[Interview] Andrew of Against Me!

Earlier last month, I sat down with Andrew of Against Me! while he was on tour with Dropkick Murphys and I conducted an interview with him. This was before Against Me! got confirmed for this years Warped Tour, so I did not ask him anything related to Warped Tour. Click ‘more’ to read the interview in it’s entirety.

RTS Nick: Can you state who you are please?
Against Me!: Yeah, I’m Andrew from Against Me! Bass player, cheerleader, cake eater.
RTS: Hows the tour going so far?
AM: It’s great. We toured with Dropkick before in 2008 and we were up for about 2-3 weeks. We struck up a good relationship with them. They are very nice, professional… I don’t even know what professional mean… I think it means that they got their shit together. They ran a tight ship and they are very nice and very accomodating. It’s a great family vibe, so when they offered to do the tour in America we jumped at the chance.

RTS Nick: How about Off With Their Heads?
AM: Those guys are total dicks…. That was sarcastic. They are good friends of ours. We’ve been on tour with them before and we’re going to Australlia with them.

RTS Nick: Now that you have mentioned it, you first canceled your Australian tour originally.
AM: Yeah, we are making it up.
RTS Nick: What exactly happened originally?
AM: With canceling everything, we basically canceled 2 months before the tour and all that. A lot of personal stuff has been going down that I’m not going to get into, but a lot of stuff with the record label as well. Basically they had a regime change. All the people that were at SIRE/Warner [Records] when we signed…. there are still some left, but about 90% of the people were gone. It’s the music industry, everythings just…changed. Whose to say thats for better or worst?
*soundcheck for Off With Their Heads began so we moved into a hallway. 5 minutes later…*
RTS Nick: We were talking about the cancelation of the Australian tour…
AM: Yeah, it was just a combanation of a bunch of stuff. We just had to step back and take a break. We did and I think it was for the better. I think we are slowly making all of that stuff up because the last thing we want to do is gypt all of the people who like us in Europe. To be straight up honest though, we just needed a fucking break. We hit a wall and we needed to stop. Much apologies to the people in Europe, New Zealand, Australia and Japan, but don’t worry… we are coming back.
RTS Nick: Are you doing anything special to make up for the fact that you had to cancel?AM: Well, we have a new drummer for them. That wasn’t intentional, but if that helps… We don’t have gimmicks or anything. We don’t have a light show, we do what we do and give it 100% every night.

RTS Nick: Speaking of a new drummer, your old drummer left to go record with Hot Water Music…AM: Well, we’ll call it the George story. George is a very good friend of mine. I’m a big fan of Hot Water Music. George is from Gainsville where we all grew up and when we had that freakout, Hot Water was playing shows without him. They were playing with the drummer from No Use for a Name where he was filling in for him while he was playing for us. Basically we played 4 shows in December, 3 shows in Florida and 1 in San Diego. We were going to play these, but Hot Water Music already booked an Australlian Tour, with George playing on the exact same dates. Jay came down and knew about 50 songs. Tom asked him to learn 20 songs. We don’t even play 50 different songs. We would need to look back on them. It is kind of a is what it is situation. I love George, he’s an amazing drummer, but he’s Hot Water Music’s drummer. I hope that doesn’t sound to shady. Jay came in and killed it basically.
RTS Nick: How do you think the touring has changed by having Jay with you guys?
AM: Lets put it in perspective. Tom started it [Against Me!] in 97. No drummer. Then had Kevin. Then Warren, the four of us, Warren, myself, James and Tom were strong for about 3-4 records. Then we had George for about a year and a half. Now we have Jay. Four drummers in 14 years is not bad. It’s not that good, but it’s not that bad. I don’t think we have hit Spinal Tap level yet. Not saying we won’t…
RTS Nick: I hope you don’t *laughs*
AM: Me neither.

