Last of the Famous

A great thing about having a site about music that I love is that sometimes I'm able to interview a band or person that is really influential to me. Just from their music, I can tell that they are sincere people who will have a lot of great things to say, and I've been right. Porcell from Last of the Famous, as well as tons of other great hardcore bands, is one of those people that make doing this such a priveledge. Not to be left out, vocalist Daniel Larsson, is an incredible guy as well with a lot of passion and sincere thoughts. I want to thank these two for being such great people. This interview covers everything from them defending their album, The Music or the Misery (which you should give another chance if you've written it off), to broken friendships to how good Ignite is. Give this interview a read and then give their album a shot.

PL: Introduce yourselves.

P: I'm Porcell. I play guitar.

D: I'm Daniel and I sing.

P: The other guys in the band are Mike, who plays bass, Supergrass plays second guitar and Alex plays drums.

PL: Where do you guys all live?

P: Everywhere.

D: I can actually answer that question. Our bass player still lives in Washington, D.C., but he's probably gonna move to New York soon. Supergrass and I are both from Sweden, but we both moved to New York City. I'm born and raised in Sweden and for some reason we ended up in the U.S. a few years back. Porcell lives in upstate New York?

P: Yeah, I used to live in Boston. I originally lived in New York and then I moved to Boston and now I live in Upstate New York. And Alex lives in Boston. I guess we call ourselves a New York band since we are actually based out of New York, but we practice in Boston.

PL: How tough is it to get to practice?

P: Its really not so hard for me cause I only live about two and a half hours away from Boston.

D: Its actually kind of a good set up I think because what we do is we all travel up there for a four or five day period at a time. We live in Alex's house in Boston, which is an awesome house here in Boston and we practice in his basement and we spend the whole time together. No one leaves so no one is late and everyone's there.

P: When we practice, we go up there and we're serious. We practice about 12 hours a day.

PL: I lot of the reviews that I've read from you guys haven't been good.

P: You know, its strange because the bigger magazines gave us bad reviews, but we got good reviews in smaller magazines. I don't know. Its kind of a weird thing.

D: And also, I think the U.S. market has been harder on us than the rest of the world. We actually have seen a lot of good reviews in other parts of the world. I don't know why this is. It kind of sucks in one way because people see 'ex members of' Gorilla Biscuits and Give Up the Ghost.

P: We're not those bands.

D: They should have not done that. That was the label that thought they would be able to use that because its true. We did play in all those bands. We were in Shelter, we did play in all those bands, but thats not really what we tried to be. And, the thing is, hardcore kids and bigger magazines think that this band is supposed to be a hardcore band, and when they hear it, they're shocked that its not. But, if you do pay attention to this record-we didn't write this record to try to write some pop punk record-we wanted to write a melodic record, a melodic punk rock record, but at the same time, we are influenced by so many hardcore bands on this record too. Me writing and Porcell writing for this record, we were listening to bands like the Descendents and Dag Nasty and Lifetime, but people seem to have forgot that there is a part of hardcore that actually had a lot of melodies. Especially the old school hardcore. That scene had a lot of melody: Seven Seconds, Dag Nasty, even Minor Threat, its a lot of melodies and thats what we felt that we wanted to do. And even Shelter. Shelter. People forget that Shelter was a melodic band too.

P: For me personally, I read those reviews and they say that we're some kind of cookie cutter pop punk band. But, when I wrote the music, I can definitely say that I was not influenced by modern whatever you call it pop punk. I don't even know half those bands. I grew up in punk rock and I was a 12 year old punk rocker. I was into bands like Channel 3, the Adolescents, Stiff Little Fingers, The Clash. Thats really more of our influence. We listen to that old kind of melodic punk music and that stuff has harmonies and a lot of melody in it and I think that is more of our influences and I think people kind of misunderstand where we're coming from and what we're trying to do.

D: And I think people are not giving it a chance listening to it. They just turn it on and be like 'this is too much melody, what are these guys doing? This is pop punk.' And I'm like 'pay attention to it.' We're not singing about nothing. We're singing about things that are actually meaningful. We have thoughts and opinions, songs about straight edge and songs about vegetarianism. We still have our beliefs. I think that people thought that we are just trying to be like a pop punk band. We were never ever thinking that in our head. We did this record-people keep saying that this is a polished Yellowcard record. Dude, we fucking did this record all ourselves. We recorded it ourselves, we mixed it ourselves, we did everything ourselves. We didn't have any high priced budget for this. We did it in our friend's studio. We did this because we wanted to have a raw record. Its weird when I read these reviews. I'm shocked. I wonder if these guys are really listening. Can't they tell that we haven't spent $100,000 on this record, we spend $3,000 on this record. Its crazy that they would feel that its a polished pop punk record. But, what can you do?

