INTERVIEW: The Menzingers

By Deanna Archetto

Photo by Daniel Muller

If you’re looking for a solid punk rock album from start to finish put out this decade, the first band I’ll recommend is The Menzingers (for what it’s worth, their album On the Impossible Past was deemed the “Album Of The Year” in 2012 by both Absolutepunk.net and Punknews.org. Punk? Punk.) They actually have the top two now, in my opinion, with Rented World out earlier this year on Epitaph Records. Their commitment to thoroughly well-written and passionate music has gotten from Philadelphia to all around the world and back again numerous times. We caught up with them before their show in Boston on 10/25, and right after their latest trip across the pond.

Allston Pudding: You guys were just in Europe, right?

Tom May (vocalist/guitarist): Yeah we just got home on Sunday actually.

AP: How did that go?

TM: It was fantastic. The Smith Street Band were on tour with us and we brought The Holy Mess from Philadelphia. They live right around the corner from us there. So to have our good friends on tour with us every night and running around like madmen in Denmark was pretty cool. I think like 60 or 70% of the shows were sold out so that was awesome.

AP: On the Impossible Past is one of my favorite albums, and Rented World will probably be up there too once I spin it as much as I’ve spun OTIP. Do you guys feel any pressure or anxiety about following up a record that’s received so much praise?

TM: We don’t actually. We didn’t really consider that until the record came out. Of course, you don’t want people who liked your records before to not like your records now. Or, you don’t want to be playing smaller shows after playing bigger ones. It’s not something that we contemplated but people started asking us that a lot. I don’t know if that made it become a thing or not.
We’re going to start writing for the next record soon. And while that may be an issue, it’s not something that we’ve ever focused on. We’re always trying to move forward.

AP: Before you called I was actually perusing Facebook and saw that you guys just put out a couple new t-shirts that are Halloween-themed and look awesome.

TM: Yeah they’re based off of a music video [for their song “I Don’t Want to Be an Asshole Anymore”] we put out earlier this year.

AP: Are you guys big fans of Halloween or horror films?

TM: I definitely am. I saw this really weird English film, and it is so English and the characters are so English and Scottish that I had to watch it with subtitles. But it’s become my favorite horror movie. It’s called Kill List and it’s fucking awesome. Eric [Keen, bassist]  loves that stuff too, and Joe [Godino, drums]  loves the Chainsaw movies, so he was stoked about that music video we did and the t-shirts.

AP: What do you remember about Halloween growing up?

TM: Halloween was always awesome, especially because I have a lot of siblings and cousins and we lived in a neighborhood with a lot of kids. We’d go around with 20 or 30 of us getting candy and stuff. I liked to save up and go to the Halloween stores and get the grossest-looking mask there. The best one I had was one that had two pieces. You glued it to your bottom jaw so when you’re talking the mask went with it. It was the creepiest thing.
I don’t know if you guys do it up there, but we have something called Mischief Night here which is the day before Halloween, and when you’re a teenager you just kind of go out and break things and steal things and just be a general dickhead. And looking back on that now, I want to punch myself in the face but at the time it was probably one of the most fun things you could do. Y’know, like egging cars.

AP: One of the first songs you put out from Rented World, “In Remission,” has a line in it about Massachusetts. Can you tell me a little about that song?

TM: Greg [Barnett, vocalist/guitarist] wrote the lyrics to that song. But a lot of it speaks to that being the first place we started playing outside of PA in the States, and Norwich [also mentioned in the song] being the first place we played a show overseas a couple years ago. So it’s one of the things that’s memorable about a new experience. There’s a whole new world out there and one of the first places we realized that was in Boston.

AP: Do you have somewhere you always go when you come here?

TM: We used to play a lot of house shows in Allston. We don’t really hangout there that much anymore though. But when we first started playing in Boston, we met a really cool group of people there and we would always stay with them and some of the most epic long nights were in Boston. We’d stay up drinking until 4 or 5 in the morning. There are so many funny stories. Several times the cops came to the shows and arrested people. One time they arrested the kid we were staying with which was awkward. Then we kicked a bottle towards the cops and the cop was like, “Who trowz a fahkin pahty on a Monday night?” in the thickest Boston accent I’d ever heard in my life.

AP: Your songs have a lot of literary references. Are there any you are still looking to work into some lyrics?

TM: I just started reading a lot of Tom Robbins. And since he’s not as well-known or classical, the references I want to make pertaining to his work may not be identified by many people. But those people who do get it will be really stoked.

AP: Do people come up and ask about references in your songs?

TM: Oh totally all the time. The best one was an older song we don’t play live anymore called “Even for an Eggshell.” The title comes from one of the soliloquies in Hamlet. The entire song is actually about Hamlet.

AP: What’s next for The Menzingers?

TM: We haven’t had much time off since we’ve been touring so much. But we’re gonna take the winter off, spend time with our families, and spend some time writing, which is going to be awesome.

 

Catch The Menzingers with fellow PA compadres, Cassavetes and Spraynard, at the Middle East Downstairs on Saturday, October 25th.