Interview with Western Addiction - Podcast 5

Alright, well thanks for tuning in to Sound Scene Revolution, a weekly offering of Bay Area local and underground artists in general. Today we share our time with Western Addiction, one of the latest in Fat Records signings, whose album Cognicide just came out November 1st. So we've got about a 35 minute interview coming up with three-fourths of the band. We've got Ken, Chicken, and of course Jason, so you might want to check that out. But before we do that, we're going to play a track off their album Cognicide. We're going to start with a track called The Poor Recipe for Civic Cohesion, so check that out, and of course stay tuned for the interview.

Alright, so thanks for tuning in to Sound Scene Revolution. Today we are sitting here with three-fourths of the members of Western Addiction. Got that out. So can you guys just introduce yourselves, say your name, what you do in the band, and what you do here at the Fat Rack? I'm Ken, I look good in the band, what do I do at Fat? Lots of stuff.

I'm Jason, I am the singer and guitar player, and I do radio and retail at Fat. My name is Chicken, I play bass and sing in Western Addiction, and I do mail order here at Fat Rack Chords. Excellent. Well, that's cool. So the basic, the intro question I'm going to leave, I got a question from a few fans, and it's... Both of our fans? Chicken, sister, Russians? Both of them. Ken's Brad. But no, the actual, it's better than just your origin. It's an actual quote-for-quote question. It's, where are you from, and why do you rock so hard? I'm not ad-libbing any of that shit. The middle of the sun, and because we have to. Like, what kind of answer do you want? Where are we from? Well, I don't know, just your history.

Well, we're from San Francisco. We're a San Francisco band. We started in 2003, Jay? Yep. We started in 2003 around April of 2003, in fact, shortly after I was released from rehab. And Jason and Chad had been playing together for a while in Chad's garage with Chad on drums and Jay playing guitar. And they had some songs, and they had a little demo, and we checked it out, and it sounded pretty cool. And everyone was really surprised to hear Jason's voice, because it's amazing, and it's really awesome. And he's not in person at all. He's really disappointing in person. But on record, for some reason, when he gets a microphone in his hand, he just is really awesome. So then I started playing with those guys, because I was trying to stay out of trouble and stay busy.

So I really didn't have anything fucking better to do, honestly. So I started playing with those guys, and then... And we tricked Ken into playing with us, too. Yeah, and then eventually we got Kenny in the mix after a while, and he was definitely the icing on the cake. He made everything we had going on before pale in comparison, and he took it to a whole new level. And now we all kind of hide behind his talent, which is awesome. You all just hope to God that he can cover your ass when it comes to us. Basically, yeah, basically. That's good, though. Which I do. He does. It's true. It's true. And the reason we rock so hard is because... I mean... That's the best question to answer. You just... You gotta take that fool ahead.

Yeah. It's kind of hard. Basically, you're kind of born this way, man. I mean, I've tried to explain it to people. I've tried to teach people to play bass. But it just doesn't fucking happen, man. I'm born with this shit, dude. You know, it's just like I was fucking delivered here from wherever I came from and with just the most insane amount of natural talent and finger work that had ever really been seen on a bass guitar before. So, I don't really know what to say. It's just that they made me this way. Whoever it was that made me, made me this way. And I would say the same for everyone else in my band. Jason's voice is definitely from the bowels of hell. That's a good thing, right? Yeah, that's an awesome thing.

Excellent. I think that works out pretty well. Who do you guys, for this... I mean, you have a sound, which if you listen to a lot of this stuff that's out now, it doesn't really sound of the time. It doesn't sound... It sounds more like it belongs, you know, not just like as an insult, but more like early 80s, mid-80s type punk. Sure. You know, what are your influences? What brings that about as opposed to playing like, I don't know, emo? Well, I would say the one thing we have most in common with a lot of those bands from the early 80s that we sound like is that we're not very good at our instruments. Some of us are. And neither are they. Anyway, we tried emo, too. It's too hard. Yeah, we tried... Basically, we tried it all, man.

It is hard. We tried the Christian rock thing, man. We tried the country thing. We'd done tons of market research. And basically, this is what we came up with. This was the only thing that hadn't really been done at Hot Topic like that year that we formed. So we went with this thing. You said a real target demographic. Yeah, we went with this because the emo thing's kind of run its course. You know, the hardcore thing is kind of picking up steam again, it seems like. You're hoping. Yeah, we're hoping. I think we're a little different type, though, man. I mean, there's a lot of the hardcore out now is all kind of like Tough Guy face tattoo kind of like songs about your honor and... And picking yourself up when you fall back down.

