Racketeer Jeff Curtis sits down with Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy to discuss From Under The Cork Tree, Superhero powers, and MySpace whores! Let’s see how that went, shall we?
If there’s one thing I’m constantly getting shit for, it’s for being a fan of Fall Out Boy. Now most people classify them as a “kiddie” band, and even the members of FOB tend to do so themselves. One thing that is undeniable though, is their knack for writing perfect songs. From the moment I put “Take This To Your Grave” into my CD player, it rarely leaves from major rotation. The melody and structure of each song is enough to make you tap your feet and want to sing along with Patrick (Stump; vocals, guitar), even if you are out of key. Let’s face it, you probably are.
Apparently, I am not the only one who feels this way; FOB have had well over two million plays on Purevolume.com (the first band to accomplish this feat), and have received an overwhelming response on their tours with acts like Taking Back Sunday, Less Than Jake, and Blink-182, and managed to put Fueled By Ramen (the label that released TTTYG) on the map. Aside from all of this, they remain humbled and grounded. For a band that has basically exploded onto the scene, they keep one thing in mind: they would be nowhere without their fans. Always making sure they play their very best so everyone gets their money’s worth, and always taking the time out to hang with their fans has solidified FOB’s mark in the mainstay and in their fans’ hearts.
FOB formed in 2001 after Peter Wentz decided to leave hardcore act Arma Angelus for something not as serious. He began to write songs with Joseph Trohman, and the rest kind of falls into place. Add charismatic front man Patrick Stump, and Andrew Hurley on drums, and you have the lineup that would launch FOB into stardom. Trying to not take things too seriously, Wentz came up with titles such as “Tell That Mick He Just Made My List of Things To Do Today” (stealing a quote from the immortal Max Fischer in Rushmore) and many sarcastic, tongue in cheek references to his life and the scene today. Shortly afterward, they signed to small upstart label Fueled By Ramen, who had worked with acts such as YellowCard and Less Than Jake.
Here’s the conversation that took place:
Racket: You guys have made the jump to Island Records. How that been going?
Pete: It’s cool. I mean, we’ve kinda seen the machine rolling, but not fully I guess. I think the interesting thing is whenever you’re in a band you can outgrow your label; the band grows just a little faster than the label does. Fueled By Ramen is exploding, but at the same time we’re just a little ahead of them. It’s cool to be at a place where they can harness us and take us further.
R: Did you guys ever expect to be on a major label, especially after such a short timeframe?
Pete: I mean, in a way you see Axl Rose on TV, and you say “Wow, that’d be awesome”, but it’s weird because you never expect it. You are living a fantasy you had when you were ten. So it’s been pretty awesome.
R: How did you guys come up with the title “From Under The Cork Tree” for your Island Records debut?
Pete: Well, have you ever heard the story of Ferdinand before?
R: No, I don’t think I have.
Pete: Well, I don’t want to give too much of the story away too much. My mom used to always read it to me as a kid. There’s this bull in Ferdinand. He is this colossal bull, but he’s just into sitting under trees and smelling flowers all day. Well one day he sits on a bee and gets mad and ferocious. That happens to be the day the matadors come to pick up the bulls. They see him and go wow, that bull is insane, we need to take him. So they take him to the arena, and everyone’s just frightened to death of him. He comes into the ring, and all the matadors run away, but he just sits in middle of the ring and smelling flowers and the air. They realize he’s not going to fight, so they take him back under the tree. That tree is a cork tree… It’s a metaphor for the place we (FOB) are at. It’s like you could be the giant bull, but you don’t have to take part in everything that’s going on. You could live under the cork tree and live out your days I guess…
R: I was reading some of the titles to your songs, and I just kinda wanna know about them…
Pete: Ha Ha, OK.
R: “I Slept With Someone in Fallout Boy and All I Got Was This Stupid Song Written About Me.”
Pete: That’s just a joke really, Ha Ha
R: OK, well what about “I Liked You A Whole Lot Better before You Became A Fucking Myspace Whore.”
Pete: Ha Ha, yeah. That song was recorded, but not put on the record. I hope people get to hear that one soon, though.
R: So what’s the story behind this song title, and the ever-so infamous website?
Pete: I have like four or five Myspace profiles, apparently, but I don’t have even one. Whatever… I don’t really understand MySpace. All I know it’s a lot like baseball cards, except you collect friends.
