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| | It's not easy being a touring band. Fireworks knows that. But somewhere in between their set on the Ernie Ball stage and a sunset playing backdrop to the end of another day at Warped Tour, I caught up with vocalist Dave Mackinder and guitarist Chris Mojan on what could pretty much be considered a home show for the band. We talk about how long it's been since they've played at home, pop music and wanting to play a release show for the recent vinyl press of the band's EP We Are Everywhere.
Photos by Brittani Ericksen
If you could just for the record introduce yourself and say what you do in Fireworks.
Chris Mojan: My name is Chris and I play guitar.
Dave Mackinder: My name is Dave and I sing.
You guys are currently on the Vans Warped Tour playing on the Ernie Ball stage, can you tell us a little bit about how this tour has been following the tour you guys just did with Set Your Goals?
Chris: I mean Warped Tour is Warped Tour, everybody goes whether they want to or not. In that aspect it’s great. We’re stoked to be playing and finally be a part of it. The stage has been treating us great, everyone has been awesome. Everyone who has came out has been great. I know there’s a shitload of bands playing at the same time. Always. Today was New Found Glory, Title Fight, Into It. Over It., us at the same time.
Dave: That’s rough.
Chris: Being able to play to kids and have a good time is awesome and that’s what makes Warped Tour.
When I talked to A Loss For Words earlier, they had to practically play at the same time as Four Year Strong.
Dave: You can’t really prevent it.
Chris: Some days it works out for us, sometimes it doesn’t. Every band will be screwed a lot [laughs].
It’s been a little while since you last played in Michigan. I believe the last time was December.
Dave: It’s been a minute for sure. I’m trying to think of it...
Chris: Christmas.
Dave: The Christmas show. It’s been that long? Really?
Does it feel like it has been that long since you played this close to home?
Chris: It definitely...
Dave: Definitely has. At this point with writing and stuff and this tour. It always feels like we’ve always been busy, which is really not this busy when it comes to shows and stuff.
Chris: One thing about being in a band is you always look to what you do next. Before you know it, it just keeps going.
Dave: Then it’s, oh, we haven’t played here in a little while.
Chris: Earlier in the year we were focusing on doing South by Southwest and those tours and such. Soundwave. It was definitely like, what’s next? What’s next? And now it’s Warped Tour in Detroit. I was saying that when we were playing today, like man we have not played here in a long time. Also a lot of the aspects of the business side of tours preventing you from playing in certain areas. We would have loved to do a We Are Everywhere [show] since we re-did the vinyl. We wanted to do a release show for it and play it all the way through and do all this cool stuff. But we couldn’t do it because of the radius clause.
You guys have spoken a bit lately on the idea of not touring like crazy, do you feel like there is this unneeded pressure from bands touring a lot to do that, as opposed to making people wait to where they want to see you more?
Chris: I think that’s good. As much as it’s an asshole thing to do. People should be wanting to see us, and I’m not saying people feel this way about our band. But in general people should be wanting to see a band. Like oh I haven’t seen them in awhile I want to see them. I always believe in not wanting to wear yourself thin. I grew up seeing some bands five times a year and by the fourth time I was like... [shrugs] alright. Not that I’m saying your band is bad, but if you’ve got shit to release...
Dave: As a showgoer, there’s so many perspectives they don’t consider. They want you to come back, and there’s a reason they see you because they like your music. So my favorite bands, I like when they go on a temporary hiatus, for better words, just so they can focus on that and writing the very best record they can and they can get excited again and crave them to come three times or four times out of the year.
Chris: Friends’ bands and stuff, they tour a lot. But they understand our view sometimes of wanting to spend more time with the songs instead of doing everything that comes our way. Everyone who likes our band is awesome enough to be patient with us. It is hard to tour sometimes. We haven’t been able to play in certain cities since April. That’s also kind of attributed to it.
The last time you guys played on a touring bill here you played a very Gospel heavy set. How would you say that has kind of played into the set you’ve been playing on Warped?
Dave: On this, it’s limited anyway. We’re trying to have a good balance of all our releases so far. We still want to push Gospel. It’s still new.
Chris: Still our favorite songs to play too.
Dave: We feel most attached to those ones. But we’ve tried to consider we have other songs.
With the musical changes you guys made on that record do they still feel very fresh and gratifying that you made them?
Chris: Oh yeah. The new ones that we choose to play, I feel great about everything still, which I think is a good sign. There’s some older songs where, it’s fun, don’t get me wrong, but I’m kind of like ‘Man, I can’t believe we did this [laughs].’ It’s kind of funny. I think that’s a good thing. You should be able to relate to that growth that is represented through new songs. It still feels fresh and when you’re a band, it’s the new, exciting things that get you exciting about writing music still. We’ll always kind of hang onto those things.
Is there a particular song that stands out a little more to you guys as far as showing that progression or maybe that you’re a little more proud of?
Dave: That’s a tough one.
