Forever The Sickest Kids
Last year brought many changes to Forever The Sickest Kids, with their label, Universal Motown, closing and two members peacefully leaving, the band ended 2011 wondering what to do next. Austin Bello and I talked about what happened last year and what to expect this year. If you can catch them in your city I would suggest it, these are a group of guys who are dedicated to what they do and despite bumps in the road, will continue on.
Arin: What was last year like and what are you hoping to get done this year?
Austin: Last year was kind of a changing year for us; it was kind of difficult. We had two members peacefully leave, one went back to college and we hang out with him all the time, Mark got married and is pursuing other aspects. Then our label, Universal Motown, imploded and is no longer a label. So from last year to now we are now a four-piece independent and at first our honest thoughts were, what are we going to do, are we going to keep making music together, and us four sat down and decided this is what we do, this is what we love, we have to keep doing this, so we’re currently, we already have six songs, we’re in the process of figuring out if we want to put out an album or if we want to put out an EP in the summer. Right now our goal is an EP in the summer, it might change to an album a few months later, I’m not sure yet, but we’re really excited, we’re about to go on somewhat of a world tour, so things are looking up and us four are stoked as ever and now that we’re off the label and we’re independent we can control more of what we do so it’s kind of an exciting time for us.
Arin: Where are you most looking forward to visiting?
Austin: In about two weeks we’re going to Japan, which this will be our third time and then the Philippines and Australia we’ve been to one other time for Soundwave. I’m really excited about the Philippines one, because I haven’t been there and I really like going to new places and we went to Indonesia which is kind of in the same realm I guess you could say and I really enjoyed that so I’m really looking forward to the Philippines.
Arin: What is your favorite part about playing a live show?
Austin: I would have to say, I like looking out and seeing people singing the songs that we wrote, and knowing that it related to them or helped them deal with something or they were able to cope with a relationship or something that was happening their life and they know the lyrics and the song was more than just a song to them, it hit their heart. That’s something I like seeing, the fans singing along and being excited about it.
Arin: The new video came out recently so what was is it like to film that?
Austin: It was awesome, we were actually in the UK when we came up with the concept, but it’s really cool because the song is called, ‘Too Young For This,’ so we decided to have a character that was like ten years old and he’s having to deal with everything that a grown up would, so he has to put on a suit, shave his face, he’s gotta go to work, he gets his car towed and all that stuff and gets pulled over by the cops and its kind of a funny story about this young kid having to relate to all these grown up things and in the end, it shows that he’s still young and I think it relates to a lot of people who still want to be young at heart and still want to be youthful.
Arin: You mentioned an album or EP later in the year, so what kind of sound can people expect?
Austin: We’re changing it up, I think we do every time. I think you can expect some sounds from our Underdog Alma Matter album, kind of more into that, some of it’s more sing-a-long, we have an acoustic track on there, we have an eighties track on there, I don’t know, it’s different, but the same.
Arin: How does the band use social networks to stay in touch with fans?
Austin: Nowadays it’s the biggest thing; I mean it has been for the past five years. We got started; I put a lot of our credit to being noticed from the MySpace era. Back then when you wanted to listen to music, you would go to MySpace and see the bands picture and listen to their music, nowadays I tweeted a few days ago, ‘It’s so hard to find new music to listen to these days, where do I go?’ and people were like YouTube, Pandora, and its hard to find new bands nowadays because the MySpace era is gone so we make sure to keep our band’s twitter, our personal twitter, our Facebook up-to-date, we talk to our fans, I think it’s important nowadays to be tangible to your fans. We try to keep more of a friendly thing than a mysterious band feel.
Arin: Are there any charities or nonprofits or causes that you guys are involved with?
Austin: Yeah! We’ve been involved with a charity called Blood Water Mission for the past ,probably, four years. Normally, when [we] tour in the state we have a bucket out and the concept is that if you donate one dollar you give a child in Africa clean water for a whole year and what’s been really cool is that we’ve been able to build or repair I think it’s eleven water wells in, four in central Africa and then seven in Uganda and this last year in January, at the beginning of the year, I was able to go with the mission to Africa, to Zambia and saw some of the wells that we repaired and saw some of the wells we built and got to hang out with the actual kids in the community. It’s so crazy to think of what we take for granted when it comes to even clean water. We run our faucet every day, but these kids have to go and they have to pump the well and they have to make sure that they have clean buckets to even get the water, so we’ve been working really close with them for the past four years and we will probably keep doing it for as long as we can.
Arin: If you could work with any producer or collaborate with anyone, who would it be?
Austin: I definitely have my favorites, it’s probably different for every band member, but since I was thirteen years old, Third Eye Blind has been my band. I just love the lyrical content and the way the melodies work so if I could sit in the room with Stephan and be able to write a song with him, I think that would be one of my dreams.
Arin: Do you have a favorites song that you have written where the lyrics are ones where you wrote the lyrics or were part of writing the lyrics and when you listened to the song back, you couldn’t believe the lyrics that came out of it?
Austin: I really like, from our self titled album, ‘Keep on Bringing Me Down,’ because it’s a story of when we were in California, because when we go to record we peace out for about two months and we go and live in a an apartment complex either in New Jersey or LA and we’re in the studio from noon to midnight even Sundays, and I remember that song because when we’re in those two months we never really see the light of day because our shades are closed and the TV’s on and we just kind of forget about the real world and people that would bring you down or whatever and for me that song kind of sets a pace for our last album that we put out. I guess trying to keep your head on straight when things are going crazy I guess.
