Set Your Goals - Jordan and Matt
Interview Date: August 26, 2006
Associated band: Set Your Goals
Interview with Matt and Jordan of Set Your Goals in August of 2006.rnrn
Where are you guys currently, since you just recently supported Gorilla Biscuits on the east coast?rn
Matt: We're sitting outside of Jordan's house.
Jordan: Yeah, we're home right now. We're waiting for Mike to bring the fricken trailer key so we can move the trailer from my house. We're off right now and back home.
Matt: We went out to the East coast for the Gorilla Biscuits shows and played a show before that in Lansdale, Pennyslvania. They were all really great shows with a lot of kids that showed up.
Jordan: We flew out. That's how we got back so quickly.
Since you only came out to the East coast for a short time, what are your plans for touring coming back?rn
Jordan: We plan to go out again in October. We're going to hit the South, and then go up the coast. We meet up with Less Than Jake and The Loved Ones in Boston for a tour that starts up October 5th. We will make our way back to California with that tour.
That tour is particularly different than the type of bills I've seen you guys playing on lately, which has consisted of mostly hardcore/punk bands. What sparked the different company on the tour?rn
Jordan: We got offered the tour through our booking agency. Less Than Jake was one of the first punk bands I got into when I was starting to get into skate punk and pop-punk back in middle school. To be approached by them at all was an honor. Those bands are still super fast, and they still fit what Set Your Goals is trying to do. Less Than Jake is hands down one of the most fun live bands I've ever seen. Every time they put on the show, they have some sort of cool theatric or a certain quirk. That's what Set Your Goals is always about. We have certain elements that are quite different from them though, like the lack of a horn section and such. At the same time, they are more-so a type of band that plays like what we set ourselves up to be.
Do you guys prefer to tour with heavier hardcore bands? I've noticed particular tours have come to like... Brockton, MA, and those are overall just a heavier ambience to them.rn
Matt: I wouldn't say that we prefer bands of that type, but that we are friends with a lot of bands that are in hardcore bands and heavier type bands. That's the reason we play with and tour with those bands. It's not a preference of style at all. We usually prefer to play with bands that are a little more geared towards our style, but we also like to play with our friends' bands.
How did the Gorilla Biscuits tour go? I've noticed the huge influence that band has on Set Your Goals.rn
Matt: That tour was great. They were like an 11 out of 10. They were all really awesome. We all had a huge blast. I probably stage-dived about fifteen times. It was truly a dream come true.
Jordan: It definitely lived up to everything I thought it would be. In fact, it lived up to more than I expected. It ruled too because we got to meet the guys, and they were all super awesome. I was actually more excited to talk to them and find out who they were and stuff than just getting to play with their band. That was amazing in itself. It's just awesome to have role models live up to what you imagined them to be. We paid for our flights to go out there--I personally paid for like half of it-- and it was all worth it.
Matt: I don't take any of it back.
Since that dream come true has occurred, what would be other bands that would be a dream come true to share the stage with?rn
Matt: I'd really love to play with The Cure, but I know that will never happen. *laugh*
Jordan: I would love to play with The Movielife if they ever did a reunion. That's one band I would really like to share the stage with. For current bands, I would really like to share the stage with I Am The Avalanche. None More Black would be totally rad. There's such a wide range of bands. Even like Jimmy Eat World, though that would probably never happen.rn
Matt: A tour with Comeback Kid would be a lot of fun too.
Jordan: Any band that really has awesome people in it--even if we aren't really into their music, although we've been fortunate to be fans of the bands we've toured with this year like Crime In Stereo, Ignite, The Distance. They've all have awesome albums out this year. As long as there are cool people on the tour, that's all that really matters.
Why did the name Mutiny get chosen as your album title?rn
Jordan: We were sitting in the studio and trying to figure out what it was that we were doing as a band and where we were at this moment in our lives. I was having all these weird revelations that were really out of character for me. Mutiny was a kind of agreement with us. What is a mutiny: A mutiny is a take-over within the inside of something. Here we are, this really young band that got picked up by a label a little bit bigger than we are used to and associated with all these new elements that are more towards the business side of music. I've always refered to our band as a hopeful \"gateway drug\" to get into different kinds of music. Yes, we have a pop element, but we also have a really fast, hardcore element (especially lyrically). Mutiny is like, we are going to enter into this side of music where a lot of people lose their roots of where they came from and bring with us our roots and where our sense of home is. It's more-or-less just us taking over, and we'll make this our own. Sure, we may make compromises along the way, but we do that to reach out to more people so more people can hear what it is Set Your Goals is trying to do.
Matt: It's pretty self-explanatory with the lyrics to the title track of the album. The lyrics sum up where we stand and about us finding our place and all that.
I noticed the reoccuring theme of pirates in the new album and also with the EP. Are you guys obsessed with pirates?rn
Matt: We aren't obsessed; we just wanted a fun theme for the new record. Also, the whole Mutiny thing could be the \"throw the captain overboard\" type deal. I don't think the next record will have pirates all over it, but we might come up with cool stage theatrics that fit the theme as well.
