Artist Friendly with Joel Madden - Mike Herrera & Tom Wisniewski of MxPx

Episode Date: September 20, 2023

Listen as Joel Madden is joined by Mike Herrera and Tom Wisniewski of MxPx. MxPx are still riding high from the release of their 11th studio album, Find A Way Home, which reflects on the passing of time, mistakes made, and feeling like a failure. “I just hope that the music hits in a way that either makes them happy [or] just gives them some entertainment,” Herrera told AP last month. “We do this for people to have something in their lives, not just today. Everything these days online really seems fleeting. But songs — good songs — aren’t. Something can stay with you years from now — that’s what makes it so worth it for us to put so much work into the songs.” ------- Listen to their Artist Friendly conversation on ⁠⁠⁠Spotify.⁠⁠ ------- Follow Artist Friendly! IG: @artist.friendly TikTok: @artist.friendly YouTube: youtube.com/@artist.friendly ------- Host: Joel Madden, @joelmadden Producers: Joel Madden, Benji Madden, Josh Madden, Joey Simmrin, Janice Leary Video Editor: Ryan Schaefer Sound Engineer/Audio Production: Nick Gray Music/Theme Composer: Nick Gray Cover Art/Design: Ryan Schaefer Additional Contributors: Anna Zanes, Neville Hardman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, what's up? I'm Joel Madden, and this is artist-friendly. On today's episode, I'm talking to Mike and Tom from MXPX. Let's go. It kind of feels like we're back in school. Yeah, seeing some old classmates. Yeah. It's been a minute.

How's it going? Man, it's good. It's good. Just doing all the stuff for this new record. Yeah, it's been a grind. It's been a lot. It's been a lot. And we're really happy.

It's like, you should be happy. Yes. Some more work. Yeah. But how long has it been since we've seen each other? I saw you in the UK. I saw you played in Seattle like five years ago or something like that. Yeah, but it's been a long time.

It's been a few years. Yeah. That's crazy. You guys look the same. So do you. Yeah, you look great. Thank you. We all look same.

It's awesome. Drink a lot of water, get a lot of sleep. Absolutely. Sleep is the key. I don't get enough sleep, but I'm trying. I'm like trying to turn over that, that leaf. It's got to commit to it, man. Yeah, you got to schedule it.

I think, I mean, I get six hours at least every night. I'm a good seven. I'm like six to seven. But seven is like seven to eight is golden. That's like. When I don't have to get up, I usually get seven and like wake up normal. So I'm okay, I'll just plan for that. Yeah.

That seems like what my body wants. But you guys are, and I'm going to show this because I'm really excited, especially knowing now that you guys are, is this your first self-release? Second. Second. Okay. Second. Yeah.

How's it feel? We did. It's awesome. We love it. You know, we did, you know, our self-titled in 2018. Yep. And that was a completely different landscape than the world is at now. Yeah.

So like now coming into 2023, self-releasing this. You know, a lot of people ask, why do you self-release? A lot of it is because we found we were just doing a lot of that work anyway. Yeah. Yeah. So we just, you know, the risk reward is different. So for us, we'll risk a little more. but we believe in ourselves.

Yeah. So that's why we self-release. We're doing the work, so let's just take that bag. So I don't know. It sounds more glamorous than it really is, because it is just getting out there every day and telling people about the new songs. But also, you know, it's funny we're talking about this

because I've just this morning was on an email chain. doesn't matter who or what but an indie label has a band signed them young, early not a good deal from just being honest right yeah

and now the band wants to change the deal and it's fair it's fair they're not actually even saying we don't like want to work with you guys they're saying we just want a fair deal that's why I think self-releasing is powerful because you realize that well a lot of times the indie labels are worse they do worse deals than the major labels that can be true absolutely a lot of times the indie labels are first on the scene early right they're like they their their their network

spread out a little bit more deep in the roots of like a these bubbling scenes and things like that and by the way I'm not against record labels not against indie labels sure right Not against major labels. I am against bad deals. Yeah. Unfair deals. Of course. And I am for good deals.

And I love it when I see labels make artist-friendly deals. And there are a lot of labels that do. But the nature of it sometimes is if I meet a band early and can get them to sign a bad deal, I will. Yeah. Yeah. Still wrong. To me, that is just wrong. It doesn't matter when you met.

And then they can argue that they've invested all this time. money into developing the band. Some of that can be true to a degree. But now it is the bands do most of the work. Yes. And you guys are, you guys are living proof. You've probably seen every kind of deal, but you've self-released your last two records. And you're doing all the work because you know what you're doing, because you've released records. You've done so many records. you know how it works. There's no, there's no, there's no mystery to you about how to make a record, put a record out, and you have that, you believe in yourselves, you're confident, you're confident in like, yo, this is the work, we're going to do it. I think sometimes bands

come in early in there like a little confused or they don't know how it works. It's not that complicated. Yeah. Yeah, when you're young, you don't know how to put a record. I don't know how to go in this too and record or anything. So it's just like you just go, oh, someone else to take care of it. We're just excited that's happening. Yeah. It's almost the easy part. But going back to what you're talking about, like, I feel like there's, with major labels, indie labels, self-release, there's not one right way to do things, right? Like you can always find a really good edge.

You know, I feel like bands, and anybody that's doing anything creative with a team on your own, whatever you are, find that edge, find that fringe, find that thing that is what you're wanting to do, but it's a little bit outside of what everybody else is doing. And you can find your niche, you can find whatever it is that gives you that

edge over. I don't want to say competition. I mean, I guess you could say attention. You know, we're competing for attention. That's it. But yeah. I think also when you do it yourself, you can just try things that someone may not really think is a good idea and you're going to, but I think this is going to work. And so no one's there to tell you now. I'll say think, because we're independent as well. So we self-release. Yeah. Right. dope. We, every win feels like a win. The little wind. for us now feel more important.

Like now I don't think that we think like we need to have the biggest song in the world. I just think we're excited for any kind of good, any good result we get. And I think that that has been one of the biggest things for us is learning like how to celebrate every fucking, every win, a sold-out show or even though we haven't played in five years, we're going to play.

We're going to play though. We're talking about. We're talking about touring again and we're like, we are actually just the idea of touring is like, I don't know, man. We're thinking like special, special, special. So we just think like let's do like fan focus shows. Let's do smaller shows. Let's do things that feel good. And that feels like a win to us.

And especially if they're like a fun, just different event. It's not just, oh, another show like that people are going to. If it's something interesting and I don't even know what that is off top of my head, but like those are the things that people just grab onto. Yeah, yeah. Well, you got to think about it. You can figure them out, right? Yeah, yeah.

I mean, maybe the show is just the fact that they haven't played in five years. Well, yeah. You get a freebie on the first one. We were talking about just how, early in the car on the way here, about how just how good you guys were when we toured together. Oh, thank you guys. And that kind of like made us like perk up and go, okay, we need to like pay attention to our live show.

Because we, you know, you come up as a band and you do your songs and you, you know, you have your new album or whatever and you just do what you do but then you see something different you're like okay these kids are like coming up behind us nipping at our heels yeah yeah it wasn't a competition thing it was just like oh that's possible like that's a really good way that they break down the crowd they get everybody singing all of that so your harmonies were just always just like perfect every night you guys were you guys were a better band than us at the time we were just just focused. We just wanted to like make it.

And we were just trying to get in front of as many people. And you guys were also one of our favorite bands. And I'll never forget it because when I saw you guys play on Life in General at my brother's place. Oh, yeah. Is that Waldorf? Waldorf. Yeah. Random ass place booked you guys.

And it was a pack show, right? And it was like the closest I'd been to any band, like any touring band. Like I remember my friend was like the runner or something and I like rode in the car. I rode in the car with him like taking, I forget, I want to say it was maybe. Was that when you guys took me to Staples?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I like was just quiet in the back, just hanging out. But like that was the first time where I saw that, like a real person was in that band that I had their CD, their poster. You had a music video on MTV and I was like that close to you guys. And that was like such a pivotal moment. Wow. What were you doing at Staples? You needed a fact, you need to like fax something or copy. We talked about this over the years. I don't even remember what I was doing. I was like on Staples.

