Dropping Daylight Interview

The Gauntlet: What's new?

Seth: We are doing our first day of tour rehearsal for the Warped Tour. It's basically the day everyone gets setup, gets their merchandise situated, and the tents up. We are in Columbus, OH wait, no we are in Columbia, MD. We will be here just tonight, then tomorrow is the first day of the Warped Tour and we'll continue from there. We are pretty stoked about it. Our new record just came out yesterday. It is our first record and we are interested to hear what people think about it. We are ready to organically make some fans by playing for people.

The Gauntlet: Do you have any friends with any of the bands on the tour?

Seth: We are really good friends with The Addition. They are coming out and joining up sometime on the tour. We have toured with Motion City Soundtrack before and those guys are great. There are a lot of bands we are looking forward to seeing. Joan Jett is headlining so that will be pretty rad.

The Gauntlet: How long of a set will you get?

Seth: Every band except for the headliners get half an hour.

The Gauntlet: that's really good. I have been to some packaged tours where the 2nd stage bands get 15 minutes and play 3-4 songs.

Seth: That's rough. When you open on tours, you normally get 30 minutes. I think it is a good amount of time to get your point across and also enjoy bands you have been wanting to see for a long time.

The Gauntlet: How was the Flyleaf tour?

Seth: The Flyleaf tour was awesome. We played a couple shows with them before as we are both on Octone Records, we are label mates. We have done some showcases together so we have kind of known each other but this was the first we got to sit down and get to know each other. The whole tour was like being one big family. We had a good time and their fans really liked us. Every stop of the tour was great. They actually saran wrapped out RV, our new RV on the last day of the tour. They also unloaded 50 cans of silly string on the inside of our RV. No band has pranked us like that before. That shit took over two hours to clean up.

The Gauntlet: Are you thinking payback?

Seth: We are thinking about it, but we are nice guys. You can quote me on this, we will get them back.

The Gauntlet: Last time I spoke with you guys, "Brace Yourself" was due in February, what happened?

Seth: Things just got pushed back. Things weren't getting done as fast as we hoped for as far as mixing, mastering and artwork. It got pushed back, and then we ended up getting a new drummer. We parted ways with our old drummer. That pushed the release back as we had no drummer. We started doing auditions and we found him. He came out on tour when we were with Taylor Hawk. Once things were cool with that, we got a final release and we are happy with how it worked out. It was such a long time. We recorded it in 2005. We have been sitting on the record for some time. We are excited to get it out now though.

The Gauntlet: What led the band to pick Allen as the new drummer?

Seth: We auditioned a few guys in Minneapolis. They were all fantastic and really nice guys. We went with Allen because the chemistry of us playing with him felt right from the beginning. He was very organized in his head. The songs we sent him to learn to try out with we asked him to change; rock out a little bit more and play faster in parts. He played a few shows with us live to see how he worked in a live setting too.

The Gauntlet: Since he didn't perform on the new CD, is he pushing the band to get back into the studio to record another album?

Seth: Nope, not really. He is stoked about the band and likes the music we are playing.

The Gauntlet: Was there an album release show?

Seth: Yeah, we had it in Cleveland and that's where Allen is from. We had had it at a place called the Winchester. It was a laid back, chill kind of thing. We played for 45 minutes to an hour.

The Gauntlet: On "Brace Yourself", there are a few of the same songs that appeared on your EP which was released last year. The new versions are so much more dynamic and layered, they sound great.

Seth: We wrote about 35 songs in about two months. Then when it came time to record, we recorded rough versions to get an idea of what we wanted on the full length. We actually got some of the demos we recorded and re-mixed and that's what turned into the EP. Those are just the demo tracks. We didn't really take a lot of time recording for the EP versions; we just needed something to tour on. We are really happy with how everything turned out.

The Gauntlet: My only complaint about the album is 'Til You Feel Something' is the last track. I think it's the best track on the album and hope you didn't put it at the end to just bury it.

Seth: You know what, so do we. That was how we wanted to close the album. People who like the songs will get into the whole record as opposed to listening to it song for song. That is one of our favorite songs and that was how we wanted to close out the record.

The Gauntlet: That's good to hear. So many bands have 3 good songs and half way through the album starts the filler. "Brace Yourself" was strong throughout. Are there any plans for a video?

Seth: A video is in the works, but we haven't really gotten going with that. We want to get the tour going and get the album out there.

The Gauntlet: Is song writing a collaborative effort?

Seth: Sebastian, my brother, is the song writer. He writes 100% of the lyrics. As far as writing goes, he brings it to the table and we will work with it. Sometimes Rob and I will work on things. Songs come from different angles. How things end up coming out is very collaborative.

The Gauntlet: We can we see the full version of Dodgeball 2 on www.droppingdaylight.com?

Seth: I think it got pushed back to maybe next summer. I think we might have a trailer for Dodge Ball 3 pretty soon. All the movies will come out eventually.

The Gauntlet: Who won the game?

Seth: Oh man, Hawthorne Heights kicked our ass. The guy who produced our record produced theirs. When we were recording in NY, they were there and our producer invited us to a BBQ at his house and Hawthorne Heights was there. It was just a day off. We ended up playing dodge ball for a while. They kinda kicked our ass overall. Their lead singer has a mean arm. He hit me square in the balls with a huge ball. It fucking hurt so bad, I can't stress. It was a clean game, they are just better at dodge ball than we are.

The Gauntlet: This is going to be the question I ask you guys each interview; has Rob moved out of his parents' basement yet?

Seth: No, not yet. Actually he and Allen live there now.