(Laughter from everyone)
R: Hmm, I never really thought about it like that, but you are right!
Pete: Ha Ha, Yeah.
R: Ok, well back on track… Are there some newer aspects that you may not have touched on with “Take This To Your Grave”? that you have on “From Under The Cork Tree?”
Pete: Yeah, definitely. It’s real fine line to walk. It pisses me off when a band writes an “interesting” second record. It’s annoying when a band decides they no longer like their fan base, so they write records to alienate them. It’s also really frustrating when bands write the same record all over again. It would have been easy to have phoned in and wrote TTTYG all over again, but when we’re on our deathbeds years form now, I don’t think that’s gonna be what matters. It’s hard. You just have to walk a fine line and write the songs that come out of you naturally. So that’s what we did. It’s an expansion. We went into these areas that are kinda dangerous and not necessarily “safe” for FOB songs. On our last record, we tried to write a record where it does not stop. Where people want to listen to every song back-to-back and it’s always on. On this record, we tried to write a record that could change, or even fit your mood. And I think we went for a different thing, kinda within our own choice. At the same time this record is like the commentary on human interaction and interpersonal relationships. If you’re not depressed a little bit, then you’re just not paying attention to what’s going on in the world.
R: Who does the songwriting? What’s your secret to success?
Pete: It’s weird. How we build songs is so different than other bands. We always try to explain it, and it always comes off wrong in interviews. I wrote all the lyrics, and Patrick wrote all the melodies. We kinda do it together. How we do it is, I write these words, and Patrick will find a melody in them, or he’ll write a melody around them. Those initial ways, plus we have a very skeletal idea. We’ll take that idea to the band and everyone will put their input in from there.
R: Tell me about the guests on the record?
Pete: We have our friend William from The Academy Is sing on a song. Our friend Brenden from this band, Panic At The Disco (which everybody should check out), he also sings on a song. All the guys in New Found Glory do backing vocals in a song, and Chad from NFG comes out in a song as well. We had to send the record to Europe for them (NFG) to record it. Then they had to send it back.
R: Have you guys toured overseas yet?
Pete: We have. We’ve been to the UK, Japan… a bunch of places. It’s pretty different over there. In Japan they don’t get as much American bands, and western culture is still breaking over there. They are really excited, and you’re so different from them. It’s like this alien thing, in the sense they are very, very fanatical. It’s cool because even if they can’t speak English, they still sing all your lyrics. England is a different place, music is a different thing over there. It’s interesting because it’s all about the music. Image doesn’t really matter too much over there.
R: You guys have hit the two million play mark on Purevolume.com. How does it feel to be the first band to make this amazing accomplishment?
Pete: It’s pretty bizarre, because it feels like we just hit 1,000,000 yesterday, we were the first band to do that also. I always break bands into a couple categories: industry bands, critic bands, and kid bands. We’ve kinda always fallen into the kid category. Where it’s the kids really like our band, the industry doesn’t care, and critics usually don’t care too much either. I dunno, it’s awesome, it feels really good.
R: Clandestine Industries, your clothing line, is really beginning to take off. Did you ever expect such a reaction from this?
Pete: You know, I didn’t really have any expectations. In FOB, we all quit our jobs to tour and record and do what we do in FOB. And it is important, it’s our lives. At the same time, I wanna do things that are outside of the box that FOB sits in. There’s certain lyrics I could write for FOB that I think aren’t believable, and I think I’d be writing them just to write them. There are things that are cool to me and important to me, that’s kinda where this all fits in. They are things that are beyond FOB kind of.
R: What can we expect from Fallout Boy in the future?
Pete: were headlining all of Warped Tour this summer, then I believe we are heading over to Japan, and to do some festivals in the UK as well.
R: If you were a superhero named Fallout Boy, what would your powers be? (Laughter)
Pete: I’ve actually thought about this a lot (laughs), it’s weird. I think something cool would be when you say something so crazy to someone, that you have the power to just make them wanna die. (Laughs) I think that would be pretty brutal. I dunno, I kinda always thought if there really were people with all these super powers then there would be a lot more super villains than super heroes. People are inherently like, “Oh cool, I can’t get killed so I’m gonna do whatever I want”. So I think FOB would probably be more of a super villain, but I dunno. Maybe.
R: That’s all, thanks for the opportunity to let me pick your brain. Good luck tonight.
Pete: No problem, I had fun.
By Jeff Curtis