Transcript (auto-generated, may contain errors; songs left out)
Hi, this is Miggy from Teenage Bottle Rocket. You're listening to Sound Scene Revolution.
Thanks for tuning in to Sound Scene Revolution. We are back once again. This week, we bring you an interview with a Wyoming-based band. I don't even have to finish that because there ain't another band out of Wyoming. Teenage Bottle Rocket we are talking with today. We got to speak with them during their tour with the Epoxies and the Phenomenauts at the back of the bottom of the Hill Club, which you've ever been to. It's kind of like a lean-to or one of those ones made out of aluminum siding with a couch and a bathroom. We got to talk to them with Toby from Red Scare, who was in the toilet at the time, talking to us over the bathroom parting wall. So it was a good time. Before we jump into that with Teenage Bottle Rocket, we also have a contest this week because we're just loaded with giving shit away.
And again, at the end, we'll tell you what to do for that if you haven't figured it out already. So what we're going to do, we're going to hop into a track off of Teenage Bottle Rocket's Red Scare debut. The album is called Total. And we're going to play track three, which is called Stupid Games. So check it out and listen to the interview.
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Thanks for tuning in to Sound Scene Revolution. We are hanging out at somewhere in the back of the bottom of the hill with a couple of members of Teenage Bottle Rocket. If you guys can all say hello. Hello. Yo. Fantastic. You guys just start off, I guess, by introducing yourself, giving a random fact or something about yourself. Here we go. My name is Brandon. I just graduated from the University of Wyoming with a geology degree on Saturday. Whoa. And we left two days ago to be on tour with the Epoxies and Phenomenauts for the next five weeks. Awesome. You want to go ahead, Cody? Absolutely. I'm Ray. I play guitar, sing half the tunes, and I'm from Wyoming.
I'm Cody. I sing the other half, and I play guitar, and I just quit my job, and it feels good. What was your job? Meat cutter. Whoa. What was that at? Meat cutter. We couldn't eat. All right, Josie. Contrary to popular belief, he did not flip burgers at Burger King. Floyd just told me they don't ever flip burgers at Burger King because they're broiled in Iraq. So you shouldn't say they flipped burgers there. All right. So you guys want to start off, just give us a brief history of the band, how you all got started in that? No, wait. Ray and I started playing together when we were really young. Our folks bought me a drum set and Ray a guitar. We're twins. We're twins. And we were in a talent show and stuff when we were growing up and always liked playing music together.
And we kept playing music together. And then we were 15 or 16 when our first band, Homeless Wonders, played with the Lillingtons. And we made friends with the Lillingtons. And then we always played in bands together and booked our own tours and did shows together. And then jammed together. And after all the jamming, no, then we started the Teenage Wilder Rocket. And our guitar player couldn't do a tour. And Cody wanted to do the tours. And he did it and liked it and joined up. And here we are as a four-piece enjoying life in music. I don't know. That's fair enough. It's better than most people. Yes, you do know. It's confidence. I need to believe in myself right now. You guys being twins, you guys ever think of doing just a gimmick or a circus act instead of being?
Somewhere you like magic? Well, Nelson already took care of that, so we don't want to come come. Don't print that we're twins. We don't want to be pinching on ourselves like Nelson did. All those famous twins acts. You guys don't want to go down like that? No. You can say we're twins. No, we never thought about doing any special twin thing. Except for make out with each other's girlfriends. What about evil twins? No, that's true. Are you kidding me? Is that true? When I was in junior high, I was making out with this girl in my closet. And then I took my... It was in the bathroom. Oh, it was the bathroom. Well, you should just let me say the closet. It doesn't really matter where it was. That's kind of gross. The bathroom?
