We go back to our hometown and all these people are still there. You get smarter by getting out, not by reading a bunch of books. That song was just like...go do some s***! Go do something that you wouldn't normally do, just to expand your world.

It's such a tiny place - it's a big, small town. People there just don't seem to want to get out. Then we did, and people got p*****, cos we did it!

-Since you got out of the town, what moments have stood out for you? I know in June you told me you had some military shows planned.
We got to see some cool places in Asia, and play for the military. It's cool, because they're just happy you're there. All the dudes want to take you out and get you drunk, take your picture. When you do shows with the Navy, the shows are always around water which is good, especially in the summer time!

-Just to talk briefly about the line-up for this tour - like your past tours, you've brought over a high calibre of band. Do you get a direct say in who you want to bring on the road?
Yeah. Suburban Legends were a band that we always wanted to tour with, cos they're fun and energetic. When you pick support bands, that's what you want!

We've wanted to tour with Less Than Jake forever, but that's just never happened.

We don't just put the tour together and say "Let's get these guys - they'll be cheap!" We try to make it fun.

We moved away from the four-band thing, because we didn't want people to get f****** tired. I know, standing there for four bands - it's kinda taxing.

-In terms of your fan-base you do things like the VIP tickets and Meet & Greets. Is it important to have that relationship with the fans?
Yeah, absolutely. You've got to keep in touch with the people that are buying your music. To be honest, the guys make fun of me after the show cos I always pack my s*** up early.

When I'm sitting at home, I'm not doing much. When I'm on tour, I want to hang out, meet people and have them say "You're awesome!" Well, thank you! When I get back home and nobody tells me anything for six months, it gets stored up.

-Well you do keep it up on Facebook and Twitter all the time. Is it important to keep that relationship, even when you're not on the road?
Yeah. We all do Twitter and all that. I'm one of the only ones who uses Facebook, everyone else has families and stuff. They wanna keep it more private, but I just add everybody.

I do a lot of bull-s*******. I do have a lot of people, old family members, and they'll read something and say "You shouldn't say that!" Block you, don't tell me what to do!

-You just released the single and EP for 'I've Never Done Anything Like That', with some interesting b-sides. You re-recorded 'The B**** Song' for it-
Right, yeah. That was something we've been wanting to do. It was our first major single we released, so we thought - let's do it again, let's have another crack at it!

-Has the years in between given it that extra energy and experience?
Well, yeah. The whole point of this tour is that the songs we play are all singles that we've released. It fit in that we did that. We also did 'Stacy's Mom', cos in the States everyone thinks that's our song!

So, we got tired of people thinking that it was our song, and Fountains of Wayne are good friends of ours.  We just did the song, and they actually thought it was pretty f****** funny!

When they originally did it, they kinda did it on the fly. Adam Schlesinger (FoW vocalist) spoke to Jaret and said that it's funny to listen to the song with the vocals actually in tune!

He said he rushed it, but it's only things that a producer would notice. No-one will listen to 'Stacy's Mom' and go - "Oh! There's a bum note there!"

-Will there be another Christmas EP?
Oh yeah, we have a Christmas album out pretty soon. It was actually done on this tour, we got the masters. It should be out pretty soon.

-Besides that, what's planned for the band after this tour?
We've a couple of shows round the homestead in November. Then, February we're going to try to do some more military shows, and college shows - stuff like that.

Maybe around May or so, we'll start thinking about a new album, then a summer tour - hopefully some Warped Tour gigs this summer too.

Female First - Alistair McGeorge

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