I have a love/hate relationship with the Alkaline Trio. Everyone who has been regularly reading this blog knows it, but I was inspired to write in response to one of Meghan’s posts. It made me think of exactly how much of a jaded and curmudgeonly old fuck I have become. For me, the Alkaline Trio is a band that I’ll always love, but know that they will never again wow me like they did way back when… Back when I saw them live in early 1997 at the Channing Murray in Urbana, IL (before Dan was even in the band) and bought their 4 song cassette demo (you know, this was before CDR’s). But for as much as I love their early stuff (pre-Derek Grant), I sorta hate what they’ve become and it kinda makes me sad.

I’m in the minority of people that think original drummer Glenn Porter was way more integral to the band’s sound than most give him credit for. It makes me sad that the Alkaline Trio has basically sucked since Derek joined the band with the exception of “Jaked On Green Beers” and their recent cover of Tegan & Sara’s “Wake Up Exhausted.” I hate to be that guy who says “I only like their old stuff,” but my favorite Trio releases are (without question) the For Your Lungs Only EP and Goddamnit. They may also be my wife’s favorite band ever, probably. I mean, she even has a tattoo of the Alkaline Trio skull/heart logo.

So yeah. That’s my take on the Alkaline Trio today, but right below here, is an interview (or more like a conversation transcribed word for word) that Amy and I did with the Trio back in 1998 for our zine More Than Corn, that shows a much different side of the band; a band that didn’t think they were going to be superstars. We did the interview in Joe’s (I can’t remember his last name) bathroom after they played at the IDF in Champaign, IL. Amazingly, I haven’t ever re-published it here, so, enjoy.

