Bowling For Soup Interview , Warped Tour-Dallas, 07/19/2003

This interview was conducted by bandchat.org correspondents Elizabeth Pardieu and Melissa Malmgren, as well as freelance journalist TaLonna Blackmon.

Melissa: So, how's the tour been so far? Are you enjoying Warped? Is it as kick ass as you anticipated?
Jaret: God, that's a good question right there, my god!
Erik: Fine, yes, yes.
Jaret : ...and the second question?
Elizabeth: Ok, second question...
Jaret : No, no, just kidding, it's going really good. We were a bit nervous at first, because we were the new kids, you know..all the other bands have been doing this for so long. Some of these bands have been doing this for nine years, so we didn't really know how we would fit in, you know. The only people we really knew were Simple Plan, I think, and a bunch of crew guys.
Chris : We actually had to clean the parking lot the first five shows.
Jaret : Right
Chris : You know, after the show, get all the trash.
Gary : Right, but then we started making a killing recycling and they stopped it at that.
Jaret : Yeah, I don't know if you know this, but take 20,000 kids in a small area, that's a lot of aluminum.
Gary : Not just aluminum.
Jaret : Yeah, you find watches and broken cell phones, you can make a killing recycling cell phone batteries. But yeah, so anyway, we got out there, and aside from the weather it's been awesome. The weather's been pretty brutal to us. We've got torrential rain one day, and then like this today, 102 degrees outside. And there were lots of changing altitude the first few days, and it was kind of hard to get your bearing.
Gary : Someone dropped a quarter.
Jaret : Don't just stand there, pick that mother fucker up! See, if you ever go back in time, you could make a phone call. Yeah, but so the crowd has been awesome, we've been really surprised like a lot of markets where we had never been like Boise, Idaho. We've never been through Montana at all. Oh, and we've never ever been near Cincinnati. And so that was a much more thorough answer than what Eric gave you.
Erik : Yeah, I think so too.

Elizabeth: Does Texas provide you with a bigger fan base because it's your home?
Jaret : As far as Warped Tour crowds, well we've only done one Texas date...that was yesterday, and it was as big as some of the one's we've had, however it's still based on that we were at the Ernie Ball Stage, which isn't advertised. So, the kids have to come by the booth, find out when you're playing, and find the stage. And yesterday, it was really stuck way far off in the corner, so I kinda attributed it to that...plus we were up against Simple Plan, which they're a main stage band, which are a lot easier to find. And we have a lot of the same fans, but we'll see after today and tomorrow kind of what happens. But as far as touring in general, Texas obviously is the biggest crowds for us because we've been touring here for 11 years, so, we've built up every city separately.
Gary : We just kept going back until they started liking us.

Elizabeth: What or who has been your biggest influence musically?:
Jaret : Tough one.
Chris : Old school heavy metal, and like, the Ramones
Erik : Cheap Trick
Jaret : Yeah, we grew up listening to everything cause we all had pretty musical parents, as far as playing though, I don't think any of our parents played anything, my mom played the piano.
Erik : But, they're music fans
Jaret : Yeah, they were big music fans. Like there was always music in the car, and they were always singing shit. So, it was everything from the Eagles to Donna Summer. And my brother's five years older than me, so add Judist Priest and Iron Maiden to that. It sounds like a big pile of musical shit now, doesn't it?
Chris : Yes
Gary : Musical Sloppy Joe
Jaret : Yes, that sounds a lot more appetizing.

Elizabeth: Where do you see yourselves in five years?
Jaret : Probably still recording and touring, but probably touring a little less, instead of year round.
Erik : It's nice to be able to take a break.
Jaret : Yeah, it's kinda cool because our friends that have been successful actually get to take a break and we're just like, wow, that's awesome. Just sit around and masturbate all day, every day, as if I don't already.

