Every Time I Die interview
Why don't we start off with names and what you do in the band?
Jordan: Jordan (!). Guitar.
Steve: Ah, Steve, I play bass.
Keith: And I'm Keith (!)*. I'm the singer.
Great, thanks. You guys having been touring a lot since "Last Night In Town," so…
Keith: Wait, can I ask you a question?
Sure.
Keith: Are we, did you ask Carl [Ferret], to ask us, to not fuck with you?
No, but …
Keith: Do you think we have a propensity to screw up interviews?
Well, we can get to that because I was going to ask about that.
(laughter)
Jordan: Did you just pee in your pants? (laughter)
No! I didn't. But I was wondering about you guys reading the questions before hand-if that gave you time to think about elaborate answers.
Jordan: Did I fool you? Because I can't read. I was just trying to fit in.
Ok. I mean, if you guys want to do that…
Keith: No, it's alright. We'll respect that if you have, you know, a preference with how we handle the interview.
My boss wants it to be serious.
Jordan: The best interview, ever?
Alright, best interview, ever.
Keith: We're just not good with dealing with…
Serious questions?
Keith: …people. We don't really know how to talk with people very well.
Ok. Alright.
Jordan: Those questions don't have anything to do with the band, do they?
No, they have everything to do with the band.
Jordan: It might not go that well.
Alright. How long do you guys plan to keep touring? It's been a while since you released the record.
Keith: Four more hours, I think.
Four more hours? Why's that?
Keith: Because, well, I don't like it here, I don't like these people, um, I can't stand this microphone in my face, and if I have to keep putting up with this bullshit, I'm just going to stop the interview right now.
(laughter and "Ohs")
But seriously, how long do you guys plan on touring?
Keith: Actually, alright. After this tour, we're taking some time off to write the new record. So, we have until the 11th, I think is the last show of this tour.
So what's been the most gratifying thing about touring so far? Anyone?
Steve: Lots of moshing.
Jordan: Yeah.
Keith: Probably the purses we steal. The purses.
The what?
Keith: The purses that we steal.
And what do you find in those purses?
Keith: Other, smaller purses, which we sell. (laughter)
Jordan: One time, other bands told us to put a tip jar out because we make more money. And one guy tipped us in pot, so…
Keith: Yeah!
Really?
Keith: Can I make the joke that I made before?
Steve: No, that's…
Jordan: Yeah, make the joke. Make the joke.
Keith: No, I won't…no, it's…
(laughter)
Come on, make the joke.
Keith: It was…it was. I forget the joke. (laughter)
You've already gone this far.
Keith: It was such a bad joke. See, it's not funny because nobody, like, we deal in bad puns a lot of the time. And so the person that comes up with the worst joke ever is usually heralded as the "King of Bad Puns." So it's not going to be funny to anyone who reads it. And people are gonna, on the Lambgoat message board, say bad things about us. And that's the last thing we want.
Alright. Suit yourself. So, how about any horror stories on tour so far?
Jordan: Whore stories? Or horror stories? (laughs)
Keith: Whore stories. Horror stories.
Steve: Horror stories.
Jordan: About this tour or about any tour?
About this tour.
Jordan: This tour started with a couple of us at Furnace Fest, swimming in a sewage-infested pond. And we thought it would be a good time until we actually got in the pond. No, scratch that. It was fun while we were in the pond, but when we got out of the pond, and there was actual shit on us, and, two weeks after that, a couple of us are having, ah, still can't breathe very heavily and cough when we try to. You said horror story, right?
Yeah, horror story.
Keith: There were whores in the pond. French, civil, like around the 16th century whores, swimming in the pond.
Jordan: Yeah, so that's two birds with one stone. So that's a horror story and a whore story.
Ok, great.
[Someone yells, "This is our interview!" at somebody else]
You guys just recently finished a brief leg of Warped Tour with other Ferret bands.
Jordan: Yes we did.
Keith: No leg is really brief.
Ok. How was it?
Keith: Legs are really prominent.
Steve: And permanent.
Jordan: Prominent and permanent. Warped Tour was sweet. I gave myself a Mohawk for Warped Tour because I wanted to relate to my fans, you know what I mean? The Anti-Flags and the NOFXs, and, I was pretty bummed out because, I mean, I did make a lot of friends with similar Mohawks on our said brief leg of Warped Tour, but then I got to Furnace Fest and I found out that Mohawks are cool now, and I got pretty bummed out about that.
