Racket Kristen- I’ve heard Four Year Strong is known for using lines from all kinds of movies as their song titles, so in the movie titled Four Year Strong who would play you and what would be the plot?
Four Year Strong Dan- It would probably be a romantic comedy because a lot of romance and comedy goes on in this band. And who would play me? I would have to say John Goodman would have to play me, with a beard of course.
RK- Why John Goodman?
FD- Um, because he’s a big guy and he rules. Everything about him is just awesome.
RK- What’s your favorite movie with John Goodman?
FD- The Big Lebowski, that’s such a great movie. That’s probably my favorite movie, that or Almost Famous, that movie’s sick.
RK- Alright alright, enough about John Goodman. MySpace or Facebook?
FD- I personally have neither, but I understand MySpace more. I don’t really get Facebook, I thought it was just for kids in college. My girlfriend has Facebook and our band has Facebook. I didn’t even know I was on Facebook. So yeah I’d say MySpace- you can’t really lurk on Facebook.
RK- Are you serious? Facebook is like invasion of privacy-type stuff.
FD- Oh really? Well I’m not savvy enough for that.
RK- [Laughs.] If you could add any word to the dictionary what would it be?
FD- Damn, these are deep questions. If I could add any word to the dictionary it would be “todd”. It’s a word we use like “t-o-d-d”- like the name to describe bro dudes. We use it constantly.
RK- Could you give an example, like use it in a sentence or something?
FD- Uhm, yeah kind of like “That dude’s such a todd, like look at that dude.” I don’t know, we call our keyboard player todd, because he’s kind of like a football playing loser. Yeah, todd.
RK- Wow, I might actually have to try out this todd word. What about your favorite curse word, what’s your favorite curse word?
FD- “Fuck,” I use fuck all the time. It’s my go to word, if I can’t think of what to say I just yell “Fuck!” especially on stage. Fuck is a good word.
[FYS’s merch guy Josh joins us]
FD- What’s your favorite curse word?
Josh the merch guy- I’d probably have to say fuck too. I mean, I know it sucks that I have to say the same answer but I think it’s true- fuck is a good word.
FD- Cunt is a good one. Yeah.
Josh the merch guy- I don’t use that one very often.
FD- Neither do I, but its just so to the point.
Random bus passenger- CUNT IS THE BEST SWEAR WORD!
FD- I like foreign swear words. Like what’s a good British curse word?
RK- All I can think of is bloody.
FD- Like I don’t know I just think they sound cool, like wanker or what’s that word… Um, I cant remember it. But yeah, bloody is a good one. They just have really cool words. My mom’s is shit, that’s her favorite curse word. She doesn’t say anything else, just shit.
RK- Gotta love the swear words. So when would you say was the first time you and the band realized you were famous?
FD- I still don’t think we are famous. The first time I realized that we were going places that I didn’t think we would was when we were on Warped Tour and they were like, “Oh you guys are going to do a signing,” and we were like “A signing? No one’s going to show up to our signing.” And there was this giant line. Actually, the real time I thought, “Woah, this is crazy,” was when we did the same thing, but in Japan. There was this giant line like outside the store, and I was like, “Oh what?” I didn’t even know kids knew us there. So yeah that would probably be it, and when I’m just walking around and kids just yell out my name and random facts about me that I don’t think they should know.
RK- So how is it in Japan?
FD- Japan is awesome, it’s really cool, and way different then here. It’s just like different.
RK- Do the kids there know your songs and stuff?
FD- Yeah! And they even sing along, and they know enough to talk to us a little bit. It’s pretty crazy, kids are crazy there. The amount of stage diving and moshing- it’s like Crouching Tiger. We eat a lot of rice out there, and sushi, and what’s that stuff called? Soy sauce. I actually tried raw horse, just like a plate of raw horse. It tasted like raw meat.
RK- Would you go back?
FD- Oh yeah it’s awesome! We will definitely go back. Like the UK, we’ve been there twice and to Australia once, that place was awesome. We haven’t done mainland Europe yet, which we’re going to try and do in fall or spring. I don’t like Connecticut.
RK- Why don’t you like Connecticut?
FD-Connecticut steals from everybody else, there’s like New York- Connecticut, Boston- Connecticut, Cape Cod- Connecticut. I mean I like Connecticut kids and Connecticut shows are cool, I just don’t like the state of Connecticut. There is nothing cool there, it’s like New England’s butt hole. Like name something cool from Connecticut.
RK- I got nothing.
FD- There is NOTHING. And New Jersey smells like shit.
[Laughing throughout the bus.]
RK- So you guys have any new stuff coming out soon?
FD- After this tour were going to try and go into the studio and write some new stuff.
RK- Any ideas yet?
FD- I mean we’ve been working on songs for awhile. I’m pretty happy with some of the stuff we’ve come up with. We don’t have any ideas as far as artwork or names of the CD as far as that stuff goes. We’re kind of a last minute band as far as good ideas go; we come up with all our good ideas last minute. Our best songs are always the songs that are like, “Oh we have to write a song today.”
– Interview by Kristen Waldek
-Photo by Rocky Morgan