Well, you don't have too many places to go when you're 12 years old. Yeah, that's true. When you're in junior high, you make out in the closet or the bathroom, damn it. Anyway, he gave me a t-shirt and I got some... Anyways, so I put it... I said, hold on a second. I left and I gave Ray my t-shirt. Then he came in and he made out with her. And then we talked about it later and giggled a lot. Did she ever find out? I'm not sure. She cared. I think she knew the whole time. She secretly had a crush on me. That's a good theory to roll with. That she just really wanted to be with you. She had to go through him to get to you. It might be funny. I think it is. I'm amused. I've been drinking, so I don't know if I'm a good barometer to go by that.
We'll say it's funny. So, real quick, you guys got Cody. Is that the name? Yeah. From Lillington. Were you guys at all worried about taking somebody from who'd already been in a previously established band? I'm all worried that he'd come in and kind of take over and be like, well, this is how I used to run things. Or was it pretty natural? We've been buddies for a long time. Like Brandon said, our bands both play together and stuff. And after the Lillingtons quit doing stuff, Brandon and I kept talking on the phone. I don't know. We were always really good friends and stuff. And they asked me if I wanted to play some tunes with them. And I was, like, stoked, so. That's awesome. Well, that's one side of the story.
That's exactly how it was. We were always, like. There was no worry. Just excitement. Yeah, Lillingtons were always my favorite band. Just being, when you're in Wyoming, there's not many bands together. Bands kind of happened in generations. And we were, well, you know, we were, like, the same, from the same era. Yeah, yeah. And we, uh. We're getting up there. With someone like, hey, man, I need help. We need a drummer. We want to demo some songs. I would drive my drums up there and help them out. And then we played in another band together called Sack. And every time we would record a song, we would send it to each other and talk about it and get excited about it. So having Cody in the band was more like having my triplet join the band.
It was just a natural process, really. Did you just say having your triplet join the band? Well, hey, he's family. We're all family. Hey, I don't know. What? I'm just trying to be clever or I'll stop. Well, you are from. No, he's doing good. He's doing good. You are from Wyoming. It is possible that everybody's family. It is kind of like a side niche scene, I guess, with people that actually stuck it out 10 years ago. No one's left in Wyoming that played in bands. Except for the Lillingtons and us. We're here now. The whole time. It's from that time. Three Quarter Nelson from Rock Springs. Are there any other fucking bands in Wyoming? Like, you look at Wikipedia and it's got Wyoming bands. It's literally Teenage Bottle Workout and Lillingtons.
There's a band called That Guy that's really good. Is that as far as it goes? Like three bands? Looker. Yeah, Looker. Let's name drop Looker. And then that's it. Give us a lot. That's weird. You know, the Wyoming. The Wyoming. There's shows all the time there. And there's a lot of bands there. We were fortunate enough to play 56 shows last year. And one of them was in Wyoming. So. How many, like, how many all-age venues are there, like, in the Wyoming area? I put shows on in my basement. Don't tell. I shouldn't say that. But, you know. Anybody can play there. Anybody can play. No, when we, when I, when we have a band that helps us out on. Are you there, O7? That's Toby in the background.
Well, you know, when we're on the road and a band will help us out and they're from a certain area of the states or anywhere and they come and they, well, we're on tour and they help us out and when they roll through Wyoming, I help them out. And if there's not all-ages venue at the time, then I put the Sean in my basement. You know, I put out a lot of gigs in my time, I guess. No, I don't. But, yeah. Yeah, so Wyoming, Wyoming's good. There's music there. I mean, we're always. A&R guys are here. No, there's good. A&R guys. Contracts. That's a great time. It's a great time. We have this, we have this rehearsed thing we say about being from Wyoming and playing music. Good music is good music no matter where you live.
No matter what state you're from. Yeah. But it's got, like, okay, what? I guess, like, you know, you can move to L.A. or something to, like, make it big, but we're really just riding the wave we caught. But there's no. Having fun with it. If you can make it in Wyoming, you can probably fucking make it anywhere in the world. So, you know, it's good testing grounds. Only the strong make it out. But, like, what? I was just thinking about this on the card right now. What is Wyoming known for? Like, you know, Nevada's known for prostitution and gambling. Like, North Dakota's known for, like, corn and shit. What's, what's, what's in Wyoming? I don't know. Cowboys. Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney. Yeah! You don't. I do not want to advertise that.
