you later.

Dan: Bye.

Dan Schafer (The Methadones) Interview (July 2008)

Finally, I've actually lost count of how many times I've seen The Methadones. It's somewhere around 22 or 23 by this point, and they're definitely holding the number one slot for now (though Chronic Seizure has to be getting close). If you don't know who Dan Schafer is and you claim to like punk rock then you're an idiot, plain and simple. Over the last 20 years the guy has been in too many bands to count, most famously fucking Screeching Weasel, Sludgeworth, The Riverdales, The Mopes, and of course the Meths. The man can sure as hell write a song

Bill: So the Meths and Copyrights split just came out this week. Why did you decide to do it on your own label as opposed to doing it on Red Scare?

Dan: Well we decided to do it on our own label because we found out that… for one thing we know a lot of the same people, a lot of the same labels just because we’ve been in bands for so long and we made the same contacts that they had. We realized that doing it ourselves is the only way at this point to turn a profit, you know. CD sales have been down and in order to make up for that, a lot of it’s been digital sales and what not. So by doing it ourselves we just found it a lot easier to have control and to actually see a profit from it. The other reason we did it is that Thick Records is really dishonest.

Bill: (laughter)

Dan: (laughter) Red Scare has been great but as a business move we had to go ahead and do our own stuff, from now on we’re just doing stuff on our own label, ours and the Copyrights’. We share the label with them.

Bill: Cool. Career Objective just came out on vinyl real recently with Underground Communiqué, right?

Dan: Yeah

Bill: I saw on the record that it was a split release between Transparent and Underground Communiqué.

Dan: Yeah, from now on with wanting to do our own stuff, I just asked him (Justin Schwier, UC Commander-In-Chief) if we could put the logo on it and he said it was fine. I mean he actually put it out but it’s kind of… that name just kind of represents us, you know, from now on.

Bill: I also noticed last time I saw you guys play you were back down to a four piece. Is Ken out of the band?

Dan: (sigh) Yeah, yeah, we’re back to being a four piece.

Bill: You’re set to go to Europe pretty soon?

Dan: Yeah

Bill: That’s the first time for The Meths, right?

Dan: Yeah, we’re going September 10 and we’ll be back October 1.

Bill: Oh so that’s right before Riot Fest then, that same week

Dan: Yup, we get back and we’ll have the Riot Fest and then the Gainesville Fest right there.

Bill: So you played Riot Fest last year, you did the pre-show and the big show and the big show.

Dan: Right

Bill: What’d you think about it? As opposed to the other fests you guys have played?

Dan: What do I think of Riot Fest?

Bill: Or just festivals in general like that, because usually you’re playing smaller shows and clubs, but when you play a huge place like the Congress Theater it’s gotta be kind of a mindfuck.

Dan: It is, it is a little bit but it’s also a great way for people to get to see bands that they haven’t, you know? I mean last year I got to see Stiff Little Fingers, you know? To me that was great.

Bill: Yeah it was.

Dan: Stiff Little Fingers and Naked Raygun in one bill, which would have never happened if it wasn’t for a festival, you know what I mean? And just a lot of other bands that he’s (Mike Petryshyn) been able to put together for a reunion or whatever. It’s just a lot of bands that people did get to see the first time around, and here’s the chance.

Bill: Yeah that’s true.

Dan: I think it’s a lot of fun, I think the bands are good and diverse. It’s been fun every year that I’ve been there that I’ve been there and that I’ve played it.

Bill: Alright. Maybe this is just my own observation but it seems like the last year or two The Meths have been less active with playing live but much more active with recording. Is that just me or has that actually been happening?

Dan: Well, locally a little less. Well for one our bass player Pete broke his arm so we’ve been on a bit of a hiatus, but now his arm’s back and you know, it’s in pretty good shape. We did play the East and West coast last year, we did some local stuff, but we’ve been continuing to do stuff out of town. I’d say your perception is probably somewhat accurate but not entirely because we have been out there the last year but we’ve also recorded a lot as well. It’s been heavier on that. This year, in 2008 I’m hoping to get away from that a little more, just concentrate on playing live more so than recording.

Bill: Gotcha. You mentioned Pete’s arm; that was actually going to be my next question. It’s fully healed up and ready to go?

Dan: It’s not fully healed up but we had rehearsal this Saturday and he played fine. He’s able to use it so as far as our band goes it’s… yeah, it’s not causing him any pain or anything like that so we’re back to where we were. At the same time he’s still having treatment and physical therapy and whatnot on his arm.

Bill: That’s good to hear that he’s somewhat back at least.