Well, back then it was we were in the van still. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. And we were probably doing our own tour managing, whatever you call it. Totally pre-internet. Pre-internet, like, you know, it was all analog. Oh, we were definitely driving by an Atlas and getting lost to every city we ever went to. Yeah. I can't imagine how much easier life would have been if we had, like, a phone or the GPS just to, like, take us right to the glove every single time.

Oh, we're going to be there in 14 minutes. Adventures just changed. Oh, yeah. It was definitely an adventure, and it's fun. There were so many fun stories. Like, we got lost in Philly one time, and we're, like, south of the airport or something like that, and Yuri's driving, he's totally confused, and he's freaking out. he's like which way is north and we're like uh that way i think he got out of the van and was

saying they're like practically hyperventing so he couldn't figure out which way it was north and it's like that just doesn't happen anymore no you don't need to know which way is north who cares right literally we're like we didn't care like who cares we're we're like just go what we've been here for it's off that way we tell bands though all the time like before iPhones before social media like you had to put posters up and hand out flyers and go to malls and try to find kids who look like they might come to your show. It was as simple as that. You were just trying to like promote each show day of the show.

And you would book these little menus. And it was all just like, it was all hand to hand. Did you walk around high school with like a back pocket full of flyers? For sure. And like demo tapes and, you know, we'd throw our own shows at like FOP lodges and all that stuff. and and to think today you can go you can you know do things on social media and you can really promote things now like you're saying there's a lot more noise to cut through so it's harder in some ways but in other ways you know it's easier iPhones obviously would make the van touring a lot

easier because how many times do we miss a fucking turn yeah yeah yeah and go an hour it's always the wrong way you had handwritten directions from some guy and it was always back We got to one point on a tour, we got to where we just did. If it says right, go left. And we got there quicker. Dude, you remember Oklahoma City, your birthday. Yes. March 11th. Like 22nd birthday.

Was it 22nd? Yeah. 22. Or 21 or 22. I thought it was 21. 21 maybe, yeah. Because we were on tour. Yeah, it was 21.

If it was your 22nd birthday, you guys didn't take advantage because you're like, yeah, we've never really been to a bar. Like, am I right? It might be 21. And we were playing pool. Yeah. I met my wife that weekend. Really?

That I'm still married to now. That's right. How wild is that? I totally forgot that. That's where you met her. Yeah. Oh my God, dude. So thanks.

You guys were part of it. Dude. That was a birthday I'll never forget. That was, that was. But also, I think it was, and it had to be 21 because it was such a big deal. I remember like that was such a big birthday. I can't believe I would forget which year it was,

but I remember that birthday very clearly. Because you guys kind of like taught us how to go to a barn. Well, we were like, go big. We were literally only a couple years older than you guys. You had way more miles. Yeah, I mean, it doesn't take long once you turn 21 to like, if you're on tour. Yeah. I mean, being on tour, yeah.

The night that Tom turned 21, we were in Florida. No, we were in Chicago. Chicago? Cleveland. Cleveland? Okay, so the night I turned 21, we were in Florida. Yeah, it was same tour. And we drove and we same tour, partied so hard that Tom was puking in the toilet the whole bus ride and saying, make it stop.

Yeah. And I was hungover, but it was the night before my birthday. So the whole next day was like hungover and then we had to do it all again. Yeah. I'm like, okay, this is drinking. I don't know if I can handle this. But back to the. the origin of that tour, the first time we saw you in that little ass venue that now doesn't

exist. I mean, it was like a little place. But getting to see you guys was like for me and like actually that close to like it was all a mystery to me until then, right? Curtain was pulled back. Being able to like see real people like and then watch the show and the show was was amazing. It was nuts. And I'm sure you guys probably just did little punk shows like that everywhere at that time, just like they were all nuts. There was like 500 people packed into a place that holds 200. Every night was chaos. Chaos. Yeah. And that was the one of the key moments I give a lot of credit to for me where it clicked like, oh, we could do this. Like we could actually do this. Like this is possible. Like other people are doing this. Yeah. Yeah. That's a huge moment to

have as a kid like to realize yeah at like 15 16 I think at the time and then we got so emboldened to like go for it and push harder and so then to get the tour with you guys like a few years later like 2000 i think was that tour yeah yeah and to get the tour with you guys was such a huge deal for us because you guys were like one of our favorite bands and I'd say like one of our formative bands you know like I think uh you guys and and uh like Rancid was another one that we just like loved yeah um but you guys were a big one I mean you guys were one of the main ones that when we first started that good Charlotte was like like following modeling after just it it made sense to us like like it was And it was that show, I'm telling you.

Was seeing that show, seeing the van and trailer, seeing like the thing in real life and how it was functioning and going like, oh, this is possible. This is how you do it. So we didn't really have a lot of access to other bands down there. We didn't have a lot of information. And then going on the tour with you guys was like we were so focused because not only did we want to make it and we were trying, but then also it was you guys.

So we wanted to impress you guys every night. We wanted to like, you know. Oh, you did it. We were chasing after your fucking, it was cool. It was a really, I've said it to you guys before. I'm going to say it again. It was a very pivotal tour for Good Charlotte, that MXPX tour when you guys took us out, had us open. And I think it was Neil that gave you guys the CD or something.

I don't know. Like remember Neil, I think it was JJ. Or JJ. J.J. J.J. He was out in D.C. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The first one was like, you got to check this band out. But Neil came to a show, another show when we were playing, like, it was us, Newfound Glory, Phoenix TX, Lefty. There was like four or five bands on this little punk band tour or whatever, pop punk tour. And we were playing some like Jersey venue, sweaty-ass Jersey venue, and Neil was there.

Okay. And they were like, he tours with MXPX and we were like, here's our stuff. CD. Can you listen to our CD? So, so anyways, we end up on tour opening for you guys, not shortly after that, like a few months after that. And then, you know, we've known each other ever since. It's wild. It's wild how quickly things would happen back in those days. Yeah. If like the timeline of this album to this tour, to this, and then going overseas. And it's wild. Everything just happens so quickly. Yeah. And I think, you know, bands do, there are bands nowadays is that get big really quickly.

And that's like, that's their version of whatever was happening back then. Yeah, viral. It was viral. So it was viral back, you know, back then, but it was, what, analog? Yeah. So. But it would happen fast, like, like, it's interesting, though, like, how did kids share? I mean, the internet was there.

It was message boards and stuff. Yeah, it was a lot of message boards. It was mixed tapes. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, when I first got into music, it was a similar thing, like being inspired. realizing I could do that myself, that moment.

And it was started with local bands. And then I went and saw all, which, you know, all descendants. Yeah. Didn't really understand that whole thing until later, but seeing them in person and at the OK hotel in Seattle. And then, oh, there's like bands playing shows of all kinds. It's not just you two. It's you two, you know, in the Tacoma Dome or wherever I saw them, the zoo TV tour.

Yeah. The pixies opened, you know, so like that was one experience. It's a hand. And it was amazing. It was amazing. That inspired me in one way, but then also going to the garage and seeing like a local punk band show

where they put everything on themselves. They rented a PA. Yeah. They strung together amps, you know. And we did that for our first show. Tom wasn't there yet, but we did that for our first show. We just got all the practice amps we could,

strung them together and made a PA out of it. Made a PA. It's just, that's what bands do. That's what kids do, right? Yeah. So. And then Tom finally, you know, he joined the band on the second album. He literally like, I was like, hey, start learning how to play guitar.

Yeah, it was a night we were riding around Mike Yuri and I in like Yuri's mom's car or something. They're like, hey, we don't think Andy can tour and we really want to go on tour. I'm like, oh, what are you going to do? You can get? And I started naming all our friends that played guitar. I played drums at the time. Like, well, you got a guitar. Why don't you learn the songs?

We're like, okay. How old were you guys there? Like 16. Oh, my God. Yeah. 15 or 16. You guys started touring. at like 16, right?

No, 18. Just freshly 18. Were you still in high school? Right out of high school. Yeah. So our senior year of high school, we didn't make it to like a full week of school. We were constantly driving out or flying somewhere. Right.