Elizabeth: Now for a bandchat.org signature question...If you could be any flavor of Jell-O, what would it by and why? Be creative.
Chris : I would be lime Jell-O, because I like green, and I would eat myself. I would watch myself wiggle and jiggle first.
Erik : I wouldn't be Jell-O, cause I can't stand it. I was put on a liquid diet for 6 weeks when I was 18.
Jaret : Wait a minute, hold on, she said you have to pick a flavor, just pick
Erik : I would be rock and roll Jell-O.
Elizabeth: Ok, that works...why?
Erik : Why? Because that would obviously be the best flavor.
Melissa: What would be in that?
All in agreement : BEER
Gary : What color would rock and roll Jell-O be?
Jaret : Black
Erik : Black
Jaret : And basically it would taste like b.o., beer...
Chris : And little chunks of puke in there.
Erik : Maybe some blood. LS: My favorite kind of Jell-O is orange, but that would be boring. So it's gonna be kinda hard to top rock and roll Jell-O. Umm, I think I would have to be chocolate Jell-o, cause I've always wondered why they don't have chocolate Jell-O.
Erik : They can do that.
Jaret : Yeah, they make chocolate everything.
Chris : It would be like Yoo-hoo though, a little bit weird.
Jaret : But still, Yoo-hoo, as we have learned over the past week, is delicious. You pour some fucking Vodka up in some Yoo-hoo.
Chris : I drink some mint flavored Yoo-hoo occasionally.
Erik : You can mix Vodka, Butterscotch Schnapps.
Jaret : That's what I'd be, I would be "Yoo-brew" Jell-O. (Cheers around the room)
Jaret : Which is Yoo-hoo and Vodka Jell-O. That's what I would be.
Elizabeth: Good answer.
Gary : I would be that blue Jell-O that you get at Luby's because no one ever eats it, and so I'd be the longest living, and whenever I'd finally die, the obituary would read: "Survived his other Jell-O flavored band mates."
Jaret : Yeah, why doesn't anyone ever get the fucking blue Jell-O?
Chris : Because it's nothing. It's just blue, it doesn't taste like anything. Tastes like Windex.
Gary : Do they even sell blue Jell-O in stores? I only see it in Luby's.
Jaret : Speaking of which, have you seen the new gold Jell-O they have? It's like ginger ale flavored or something.
Elizabeth: Oh, with the bubbles.
Eric : Never heard of it.
Jaret : When's the last time you actually went shopping for a box of Jell-O? (Sarcastically) I actually did about 2 months ago, right before the colonoscopy.

Elizabeth: Do you feel that you have stayed grounded with your new found success?
Erik : I don't think we couldn't. We have too many people that would kick our asses if we weren't.
Chris : I'm actually much more of an asshole now. I never call anybody back anymore, wait, I didn't ever call anybody back before. I guess I'm the same asshole.
Jaret : I don't know. We still don't really think of ourselves as successful. We've accomplished a lot as a group, and we accomplished a lot of the things that we set out to do. But, it's weird because no matter what level you get to, there's always someone else who's kinda a step above you. So, it would be really hard to get a big head, cause there's always something better than us. I don't even have an automobile; I don't know what that means.
Erik : It means you walk a lot.
Jaret : No, that means I don't have any money.
Chris : I still shop at Wal-Mart. I love it.
Jaret : Wal-Mart is one-stop shopping.

TaLonna: If you could send any message out to your fans, what would it be?
Erik : Have a good time, all the time.
Jaret : Directly to our fans, the stock answer is just "Thank you." If people didn't come and watch us, and buy our albums, I'd still be working at my cousin's cleaners. Chris would still be blowing people for coke.
Chris : And it's not like the powder, like Coca-Cola.
Jaret : Eric would still be pimping out his mother and sister.
Erik : Yup.
Jaret : I don't know what Gary would be doing, Oh, he'd still be in college.
Gary : Gary'd still be out in the driveway stompin ants.

TaLonna: Obviously, if you're on tour you've been doing a lot of interviews. What is the one question that you are just plain fed up with, if any?
Gary : How'd we get the name.
Jaret : Yeah, that's pretty easy...it's how we got the name.
Elizabeth: So, how did you get the name?
[laughter]

TaLonna: Now that you have some loot, have you made any grandioso purchases?
Jaret : We really don't have that much loot. I mean we put all of our money in the bank pretty much. We still have a very small salary that we pay ourselves. Because the next few years are still unknown and we know we still want to be in this band. So, you know, if we end up having to finance ourselves or whatever, we're just saving everything for a rainy day. You know, cause it may fuckin' rain, and I'm building an ark, no I'm gonna pay someone with the money in the bank.

