I was so stoked when I found out that I would be conducting this interview. The moment I saw that Pennywise was playing Providence, a ton of questions flooded my head like a much needed rainstorm. Being one of the first punk bands that I got into so many years ago, Pennywise will always have a special place in the section of my heart that I have dedicated to music. Its a awesome feeling being able to interview (or even talk) to someone who had a major impact on your life (punk music has been a consistent happiness and passion in my life). This interview took place on November 19, 2005 at Lupo's in Providence, RI with Fletcher while Randy patiently waited for the interview to end so he could watch Lost.

PL: Start by introducing yourself.
FD: I’m Fletcher from Pennywise and thats Randy the bass player right there.

PL: A common criticism I’ve read about The Fuse is that it sounds like all the other albums you’ve written. Does it make sense that bands are supposed to reinvent themselves with every album?
FD: Only if they’re dumb. Just kidding. I only said "dumb" because Randy doesn’t like that word.
RB: If you’re a band that reinvents itself, then thats what you do.
FD: Hey, if you’re gonna answer, then you’re gonna answer into this (the voice recorder). You gotta hold it. But, I’m starting up and I’ll let you know when its your turn because you said that you didn’t want to do the interview.
RB: Then...get out of here and let me watch Lost.
FD: I’m the one who bought it at $59.95. So, we don’t really care because there’s been so many punk bands that have tried to reinvent themselves and ruined the band. You’re totally into a band and you get their first couple albums, and then their third album comes out, and it’s a totally different sound, and you’re totally bummed. Would you like The Ramones if they didn’t sound like The Ramones? Its kind of funny because the critics will say that it sounds the same and they never expand their role, but thats not true because every album has little nuances and stuff that we try to make stuff a little bit fresher. But overall, its funny because half the people say that they like the first albums better or they like this album or that album better. Then, in the same breath, they say that all the albums sound the same. If they like our first album the best, then why don’t they like our new album if it sounds the same? We just try to keep it Pennywise. We know we’re gonna get grief for it, but at the same time, we’re not gonna lose our fans.
PL: I think a backlash might be worse if you did change your sound.
FD: Oh fuck, I think if we changed our sound, people would say that we sold out, we did this. But what are we gonna change to? Metal? Emo? Rap? There’s definitely gonna be a bunch of people complaining, so we’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.

PL: Being a band for as long as you have, do playing classic songs from your old albums ever get stale?
FD: Every once in a while, if you play one song for a long time, I guess you’d get kind of bored with it, but we always try to switch around and use a couple different songs every time we go out. The new fresher songs always keep the set interesting. At the same time, some of our older songs are our best songs like "Bro Hymn;" its kind of tough to get sick of that. Its pretty easy if the crowd is going off singing the songs and the sound man is doing a good job. If it sounds good and the kids are going off to it, then it doesn’t matter what song we’re playing. Its pretty cool.

PL: Does it bother you that you live in a country with a President you don’t support?
FD: Yeah, definitely. Its one of those things where, of course we love America; we were born and raised here. I personally love America, but watching what goes on in this country and watching the reign of terror that the "powers that be" have on this country and the education system and the social security system and the fucking police system, its totally insane and its really frustrating, but what can we do besides go out and vote, but when we vote, they find a place like Ohio or Florida where they can fix the vote so what does that vote mean? Do we live in a democracy? No, we don’t live in a democracy even if there’s a Democrat in office. Its really frustrating if you go to a place like Europe, Australia or Japan and see things in a different light. You see things completely differently if you can travel over there. You’ll come back here and wonder what the fuck is going on. Its frustrating, but we still have a good time, we still love being here and we get to say our piece on stage and in songs and in the press, so we get to do our part to try to help correct the problem.