Yeah. Everybody's falling down. Yeah, all these hardcore kids are falling down and they all sing songs about how they pick themselves up. Have you ever seen a hardcore kid? Or people are... Yeah, yeah, that's true. People are holding them down, too. They're all being held down and they're picking each other up and they won't sacrifice and they all have an honor and a code. A lot of honor. A lot of honor. Like Braveheart. Yeah, it's like Braveheart meets punk bands. It's crazy. But we just like to hang out with each other and play instruments, so it works out. That's cool. So, sounds like you guys have experienced a lot of the lower half of the scene. You're very aware of the crap that's out now. How does that...

The stuff that's pretty blatantly just to get a fan base and to earn money, how does that make you feel? Is that adverse to everything you're... I don't want to say stand for, but... It's not a part of business, I think, right? I mean, I don't care what people do. I think it's fine if they want to do that. Like, it's got nothing to do with me or us. We just... We'll just play shows and have a good time. And I like to get drunk. Wow. Where did that come from? I just wanted to work that into the interview. First time he's ever grabbed a mic. Because we don't give this guy a mic on stage, so, like, in an interview, he gets a mic and he's like, uh... Yeah, the scene's all fucked up right now. I personally like long walks on the beach and, uh...

Yeah. Who else? Who wants to buy him a dinner? Yeah. Yeah, Jay, you should have to... Because you talk about that a lot in your Church of Black Flag song. I don't even know if we know who our fans are yet, or if we even have any. I think you get some, yeah. But we never thought about who would like us, or... I don't know. I don't even know how to write a song to make a certain person like us. I don't even know what comes out. Just something comes out, and it's our band, and... And greasy old dudes in El Rio are loving it. It's true. I mean, as far as a lot of those bands, like, personally, we're not fans of them. At the end of the day, like, it's cool that kids are out there playing instruments and stuff. That's always awesome.

But, I mean, as far as, like... It would never be something that would make me angry. I mean, it is kind of frustrating sometimes to see bands form for weird reasons, especially, like, quote, punk bands, you know, start to make money or whatever. But there's so many things out there that hold such higher importance for us to worry about, and there's so many other things going on in the world that, like, it's not really worried about some dude wearing makeup in My Chemical Romance, like, playing shitty songs, you know? We actually have played with some bands where you can tell, like, they're kids, but they drew from older influences. This one band we played with called... They were called The New Flesh, but now they're called Dead Ringers.

They're friends of ours. It's, like, they're some of interns. Oh, and I'll mention them next. But, and this other band called Nothing in Return, too. Like, they're young kids, and they, like, played music like The Damned and TSOL. Oh, wow. I almost cried. I think that's always going to happen. Whatever, like, whenever, like, a certain part of punk becomes mainstream, there are going to be kids that are drawn to it initially because of that, but the kids that are true, the kids that are, like, actually, that it really speaks to them, they'll seek out the good stuff, and they'll find the good records, and they'll find the good bands, and then they'll start their own bands, and then the circle of life will continue, and sometimes the sun does go around the moon.

Wow. Sometimes the stars come out in June, Richard. It's true. Yeah. Sometimes. They saved the best. Not, you know. Yeah. Just when I thought the best had passed, Jay, you went and you fucking saved the best for last, man. If someone touches me right now, I swear to God, this interview's over. They're slow dancing. Let's do this. No, but you can tell, and it was pretty cool. Like, I was actually, like, a proud, like, parent or something, like, my little kids that got an old hardcore. Yeah, I was pretty happy. Excellent, dude. Well, that's good to hear. You said you were going to mention another band? Nothing in Return. And Dead Ringers. And Dead Ringers. They're, like, the Nothing in Return dudes, they're, like, 16 to 18.

And they sound like they're straight out of a timeline. And they're shredders. Yeah, they're badass. And they're from the Bay? Well, why don't you just go fucking interview them? They are. They're going to be our next couple of shows. I'm out of here. We've already moved on to the next. We got our next 12 shows lined up. We're just, we're putting you in the back catalog. Damn it. Damn it. Son of a bitch. All right, I'm going to keep sprinkling fan questions throughout here. I know. It's my sister. I didn't even know my sister had it in that. I put it in. God.