I heard they're called "Fashion Hawks" now.
Jordan: That's if they look good. Mine doesn't. Mine is just a Mohawk, and it made a lot of new friends at Warped Tour, so, and now that Warped Tour is over I guess I have to cut my hair.
Keith: They call it a "Faux Hawk" or something.
I don't know. Is that what they call it?
Keith: I call it a "Blow Hawk." Because they suck.
Steve: How about a "No Hawk?"
(laughter and "Yeahs")
Keith: I am now coming out of the bushes.
Steve: Can you put that in brackets?
(laughter)
Keith: Yeah, can you bracket my wing motion?
Steve: Bracket the West Nile Virus we just got.
Yeah. How was the crowd there [Warped Tour]? Was it different from the typical hardcore crowd, like tonight?
Keith: At Warped Tour?
Yeah.
Keith: It was a lot younger.
Jordan: A lot of teen angst.
Steve: A lot more "Push-pitting."
Keith: Yes.
Jordan: Yes. A lot of "Jock Moshing."
"Jock Moshing."
Steve: A lot of "Body Banging."
Jordan: Yes. (laughs) There was this one dude, who just like, this rules. Holy shit. Where were we? Somewhere in Ohio?
Keith: Ohio.
Jordan: Yeah. Dude, like, got on stage to sing along, but then he realized Keith wasn't really paying attention to him. But he was already on stage, so he couldn't just get back down. So he just did a little "corn moshing" on stage and then just kind of fell off. And then I think I stopped playing for a little while because I was laughing so hard, and a couple drops of pee came out. (laughs)
How did the crowd react to you guys? You mentioned that they were younger and more of a punk crowd.
Steve: Oh, yeah, totally.
Keith: It was a pretty good response. There was a lot of confusion over what was going on, because we said that we were, we said that we were a Hall and Oats cover band, so we had a lot of the older guys coming over.
Jordan: (laughs) What we did was, there is this Internet thing.
Keith: Have you heard of the Internet?
Yeah, I think I have.
Jordan: Well, we got our hands on a copy of the New Found Glory CD before it came out. So, we burned a copy and carried around a Discman and were playing it for everybody. We were like, "Yeah, come check out our band." They were like, "Whoa, I've never heard these songs before!" So they all came over and were pretty stoked. They were a little disappointed and a couple of them left. But, you know, you throw them in a mosh pit and they'll stay.
Keith: Can you put in brackets that Steve is rubbing his mustache? (laughter)
I can do practically whatever you want with this interview.
[Steve rubs his mustache]
Keith: Put it with parentheses at the end. And when I say my name, at the beginning where I said my name, can you put a parentheses and an exclamation point after my name?
(laughter)
I can do that.
Jordan: Wait, me too. Me too. (laughs)
I can do that, too.
Keith: Can I have an explanation point, and then an asterisk, and then at the bottom for the footnote, be like, "Totally Sweet Dude."
We don't have footnotes in our interviews, but I'll see what I can do.
Keith: We'll set the precedence.
Jordan: This is a groundbreaking interview though, so you might have to make some changes after this.
It is.
Keith: This is actually the most serious interview we've ever done, in all honesty.
Jordan: And in all honesty, it is probably the best interview we've done, too.
I have read some interviews…
Keith: Is it over?
No, it's not. Not yet. Not by a long shot. You guys have gotten pretty popular since you released the record.
Keith: No…
Jordan: Thank you.
Keith: It's because we sold it with coke. We put a little baggy of coke in it.
Ok, cocaine. But on a serious note…
Keith: THE WHITE PONY.
(laughter)
Why do you think you guys are so popular with the kids? Don't say "we tour a lot," because that's a canned answer.
Keith: Is it? No, I think that's the reason. Well, I don't know.
It's a reason, but…
Jordan: Wait, what's the question?
Keith: Kids get popular in high school because they throw raging keggers at their parents' house when they go away for a weekend. So we treat every show like a raging kegger.
Except you bring it on the road.
Keith: So we take the keg on the road. And that's a keg of merchandise. (laughter) And that's a keg of music notes.
Jordan: And a keg full of good times.