RTS Nick: You guys are releasing a demos album called Total Clairty. Why did you decide to release Total Clarity at this time?
AM: I think it was good timing. White Crosses has been out. It will be out a year in June. We’ve had the demos for Clarity for a long time. It’s not just a thing to throw out there like, “Oh we should put this out!” We’ve always wanted to put out these demos. They are very different from Searching For a Former Clarity. A lot of people have already heard these demos. They are the “stolen demos” thats on the internet…
RTS Nick: They leaked?
AM: Yeah, with the wrong names for every song. *laughs* That’s just what it is.. You know? We went back to J. Robins and remastered a lot of stuff.
RTS Nick: Is the quality better?
AM: A little better…. I think we recorded those in a day or two. They were just a demos. We went back to Robbins whose in Gainsville and pretty much get them mastered here at The lodge in the city (New York.) They mastered White Crosses and New Wave. Mastering actually will do a whole lot for a record. Basically, Total Clarity remixed and mastered sounds really fucking gnarly and loud and mean. I’m stoked on it.
RTS Nick: Is there any reason why you did the same thing with The Essential Cowboy demos?
AM: Same Thing. We have stuff for everything. We record a lot. You know, for demoing or recording in Gainsville or whatever. We just like to record and put knew ideas on tape.
RTS Nick: Is it safe to say that it’s going to happen with White Crosses?
AM: There are demos for all of that too… Who knows? Maybe… How’s that for an indefinite answer? Maybe…

RTS Nick: What exactly happened with Sire Records?
AM: It was kind of a mutual decision. I’m not going to shit talk or anything, but no record label are in that good of a situation right now and like I said, over half the people we worked with got fired and it was just time… for both of us. There was no “Fuck You, Fuck You, Fuck You, Fuck You, You’re gone. Fuck you we’re leaving.” We were just like, “We want to go” and they said fine. Here you go.
RTS Nick: Did they ever change or influence the sound of New Wave or White Crosses?
AM: No. Not at all. That is the main thing that a lot of people don’t get. All those things, and we had creative control. We would never sign something that would hamper any of that. The change in sound was intentional with us. When working with Butch Vig, we wanted to make a bigger sounding record. We wanted to get as good as a sound as we could and I think we did that. The thing is, a lot people want our shit just to be more… raw and that’s fine. That’s what the live show is.
RTS Nick: People think the complete opposite end of the spectrum. They will either say they love it, or it’s absolute garbage. I don’t think New Wave was this “Punk” record. It was something bigger.
AM: I don’t think New Wave was a punk record. I don’t think we are a punk band. A lot people give to much credence…is that the right word? People give to much credit to like what people say online. 90% of people saying shit online have no fucking clue what they are saying. A lot of it are just empty words. They just rant and type. No one is going to call you on if it is a fact of not. The whole thing is getting better and better, but you can’t put to much credence into something like that.
RTS Nick: Are you signed now?
AM: No. We are Free-Agents to the world.
RTS Nick: Is there a record label that you want to sign too?
AM: Ummmmm, Warner Brothers… *laughs* No. We are kind of enjoying just being free right now. It’s kind of a liberating thing. Who knows what we’ll do… maybe we’ll record the new record on our own. We’ll see if someone wants to put it out. If they don’t want it out, maybe we’ll get Jordan to put it out. We could do what we want. It’s a very liberating feeling.

RTS Nick: After this tour, I read that you are recording a EP…
AM: No, in between this these tours, before this we did a headlining tour with Cheap Girls and Fences. That was about a month long and after the last show in Bloomington, Indiana, we went up to Madison, Wisconsin and recorded some songs because we just had a week in-between tours. So we already did it.
RTS Nick: You have a release date?
AM: No. Not yet… Hopefully the sooner the better, but with Total Clarity coming out. We actually did a serious radio thing. It was in the Fishbowl or whatever. We were at there offices and we played full band electric. We played one of the new songs. I’m not sure when it’s going to be online… but yeah. I think it’s on Faction though.
RTS Nick: Oh! You said Fishbowl. You mean Sirius/XM satalite radio?
AM: Yeah. The Fishbowl is the thing in the lobby where you just play. We saw Trey Parker and Matt Stone from South Park. They were on the Daily Show last night
RTS Nick: Dammit, I missed it.
AM: *laughs* You gotta watch basic cable man.

RTS Nick: I do.. I guess I missed it. After Australia, what are your plans afterwards?
AM: We have Crazy Fest in Louisville. Sasquatch in Washington. Nothing has been announced yet, but we will be on tour. [Editor's Note: This was his Warped Tour hint] We are going to do another headlining East Coast run too.

RTS Nick: Do you have anything else to add?
AM: Nope. Tour has been great. Not now, because I just ate a big fucking piece of cheese cake, but in 2-3 hours.. I will be fucking ready!
RTS Nick: Thanks for doing an interview with us!
AM: Thank you.

Tags: Against Me! Interview