Dan: (chuckle) Yeah he’s back in terms of playing a bass, you know what I mean?

Bill: (chuckle) The other stuff not so much, but the most important part though

Dan: He still can’t extend his arm completely forward, he can’t get it completely straight yet.

Bill: Is Transparent just going to be for Methadones and Copyrights stuff, or do you see that branching out farther?

Dan: For right now it’s just us, we’re putting out our own stuff. If anybody wanted to put out a record I would probably encourage them to do it themselves. I mean, if they wanted to share a name they could, we could pool in our strengths but for now we’re still figuring a lot of stuff out because it’s so new to us. We do have it out, it’s available through Interpunk, we had some sent out to Insubordination Records, and just started getting it out there, so I mean, it is available.

Bill: Alright, yeah. That’s pretty much all I’ve got, do you have any other last words or parting thoughts you want to say?

Dan: If you want to contact us to go Myspace.com/themethadones, look out for Transparent Records which is also on myspace. We have a CD release show July 25, that’ll be at the Bottom Lounge. Besides that? That would probably be it. Is there anything else you need from me?

Bill: Nope, I think we’ve got all the bases covered, thanks for your time.

Dan: Alright, bye.

Jason Swearingen Interview (June 2008)

Welcome to the first repeat customer in the interview section, Mr. Jason Swearingen. You may know him from the insanely popular Love & Squalor interview posted a couple of weeks back. You may also know him from my AirRaid piece about DIY Comics. He doesn't really have an up and running project yet but if his idea goes through, I'm pretty interested in seeing what he can do with it.

When did you start drawing?

Most kids scrawl on everything they can as a toddler. I never stopped. Growing up, I'd spend a lot of time at my mom's office during the summer, doodling on copier paper all day long. I got into comics through the Uncanny X-Men in the summer before 7th grade, and it snowballed from there.

As for newspaper comics, I can't even remember when I started reading Calvin and Hobbes. That kind of art has always been a huge inspiration to me, yet it hasn't been until recently that my inspiration and ability in that area was good enough for me to feel satisfied.

Are there any artists, DIY or not, that you feel inspired by?

Oh boy. As far as comic books, go, I love the work of Madureira, Pacheco, Quitely, McNiven and more.

For newspaper comics, I have an unhealthy obsession with Bill Waterson's work. The man is a genius. I don't believe there will ever be an artist in that field capable of besting him. What's sad is that no one seems to even be trying. He reminded us that newspaper comics can be a work of art the way Watchmen reminded the world that comics don't have to be kids' stuff. Calvin and Hobbes was insightful yet goofy, childish yet mature, hilarious yet thought-provoking, and always in a way that wasn't cheesy or preachy or soap opra-esque. The art is still mind blowing 13 years later, both in layout and execution. Today, everyone seems to be obsessed with being quirky and simple. I believe that comics can speak to the nature of existence AND make booger jokes simultaneously. You can be serious and funny, and challenge yourself to do both amazingly well.

I also draw inspiration from Darby Conley, Gary Trudeau, Bill Amend and many, many more.

What is your project?

I am always working on some form of comic book art, however my current, and favorite, project, is tentatively titled The Treehouse. It's a newspaper comic about a boy, his sister, a butterfly, a penguin, a squirrel/dog hybrid and the girls that live next door. I use the traditional newspaper dimensions, both daily and Sunday strips.

Why are you choosing to do it in this format?

As I said before, the newspaper comic format has been a love and obsession of mine since I was in grade school. I love the possibilities it presents and lament the fact that many of those avenues of expression are not explored by today's comic artists (whether they be pun-ridden strips written by middle-age lawyers whose friends tell them they're hilarious or hackwork slapped up on the internet by kids with too much time and not enough direction). The newspaper comic is one of the few art forms left that is this unexplored, yet it remains stagnant, most likely due to the innovators sticking to the web and self-publishing, leaving print to older imitators of the likes of Cathy or, God help us, Frank and Ernest. Sadly, the glut of webcomics prevents the true innovators from being found and recognized. Could you imagine if newspapers were filled with comics of the quality of Penny Arcade, Multiplex, XCRD, Nothing Nice To Say, Yirmumah or any of the Digital Pimp stuff?

If given the offer, would you do more traditional work for a newspaper?

In a second. I will most likely begin self-publishing, but I am also pursuing syndication possibilities. This is not for money. Heaven knows you stand a higher likelihood of hitting a niche and making decent cash selling merch online with a webcomic than succeeding with newspaper syndication. But as much as I love reading comics created with the vast freedom of self-publishing online, I relish in the restrictions of the newspaper genre. I feel it focuses my creativity and challenges me to write beyond vulgar puns, forcing me to write economically. You know what they say about brevity.