West coast, mostly? Mostly. Mostly. We flew a little bit to like the east coast. But it was a lot of just like, you know, please excuse Tom from school on Monday. He's flying home from Nashville or something. Right. And our parents were cool with it.

And the school was like, what, really? Okay, whatever. Yeah. It wasn't a big deal. Yeah, but it was starting to happen. We literally, we graduated on a Monday, shot our first video on Tuesday, and then went on tour for a couple months on Wednesday. Straight out of high school. It was planned.

Like we knew we were just counting down the days to get out of school and go. And you guys were in Bermerton? Yep. Bremerton, Washington. Yeah. Born and raised. Went to Central Kitsab High School, which is in Silverdale. So it's like this sort of, I don't know, it's like water world, right?

Picture, the movie. It's like that without Kevin Kossner. But there's water everywhere, so you can just kind of like drive around. But it's a beautiful area that we definitely didn't necessarily love when we grew up. Right. It was a Navy town. All the Navy guys would like beat up on like the regular kids, you know. Right.

But nowadays it doesn't feel like that at all. It feels like a totally normal, like everyday city that anybody could kind of have a chance living in. Right. But the world's gotten a lot more connected. Yeah, it's so connected now. Yeah. You're right. You're right.

it's different than it used to be. I mean, that's how I feel about the place we grew up. It's small, but it's connected. Everything's more connected now, I think. You go back and it still feels like your original home kind of thing? It does. It does when I go back. It does feel like still feel the same a little bit.

And there's something about that place that I always wanted to leave. So when I go back, I still have that same feeling. But I have a nostalgia for it that I appreciate. And I definitely like enjoy it every now and then to go back. Absolutely. But it's very far away. And you get to leave. And then you leave. Yeah. Yeah. That's the best part of you. Yeah.

You can always leave. And I love and and also just feel like now it does feel like the world's smaller, more connected. So I never feel like I'm far from home. If I wanted to go back to Maryland tomorrow, I could go back tomorrow and spend three days there and get my fill and then come back here. And so I don't ever feel. But at the time, you know, I was seen in the 90s. It was a different time when we were growing up. it didn't feel so connected, so you did feel far away. It was hard to get, like, felt like that anyways.

And maybe money is a big part of it, too, like having the money to, like, go. Sure, of course. Of course. That helps. New York or whatever. Helps a little bit. Yeah. You know, when we were flying down our senior year of high school, we'd come down

to OC at least once or twice. And those shows were huge. So we've always done really well down in SoCal. And everybody always thought we were from down here because of our sound. We sounded like a surf punk band or whatever. Yeah. Same with us kind of. always loved that style and always loved that.

So we're, you know, we're finally, we're coming back to the Hollywood Palladium. Oh, you guys are. January 6th. Oh, great. It will be there. Come on now. I'm going to come.

I will come. MXPX, less than Jake, Reliant Kay, smoking popes. Yeah. Tickets are on sale now, but it's going to be awesome. Yeah. That's a great lineup. Yeah. We're stoked.

So we like doing those kind of big events, especially down here in where, you know, sort of like our second hometown. We feel like that anyway. We just always just spent so much time down here too. Yeah. Yeah. We, everybody always wonders like, why didn't you leave,

like we were just talking about hometowns? And it's just like, we just feel like we spent so much time down here. We probably should have. But I don't know. I think MXPX, it's like part of our brand to be in Bremerton. Yeah. I don't know what it is. It just, there's a pull there that just keeps us anchored.

I think you got to be, so my, the West Coast to me, I just don't think you. you can go wrong, right? Like my probably, like, favorite town is probably Santa Barbara. Yeah, right? Like, that's quiet. It's shallow.

Simple. But, like, I just don't think you can go wrong on the West Coast, but I'm also not from the West Coast. So I go to Seattle and Oregon, go to Washington, Oregon. I'm happy in any of those places. I always feel like I'm, like, for whatever reason, when I'm on the West Coast and I live in L.A., but that's kind of a function of like my wife's from here.

So parents are here. You know, we settled down here and had our kids here. And then they got, you know, so I always think like, I wonder if we ever leave LA. Like, because it's hectic, it feels a little hectic here sometimes. And if we did, it would just be to some other West Coast, smaller West Coast destination. Once those roots get further down, it's just hard to move. Yeah. Yeah.

Your kids got friends here now and like how you yank them. You got to have a real good reason to yank him out of the school and all that. Dance team, baseball, like all the stuff. They're like, no, we're not leaving. I think just do what I do. Just buy a second house somewhere else or three and forth or whatever, you know. Yeah. Yeah.

Just do that and then just go there. Yeah. A month or two a year. Exactly. It feels like a vacation, but you're still working. So it's, yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

So, so when you guys were growing up in, in Bermerton, in the 90s, I mean, the Seattle thing was the thing. How did that affect your guys' musical, like, roots? Were you connected to that at all? Did you get into the Nirvana Pearl Jam? Yeah, I mean, like, we were kids in the early 90s, so everyone liked that. I mean, it was just like, Nirvana happened.

It was like, I don't listen to, you know, Metallic anymore. There's all I listen to, right? But, like, it was, Seattle was a weird scene back then. It was a 21-over scene. Like, all the clubs were 21 over. So by the time we got to see bands like Nirvana, Soundgarden, Mudhoney, they were playing. They're already big. They were playing huge places already because those are the only place where you could have kids come to shows.

So like all those pictures, it's all these clubs we play now, the real ages now, but there was different laws back then. But it's just it was a different kind of thing. But it was also the kind of thing where like Yuri and I at the junior high we went to, you could stand up on top of this hill and like look over and you can see downtown Seattle off in the distance. We were like, that's where it's happening over there. right over there yeah and it was like it was like the center of the musical universe but the same time it was like just cross street really and 21 and up yeah and we were yeah i feel like yeah i feel like yeah i feel like yeah i feel like i'm gonna go shows i think it's probably subconscious in a lot of ways but like wanted to be part of that scene not being part of the scene because we're too young

made i feel like i because of that maybe i latched onto that southern california sound something that's a little further away yeah but almost more attainable because it felt younger, it felt like this is the wheelhouse I can live in. So for me, like getting into punk rock, I still liked Nirvana. I liked grunge, you know, from what I heard, you know, Mother Lovebone and tree people, all that. I liked all that. But I really, really latched on to that melodic, SoCal, Descendancy style punk rock.

Oh, yeah. We were talking about how music used to spread, right? I got a friend from junior high. She brought me a tape of descendants lividge one day. I was like, oh, you should check this out. I took it home, and I'm instantly. I'm like, okay, this is the new everything to me. The new everything.

This is it. This is what I'm into. Then the next day, she's like, oh, here, check out bad religion, no control. And I'm like, okay, this is like, what is this world? I need all of this. So it was back in the old days, too, it's like, you know, no YouTube, right? So, like, we would literally, you get the catalog in the CD. Yeah.

And you'd be like, I don't have that one. I'm just going to buy that one. And you bought it just off the label. Sometimes it was just like. You go to a shop that had band t-shirts and you'd see one that look cool and you'd be like, what's that band? And then you'd check the band out and it'd be cool. Like it was a trip how you would find music back then.

It was just so hand-to-hand sharing with people. But I think there's something to that though, like the age where the music in Seattle was happening and it was an older crowd. It was 21 and up. And it was like, it was like that scene was like, it kind of like in D.C. There was this like the D.C. hardcore. Yeah. Like scene.

Super cool. But you weren't really a part of it if you were under a certain age. It just wasn't like like at the time in the 90s when it had gotten big and everyone knew about it. It wasn't so easy for like a 15 year old to go and like go to those shows and feel like, oh yeah. Yeah, you'd get trash. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It was kind of like that with us too. Like we were getting into hardcore and punk and we're like, and all the kids were older than us. Yeah. And we started as a band, MXPX, we were always the youngest band. And so by the time, you know, we were a little bit, you know, had a few years, we're still young. We're still kids, you know, still like learning.