I was like saying the only president from California was Ronald Reagan. Wyoming's known for that building that Richard Dreyfuss was carving out of, not a building, that. Devil's Tower. There you go. Richard Dreyfuss with the mashed potatoes. We're known for that. That was in Close Encounters? Yeah. Close Encounters. And also, Starship Troopers, fortunately, was, uh... Brokeback! Was filmed. Brokeback Mountain. Brokeback Mountain was filmed in Canada. Brokeback Mountain. We're famous for Brokeback Mountain now. That's the newest, that's the newest hit of Wyoming. There's... Brokeback Mountain. There, there, there... We live in Wyoming. We don't know what people think about it. I live it. Oh shit, that's the tagline for the entire interview.
We're keeping that one. Take a quick little break right there in our interview. Let you guys catch your breath. Enjoy a little more music. If you haven't guessed or we haven't mentioned it, everyone was drinking when this interview was occurring. So, uh, if it's less than understandable, we apologize in advance, but it's not our fault. There was beer. It was a Friday night. There was music. Maybe there was some dude-on-dude touching. I don't know. I'm not allowed to comment on that. But, uh, we apologize if there's any problems with the interview. Anything's incomprehensible. But, uh, before we jump back into the interview, we are going to play another track off of the Teenage, they're not the, just Teenage Bottle Rockets, Red Scare debut total.
We're going to play the track Go Away. And be sure to stay tuned all the way to the end when we'll tell you how to enter a contest to get free shit. So check it out.
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Uh, train of thought. All right, so, I was, uh, MapQuest-ing it, because I, my job sucks. Um, so Laramie's, uh, according to MapQuest, 1,125.11 miles from San Francisco. How do you guys hook up with Red Scare? That was a population. I will take this one. I'll take it. Field it. We played Gilman Street with Tri-Failing, and Ken and Me U showed up and got a copy of our, the CD-R that was a compilation of all our vinyl. Ken and Me U and Davy Jones. David Jones, Ken and Me U. They, uh, they gave the CD, um, Ken and Me U worked at, Ken worked at Fat, brought the CD to, um, Toby. The score?
Don't worry, Fat. And it's because we played with Tri-Failing at Gilman. It's all because of that.
We decided we wanted to have you guys. Well, we played Gilman, we gave a CD to a guy, they gave a CD to Toby, and then he emailed us. Well, there you go. And it has nothing to do with the fact that you're not marketable, because you're all very attracted. Thank you. I think that, that's, that's a compliment. Well, listen, we got signed before MySpace, so he can look at us. Yeah! We're bigger than MySpace! Yeah. Was that Toby from the bathroom who just shouted, we're bigger than MySpace? And he threw toilet paper. And he threw toilet paper over. So, Toby's been dragging, hasn't he? Yes, he has. Like, since, like, three in the afternoon, I have a feeling. We should roll another, uh, move it. I'm on it. Anyhow, um, as we proceed with the interview, um, so your guys' album, the recent one, Total, has been getting a lot of, like, notoriety.
And some people, it's even been on the Best of 2005 list. Have you guys been keeping track of that? Thank you. Does it even affect you, or is it just kind of, do you guys see it and it's kind of nice to get recognized, finally? Yeah, it is nice to get recognized. Go ahead, Brian.
All three of us. Maybe you should point to, like, one of us, like, you answer this question. I assume, because you guys have done this more than I have. All right. The recognition's great, and, uh... When someone says something nice, Toby will say, I am it, we I am together. Oh. And... You guys have the internet in Wyoming? We just got it a couple weeks ago. That's huge. We're catching on. No, he'll I am it, and I'll go, and I'll read it. When we get on people's, when we get on people's favorites of 2005 lists, and when we, uh, when people say nice things, it's, it's always good to read it. It's fairly easy to stick out and punk rock those days, I think. Yeah. And, uh... I don't know. It's great. It's great to not be able...
