|
|
 |
MxPx.
 It's
only been a short time since MxPx has ventured down to Australia,
and I'd foolishly been thinking that all had been quiet in the
interim. On the contrary, the trio have been incredibly busy
piecing together footage for a forthcoming DVD, working on an
accompanying EP, and working their butts off on yet another
new album. Do these guys ever take any time off? Not according
to guitarist Tom Wisniewski.
"Things are hectic," he admits. "We just played a few shows here in Seattle, at a club called the Graceland. We brought some cameras along, and we filmed the shows and soon we'll be putting them out on a DVD - and also it'll be accompanied by a five track acoustic EP. We've been talking about doing a DVD for a while, and we were thinking that we wanted to do something cool and interesting for the fans, so we added the acoustic stuff as a sort of bonus. There will be one brand new song that will appear only on this EP, another one is a new song which will also be on our new album which will be out mid next year, and then three older songs done acoustic. It'll be fun."
Having been together for well over a decade now, MxPx certainly aren't strangers to the live stage. However, things had to be done a little differently this time around. "It was strange doing the shows for the DVD. We did all three shows in three nights at the same club, and filmed the whole lot - but we had to wear the exact same clothes each night, for consistency and all. It was worth it though, because these were the smallest shows we've done in Seattle for a while. And we had a lot of kids come every night, which was great."
With the work on the new DVD almost done, the whole band are keen to get back on the road and get back to doing what they do best - travelling the globe, playing amazing shows to kids the world over. "We've been doing small shows all over the summer, but while we've been doing that, we've also been working on a new album back home in Bremerton. A while back we built a studio there, and when it came time to work on the new stuff, we decided we might as well put it to use, finally.
"Usually you're paying like a thousand dollars a day to be in a studio, but on this album we can go in for as long as we want and it's not costing a dime. And things are more relaxed too, being at home: we can just turn up, hang out with our friends, I can go home and see my wife in the afternoon, whatever we want. It's like we're getting back to our roots or something."
While they have played down under pretty regularly, it's rare
that MxPx should come again so soon. "Well, we always love Australia,"
Wisniewski assures me. "We had been thinking about coming down
to do the Livid festival, but that fell through so we thought
we might as well just come on down in October.
"It's cool that we're hooking up with Unwritten Law while we're in Adelaide. though. It's funny how sometimes you run into friends who are in bands on tour in other countries. I think we're meeting up with Lagwagon for one show while we're there too. That's the funniest thing, because we run into them everywhere. We even ran into them in Hamburg, Germany, when we walked into a McDonald's!" Wisniewski laughs. "I don't know, I guess we're just meant to hang out with them."
But in no way has being in a highly successful band and hanging out with rock stars every night changed Wisniewski's attitude. He's obviously still just a small-town boy at heart, with his feet firmly planted on the ground.
"It's just unbelievable to know all these people I like and respect. I remember we were doing a tour with Bad Religion and I'd just bought a new guitar and I showed it to Brian Baker and he was messing around with it, saying 'Wow, this is a really cool guitar! Where did you get this?' Here was this guy who I'd totally looked up to and respected for so long, and we're just hanging out, playing around, talking guitars and everything. It was great!"
Ryan Smith
 |
MxPx play with Unwritten Law and Mere Theory at Heaven on Sun 17 Oct. Tix available from dB Magazine.
|
|
|
The latest issue
available now!
|