Keith: Yeah. We have music on tap.
(laughter)
So, the band's showmanship you would say?
Keith: Yeah, when you watch us, it's just kind of like the girl, it's like the kid that goes to their prom by themselves, and they watch everyone have a good time, and they wish. We treat everyone like we're the best in the world. And that when we play, we give each other high-fives and turn our back on them, and make a lot of inside jokes about them later. So kids just see that, and they want to be a part of us.
(laughter)
Nice. Sounds like high school all over again.
Jordan: And edit the "likes" and the "ums" out of the interview. I read your Coalesce interview, by the way, I'm on Lambgoat as soon as I wake up every morning, so I know all about it. Don't try to fool me, because I know where you're coming from. And poor Sean came off…
Oh yeah. Ok. Yeah, we had some complaints about that, but…
Keith: Really? Like what?
People on the message board. "Edit the "ums" and the "likes"."
Jordan: Well, then do it! If the message board says so, get off your fucking ass and do what the message board says!
Keith: The pasty-face mouth breathers on the message board don't want to read through a few two-letter words on an interview. They want it quick, and they want it now.
Jordan: Those 20 kids who hate Every Time I Die, and love to post their favorite poll of the top five overrated, talented, top-10 list, as well as your least favorite, underrated, most talented band.
I've seen you guys on those lists.
Jordan: That's because we start the polls.
Steve: That's because Keith's vocals sound like Fred Durst.
[Keith burps]
Keith: I guess so.
Jordan: So if you're ever wondering why…
Keith: Is that why? Is that what they said?
Steve: Yeah. Fred Durst vocals.
Keith: I HATE YOU.
Jordan: Get on the fucking 'goat, man. Here's the reason. If you're ever wondering why the same poll appears every four days…
It's because you guys are on there.
Jordan: No. Yeah, it's because we started it. We start it. And we stick up for ourselves, and we say that we're, like…
(laughter)
Keith: That's how to get people to like you.
Jordan: Yeah, just recently, I went on and said I was some kid and just talked about how great Every Time I Die was. And, if Ratboy is in a bad mood, he'll go on and will talk about how bad Every Time I Die is.
Steve: It's an ongoing battle.
Jordan: You think that it's like kids who like Every Time I Die, versus kids who don't like Every Time I Die. But it's just Jordan versus Ratboy.
Keith: It's Every Time I Die versus Every Time I Die.
(laughter)
Jordan: Sometimes I'll leave a name. Sometimes I'll be anonymous. But it's just me on there.
So you guys have that rock/party aura to the band. Is that a reflection of how you guys really are?
Keith: I think that's one of the, like, best things about being in this band, is that it's not like, there's so many times when you see, you know, you see a MTV Cribs, or you watch Behind the Music, and they're like, "Don't confuse the art with the artist." But that's us like, everyday of our lives. I mean, there is nothing that we fake when we get up there, so…
What about the cover of "Last Night In Town?" You guys are beating somebody up.
Keith: Well, we were beating up my roommate at the time-his name is Ryan.
Jordan: Aw, don't give him a shout-out on Lambgoat!
Keith: Big ups. Mad props.
(laughter)
Jordan: A shout-out on the fucking 'goat.
Steve: Shit's ivory, bro.
Keith: I don't know. That was just kind of like, I don't know how that came about. I think I saw an ad in a magazine that was similar to that and I thought it was pretty sweet. But, I'm sure a lot of people want to hit Ryan, so, we kind of stay true to form.
(laughter)
So do you guys personally get into a lot of fights?
Keith: Me personally? No. I think I've been hit once. And other times, it was all in the span of 20 minutes. We went to a New Years Eve party at my friend's house, and there was a big fight. And I got hit once, and I don't remember anything after that, because I was crying in the bathroom. But apparently, there was a picture of us fighting, that someone actually had the decency to go and get a camera and take a picture of the fight where I'm bringing down a beer bottle on somebody's head, and, but my mouth is all bloody and you think it's like this heroic, like, still shot and it's just the most, it looks like a cripple throwing a Frisbee.
Jordan: (laughter) Here's what we're going to do. Here's what we're going to do. The picture is in Steve's room. We're going to post it…
Can you scan that and send it to me?
Keith: Yeah.
Jordan: There is a picture of me, in a headlock, and Keith with a bloody mouth and a beer, just looking retarded.
