Jimmy Eat World

Bobby: Starting with the basics tonight is the second show on this Canadian tour with Attack in Black. Are you excited for the tour?

Tom: Yeah, we are. We haven’t been up here for a while and we’re playing a lot of cities that we haven’t played before. We’re looking forward to it.

Bobby: On Tuesday you guys played in Montreal on the first day of the tour and it happened to be Canada Day. Did the fact that it was Canada Day make the tour kick off all that much more exciting? I’m sure the fans in Montreal would’ve been pumped for the event.

Tom: Yeah they were. It was like a big party. Even before we started playing there were people out on the streets, just excited because they had the day off from work and it ended up being a really fun show for us.

Bobby: Let’s talk a little bit about your sixth album, Chase This Light, which came out last October. First off, you guys self produced it but had help from three other producers: Butch Vig, John Field and Chris Testa. What was it like working with three different guys on the record?

Tom: It was fun. Butch Vig was actually the executive producer and what that means was that he came out for the first week that we started recording and listened to all the songs and give his input on the songs. Then while we were recording the album we would just sort of send him the songs online. He would check out the songs and we would just talk over email and phone and stuff. That was a different way to do it. Both of us have never worked that way before. He had really good ideas. Chris Testa, all of the guys did a great job. Chris Testa engineered and produced it. They all had great ideas. It was fun.

Bobby: The song “Carry You” was originally written for Jim’s solo project, Go Big Casino. What made him decide to re-record it and put it on this record?

Tom: I think he just always liked the song and he had more ideas for it to make it a little more complete. I think even though he might have had it in the past, he wanted to get a good recording of it. That’s about it.

Bobby: The record had a total of six bonus songs. There was Be Sensible, Open Bar Reception, Distraction, Beautiful Is, an acoustic version of Dizzy and a cover of Springtseen’s Take Em As They Come. Why did you decide to release the bonus songs as bonus songs instead of putting them on the record?

Tom: When we make a record we want each song to kind of stick out on its own and sometimes you get songs that kind of sound a little bit similar. I mean the songs Be Sensible and Dizzy, they’re totally different songs but they kind of have the same feel to it a little bit. So we don’t want to get too many songs that sound the same or have the same tempo so songs like that are usually the ones that end up being the bonus tracks.

Bobby: How did you pick which outlet got which song? I mean some went to import CDs, some to iTunes, some to smartPunk, and one even to BestBuy. Or is that just the label that kind of decides that?

Tom: No, we decide. It’s our management and it really isn’t that hard. Each territory will want an extra song.

Bobby: In one interview in June, Rick said you guys were already planning on heading into your home studio to record the follow-up to Chase This Light. Have you started working on anything yet? Have you started working on any new songs?

Tom: You know, there are a lot of ideas that we have and when we finish this tour, I think it ends on the 22nd or something of this month, we’re going to start recording again in our studio. We have been putting out records three years apart from each other and we don’t want to keep doing that, that’s a bad habit to be in.

Bobby: So you want to cut it down to two years then.

Tom: Yeah, yeah. Touring usually takes up a lot of that time too. For Bleed American we were out on tour for two years. We just want to start working on the new record sooner.

Bobby: That CD, whenever it does eventually come out, will be released on Interscope because you still have one more record left on your contract. But you guys have said that after that release you guys may consider self releasing stuff instead of going through a label. Do you think that’s going to start to become the new trend in the music industry? I mean, look at Radiohead or Nine Inch Nail; or closer to the punk community look at Less Than Jake who just self released their CD on Sleep It Off Records. Do you think that’s going to become the new trend now?

Tom: Yeah it is. Like you were saying a lot of bands have done it. A lot of the bands that have done it already have a pretty good following. Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails, they have people to buy their records and they don’t care what label it’s on. But I think it might be a little bit harder for a new band as far as them self releasing it for free. I don’t know, it’s just kind of a hard time to really tell what’s going to happen. It seems to be working for Radiohead. I mean, I read an interview with Tom Yorke and he said that on this record they made more money the all their records combined or something like that.

Bobby: Like you said, it could have a slightly detrimental effect on some bands who don’t have the following or the capital and need the help from the labels to push them out there.

Tom: Yeah, like with the radio stations and stuff. There’s a lot of stuff that labels help bands with.

Bobby: You guys have had lots of trouble with record labels like you were mistreated and dropped from Capitol – who actually tried to sign you again after they heard Bleed American; but you signed to Dreamworks which was then bought out by Interscope. Do you personally think it’s a good thing that some bands are starting to take back control of all their songs?

Tom: Yeah, you know; even if everything’s going good and the label is working hard for you, the band members still need to stay in control. Nobody really knows or understands the band more than the band.

Bobby: At the end of April you guys re-released a deluxe version of Bleed American, giving it back its original title and giving it tons of bonus material. I think there was a total of twenty songs added to the release. What made you re-release Bleed American?

Tom: We just had a lot of extra songs, like demos that we kind of thought the kids would like. I think it was kind of a good transition between us stopping touring and the next record.

Bobby: Was there ever any thought of just releasing another b-sides compilations like you did in 2000 with Singles instead of packing it together with Bleed American?

Tom: No.

Bobby: At the end of May you guys posted a number on your website saying to call that number if something was wrong with the deluxe CD to get a replacement disc. What was going wrong with them?

Tom: I think there was something where it was sticking on one of the tracks or something, it wouldn’t go past a certain song. It was the manufacturing of the disc, the people manufacturing the CD messed up. So there was a number you could call to get a new CD. There was nothing we could do about it, it was the plant.

Bobby: When I was doing some research for the interview I was reading some old interviews that you guys did. There was one interview that you did that kind of stuck out for me. It was actually quite an old interview, it was done in 1999 and you were talking with this guy called Chris Blackburn. You were talking about the song Sweetness which you just finished recording with Mark Trombino but didn’t know what to do with it. You said there was talk about putting it on the next pressing of Clarity which had just come out the month before; but you said “that would be kind of fucked up for the kids that already have it.” Now that kind of seems to be an afterthought for the most part, record labels are constantly re-releasing CDs like six month after the original release with a ton of bonus stuff. Like Coheed and Cambria, Senses Fail, Taking Back Sunday, Bad Religion, they’re all releasing deluxe versions six months after the original release. Why do you think that trend’s starting to happen?

Tom: I don’t know. Just as far as deluxe versions being released?

Bobby: Yeah, so soon after they’ve been released originally.

Tom: Yeah, I didn’t know a lot of bands were doing that like six months after the release, that’s a good question. For some people it’s just to give… I don’t know. That’s a good question. You’d have to ask the guys about that.

Bobby: I love going to concerts, I try to go to as many as I can but of course some are always more memorable than others. For instance, you guys are one of my most memorable concerts because you were the very first concert I ever went to six years ago.

Tom: Oh, no way.

Bobby: I actually still have the t-shirt on my wall from that show. I was fourteen, it was my first show ever, and it was awesome. What are some concerts that you went to or played at that were really memorable for you?

Tom: One of the first concerts that I ever saw was The Cure and that was pretty memorable. I saw Nirvana I think it was right before Nevermind came out or right when it came out, it was a small club show. There was also the Lollapalooza shows back when it first started, the first couple that they had. Those were always fun to go to because there was this huge bill of bands. There were always a lot of good bands that were the best bands that were around at that time.

Bobby: I guess that’s about it, thanks a lot. Do you have any final thoughts you’d like to add?

Tom: Nah thank you.

Bobby: Thanks a lot.