Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Honouring Your Vows With JASON BLACK From HOT WATER MUSIC

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Honouring Your Vows With JASON BLACK From HOT WATER MUSIC · HEAVY Music Interviews

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  Shut down. I can do the whole Saturday. Yeah. Hey, this
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  is Jason from How Our Music. Our new record, Vowels is coming out
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  on May tenth, and we are very pumped for it. Beautiful Jason,
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  thanks for joining us today. Thanks for having me all right, pleasure.
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  So, as you mentioned, vows will be out on Made the Tent,
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  which isn't that far off now, bright, Like, how do you feel
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  about like you still get nervous about releases, anxious, don't really give a
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  ship like that? What's supposed to all the above? No, it's definitely
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  anxious and nervous. If I don't give a ship, we made a bad
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  record, so uh no, it's it's a lot of let's say, it's
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  definitely all the above, and it's always kind of changes in the way that
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  it's I mean, this is the first time we put out two records so
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  close together in a long time, not the first time. It's been a
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  long time since we put two records out this closing succession to each other.
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  So that's like been pretty cool. But even then, it's the landscape of
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  releasing albums is just constantly changing, and even not to sound like a weird
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  lued eighteder like super gen X or anything like. It is just almost day
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  to day, different things need to be done. So it's there's that like
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  weird level of anxious that's kind of in the new landscape of whatever we all
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  do here. That wasn't the same as before. Like before it was like
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  I hope that we get some good reviews and like that, you know whatever
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  the X like hopefully this store pick it up and that store picks it up
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  in this and that or whatever. And now it's just like I hope it
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  doesn't get buried five minutes after it comes out, just like a flood of
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  other posts or whatever. It's so weird. Sometimes at the press release calls
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  at your most ambitious collection of songs to day? Would you would you agree
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  with that statement? I think so. I feel like we've definitely thrown a
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  couple. Yeah, I think it is. I mean, there's some stuff
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  on here that would not have made I don't want to say I wouldn't have
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  made it on any other records, because it's not a quality issue. I
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  think there's some stylistic variable variants this time around, a little more so than
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  usual for us, and I don't I think it only happened because of the
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  specific songs being as good as they are whatever working as well as they did
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  that way, Like there's you know, I think a song like specifically I'm
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  thinking of like after the Impossible right now, Like that's like could very easily
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  turn into like a super like very cheesy kind of like prom rocky song,
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  and some people might think that it is that, and that's fine, but
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  I think we, you know, we don't feel like we did that,
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  So I think that they're like that song and specifically that song, like maybe
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  remnants some of the vibes on that too. Definitely, we didn't not put
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  anything on the record as far as like no, that's not cool or we
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  shouldn't do that, or that's not like us, and we're not really ever
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  like that anyway. But I think in we were instead of maybe policing things
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  as much, we were more pushing the more outlier elements to get to the
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  quality where they felt like they could land on the record. Very cool now,
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  Bales says, the Hard War Music celebrate your thirtieth anniversary as roll Mate.
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  So is it an album that sort of covers your musical output either thre
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  you thirty years or is it sort of more look into the future of the
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  band is close. I think definitely, you could definitely say it covers the
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  thirty years, like there's a little bit of something from every era or like
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  aspect of stuff that we do on the record, kind of the records that
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  we've always strived to make and at least that I always want to make.
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  Like bands that I really like hold their records that not necessarily the best records
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  in the world or and higher, you know, standing in other records,
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  per say, but like rock records that I really enjoy are always by bands
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  like Faith No More or Fish Bone or where there's just a lot of variants
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  from song to song a song and it's not just like Chi Chok and I
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  think we did that on this record, and I I think for as far
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  as looking forward goes, we did we did some new stuff, which is
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  an easy thirty years and so I mean, I think with us, once
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  we can get something new in the kind of repertoire in the rotation, we'll
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  take it and run with it and keep pushing and pushing and pushing. So
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  that's kind of a pretty exciting thing. So after thirty years and ten albums,
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  mate, like, would you say it's easier or hard did it come
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  up with new material? The more you write and the longer in the game,
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  it really depends. I mean, for like, when we set out
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  to do this, we weren't sure. We just knew we wanted to do
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  some new music for the thirtieth and not sort of just do like a nostalgia
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  run and you know whatever, like let's do a thirtieth anniversary tour, but
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  like, let's put out some new music to like kind of just let everyone
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  know. We're not like, Okay, this is it and you were going
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  to play the hits and blah blah blah. So we started writing. We
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  didn't necessarily have an album in our sites, but we got there pretty quick.