Keith: I look horrible. I can say it might not have actually been me, because I don't think I'm capable of making that face again. There is blood like, splattered all across my face and I'm trying to bring this beer bottle to some kids head. I don't know if I connected. I think the flash went off and I fell over. But it was a mess.
You guys will definitely have to scan that and send it to us. We'll post that.
Jordan: Yeah, fights actually do happen every once in a while on tour. It's one of the funnest parts.
What about fights between yourselves? Do you guys fight each other?
Jordan: When Ratboy is sleeping, we will kick, and punch, and poke, and scrape, and claw.
(laughter)
Keith: Yeah. We poke at his lip. We'll punch him in the face, breast, chest, neck, and head while he's sleeping.
Jordan: But other than that, we just fight everybody else.
Keith: No. How many fights have we actually gotten in? There was one in like, North Carolina I think, where somebody threw…
Jordan: Don't go talking about it. The kid will be reading it.
Keith: The kid can't read. But…
[Keith burps into the microphone]
Keith: I think that was... can you duplicate that echo? (laughter)
I can try.
Jordan: Like, "Click here for audio." (laughter)
Keith: No, but I specifically remember one fight that we were actually all involved in. But…
Jordan: It's usually just Andy.
Keith: Yeah, it's usually just Andy. And once Andy starts fighting someone, there's no real need for anybody else to help out.
Does Andy have a short temper?
Jordan: No, he's just got a really hard punch. Have you ever seen Andy?
Yeah, I've seen Andy. I don't want to mess with Andy.
Jordan: I unfortunately wasn't around, but Steve saw him punch a dude once, and, a large crowd of people thought the kid was dead.
Really?
Keith: The thing is, we're not aggrandizing, that's not, we don't fight everybody.
Jordan: We don't talk about it.
Keith: But it's, Andy is a big guy. And there is no need to fight if Andy is fighting. So, sometimes we'll spit on people, sometimes we'll call their mom. We'll call their mother and bring the phone up to their mouth while they're being punched upon. While they're having their face filled with drop kicks. Other than that, it's just a good time.
(laughter)
Going back to the album. I've seen the cover both in red and green.
Jordan: Don't get me started…
What's the deal with that?
Keith: Don't even get me started.
Is it limited edition?
Jordan: It was…oh my god. I'll tell you the real story. I'm not going to joke around because this is serious talk right now. The first like, couple of hundred, the record was supposed to be red. It's supposed to be red. And we were waiting so long for the CD to come out, and it finally did, we were in the middle of our tour last summer with Santa Sangre and Killswitch Engage…
[Steve discusses getting some beers from the club with Keith]
Keith: Talk to that big dude that's got the Norma Jean shirt and a bald head.
Jordan: Steal them from the back room. There's like cases of beer. Steal it from the back room.
Steve: I'll go look around. I'll be back in like four minutes.
Jordan: So in the middle of that tour, we got these CDs sent to us and we opened them up and they were green. And the choice was either push back the release date like a month and wait for the red ones to come, or sell these green ones, call them limited edition, and then just get the red ones in a couple of weeks.
Keith: We wanted to call them "New Edition," but there had already been that band.
Right, right.
Jordan: Yeah, so there would have been a lot of legal trouble with that. But then, you know, six months later when the pressing plant messes up again, and you can't really hide this limited edition anymore because now there's more limited edition…
Keith: Now the limited editions are the red ones, pretty much.
Aww, geez. C'mon…
Jordan: All we know is that there are supposed to be red, we want them red, we paid a lot of money for a man behind a graphic design desk to make them red and make them look good, and that whole concept just got thrown out the window, and now we are just selling screw ups and not really caring about it, because we've actually sold a red and a green copy to the same kid, which is our goal. And next week, we're going to have a pink copy, and that same kid is going to come back and going to be, "Whoa, limited edition!" And we'll be like, "Buy it dude. It's got freakin' laugh tracks on it." Go buy it.
Nice. How about the lyrics you write Keith.
Keith: Ratboy writes the lyrics.
Ratboy writes the lyrics too?
Keith: Well, for the really complicated, smart ones, that's Ratboy's duty. I'm just kidding.
What are the influences you draw from for the lyrics? Or is it just ranting?
