Steriogram |
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Tim Youngson & Brad Carter of Steriogram
April 24, 2004
Interviewers: Jennifer F., Jesica Fowler, and Melissa Lozano |
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Tim: (referring to High Voltage) So did you guys start the website?
HV: Yeah
Tim: Rad. That's cool man, so who does what?
HV: We're all writers, some photographers...
She [Melissa] is the webmaster, she does all the
website stuff. But we all contribute reviews and all that.
Tim: So you do all the technical stuff? Ah,
cool man. All right. We do all that on our site. Well,
Brad does most of it.
HV: He's the web geek?
Tim: Yeah, we've all got Macs, we
all bought Macs. You should get one.
HV: (Melissa) I know, I love Macs,
but they're expensive.
Tim: We all bought one. That's
like our little life. Like, in the van, you've got no
personal space, but you've got your Mac. You
can put your head phones on and listen to music.
It's pretty good.
HV: Your albums coming out soon in the US,
what was the recording process like?
Tim: Recording process? It was heaps of fun, it
was the first time that we had done a full length album. I
thought it was an awesome opportunity to get all our
material down. Cause we've been playing together five
years, and had done EPs, but we've never had
something that's full length to give out to people. So
we were all excited about it. And
we recorded it in a
place called Henson Studios, which is like Jim Henson, the
muppet dude, yeah, yeah, in LA. It used to be
called A&M, but it's quite famous. And so, it has four
studios there, and we recorded in Studio 4, which is
where, like, my favorite band, U2, did Rattle and Hum
in there. And for me it was like whoa, far out,
this is pretty crazy. And then all the famous people that
were walking around the studio, it was weird. Me and
Jared (drummer) were running around and Don Henley was around the
corner, from the Eagles, and we were like whoa! And we
talked to him. And one day me and Tyson were bored
and so for some reason we just took our shirts off and
started running around the corridors, and we came around
this corridor and
Limp Bizkit was sitting there,
and we're like Hey, wicked! So that aspect
of it was real cool. But the recording process, Brad,
you want to talk about that?
HV: How long did it take to record it?
Brad: We started recording on March the 12th,
last year, 2003. And we finished, we mixed it in
New York, and it took three weeks to mix it and we
finished mixing about May the 20th, something like that.
So something like three months. Then after that,
there was one song that still didn't get mixed, "Walkie
Talkie Man." They just did heaps of different
versions of it cause basically what we did was we
recorded the full song in New Zealand, like, real cheap,
it was basically what got us signed. And we just did a
real rough job, so they were spending all this money on
trying to redo the song, but it ended up not sounding as good
as the original. So in the end, they just ended up remixing
the demo that we did in New Zealand, in Wellington, and it's
kind of funny in a way.
HV: So the album's already come out in some
countries, how's the response been to it?
Tim: Real good. Yeah, it's come out
in New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. So we've been in
New Zealand for years, so it's kind of nice to get that
out. When we went back last time we did a big tour
and the album was out, and you could see people singing the
words and all that, which is real good. Then we
went to Japan, which is weird cause we've never been to
Japan before, we've never played a show there. It's
kind of weird cause we didn't put any groundwork there
and the album's out there and we did a show and the
kids were just crazy, everyone knew all the words. So it
was kind of weird for us cause we'd never been there
but all these kids knew who we were and
knew all the words.
HV: How did the band name come about?
Brad: Oh, I just made it up when I
was a young guy. It's just a name when you always think
of band names, so we'd do this one week test, we'd
just saying something over and over in your head for a
week and if you don't like it at the end, it sucks.
But it you do, it's like oh, I can do that. I
used to do graphics on cars and stuff, logos and
that, so it's the same for that.
HV: Do you guys all live in LA now?
Tim: Well it's weird, we live a
weird lifestyle really. We did during the recording
process. We had an apartment and lived there for
like four months, but now if we have time off we'll
go back there cause the label's there, but we'll
live in a hotel. We live in hotels pretty much.
HV: What are some differences between LA
and New Zealand, or the US in general?