Hey, Jay, this is your dad. Just want to say what's up. Your mom feels okay. It's my boss from the other room. Can you tell Chicken to please get back to work? Stop asking them shitty questions. Yeah, I think these are good. They're actually good questions. I don't mean you, personally. Considering this is, like, I don't know how many interviews you guys have done. Unless you've already prepped the media tour for this. Yeah. We've done, like, three or four. We did a radio interview. Radio in Saskatchewan, man. And a lady was forward with Ken. No. What was it for? Like, what radio? Sex, dude. Oh, um. Not that. Oh, a local college station.

Butt sex, dude. No, just a local college radio station. It was fun. No, right on. But she was all hungover and still drunk. I was listening at home. I was supposed to go, and I overslept. I know my close friends will find that hard to believe. But I overslept, and I was listening on the radio. And she was drunk and totally making passes at these two guys. Yeah. And they're the ugly guys in the band. So it was really weird because me and Chad were, like, listening. And it was totally, we blew it. You're just like, if I had only woken up. Yeah, had I only gotten my shoes done. Listen, if you were over, and I would have been having sex by now. They were uplifting weights and looking in the mirror. So they're like, I should have been there.

It could have been me, man. Turn up the bass on that chick's voice. That's not okay. Let's keep going, man. We're getting on track. By the way, you're never going to listen to this interview. I'm going to make sure you guys, of everyone else, you three people, never actually hear this interview. What? Next question. Fan question, right. In the church black flag, who would be pope? Who would be what? The pope. That's a rad question. Black flag. Black flag. Okay, Ken, we have a song called The Church of Black Flag. Who would be the pope? The pope. Holy crud. You know, I don't want to burst your bubble or whatever, but that song's not actually about black flag. There's no church? Yeah, I don't think. I was totally ready.

I don't think he was asking if it was an actual church, man. I think he was just saying. All right. He's sharing metaphors. I was going to start making donations. Yeah, Shakespeare, fucking get a clue. He meant like, it was like, you know what he meant, right? Who would be the high figure that we respect? Yeah, sure. Is that what you meant? Yeah. All right. That's it, yeah. I don't know. I don't like a lot of hero worship, because every time I meet a person that I like in a band, I'm let down. No. I would rather not meet any of my favorite band members, for the most part. I would say my experience has been the opposite. Like, with punk bands, almost everyone I've met from bands that I really like and respect in punk bands, 95% of them have been really fucking cool guys.

Really? That's got to be hard, because you guys have some pretty big shows coming on. Yeah, the thing is, but I like different bands. I don't really like, like, Stutterfly and, like... Switchfoot. I don't like Switchfoot. Yeah, I heard the Switchfoot guys are total dicks. And Nickelback. That must have been a total bummer for you, when the guy from Nickelback wouldn't sign your fucking yearbook. Dude, sign my comb. That must have totally sucked ass, Jay. Embarrassing. No, dude, most of the bands that we like a lot, I would say that the dudes are cool guys. That's true. Well, I mean, the bands, we've, like, bands on fat or whatever, I like a lot of those people. Well, you've probably met them before. If there was somebody really cool that you really wanted to meet really bad, I think I might opt for not meeting them.

Just in case. Because you wouldn't want to be bummed out. Yeah, you're not the first person to actually see that. Really? Yeah, yeah. See? Yeah, totally. A lot of people. I stand corrected. But I don't know who. There's only one person that I think I'd want to meet or I'd go fan Psycho 4, and that's Johnny Cash and Jesus. JC. Johnny Cash. JC. They share the same initials. Right. There's a reason for that. But luckily, see, the Johnny Cash thing's a cop-out, though, because now you don't got to worry about it. You're never going to do it. Oh, right, right. Yeah, that's true. Right. He's got you there. I don't know. Is there any old punkers that you'd want to meet real bad? We met Bill Stevenson, and he's so awesome. That's cool.

Like, seriously, so nice, so cool. How did that come around? Ken, tell them. Hi. Well, he... I've been alcohol. Oh, you're lucky. No. You can see he's in Only Crime. Yeah. Fat, so we got, you know, we get to work with him all the time. I also hear he was in The Descendants. Yeah, a little bit called Black Flag. Black Flag. Oh, The Only Crime, dude? Yeah, I met the guy from Only Crime. Yeah, he's awesome. Runs Blast, you know him. You know, he's been around. Yeah. Anyhow, sorry. Yeah, anyway, so, yeah, I got to meet him, and he's been, like, my idol since I was, like, you know, 15. Which is, like, 40 years now. See, that's why we have a lot in common with those 80s, man, because we're fucking old shit. Because you're actually 45.