It's good, it's nice for us to be able to take, not take, not book a tour for granted. Yeah. Because, you know, all the work that goes into booking a tour, now we just get to sit on our ass and go on tour. And somebody else books a tour, and you just, you just show up and play. That's awesome, and then... But who knows, we'll probably be booking our next tours. Yeah. We don't have a booking agent, but we, we always piggyback onto these tours, though. You're just like, who wants to take us on tour? Somebody does. Well, no, we went, we went, we went on tour. Oh!
Something just fell. It's alright. We went on tour in Europe, and that was booked by a guy, and then we went on tour with Goober Goolies, and that was booked by a dude. And then we went on tour with the Epoxies, and that was booked by a girl. There you go. Now, this is, this is like your, what, second real tour? Someone that wasn't us. Like, second real tour, like, that you've been on tour? Oh, they're all real. Well, like, full size. Have you ever been, you have to go with them. God damn it, it's not little!
It's cold, it's cold, it's alright. This is our third, I'd say this is our third major. Third full size, like major. Well, this is our third one that was more than two weeks. The first time we played in San Francisco, there was like 15 people at the show, and we played with, we played with Riot of Go-Go, and Sputterdoll, and they were really cool to help get us on the show. We were really excited to come out here and play, and we were, we drove all the way from Wyoming to play a show in front of 15 people, and then like the next year we were playing with Dead to Me at the bottom of the hill, in front of like 300 people, so that's, that was cool. That's gotta be a pretty fun progression, like to go to each town and each time see more people show up.
So, like, is this probably the biggest one that you've been on through San Francisco, or? I think Slams with Mr. T Experience. Yeah, that's probably the biggest one. That was, I think it was 550 people, or 500 people, I'm not sure of the exact number. You guys ever get like nervous about it, or is it just like a 5 people, 15,000? I was nervous at the Ben Demi show, the first show at the bottom of the hill. Oh yeah. And, uh, I always get nervous. Oh. Any particular reason, or just here? Um, well, recently the reason is because I switched to guitar, and just getting used to it, but, uh. You used to play bass. Ah. Yeah, I play bass. Just recently switched to guitar. Second show, tonight. Seriously? Mm-hmm. Wow. So, that's the recent cause of nervousness.
He didn't fuck up, so, I mean, I didn't notice, so it sounded good to me. You must be, you must be deaf. Which you don't know. I've been drinking, so it's totally okay either or. Let's say hi to our new bass player, Miguel. Hi.
That was totally anticlimactic. Like, you needed to bust out over the top. There we go. Hold on. I don't have anything else. Oh. It's okay. I told Miguel he couldn't participate in the interview. I told him to shut the fuck up and do what you're told. He asked, and you just, you fucking just hit him in the eye. You were having none of it. I was like, man, love. Okay. What is this? I was going with some of this. Okay. The song, I guess we kind of already covered this. I was asking you guys about, I was going to ask you about Bloodbath at Burger King and asked if anyone in the band actually ever worked at Burger King. Has anyone ever worked at Burger King? Negative. I worked at Taco John's. Yeah. We've worked at a number of fast food restaurants, including Taco John's Pizza Hut, McDonald's.
Burger King just flowed off the tongue a little better than like Bloodbath at Pizza Hut or something. Yeah. Bloodbath at Pizza Hut. Fuck. I think he just re-named it. There it is. Yeah. Yeah. We've got to re-record it. I get Royal Keys. What about the Burger King was like, I don't, like when you go into fast food places and you see some lady like giving the help shit, you know? Yeah. It's like, that's basically what it's about. Like a fucking justice for people that work shitty jobs. There, there's a fucking lot of it. Has there ever been like one instance, cause you're talking about like you worked at Taco John's and fucking. There's one instance, like when we were, like when the Lillingtons were on tour, we saw this lady asking these people at McDonald's how many French fries were in a large.
