Band: No Use For A Name Member: Matt Riddle Label: Fat Wreck Chords Location: Starlite Room- Edmonton, Alberta Date: March 15th, 2006 Interviewer: Bobby Gorman

This was a memorably night for me, not only was it my fiftieth concert I'd ever been to, but I also had to chance to talk to both No Use For A Name and I Am The Avalanche before the show. The interview here, with Matt, went really well, and I learnt a lot about the band and got some surprising answers. I'd like to thanks Rob for setting it up, and thank Matt for taking the time out of his hectic schedule to sit and talk with me for a bit.

Bobby: Okay, I guess starting with the basics, you guys have been on tour with I Am The Avalanche, Punchline and Versus the World for a few weeks now, how’s that going?

Matt: It’s great. The bands are really cool you know? I don’t know how to explain it. I don’t know if bands ever go on tour with bands they don’t like; so “oh yeah, it kind of sucks” is not really an option. I mean, these guys are all really great guys. It’s been a lot of fun. We were out with Suicide Machines before this, they just left the tour about a week and a half ago, and we’ve known those guys for like nine years so it was really cool to see them again. So the tour’s been really fun. We’re getting towards the end, but we’re looking forward to getting home. This is like a six and a half week tour, and it’s just like, time to get home. See the women, you know.

Bobby: Has there been any really memorable moments from it so far?

Matt: It’s weird; every tour has got that moment. This one has been pretty uneventful to be honest with you, there’s not a lot that’s been going on. The fact that it’s been so cold means we haven’t actually been going out that much, so nothing too crazy has happened. Something has happened on this tour, I have to think about that because something did happen that was crazy, but I gotta remember what it was. We’ll come back to it.

Bobby: Originally Rufio were supposed to be on this tour instead of Punchline, why the switch?

Matt: They broke up.

Bobby: Oh really?

Matt: Yeah, they broke up.

Bobby: I’d heard rumours, but nothing had been confirmed.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, they just broke up, so…

Bobby: Okay, last week, on the 8th, Dave had to leave because his wife is having a baby. Filling in for him is Scott Schifflet, originally from Face To Face, what’s it like touring with him?

Matt: You know, I don’t know how much you know about all that history and all that stuff, but I was in Face To Face. I’m the guy that he replaced. So for me and him, it’s really fun. We think it’s hilarious, it’s like “Oh my God, here we are in the same band.” Plus, Scott’s brother, Chris, used to be in our band; so there’s this whole incest thing that we think is really funny. He was almost like a natural choice. We called Chris, but he was going to be really busy on and off. So it was Chris and Fat Mike who were both like “Hey, why don’t you call Scott? He’s a great guitar player.” So yeah. And he’s an amazing bass player, better than me, but as far guitar players go, he’s one of the best in the world. He just rips. So it’s a really great honour and people just trip on it. They’re like “wait a minute, that’s weird;” because it’s like seeing Chris up there because he looks just like him. But he’s a great guy; he’s a lot of fun to have out here for sure.

Bobby: Yeah, even on you’re website you described it as an “incestuous move.”

Matt: *laughs* Yeah, it’s pretty cool though. Like I said, we talk about the old Face To Face days, so it’s a lot of fun.

Bobby: On your message board, there is also a rumour that Dave gives out guitar lessons. Is that true?

Matt: He teaches guitar at a school near his house. If he has a lot of time off, he goes in and teaches kids guitar.

Bobby: So how would someone be able to set that up and go to that school?

Matt: You’d have to live by him. He did it on the Warped Tour for this guy that was working on the Warped Tour. He would come on the bus once in a while and Dave would show him a few things. But you know, he just does it for fun. When he works for the school he gets paid for it, but it’s not good. He just does it for fun.

Bobby: When you guys first started this tour, you guys did a show on PunkRadioCast…

Matt: We didn’t do it, because Dave had to leave early. I wrote that on the message board actually, I wrote down this thing saying “hey, sorry we can’t do it” because the doctor that’s delivering Dave’s wife’s baby, he said “Dave, you gotta get home now, the baby could come any minute.” So he had to leave early and Scott had to come in early. The next day I think was the PunkRadioCast and we couldn’t do it because we didn’t think Scott could pull it off. But if we would have known now, he can, like he could have totally pulled it off, he’s a great guitar player. The funny thing is that Dave still hasn’t had the baby yet. We’re still waiting on it.

Bobby: Well originally when that show was announced, Melanie from Fat Wreck Chords said “someone needs to call in and ask Tony about his season tickets to the “Black Hole”.” And while I’m not calling in, what are the season tickets to the “black hole”?

Matt: I think that’s the Raiders tickets. I think that’s what that is. It’s like a really good spot to watch the Raiders play in the arena. But sports, I don’t watch it. Never really into it.