Keith: Alright, I'll answer this seriously, because I usually screw around with this question because I don't like talking about myself very much. Seriously, a lot of it like, at the time that we wrote the record, I was like finishing up at U.B., and I had to take like, a ton, a ton of literary courses because I was an English major and I had to take a ton of literary courses to get my degree in the amount of time I had. So, I was taking like, six literature courses. So I was taking like Milton and Shakespeare, and John Donne and Chaucer, like all at the same time. So that was pretty much pervasive in my life. Like, all that old literature. So, I mean, if there is somebody out there that would actually put the time into reading hardcore lyrics, which I doubt there is, then, you know, there is a lot of Shakespeare images in there, just because that was what I was reading at the time. A lot of the other times, for instance, I'll tell you seriously. The first song on the CD, the sixth song on the CD, and there's some other song, I wrote them in one night, because it was two days before we recorded, and the band was already there in the recording studio just doing the music, and I hadn't done all the lyrics yet. So, my roommate Ryan and I, who is on the cover, got really, really drunk…
[Jordan says "Dammit" to another Ryan shout-out]
…really, really drunk. I mean really drunk. And I went up into my room, and I had a six-pack of Miller High Life, sat down at my computer, and I was in there, I'd say for 13 hours, writing songs. And I did three songs in like one-and-a-half days, because, I tried not to sleep. But here's a funny story. The next day, I was supposed to leave that afternoon after school. I was going to get out of class and go right to Zing Studios. And, the morning of that day, before I went to school, I had a 10 o'clock class, and I got up at six o'clock in the morning. And this was kind of in the winter, so it was still dark out, and it was freezing, and I took my notepad and my car, and I parked my car in the school parking lot across the street from my apartment. And I was just writing, but it was freezing, so I had a hooded sweatshirt on, a denim jacket, like a denim vest because that was all I could find around the house. And it was bright so I brought sunglasses and had a hat. And I brought my beer. And I was writing in the notepad, and around 7:30, 7:30 comes around, and school busses start pulling into the parking lot. And there is this dude, in this car, drinking Miller High Life with sunglasses, a mesh hat, and a hooded sweatshirt just staring out the window and writing. So, needless to say, I tracked those kids down and I had to explain to them that I'm a professional, I'm not a child molester, I have a job to do, and I explained to them that we were writing a CD, and them I sold them a t-shirt.
Nice. That's actually a really interesting story.
Keith: I didn't really talk to them. But it was true until the point where I talked to the kids. Ok.
And…
Jordan: I'm sorry…
No, go ahead.
Jordan: I just think it's funny, on a little side note, that after Keith told me I can't help. When we play "Logic of Crocodiles" live, and Keith's like, "Yeah, I wrote this song after I had no sleep and was just really drunk, and it means absolutely nothing," and you know, you see all these kids pull metaphors, and get up on stage, kids are just fucking punching each other in the face, screaming like the words to the song. And I can't help just like, I mean I love the song, it's one of my favorite songs and I love the lyrics. I just can't help but just smile when I see kids going bonkers, not realizing that they're screaming words that make no sense, and came from, like, a drunk insomniac two days before a recording.
Keith: There was actually a poll, I think, on some message board. I got an e-mail like, "Check out this poll," and it was like talking about those lyrics, and like, "What do you think this means?" And it seriously had, I'm flattered, like, honestly, I don't want to like…
Jordan: Oh yeah, when I say I was laughing, not laughing, laughing at these kids.
Not like, laughing making fun of them.
Jordan: Yeah, I just think that maybe if they knew that Keith was drunk and in a hurry, they wouldn't, like, relate to these lyrics as much as they do.
