I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Justin Pierre of Motion City Soundtrack and the next 45 minutes produced one of the most interesting interviews I’ve ever done. From the 4 Albums, 2 Nights tour, to their upcoming album, and even their exciting new project with Drexel University, there was never a dull moment. Check out the interview below.
Hi, my name is Justin Pierre. I play guitar and sing in the band Motion City Soundtrack. Yayyyy!!
How would you describe your genre to people who had never listened to your music before?
I don’t know, I just kind of tell people that we’re a rock band. I think a lot of people think of us as “pop-punk.” That is the phrase that gets thrown at us and I think that’s because we spent many years on Warped Tour, playing Warped Tour and we’ve sort of been associated with bands that have also had that label, whether it’s Blink 182, The All American Rejects, or Fall Out Boy, you know those are the sort of bands we went on tour with. So I don’t know. It neither pisses me off nor excites me, that label –pop-punk. I mean it is what it is and if people want to call us that, that’s cool with me. But I usually say “I’m in a rock band,” because that’s very generic and just sort of the simple answer.
What got you into music, originally?
Man, I don’t know. I guess this could be totally crazy. I think I was always a fan of music, it was always around my house. I know my dad had a lot of records and as a small child, wearing diapers, he has pictures of me listening to headphones of his Beach Boys albums and Beatles albums and stuff. So I think I’ve always listened to music but as far as playing music, I sadly attempted to play the saxophone when I was in grade school and it was not so good. But I had this friend who played guitar and we were both into Metallica so we decided to start a metal band where he played guitar and I played sax and it didn’t go so well. But, yeah I think it was kind of, I’ll have to say Metallica made me want to play guitar. So this was around the time, before the album “End Justice For All” but somewhere around there was when I got a guitar and I basically just taught myself how to play by reading their tablature books. So I learned how to play guitar to Metallica tablature books. And then I just, I don’t know, I started playing and in high school I got into different music, I guess it would be considered alternative but it was more of the weird, indie music that sort of blew up in the wake of Nirvana blowing up. So bands like Super Chunk, Pavement, Pixies, Nirvana, Jawbox, Fugazee, things of that sort throughout high school. Then after that I ended up, I had one high school band that was pretty good and we ended up playing like in Duluth, Minneapolis, and St. Paul, Minnesota - those three places. And I ended up playing a lot of shows with a band that Josh Cain, who’s the guitarist in Motion City Soundtrack, was in. So we sort of became friends that way and then when our bands broke up we ended up forming Motion City Soundtrack in 1997. So that’s kind of how I got to be in Motion City Soundtrack.
The guys are between labels, but that didn’t stop them from recording the fifth full-length on their own dime – and their own terms. “We had no one telling us, you know, ‘That’s good but maybe you should change this,’” Taylor said. “It was cool, we felt very free.”
PropertyOfZack sat down with Tony Thaxton from Motion City Soundtrack just a few weeks ago for a brief interview. Tony and I discussed the 4 Albums. 2 Nights. 7 Cities, Motion City’s departure from their major label, the environment that their new album was created in, and more. Read up and enjoy, it’s a good one!
This is the third stop on the discography tour. How were the first two cities?
They were good considering I didn’t know what to expect. We started in LA and it went really well. It was a really fun way to start, so I hope it continues. It’s so spread out. We even had a few days off where everybody went home and then we’ve had random shows and lots of days off. We started it two weeks ago and this is only the first city. I’m looking forward to tonight though. It should be fun and we have lots of friends coming out.
Motion City played the first three albums one time in Chicago before Dinosaur Life was released, but this is the first time you’ve done a tour of your albums. Was it daunting learning everything over again?
The first two records are kind of easy because even though those are the oldest songs, for years those were the only songs we had so we played all of them and played them a lot. Doing the second night, our catalog got bigger so some of the songs got lost in the mix as far as live performances go. Now we have a few shows out of the way, but the LA show [Laughs]. There are a handful of songs that we’ve never ever played before on those albums.
Have fans been going all out for the shows so far?
It’s been great. It’s a weird tour, but that makes it fun. The super fans are really excited about it, but the more casual fans aren’t as into it. The people that are coming out are the hardcore fans and are having a really good time.
Was this just the perfect time to do this tour considering there’s a little bit of a stand-still on releasing the new album while you figure things out?
Yeah, and we haven’t really toured this year. We did Brazil and some college shows. This is really the first US tour we did this year.
In terms of everything that’s going on now – When did it sort of become apparent that you guys were splitting with the label?
I honestly can’t remember. I think it was at the end of last summer. It was nearly a year ago now. I don’t think any of us were too surprised by it or anything. Everyone was cool with it. I think we didn’t necessarily see it coming, but we weren’t surprised by it either.
Many would say it was quite ballsy for the band to record this whole record out of your own pockets without label help. Was there anxiety through that whole process?
Maybe a little bit, but kind of not. We knew that we were just going to go in and make a record and do what we wanted and make it how we wanted to make it without dealing with outside comments.
POZ: Was it freeing to do it that way?
Tony: We were lucky in the past. We never got anyone too heavily involved trying to make us change things. We’d get notes here and there, or you at least had to get demos approved. I know everyone says they’re excited, but I’m really, really excited about this record.
(via tonythaxton)
An interview with Matt for Young Hollywood. ALSO, NEW SONG NAME ALERT!!
Prior to interviewing Motion City Soundtrack’s Justin Pierre, we decided to put him through the Dustin Downing “School of Candid Photography. “Pierre was open minded enough to play along as we hoisted him onto the balcony of a 2-story abandoned building and had him borrow various reading material from the stash of a Sunset Strip homeless man. Although the dismount from the disheveled building was not pretty – picture Downing with Pierre on his shoulders in a manic frenzy of trying to avoid rusty nails and a wrong step on a cement staircase – the photos turned out rather stellar. We’re happy to say that Pierre survived, was able to grab some much needed hand sanitizer and arrive safely back at his hotel.
Kicking it by the pool at The Grafton hotel, Pierre told us about the band’s upcoming 4 Albums, 2 Nights, 7 Cities tour that they will officially kick off in Los Angeles on August 19thand 20th at the House of Blues. He also discussed doing the voice of a 12- year old boy in the animated series “Godkiller” and being called a “good weirdo” by Margot Kidder at Comic Con.
Read the rest of the interview and to see more of the pictures taken, click here.
Click through the picture for another interview with Justin on SPIN about the fifth album and what their new material is going to sound like.
Motion City Soundtrack are one of the hardest working bands around at the moment. It seems as though they’ve been consistently touring for the last few years - they thrive on live performances and it wears you out just looking at the tour schedule. The only time they’ve taken a break is to record I Am The Movie after signing to Epitaph Records. With the album successfully wrapped up and doing well, they’ve hit the road again with fellow tourmates Limbeck and The All-American Rejects.
The tour is going so well that several of the venues have been upgraded to accommodate growing demand; tonight’s show in Leeds has been moved from The Cockpit to the Leeds Met. This may explain why Justin Pierre (vocals/guitar) and Joshua Cain(guitar/backing vocals) are buzzing with energy. Both come bounding through the emergency exit, Justin clinging to a polystyrene cup of tea, Joshua with a beanie hat, both stating that this is warm weather compared to the climate they’re used to. Joshua states that in their hometown of Minneapolis it would be snowing!
The interview takes place outside, away from the bustle of the backstage area. An ambulance rushes past and a ticket tout looms in the shadows like Fagan. Welcome to Leeds.
Since it’s Justin’s birthday, I thought I’d post this ten minute interview with him before Reading last year.
Happy Birthday again to Mr Justin Pierre!