So like, it's funny how that we should be the type of people that would be like, okay, we've been doing this for a couple years, but we're literally still just like turning 18. Yeah. So, and back then, you know, you didn't have all the self-help. videos online. Yeah, no. Things telling you, okay, do this, be confident, get that swag or all this. There was none of that. It was all just, you could listen to music and you listen to like your older brother, your sister's boyfriend or whatever. Yep. And he would like tell you the wrong things for sure. Yeah. And they would tell you, yeah, that's how it was. But I do think that there's something about like

pop punk and the Southern California kind of a little bit New Jersey. But really what I, where I feel like it was born was kind of like Southern California at Finney. feels like that pop punk was. And like there was something more attainable about it. Like as a young kid, it felt like you could do it. It felt like you could. Yes. And it felt like you fit in because sometimes you'd go to the hardcore shows.

And I remember trying to find my way in in D.C. And it did not feel like I was cool at all. Like I did not feel cool enough to be there. I definitely feel tough enough to be there. So you go there and you're kind of like 14, 15. And you're like, what do we do? How do we get in? here and there's something about that pop punk that made us feel like we could do this and we fit in

and we and like people accept it and we the whole thing just felt more like user friendly for us to actually find an identity as a band because we couldn't like we were never going to be like the screaming fast punk band just we liked it didn't feel that easy for us to like do it though It's so hard for bands and artists to kind of like find who they are. Yeah. And be comfortable with that. Even if you find who you are, to be comfortable with that. And even the, I would, I'm speaking a little bit for other people, but I feel like a lot of artists that you feel like are the most confident.

There's something behind there. They're just like, they're not. Yeah. They're just trying their best to be, which is just as good half the time, right? They're doing a better job. They're doing a better job. So just because they look like they got everything together. it doesn't mean they do.

But that's okay. And that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. It's just like obviously be your best self. Try. Try to be your best self. I don't, I think that like no one has their shit together. You're right.

I think like we just get the older we get, the more zen we get about it. Yeah. Like we're always going to have some shit to figure out. Like this year you're worried about some shit that you last year, you can't remember what you were worried about last year. Yeah. All the shit. I guarantee it.

If you like stop and go, okay, what am I the most worried about in life right now? Let me just like think of the list. And you could probably find like five things that you're the most worried about. Like you've been obsessing over it in this time of your life. If you go back a year or 18 months, guarantee you were obsessing over something else that was felt just as heavy that worked itself out. Right. For me, when it comes down to it, what I realized probably just recently. like in the last couple years, health is wealth.

If everybody's healthy and everybody's okay, we don't have any real problems. Right. Like those are the real problems. And so like if we're going down the list of like the checklist of like, is everything okay? Because I do think also like we have a tendency to like have this bias to look at life in from our perspective of is it good or bad. Am I seeing the world in a good way or a bad way? So do I think life is good in general right now? Do I think it's bad, right?

That's going to be literally my perception and my experience of the world is going to be what I perceive it as. So if I think it's bad, I'm going to experience it in a bad way. The Novak not distinct of the others. Simply want to their secretos are occultes. The difference is that they can't buy the silence and call it to kill to who the wrong.

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solo in Sky Show Time. Yeah, plus you get caught in a feedback loop of everything's bad, then you see all the bad, and it makes you feel like it's even worse. You're finding evidence of bad. And so, like, I had that for, like, and I wouldn't say,

it's, looks, it's dramatized when I, when I, packed it all into that one statement. I wouldn't say that that's always how I was all the time, but I had a tendency to fall into like a pattern of like looking for the evidence that things could go wrong, that things were bad. And I think it was childhood shit, right? So I had to work through that. But I did. I've been working, I've been in therapy for 12 years, dedicated, work, work, right? Like just just get those patterns right. Confront. Yeah. And, Now I kind of got to a place where like to be kind of zen about the whole thing.

And like the real question is, are we all healthy? We all here? Okay. Most important. Okay, we are. Check. Now if, and now there's four people in the equation. So you have your, you know, for me, it's my wife and my two kids.

For you guys, you have your family units. However many people are involved in that, could be like your parents or whoever is really connected. to your family unit, then you're going to have to also kind of like check in on their, how, where their heads at. Because if one of us isn't happy, then all of us kind of aren't fully happy. I think, right? Like functionally as a unit, we like, all of us need to.

You can feel it. You can feel it. You're like, so that becomes part of the like work is like, how do we like get everyone going on the same, in the same direction and in the same kind of like, having the same experience. We're having a good time. We're having a good life. To me, that's the work of family.

It's like each kid's going to be different. They're going to be like inclined to feel a certain way and you're going to have to try to nudge them a little bit along if one of them's all the way over here or one of them's all over here and try to get them to a place where I think they're like calibrated in a way where like life is, I think life is good if we're all healthy. and we have our basic needs met. Yeah. We have food and shelter.

It sounds stupid, but like I actually really feel like, because when I try to track what I'm stressed about this year, and I will easily fall into a loop of a pattern of I'm stressed about this. I'm not getting enough of this or I'm not doing enough of that. But I always have to get myself out of that pattern because it's like a default for me to find the thing to protect us from or to work against. and like get over to the Zen part where I'm like,

no, everything's good. Of course I'm stressed about that, but I'm going to be stressed about something else in a year. Yeah, we always find like when you solve one problem that just makes other problems. No, it just makes room for other problems.

Yeah, makes room for other problems or whatever it is. There's always going to be problems. I'm not saying don't solve them, but yeah, it's very real, very real. I think it's like get comfortable

with the work of solving it. That's it. And just like, like get comfortable in that zone because if you are you will actually progress as a person but if you're constantly like running away from the work part and you're not progressing and solving problems then you're kind of just like running around in circles avoiding perceived problems yeah i think humans are made to solve problems yeah part of why we're here whatever i don't know why but that's just it fulfills us it gives us you know hope goes okay

I can live another day. You know, we always talk about, not we, but just humans in general, like, I can't believe I've made it this long. But, like, if you really think about it, like, we're just built to, like, keep going. We're built to fight. We're built to try. And so it surprises me when people don't, you know. So that's why we all love that, you know, not the American spirit, the human spirit of

conquering our demons, of pushing past what we thought was going to be the end. 100%. And bands are great examples. it's like a living example of a group of people putting getting together and doing something almost impossible conquering something because it is when you think about it like it is it is virtually impossible to have success with music it's like a magical to most people they're like how would I even write a song right what's the new statistic on like how many people are in the business and how many people are actually successful making a living doing it I mean I bet I'll Nick I

I wonder how many artists are uploaded to Spotify every day, how many artists are on Spotify, and how many songs are uploaded daily, weekly, monthly, whatever. He'll check in a minute and we'll find out. Because when you see the numbers, I think you actually would go, like, oh, it's staggering. You almost don't want to see the numbers. It ruins your, like, I don't know what world we artists live in

that makes us think that we can put out music to people to the public, but we do, like that kind of thing. You don't want to see the stats of what you're up against because it's so crazy. We shouldn't be focused on that anyway, right? Like as an artist. But you should acknowledge what you've done, and that helps, you know, crystallize the size of it.

Because I think even like when you think of athletes, right, At each level, the athlete gets to, the numbers go down. Music's different. So anyone can make a song and upload it and they're an artist now. And they can have success. Like there's breakthrough successes in that in general. But what's the number? As of 2022, 100,000 songs daily.

Uploaded to Spotify. How many artists are on Spotify? Millions. It's got to be a million. Yeah, it's got to be. So 100,000 new songs a day just on Spotify. That's why. Yeah.

That's a rough business. So that's almost a million a week. 11 million people competing against for the attention of, right? Of the audience. When you think about that, just let's say 2.8. million songs a month what's that what's that like 28 30 million ish

songs a year just songs uh 36 million yeah right so 36 million songs a year right that you're that you're competing for the attention of right not again we always say music it's not a competition no it's not a competition but we're

we're running in traffic Yeah. And we're trying to find our lane and then we're trying to. So the sheer numbers and the difficulty it is to stand out and then to have a career over time. Now I'll bet you anything when you look at those numbers and then you start to dial in what a career looks like in accomplishment of careers, right? And so if you look at the metrics of a career from, you know, these days it would be streaming.