Brad: They're just two completely different
cultures. I mean the American culture, with the amount
of people in this country, seems like it runs a
certain way to work, you know? Like, say, you go
to a Best Buy and anywhere, it
looks the same and you know where it is. It's like established, where in
New Zealand, there's more room for more off the
wall kind of things. The one thing I like
in New Zealand is the food is a little bit
better, a little more fresh maybe. But the
food here is all right, you just have to
get used to it. The coffee's good in New Zealand.
HV: Do you get to go back to New Zealand often?
Tim: We try to get back as often as we
can. We miss it heaps. The good thing about this
culture is though, the shows here, are killer.
Everyone's really enthusiastic about music. You can
play every night of the week pretty much and
you'll get a crowd.
Brad: People in New Zealand
won't do that.
Tim: Yeah, it's just shows all the
time, whereas in New Zealand, it's so small. We
did a tour where we were just trying to get more
play and we did high schools and we played for
about 7-8 weeks and we played almost every high
school in New Zealand. And after that you can't
play again, cause you're over played pretty much.
So yeah man, you can just go for years. And the
kids love it. You guys, when we come off stage are
like, "Hey, yeah!" In New Zealand, when you
come off stage, it's kind of weird, no one says
anything. And I'll pull up beside a guy and
sort of give you a nudge and he's like, "Ah,
good show man," and then they'll walk off. (laugh)
Brad: it's their way of saying you're wonderful.
Tim: Yeah, it's just different. So
I kind of like the American culture like that.
Brad: People like the bands more. They want
to buy t-shirts, they want to get their tickets
early, but in New Zealand everyone?s last minute,
like, "You want to go to the show?" "Ok, let?s go."
They'll walk out the door and buy a ticket at
the door. And no one?s going to drive more than
45 minutes to see a show. It's kind of weird, you guys
have lines. Like there's a line out there today.
Tim: In New Zealand, if you sell tickets,
you probably sell tickets at the door, that's
where you make it. And everyone will stay home and
drink and then come to the show, so the supporting
bands don't get anybody, then a whole lot
of people come in.
HV: What's in your CD player right now?
Brad: I've been listening to the
new Phantom Planet album. I just got a free one. It's
really good, man. So are The Thrills. We just got off
a tour with The Thrills, and their album is so cool.
It's kind of like Travis mixed with The Eagles, but happy.
Like really uplifting theme to it. It's really
soothing but it's really just fun and happy. They sing
about Santa Cruz and baby baby and stuff, but the guys
are really cool too. They don't speak much,
they're quite quiet guys, but we just got off tour
with them and they're great guys. They're
going to tour with the Chili Peppers now
in Ireland. So yeah, much respect.
HV: So do you get along with all of Phantom Planet?
Brad: Yeah, we were friends with
them in New Zealand, they came and played New Zealand
and we met them and kind of kept in touch really
loosely over the last couple years. Then this tour
came up and they asked us to come out. So it was really
kind of a good opportunity.
Tim: They're really nice guys.
HV: What kind of musical influences do you guys have?
Tim: Oh, all sorts. it's kind of weird
being in a band cause you have five different guys that
listen to different music. So like, I grew up on U2 and
things like that, now I really like Muse and Radiohead
and things like that. But then you've Jake, the bass
player, he really likes Primus.
Brad: I don't like Primus.
Tim: In the van you get to listen to really
different things. And then we've got Andy, who's
our camera man at the time and guitar tech and he's
like a hip hop sort of guy. And it's cool, you get
inputs quite a lot. And then Tyson, he really
likes the Beastie Boys.
HV: Then your camera man will really like
St. Louis, cause they've got Nelly.
Tim: Yeah!
Brad: One thing that's happened in our
band is that all our different sounds come out one
way or another to kind of evolved to what we sound
like now. So we didn't really plan our sound. One thing
about Steriogram is that when we started, I was the
singer, and Tyson was the drummer. And it was kind of
like a melodic rock band, like Supergrass or something.
