July 15, 2008
A Test
I have no idea where to start. It might be easier to list what’s gone right as opposed to what’s gone wrong on this tour of all tours. A good friend of ours, Jon Cheese, has the letters PMA tattooed on his forearm. Positive Mental Attitude. That is what we need right now. We are in the biggest test of our band’s career…hopefully we’ll pass.
We are about two weeks into the Shout It Loud Tour with Less Than Jake, Suburban Legends and Goldfinger. Every show has been at the very least, awesome. The things that have been less than awesome are our van, rental vans and borrowed vans breaking down, time after time, and our trailer breaking, not once, but twice in one day. It’s like Murphy’s Law, “if something can go wrong, it will”.
We tried to help the environment out and save a few bucks by renting a van converted to run on veggie oil. That veggie part broke on the first day. At least we can still run the van on diesel fuel. Then that broke. We’ve taken cabs to garages in the middle of nowhere, sent Eric, our tour manager, on buses to retrieve broken down vans, trailers with an odd amount of functioning wheels and we’ve been late to almost every show.
Even when the shows are not that far in between, we can’t seem to make it on time. We go to sleep around 3a.m. every night, not because we’ve been partying or hanging out, but we usually have to drive for a few hours after each show. We’ve been getting up around 7 or 8a.m. too.
We really can’t believe how piss poor our luck has been on this tour, except for the shows! We are so incredibly lucky to play these packed shows in front of people that really seem to be having a bona fide good time. We are pretty lucky.
However, we are all totally exhausted from the extreme lack of sleep, endless problems that arise, late nights, early mornings, and no air conditioning, while driving through the country, 3 people to a bench. It’s hotter than two rats screwing in a wool sock. It’s all a test.
We try to stay positive. Stay positive. Always stay positive…but it’s tough. We think it’s a test because we’ve been a band for 12 years, have played hundreds of shows every year, traveled across borders, oceans, desserts and time zones, and our luck has never been this bad.
But because it is so stressful and taxing on us, we believe that when we get home in August, we’ll be so happy, relaxed and healthy, then we’ll write the best record that can possibly be written. We are very excited about writing. We’ve been paying our dues for a long time and this is a psychically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting tour.
I hope that it doesn’t seem like I’m complaining, I just want anyone who reads this to get a glimpse into our situation. We definitely have a good laugh at some point everyday about all of the shit that’s hit the fan. I’ve heard and said, “it can’t get any worse, right?” every day since we left Boston on July 2nd. It’s July 15th today.

I guess that’s all for now. I’ve posted some pictures below too of photos that I’ve taken. Thanks for reading and please come and say hi to us at the shows, it definitely helps our PMA.

Sean P. Rogan
www.seanprogan.com

Hey everybody. Our buddy/merch-guy, Sal, had his iPod stolen on Friday, April 6th at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, NJ. It was taken out of his bag near the merch table.

We are pretty bummed out that someone stole from us. If you, or anyone you know, has any information regarding Sal’s iPod, please contact Sal at salellington@hotmail.com.

We appreciate any help you can give!

Thanks for your support.

sean
bigd

We are finally back on tour! Right now we’re in Cleveland and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is across the street! How cool is that? I think we’re going tomorrow before we leave town. We’ve got lots going on right now, here’s what’s up…

First of all, the tour with Anti-Flag, Alexisonfire and Set Your Goals has been one of our best tours! All of the bands have been really nice so far and we all sound so different, that to me, it makes for a great show! We’ve been playing songs off of Strictly Rude (almost out!!!) and Beijing To Boston (out now!!!) and they seem to be going over really well! It’s funny to see who’s been illegally downloading the record, because they know the words to the new songs! But, we’re cool with it. We obviously want people to buy the record, but if you’re at a show supporting us, we’ll take it!

We got our first draft of the edits Dave and I did with our buddy Chris Mitchell down in Knoxville. This DVD (Built Up From Nothing) is going to blow your mind, man…totally blow your mind! We’ve got so much to do still, but with the start that we have, the potential is limited to only our imaginations!

Oh yeah, here’s a random story.

Last night, we were driving from Buffalo, NY to Cleveland, OH. We had a day off so we went to see a movie and then hit the road. As we get into Pennsylvania, we stopped at a rest stop…that’s what we do. So, we all head into the men’s room to…well, you know. After I finished my job at the urinal, I went over to the sink to wash my hands. There was an old man with yellow, rubber gloves on, mop in hand, staring me down.

“Hey, you forgot something” he said pointing to the urinal as I’m washing my hands. It’s weird enough that he was talking to me, and I was thinking to myself, “what could I possibly forget at the pisser?”
“Oh…really?” I said in a confused state as I headed back to the urinal he was bitterly pointing at.
“Yeah! You forgot to flush!” he said in a manner WAY too upset for normal people.

Ok, now is this guy fucking with me? Is it really that big of a deal? Do I play it cool? Do I go back and flush it and give this angry old man the satisfaction of yelling at a group of guys just trying to get to the next show?

As I was thinking all of these thoughts, I hear Dave let out a laugh. His one laugh perfectly described my inner thoughts. Maybe it’s because we hang out 24/7, but it was hard for me to not laugh.

So, I said to the man with the mop, “Uh…I don’t really like touching those, lots of germs.”
“Well if you can’t flush, you shouldn’t be allowed to use them!”

This threw me for a loop. He was so angry with me and he definitely wanted to punch me. I decided to not get into a fight with an old man in the bathroom and just shook my head in disbelief and started to leave the bathroom. However, he was blocking the exit now with his mop. Homeboy wanted a staring contest. So, being a gentleman, I gave him a good 5 seconds and let him have his moment.