Why did you choose to go the DIY route?

I haven't really. I will go whatever route allows me to write and draw as much as possible. I want my comics to be enjoyed by as many people as possible. But, more importantly, the more opportunity I have to draw and write, the better I will get.

The Forgotten Interview (April 2008)

This email interview with Gordy and Johnny of The Forgotten took place right on the cusp of their recently release self titled album (which was reviewed on this blog in this post and was once posted on AirRaid). Josh over at TKO set this up and the interview was all set to run on AirRaid but then things got shot to hell and it never did. I wrote a feature narrative around the answers but that also hasn't been posted yet, but there's still a slight chance for that to go up at some point I guess.

BILL: It’s been a couple of years since I’ve heard any news about the band. Was there a planned out hiatus or was it just life getting in the way of the band?

Johnny - After Craig left the band, we were temporarily member-less for a while. Gordy went and did some Bastards tours for a few years. Gordy and myself got married (no, not to each other, we're already in a sexless marriage anyways haha). We found a new bass player (after I moved over to guitar), wrote some songs, switched bass players one more time and thanks to some key people in our corner (Lars Frederiksen, Michael Rosen, Mark Rainey and Ron Martinez), we have a new record. No hiatus was planned, the cards were just dealt and we played 'em the best way we could.

Gordy: I had hit burnout too. There were like 3 years where I was touring 10-11 months out of the year. Usually that is nothing to complain about but I was really grinding myself down mentally without knowing it. After the last Bastards show in ‘05 I took time off and got married and recharged my batteries. I’m glad I did because by hook or by crook, TF is better than it’s ever been and all the time off got us the right people with the right mindset.

BILL: How long has the current lineup of the band been together? Did the open call for members work out or did you end up finding people you knew already.

Johnny: Nick's first show with TF was December 9th 2006 in Santa Cruz followed by December 17th at the Warfield with RANCID. Jonny Manak was playing in TF and writing with us for a while and when he wanted to focus on other bands he'd already signed on for, we got Nick Schuneman within 24 hours of Manak departing.

Gordy: Well those open calls aren’t what we are about. They never work for us. Nick was part of our family and we respected him a whole lot before he even was a thought on bass. When he overheard a telephone conversation that our drummer was having about getting a new bassist he jumped the conversation and was in the studio in 2 days.

BILL: How was the European tour that you just finished up?

Johnny: Getting back to Europe was great. After not being there for almost seven years, I was really surprised how well the shows went. We had a GREAT band on the road with us, our new friends RADIO DEAD ONES which is pretty important. We were still with our old tour booking company, MAD, and had a great tour manager because of it named Schlumpf. With Bobby $500 franks and Greg Brodick in our corners for merch & video respectively, we played the SHIT out of seven countries in 17 days and (I believe) left a HUGE TF footprint all over Europe.

Gordy: Man that tour was fun. Quick and to the point but fun none the less. We were stoked to see that our fan base wasn’t gone. It was great to see so many old friends and make so many more new ones. I don’t know if the Arena in Austria will ever let us in the bar again, but it was fun while it lasted!! hahaha

BILL: Any plans for a tour of the States to support the new record?

Johnny: We're already playing mainland shows and will definitely be looking to do more.

Gordy: Oh hell yeah. We’ll get something up here in the next few months. National tours aren’t as easy these days as one may think but I figure we can do a few months out.

BILL: The first thing I noticed when I opened up my package with the new album was the cool “Japanese Import” theme on the artwork. Who did it/came up with the idea?

Johnny: I don't remember. I think touring Japan had us all digging on the kanji-style artwork. The early TKO release by THE UPSETS with the gold dragon and red background was also influential towards the artwork of the cover. We've never been a band big on spotlighting the members, so it's not full of pictures of ourselves, just lyrics, a couple band shots, and a simple design. We try to let the music do the talking for the most part.

Gordy: That was our producer and myself. Before we started pre-production on this Lars and I were talking album covers and he said that he always like the obi strips on Japanese cd’s. I found a graphic of a phoenix rising and thought it fairly apropos considering this was our first album with a new line-up in 6 years. I explained the concept for the cover art to Julia Smut at TKO Records, sent her the art and she came up with what you see on the cover.

BILL: One of the things I’ve always liked about you guys was that each album seemed to have its own personality. At least to me, Veni Vidi Vici had (forgive the generic terminology) a more upbeat ’77 sound, Keep The Corpses Quiet was more balls out thrashy, and Control Me had a more rock and roll edge to it. This one seemed to take the majority of the best elements of all three and meld them together. Was that a conscious choice? Do you guys all jam out ideas in practice or does one guy come in with fully formed songs?