Then a couple of years later it starts this hip
hop thing and it just evolves into this other
whole thing, you know? So now, in a way, we're
only here because I think that like, I'm not sure
if I'm right to say this but it seems like there's
a lot of different boxes for like music over here.
You've got the new metal box, then the new sort of
Stokes/Jet/Vines box, then you've got to find a box
but I don't think there's a box for us at the moment.
Cause no one really knows, like, "What genre are you
guys?" And no one really put us anywhere, so we're
just like, we'll wait and see what happens. I mean,
a lot of people like the music and we're encouraging that.
Tim: Like when you play to a new crowd, the
first few songs you can see them just going, "Do I
like this, or don't I?" Then by like the third or
fourth song they're more sure.
Brad: And I think then they understand
the music a bit more too. Cause if they just hear it
on the CD, maybe it would still be cool but
be a little different.
HV: What other jobs have you guys had?
Tim: My first job I think I worked at
Pizza Hut, making pizza. So I did that then I worked at
a bike shop, a motor bike shop. So I've been a student
and stuff like that.
HV: What's the worst job?
Tim: Pizza Hut. Dude, I used to work
with chicks that would spit in the pizzas and stuff
like that. So you see some stuff that you don't
really want to. And now all we eat is fast food, you think...
Brad: I bet I've eaten a lot of crap.
Tim: Yeah.
Brad: I used to do a paper route when
I was little. I used to do this thing, I had it down
because I was delivering junk mail, you know
what junk mail is? Yeah, so I was delivery pamphlets.
I'd take them up to all the old people who
I knew would have money. And they used
to give me chocolates for pamphlets. I don't
know how that works, and at Christmas time they
would give me 20 bucks, so it was pretty cool. (laugh)
But anyway, then I did gardening down my road.
Some lady used to give me 10 bucks an hour just
to pull the weeds out of her garden. On Saturday morning
I'd go do this so I'd have enough money
to go out with my friends on Saturday
night, go to the movies with them. Then after
that I did a job called, it's a company, Turners &
Growers, they distribute vegetables around to
the big warehouses, so you got to drive a
big forklift and that. I didn't like peeling vegetables
all day. Then the McDonalds, I've done so
many freaking jobs.
Tim: One of my funniest jobs I've had
was working for a promotions company, so I
had to dress up in different suits. We got Nesquik,
I was a Nesquik bunny for like an event. I was
hugging all these little babies, like (high pitched
voice) "Hi, how ya doing?" Then the worst
one, I had to be the Highlander at the supermarket
selling condensed milk.
Brad: Do you have photos of that?
Tim: No.
Brad: You should have taken photos
of that, man. (laugh)
Tim: So I had a kilt that
wasn't a kilt, it was a cotton towel. And I had
like white socks, and I have really hairy legs. And
I was carrying this tray of Highlander?s chocolates sort
of things. It was bad, dude.
Brad: I did one for the same company as
him cause we were all pretty much broke and did
the same sorts of jobs. I dressed up as a
pint of Guinness and had to walk up and down a
main street. I had like a beanie on and the froth
like came up to here (motioning up to his nose) and
I was just looking out and the whole glass of
Guinness was this big hoop around me. And you'd
walk up to people like, "Hey, this is Guinness."
No one recognized me, thank God.
Tim: It's quite funny. With
the Nesquik Bunny, I did that once in a
supermarket and you come up on old people that
were looking at meat, and sort of put your hand
out and grab a pack of meat. (laughing) And
they look over it was just funny. It was good times.
HV: What do you do between shows?
Brad: It all depends on how much
time between shows you have. Like last night, we
played. The rundown from last night, we finished the
show, I went bowling, then we went out and had a
good time out in Iowa City, then we went to bed at
like 6 o?clock this morning or something. We woke up at
like 10, got back in the van and drove here and
now we're with you guys. It's pretty much what
happens everyday.
Tim: And if we're not sleeping, we're
usually emailing or whatever. We get a lot
of stuff on our site, so we try to answer
as much of it as we can. Cause we sort of
do the merchandise and all that sort of stuff.
It's pretty full on. There's not a lot of
time where you're really bored. You get
bored of the van.