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  So it really just depends. I think though for us at this point,
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  we're not gonna make a record if we don't have a good one to
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  make. So it really is like, you know, the next time we
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  set out to make a record, we might end up putting out a three
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  song EP, because that's that's what happened, and those were the only things
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  that were good enough, you know, for us to feel comfortable putting out
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  or feel like we needed to be put out because we've said a lot already.
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  So yeah, it's like at some point you got to make sure that
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  we said as much as we've said. If we're gonna say anything else,
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  we want to make sure that it has has some has some heft to it
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  or some some meat to it, for sure. And you also choice to
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  return to producer Brian mcturnon who you would work with on three albums? What
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  was considered your classic area era Sorry in a flight, right, a fight,
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  a crash portion and the new what Next? But what is the thought
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  process behind that? That's our comfort zone and in a good way. Like
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  if there was I mean now that there's five of us, if there was
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  a sixth member of the band, it would be Brian. I mean he
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  and I've said this on a couple other interviews. I think the thing about
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  him is that he produces us from the vantage point of a we're friends,
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  we've known each other for a long time, and he made those records with
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  us, so that's you know, he's got a very good grip on how
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  we operate. But he also is a fan of the band, and so
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  he wants to make a record that he wants to listen to because of us,
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  not because of him being the producer. So he's not producing it to
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  put his name on it. He's producing it because he wants to help us
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  make the best record we can make. And not that most producers aren't in
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  that same you know, laying our stuff goes. But I know with him
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  that it's like the only reason he cares that his names on it is because
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  he likes it. I guess you know what I mean. It's not so
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  it's from a very pure like producer standpoint. As far as us working together,
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  I mean, and we're like I talk to that guy almost every day,
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  so it's it's a lot of fun to work with him, and he
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  knows us very well and knows how to get the best out of us,
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  and he knows what we're capable of, which is I think important for us.
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  Sure. Yeah, what more? The music haven't had any guest artists
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  for a number of albums might but on Vows you've got members of Turnstile Thrice
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  to interrupted his Fastide and more so, firstly, why did you decide this
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  album was right to bring guest artists back? And what was your selection process,
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  like did you have a set cristeria for who you wanted to day.
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  The initial thought was just part of kind of like tying into a little bit
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  of what I was saying. The last question is that we don't ever want
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  to make want to make a record for no reason, and then every time
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  we make a record, it's like, well, what's different about this or
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  what makes it a little more exciting for people or for us or whatever,
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  And that's something we thought. It was that we just haven't had guests in
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  a minute, so we wanted to explore that a little bit and see what
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  we could come up with. So that was I mean, that was excuse
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  me, kind of the thought for the thought process behind that. Well,
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  before we recorded, we're like, well, let's see what happens with the
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  songs and who maybe would fit where, and it's like the criteria the list
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  was literally everyone that we thought of We asked and they all said yes,
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  and it was which we're very lucky, And it was pretty off the cuff
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  as far as like, I mean, we had some ideas of who we
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  would like to have on it, but we didn't want to ask someone to
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  be on something that didn't make sense for them or you know it just like
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  to make it feel forced and just like for no reason other than saying so
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  and so you know is on the record. So everything was like, you
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  know, very carefully like thought out as far as like this person would be
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  good here and if they want to do it, cool and if they don't,
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  then that's that, you know, like and so it's kind of there
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  wasn't any nobody got more than one. Like everyone that was on it was
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  sent the song thereon and like, hey, would you like to do this?
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  And from there it was sort of like you can do what you be
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  yourself and be an artist because that's why we're asking you to be honest,
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  is because we like what you do, so go for it and be creative,
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  which is cool because then it was felt much more collaborative hopefully for everyone
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  else involved as well. Now, Benny thirtieth anniversary made its fitting to sort
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  of go back, and so I'm a little bit so I want to go
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  back to the start of Hot Water Music, Like You're formed in Florida back
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  in nineteen ninety four. So what was the musical climate like that gave birth
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  to the band and where did you fit in initially? Excuse me, the
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  as far as fitting in, I mean in Gamesville where we a few of
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  us still live and where we started, we didn't really fit in. When
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  we started, it was much more of a honest, say, like crusspunk
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  vibe here at that point, but more of a like East Bay kind of
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  shiny blats, this is a little crust punky here, and we were,
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  you know, they we got made fun of for like George having too many
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  symbols and whatever like having it was one of those like, I don't know,
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  my first base was not my first base. The base that I have
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  when we started playing was this same type of bass I use now because I
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  saved up for like eight months to buy it, and so it was one
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  of those like oh rich kids, which is not true. I think it
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  was. It was still at the time where like there was a subsection of
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  punk or whatever that kind of chat on people taking themselves seriously and trying to
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  be good on some level, Like there was like it was still the just
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  like punk is just the vibe and not actually doesn't matter about the music so
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  much, which is true to some extent. But we just didn't fall into
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  that category. So it took people a while to be okay with us.