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Matt Skiba (MS): I’ll be right with you Dr. Jack Kevorkian…
More Than Corn (MTC): What do you think about what’s going down with Jack Kevorkian?
MS: I think Jack Kevorkian is at the forefront of something pretty incredible & if you listen to him speak, he’s a total humanist. He’s a very understanding man. I think that guy has more understanding of death than most people even want to know about. He’s a Samaritan. People want to die. People can’t bring themselves to kill themselves & they’re just in such miserable pain. This guy offers them an option. I mean, there’s certain situations where I wouldn’t want to live. I really respect Jack Kevorkian.
(knock knock knock at the bathroom door…)
Glenn Porter (GP): Hey dudes!
MS: Hey dude.
MTC: Oh, come in & sit in the tub.
GP: What the hell’s going on in here?
Dan Andriano (DA): We’re doing an interview.
MS: Come on in brother.
MTC: Are you guys fucked up right now?
MS: Is that the first question?
MTC: Mmhhmm.
MS: A little bit. We’re not all the way there, we’re holding ourselves together.
GP: Fiddy percent.
DA: I don’t get fucked up.
MS: Danny doesn’t get fucked up. Danny’s a Mormon.
GP: He recently discovered the straight edge movement.
MS: Danny kind of fell a little short of punk rock heritage & he just found out about this band called Minor Threat. He’s really into Earth Crisis.
GP: Danny, put that Budweiser down!
(Danny starts chugging his Bud.)
MS: Danny, NO! He said NOT to drink. Danny’s still trying to understand the concept of straight edge.
MTC: I’m straight edge… between drinks.
MS: I’m straight edge from the time I fall asleep until the time I wake up.
DA: That’s cheesy.
MTC: Why [the name] Alkaline Trio? Is there any meaning behind it?
MS: We don’t have a strong meaning behind our name. Me, Glenn, and our old bass player, Rob, wanted to think of a name that we wouldn’t have to deal with the problem of naming a band and then hearing of another band called the same thing and having to rename the band. We wanted to stay a three piece and wanted to stay away from monosyllabic names. It’s like you pick a cool word, you name your band that, and six months later, before anyone’s ever heard of you, there’s like three other bands named that. So, we wanted to be called the “something” trio, so we opened up a dictionary and got to like the third page into “A” in Webster’s, found alkaline and that pretty much settled it.
DA: I wanted something a little more emo sounding like October Never Cries.
MS: Danny was thinking something like Picnic In October and we were like, “Noooo, not Picnic In October!”
DA: How about Tears Of A Young Boy…
GP: I wanted it to be Big Johnson…
MS: And I was like, “Glenn, there’s shirts that say big johnson,” and he was like, “Ohhh fuck.”
MS: We went through all these things, No Fear, Big Johnson, Co-ed Naked Punk Rock Show, N Sync Trio…
DA: …Bad Boy Trio, Backstreet Boy Trio, New Kids On The Trio.
MTC: So you must like Britney spears then?
MS: We did the Britney Spears Trio…
DA: Her & I had a falling out recently so we haven’t spoken.
MS: She told us she was never going to sell out & then she went on the cover of Rolling Stone. We were pissed.
MTC: Is that why she wants you to “hit her one more time?”
DA: I’d hit her and hit her again.
MTC: So she keeps saying, “Dan, hit me one more time?”
MS: That fuckin’ Britney Spears is going to learn a lesson and she’s going to learn it good!
DA: I gave her all I had and I just couldn’t do it anymore.
MS: Danny just couldn’t hit her where she wanted to be hit I guess.
MTC: Where did you guys record [the new EP] at?
MS: Atlas Studios in Chicago. We recorded our original EP, then our Goddamnit record & we just recorded an EP called I Lied My Face Off which will be out in late June. Glenn wanted to call the new record Fluffy Bunnies but I wrestled him right out of that shit. Danny wanted to call it Screwdriver Again and I was like, “No,” and wrestled him out of that. “I Lied My Face Off” is a song that Danny wrote and it had a good ring to it.
MTC: The new songs are really good.
MS: Thank you. We’re really proud of them.
GP: They’re all about arm wrestling.
MTC: How do you guys feel about the war in Kosovo?
MS: It’s ridiculous.
MTC: OK. How about some funny tour stories.
MS: The funniest tour story that I can ever recollect [is when] we were somewhere in the south touring with the Blue Meanies. It didn’t involve all the members of the Blue Meanies but I was told they didn’t mind if we mentioned their names.
DA: They ate the fucking bible and threw it against the wall and then threw it in the toilet.
MS: They ate the bible.
DA: It’s ritualistic.
MS: I had sunburn worse than anyone’s ever seen sunburn. We went to Mardi Gras and we all stayed up until like eight in the morning and I fell asleep on the banks of the Mississippi and got fried [with] third degree burns all over my face. So the next night, we’re sharing adjoining hotel rooms with the Blue Meanies and I put this diaper rash cream on my face. My face was just burning. It was so deeply red and purple that I left space to make it look like Gene Simmons face make-up. Me and Joe dressed up like KISS. Instead of painting black, I just left my natural skin tone as the star eyes and the lips. It was so badly burned that it looked black. So, I’m running around showing off my rad Gene Simmons face paint and I walked into the Blue Meanies room and because it was Sunday evening, they were reciting hymnals from the bible, ripping out the page, shoving it in their mouth, and swallowing it. They each took turns and by the end of this religious excursion, the bible ended up in the toilet. That was probably the highlight of everything.
(Andy Pishko enters the croweded bathroom)
MTC: Wasn’t it scary?
MS: Well, me and Danny basically sat them down and said, “You guys really need to learn the way of the lord.”
DA: Are you guys familiar with the teachings of our lord Jesus Christ?
MS: And we sat down and talked to them about Jesus for a while but they just took their clothes off and peed on us. We pretty much just gave up and went to bed afterward.
DA: I was bummed cuz I love Jesus.
Andy Pishko (AP): Are you guys religious? Do you love Jesus in a physical sense?
DA: Uh, we try… I’d fuck him. Who else has fucked Jesus? I’d pop his cherry. See, you have to do things like this to guarantee your entrance into hell.
MS: I don’t really hold a lot of heart in organized religion at all. I think what Jesus Christ represents is a really beautiful thing. I think on a very basic level, treating people the way you want to be treated is my ideal philosophy. I think that organized religion has caused a lot more war & pain than anything. I don’t hold a lot of solace in Christianity or catholicism or anything like that. I think it’s almost insulting to put a name on it, not to speak for anyone else, to me, my spirituality is important enough that I don’t want to put a name on it, I don’t want to say that I understand some foreign, ancient history as to be the way my life should be run. I respect the life of Christ & understand that it existed historically. It’s a fact. What he stood for is an amazing thing. How much he was the son of god or how much he parted water into two pieces is beyond me.
DA: Well, Moses kind of did that.
MS: Well, Moses was really into black metal [and] that was the problem. Moses was into a lot of Venom. Jesus was more of a Mercyful Fate guy. They were just like, it should be a civil thing, like, “OK we can both like these different bands,” but Jesus was like, “Fuck no dude. Venom sucks!” They had all kinds of problems. We see this. We just choose to find our own religion.
MTC: Do you guys have any theories?
DA: I have a theory that Matt was put on this earth to rock the shit out of everyone else.
MS: We fuck around with religion but, honestly, I think that if you have religion and it can get you through your day and you’re not hurting anyone or negatively influencing people, it’s a beautiful thing. I’m not a religious person, I would consider myself more of a spiritual person. I think that if people that have religion on a very simplistic spiritual level it’s a really cool thing.
MTC: To each his own.
MS: Exactly! Whatever blows your hair back, whatever gets you through your day, whether it be booze or church, whatever. My religion exists in the present, all of us being alive and sharing time. I think it’s alright to be scared and unsure. People want to believe in religion and feel that this is the answer. I tried to do that, I investigated the shit out of Christianity and wanted to believe in it and I want it to be true but if I really think long and hard about it, I know it’s not. It’s just not realistic. I don’t have any definition or any supreme security of my existence. It’s more a celebration of being alive and being with my friends and playing music with my friends and being around people that I love and just feeling blessed that I have a life, wherever it came from, if it came from god or the devil or whatever the fuck it is. I don’t believe in that but if it’s true, I don’t fuckin’ know. Nobody is ever going to be able to figure it out, you just gotta have a good time and treat people the way you want to be treated. I just firmly believe if you do the right thing, the right thing will happen to you. You’re not going to have any supreme explanation for it. nobody knows anything. I guess that’s my theory.
DA: I have no theory.
MS: I’m gonna get a beer. I gotta pee so bad you’re gonna have to leave.
DA: I want to know what Andy Pishko thinks.
AP: I don’t think much of anything.
MTC: When are you guys moving to California & why?
MS: We’re moving to the Bay area in the fall. We’ve all grown up here but our record label is there. We went out there and were so relaxed. We’re mostly moving for weather and scenery. The beauties of mother earth have been kept from us for far to long, we’re ready to indulge.
DA: I’m sick of Midwestern weather.
MS: I need to excuse myself. Thank you so much, that was rad.

Related posts:

1. Review: Alkaline Trio – Agony & Irony
2. Alkaline Trio Warped Tour pix
3. Alkaline Trio cover Tegan & Sara
4. Our Favorite Albums of 1998
5. Bad Religion Warped Tour pix