Brad: The van's like your down
time. Because basically you can't do anything because
you're driving. So that's when you get on
the computer and reply to emails or watch TV or
just hang out. We don't have a tour bus yet, so,
I think when we get a tour bus it'll be a
bit easier, a bit more room and stuff. We've
been in that thing for 60,000 miles, 150 shows now.
Tim: We?ve crashed it four times.
Brad: Three times spun it, one time
just completely smashed it. Sometimes you do
get a little like oh my goodness, like I'm just
so tired right now and it's like, we
just got to
keep going. Then you stop and think for a
second, hang on, aren?t we getting paid
to be in a band full time?
Tim: This is pretty good.
Brad: Then you just shut up.
But it's only like now and then you just have
a time when you don't want to see anyone cause
you're just tired and grumpy and the
other guys in the band are hassling you about
something. But that doesn?t happen much. You
just learn to love each other.
Tim: it's brotherly love.
Brad: it's brotherly love in our
band. We?ve been together five years now, so we've
learned to get along and love each other.
Tim: it's kind of a w
eird, a pretty
unnatural thing, for five guys to be together 24/7.
Brad: it's been full time for the
last two and a half years. Before that we all
had to have day jobs. So Jake would be working your
shift work at the Petrol station and every time
we had to go on tour he had to get
fired. Cause his boss would be like, "If
you leave, you're not coming back."
So every time we came back he had to get a new
job. (laugh) And my boss was like, "Brad,
no more time off for tour, not for tour."
HV: So you just got off the Something
Corporate/Yellowcard tour right? How were the
fans for that, because I know the SoCo fans are
pretty hardcore.
Tim: That was huge.
Brad: That was the thing. At first we
were a bit scared cause the emo/punk scene,
we'd never played for before. We played for
Trapt scene, we've played for Saliva scene,
we've played for 311 scene, we've played for all
these, but to go to emo/punk is completely different.
But it went off the first show in
San Francisco, we just came out and we were
ourselves. And I think, I don't know,
I think people just got it. I don't know
how to explain that. And I love Something Corporate.
Tim: And the shows were awesome, just huge.
Brad: 2000 kids a night, every night.
Tim: Yeah, it was like sold out.
Brad: And we're d
riving to keep up with the
buses, cause they all had buses, we were driving
like 12 hours almost a day. I was so sick by the
end of it. But we wish we could still be on
it as well, it was such a fun tour. It's just when
you get that thing with all your friends on
tour, cause all the bands hang out
every night, it's just like a big brotherly
love thing on the road, I guess.
Tim: It's kind of funny jumping
from that scene to now Phantom Planet. Just seeing
the change in crowd and what you have to do
to work a crowd. I think it's safe to say that
the Phantom Planet scene is a lot more mellow.
Brad: It's almost like they're
more intelligent as well, they're more of
an analyzing crowd. They'll sit back and "this is
a really good song, I like that song."
HV: How was the Yellowcard crowd,
more crowd surfing?
Brad: Yeah, more crazy. We'd just
walk out and it'd be (noise). And then Sean
from Yellowcard would be like, "Man, you tired the
crowd out again for us tonight." (laugh)
And we'd be like, sorry man. Yeah, it was great.
But this tour is cool as well. We just played
in Minneapolis, and that was the best show on the
tour so far. The crowd was just great. Then
when Phantom comes they go off cause they know the songs.
HV: Do you guys have a favorite city of all time to play?
Brad: Well, besides New York, cause
New York's kind of the biggest, Seattle's
probably my favorite city.
Tim: Seattle and I really like San Diego.
Brad: Oh yeah, that was so cool. We went
off road skateboarding. it's like being on
California games. It was cool.
Tim: I think it's most like New Zealand
almost. San Diego. (about his food) The food in America is huge.
HV: Yes, our portions are generally larger,
we're a fat country.
Tim: I discovered Steak and Shake
for the first time. Good fries. Frisco melt is great.
I love it, man. And their shakes are wicked, with
the fudge. I like it.