How many streams do you have? I bet if you looked at yours, you would be in the low percentile, right, the successful artist group versus millions of other artists that are trying or have tried and failed, right? And who knows why, right? I have a theory that work and talent matter. But if you look at that and then you go, okay, what we accomplished as a group, three guys in our support. system um or us five guys um is pretty incredible just against the numbers just against the numbers right yeah the thing about music is it's kind of this it gets dismissed as not complicated especially our kind of music right like and and our ages when we start like we're young and we know so we're not

necessarily like people aren't taking us as serious as maybe some tech founder or some other founder of a brand or some, you know, when you think of like just from an entrepreneurial perspective of like what you have to do to start a band, get, get relevant, become relevant, have success, sell tickets, sell albums, get streams, all the things you have to do to stand out against all these artists. It's just like, I don't even think you could do the math on what the odds are. I think it's just getting noisier, the longer it goes for it. there's just more and more content. Like if you think about like back in like the really old days, like Beatles days,

like if you were on TV, that was it, you had made it. And you had a record out. And there, I mean, I don't know the numbers, but there was like three channels. Now if you're on TV, cool, there's 800 channels, you know, like it's just there's so much. And nobody's even watching those channels. There's so much more going on. Yeah, well, YouTube's the biggest, you know, broadcast network in the world. And there's millions of channels.

So again, yeah, you're against, you're up against a lot. Yeah, there's, I mean, the way, the way we've tried to break through the noise is by doing these live streams and what we realize is, one, the live stream itself is us playing live, actually live. And because of that, people will let us play anything. They'll let us play a new, you know, all the new album straight front to back without going, play punk rock show, play let's ride, play, you know, whatever. Yeah. Because it's a different setting than going to a face-to-face in-person show. So for us, it's really worked. And then to not only do that, we brought in a bunch of friends, a bunch of partners, and we broadcast it on their stuff, like Warp Tour. That's dope.

Yeah. I mean, Zeeberhead, Simple Plan. I saw that. It was like on 30 different. I would have asked you, but we were already coming on your show. So I was like, I'm not going to push it. I would have done it. We'll do it again. We'll do it again. Next time. Our whole thing is just like, let's just try something different because we're such an indie type band. One, it's not going to hurt anybody else because we're not, you know, whatever. But, but two is just break out of those little bubbles that we all have on the internet, you know, the MXPX bubble of fans, good Charlotte has bubbles and, you know, all of these. So thank you for, actually, we did, we did all press. We did I. Wadadad I. So thank you. It was great. It really, it's kind of too soon to even tell. But I think

just the, the sort of like ripple effect, you know, just getting to that extra person that you never would have got to get into that extra person over here on the alt press YouTube so like that that's very real and and and if you stack up a thousand here a thousand here pretty soon like our first couple days was like just on ours was over 700,000 views wow and and by now it's got to be you know triple quadruple and it just starts stacking that's really smart are you guys the first person to do that I mean I don't know I think more people should do that I think we were in the way we did it where we were going not just on our own, but going simultaneously live. It's a multi-cast.

We would shout out to all our friends on there. So if somebody was watching on somebody else's, they would get to know that less than Jake is doing a tour right now and selling out a bunch of shows. So if you're going to go, don't wait, get those tickets. Things like that. They're helping us. We want to help them.

The whole idea, like, I didn't get it at first when it was pitched to us like when we were talking about it. I was like, I mean, want to just be the same people? But then like when we were actually doing it clicked in the middle of a live stream honestly when we were doing it and one of the one of the comments came up and someone was like i keep scrolling through facebook and this stream is on every single channel what is going on this is crazy mxpx is taking over the internet tonight i'm like okay i get it now this this totally clicked i'm like this is kind of genius actually so we're just we're just out talking to friends you know hey

you know no any long time can we throw us off on your channel tonight sure why not you know and just that's just a random weird thing that it clicked yeah We hope more bands try it. I mean, why not? I mean, I believe, and I bet on it big, and I really believe in it, is live streaming is the future of music. And not the future of shows because people want to go to shows and have a show. It's different.

But what we've seen is in the last couple of years, and especially obviously COVID accelerated the live stream. idea. For us, big time. People kind of, it clicked and they were like, oh, but what now bands are starting to see is like the live stream doesn't take away from your live tickets. It's a whole different audience. It's everyone who can't be there for a bunch of reasons that like are real.

So you have people who have mental health issues, people financial. They can't make it location. Obviously, number one, they can't actually be there. People with all different kinds of things that keep them from going to any concert. So what we see also you have people around the world who have never been able to experience your band live that now have experienced it in some capacity live and they got a little glimpse into what that might feel like. And the importance of that is this. In other places in the world that were not, that did not have access until the last couple years to live

because of a bunch of reasons. Smart phones now, more and more people every year. the amount of people that actually have them goes up exponentially every year. So places like India, places like South America, that more and more people have access to music. And the chances of you touring there are low. Yeah.

Right? So with the live streams, they're getting to experience this music that they never have. And so what I think bands are starting to see is like just like streaming when we we kind of in the early 2000, 2010, 2011 when streaming really started to get organized, you know, when it first showed up and it was Napster and Limewire and all that stuff, people were essentially, they were stealing music. They weren't stealing it. They were getting it for free. And the industry at large hadn't found a way to monetize that. Now, obviously, the biggest strategy is streams. Like, how do we get playlisting? How do we get?

So streaming is in a place now where it's completely, uh, probably one of the more important metrics, how you would measure how something's doing, right? I don't think it's the, the metrics of success because we all, I also see, uh, it's interesting, bands that stream a lot but cancel tickets, bands that don't stream as much but sell a lot of tickets and sell way more tickets

than, you know, if we looked at our streaming numbers, they're probably not as high as some artists who are popping in the streaming sense right now, but they can't actually sell tickets. Tickets are hard to sell. You have to earn those tickets.

Of course. You got to go and tour. Yeah. And once you build a real fan base and you sell real tickets, you can sell tickets. There's a lot more to it that going out to a show.

You know, you got kids, you've got to get a babysitter, you're driving out your fine park and all that stuff right but like one of the one of the my favorite parts about the live streams that start happening right away is people would put up videos of the live streams on in their house and there's like their six-year-old kid just dancing their heart out right in front of the tv i'm just like that's so cool it's so fun like and now so what i'm saying about live streaming though is in the future every band is going to live stream they're going to live stream if not every show they're going to live stream once a week twice a week

whatever, they're going to have a schedule, just like a TV program, of when they live stream. And the future is going to be live stream to the world. In the 90s, we watch baseball, football, basketball, whatever was on TV, whatever was programmed. And now we go on the NBA app and we go, okay, I want to watch the game tonight, where is it streaming? And we just watch it through the app. Yeah. Same with MLB.

If I follow, you know, I follow the Orioles, but I don't live in Maryland. and I don't even have cable anymore. I just stream everything. Yeah. I stream all my TV movies. So I want to watch the baseball game. I go on the MLB app and I find the stream, right, through the profile. That's going to be music.

That's going to be in the future. Bands are going to have like a broadcast schedule of 10, 20, 30 shows a year for their fans around the world. And those shows are going to happen at different times. so different like like this show is streaming because we're in this country so these fans in this part of the world are going to tune in that can't come to the tour or whatever yeah but like that is the future like just like streaming and in in the way it behaved and the way it grew live streaming is going to become like an organized functional part of everyone's business we're

just in early early days yeah and what you guys are doing is showing like proof of that like we're taking this and adapting it to our band how we need to use it, how we see it for us, which is pretty genius actually. Like we're letting our friends stream it through their channels, which is amazing. It's like, let's feed this out to everyone's audience, whether, you know, if they like similar things as MXPX. Because also what you're probably experiencing is young fans who have never got to see you play and aren't as familiar but know your brain.

Like they know MXPX, but they never dove down the MXPX like rabbit hole. And then they see the stream. They see the stuff and they dive down and they find, you know, your records and they start digging. And like that's the fan experience. Yeah. Think of live streams like an egg that we're putting into our basket, into our nest. And then we've got live shows.