What? They actually had to fucking count them for her. And that was, that was a lot of the influence for that. Watching that, did you just want to hit her? Yeah, yeah, you totally did. You just wanted to go over and fucking smack her in the head. There's a scoop full in each fucking carton and that's all you get. And just fucking hit her. Yeah. Like, I mean, are you really worried about like the, the fucking, I don't know, the deal that you're getting on these, on these French fries? Yeah, unfortunately. They're kind of, they get treated pretty low on the rung of society, but yeah, so it is. I actually have a question for you. The Lillingtons recently, I guess, regrouped, reformed. How'd that go? Well, we're going to do another record.
Do another, you don't know if there's going to be anything else. That's as far as it goes. That's as far as it goes, so. You don't want, you don't want to put anything else in stone. Well, you don't count on anything, so we, we just, we're going to do a record and that's it. That's cool. Are you guys excited? Is this a Lillingtons interview or is this a Bottle Rocket interview? It's a Bottle Rocket. Okay, okay, all right, let's, on with the show. So how do the Lillingtons feel about, well, no, I'm fine. How do you feel about the Bottle Rockets? You guys got any plans for recording or anything in the future? We do have plans to record the future. The next step is to record the following, but right now we only have six songs written.
Oh, I'm shaking this around. It's all right. Um, yeah, we only have six songs written at this point, but we're going to take our time and make sure the record rules. Are you guys looking to put it out on Red Scare? Have you had other people approach you since then? We have had other people approach us, but we're going to put it out on Red Scare. And is that because, uh, Toby threatened you with violence? No, no, no. Toby put, Toby went out, Toby put, uh, went, when, uh, you know, he went out on a limb to sign our band and he was the first one to do that, so he's the one that we're going to stick with because we're happy right now. That's cool. We're doing everything we wanted to do with, uh, punk rock right now, so.
That's cool. Red Scare's an awesome label. Yeah, it's like. We're totally at home and it's, the coolest part about it is that we're really good friends with Toby and that's what it's all based upon for us and it's great. That's cool. We're definitely releasing the next record on Red Scare. Excellent. Well, I'm really excited for that. Oh, yeah. Thinking about it. You guys, I was reading a lot of shit, uh, trying to prepare for the interview. I don't think I did too well, but, um, a lot of the stuff labels you guys is like Ramones core, like Weasel core and how do you feel like, does it bother you at all that you just can't be called your own type of music that everyone has to kind of like label you in some way like that?
No, it doesn't bother us at all. We love the Screech and Weasel and we love the Ramones and that's exactly what we want, the type of music we want to play and that's why we sound like that because that's what we want to sound like and. It's what we like. That's, yeah, so we don't, we're not offended by that at all. That's cool. It's a compliment to us for anyone that said, compared to Screech and Weasel or the Ramones. Definitely. That's cool. Would you, uh, actually, I don't think, uh, Ben Weasel's, he's doing something with the guy, one of the guys from some big name band. All American Rejects? All American Rejects. There we go. So, I would ask if you'd play with Screech and Weasel, but they don't have any slants.
This band, Homeless Wonders, played in Oklahoma City, like in the late 90s and, um, we played with this band called Mr. Crispy and I guess they went on to be All American Rejects, so that's kind of weird. Are you, really? You guys ever call them up and you're like, dude, we played with you when you were Mr. Crispy? I don't know. You ever got, just call in a favor, dude. No, I don't know, I don't have his number. Just contact their PR guy and be like, listen, we played with them when they were Mr. Crispy, back in the day, now they're famous, just give us a tour bus. That's all we ask. I think that, I think that'd work. No? I think that'd work. That's, that's why I, that's why I do a podcast of 40 people every week, because I think that idea would work.