HV: Do you have any pet peeves?
Tim: Jared, our drummer, has the
most high-pitched voice that anyone has got. It's
super high, I don't know how he does it. And
he just gets excited and he's just like a
kid and screaming all this stuff in the
back. But it's not too bad when you've
got your laptop, you just put on your headphones,
and the whole world goes away. But I don't know. You
don't really know what annoys you until it does.
Brad: I'm the guy that stays up
too late but I?ll just be working away and
someone's just like, "would you just freaking go to sleep,"
so I'm like, ok, sorry. Because I just can't
sleep sometimes.
Tim: Everybody's got their different
quirks. After awhile, we've done well to deal
with stuff like that, you have to.
HV: Do you have any weird fan stories?
Brad: We can't talk about this in
an interview, last time we said something we
got in so much trouble.
Tim: They found out. As soon as it's
on the website, they're all on us.
Brad: I know they'll be reading it tomorrow.
Tim: People forward them around to people.
HV: So you're not going to say?
Brad: Oh, I'm not going to say anything. (laugh)
Oh, no way. it's not a thing with the guys,
we'll just leave it at that. The guy thing usually
is guys want to be in a band a lot of
times. So they'll talk to you for hours about
random stuff but the thing is, I was the
same way at 16. If I could hang out with a
band, man, I'd have a billion questions to ask
them, so I don't mind that. But
if it's some girl who doesn't know what
to say and keeps on emailing you every day saying
the same thing. Then when I don't reply to them
because I've got about 100 emails coming in
a day. It's like they take for granted they can have
a relationship with you one on one when that just
physically and realistically can't happen But
it's like they get offended because you're
not giving them the attention they want. At the
same time, you'd love to give it to them
of course, but you can't. Is that a
good way of explaining it withou
t getting us
into trouble?
Tim: But we haven't had any stalkers like
in the shower yet or anything. (laugh)
HV: What kinds of movies and TV have you been watching?
Tim: We watch a lot of Pay-Per-View
in the hotels. So Butterfly Effect, have you seen
it? I thought it was going to be kind of crap,
but it was like really good. It freaked me out a bit.
Brad: Along Came Polly. I love Ben
Stiller. And Jennifer Aniston is a
beautiful creation.
Tim: I watched a psycho one the other
night, called Monster. She's real hot, but
in that, she's not hot.
HV: I think she won the Oscar for that, didn't she?
Tim: I can see why, she did really
well. Yeah, she's a prostitute and then the first guy was
going rape her, then she got in the habit of killing.
it's a true story. It freaked me out.
Brad: I just watched Whale Rider. It
was filmed in New Zealand. it's just one of those
films that reminds me of home a lot. The area
and scenery made me miss New Zealand, but
at the same time it's such a beautiful story
about this one girl. I don't know what it would
be like for you guys to watch it. But you
should watch it, it's good. Have you guys seen Lord of the Rings?
HV: Of course. We love it. We
have pictures of the characters on our staff photos for the zine.
HV: What kind of older movies do you guys
like?
Brad: When I was 16, I used to love that movie
with Tom Hanks and Liv Tyler in it, called, That Thing You
Do. My band at the time covered that song for our prom
or whatever. (sings a bit from the song) Anyway that was a
good one, what other movies, Predator. That movie's great,
we watched it in science. We had a really bad teacher. We
also watched My Girl 2 in science.
Tim: My favorite movie of all time: Top
Gun. We always walk out to it, on stage.
Brad: Have you seen us play live yet?
HV: Yes.
Tim: Well you'll hear it tonight too,
the opening track is off of Top Gun. So I
love it, I don't know why.
HV: How about TV shows?
Brad: Quite a lot. I love South
Park, and Family Guy. I actually, this sounds
pretty gay, but me and Jared, we're like buying
a series of Friends each so we're up to six now.
I just love Joey and Chandler heaps. Cause in
the van, you do 20 hour drives, and you
can just watch a whole season of Friends, and it
just keeps going one after another. But that's
probably embarrassing.