Yeah, Jason. He's an oldie. Yeah. Yeah, so, yeah, Bill is an awesome guy. He's actually in town right now, and... So, can you get him down here, so we can end... Well, we're not interviewing Bill today. He's actually in town. His room number is 16C. Shh, I have his number. Do you know when he goes to sleep and when he wakes up in town? He likes to sleep around 8.30 or 9 after a hungry man dinner. That he warms up in his hotel room. That's what Bill Stevenson would eat. Yeah, that's what Bill does. Yeah. He'd be all about the hungry man. Okay, let's move on. I don't even think we ever answered that question, but we'll... What was it? No, the Pope of the Church of Black Flag. We kind of did some. Yeah, more sort of than not.

Okay, when you guys were starting the band, was it all... This is totally a fucking shit, but when you started, was it all, like, awkward working at Fat Records, or were you totally, like, pushing all your demos on them, or did you try and kind of, like, keep it off to the side and not let everybody know? Or was it, like, every day, like, hey, guys, guess what? We had practice last night. Here's what it sounds like. No, it was definitely the opposite of that. I was embarrassed. Like, you never want... I would never want to play any of this stuff for anyone here forever. No, never. It's funny, like, there's generally some pros about all of us working here. Logistically, like, as far as bands go, it's pretty rare to play in a band where all four guys have the same exact schedule.

Yeah. That's actually, like, super fucking rare. So it works out pretty rad in that way. But since all of us have been at Fat for a pretty long time now, and Fat is a small company, and it's definitely, like, family. And I don't know about your guys' family, but my family, we make fun of each other all the time. I'm the youngest of five kids, and me and my brothers and sisters always bag on each other. And it's no different here at Fat. Like, the way we show love for each other is just tearing each other apart. Shame you to tears. Just shaming the other guy to tears. We will shame you to tears before you leave here, both of you guys. So your first show, they all showed up and then, like, left while you were playing.

Just, like, we would probably talk shit about their band if they started one. I don't know. I mean, that's just kind of how we communicate here. It's a – everyone came, though. Yeah, people came. I mean, they'll support and they'll make fun of you, but – They would make fun of us right to our faces, but if somebody, like, tried to beat us up, they would beat them up, kind of. Yeah. But the thing is, like, when we first started, it wasn't, like, something that we ever thought – Like, honestly, it was something to do on Mondays and Wednesdays after work, like, go hang out and play instruments. We never thought we would be playing shows, even, or, like, putting out records. When we first put out that 7-inch, we were so fucking stoked.

And then we had no idea. We wanted to do the split with New Mexican Disaster Squad. We were freaking out. We were like, dude, this is so awesome. Like, for four guys that, like, work at a record label and have been into this music for, like, a long time, we're still, like, all 14-year-old, like, geeks inside, you know, that get really stoked about stuff. Our record – when our records get shipped here or when our posters show up. Yeah, we were like, yeah, dude, check it out. I don't know. It's silly. Yeah, to Jason. Good job, buddy, from Jason. It's actually pretty cool when that stuff shows up. It sounds so dumb, but it's cool. No, I'm totally sure because, I mean, that's, like, you know, it's kind of, like, a hallmark almost of you've made it, you know, some sort of validation.

Yeah, because it's kind of this, like, intangible thing that, like, lives inside your head, like, of you making progress with your band, you know? Like, you don't really have – you get to go play shows, and that's fun, but when the little physical things show up, like, you actually get to be like, oh, yeah, that's right. That is why we went and practiced all those nights. Like, you get to have – like you said, you get to have something that you can show for it and be like, whoa, this is crazy. This is actually working out. Yeah, for sure. All right, so we're going to take a break right there in the interview, let you catch your breath, get some Kool-Aid, find your place. But we're going to jump back in it in a little bit.

Right now we're going to play another track off of Western Addiction's latest LP on Fat Records called Cognicide. You can find that in your local stores or check it out at fatrec.com. But we're going to play the track Charged Words, which is the opening track on the album. And when we come back, we've got the second half of our interview where you'll find out – you'll get our very first caller of all time, and you'll get to hear the answer to the infamous Smurfs versus Ninja Turtles question. So don't move.