Bobby: You guys have been in the band for well over a decade; do you think you could ever see yourself doing anything else?

Matt: Oh sure. Yeah, I mean, we’re still people. There’s a million things in the world that you could do with your life. I mean, playing music’s fun. I have just as much fun playing in the living room by myself as I do playing in a band. But being in a band, I’m able to make money doing it too, which is great. It’s awesome, we love it. But in my off time, sometimes I’d just put a bunch of CDs in my CD changer and just practice to that, you know? Blast those out, its fun. I think we’re all the same way that way, we all like it, but there’s a lot of things in life. Like when me and Trevor made Face To Face together, at that time, it was doing okay, but I was in college too. I was going to be an anthropologist – that’s what I was going to do. I studied physical science, anthropology, astronomy; I’m all about the sciences. So yeah, there’s a million other things I’d like to do. But I love doing this.

Bobby: How many more CDs do you think you still have in you? Hopefully a lot.

Matt: Well, there’s no way to answer that. I mean, what happens if after the show we get into a huge fight and break up, you never know. I don’t think it would happen, but… I’m hoping we have a couple more left, for sure.

Bobby: How do you think the music scene has changed over the past decade that you guys have been around?

Matt: That’s almost impossible to answer. It’s changed… it’s gone from black to white. It’s so different than it was; it’s nothing like it was. In my opinion, the punk scene, I think major labels came in, the corporate labels came in and made the scene corrupt. They’re force feeding kids all this shitty music and making them believe that’s what’s good, and kids buy it. It’s just a really horrible time for music right now, for sure. All those bands, like the Fall Out Boy bands and all that stuff, like I just can’t believe it. It’s amazing.

Bobby: Do you think the internet has played a big role in that?

Matt: Huge role. Internet, computers in general… I love computers, like I said, I’m all into science, I love computers, all the technology. But when it comes to music I think it shouldn’t be like that. It should be from the heart. It shouldn’t be something that’s just put together by three guys in L.A. who go “Oh, this band looks good, let’s get them to play it.” That’s how it is now. So yeah, I think the internet has completely destroyed the scene, or helped.

And everybody can put a band together now. Everybody you know is in a band. It’s like you know, stop. Just stop. If you’re not born with it, fucking let it go. You know what I mean? “I wanna be in a band!” Alright, well do you suck? “Well kinda…” Because you can suck nowadays and still be in a band. Like I said, Fall Out Boy’s a perfect example. All those bands suck. Watch them live, you won’t believe it, they don’t sound like the record, I’ll tell you that. There’s no talent there at all. I mean, we make our mistakes, but that’s because we jump around and have fun, maybe drink a little bit. But these bands genuinely suck. I mean, by no means am I being cynical about it, I’m just being honest. It’s amazing that anybody can do it now. And as long as they look okay the girls will buy it, and if the girls buy it, the boyfriends buy it and that’s how it is. It’s very corrupt. Major labels know how to do that though.

Bobby: Yeah, they are good at that. Okay, last time you guys were here, back in 2003, I talked to Tony about a DVD that you were going to release. And he said that after that tour, Rory and his brother was going to be working on it, any updates on it? It’s been three years now.

Matt: Yeah, it’s no further along than it was. In fact, I think we’re going to scrap the whole thing and maybe start over, we don’t even know. It’s just, we have so much footage, we don’t even know what to do. And the stuff that Rory’s brother put together, we just don’t like. It’s like “nah, that’s not what we want” and it’s over and over and over again. So it’s gotta be something we all have to sit down together to do, and we’ve done that and that didn’t work. So I don’t know what we’re going to do. It sucks.

Bobby: Still talking about DVDs, last year you guys were on the Cake Boy DVD with Warren Fitzgerald, how was that?

Matt: How was it? It was fun. We knew it would be exactly what it is, which is just nothing, it’s just dumb. But we weren’t doing nothing else and it was like “alright, let’s do that, it would be funny.” I don’t think we even got paid for it, it was just something to do. It was fun though because Warren and Joe and those guys, they’re friends of ours so it was fun. And it’s only like an hour and a half away from my house, so we went down and just filmed stuff. It was fun.

Bobby: Do you think you’d ever take acting up as a career?

Matt: Nuh-uh. I don’t think so. I’m good at it, I don’t know about that movie, but I know how to lie like a dog. I’m the best liar you have ever met, so I know I could pull it off. But I don’t think I’d ever do it.

Bobby: Most importantly, are you guys really that mean to your roadies?

Matt: Oh yeah... No, to be honest with you, they’re mean to us. Yeah, yeah for sure, they’re always mean to us. We just sit back and go “okay, whatever you say.” I was talking to my wife about that recently, about our soundman, and she was like “you guys should hire somebody else” because he’s just an ass all the time. We’re too nice though.

