New band We Are The In Crowd are quickly becoming UK favourites, we caught up with vocalist Jordan and Bassist Mike at Wolverhampton’s Slam Dunk Festival.
Today is the last day of the festival, how have you found it? How have the crowds been?
Mike: Its been an adventure, a non stop thrill ride.
Are there any bands that you’ve managed to catch, or that you are planning to see?
Mike: We’ve seen our friends in State Champs a little bit, and we’ve caught Motion City Soundtrack they were fantastic.
Jordan: Modern Baseball they were really fucking cool.
Mike: Save You Breath, I just like cool things.
Your music style features male/female duelling vocals, how did that happen?
Jordan: The two vocals thing kind of just happened, we didn’t start the band and say ‘were going to do this…’ We just realised what we had.
Mike: We’ve got two amazing singers, so why not have them both singing?!
How would you describe the new album, since your first would you say you have you grown as a band?
Jordan: Absolutely yeah, we toured on the first album for like a solid year/two years. So to do it all again and start writing was like a whole new experience.
Mike: It’s more focused. It sounds like an ‘album’, where as the other one sounds more like, just a collection of songs. If that makes sense?
Jordan: We were babies back then.
Mike: We were just rushing to put out records. There are obviously (in my opinion) some really great songs, but I think the rest of the band feels the same way. But for me I just really like the flow of this one, compared to either the EP or the first full length.
How was it working with legendary producer John Feldmann?
Mike: Intense! He’s a very intense guy, I don’t think I’ve ever drank that much caffeine. He’s like ‘gotta pump full of caffeine’, four hours of sleep a day like max, because he had us working 24 hours a day.
Jordan: We wrote it, tracked it and finished in 22 days. Exhausting.
Do you know when you’ll be back in the UK? What do you have planned for the rest of the year?
Mike: I don’t know if we are back here this year, we already did a tour. I feel like you guys are going to start getting sick of us! But the shows are always packed and we thank you for that. We’re obviously going to come back, unless we die. I don’t know about this year though. We shall see if the planets align.
Speed Round
How would you like to be remembered?
Mike: I would just like to be remembered. Period.
Dream dinner guest (dead or alive)?
Mike: I prefer to spend most of my time with dead people..
Jordan: I would like to hang out with Steve Jobs at dinner.
Mike: Oh! Ha- a dinner guest that is dead or alive.. I dunno man. Yeah Steve Jobs.
How long do you spend in-front of the mirror?
Mike: Me? I dunno, that’s a question for you.. (looking at Jordan)
Jordan: 10 minutes.
Favourite swear word?
Mike: Fuck.
Jordan: I’d also say Fuck.
Mike: We sound so uneducated and fucking ignorant all the time, it’s like it’s a space bar for us. When you watch an interview, the amount that everyone says fuck is ridiculous. We sound little kids that just learnt how to swear recently.
Jordan: Instead of saying the word ‘er’, we say ‘fucking.. something’ or ‘fuck.. fucking’!
Best excused you’ve ever used to breakup with someone?
Jordan: I’m really apathetic about everything.
Mike: Sometimes Jordan just stops answering a girls text messages
Jordan: That is kinda how I do it, and they just eventually realise we’re broken up until eventually she puts ‘single’ on her MySpace and then I’m like “I guess we’re broken up” and I’m off the hook at that point. Then you see them a few months later..
Mike: And she’s like “remember when you broke up with me by not talking to me ever again, that was cool.”
Best day of your life?
Mike: Today, and everyday. Everyday is the best day.
Religious, Spiritualist or Humanist?
Mike: Humanist
Jordan: I don’t even know what any of those things mean. (Leads into long philosophical discussion..)
Mike: He’s a humanist.
Worst thing you’ve ever put in your mouth?
Jordan: What the fuck was that gross ass shit we ate in Indonesia?
Mike: What the fuck is it called?
Jordan: It was some south east Asian fruit, it’s on the tip of my tongue.
Mike: That’s the one, I guess!
Jordan: Think about the laws, if we think about the laws we’ll remember the name of the fruit.
Mike: No chewing gum. No blah bla blah. No something. I don’t remember but its gross.
Jordan: Look up gross Indonesian fruit!
(Possibly a Durian fruit- The edible flesh emits a distinctive odour that is strong and penetrating even when the husk is intact. Some people regard the Durian as having a pleasantly sweet fragrance; others find the aroma overpowering and revolting.)
Last band you paid to see live?