♪ song played ♪

Yeah, what the hell does your album title mean? I totally thought I was going to be all cool. Yeah, what do you guys think it means? I was going to look it up online, and I'm like, there's got to be some definition. I found nothing. Ask him. What do you think? Sound guy. Give this guy a mic. Sound guy. Laptop dude. Sound guy near me. Sound guy. He's doing a crossword puzzle. Here, hold on. He's wearing a visor, too. He's wearing a visor. He's playing party poker online, like we're trying to fool us. Hey, no more Tetris. Before I throw this on you real quick, read that. That's the album title in case you weren't sure. What do you think that means? I have no idea. Come on, man. It's actually the first time my voice is on the podcast.

Really? Wow. I actually, he works for free, like for a bowl of rice.

That's my step. No, but come on. There's the woman getting attacked by boars. Any idea? No.

You made sure you got that one. That was a no, but the undertone was never put the fucking mic in my face. Yeah, basically. All right. Yeah, it's a made up word, actually. No. No, yes, it is. I feel so stupid for looking it up online. No. We actually are going to put this part on our website called the Western Addictionary, and it has all the words that I made up, and that's just a word I made up. I think of all sorts of ridiculous things like that. What does it mean? It means thinking something to death. That's really good, dude. Like when I make up words, they're fucking terrible. It's like when you're all loaded, like, skin and blasphemy. Well, that's the other thing, too, that Jay doesn't smoke weed, so it's kind of weird that he's sitting around making up words.

But that's why his are good. Yeah, I guess that's why his actually works. When you sit around smoking weed, you're like sitting there, and you're like, door knob. No. Dob. It's a dob. Yeah. You just combine two words that already exist. Yeah, uh, I don't, those aren't made up. I gotta make up a bad word, huh? I'm gonna make up a, I just. He actually does make up, um, bad words all the time because he has a daughter, and he can't, uh, cuss in front of her, so instead of saying, like, we'll be at practice and someone will mess up, or like, he'll drop something on his enormously huge fucking freak foot, and, uh, he'll be like, oh, oh, you slinky. Or, uh, someone will be pissing him off, he'll be like, oh my, you wacky wall crawler.

When he's reading that, you bean burrito. Like, he said that to me one time, I was like, what? I don't even know what that means. I don't, uh, should I be pissed? I, am I getting yelled at right now? But that ends, like, whatever argument at that point because you're like. It stops him. Yeah. I have nothing. Yeah. Yeah. But you can tell, like, it's because he doesn't cuss. Like, he's constantly thinking of stuff. I just thought, I said bullcrap the other day at work, and they, I said that too, but bullcrap, is bullcrap not okay? Dude, bullcrap is like, that's like third, that's like second grade, dude. If, if I'm, I'd be honest, if I met you on the street and you said bullcrap, I would kick your ass. I'd kick your ass.

And I'm entirely non-violent. Yeah, but. But now that I've met you, I can't do that because I feel sympathy towards your cause. I might, I called chicken a two-year-old liar one time. Yeah, that was really weird. I didn't understand where that was coming from at all. And you just, you totally, like, want to get this teacher, you're like, yard duty, some old way. Yeah, I was like, what the hell is going on here? I didn't, didn't really make much sense. So there's, yeah, lots of made up words. There's a bunch of other ones in there too. Oh yeah? Well, I'll be sure, now that I have it, fucking physical, by the way, contact the people of Rasputin and Streetlight because they didn't have, they also didn't have.

It is my job, actually. It's, don't worry, they're terrible. They have Mike Park's new album listed under the Ska section. So, I went and when we were talking to him, I talked to him about that and he was like, yeah, I think they have it under Ska. I was like, are you kidding me? Mike just joined this band called Chips and Skulls, so though, I don't know if you know that. No. Yeah. He did. And Ska by the head. You're making that up. No. Why do you lie? Because we talk about different Ska names all the time. Pretty marital sex. Yeah. Any kind of Ska. We do demos here, like kids send us demos all the time to Phat. No. Yeah. True. We are the only label left for sure that still listens to every single demo that gets sent.

Oh, now you've just, because of our listenership, you've maybe got one more coming. We've got like, me and the other mail order kid, Pat, we listen to them. I'm like, almost everyone that's worked here has listened to demos at some point or another, but the Ska bands are really fucking hilarious. Like we, there's like, seriously, Chips and Skulls are. Skab of the Hut. That guy, that's the bravery guy. Yeah. What? He used to be in a Ska band. Really? Skab of the Hut. We, we got their demo. Demo. Oh, man. What's wrong? There's so many awesome Skulls. You guys should sell that shit on eBay. You know that. You could be like, yeah, he's now with the bravery and selling thousands upon thousands of valuables. Chips and Skulls was.