Chris: I actually think, even though it was the song we chose to be the single, the song “Arrows” represents the record very well. That song has that different kind of edge to it that we haven’t used before. It was the piano or keyboard... that was a very balanced song on the record. If I was to pick a song I thought stood out on the record more, I’d say “Teeth”. A lot of kids actually don’t like that song because they don’t like slower songs. But those songs are the two that show the most growth or you can call it a different sound.
What influenced the creation of “Oh, Why Can’t We Start Old and Get Younger?”, that song is certainly different not just in your discography but on that record as well? I remember seeing you guys with Polar Bear Club and looking over at their merch table to see them all dancing... anyways, where does that influence manifest itself from?
Chris: We LOVE pop music.
Dave: I won’t deny it, we love pop music. I mean, if something trickles into our writing psyche then so be it. I think there’s no shame in taking influence from songs and making them your own, that’s how songs are written. I think that was just sort of a fun, upbeat song. Polar Bear Club starting making up dances every night, a few nights they went on stage.
Chris: I will say that was a song where it started. Dave had a riff and a melody kind of. And once we started kind of actually writing it and playing it, we all looked at each other like, ‘We gonna do this? Are we gonna do this?’ Fuck it, who cares. I think that that’s a thing about a lot of our songs. If we like it, we’ll play it. The general feel of our band will still show through and you’ll know it’s us.
Dave: Bands need to take risks. They really do.
Chris: Sure, we’ve gotten shit for that song. I don’t care. Even when we recorded with Brian McTernan, that was the first song we worked on. And he’s like, ‘I remember hearing this one, this ‘80s or ‘90s pop-sounding song. You guys wanna run that song over?’ We played it and he said the same thing, ‘We’re gonna do this?’ Yeah. We write what we wanna write. That’s a fun, upbeat song so who cares.
So a very truthful question now, does Detroit still go hardest for “Detroit”?
Dave: I think so yeah. It’s almost like when we play that song, we set the mood. People know what to expect with that song.
Chris: It’s hard to sing the line ‘I love this place unconditionally’, no offense to Kansas, but in like Kansas or Ohio [laughs]. Great places and great shows in those places. It’s relatable here. And that energy... when we play that song at home, in my mind... finally. I feel so good playing this song. Other times it is kind of funny to me. Kids all over the place always enjoy that song, but Detroit still goes hardest for that song.
Dave: Everyone has their own “Detroit”, for sure.
With being on this tour, did you ever throw around the idea of doing the acoustic stage?
Dave: I would love to have done it personally. The opportunity might not arise.
Chris: It’s kind of late in the game now.
Dave: We’re always doing stuff acoustic, I’m always playing guitar.
Chris: I think since we don’t have much of an acoustic past, I think that might have had us overlooked as an option. But Dave plays more acoustic guitar than a lot of people. We would have really liked to do it, or just Dave himself.
Dave: It’s not completely out, it just isn’t out there.
You guys did mention doing some sort of release show for We Are Everywhere, can you talk a bit about the possibility of that still happening?
Chris: I mean, I would love to do it still. I don’t know if people would still care at this point. I would to do even a smaller venue, have it for sale. Play the record through. It wouldn’t hurt to do another home show a couple months after this tour either. |
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Displaying posts 1 - 13 of 13. |
10:18 PM on 07/19/12 | http://tinyurl.com/raichuraichu Gospel is still one of my favorite records, and Why Can't We Start Older is my favorite song off it. If these dudes go poppier I would be pretty stoked. | | |
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10:18 PM on 07/19/12 | I just bought the We Are Everywhere pressing off of eBay based solely on the acoustic 7" that comes with it. I'd love to see more acoustic stuff from them - the subway tracks were solid and "Decline Of A Midwestern Civilization" is incredible. | | |
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06:28 AM on 07/20/12 | We're Still Pioneers is about the catchiest song ever | | |
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06:50 AM on 07/20/12 | Love is easier made than kept! I really love Teeth, but I can understand why "Detroit" - minded listeners wouldn't. I still hope this transition works out well for them in the end. | | |
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07:33 AM on 07/20/12 | Can't wait to see them at Warped next week. Incredible band! | | |
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11:39 AM on 07/20/12 | did you happen to hear if they are recording any new material anytime soon? its been over a year since gospel came out, but it sounds like they are still wanting to play it and push it pretty hard. | | |
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03:44 PM on 07/20/12 | i don't care who the fuck is playing during their....I will be there to watch them at the Columbia MD date! They should be huge! | | |
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03:45 PM on 07/20/12 | I don't give a fuck who is playing during their set. I will be there to watch them at the Columbia MD stop! They should be huge now | | |
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09:29 PM on 07/21/12 | Gospel is still one of my favorite records, and Why Can't We Start Older is my favorite song off it. If these dudes go poppier I would be pretty stoked. |
Totally agree with both statements. | | |
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09:52 PM on 08/02/12 | Imagine Living Like a King Someday met Dave Mackinder in cinci on tuesday while i was working for alt press, suuuuuuch a personable guy and a great musician. | | |
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