P: At the same time, I've been in a lot of bands and I've been doing this for a long time. You can not let bad reviews get to you. When we did Youth of Today's Break Down the Walls record, Thrasher was the biggest magazine that covered music at that time. If you got a bad review in Thrasher, you were devastated. Pusshead used to do all the reviews and he totally trashed Youth of Today's Break Down the Walls, and Maximum Rock n Roll trashed it and we were all really bummed, but whatever; time will tell. These days, people look back at that record and think its a really good record, so we're just doing it. We love our music and we love our songs. We're just going out there to play.

PL: Have you gotten a good response on tour so far?

P: Awesome. Awesome.

D: This is our twelth show ever today, and its really new to us still, but kids are definitely checking us out. Just now, people were coming up to us and asking when we were gonna be at the merch table. People are gonna be checking our record out. I think we have been a little let down with the label letting people know that we exist, but this is actually the best way in the end. Being out here playing and letting people know that we exist.

PL: What advice would you give to someone who is losing a best friend, friendship wise?

P: (Long pause) Thats a thoughtful question. You caught us by surprise with a thoughtful question. (laughs) I'll tell you, I've had so many broken friendships. I think that you can't really let it get to you too much. Friendships come and go and people constantly change and they move into different stages of their life. I remember when I was straight edge, and everyone that I hung out with was straight edge. And then straight edge became kind of uncool and people got out of it. The whole straight edge scene crashed, and literally, I lost every single one of my friends. Not really lost them, but we just had different interests. They wanted to go to bars and I wasn't into it. I think people just grow apart sometimes and you've just got to accept it and find like minded people that you can hang with.

PL: Has there ever been a resolve in any of those situations?

P: Yeah, definitely. Definitely.

D: I went through situations like that a couple times in my life too where I felt that I lost people that I've cared so much about, and I let it get to me. Its hard not to; its someone thats really close to you, and you love spending time with this person, and you eventually lose that connection and you don't know where it came from. Its upsetting and it makes you sad, but you keep going and you've got to find each other again as friends. Its almost like love. Its almost worse, sometimes because friends can be so much closer in one way. You can share everything with your best friend, and its tough when its not like it used to be.

P: I think "Fourteen" is kind of like that.

D:I definily have had fallouts with a lot of my friends, for the same reasons that Porcell said there. We've all had really strong beliefs, thoughts and politics and these kids felt that we had so much to give and to share with the world. At some point, everyone grew up in a way that-I felt that I grew up, but I felt that I wanted to take that to another step and spread the message in an even better way. These kids grew up and just turned into the people that we were against. They would go to bars that we would make fun of and stop being vegetarians. They would be suddenly buying meat from the same butcher shops that we had spray painted before. Not that I really-but its weird when you have this strong connection and then you lose it.

P: Yeah.

PL: Porcell, can you name all of the bands that you've been in?

P: I was in a band called Violent Children; its the first band that I did with the singer of Youth of Today. And then that band broke up and we did Youth of Today. I did Judge. I played in-I didn't play on any Gorilla Biscuits records, but I played with them for about the last year before they broke up. I played in Bold for a little while. Project X-that wasn't really a real band, but we ended up playing a handful of shows. I did Shelter for a really long time. And then after Shelter, I did a really brief band called Never Surrender that I sang for. We put out an EP. Then I started this band.

PL: Which one has had the most meaning to you.

P: They've all had different kinds of meanings to me. Its weird because they all reflect different stages of my life. Youth of Today was a real idealistic, positive band and Judge was a little more sad, kind of angry band. Shelter definitely had a meaning for me; that whole kind of spiritual level, so I can't say that one was more important than the other, but I think it was all part of growing up. You go out and look for different issues and you go through different things and resolve them and its just like going step by step.

PL: Is it cool having pretty much your whole life on record?

P: Yeah, its really cool. People have yearbooks, I have records that represent different parts of my life. Its kind of cool cause I can look back at a Youth of Today record and see where I was when I was 17-18 years old.

PL: Daniel, this is your first band, right?

D: I've been in a lot of bands. (Whoops-damn trusting outside sources) I was in Shelter for awhile. I was in a bunch of Swedish bands. I was in a band called Another Reason, which was on Crucial Response in Europe. My best friend was the guitarist of that band and we did really well in Sweden. We were kind of like Judge, just a hard straight edge band. The guitar player, as the record came out, stopped being straight edge and we couldn't really do the band. Everything that me and him wrote was about straight edge. I started a bunch of bands that did well for awhile, but most of the time, for different issues or whatever, we always broke up. Now I'm kind of happy because now I'm in a band with someone that I actually grew up listening to and admired.

P: Daniel also rodied and tour managed for Sick of It All, Dropkick Murphys, and The Sounds.

D: I've been on the road a lot and I've worked with a lot of big bands.

PL: Name one album, besides your own, that you think all kids should have in their collection.

P: I can think of about 50.

D: Alright, you name one and I'll name one.