Premarital Sax is one of my favorites too, man. That's pretty hot, yeah. Because it's sexy, you know. It's sexy. And twist on it. And you could dance to it. And you could dance to it. It's got everything you need. I like to dance when I'm having the sex. The sex. You know what I'm saying? You need to do finger quotes when you, the sex. Like, I don't know what the kids are calling it these days. I don't know. All right. All right, what's next? All right. As we're on the topic of you guys all working at fat and laughing at Ska bands, demo tapes. What the hell, who's going to fill in for you guys when you're all on tour in Japan and throughout the West Coast? Oh. More importantly. You say that until you come back and someone's at your desk and they're like, and you are.

Or when we get called like 200 times. Yeah. Well, there's another guy that does mail order with me. My homeboy, Pat. So, I think he'll probably do it while I'm gone. We all have people that. We all got backups. Yeah. Like your understudies. Yeah. Just waiting to kill you. Yeah. Ken's employee, Vanessa, will be doing some stuff. We got people to help us, but we try to get everything ready before. So, you just don't like walk off and fucking leave. Ken works nights and weekends to make up the time. That's real. Graveyard. All right. All right. As long as he does that. Now, the next question's for Ken, so someone may have to have a phone. There you go, Ken. Someone actually, they asked, they're always, is it difficult being in both NMEU and this band?

It kind of is, but it's, we kind of schedule it so it doesn't conflict. So it doesn't conflict. Yeah. You guys ever play shows together? We did once. Kill you? Yeah. It was a double duty, and I don't know if it's good, like, because I played back to back. Mm-hmm. So, but it works. It's fine. Like, NMEU, we're doing a new record early next year, so we're working on songs.

Sometimes, you know, I kind of get burnt when I practice, like, every night. But so far, it's been all right. You know, we've got, like, next month, this month and next month, like, all Western Addiction stuff. Mm-hmm. But I'll still be working on NMEU stuff, and so it works out. It's all fine right now. Excellent. We love each other's bands, too, so we try to help each other. If the two bands were to fight, who would win? Cage match. Me and us. Yeah. There's some skinny video game players. Yeah. Yeah, we've got those suckers, like, pretzels. Yeah. But they also got the crazy factor, too, man. Yeah. Those guys could flip the switch, man. Joe, like, I've never really seen Joe that mad. And if you got Dave Jones pissed, I think he'd flip a crazy switch on you.

Yeah. Yeah. I, yeah. I think you guys should just do that and sell tickets to that. I would totally go to see that. The battle for Ken. Ken would have to be in the middle on, like, a podium. Loser gets Jason. Yeah. Oh, we don't want to do that. Oh, wait, fuck. We already lost. Damn it. You lost. Well, you get Jason, at least. You lost when we started. Damn. You lost when we started. Before this competition even began. Okay. This is a segment we tried last week. It didn't do so well last week. But we're going to try it again because we feel if you fail at something, you should try it again and again until you eventually get it right, I guess. Sure. That's our goal. But this is a, we think of song titles and throw them out to people and we see what they think just of the song title.

It doesn't have to be about anything in particular. But see what you guys think on a scale of, I guess Mike Park did it one to five. We originally thought of one to ten. But I guess he thought that would be too generous with us. He was like, I'm not going to think that hard about it. So five being totally rad, one being complete. Yeah, five being if you just saw that on the back of an album, you'd be like, I would do that. Or you would put it on your own album. Okay. And one being like, that sounds like something from a fucking Trick Daddy video or something. Right, right. I don't know. Maybe you guys like Trick Daddy. All right. Who doesn't? I know I love Trick Daddy. All right. So we're going to, we're going until I feel we fucked it up enough that we can stop it.

So first song is like Fat Chicks with Hula Hoops. Not so much. No? No, that's a one. That's a one. That's a meme. We're Palsy Vibes, man, at Western Addiction Headquarters. It's true. You like all types? Yes. You like everybody equally. Freakier than D-gear. Mm-hmm. All right. Well, I should have gone with the Freakier than D-gear. I think that would have been like a four. Yeah. Let it down.

All right. Next one. A few quick facts about VD. Mm-hmm. That's the middle of the road. That is kind of gutter mouthy. Yeah. It's not as bad as the first one, I don't think. We'll give it a one or two. But what if it's like a total like informative, like kind of like Jeff Ott kind of vibe to it? You know, like, children when you're having sex, cover up your ding dong. You know what I mean? Like it's all Jeff Ott and out. I would pay money to hear Jeff Ott sing that. Yeah. That'd be awesome. If I just saw him on the street, I'd give him like $50 and be like, sing it. Sing it, Jeff. All right. Just make it up as you go. All right. Sonia. All right. Next one. Carpe scrotum.