I said excuse me and gave him another good look so he would move and he did. This is something that would only happen to me. After I left, Dave went up to him and said, “Yeah, that kid’s an asshole!” I don’t think the man picked up on his sarcasm. The guy was on such a different level of normality than most of the people I’ve met in my life so far. He must spent all of his time in this little rest stop in PA, cleaning it over and over, getting so upset if a drop of water goes out of the sink, or if god forbid, someone doesn’t flush. It was pretty clean though, but it did smell of shit…I mean, it is a public restroom. There’s a sort of code, or bathroom etiquette. We travel all over the world and I’ve been to more public restrooms than most people. If you take a dump in the toilet, you better flush! If you piss in a urinal, it’s optional.

Back in the van we were all cracking up, talking about this interaction. He gave Dave a look of death for having a little soap hit the counter too. It was a very funny situation that I thought I needed to share it.

Sorry for writing words like piss, dump and other bathroom slang.

Sean P. Rogan

What’s up rudies?

The fine people at Side One Dummy asked me to post this. There’s a contest over at www.interpunk.com where you can win some Big D swag…an autographed drum head as well some other stuff.

http://www.interpunk.com/showcontest.cfm?contestname=405&Key=731721&

Also, if you pre-order our CD, Strictly Rude, you get a free autographed poster and a patch. And who doesn’t want that?

http://www.interpunk.com/item.cfm?Item=141343

Thanks for the support.

We finally hit the road tomorrow!

sean
bigd

So much going on!

The “Noise Complaint EP” is now available on i-tunes, featuring Noise Complaint and Shining On from the upcoming album “Strictly Rude”, and also featuring an exclusive track called Halfway Home. Get a sneak peek at the new album before it drops March 20th, with a bonus track to boot!

Also, hit up this interpunk.com contest for a chance to win an autographed Big D drum head, a copy of “Strictly Rude”, and lots of other cool prizes from all the bands on the War Sucks! Let’s Party! Tour. This contest ends tomorrow!

If you have a minute to spare, cruise on over to http://www.punkradiocast.com/TOP10 and vote for “Souped-Up Vinyl” in this week’s countdown. You can vote once a day!

And finally, check out the April issue of Alternative Press, featuring a 4.5 star review of “Strictly Rude” on page 178! “Best ska record since the new millenium!”

Thanks, we love you!
Dan and Big D

Ok, so after 24 hours a day with Dave for the past 2 weeks, we’re home in Boston. What have we been doing, well I’ll tell ya!

Stage one of our trip started by flying to Knoxville to start our DVD. We spent about a week or so down there with our buddy, Chris. We definitely made a dent in the progress! We’ll be going back in June to hopefully finish it up. After our time with Chris, we flew to L.A. to shoot two new videos. Oh yeah, our friend, Zarah, drove all the way from Nashville to Knoxville to pick our asses up and then drove us the 3 hours back to Nashville to make our flight. THAT WAS REALLY NICE!!!

Onto LA. We shot the videos out there because of a few reasons. Dan Dobi, he did our LAX video, lives and works out of there and we really wanted to work with him again. It was one of our better ideas too, he’s unbelieveable! We also wanted a summertime, warm vibe for the two songs we shot, not cold and snowy like in Boston.

Anyway, after 2 weeks of floor and couch surfing, Dave and I are home. The rest of the boys just went to California and it was great seeing them after our time in Knoxville.

This trip was such a huge success in every aspect. Also, while we were at the SideOne Dummy headquaters yesterday and our CD’s came in! Strictly Rude is totally done, printed and pressed. It’s one of the best feelings holding this album. We’ve never worked harder on anything in our lives.

We absolutely cannot wait to get on the road next week!

sean
bigd

It’s out today! Happy release day everyone! Check out www.interpunk.com and/or www.badnewsrecords.com to order the CD or www.springmanrecords.com to order the vinyl. Finally!

Dave and I are in Knoxville, TN editing our DVD right now with our buddy, Chris. We’ve been working really hard, his family has been WAY too nice by feeding us and providing shelter (and reading our updates) and we needed a break. What should we do while in Tennessee? LET’S SHOOT GUNS!!!

Me being the tree-hugging, vegetarian-musician type didn’t want to shoot anything that’s alive. Luckily we had a bunch of skeet and random other crap to shoot. So, we shot at it. I didn’t really hit anything except a Mountain Dew can. Dave hit his very first skeet, and his last! The ones in the middle, well, we can make pretend they were dead on.

I made a video of it. Thanks to Chris and all of his friends for letting us use their firearms and keeping us safe while having a good time.

Check out the video and leave a comment!

spr

Hey everyone.

We’re all super excited about Strictly Rude coming out, but don’t forget about Beijing To Boston. It comes out on Tuesday the 20th…next week!

Here’s a review we got…not too shabby.

http://www.upstarter.com/reviews/punk-cd-reviews/beijing-to-boston.html

Thanks to everyone for buying 10 copies.

sean
bigd

Howdy y’all! Dave and I are in Knoxville, TN right now editing our DVD. Finally, after years and years, hundreds of hours of footage, thousands of photographs, we’re putting it all together. We’ve already put a ton of work into this project and now it’s coming together. I have no idea when it’ll be released, but definitely this year. Anyway, back to work.

Next week we fly to L.A. to shoot a couple of videos. We’ll be shooting videos for Noise Complaint and Shining On. Besides two new records, two new videos, a DVD with unreleased songs and 10 years of footage and photos, we have about 100 shows booked from now until the end of August. This by far is the busiest year of our lives! I can’t express to you how much work we’ve been doing! It’s crazy.

Well, that’s enough slacking for me, back to work.

DIY.

sean p. rogan