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  I guess as far as like the overall, Florida Climbate was cool. Like
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  it was. I really enjoyed it at that point. The kind of area
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  that we all grew up in had a lot of bands, had a lot
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  of shows, and I don't like the I mean the big bands for us
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  at the time were like I mean Farside was one of them, say I
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  am quicksand just a lot I mean a lot of the bands that we get
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  to we're lucky enough to be able to play with now because even though we
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  were super young then, now that it's thirty years later, you know,
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  it goes If you're eighteen and someone's twenty three, think they're like almost gonna
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  die. But now, like so the time gets a lot different further down
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  the road we get. So it's uh, yeah, it was a cool
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  climate and I really I have a lot of fond memories about like the our
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  formative years. It's free, like in the band and not in the band
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  in Florida and kind of music scene that was going on here, it was
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  very cool. Yeah, thirty years is a long charm in music made,
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  and like over that charm, there's been plenty of fads and trends coming go.
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  So as a band, have you ever tried to change with the chimes
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  or have you sort of been more contentious to stick to your own paths.
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  We've tried to change as much as we could, which was a mistake.
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  It's mostly like I would say, kind of the two thousand and four zone,
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  which was right after Crossing came out and probably like the historical peak of
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  the band or whatever. And right after we did that, it was sort
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  of when all of the like hot topic sort of that email wave came in
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  and got massive, and there wasn't really anywhere left for a band like us.
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  A lot of our peers had broken up or stopped playing or whatever,
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  and so we were kind of left hung out where It's like the other bands
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  that we were kind of friends with that were still around at that point had
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  like Half Plane Trio were fucking massive or AFI were massive, and then really
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  we didn't really fit in with their new fans as so many of them that
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  they were, so we you know, caught ourselves wearing like all black long
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  sleeve button downs and ship for a little while, but that went away and
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  it looked really weird when we did it too. It was this a little
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  short lived detour in the world of trying to adapt to the music industry,
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  we just decided no thanks and around smart cool. Now you're also going to
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  be celebrating your anniversary by going on huge tours of the UK and the US,
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  so tell us about those. Yeah, we just just wrapped the UK
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  ron and that went really well. It was cool. The US starts in
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  like two weeks and that's insane. Like we're going on tour with Quicksands all
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  summer and then in the Europe in November as well, which is great,
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  and they're one of my favorite bands, and we're definitely a super influential band
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  on us before we even started the band US individually, I'm looking forward to
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  it's been it'll be the most we haven't done this many shows in a while,
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  so it's gonna be cool from a lot of angles, aside from being
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  gone for so long. It'll be nice to get to a lot of these
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  places we haven't been in a minute. And the other thing that happens when
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  you know, the last ten years or so, we've been doing shows like
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  two or three in a row kind of thing for the most part, and
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  it's pretty hard to hit your stride doing that, So it'll be nice to
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  have like an actual section of shows where like by the fourth or fifth when
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  we're super warmed up and feeling like really great, because no matter how much
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  you rehearse, no how much you know, you prop and get ready,
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  there's always like still have to knock the rust off on the first few shows.
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  So I think that's going to be very cool for us to kind of
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  really get the kind of nucleus super super jealo together and super tight for the
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  rest of the year. All right, nice and is a strier and you
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  saw it spread it down the track light or you haven't gone that fight,
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  Yeah, February twenty five, so we're like in the middle of getting the
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  announcement figured out and all that stuff. But it's definitely happening. Yeah for
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  Jason, Well, thanks very much for you, Tom. Today, I
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  made the album Bounds is out May the tenth. Then it's a thirty year
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  celebration of the band Water Music and there's a ruddy cracker from what I've heard,
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  mate, so based on black with it and we'll see you out here
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  next year. Alright on, Thanks Chris, I appreciate it. Shut Down.
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  I can do the car Mside Quincy my too. Rat double call up
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  started down car Saturday swinging on a Sup stream down to us in another corner
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  Colorway con it in it down in a back seat and then riding up Scared
• 17:51
  Saturday is swinging on a Sup stream sunside to tell me song comeback. So
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  some like Jay asas f comp Sta static welcome starting for the I'm trying to
• 18:26
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• 18:56
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• 19:26
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