Keith: There was a poll, and it seriously took, line for line, "What do you think this means? What do you think this means?" And it was like, to me, it meant nothing. Like I said, I just told you the story. I was just rambling and with the roommates that I had, rambling was a big part of our humor where we would just ramble off random things to each other. Say things that don't mean anything. So, I said, alright, as a tribute to because, I'm not going to scrape the barrel and be like, "Alright, I don't have anything to write about, so let's write about a break-up. Or let's write about my parents," you know, this and that. I was like, I'm going to write a tribute to like, this sort of humor that kind of goes past a lot of people that like, maybe if my friends read it, they'll think it's funny. But they dissected the lyrics line for line, and I'm flattered, because, that's like, I'm sure a lot of the writers I read do the same things. But I love their writing. Like, it doesn't mean like, Ernest Hemingway was supposedly a homosexual and people dissect his writing and try to find all these Freudian slips in it. It doesn't make his writing any less good, you know what I mean? Like, I love his stuff. So I'm flattered that people would try to do that, but it's funny to me because I just, it was an accident sort of. But, you read it, every time you read something, you get ideas from what they're trying to say. And, partially, that's what lends to the writer's mode of writing it. It's like you have to surpass them writing it in order for the writer to understand what he's trying to say in the first place. I get my ideas for my own songs from other kids, what they think it means. And, I'm like, "Yeah, that's probably right. Maybe I didn't realize that?" So, I'm definitely not dissing them in any way.
I've read a lot of older interviews that you've done in the past where you get pretty extravagant with your responses. You mentioned earlier that it's because you don't like to talk about yourself?
Keith: Yeah, I don't take myself too seriously. So, I try not to give people fodder to take me too seriously. Because if you set yourself up and make yourself sound like this, guru on whatever it is you're talking about, they're going to find fault with you, you know what I mean? So you laugh at yourself before other people can laugh at you. So that's what I do. And you read an interview, and I don't think I've ever answered interview questions seriously. And it's a joke, because, if I try to answer seriously, it would end up on the Lambgoat message board and people would make fun of me.
(laughter)
Ok. How about the writings you post on the webpage?
Jordan: Hey, are you going to fucking get back to me at all?
(laughter)
No, no, we'll get back to you. Don't worry. I almost done.
Keith: As far as the writings are concerned, like, that's kind of like a different style. There is a style that I reserve for lyrics, and a writing style that I also like to do, that I reserve for those stories. And I just talked to somebody I met, who said that they talked to me about it. "I read that story that you wrote." I'm like, "What'd you think about it?" "I think you're an arrogant asshole." And I'm like, well, ok, awesome, but that's just like a character, you know what I mean? So it's like, the writings that I post on the shitty dudes thing is just like, an outlet for me to try something else. But those eventually, like I have saved up. I don't know if this is going to work out, but me and Wes from American Nightmare [or so they used to be called] are talking about like putting a book together.
Wow. That would be very cool.
Keith: So, that's all stuff that would go in there. Just pretty much writing for that.
Jordan: Along with pornography.
Keith: Yeah.
Jordan: Wes is taking care of the pornography and Keith is doing the writing.
(laughter)
Keith: I just write about his sex.
Last lyrical-related question. What's behind the title of the album? Is there any meaning at all?
Keith: I think, ah, I guess it's just because, don't put in all this mumbling and stuff. But, what'd you find?
[Enter Steve from his beer hunting]
Steve: Some dude was like, "What the fuck you doing?" I was like, "I'm gonna get out of here…" So, sorry guys…
Keith: As far as the title goes, I think it just encompasses an attitude, where like, if it's a sailor's last night in town, chances are he'll rent a whore for an evening and, you know, do a lot of dirty things. The "Last Night In Town" indicates that there's going to be a lot of inconsequential activities and you're not going to think about what's going to happen. So, it summarizes the attitude of our band basically…
How about in terms of the writing process? Now you can answer some of the questions [Jordan]. How was it different compared to "Burial Plot Bidding War?"
Jordan: Well, "Burial Plot Bidding War" sucked, and "Last Night In Town" is actually, I'm actually pretty proud of it. So that's the big difference.
(laughing at something)
What exactly about the "Burial Plot" sucked, versus "Last Night?"
Jordan: "Burial Plot" was a lot of good enough. Like, "We're a fucking band now. Hey, that part's alright. Who cares? Keep it." But "Last Night In Town," we tried to finely comb everything and just make sure we didn't have these good enough parts-this filler. So, you know, I'm just even 10 times more excited about the next album, because I think we're just that much better at it. Like, when we recorded "Last Night In Town," we thought we nailed it all and it was perfect. Now I listen to it and I find stuff that I'd like to change. So, that makes me really excited to go home and write because, now, I just think I'm really excited for the next record. I think we'll be playing one song off of it. On the Poison The Well tour we played another new song, but we just ended up, kind of, just scrapping it for now and going back to it later. So, even though we only have one-and-a-half songs written, I already know it's going to be our best stuff.