TaLonna: Would you prefer playing with larger bands like Blink 182, or with smaller bands like Uncle Silas?
Jaret : See, that's a really hard question because we have this habit of becoming two different bands. Like we did it earlier in our career. Like we were a cover band and then we were a rock 'n roll band. And right now I think we're sorta an arena rock and we're still a bar band too. And it's been really hard to do it cause when you play to a big crowd they can't understand a fucking thing that you say, and plus you don't have enough time, so it's really hard to compare. Its two completely different things and I like them both.
Erik : You can't deny that it wasn't an absolute blast to play in front of 80,000 people in a giant stadium, but it is really fun to play in a bar.
Jaret : Yeah, they both are fun. It's just different.
Erik : It's like peas and carrots. They go together, but they're not the same.
Jaret : I miss it, so it's gonna be good when this all ends and we actually get to do a few bar shows.

TaLonna: How's life on the tour bus, especially in comparison to your many vans? Are there any problems with the whole closed quarters scene?
Jaret : The closed-quarters thing, I thought would be a problem, and it's really not. The only irritating thing is when someone who isn't in the band or crew, like somebody has like ten friends come in and you're in there and you want to take off your pants and walk around in your underwear for ten minutes while your pants dry. That's really the only time the closed-quarters thing gets to ya. When you just want five minutes to yourself.
Chris : Just five minutes.
Erik : There's a lot of convenience that comes along with being in a van, cause here, you pull and the buss parks. You can't just jump on the bus and get Burger King or you can't always stop at Wal-Mart or Target whenever you need to get something.
Jaret : Everything that you need for survival is here, on-site. So, there really aren't ways for you to go anywhere or do something else. Like if you need to go to Wal-Mart, it's a royal pain in the ass , cause except for today, you don't know where the hell you are so how do you tell a cab to come get us. So that part of the van I really miss. Just being able to get in it and go. We weren't limited to anything with that. We drove that trailer through drive-thrus, whatever, we only got stuck in one.
Erik : And we laughed.
Jaret : We laughed.
Chris : We pissed off the cars behind us.
Jaret : Yeah, six drunk guys getting out of a van, "You gotta back up." And three of those drunk guys just whip it out and start peeing.

TaLonna: It says in your bio that "beer is a common ingredient in BFS's recipe for fun." What's your beer of choice?
All : Miller Light
Chris : I'm a budweiser guy, but I stopped drinking beer because I'm on a diet. So my bear of choice is Vodka and Marijuana.
Jaret : He's part Russian.

Elizabeth: Also, according to your bio, your album "Drunk Enough To Dance" was produced by Butch Walker. How was working with Butch? Was his creativity an influence to the album?
Jaret : He's a genius, first of all. He's an incredible songwriter and just an all-around cool guy. And what he added to the album, besides just making us sound like what we sound like, is just little things. All the songs were written besides "Girl All The Bad Guys Want" and "Life after Lisa" before we went there. He would just change one thing, like, put this in the bridge instead of the intro, and all of us just look at each other and say "Wow, that's really good." Little things here and there.
Chris : And also he made it easy too. He just said play it and it's good. He's not gonna sit there and push you or say you suck.
Gary : Didn't he touch you in the bus one time?
Chris : He did. He's the first person to ever touch my wiener that's just a friend.
Erik : In the studio, it was just get through it, and knock it out as quickly as you can and you've got an album.
Chris : He'd also just sit there and fuck around, basically just sit there, and it doesn't really seem like you're working your ass off.

TaLonna: Final question: What's in the immediate future for Bowling For Soup?
Jaret : We're gonna finish this tour and then we're going to England for about five days. And then we are coming back and taking two weeks off and then we're doing our own tour in the fall.
Gary : And during those two weeks, I'm going to sit in the air-conditioning all day long.
Erik : I'm gonna shit on a toilet that's not surrounded by a blue plastic box.
Jaret : That you don't have to wipe down before you sit on it.
Chris : And sweat your ass off so much that you don't know when your ass is clean.
Jaret : Man, that's a valid point and I'm glad someone brought that out.