PL: Name one thing about the Bush presidency that you either liked or agreed with.
FD: More salmonella in school children’s lunches. I think thats pretty good. The Patriot Act was a cool one. I like the idea of them being able to kick my door down and come in and rifle through my drawers because I might be a terrorist. The tax cuts for the rich, that was another good one. Um...what else; there’s got to be something good.
RB: You can drill for oil in the national wildlife.
FD: Yeah, and you can get more lumber now, and I think the pollution situation is a little bit more lax. The cool thing is, if you buy anything over a ten million dollar lot, you get to write it off. I don’t know. Maybe I’m slipping. Can I think of anything good that Bush has done?
PL: I can only think of two.
FD: Okay, refresh my memory.
PL: One was when he admitted he was wrong handling Hurricane Katrina.
FD: Wait a second; thats not a good thing.
PL: I thought that was good because he admitted doing something wrong.
FD: Okay. There was no way he couldn’t admit. He was put out there in the press and the media day after day, and there was no way that he could not answer for that. He could blame FEMA, he could blame the local governments, but he’s the fucking President of this country, and when something goes wrong on that kind of level, the President needs to act. He was backed into a corner and he had to take some heat for it. But fuck Katrina, what about Iraq? What about the repercussions in Iraq? How about "I was wrong and there were no weapons of mass destruction?," and what about "We acted too fast." What’s gonna happen when the dirty bomb comes in and kills millions of people.
Okay, so thats one thing: he admitted he was wrong about something. If thats the best quality you can find in a person, okay, we’ll take that. What was number two?
PL: People disagree with this, but the first few days after September 11, I liked how he had the country united. It wasn’t because of him, but he was still the face of the country.
FD: The one moment where I thought Bush was okay was when he got choked up and almost started crying during an interview immediately after and he showed a human side and was visibly distraught. But, then again, if you attack any country or any town, they’re gonna unite. It was almost to the point of false Patriotism. People were so eager to attack whoever did it that they weren’t thinking about the reasons why it happened. There was a reason why America was attacked, and its not because of me, its not because of Randy or you or Phil; well, maybe it was because of Phil, but its because of our government and the policies that we’ve put out to the rest of the world, wether it embargos, because we’re starving fucking kids. We’re doing shit thats causing other people to die all over the world, and there’s a reason why people in the Middle East hate us, and its not because of our religion, its because of us. Religion has something to do with it, but its because of what they believe America is all about. We’re not about greed and we’re not about major corporations running the planet, our government is. They see that shit, and they hate it and they hate what America is all about, and so they come back and kill innocent people. I don’t want to say that I blame our government for what happened, but I do. Instead of trying to rectify situations, we make them much worse. When a million people are getting slaughtered with axes and hoes and machetes in Rwanda, what did we do? A million people. Do you know why they stopped that genocide? Because bodies were running down the river and the water was blood red running into other countries. But, we’ve got to go to Iraq and disarm their weapons of mass destruction. Its all about oil, its all about greed, its all about Halliburton getting a big contract, its all about controlling the Middle East, and this is all happening because people want to get rich, and who’s paying the price? The poor people are going to war and they’re getting killed, and innocent people are losing their lives because of terrorist attacks-which are totally cowardly and totally wrong-but innocent people are losing their lives. Why isn’t Bush’s family over there no the front lines? Why is it the poor black kid from New Orleans eating dirt and getting shot at while he watching his Grandma and Grandpa die from dehydration at the fucking Convention Center? Why? Because of money, power and greed. What was the question or statement you had?
PL: How he had the country united after 9-11.
FD: Okay, yeah. Anyone was gonna unite. I don’t think Bush had America united. But, then again, why did we have to unite?-because our fucking government has done so much damage all over the world, and they’re coming back to get us. We’re a fucking target now because of our government, and we’re only at the tip of the iceberg here. Its gonna get so much worse before it gets better, and its because of our government; its not because of me or you. But then again, Americans are pretty complacent. They sit around watching Friends and eating McDonalds and Dominos and shopping at Wal Mart and getting their coffee at Starbucks. They don’t go out and vote. The vote rate is astoundingly bad. Hows it gonna change? Its gonna change when this fucking place is in fucking nuclear winter. We’re fucked. So is Bush, but he’s going to Heaven so he has nothing to worry about.

PL: What’s the best way to honor the memory of someone who has passed on?
FD: I guess there’s not really a best way. Do you mean immediately after or just in general?
PL: I was thinking more long term.
FD: I guess everyone has a different way. If the person was an artist, go see their art. If the person was a race car driver, go to watch races. However the person you cared about would want you to honor it. We honor Jason’s memory, our old bass player, by playing his songs, and we’re out there dedicating a song to him and we’re keeping the music alive that he wrote. I guess it depends on the individual.