Bobby: Okay, I love going to concerts. Of course some are more memorable than others, I know this one will be memorable for me because it’s my fiftieth concert I’ve ever been to. Thinking back to when you were still a teen, what are some concerts that you really remember going to.

Matt: Iron Maiden. Every Iron Maiden concert I’ve ever seen has been the best concert of my life. I’ve seen them nine times, and they are the best band in the world, in my opinion. They’re just phenomenal. I mean, I’m wearing the bracelet, I have a tattoo on my neck, I think they’re the greatest band ever. But also Mayhem. Every heard of Mayhem? They’re a black metal band, like evil satanic metal from Norway; and I saw them about three years ago in L.A. with my wife and we were just like “oh my God.” That was amazing, I loved that. Cradle of Filth. I’m a big metal fan, so those are the memorable ones. No punk band has blown me away yet. I really liked when I saw Motion City Soundtrack, I thought they were great, super good band. There was one punk show that was really memorable to me, which was The Adolescents and that had to be ’91 or ’92. But what was so cool about it was their guitar player, Rikk Agnew, freaked out on acid and ran off the stage, and Tony Cadena, the singer, asked if I knew the songs and I went up and finished the set with them on guitar. Yeah, that’s one of my highlights for sure. Even though the kids today don’t know who the hell the Adolescents were, it’s so rad that I do and I know what they meant to me. So that was definitely one of the most memorable shows of my life.

Bobby: I’m guessing the answer to my next question will be Iron Maiden, but…

Matt: Favorite band?

Bobby: Nope, if you could tour with any band, dead or alive, broken up or still going, which band would you choose to tour with and why?

Matt: I don’t know if it’ll be Iron Maiden because I don’t know if we’d go over well with them, with the crowd. It’ll be weird. I don’t know, that’s a tough one. I think a tour with the Adolescents, no with the Descendents would’ve been fun back in the day. I think that would have been a lot of fun. Yeah, that’s a weird one, I’m not sure. I’d like to tour with Maiden just so I could watch them every night, I mean, if I could come on and do a song with them that would be cool. But for the band, I don’t think that would be all that good of an idea.

Bobby: Okay, now onto a bit more unusual questions that I just like to ask at all my interviews to keep it interesting and stuff. First off, if you guys were stranded on a desert island, with no food and nothing to eat, which one of the band members would you eat to survive and why?

Matt: I guess Dave, because he works out all the time so he has bigger arms, so there would be more meat there. But I’d probably starve to death first; I don’t think I could do that. I don’t think I could eat somebody else.

Bobby: Okay, now, if you were the member of the opposite sex for a day, week, month, however long you wanted, what would you do and why?

Matt: Oh, I’d probably become a lesbian, or I’d just sit in front of a mirror all day. Nah, I don’t know, those are typical answers. You know what I would do… what would I do? I’d probably hang out in the girl’s locker room for a while. I mean, I can’t say I’d drop down and give somebody a blowjob, you know what I mean? I wouldn’t do that. I would do something that involves checking out all the other girls, and as a girl you can do that. I guess.

Bobby: Could you tell us something about the band or one of its members that not many people know about, like something weird they do on the road or something like that?

Matt: Okay, our drummer, Rory, could pretty much beat up anybody you’ve ever met. He has survival skills that are beyond anybody’s wildest beliefs. The guy’s insane. If I was to get my ass kicked, I’d want him to be there, ‘cause he’s gnarly. But you’d never know it by looking at him, by talking to him or anything, not at all. But he can get out of any situation, he can fight.

Bobby: Okay, if you could have one thing at this moment, anything at all, what would you have and why?

Matt: Oh, all the money in the world, for obvious reasons. You know what I mean? Money makes the world go round, so that’s why I’d want all the money.

Bobby: But one thing interesting about that is that I said that to a friend the other day, and he said that if you’d had all the money in the world, the money would be useless.

Matt: Yeah. That’ll be great. If money was useless, that’ll be awesome, you know what I mean? It would make everybody equal. So there, it works in two different ways. If I had all the money in the world, then nobody would have any money and that would be great. There’d be no power, there’d be nothing. That’s even better.

Bobby: Okay, I guess that’s about it, do you have any final thoughts you’d like to add?

Matt: Nah, I think that’s cool. Do you think anybody’s going to come out tonight? In the cold, cold, cold night? It’s freezing outside.

Bobby: Oh yeah, it will be good. I can’t wait for the show.

Matt: I hope so.

Bobby: You guys pulled in a big turnout last time you were here.

Matt: But that was like what? Three years ago? The punk scene’s completely different than it was.

Bobby: Yeah, but tonight’s at the Starlite Room, the Starlite Room has quite a lot of respect, so I’m guessing you’ll get a good turnout.

Matt: That’s great, that’s good to know. Well, I hope everybody shows up!

Bobby: Thanks a lot for doing it.

Matt: Yeah, thank you.