justin: Where are you going after the Warped Tour?
jon: We're going to be home for a couple of days, and then we go to England. We're doing some dates with Sparklehorse. We're playing Manchester, Glasgow, and London, and then we play the small stage at Redding.
justin: Have you played overseas before?
jon: Yeah, we went on a european tour a year ago for about two months, and we've been back and forth to England twice now.
justin: how are the crowds treating you? is there a diffence between playing here and europe?
jon: In Europe, England is pretty caught up on modern music. Europe seems to be stuck in the late 80's hardcore thing. They're more into metal ... they're more like the hardcore kids are into old school, that's not even old school, its like late school hardcore.
justin: how have the crowds been treating you over here?
jon: good. we've been having our own little gathering at the shows. its been going really well. I was really scared and intimidated ... this is our first festival and its a lot friendlier than I thought. I have more energy that I thought. Its like going to an amusement park everyday. You know how that drains your energy. I feel good about it.
justin: so you never get tired and just feel like not doing it anymore?
jon: nah, I'm only 25. I've got a few years ahead of me.
justin: so where are you guys from?
jon: we're from the south bay of los angeles.
justin: so how did you guys get started?
jon: well, we kinda got turned onto new wave and punk through KROQ, which is a radio station. Our friend Lance, turned punk overnight and we all followed him. We were all poseurs and we all followed him. And we started going to go see bands, and he started playing bass, and we started playing guitars, and I started singing. We've been playing since about '84.
justin: did you guys have any projects before that?
jon: well, we were all in separate bands like from when we were all 15, 14 to now. Its like tons of bands that we've been in since we were teenagers.
justin: so what direction do you think you guys are going in right now?
jon: we just recorded some songs at home to do demos and stuff. We signed to warner bros. and the album "building" is going to be released on warner bros. sept. 10. We'll just chill on that for a while and then keep writing songs. We played a new song tonight, the opening song.
justin: how long were you on rev for?
jon: since 1993.
justin: do you think warner bros. is going to get you guys a lot better known?
jon: its hard to say. you know, a lot of people ask me that, but I've never been on a major label before. i don't even know whats going to happen, you know. we're not ashamed that we signed. we're not afraid to admit it. we're happy. we're a happy band. we're happy that we're a full time band and we're able to travel and tour and play.
justin: are you guys living off the music?
jon: we've been a full time band for about a year and a half. we've been able to pay the rent and stuff. its the best feeling in the world. I don't care what anybody says about it. it feels good. After 12 years of being in a band, it feels really really good.
justin: so, is that what you call success ... being able to live off the music?
jon: I'd like to sell more records obviously. I'd like the awareness to be built more. we'll see what happens. we're all excited about warner brothers and the new record.
justin: so what are you guys all about? do you have some sort of message or something you're trying to get out or are you just playing music?
jon: anybody that's heard us knows we're an optimistic band. we're not like this dark negative band. we write songs to try to make people feel good and feel happy. try to look at the brighter things. it seems like a lot of bands are real negative and dark. they write about their pain, and they're all tortured. tortured artists kind of stuff. and we're not like that, we're just into writing songs that inspire people.
justin: I think when a band can write music that really gets out a certain emotion, the crowd really gets into it. thats why a lot of little kids like all that dark hardcore stuff. but you guys seem to be a little bit more optimistic.
jon: yeah, a little bit more optimistic than pessimistic.