We've got now live streams. We've already got streaming audio. Yep. Which we were kind of late on streaming audio, I'll be honest. we all were. We got, I think we had like on the cover uploaded first by the record label, Universal, and they uploaded all their old records kind of late, like all at the same time, and nobody knew about it.

And so by the time, and then our 2018 record, self-titled, we didn't even really pay attention to like Spotify and the playlists and all that. And then right after the record came out when the songs were actually doing pretty well, and Let's Ride was doing really well. and the video, and then it was on the Tony Hawk video game. That kind of like opened our eyes. Like, whoa, we need to pay attention to this egg, you know, streaming egg. And so I think when the live streaming thing came about, we jumped on it.

Like, let's not sleep on this like we did on regular streaming. Let's pay attention to it. And you can't pay attention to every single thing that comes about. But you can find your version of how you're going to participate and how you're going to like adapt it to you. your thing. Yeah. The great thing with streaming too, live streaming, like the band just actually playing in

a room is the first show, kind of expensive set up. We bought a bunch of cameras and a bunch of gear and said like that. Second show is free. Yeah. Just pay our people, of course. Yeah, yeah. But, I mean, like, so the hardware costs. It's done.

Yeah. It's just done. Yeah. Hugs. That's all good. But yeah, we basically set up a little TV studio in our studio, and now we can just do it whenever we want. That's dope.

We sometimes we sit at practice and we're just practicing like a Wednesday and we're like, let's make sure everything works right, going live. Hey, Facebook, hey, YouTube, we're just on right now. We're going to play a whole songs just to make sure our stuff still works. Let us know how it sounds. And just, like, throw a few out there and people get stoke because they're like, it was Wednesday night, I was making dinner. And all of a sudden, like, you popped up on my feed.

And I was like, whoa, what is this? Just like a fun little, hey, we're still here. So I'm Anna Mena. And like my music, my hair changed with me and has to be able to to continue my rhythm. For so, potion nine of Sebastian Professional

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who are those don't. Yeah, that was dope. You can like troll people but in a good

way. Yeah. It makes them happy instead of bummed. Yeah, it's like reverse trulling.

Yeah, Yeah, reverse trolling. Yeah. I mean, why not? The world is a crazy place. People have, like, negative experiences every day, daily. And so if MXPX can be the source of some opposite of that, that's what we want. You know, we love that.

That keeps us motivated. It keeps us going. You guys have always been that way. I think we try. I think that's how we're built. That's how we're built. Yeah. Super positive.

Super positive. always cool back you know behind the scenes we i mean maybe to yourselves yeah always like every band that comes in contact with you guys loves you guys you guys you guys have always been like the coolest i mean you again like i would say that tour that we did with you guys in 2000 um we did the whole u.s and it was a a really good amount of shows i mean it was a real a couple like two and half months or something. Yeah, yeah. It was like a real tour.

And every night was sold out. If you remember that, it was a dope tour. Yeah. And we learned, like, I think that's where we really learned how to tour. Well, we talked, I remember talking about that on that tour. You guys were planning your first headlining tour after that, like in the spring or whatever. And you were like, you know, what should we do?

We were thinking about doing this. And we would talk just throughout the day. And, like, I remember you guys were just so excited to go out and do it. And, like, it was great. It was fun. It was fun to watch you guys because it was just starting to have for you guys. I'm like, this is so great. This is so cool.

We were stoked. And that tour was, I mean, unforgettable. It still remains probably one of my most important tours. I mean, it was really like one of those, it was one of those moments. Just everything, the experience. What it did for our band, I mean, was amazing. We gave us a touring fan base, in my opinion. That was awesome. Yeah, we always look back to a few tours and that's definitely one of them,

especially for me personally, you know, meeting my wife on that tour. Yeah. But yeah. You guys, man, like, you guys always had it. We always knew that. As soon as we first heard your CD, hadn't even met you. Yeah. We were just like, these guys know how to write songs. They got something going on. And then the fact that you brought it with the work ethic. I mean, that's honestly what it takes. People always ask, how do you, how do you be successful? And it's like, you just don't quit because if you quit, you're not going to be successful. But I mean, it doesn't mean you can't quit something, a part of something. I'm not saying that. But in whatever way, we've just continued to write music, continue to do shows, continue to like, we've gone through some pretty insane

ups and downs as a band. What's been the biggest up? The biggest up? I mean, I think right now, being on your show, putting out this new album. Yeah, this is the pinnacle moment right here. We're loving life right now. But what do you think? I mean, this is one of my favorite episodes because we actually really know each other. And I've had people on here that I know. But like, I don't actually think people today know or think about 20 years ago and like how important that was right before tech, right before all the, the world became what it is now. And it's a different world. It's just a world it's like that was still kind of old-fashioned in a nice way with some modern touches right good charlotte is like sacred ground for me because those guys and us together um you know we've been

together now for what like 26 to i don't know like all 26 years or something or i don't know whatever yeah 26 25 26 years that's sacred to me that's like a marriage in itself to be in the band together and the success of that band opened the world up for me where I never thought I'd have a chance to be anyone in the world. You know what I mean? Yeah. And so the building blocks of that career were touring and staying together and making records, right? Writing good songs, but touring. And I really give that MXPX tour that Good Charlotte did, those early tours, but that one in particular really gave us a lot. Not only did it give us a fan base of people

that got into our music and we shared a lot of fans after that tour. They were your fans, right? They were your fans first. And they came, they saw us with you guys. That gave us a touring fan base, but also like how to tour the right way, how to treat other bands,

how to run a tight crew that all treat each other a certain way and like how to have a good, touring family is so important you go to some tours and you see it and it's chaos and it's not a good time yeah i mean we always we always wanted to pick bands that we just would want to spend a couple months with too hang out with and like listen to every night you know like there were there were tours when we'd get like here's this list of bands that would like to go on tour and it's like i don't like but these are these guys through my friends that i like and i want to take them instead like i

remember way back it was before it was maybe a few months for the tour but i saw you guys play in Seattle summer. I came back and met you guys and just said, hey, and like, I remember watching you guys that night. I'm like, this would be so great every night. Like this is, this is, this is, I could live this for a couple months and just seeing these guys play every night and it was awesome. Yeah, the decisions are definitely, weren't business decisions back then. It was all about what's going to be fun. And that's kind of, I mean, that works too. Like half the time. It does. It's, it's, worked with us, worked with you guys, you know, doing things that just, you feel you're drawn towards and just how many how many of our guys told us about you know it just kept coming up and like will this

be cool will this be a good time yeah yeah that to me is like some of the purest decisions you can make for a good brand and a good thing like a good a good any business really like what's their experience going to be in the restaurant if we do it this way versus if we do it that way like that's at any scale that actually i think always matters it's like like like like like like what's the experience going to be. Oh my God. Yeah, that's, you're showing maturity by that because, I mean, I remember never thinking about the experience

when I'd make decisions. Nowadays, I really try to like, go, okay, what's it? Like, yes, I want to do it, but then you think about, what's it going to be like? And then, you know, for me, you know, but like Tom, Tom wasn't even going to come on this trip. And I was like, dude, we're fine. It's with Joel.

And he's like, oh, Joel? Okay, I'm coming. So. I think it would be fun to go see. Joel. How early did you guys have to get up today? Oh, we flew down last night. Oh, okay.

Oh, good. Okay, good, good, good. Did you guys have dinner last night or do anything? No, we got in late. No, we got him pretty late. So just straight to the hotel in bed. Yeah. I mean, as much as you can do that.

Yeah. And back home today, like back on a flight today? Yeah, fly back home tonight. Oh, cool. Yeah. It's a quick trip. Come down real quick, do a few things. I mean, that's the thing.