Tim: I just got into The Sopranos. I
heard this big buzz about The Sopranos, so it
was one of those I had to see. it's quite full on.
Brad: Is it filmed in New York?
HV: I'm pretty sure.
Tim: I don't know. It looks like
New York. Cause he drives over a bridge it looks
like New York.
Brad: I like The Office. If you guys
have worked for a psycho boss before, like an
egotistic boss. I'm sure you have at
one time in your life. If you even work for
the slightest egotistical boss who totally has
no clue what he's doing it will be
the funniest thing you'll watch. I was on
a plane from Sydney to Melbourne five weeks
ago. I'd already been into The Office for
like a year or so. And there were all these
corporate people on my flight and they were
watching it on TV and they were laughing so loud
that the airline attendant tapped me on the
shoulder and was like, "what are they watching,
what are they watching?" 'cause they
all thought it was the funniest thing. It's
just funny. It's like a tragic comedy.
The guy's an absolute moron, but he's so lovable.
HV: I think that's all our questions.
Brad: You didn't ask what sports I do.
HV: Oh, what sports do you do?
Brad: I don't do any sports.
Tim: I used to do rugby. Rugby's our
national sport. But I'm too skinny.
Brad: I used to be a soccer player.
Tim: I got knocked out seven times. It
was good times. It was fun.
HV: Any broken bones?
Tim: No. We played cricket as well, you
know what that is? I broke my fingers playing
cricket. I caught the ball wrong, cause it's a hard ball.
Brad: I like rally driving.
Tim: Oh, rally driving is great.
Brad: Do you guys know what rally driving is?
HV: Not really.
Brad: You have a really fast turbo
driven car that's a really small car.
Like a Subaru WRX. There's not many in
America, it's big in New Zealand. It's
basically hanging really fast across country
roads. You need a good driver to do it.
Tim: I saw this one picture when
we were younger this guy hit this sheep at 180
kilometers per hour and the sheep just exploded.
They put roll cages in and the cars are real
strong, but they're fast. You have about 20
teams or 20 drivers.
Brad: You have to be the fastest
time through a certain amount of miles or something.
Tim: Then you have a real tight corners.
Brad: That's what I want to become. Cause
of those expensive sports I need some money
to buy a car. Costs a lot of money to be in a band.
HV: So it's not like race car driving here?
Brad: That's one thing I can't
understand about America like that. You got
Nascar and just drive around and around a circle. How boring is that?
HV: But they have some hardcore fans.
Brad: Yeah, I'm not saying they don't,
it's crazy big. I'm not saying it's not big. I'm
saying I can't comprehend it. We have this
thing in Belfast, in Australia and New Zealand, like
Australian Holden. Like Ford versus Holden, which is
kind of like GM versus Ford over here. And it's
the biggest event of the year, all the
Holden's versus Fords. And the track is like
6 kilometers long and it's winding and there's
like all these corners, like famous corners,
and all the different passings. And
they do 100 laps or something but it's
like a proper circuit. it's so much fun
to watch. But Nascar, it's just like
round and round. it's like another thing I
can't understand is that in America, they
used to have rugby, you guys were
the Olympic champions of rugby in 1924.
it's like our national game. And then in like
1925, somebody invented American football. And
I can't understand that game, I've tried
so hard to watch it. But Tim's starting to
get into it.
Tim: Like Madden. Yeah.
Brad: But it takes so long to do
a move. you've got to strategize it out.
Tim: And you've got to change a
whole team pretty much. If you're like
defending, you've got to change it all.
HV: Do you have a favorite team?
Tim: No. No, not really. We watched
the Superbowl, so we all picked a team for that.
Brad: Did our team win?
Tim: Yeah.
Brad: What team was it?
Tim: Got me. (laugh) We picked the right one anyway.
Brad: It's pretty hard, you've got a
50 percent chance. But my two teams for NBA, I've
got a west coast team and an east coast team.
My east coast team is Miami Heat, Rafer Alston's
my man. And I've got Koby on the west coast
with the Lakers.
HV: Well, thank you guys so much.
Tim: Thanks a lot, man.
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