"February Air" Lights

Hi

I am bored.

Setting: An Interview with 4/5 of the band "Red Letter Day

I met with four member of the new emo kings of this music scene, Red Letter Day: Lead guitarist - Jonah O'Callaghn, Rhythem guitarist - Paul Spinella, Drummer - Aaron Knight, and lead singer - Benett Williams. We talked about their new record coming out this March, Sunday Drive, and anything you'd expect in an interview at People Magazine even if the conversation wasn't steered that way.

Can you introduce yourself and say what instruments you play for the band?
O'Callaghn: Hi, I'm Jonah and I play guitar.
Williams: I'm Bennett I sing.
Knight: I'm the second singer and I hit drums in my spare time.
O'Callaghn: That's cool what's you name?
Knight: [Group Laughs] I'm Aaron, too.
O'Callaghn: In his spare time also.
Spinella: I'm Paul and I play guitar too.

No bassist?
Knight: He's sleeping actually. He was puking all last night, he has the flu so we decided to let him sleep so he didn't throw up all over your nice microphones and shit... can I say shit?
Yes
Knight: Really? Sweet.

You have a new record coming out?
Williams: Yes. We do, on March 20th we just found out. So mark your calanders and buy a copy the day it comes out.
Spinella: Really the 20th? One day and it'd be the 19th.
What's the 19th?
Spinella: In high school we were really into a band Sunday Drive and they broke up our senior year and went to their last show ever and it was on the 19th of March.
That's pretty cool.
Knight: I don't like Sunday Drive. Can I say that?
O'Callaghn: Aaron's the only one who doesn't.

Are they really big influence of your sound?
Williams: Well I used ot be in a really emo acoustic project, but when Paul and I started writing it was mor going towardshardcore music, which we didn't want to sound like. And my original emo acoustic stuff was really influenced by them, and we ended up using one of my old songs as our first and that sort of paved the way for our sound now. Which I guess means Yes. Our earlier stuff definatly, and for this record we really went back to those records that we listened to a lot in high school.
Spinella: We didn't try and sound like we did, it jsut happened. We just went back to our old influences and molded it with our newer sound and it turned into our new record. I mean we don't want to make he same records all the time and this one I'm really excited about becuase it's something I know I'd have liked in high school and something we all would have.

What was that first song you did called?
Williams: It didn't really have a name. I mean we just called it "Elisa's song" because I met this girl and I wrote her a song to you know [air quotes] "win her over" and we ended up using that song as ours. But you probably can't find a studio recording of it, but I recently went back an played, well, there were three songs I wrote to that one girl and I played them all together one night so there are YouTube videos definatly but not of the full song.

Will you release those songs again?
Williams: Maybe, I mean those songs are really personal and after I performed those three songs there was a lot of drama from our fans towards my fiance and me on like the message boards, so I'm sort of nevous about letting them out.
O'Callaghn: Just for the record it's the first time he publicly referred to his fiance.
Williams: [Sighs] Anyone who reads this: Yes, I am engaged.
Knight: ...get over it.
[O'Callaghn and Knight laugh]
Why did it cause drama if the songs were about just a girl in high school?
Williams: Actually the girl the songs are about is my fiance. So a lot of fans were freaking out and being creepy and posting pictures of me and her after I performed those songs. And they made up rumors and all of this stuff. It was a mess.

What are the songs on this record about versus the last one?
Williams: I tried less to write about my personal life so I started writing about other members of the band's lives so it wasn't a "My personal life story" record and so people don't know who's stroy it is and who's it isn't. You can think what you think, but it isn't about me or my fiance so much as it is Jonah and Aaron and Paul or our new bassist James.

Is there a general theme of the songs?
[Pause]
O'Callaghn: Girl Problems.
[Group Laughs] Williams: It was easier to write about girl problems because there was so many stories and bad experiences to write about.
Knight: Plus he tends to write cheesy songs about [his fiance] that are so happy and lovey it kind of kills the "emo band" stereotype for us. So he wrote about awful relationships that are mostly ours.
So there isn't any songs about your life that are bad, which means all the happy love songs are about you?
Williams: No, actually on the new record there's one I wrote about liking a girl who was still n love with somone else which was the last bad relationship I was ever in. But it was told from someone in the band' point-of-view. So it's not directly about me, but it's about the guy whose still in love with this girl thinking she's in love with this kid who probably loves her back.
Spinella: [Mumbles] She's going to be happy you mentioned her.
Who?
Spinella: The song is basically about me and my wife Rainie in high school when we broke up.

Another high-school sweetheart turned wife?
Spinella: Yeah.
Knight: Everyone had a crush on her in high school. Spinella sniped her when he could.

So they aren't about directly recent relationships?
Williams: No, actually a lot I wrote has been in the past few years.
O'Callaghn: Before any of us decided to get married or anything.
Williams: [Laughs] Exaclty.

Are you excited to be on the current tour?
Williams: We love touring, we love our fans, but now it's hard because me and Paul are startign families and we are keeping our dreams too. And this tour is hard becuase we're going to be on the road for like six months becuase we're branching off and doing a tour right after so we're only home for like a night in that. But we've never been happier. We're playing smaller venues and getting to see more fans and more people and more cities. It's like we're going back to the beginning. We've never been happier I think lately. I mean we're older but the road has mad us ten years older but it's like going back and getting that same old rush playing songs we werne't good enough at playing to write but we love and would have loved back. It's basically going back to our roots. And we're playing the same venues and tours like our favorite bands like Sunday Drive did when we were that young. So we're the Sunday Drive for a whole new generation that didn't get to see them.

Do your families tour with you?
Spinella: No, I have a daughter and I don't want her to grow up on a bus.
Knight: Paul's getting a jump on life.
Spinella: [Rolls eyes] My wife's going to be so happy I talked about her.
[Group Laughs]

Is there anything you'd like to say to anyone?
O'Callaghn: Hi Rainie! Hi Elisa!
Knight: Buy our record! I need money to buy food, I'm an actual starving musician.
Williams: Yeah, buy our record and listen to it. Like it hopefully and come to our shows, we are selling merch and hanging out so you can come meet us and stuff and talk to us. But I hope you like the record.
O'Callaghn: Bye, we love you all!