popYOUlarity.com: For those who are unfamiliar with or unsure if they should buy the album, what would you tell them about it?
Alex:It’s a combination of a bunch of songs we wrote over a long period of time. We’ve been together for 3-4 years before we put the album out. We have been writing a lot of songs since then. We took the best of all those songs during that time frame,put them together, and wanted to make sure all the songs had a lot of energy to get people pumped. I would say that for our first album represented the best of what we put together at that time.

popYOUlarity.com:When you first start out there are pressures to succeed. Now that you are becoming successful, what new pressures are there and how do you handle them?
Alex: As far as successful, we’re not making any money and that type of thing. We have not gotten financial success. We don’t have the financial freedom yet. You know, money from the album. The actual success of hooking up with Epitaph, and getting out album distributed. As far as new pressures, I would say that with our label, it being an Indie label, they give you a lot of freedom. They let you write what you want to write and take it from there. They are always supportive. We feel really comfortable with our new album because there was no pressure for it. We had 2 years to write this stuff; we will be going into the studio next month. We have the album written the only real pressure is to go out there and play shows.

popYOUlarity.com: Do you consider yourself a rock star yet?
Alex: Hell no! None of us do. We’ve talked about it before but you know there are no girls fainting at shows or anything. It’s not like any rock star stuff yet. Maybe to reach that sorta status you have to sell a couple million records or something. Our loyal fans don’t treat us like that. We don’t really know what it is to be a rock star.

popYOUlarity.com:Critics either sing your praises well before the band becomes famous, or come to the party late in the game. What is your take on critics and where do you think you fall in the spectrum of critical appreciation?
Alex:As far as the reviews we’ve read about our stuff most of them have been better then we expected, but not critically acclaimed. You always get bad reviews. Any press is good press, to let people know you’re still surviving and doing stuff. We’ve had bad press and it kinda bums us out but most people give us good reviews.

popYOUlarity.com:What comes first lyrics or music?
Alex: Music. I don’t think we’ve actually written a song with the lyrics first and then written music around it. We always try to emphasize and keep the audience hooked and work on the music. We take pride in writing catchy stuff; we think that’s important to our style. We like it and we want the crowd to be able to sing along with it. So we come up with the music first and either we write the lyrics later. Otherwise, the music and lyrics have been written together, or at least the structure of the lyrics.

popYOUlarity.com:What’s it like seeing the crowds grow?
Alex: It’s really cool. It’s the biggest rush. Right now we’re driving on down to L.A. It is something to feed off of; we always feed off the crowd. We haven’t gone out as a headlining tour yet and I think if we did I don’t think we’d draw really big at places only because we’re still in the process of growing. It’s been kinda gradual with us. Actually, we have more fans in other areas then in our hometown. In South California, there are so many bands and stuff there’s so much to choose from. Maybe they don’t have time for you down here, but it’s been fun watching the fan base grow. We think that’s important.

popYOUlarity.com: When recording do you put out a lot of tracks or do you go over and over your tracks?
Alex:We don’t usually record a lot of tracks- we start with a drum. For this album, it was really simple. We had one guitar going over the base and drums and not a wide variety of tones and sounds. For the next album we’re branching out and spending more time making each song unique when we record. We’re going to be going on June 9 and we’ll be out early next year. We’re really confident about this next album; most of the songs we think are pretty good.

popYOUlarity.com: Are you playing more dates on the Warp Tour this year?
Alex: Yes. I think we’re playing 6 dates Phoenix, LA, Longbeach, Sacramento, San Francisco, and San Diego. Maybe something else will pop up. Last year we stayed on and played for free, just so we could keep playing. Maybe something like that will happen this year.

popYOUlarity.com: What’s the best thing about playing on a tour like that?
Alex: The last Warped Tour was our first major tour. It’s kinda like a circus and it was really fun. It’s more of like a little party everyone goes out there and gets drunk and cruises around. And one thing about this years Tour that we’re more excited about is there are less bands. It was pandemonium. You would have a bunch of your favorite bands playing at the same time. So it might be better to be able to check out the bands. I think this year will be really cool.

popYOUlarity.com:what do you think constitutes musical greatness in terms of the band’s performance ticket sales, album sales, and other recordings?
Alex:As far as musical greatness, it’s great to have good recordings and that’s what were going for the next album we’ve learned a lot. We’ve opened up to all of it. It’s a mixture of everything. It’s really important to tour as a band and we really believe in that. Almost every show we’ve been offered we’ve done.

popYOUlarity.com: When you’re an old man sitting on the porch in a rocking chair, what will you remember about your musical career so far?
Alex:That’s a pretty good question. It’s something we can look back on. I don’t know about telling the grandkids because we have some pretty bad stories. But, we can look back on it and say we did the best we could and we accomplished most of what we set out in the beginning to do.

popYOUlarity.com: Is there anything you’d like to say to the readers of popYOUlarity.com?
Alex: Keep going to shows and have fun. Go and see us the next time we’re in your town, you’ll have a good time.

+Debbie Gebert

Links:
Official Site