PL: Does it seem that kids getting into punk music now through bands on the radio are taking the time to research the pioneers of the genre?
FD: First of all, they’re not getting into punk music. I guess they’re just getting into music at this point. In my opinion, there is no such thing as punk music anymore. They definitely need to take the time-if you’re gonna be getting into a band like Pennywise, then you’d better be going out to buy a Black Flag record or a Minor Threat record and finding out where that stuff came from. Once again, we’re not the real thing. We’re doing our thing, but it came from a certain place that they need to know about. Its just like any kind of history. If you want to eat a Philly Cheese Steak, and you’re in California, you need to go to Philly and go to Pat’s and get a real Philly Cheese Steak. If you want a slice of pizza, you need to go to New York or Italy; you don’t just go to Domino’s and think that’s what its all about. If you want a stuffie, you come to Rhode Island. My point is that the kids that are getting into music today, they’re thinking Blink 182 is punk rock. They’ll be lucky if they even get into Pennywise as an influence, let alone get to Black Flag or The Ramones or the Sex Pistols. We think its hugely important for kids to find out what this is all about. We play cover songs every night and tell kids to go out and buy these records so they can know what its really about because its been so watered down, so commercialized and so packaged up in a nice little ball that there’s nothing real about it anymore. People can just go to Guitar Center, get a line of credit to buy an amp, look a certain way, make themselves a CD and put it up on Myspace, and then they’ll make their own record label-which is cool, but it happens so much faster and so inorganically now. You could literally learn how to play an instrument and put out a CD in a month. The struggle and the compassion that someone like Black Flag went through-with no equipment and no money, and not being able to record their stuff because they didn’t have the money to record it, and then not being able to get a gig because nobody wanted that kind of music in their venue, and then not being able to put out a record because there was no record label so they had to start their own label. Thats what made their music so passionate. Now people have a demo tape out and 40,000 listens on Myspace and can get 400 people to a show. Venues will give them 500 tickets and have them sell them at $5 a piece, bring them back $2500 to play, and if they don’t sell that many tickets, then they have to pay to play. All the realness is gone. Go out and by the real shit, whether is Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath or Black Flag, go out and find out what real music is about.
PL: About ten years ago, I was at a party and talking to this old Boston punk rocker. I said something about you guys, and he said that he hadn’t heard you, but he thought that bands like you and NOFX were good because people would buy your records, and then from there go back and buy the older bands’ albums. It doesn’t seem like people are doing that these days.
FD: Well, its ten years later. Now you’re in such a fucking fast food society, that people who are into music will turn on MTV and see Brittany Spears and Yellowcard. They’ll go to school, see the Brittany Spears look alikes over there, the white kids that think they’re black and the black kids that are into rap with their little bling, and then there’s the punk rockers. The kid will decide to be a punk rocker. "What are you guys doing?" "We’re listening to Blink 182 and Yellowcard." "Cool. Where’d you get that shirt?" "Hot Topic." And then they run down to Hot Topic to get a spiked belt and a Dead Kennedy’s shirt and a Yellowcard shirt, and a Pennywise shirt and some green hair dye and a mohawk.
People are just fucking robots, and its hideous. Like I said, the heart’s gone, and the kids that think they are being individuals are just copying more than ever. Look at the emo movement: "I’ve got tight pants. My hair’s all fucked up combed over my eye. I know I can’t see good out of my right eye because my hair’s combed over it, but it looks cool and everyone’s doing it. And I’ve got black fingernail polish."
What the fuck? Punk rock was created to be an individual. You’ve got all different kinds of fashion sense in punk rock: you can wear Levis and a T shirt and some Converse and be a punk rocker, or you could have a mohawk that is five feet in the air and have nails coming out of your forehead and be a punk rocker.
Now, everything’s been done. You can walk down the street with tattoos sleeved up your neck and face, and you barely get a second look. Everything has been done and commercialized. Its changed. Everybody wants everything now, and commercialism is just grabbing it: "Lets make some money-oh-Limp Biskit’s not cool anymore. Lets throw them in the trash can and now kids don’t have to play their basses down on the fucking floor. Have you noticed that everything is moving so fast? The trends come and go really quick.