Like, we talked about why did we never move to L.A.? It's right here. It's like a two-hour flights. not hard to get here. Yeah. It's really not. And it's convenient. It's right here. And I can go home to, you know, the green northwest, all the water and everything. Yeah. So yeah, we're all just doing life and making records and, and it's good. Dude, I love seeing your place. Looks beautiful. Thanks, man. It's, we, we love it here. We have a lot of fun here. You get stoked when I see friends of mine, like, being successful and doing well, too. It's like, you know, like some people look at,

like, you were talking about competition, like, you know, like, well, have that like then i can't but there's plenty of everything to go around like i'm stoked when i walk in and see this and this is you guys spot it's awesome thank you i i i love it i think we're we're like we live in our own bubble and we just work on like it's like we just work on these like in our minds they're just like little projects that we believe in um they're actually like it's actually just a bunch of people too that like are really talented and We're just, the group just keeps growing of talented people who have good ideas who most of the time we're just like, yeah, that sounds cool. You should do that. You know what I mean? Like,

I think it's, I think it's, and I think we're still learning how to be, how to be ourselves. You know, I think like that's the, that's the process of all of it is just try to like do what you think. I think that, that like we get hyper focused when we're young on how to be big. maybe like or how to be successful i don't know and what we for what we lose is the first thought we had which was to make that thing because we thought it was cool and we liked it or it made us feel good somewhere along the road we start getting caught up in the size of it maybe to everyone else when you're young you you want your band to be big because you want people to see and hear what you do. You want to feel more important.

And do all that. But then like, I think your, your definition of big changes over the years, too. It's like now I'm like, to me, to me, to me, to me, to me, to me big is like being important to someone's life. And like, when people come to the show with their kids and like, I remember we played in Orange County earlier like last year or whatever, but some guy was in front with this kid the whole time and they ended up like meeting us after the show. I'm like, you're a good dad, man. That's rad. Like he's holding this kid up in the front

row the whole time. The kids screaming along. It's just, it's awesome. That's, to me, that's, like, that's big. That's life stuff. That's core memories for that kid and with his dad. That's cool. I agree. And I also just think, like, cool is a thing.

Yeah. Like, sometimes, like, I love it when brands do limited drop. Limited feels better to me. Like, I like smaller shows, personally. I'd rather, you know, I don't know. Yeah, me too. I mean, I love it. I'd rather go to a show at the Palladium than the forum.

I would rather do that. To me, that's a, all day long, I'll go to a show at the Palladium. And I know I'm going to enjoy it. I'll be at your show. January 6th, put in your phone right now. January 6th. We got you. But I just feel like that's a better show.

I just feel like, I mean, like, and even that, like, that's a big show. But it's not arena. It's not going to be a remote, like, it's still kind of human. But you're still in there. You're still in your face. Like, it's still like, you can get active at that. show. And then, like, I'll go to the Trubidor all day long if there's a show at the Trubidor. Like, I love a show at the Trubidor. You can hear the stage more than you can hear the PA.

Oh, my God. It's to me one of the best places to see if you can see a band. Like, they just every now and then. We did a show a couple years back, 2015 or 2016. We did a show at the Trubonor. And it was still one of my favorite shows because it's just feels so like, special There are people are right there on you. There's no separation. That place better sticker. I mean, like, of all the landmarks in Hollywood, some come and go or whatever, but that one's still strong.

And every couple of years, there's always some article that comes out like, like, Save the Trubedo. Yeah, save the Trubador. I mean, it's tough for venues, man. Yeah. But it's one of my favorites. Yeah, that place is great. When's the tour start?

Well, we're doing shows. We're doing Furnace Fest coming up, headlining Friday night, September 22. at Furnace Fest. Oh, cool. That's kicking off sort of like our first show since the album came out. Okay. Then we're doing when we were young.

And then we have, we have some shows we haven't announced yet. Okay. So we've announced the Palladium, Hollywood Palletian. But no tour. But we're going to do like a bunch of weekends. Like we're going to be doing more shows than we normally would do. Right.

And it starts in 2024. So good. I can't say anything because of radius clauses and some of the support bands have some things. So we're just, but we will be announced. and everyone soon. Good. Yeah.

How does it feel playing shows? That's great. It's, I mean, you know, get out on stage. That instant feedback from people when you play a song and they know it and their hands fly up or like when the song's over and they're just stoked, like I just heard my favorite song. Like, you know, it's just that, that instant connection with people and the feedback of them getting excited than you getting more excited and put more into it and they're getting

more just. It's a drug. For me, I mean, physically just, you know, trying to stretch, trying to stretch, trying to to feel more limber going out on stage and having that mental whatever it is like i'm here don't mess it up let's go like i get pumped up and i feel physically stronger more limber like i could jump over a you know burning building you guys look fit and but thank you definitely look fit you definitely look like you're like tour ready how we're ready i mean definitely definitely stage not always the case It's like, you know, it's not easy these days.

They're just like, keep stretching. Keep stretching. That is. Is stretching your secret? I mean, it's probably the most important thing. You know, if I couldn't do anything else before going out on stage, I think stretching would be for me the most important. Warming up the voice is kind of important too.

I got hernia on stage. Did you? And actually had a good surgery. Were you not stretching properly? I wasn't stretching. Yeah. No, like serious. Yeah.

Like had it from stage, had it for, 10 years. Didn't know that that was what it was. Didn't know for the first five years. And then I found out it was hernia, right? And it was, I remember the day I got it. I remember I climbed up something and jumped and landed wrong. And like my body caught itself or whatever.

And I got a hernia. It was crazy. And then didn't know what it was, but I knew I got injured a little bit. Definitely felt it. But then it would get a little worse. Every now and then, that same injury would be like, oh, it's that. that part I injured. That's when it's kind of scary when it's getting worse and not better.

Dude, and then like five, six years in, oh, onto a doctor, and I was like, God, this is you have hernia. And then five years later, I had to get surgery. And it was three, actually. Oh, man. And then, but never been better once I got surgery. That's good. Great.

Good. Back then. That's a good thing for people just to hear to, like, to take care of yourself. We're talking about being fit and being healthy, right? like if something's got you just if it's bugging you it's hurt and whatever get it checked out yeah go to a doctor talk to someone don't just go on webmd and say like oh i must have gas and i'm so not a and i'm not a doctor guy like i'll avoid doctors because i don't want bad news yeah like if i avoided it it'll go away but um all the people out there that are listening that are trying to improve their own

you know experience whether it's their health or they're building a business or going after an art, you know, they want to be an artist of some kind. All the things we share are, they're getting information for free. I think it gets them there faster. I think that's the hack, yeah. We're putting the game plan out there for everyone. Every time we talk about it, like all you got to do is listen to the new people coming up. Pick up the, yeah, and pick up the little details.

Yeah, try this, try that, find what works for you. I mean, there's, like I said earlier, there's no one way to do things. And trying to just do things exactly the way somebody else did it, it might not work. Yeah. But you can take elements of what somebody does and apply it to your own situation. So like with us, we have a certain situation and why we don't tour as much or, you know, when my kids get a little older, maybe we'll tour even more, you know, or whatever.

But for now, it's like we have our situation and it affects in real time, you know, the types and the amount of shows we do and what we work on. But perfectly happy doing that. It works for you, and then as that changes, as your life changes, you can adapt. in different ways and play more shows or who knows. How do you guys like the shows now? Do you feel like they're rowdier, as rowdy? No, they're as rowdy.

I mean, it's funny. You guys always kind of pretty rowdy shows. Yeah, people are getting older, but then like Tom said, they're bringing their kids. It's controlled chaos. So it's, yeah. I mean, anytime we go to South America, all bets are off. It's insane down there. Yeah, insane.

And we definitely want to hit South America next year. We want to hit Japan. We want to hit Europe. Japan's nuts for you guys. UK. Yeah, we've awesome. Really well there. One of the last times we were there, Benji came up and sang with us.

Yeah. Yeah, that was awesome. But yeah, we just want to hit everywhere a little, you know, as much as we can, because it's been way too long. But like you were saying, you know, we can work on what we want to work on, what we can work on. And, you know, we can't always get to the UK or to Europe or Japan. But I think 2024 is the year. Yeah. I don't see why you couldn't go do like three weeks in UK and Europe and just hit all the key cities.