P: One record that all kids should have in their collection. One that you have to have in your collection is the Minor Threat Discography. Its weird because they were one of the first hardcore bands that I got into, and I listen to them now over 20 years later, and that record still sounds incredible; all of their records, so thats a definite one.

D: I feel that that's a good question because I do feel that kids these days-when we play a Misfits song and I see three kids knowing the words, that scares me a little bit. What happened to punk? When I got into punk, it was not 1982, it was 1992 and I was still young. I got into hardcore and punk through some bands that were cool then like Snapcase and Earth Crisis, but, right away, I was like, 'Where does this come from?' And I wanted to check out what was going on before. It seems like kids forgot about that part. Even a band like New Found Glory was inspired by Gorilla Biscuits and Shelter and things like that. It seems like kids don't ever want to know; they don't care. Punk became so not punk; it became so not dangerous, which also scares me. It should not be the mall thing, where you can be at a mall and become a punk rocker at the mall. You should have to search it and find it. Punk and hardcore is not just a music, its a lifestyle. You've got to search it to learn how to live it, but I think he answered the question really good. I think that Minor Threat is a record that kids should have. I also do think that Gorilla Biscuits and Youth of Today are bands that kids should check out. Read the lyrics. Kids might be shocked when they turn it on and think that it sounds like crap and its such a cheap recording. But listen to the excitement. Its so real and raw and the lyrics, everything. Its not producers going in and making it sound like a major would put it out.

P: Especially Minor Threat. Even though that record sounds incredible and is great hardcore, that band changed my life. They shaped who I am today. They brought in all these great ideas like straight edge and living your life in a positive way. When I was into punk rock, it was all Sex Pistols and negativity and 'fuck the world.' Then you hear Minor Threat and its such a different thing. They said 'fuck the world,' but in a very different way.

D: They said 'fuck the world, but think about what you're doing.'

PL: I think a lot of people are influenced by them and don't even know it.

P: Sure.

PL: I can't think of any band thats done that before.

D: To end that question, I want to tell kids to check out whats going on out there except for whats on the radio and in the big magazines. Don't be scared of reaching out to bands that might not be as big because that stuff is important.

PL: Do you have a prediction for the next four years?

P: I don't like to think about the next four years. I fucking hate George Bush and I'm devastated that he won the election. Its so disturbing to me that the American public would actually let that guy back in office when he had such a horrible track record for four years. Its weird for me because I'm a little bit older and I have kids, and I really worry about what the world is gonna be like when my kids grow up. We have this crazy president who is a war monger and doesn't give a shit about the middle class, doesn't give a shit about the environment, and caters to the rich and the big corporations. Its really scary. So the next four years, I don't really have such a good projection for, but I think it will make for a lot of really good punk rock.

D: I think the rest of the world is going to see a change with a lot more anger towards the U.S. than you've ever seen before because I feel that the whole world was shocked that he was reelected. I think everyone, especially being from another country, I think they're shocked because they thought that Americans would have seen whats happened in the last four years. A lot of people are gonna try something different if it doesn't go right, but I guess we were all wrong. And now that we're on tour, we've talked to people that voted for Bush and we asked them what the reason was. They said that he's so cute; he looks like a monkey, and I'm like 'oh shit.'

PL: I was actually hoping that we would get voted out of office but would stay on TV somehow to see how stupid he looks. He looked really funny during the debates.

P: Those debates were devastating. I can't believe he won, but what are you gonna do. At least the kids-it seemed like it was a landslide for the young people that voted for Kerry, or at least for change. So hopefully the next generation is gonna be the next generation that will take over and make smarter decisions.

PL: Do you have any final comments?

D: Thank you for doing this interview and we're happy being out here. And, I'll tell kids again not to always listen to what these big magazines write. I'm not saying that we're the best band in the world. I never would say that. I think we did a good record. I love our record. The kids should give it a second chance and also the reviewers should give it a second chance and actually listen to it. There is a lot of hardcore there. If they don't see that, then I'm sorry, they don't understand hardcore. Fuck it, we're happy being out here. Thats my final comment. And, like I said, thank you for the interview.

P: Yeah, we're just happy being out here and playing. Thats what we love to do, and we're definitely grateful if someone comes out to check it out. And we're psyched to actually be able to do things that a lot of bands these days probably can't do. We're actually gonna get this album out around the world and get to go to all the places again like we did before. We're gonna go to South America, Europe and Japan and stuff like that. Its not always about making it big, its also about the enjoyment of being able to see the world and travel to different cultures.

PL: Thats like Ignite.

P: Yeah, definitely. We actually saw their website today. They're one of my favorite bands ever, and they're also a very melodic hardcore band thats been getting a lot of shit in the press too, which I don't think is right. And they were in Brazil, touring and doing really well, so its cool to see.

PL: Yeah, I love that band.

P: Yeah, awesome.

Interviewed by RF

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