PL: Whats the last concert that you attending that you didn’t play in?
FD: It was this band called A Heartwell Ending. It was an emo concert, or screamo-I don’t even know what its called. It was so fucking hideous. The band was okay. I’m not saying that emo music is bad; I have nothing against it. Some of the shit is really gay, but this particular band is really good.
RB: Whats wrong with the word gay?
FD: Nothing’s wrong with the word gay. I told you, I’m gay, and you’re gonna feel the wrath really soon.
So, the show was just 18 year old kids eating pizza and drinking coke. A full bar and only a couple of them are having drinks. Parents are there and I’m meeting parents. What the fuck are parents doing at people’s concerts? My mom didn’t go to my concerts for 20 years. She wasn’t allowed to go until 20 years later. It was really an eye opening experience with what the youth of today is doing, and its really strange: parents in the audience, they’re so well behaved and everyone’s polite. The early days of Pennywise were just absolute mayhem. The scene has just totally moved on, and that was the last concert I went to.

PL: Whats a little known fact about Epitaph Records?
FD: I have a good one, but I won’t say it because Brett probably won’t like it. It was Epitaph Records in the 80s, and then Brett kind of went on a crack cocaine bender and stopped the label for awhile. Then he restarted the label once he got sober, because thats what you do when you get sober-you do creative things. He restarted the label and he started recording and he built a recording studio in this little house in Hollywood, called West Beach Recorders; its where our first record was done, and Suffer. It was a three bedroom house that had a recording console in one room, drums in another room and a couple closets for amps and singing. The living room was the front lounge and another bedroom was the office, and that was Epitaph Records; the record label and the studio were in this little house in Hollywood. That, to me, was where the whole punk rock resurgence started: the Suffer album by Bad Religion, NOFX, Insted, us and a couple other bands on Epitaph-not that we were solely responsible for the punk rock resurgence, but that little compound right there was a huge part of putting punk rock back into play. Then they moved out of there and they got a new spot, and that place is in a movie with Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy. Whats it called? Bowfinger.
Little known fact: If you rent Bowfinger, the scenes that are filmed in that house, thats where Pennywise-Pennywise, Suffer, No Control, Down by Law, NOFX-all those albums were recording in that living room.

PL: Name one, album besides your own, that you think all kids should have in their collection.
FD: One album besides my own? Chaos Delivery Machine. You want to hear it?
CDM: I don’t have it.
FD: Where is it?
CDM: Its in my backpack
FD: Uhh.
RB: Suffer.
FD: This guy is so into his music, he carries it around in his backpack with him. Chaos Delivery Machine-we’ll put that as an alternate. One CD that you should own is Minor Threat. It was one of my personal life changing favorites, although the straight edge thing didn’t go over too good with me: "Don’t drink, don’t fuck, don’t smoke." It was awesome; one of the best albums ever made.

PL: Do you have any final comments?
FD: Here’s what I told the interviewer yesterday when he asked if there was any question reporters or people ask you thats annoying or kind of bums you out. I said the only one is: "Do you have any final comments." It doesn’t bum me out. You’re the first reporter I’ve told this to, but people don’t like it when you ask that question. Randy, do you like that question?
RB: Yeah.
FD: You like that question?
RB: Yeah.
FD: Alright, Randy, do you have any final comments?
RB: Its hard out here for a pimp.
FD: Trying to get money for the rent. With the Cadillac and gas money spent. I’m a whole lot of bitches jumping ship. And now, I have a question for you: Have you seen "Hustle and Flow?"
PL: No.
FD: Whats wrong with you you whitebread eating motherfucking cracker? Get your ass out there and see that shit. Its awesome. Thats my last comment: Hustle and Flow, fucking best movie of the year. Check it out.
And you can ask that question if you want. I’m just saying, thats one question that annoys me because I just did all this talking, and I’m supposed to come up with something on my own to do. Thats just my personal.
PL: Some of the reasons I ask that is because I don’t usually ask much about the music or the new CD or anything.
FD: I thought it was a great interview. Its one of the best ones I’ve done on the whole trip.
PL: Thank you.
FD: Awesome.

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