Yeah. Yeah. And we're going to try to go to Indonesia. Do you guys go there ever? Indonesia's nuts. It's so insane. It's like a hidden gem of like the touring world almost. It's incredible.

The shows are incredible. Yeah. First one we went there. Yeah, it was this huge show and we've never even put out a record officially here, but it doesn't matter. They love music. Yeah. They grew up on punk rock. Yeah.

Yeah. It's definitely Malaysia too. Yeah. In Thailand, too, crazy. Yep. The shows are nice, man. Yeah. And Philippines, I mean, every, like, it's crazy over there.

And also that part of the world, too. They're still at that point where they're just excited you even came. Yeah. The first time we went to South America, they were just like, thank you just for coming to Brazil. We're like, people don't. Inventoria shows is slower than. Yeah, exactly. So they're just stoked you even came.

Right. How many years has MXPX been abandoned? 31. 31 now. Yeah. Oh, shit. I know. It's wild.

I mean, it's almost too. once you get past 30, it's kind of, it's insane. But so we- So you guys are eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Are we? Yeah. Just FYI. You have 30-year band?

25 years from your first release out. Okay. Yeah, we should have a minute. So we need to get you guys on the ballot. Yeah. I know, let's do it. I mean, it's, yeah, I'm serious. Let's get Mike Shea to help.

Yeah. I'm serious. He's in Cleveland. I'm serious. Yeah. You guys are an important band. Really, like, so many bands. You were saying the legacy thing, and that's, that's to me a huge, like, kind of like, almost untraceable commodity is like what kind of legacy and effect you have down the line of bands.

Yeah. Like the descendants, their biggest record they ever sold was maybe 30,000 copies. But 25,000 of those people all went started every band you listen to. Yeah. In the pop punk world. It's true. It's crazy how the descendants. That downstream effect of like, you know,

you came and saw us play a show and then you started your band and like that kind of just like that perpetuation it's it's awesome it's it's really cool to hear it's it's like one of those things you can't necessarily look up sound scan or ticket sales but it's it's there and it's real it's intangible yeah it's the most important part of art is the intangible part because we make the piece of art and then we we copy it and sell it you know we sell copies but like it's really intangible important part but what's the through line that keep like 31 years what is the thing that keeps you guys together? I think honestly setting egos aside with us, like we fight.

We have, you know, friction, but I think we can be comfortable and ourselves around each other. Like, we don't ever have to worry about somebody stabbing us in the back, saying the wrong thing in front of any of these guys. And I think that's probably hard to come by when you just meet somebody. You know, we've known these guys, you know, my whole life. literally my whole life. And I think it started earlier on. Like we've just always been comfortable with each other.

We had a huge fight on our first tour in 1995 at the end. And I wrote a song about it. What was it over? Who knows? We were just not used to being in the band together and in the van 24-7 and just like this. And ever since then, I think we've just been comfortable with each other. Yeah. And that, what would you fight about now?

if you ever got into a fight about anything, would there ever be anything you could fight about? Because attitude stuff, just like miscommunication. It's all miscommunication. The last time we actually kind of got like snippet each other at band practice was just miscommunication. He understood something in one way.

I understood it a different way. And we were talking it through. We were in like the middle of the heat of, we're like trying to go and really do this right now. And it was like, well, hold on. And like, no, no, let's go. But wait, I want to fix this. But I want to keep going.

It was like. Yeah. Only time I snap. At Benj is when I'm anxious. Yeah. Period. Yeah. I'm anxious before we play shows.

We were probably anxious. I get anxious before I play shows. Yeah. And I get very edgy because I'm like, I don't want to talk to anyone. I don't want to look at anyone. I don't want to see anything. I don't want to talk about it. I just feel fucking locked up and anxious.

And my wife is really good about being like, ooh. like before we might travel or something she's like oh a little anxious why don't we uh why don't you like go and grab a coffee and like get your head right before we have to like travel together with the kids and everything and i'm like you want to throw you're 100% right thank you i'm gonna go and then i'll come back and i'll be like thank thanks because i won't be aware of my own fucking anxiety like whatever and it's usually like the worst with with show if i play shows i'm just so fucking nervous before. I feel you.

I get some of that, like where I don't want to talk to anybody. I don't want to be around friends. I love my friends. I want to see him after the show. After the show. Like, let's just,

yeah. It's a singer thing, I think. You're kind of like, folks, like there's lyrics. Am I going to forget the lyrics? And you're not in real time going like,

whoa, I'm really anxious. You're just going like, hey, what's the fucking problem here? Oh, yeah. It must be you.

There was one recently where we're lying checks. Get out of the room. Like, and you're like, it's not. I'm just fucking anxious. I don't know what to do with myself. But there was one recently at festival where I had to like remind Mike,

because he was worried that like, you know, they weren't line checking and we're supposed to be going on, right? And I had to grab him like by the shoulders and be like, this thing we do is fun. Do you understand? Like this, we're about to go have a blast for an hour. Like this is really fun. They're going to check the stuff.

There's something broken. They're going to fix it right now. But once they fix it, this is going to be a really fun night. And then he's like, he literally was just like, like, you're right, man. And then I kept staring on me. He's like, why are you staring at me? I'm making sure you actually do get that this is fun.

You're like, I will, bro. In a minute. Let me start having some fun first. But like that's the same. Benj will be like, yo, chill, bro. Like you're kind of being a dick right now. And I'm like, oh, I'm sorry. Now we've gotten good at it because I'm like,

yo, dude, I'm sorry. I'm fucking anxious. The more you go through it. He's like the more, yeah. In the tower and I'm on the plane trying to land the plane. Like I don't know what these controls are. Yeah. Yeah.

That's how it feels. Like, that's how it feels, like, before you go do some shit. I think, like, the bottom line of it, too, is it shows you still care. Yeah. It shows you still care about doing it because, like, you want to do a good job. You want to do, right? You want to, like. You want to hit the ball.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You don't want to strike out. And that's the thing, too, is, like, I wouldn't necessarily want it to go away. But I think learning how to, like, walk that, ride that bike, you know, and not fall off. I think when you crash is when you snap at people, when you, like, act out. without, but when you become conscious of like, oh yeah, I'm always a little focused and anxious before I work on things where I have to be like in front of the camera or on stage, right?

So as long as I know that, I can be aware of it and then I can, I can make the adjustments I have to make so that I'm not like hurting people's feelings. Also, I think to a little bit of chaos before a show or something like that is a good thing. Yeah, yeah, it's energy. It adds energy to it and adds, it like it puts you a little on edge versus. If everything was smooth all the time, it'd be boring. Like, let me take your fucking pulse here. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. If you were like some giant band where everything was perfect every single time, that's really good insight. You have to act. You've got to act excited. But like when he's tripping right before we go on, like five minutes before and I'm like shaking him by the shoulders, like that's still there when you go on stage. That's kind of like what you need to go in the ring or to go do the thing.

That's good insight. I never thought about that. I have literally been talking about this and certainly have talked about it before, but never thought I don't want to change it. I want to fix it until one day I'm never going to be anxious before a thing. But just hearing that, I'm like, you know what, actually wouldn't, I actually kind of need that edge. You use it. It's working for you.

Yeah. Harness it in a way. It works for you. It's working for us. You know, all these years. Like it keeps us going. It keeps us energetic. Like I was saying earlier, some of the best.

times I feel is on stage. It's because of that drug, that energy, that whatever, you know, it pushes, pushes me forward like, whoa, I'm strong now. I can lift a car. That's how it feels. That's real. Yeah. January 6th. Yeah. Yeah. I'll get to see you guys be anxious. I'm going to come backstage before the show. It's like how you feel it. Check the anxiety meter before the show. Yeah. How we feeling? Just knock on the door like the police. Bam, bam, bam. Yeah. awesome guys thanks for coming on thanks for having us congrats on the record

thank you dude great to see you so great to see you too hey thank you for listening to artist friendly hope you enjoyed this episode with Mike and Tom from MXPX if you really like the episode

you can go to Spotify and follow you can go to Apple and follow you can also leave likes and comments everywhere you listen to your podcast thanks for listening we'll see you next time