Oh, my God. These dudes are just. I'm actually really surprised that no one in this band has ever thought of that before. Seize the sack, man. That's basically what that means, dude. Carpe scrotum. Carpe scrotum. Wow.

That's maybe a two or three because it's so funny, but did you guys think of that in the car on the way up here? No. Yes. That guy did. The guy in the visor did. Oh, man. There was one. I don't know. Balls just seem to work in songs that I do. That'd be like if your friends, like, I mean, I don't know. Because, like, what's like, how do you put that in context? How do you use that in a sentence, you know? Carpe scrotum. Yeah. Does that mean, like, just grab life by the balls kind of thing? Or is it more like your friend's being a dick and you want to just seize his sack, man? I think the first one. Seize life by the balls. The balls. If you have to. Callers. Yeah. Can we get a call? Can we take a call? Yeah. Can we take a call?

Can we take a call to your podcast? But no one's listening. Yeah, we got Jeff from Ohio here. Oh, yeah. Is this Jason? It's me, Jeff. Go ahead. My friend Bob is having a birthday party next week. I was wondering if you guys could come out and play it, man. I love punk bands. Is that right? You guys could. I love Stone 4 to 1. I'll start Blink 182 on TRL. I was wondering if you guys could come out and play my party, man. I don't know how these people are calling in. Yeah. This isn't even out. It's a call-in show. Body, we'd love to come play your show. If you get a hold of our booking agent, Ken Yamazaki, at gmail.com, that would be awesome. Okay, guys. See you in the pit.

See you in the pit. Yeah, do we have any of you? Everyone else? All right. Yeah. I think. No more callers. No more callers. Yeah, I think that's going to be it for our call-in section. That's the first one ever. Yeah, thanks for calling, Bobby. Good up. Yeah, good looking out, man. Thanks.

He called in because this isn't even live. I don't know. He just felt like it. Yeah, that's weird. Yeah. You should very much go and play that guy's show because I'd be very afraid. I'm all about it. We're there. He's probably watching right now. Anyhow. All right. Last question. And I always preface this one because it was phrased to me when I was like 14 and I've always thought about it. And I ask everybody, so don't worry. I'm not singling you out. If the Smurfs fought the Ninja Turtles, who would win? Ninja Turtles. Way bigger. They're bigger. Yeah.

The thing, and I'll tell you why. Because the Ninja Turtles have way more zen and there's way more like logic behind their tactics. They actually like study and they train. They have a master splinter. You know what I mean? Like they got to shoot down. Is that that rat that does throw? Yeah, it's not that rat. It's a master splinter. And the Smurfs are kind of more like Papa Smurfs. It's like this old guy. He's kind of more old than he is wise, you know? Like, I mean, yeah, he tells them like good stuff to do or whatever, but it's more about how to live your life, not so much like how to like really battle and take control of your own destiny. Well, give kid a mic. No, the Smurfs never eat and those turtles, they're always eating it.

Escape from New York Pizza. Maybe only if the Smurfs teamed up with Gargamel and like just made some one big evil Smurf faction. Got the tag team. Smurfs of action, yeah. The thing that keeps getting brought up is Return of the Jedi when the Ewoks took down. Is that too much nerd for you? I'm sorry. No, it's not. I mean, you're definitely going to want to ask you these questions. They're the Star Wars band. No, that's a good point. But the thing, it's not just that the Ninja Turtles are big. I mean, they're masters. They're named after Renaissance artists. Donatello, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo. Holy crud. Most people might think it's the other way around. Really? They vote the Smurfs? No, most people think the artists are named after the Ninja Turtles.

Right. It's usually 50-50. More people are leaning towards the Ninja Turtles though lately. I've gotten more votes for the Smurfs before. Two Smurfs? They don't even have shirts, man. They can't even get together to get a shirt on. The Ninja Turtles don't even have... They train all the time, dude. They're badass. Can I take another caller and tell me what they think about the Smurfs? Yeah. I don't know. I think the phone lines are all done. They're jammed. You guys have silenced all our callers. So we're just going to... We'll wrap this up real quick. But you guys, the plug section. The end of the interview. Everything you guys want to push on whoever listens. Our record came out today. This is actually our record release party right here.