Mike: I don’t want to sound like a jaded prick, but I haven’t because we are always on tour. I tried to see Brand New over the winter because they did a bunch of headlining shows in New York and New Jersey but the tickets sold out in like five seconds. I think I tried to buy those. That’s one of those things even though they are from our area everyone’s trying to get guest list spots for that show and I am not nearly connected enough to guarantee that I’m going to get a free ticket to that.
As a child what did you want to be when you grew up?
Jordan: I wanted to be a garbage man
Mike: A garbage man!?
Jordan: I wanted to be a fucking Astronaut.
Mike: I wanted to be a Dinosaur.
What would you say if you met the Queen?
Mike: ..What do you do?
Jordan: Yeah I would say, honestly ‘what do you do?’ I mean it’s pretty cool.. but what does she do?
Mike: Wait, are people going to be offended by that answer?
Jordan: I mean our President doesn’t do shit. So what does the Queen do?
DC or Marvel?
Mike: Marvel.
Jordan: I’m gonna say DC.
Rock, Paper, Scissors?
Mike: We do that in our hotel room for beds sometimes. Out here me, Jordan and Cameron share a room and sometimes there is one big bed and two small beds.
Jordan: We usually stay at Travelodge’s and they are all equally fucking terrible.
Mike: So when it is one big bed and two small we RPS for it.
Jordan: When you do it here are you doing that Rock, Paper, Scissors Says or are you doing Rock, Paper, Scissors?
Mike: That’s bullshit, when someone does the says shit we don’t play it like that.
(Rock Paper Scissors Says?! ..No idea..)
Star Trek or Star Wars?
Mike: Star Wars
Jordan: Star Wars
Last time you were starstruck?
Mike: I’ve gotta make sure he’s not around, but I’m a really big Motion City Soundtrack fan. We’ve done a bunch of festivals with them, done Warped Tour with them and shit. I just really like Justin Pierre’s lyrics and everything. We’ve been sharing green rooms and hanging out with them, and they’re like normal dudes. We get along with them really well, but I have to actively not say something stupid.
Jordan: He’s a fan boy.
Mike: I haven’t said anything yet! I have no filter and I usually say exactly what I think at all times. Whether it’s good, bad, stupid or profound. And I’m not saying the things I naturally wanna say, so it’s like making me weird.
Weirdest moment of your life?
Mike: Life is just weird in general, I don’t have an answer for that one.
Jordan: Probably coming over here and seeing the reaction, because this was the first international thing we did. It was really cool, I remember seeing like people shouting my name here. It was kinda strange, we don’t really have this at home.
Is this the first time you’d been to the UK?
Jordan: Besides touring I came over here in the 8th grade.
Mike: I’d never left the country before I was in the band. But now we just travel all the time, we’ve been everywhere at this point, like three or four times over.
Jordan: We are airport veterans.
Doesn’t that get old?
Mike: Yeah, to be honest it fucking does.
Jordan: It does get old, like my Mum’s like “he’s so lucky he gets to see all these great places” and I’d rather be in bed with the dog.
Mike: But it’s cool, when you get to meet fans at all these shows, that’s why you do it. But the travel aspect of it, the moving gets really fucking old. It wears you down. The first time you go some place it’s always amazing, second time it’s a little less amazing and then the third time it’s pretty much the same as playing a show in the states. There are some cities in the UK I’ve been to more times than US cities, I’ve probably spent more time in London beside Los Angeles, New York and maybe Chicago.
Jordan: Last year alone we were here like seven times.
Mike: Eventually you are like, arh I don’t wanna be on a fucking plane. I hate the act of coming here because I know I’m gonna get jet lagged. I know this because I can’t sleep on the fucking plane and we only take red-eye so I know for the first twenty-four hours in Europe I’m gonna hate my fucking life. Once I’m readjusted I’m fine!
Jordan: What about when we go to south-east Asia and that’s a twelve to eighteen hour flight?
Mike: That’s easier, because eventually my body gives up and I can’t stay awake anymore. We’re not even on the plane long enough for us to get a normal nights sleep.
Jordan: We still do it though!
Mike: I do love being in a band though by the way!
Slam Dunk Special General Knowledge Question
What is the technical term for a whales penis?
Mike: I know the name for a whales vagina, San Diego! (Haha..)
Jordan: Someone was talking about this recently, what is it?
Mike: I think I was talking about this recently but I don’t know.
Jordan: Is it a dork? (Correct! A Dork) Oh wow!
Mike: There you go!
Final comment you’d like to add for the UK fans?
Mike: We love you, stay just the way you are never change. Stay in school, Uni is cool!