And is the writing process usually a collective effort?
Jordan: Ahh, me and Andy will go to Ratboy with riffs. Ratboy will yell and spit at us.
(laughter)
As a rat should do.
Keith: He'll snarl.
Jordan: He'll mope. He'll go into depression.
Steve: Shrug shoulders.
Jordan: Often times, after we play the riffs, he'll just ask us to leave. (laughter) As we're upstairs…
Keith: He pushes a button and a trap door opens up in the practice space…
(laughter)
Jordan: And now he's working on a trap door in which we fall into a pile of butcher knives a la Mortal Kombat-style. But he didn't get it rigged up before tour, thank god.
Keith: Ah, Grrr.
Jordan: It's a little inside joke. I'm so sorry. I hate inside jokes.
Keith: Yeah, I'm outside.
(more laughter)
Keith: And Ratboy walks shirtless from a bush. With a horrible sneer on his face.
[Ratboy enters interview, shirtless]
Ratboy: What's up guys.
How's it going?
Ratboy: Good.
How was the pizza?
Ratboy: It was really good.
Jordan: Oh, there's pizza?
Ratboy: Well, no, I bought it.
Jordan: Oh, really.
So how long did it take you guys to write the whole album?
Jordan: Ahh…four minutes.
That's very impressive. You're like a grindcore band, but you write fast.
Keith: Well, we have, on "Saved by the Bell" where Zack Morris does the "time out?" Well, we do that before every practice.
[Bloody guy walks by]
Jordan: Whoa dude, are you alright?
Keith: Oh smokes! So we do that before every practice. We pause the time. Then we wait for Kelly Kapowski to write a good answer and copy off her. What was the fat teacher's name?
Steve/Jordan: Mr. Tuttle.
Keith: Mr. Tuttle. He doesn't have anything to do with the story. He didn't help.
Jordan: If he could fucking time out, how come he was so bad in school? Just fucking time out and fucking cheat!
Keith: Yeah, Jessie's smart, Kelly's smart. You know Screech is a genius.
Steve: But see, Preppie got 1502 on his SATs and got sent into, ah * Yale *. So he did do good on his SATs.
(laughter)
Keith: Remember that whole season when they went to the Hawaiian beach house?
Yeah.
Jordan: Wasn't that Stacey. She's hot.
Steve: Stacey Carosi (sp). Yeah.
Keith: Oh yeah! That was the lady, she was the one in the show, that was about models, that was a spin off of "Who's The Boss?" [Living Dolls]
Jordan: Yeah.
Keith: Remember, Sam went to a modeling school, and that girl, Stacey Carosi, was at that modeling school. And then, she was somehow, let back into the "Saved by the Bell"…
Jordan: And now she's in some sitcom where she's like a mom.
Keith: "Queen of Heart." "King of Heart." [King Of Queens]
Wait, they had a spin-off for "Who's The Boss?"
Jordan: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah, it was when went to a modeling school.
Jordan: Didn't last.
I had no idea.
Jordan: And you learn.
Keith: This just in: Grace Under Fire taught America how to love again.
(laughter)
Steve: I back that.
And you mentioned you recorded with Adam D. (Killswitch Engage).
Keith: Yeah.
How was that?
Keith: He was sweet. He likes mouth a lot of the drum beats and guitar riffs and make them into human sounds, which, we probably should've recorded instead of the guitar tracks.
Jordan: We did on a couple of songs.
Keith: Most of the squealies.
Jordan: What you mostly hear is guitar, but what you might think is guitar is actually Adam D. just laying down some Police Academy-style sound effects with his own mouth.
(laughter)
Are you guys going to record with him again?
Jordan: Fuck no!
Keith: F- that dude.
Jordan: I'd love to. It was cool because Norma Jean, their new CD is amazing and it sounds amazing. So I called him up, I was like, "Dude, the new Norma Jean sounds amazing. How come, what happened man? You made our record sound like shit! What the fuck?"
(laughter)
Keith: It sounds like someone took a crap or a dump in a CD player when you put our CD in.
Jordan: No, just kidding. We're really happy with it. But, if that Norma Jean is any indication of what he can do in the future, we'd love to go back with him, because he's amazing both musically and recording wise.
Pure poetry.