Five dudes like our shows. The record release party is a sausage fest. Yeah. You ever been to one of our shows? All our parties are sausage parties. Yeah. Our record comes out today. It's called Cognoside. Check it out. If we're giving plugs, why don't we give... Give your other bands plugs. No, fuck those bands, man. How about like... If you're going to be on the Fat Records website and you're going to be buying our CD, you should probably buy the Propaganda one instead because it's way better and it's amazing and the lyrics are super, super good. It is so awesome. And we wish that more people would be into them. We're allowed to talk about other bands? Yeah, we're allowed to talk about whatever we want. You should check out this band called Direct Control.

They slay. Holy crap. They're super good. Where are they from? I think Richmond. They're so good. Yeah. Everyone's coming out of fucking Richmond now. Yeah. Crazy scene over there they got. Let's see. I guess we should talk about our shows that we're going to play. We're playing our record release show this Friday at Bottom of the Hill. November 4th. With La Plebe. They're awesome too. Let's talk about them. They rule. Everything Let's Go. And The Dead Ringers. Friends Band. Are you guys the headliners? I would take it. We are three out of four. But Plebe's going to headline because they are so fucking awesome. Yeah. It's not even funny. They're nice too. I think the nicest band I've ever met. I get an email like three times a day about a show they're playing that day.

They play weird shows too. It's so cool. They'll play any. Their deals they play. They play a giant mouse. Like a giant life size recreation of the game Mousetrap over Halloween weekend. They play anywhere and everywhere. I would have liked to have seen that happen. Yeah. I know. I know. As would I. But. You don't get everything you want in life. You don't get everything you want in life. I think you should just be stoked that you got your second wish of getting to interview us. Nah. Check that one off the list. Check that one off the list. Things to do before you die. Yeah. One more thing and then I can die. So I'm getting closer. I'm getting closer. I don't know. Maybe I shouldn't have done this interview now. Thanks for interviewing us though.

We really appreciate it. Thanks for taking the time to come on. And we will check out your podcast. The one coming up on the 4th? Yeah. Yeah. Cool. It's good politics. We're trapping him right here. Right. We're trapping him right on his own show. Then we're also playing at Slim's in San Francisco. You guys are doing most of the West Coast dates with Propaganda right now. Yeah. Okay. The only one. You're not doing the one at Gilman Street? Is that it? No. Yeah. We've never played Gilman. Really? We'd like to a lot. We want to bad. Everyone's fucking played Gilman. Don't say it like that. I'm sorry. We want to play there real bad. We just haven't been able to. Well, now maybe because I'm sure they listen. Yeah. They can help us out.

There's a really long wait in this to get a show over there. And we have a hard time thinking ahead with this band. Like we're all busy. Like we all play in other bands. Most of us play in other bands. Most of us are good enough to play in other bands. Should I note that you're looking at Jason while you're saying this? Yeah, yeah. Jason doesn't play in any other bands. He's actually probably the smart one. He puts his heart and soul in Western. Exactly, man. Exactly. You guys are just fucking him up your soul in town because you're half-hearted. It's true. I have a shell of steel from being with these guys. It's hard to think ahead for us. We got some good stuff coming. We got lucky stuff coming. Stay tuned, man.

Keep casting that pod, dude. You know what I'm saying? Keep your pod fully casting. There you go. You can use that for the motto for your show. You don't even have to ask us. We're casting the pod. Yeah, that's great, Mark. Keep the pods fully casting. Everything you say is ours now, so we're going to chop it up. Put it into the theme song. That's okay. Well, thanks a lot for coming. Thanks for having us. Yeah. Go vegan. All right. Well, that wraps up our interview with Western Addiction. Be sure to check them out. If you're in the Bay Area, they're going to be doing a West Coast stint with Propagandhi like they were talking about. And if you live in Japan and you listen, then you can't understand me. But they're going to be in Japan playing with no effects, so you should check that out, too, if you get the chance.

Really good guys. Really, really awesome live show. So that'll about conclude it. Next week, with any luck, we should have Arno Core. They should be on the show. But if not, we'll have somebody else equally as awesome lined up for you guys to listen to.

We're always here for your feedback, and if you're a local band, of course, we would love to sit down and waste your fucking time. Before we take off, we're going to play one last track off of Western Addiction's LP Cognoside. We're going to play the track Animals and Children. So, nice way to send off Western Addiction, Sound Scene Revolution. Thanks for listening.