After waiting for the band to eat, I got onto Four Year Strong's tour bus and was greeted by Alan, Joe, and Jack. They were watching the Bruins game and just hanging out. It was definitely worth the delay. We were sitting across from each other in the lowly-lit comfy warm bus, just chilling.
I started off asking about the FYS Yourself" feature on their site. A fun interactive ditty where you upload your photo and modify it with Four Year Strong embellishment. Sort of like online paperdolls I suppose…for the tough guys…
Mary Magpie: "What was the idea behind 'FYS yourself'"?
Alan: "I remember we came up with the idea on the subway in New York City. I don't know why."
Joe: "Just for fun."
Alan: "We were just like, you know whatever, talking about stupid ideas with each other. And our manager was there with us and was like 'we should make that happen' and we were like 'yeah, okay'. It was way more of a hit than I thought it was going to be. It's kind of a stupid idea that we came up with."
Touching on the news that Keyboardist Josh Lyford was no longer with the band,. The question of "why' he left was overdone- I wanted to know 'what now'.
MM: "Is your band going to be heading in a different direction since you had a personnel change?"
Alan: "Yeah, I think a little bit."
Joe: "Not wildly."
Alan: "Not wildly a different direction, still Four Year Strong. It really has nothing to do with Josh leaving the band."
MM: "You guys have had a lot of synth players in the past."
Alan: "He was the only real one. Before that we were just trying to find the right person. Then we did find the right person with Josh. It didn't end up working out."
MM: "What was the idea behind the 'It Must Really Suck To Be Four Year Strong Right Now' video?"
Alan: "We were in London for the day and wanted to do it. We said sure why not, sounds like a lot of fun. It was a cool idea to get the fans involved and to get them in the video. And then just have us make an appearance in the end. Which, personally, was sweet. We didn't have to shoot a video all weekend, like all the other videos we've done. We didn't have to work our asses off."
Joe: "That other video was full of spiders, that field was like infested, they'd just go up your socks."
Alan: "And in every other video we've made I get a ridiculous sunburn because it's always outside. And in this, most of the work is done by everyone else. It was great."
"What's the meaning behind the song(title)?"
Alan: "The title doesn't really have much to do with the song. The title actually came from a review that was in AP Magazine about the band Set Your Goals, their new record at the time. It was a great review and they are great friends of ours, great guys. And at the end of their review for their record, the last line was 'So all in all, it must really suck to be Four Year Strong right now.' We just thought it was ridiculous(Joe: that they brought our name up in someone else's review). It was unnecessary. We ended up asking them what the heck it was about and they thought it was funny, we thought it was funny, we just thought it'd be fun to poke fun at it."
FYS is notorious for 'plugging' up and coming bands-I had to know whos next
MM: "What's one band that you think your fans haven't heard of that they should listen to? You always seem to be promoting someone new''
Joe: "They(A Loss For Words) are some of our best friends."
Alan: "We grew up in a scene where you gotta help out the bands that've helped you out."
Joe: "We got helped out a ton by other bands."
Alan: "That's the way it should be. It's not a race or competition."
Joe: "American Verse, Daytrader, Title Fight, Fireworks- fantastic, great friends (are all bands we're listening to)".
FYS is running on tandem tours right now- their own as headliners and part of the Bad Religion tour as first opening band.
MM: "How does it feel adjusting to the shift of being an opening band and then a headliner?"
Alan: "It is pretty weird because we've been playing a whole tour playing in front of thousands of people who have never heard our name before. So that's really fun to do because we hadn't done something like that in a while. And it's fun to go up on stage and have no one care at all who these people are walking on stage, don't care what music they could possibly play. Just waiting for the other bands. But halfway through the show you can see a couple of them bobbing their heads, starting to enjoy it. And it's fun."
Joe: "I almost prefer it."
Alan: "It's satisfying. You're playing the show and you're just like if one of those kids didn't know who we were and they go home and check us out, buy our record, then it was worth it. It was a surprisingly young crowd- it was Rise Against-"
Joe: "Very open"
Alan: "And everyone seems to be really cool and open minded."
Joe: "I was not expecting to go on tour with Bad Religion."
MM: "What's the funniest tour memory you've had?"
Alan: "I don't know… we're pretty boring. We don't do that much crazy stuff."
Joe: "I enjoyed karaoke at Buffalo Wild Wings."
Alan: "That was really funny. We were with Trapped Under Ice, Fireworks, Polar Bear Club, and we went to Buffalo Wild Wings once one night after a show and did karaoke. One of the guys from Trapped Under Ice sang 'Silent Night'. It wasn't anywhere near Christmas but he got really serious and sang the entire song. That was a good time."
MM: "Can you describe yourself in three words?"
Alan: "Handsome, smart, funny."
Joe: "Better. Than. Alan."
MM: "What's one embarrassing or unexpected song on your iPod?"
Alan: "I don't think I'd be embarrassed by anything. I definitely have some Miley Cyrus. Well, actually I don't have an iPod. I lost it. I left it on an airplane. Coming back from Europe. I've got some weird stuff but nothing to be embarrassed about. Music is music."
Four Year Strong- into Miley Cyrus, hockey, and karaoke. Beardcore never seemed so chill.