There's always been an ongoing tension between pirates and ninjas. What is Set Your Goals official stance on this ongoing battle?rn
Matt: This is way too hard. *laugh* Pirates have lasers according to RealUltimatePower.net *laugh* I'm a bit biased though, so I'll have to say I'm partial to pirates. Ninjas are cool though.
Jordan: Ninjas definitely have more of a manipulative, mind-control type thing going. They could definitely outsmart pirates. Pirates run in completely supreme masses, and ninjas like to battle individually. *laugh* It would be a pretty even fight if you put them together. I'd have to go with pirates though.
Matt: Pirates have guns. Ninjas have swords.
Has there ever been tension between Set Your Goals and a possible ninja-based band?rn
Matt: *laugh* No we haven't. That would be amazing though. There needs to be more ninja-based bands out there though.
Jordan: I once saw a ninja in training at a movie theater.
Matt: I am like practically a partial ninja.
What is the particular writing structure with Set Your Goals?rn
Jordan: I sit in my room, and when I get bored, I get my guitar and strum out some riffs. If I find a riff I like, I will go and say, \"Hey we should try this out.\" We'll base an entire song around a particular riff and write whatever structured or unstructured song comes out within that. After we lay the song out, Matt and I will get together and think of topics or themes that we can relate to. We will work together on a song or each tackle the topic on our own. After that, we come back and work together to fit together the melodies and make everything fit well into the song as far as singing.
Matt: When we record it, we change it like a million times. It's a constant work in progress.
How long did the new album take to write and record?rn
Jordan: It took like two years. When we put out our first demo and for like the first two years of the band, we weren't a full-time band. We all had jobs and went to school and everything. We chipped at it here or there. When I was writing music, I was never like \"This is going to be a Set Your Goals song.\" I just go and say that I'm fed up with whatever right now and strum what I feel on guitar. Once we were signed to Eulogy and had to put down an album, we sat down and gathered everything that we had written or come up with over the past two years and polished it. When we went to the studio, recording and engineering took about two weeks and then a week of mixing. We sent it to be mastered after that.
Matt: We had a lot of stuff written before we were signed. We demo'd a few tracks like a year and a half before the full length was recorded. We were shopping for a label and such. We hear a lot of complaints about the demos and such because they leaked and now kids don't like the newer versions. They weren't supposed to hear those old versions.
Jordan: The Reset EP was also a bunch of demos, but those were with the intent of release. We went in and did that. The other demos were more of \"labels, this is the type of direction we are interested in\" and see if they were interested.
What is your stance on music downloading, since you mentioned that those songs got leaked beforehand?rn
Matt: I don't really have a problem with it. I do download music, as most people do. I don't think it's a huge problem, but I stress the importance of supporting bands that you believe that deserve the support and respect. I still believe you should buy an album you like regardless if you downloaded it before. Go to shows and buy t-shirts. Don't only sit in your room and download music.
Do you anticipate another tour after the Less Than Jake tour, or will you take some time off for the holidays?rn
Matt: We'll probably take a couple weeks in the winter, but most likely we will be touring the rest of this year well into next year. We haven't gotten to the point of knowing what bands we'll tour with, but there are some bands we'd like to tour with and have sent those requests into our agent. We'll see what comes of that.
Do you feel that you will be writing for a new record in the next year or so, or do you plan on mainly touring?rn
Matt: Our preliminary plans are to be touring, but we have some skeletons of songs being worked on here or there. I've heard Jordan play some stuff in the van. I'd like to write and record an EP possibly next summer or something like that. You can't really rush writing. We'll see how it goes.
What artists and musicians have really shaped and influenced how you write?rn
Matt: Lyrically in particular, Civ's work has changed my life. I also like a lot of The Cure and The Police. That's a style I have drawn from when I write lyrics. I write from personal experience.
Jordan: Musically, when we started, it was obviously all the punk bands we were into. The Movielife, Lifetime, and Kid Dynamite were definitely up there in influence. Turmoil as well. Turmoil is fucking awesome for more of a heavy side. I actually ripped off a Turmoil breakdown. *laugh in background* This year I've gotten into drawing a timeline way back in influences, and I've gotten into a lot of Bruce Springsteen, early rock, soul, and R&B. The way Bruce Springsteen wrote such detailed, descriptive stories in his songs on the Nebraska album. There's so much we want to do with this band in the future with more albums so people will start seeing not only punk rock elements and influences but all across the board.
Do you have any final comments to the readers?rn
Matt: Listen to metal, and don't smoke.
Jordan: Don't smoke for sure. Get into music. Immerse yourself into it. Always trace your favorite bands back and see where they came from and explore those bands. Do your homework. There's so much out there to learn and check out. And myspace.com/davecrisafi.