We let Toby beg other bands and other labels to take it, do any favors for us. We don't lose the face Toby does, the Lolo. Is that why you guys are sticking with Red Scare, because Toby will do anything? He has no personal pride. Well, he does got a lot of experience with the label. He has, he has no shame. He has a lot of experience for like, sucking up to people for free shit. Yeah. Well. What? I just met him tonight, and if he ever hears this, he's going to be so pissed. Sucking up to people for free shit. He was so nice to me, and now he's going to be like, fuck that guy. Did he leave? I don't know where Toby went. I don't know. This whole thing's kind of degenerated very quickly, so we're going to. It's okay.
No. He's going good. This is good. I like it. The last time we got interviewed at the same time, it was a disaster. No, I think this is. Everyone was all worried about what you were going to say, and at this point, I think it's. Don't worry. This is. We're really just riding the wave we caught with our band, and having fun with it, so. This is all bullshit, so don't worry. It sucks. It's nice to have a relaxed environment. There you go. You're going to interview. Hey, go to myspace.com forward slash that guy. That guy? Oh, no, no, forward slash that guy sucks. Who is that guy sucks? It's a band from Laramie. Ah. Yeah. Well, there we go. All right. Oh, that was that guy that you mentioned earlier. All right. Well, we're going to wrap this up, so do you guys have any plugs?
Do you guys want to push websites, anything like that? Do you guys know if you have a website?
TeenageBotterRocket.com. Yeah.
Did you just push Bang Bus? You've seen Bang Bus, haven't you? Yeah. I live with my girlfriend, and she's totally going to kick my ass. Well, but I push Bang Bus. All right, so TeenageBotterRocket supports Bang Bus. It's good to know. There's nothing wrong. I'll scratch that from, yeah. Can you erase what you're recording in your cassette? We got an A-track. Don't worry. It's good. No one will hear. All right, so I want to thank you guys so much for taking the time to talk to us, and have a good rest of the tour. I like your magazines, Austin. I'm glad. I hope this. Hi. Hello? All right. I'm glad to do an interview. Interviewing. Can we interview Maximum Rock and Roll now? Are we interviewing? If we were Maximum Rock and Roll.
If we were Maximum Rock and Roll. Do you have any, who's your favorite columnist? I've never read Maximum Rock and Roll. What is this for? It's for podcasts. What do you, who are you? Who are you? How did you get in here? I like Georgetown. All right, so that is the disintegration and slow plummet of our interview there with Teenage Bottle Rocket. Like I said, booze was involved, so we apologize if it was incoherent and just kind of fell apart into shambles there at the end. But that's how we like to get things done. So, like I said, we have a contest again this week with Teenage Bottle Rocket. It's actually being run by Toby from Red Scare. So, if you guys want to enter, here's what you're going to do. You're going to send us at SoundSceneRevolution at gmail.com.
That's our website. Get your pertinent information. That means your name, your address, your age, photos of attractive women, panty size. If you're a guy, you've got to figure out your panty size. But no, just at least send us your name, hopefully your address. Give us your email address. We should get that when you email us. And make sure you put Teenage Bottle Rocket Contest in the subject line. What you are going to win in this contest is, I believe we agreed with Toby from Red Scare on two people at random are going to be picked. And Toby's going to send you some Red Scare shit. So, it may be a really cool prize package with lots of CDs and t-shirts and hats and fucking Muppet dolls and stuff. And it may just be photos of Toby, which would be fucking terrible because he is a hideous bastard of a human being.
But he looks like Ronald McDonald and the Crypt Keeper if they had a child. It's fucking horrid. But, so Toby will hook you guys up with a prize package. We'll let him know who wins. So, again, send us name, information at soundscenerevolution.com or soundscenerevolution at gmail.com. Again, the subject line Teenage Bottle Rocket Contest. And we're going to play one last track off of Teenage Bottle Rocket's debut on Red Scare. The album is Total. The track is number 12 and it is called A Bomb. So, check it out. Be sure to enter the contest. Thanks for listening. And we'll see you guys next week. Hi, this is Brendan from That Guy. You're listening to Sound Scene Revolution. That's an hour. Thank you.
