Suburban Horror: You guys have a new record coming out on March 7* called "The Misery Index Notes From The Plague Years". Why the name? What is "The Misery Index"?

Nathan Gray: The Misery Index is an economical term that we stole from the Carter administration, but it actually has nothing to do with that. I shouldn't even be explaining that. We sort of just took it because the title all together describes what we've been going through to get this album out, and the music industry grinding wheel basically with Wind Up. But also our personal lives; we've been writing this album for probably almost three years and it's been absolute hell. With our personal lives, and the political scheme in the world right now, we figured it was a pretty apt title.

SH: A lot of BSF fans were disappointed by Tomorrow Comes Today. Would you say Misery Index will appeal more to fans of Tomorrow Comes Today? Or will it appeal to older BSF such as After The Eulogy, or This Crying This Screaming?

NG: I think and I hope. I believe it will appeal to both, and I think that it has a good amount of both. I don't think that the people who got into us through Tomorrow Comes Today got into it for amazing production value. I don't think that's going to turn off any fans from TCT, but I think that it'll bring back some people who maybe have gotten turned off. We weren't too stoked with it. We loved the songs and what WE did, but we weren't too stoked with the production value. We liked what Dave Forman did. When Jay Bumgardener came in, he that boy band, nu-metal cream on everything. It just made everything sound like crap you know? But I don't want anyone to get us wrong. We love the songs but not the production of it. I think that's what turned a lot of people off. You could've heard the songs in a more raw form. I don't think anybody would've thought twice, but to have those songs in that... creamy production was overwhelming.

SH: There's a lot of new things on the album like horns, a hip hop sample,electronica. what lead you guys to add that on the album?

NG:The band had gone through a lot with rewriting songs and trying to get different things on the radio. After that we were like "Screw that, we're bringing it back". Anytime we asked "Can we get away with this? I think that might sound cool." If someone said "Nah, I don't think so", we said "GOOD! Let's do it!". All of that stuff was as important as the actual songs and the album. We wanted to make AN ALBUM. We were so sick of being driven to this single-minded culture of the music industry. Not that we wouldn't be putting out singles, but we wanted an album. It's like you got your hit single and then a bunch of songs that were trying to be a hit single. We wanted a complete, continuous album. We wanted to have fun with it. Add horns if we want to add horns. Do some weird electronica crap, hip hop, keyboards,pianos, or cellos.

SH: You guys previewed 3 songs on your website before the album, (Phone Call 4AM, Dear George, Plague Years) None of them are on the album. Why?

NG: They just weren't picked. Every time we do a record we write like 30 songs and then we conduct a voting process that eliminates some and keeps others. I love Dear George because I wrote that one. It's not that they weren't good songs. It's just not what we were looking for at the time to blend in with the other songs. One way or another, we sit down and vote. Certain things get certain numbers, and everyone votes on it. Whatever has the highest score wins. It's like being an American Idol Judge.

SH: So you're touring for this album and leaving for Europe on March 8. Are there any tour plans for the US yet?

NG: We have plans, but I don't know what they are at the moment. If I was in front of my computer I'd know. We leave late April for the US tour sometime between 25th through 28th. We leave in late April and get back in late May from the US tour.

SH: Why did you decide to tour Europe before the US?

NG: Because they had an earlier release date, but also for other reasons. In Europe that doesn't really matter that we were out of the public eye for two years writing this material. They're used to not seeing a band for a year or two on end. In the US, that completely kills any turn out you had. You can go from packing clubs with 5000 kids to having 10 people at your show. We've always done really well in Europe, so it makes more business sense. It's "let's go to Europe to finance the US tour", but at the same time we don't want to be one of those bands that's huge in Europe because that's all we'd do. We want to do shows here too. We'll go to Europe first, then see what we can do here. Then go back and forth.

SH: What caused you to leave Wind Up?

NG: After TCT came out, they were tough on us about not hearing a single on the record. Before we were like "we don't care". We don't mind having a single but if you're not hearing it, tough shit. We don't like working too hard at that, but then we thought "well we've got this contract, so we might as well work a little bit." They heard like 2 songs off the album, which were 10 & Counting, and b-side that kind of sucked. They saw something in 10 & Counting and wanted us to work on that. It the main song they wanted us to work on. We didn't have to rearrange any songs when we left Wind Up. But with 10 & Counting, they got their paws on that one. We left because it got out of control. They were told us we needed a co-writer and we turned down that idea 4 times. You don't need to ask someone to do something they've already said no to so many times. That's morally reprehensible, and we're not fucking doing it. That's just stupid! There's no way in hell we're going to find someone to write our songs for us, or help us write so that they can be radio viable. That's just dumb. So finally to their credit, I called our A&R guy and said "You're miserable, we're miserable. It's been 2 years. This is stupid. You're not going to get your radio hit, and we don't want to do it. Can you let us go?" We had like 6 albums left in our contract, owed them a good million dollars and they let us go. They were like "You're right. See ya." We left on good terms, so I can't really say anything bad about them. They put us through hell, but that's their thing. They finally realized it was not our thing, they let us go. They agreed to take that loss, which was really cool on their part.

SH: So you guys have a new home at Equal Vision. What made you choose them?

NG: It was actually an easy decision once we figured it out. We had been talking to just about every label in the world, figuring out what we wanted to do. One day we just said "We haven't talked to Equal Vision. Let's try that." We called them, asked if they wanted the next album and said "Yeah, of course we do!" So we said "Let's do it". Why didn't we just get Equal Vision to do it in the first? We've been friends with them for a long time. They're a great label and have helped us out before. They did our merchandise and a couple of other things back in the day. It seemed obvious that we should be together.

SH: So after 10 years and all you guys have been through, why do you still do it?

NG: We're stubborn. We are incredibly stubborn people. Ask anyone that's dealt with us. It's horrible. We're so driven and stubborn, it drives almost everyone around us away. That's actually the only way I can describe it, because I have NO IDEA why we keep going. We just do. We all have this attitude: We enjoy it, so we keep doing it. But the driving force behind it is that we love what we do. We can't think of anything else, so why stop? It's hard to explain the stubbornness, but that's how. We've been around for 11 years now, working our asses off to get to this point. Then we drop off the face of the earth, and we have to work to get back. There's a sense of challenge and accomplishment in it. We have music to put out, and a story to tell. That's what we do.

SH: That's it. Thanks for talking to us. Any final words?

NG: Buy the record. Go get that stuff.

*(Pushed back to March 21st)

Boy Sets Fire