Johnny: 99% of the time it's one of us coming in with just A BASIC guitar riff, myself for the most part with this record, and working it out with the entire band there. Eventually it will meld into a great song when you have good musicians around you. Another important factor was that we decided to demo this record twice before recording the final version. Although it delayed the album's release date quite a bit, I believe it had a huge factor in the success of the recording and quality of the songs. We hadn't previously spent this much time demoing songs. We never aimed for any certain style, just kinda played/wrote what we felt like hearing ourselves at the time to be quite honest haha, wrote a record that WE would listen to.

Gordy: Well thanks because that’s kinda what we were going for. I say kinda because the most important thing in writing an album for us is, doing whatever the fuck you want. We won’t be told what to do or what sort of vibe to emit. But we were also very aware that each album sounded different and wanted this to be the cohesive component.

BILL: The Class Separation 7” was I believe the second TKO release, so you have a super long history with them. Did you know Mark before the label started? What made you come back to TKO?

Johnny: With BYO Records, we signed a 1-record deal (Control Me) with an optional 2nd record. BYO decided to pass on our new material for whatever reason. Just as soon as we were out and "SINGLE" on the market again, TKO quickly swooped us up into bed haha. Since we'd already had mad history with them, the transition was quite easy. They were the label that released all TF's first material and we knew when Mark Rainey said he was in our corner and wanted to do this record, he meant it 100%. It's nice to have a record label who's excited about your upcoming release instead of just going through the motions, ya know? We continue to stay in contact with BYO RECORDS and consider Shawn Stern and Mark Stern life-long friends.

Gordy: Oh yeah, long history. I didn’t know Mark before we were on TKO, but none the less we have a long history. I feel that everything happened for a reason with this album. BYO is a great label and we were stoked to have worked with them. But this album required a lot of personal attention from everyone including the label and I believe only TKO has the personal investment and history to really care as much as we wanted someone to care about this album. That’s what really made this album I think; the personal attention to it from the band, to our producer, engineer and TKO Records.

BILL: Are there any plans to press the new record on vinyl or release any new 7”s?

Johnny: 12" full length will definitely be pressed soon. 7"s haven't been decided on yet.

Gordy: Well the vinyl version is out now and has a cd with it. I doubt we’ll do a 7” from album either. Right now we are focused on just pushing this full length and possibly doing a video for it.

BILL: Who are some good younger bands from your scene going on now? Anyone else nationally you’re into?

Johnny: RADIO DEAD ONES (Berlin), TWO POINT EIGHT (Sweden) and while not a young or new band, I think seeing THE AGGROLITES live will change your life

Gordy: I agree with Johnny there. RDO, Twopointeight and Aggrolites are all bitching bands. I’d like to add The Briggs, Switchblade Riot, Society’s Parasites, Wardogs and The Ignorant to that list too.

BILL: I saw on your website that you came in fourth place in the Punk Rock Bowling tournament. What are your strategies for next year to take it over the top? Who’s the best bowler and who’s the weakest? In Big Lebowski terms, who’s The Dude, who’s Donny, who’s Walter and who’s The Jesus?

Johnny: HAHA without bragging, I would definitely be the ringer on our team. I'm about a 170-200 bowler. BUT Gordy, Nick and Dave definitely had a lot to do with that 4th place Punk Rock Bowling finish in 2007 because I choked the last day and THEY had spectacular games that made up for my low scores, mainly Dave.

Gordy: Haha well I don’t know, I barely remember that movie. My band is all good bowlers except for me. I have lots of fun doing it, but really don’t take it too seriously. I just go to have a few drinks and play around. Haha. To me Punk Rock Bowling is not about the bowling nor the Punk Rock.

BILL: Any parting thoughts?

Johnny: Give the new "self-titled" record we just released a serious listen. We're super proud of it and hope everyone enjoys it as much as we do. This isn't just another FORGOTTEN release, it's honestly a piece of work that we spent a lot of blood, sweat, and tears trying to get written and released and with the help of the people I listed above, we were able to DO IT!!! thanks boys

Gordy: Wow, parting thoughts. Hmmmm. So much to say and such little space to do it all. I guess if I had one thing to say it would be to my brother and sister punks out there. I know a lot of them are like me and don’t take their punk with milk nor sugar. I just wanna say thank you to them. Every scene will have the tourists and the lifers. It’s the fucking lifers that make this shit go round. Also big thanks to Ron Martinez, Mark Rainey and TKO records.