Interview & photo by Rachel Jablonski
My American Heart from San Diego, California is a young band in age and in the music business. A group of 17 and 18 year old guys currently out on Warped Tour, their first full length record due out in September, the band is quickly learning the importance of marketing in the world of music. Front man Larry Soliman speaks passionately about the band and their endeavors while guitarist Jeremy Mendez gives his two cents as well during our interview at Warped Tour in Milwaukee, WI.
Rachel: It’s an awesome day out here today on your second day of Warped Tour, what were your impressions of yesterday? How did the first day go?
Larry: Tons and tons of people. What I’ve realized is just like if you’re not out there trying to sell, you’re not going to make any money. The more you promote yourself, the better chance you have for people to come out and see you again after Warped Tour. It’s pretty tough, it’s a little tough.
Rachel: How so?
Larry: Just lugging your equipment around and the heat, but the heat hasn’t been so bad lately. I know when we get down South and we get into July it’s going to be horrible. It’s a good experience, lots of good people on this tour, lots of nice people.
Jeremy: Yeah.
Rachel: Do you have any funny stories from the first day? Did anything exciting happen trying to coordinate the first day?
Larry: We have a bus, I don’t know if this is really that funny… [laugh] No, it’s not that funny, but we have a bus and there’s this bay where we store all our stuff and our manager’s bag happened to be under where the bathroom is and it leaked all over his bag the first day, so he has no clean clothes now. I think it’s pretty funny, I’m sorry. I saw dudes walking around in like small thongs and booty shorts that are really small and see through, it’s pretty awesome. Nothing too funny, not yet.
Rachel: Did the first day go pretty smooth to set up and all that stuff?
Larry: Yeah, there’s like a battle for the best spots though for your merch tents. It’s pretty funny.
Rachel: How do they determine that?
Larry: You’re in charge of where you place your tent so if you know a band sells you might want to go next to them where there are a lot of people that come by so you can give them the whole pitch.
Rachel: Do you actually sit at the tent?
Larry: I actually sit there all day. I mean people don’t like to just see the merch people, they like to see the actual band.
Rachel: Sounds like you’ve got this marketing thing down.
Larry: Pretty much. Gotta be on top of your game.
Rachel: What can we expect from your set at Warped?
Larry: We have a lot of energy and we get complimented a lot on our tightness.
Rachel: How do you maximize your time in the half hour or whatever you get to play?
Larry: Usually our songs are no longer than 4 minutes you know so we have time to play 5 or 6 songs.
Rachel: What’s your main goal on this tour?
Larry: We just recorded a CD with Sal Villanueva, he produced Taking Back Sunday and all of Thursday’s records. We went in with him for a month, month and a half and just recorded our first full length on a label called Warcon - that’s Kevin Lyman’s label, he owns Warped Tour and Concrete Marking so it’s Warped and Concrete put together... Warcon. That’s how they got the name. This summer we just want to promote the hell out of that just so we get ready for September when the album is released.
Rachel: What was your time in the studio like?
Larry: It was a little stressful because it was like changing parts here, changing parts there, actually getting them down to the point where you know you’re not going to mess up, and just doing takes over and over again. It’s the hard part of being in a studio like that.
Rachel: What was it like working with Sal?
Larry: Coming out of it, we are now like ten times better musicians. I mean it’s amazing. He helped us out a lot. He isn’t like “Oh let’s make this a hit, let’s change this part, let’s change that part,” he’s more like he’s trying to make you sound the best that you can be without making too many changes. Little arrangement changes here and there, but I mean he’s great. His creativity is amazing. He’s an awesome producer.
Rachel: What does the new album title, The Meaning in Makeup, mean?
Larry: The whole scene is based on aesthetics and stuff like that and we just want people to know that you don’t have to wear makeup to be beautiful. You don’t have to do things to fit in with the crowd; it’s ok to just be you.
Rachel: How would you describe the album? What were you trying to accomplish most?
Larry: We’ve never recorded a full length before and we’ve never had a huge budget to do anything. We have a single called “The Process” and it’s mainly about just the whole scene in general and how people feel like they have to fit in with everything and they don’t really have to. It’s cool to be yourself.
Rachel: How do you think people feel like they have to fit in?
Larry: That whole teenager thing where they’re like oh my god that person is so beautiful, they hang around with the cool kids, I want to be just like that. And there are people who won’t be your friend if you’re not like that, but who would want to be friends with those people anyway. If I have to look a certain way and you don’t want to be my friend because I don’t look a certain way, fuck you. That’s my attitude on that.
Rachel: Have you had that pressure before?
Larry: Yeah, actually a lot of people have gone through that at least one point in their life, yeah you could say that.
Rachel: You talked about “The Process” and you just shot a video for that, right?
Larry: Yeah we just shot a video. We had a lot of fun.
Rachel: What’s the concept behind the video?
Larry: Well it starts out with a girl. She has all this makeup on, she’s really gorgeous and then it’s showing her as she’s putting the makeup on that it’s actually taking it off. As the video progresses you see shots of her taking her makeup off as she’s putting it on. And at the end she looks in the mirror and she breaks the mirror. The whole “I don’t give a fuck, I don’t care what I look like” ya know? This is who I am and it’s ok. There’s some band performance and stuff on there too.
Rachel: Who’s the girl?
Larry: She lives in San Diego and we found her on My Space. She had experience doing other commercials too so we thought she’s be good for the video.
Rachel: Isn’t it crazy all the connections you make through My Space?
Larry: Oh dude, it’s crazy. We have like 32,000 kids on there, it’s awesome. The thing that sucks about it is that it’s all on a screen.
Rachel: Geoff Rickley of Thursday put some vocals on the new record.
Larry: He sang a verse for us on a song. It’s like 2 minutes long, not long at all, but he did a verse on that.
Rachel: What did that add to the album?
Larry: His voice is awesome, I love his voice.
Rachel: Is there anything else you want to add?
Larry: Thank you, we appreciate it.
Rachel: Thank you very much. Good luck on tour!