BOMB le MUSIC INDUSTRY!

Bomb the Music Industry is the latest project from Jeff Rosenstock, former frontman of the ska band Arrogant Sons of Bitches. Jeff and a rotating cast of musicians (some from ASOB, Mustard Plug, and Rick Johnson, to name a few) tour playing songs he writes and records, normally on a computer-studio and a booth in his bathroom. The new record, Get Warmer, actually came out on Asian Man records, but all three of their previous releases were never pressed. That’s right, this band just GIVES THEIR MUSIC AWAY!!! THE FUTURE!!! Right before I moved to Boulder, they played a show on D-Day in the attic of the Philadelphia Trocadero, an AWESOME place to see a show if you’re ever on the east coast. They don’t sell merch, but they’ll spraypaint any shirt you bring them with a logo stencil they cut with an x-acto knife. They don’t charge to play, but they accept donations for food and gas. Basically, fuck Radiohead, these guys were doing it way before. I got to talk with Jeff and John of BTMI! after they played here in Boulder last week at club 156 (in the UMC, next to the bowling alley), here’s what we got:


We started talking about smoking, and Jeff told me he had a bad cough two weeks ago, and now has been going through hot and cold flashes like he’s got menopause. They just got in from SLC, and they’re heading off to Lincoln Nebraska tomorrow. They thought Montana was worse to drive through than Nebraska, I still beg to differ.

"When Lewis and Clark got to Colorado, they were like 'This shit is gold'”. - Jeff Rosenstock


EmceeEsher: So you heard about Radiohead’s newest album, and how it’s being released, BTMI has put every record out free for download on the internet, and doesn’t sell merchandise, instead you spraypaint t-shirts and give everything away for free, asking merely for donations.


Jeff: NO, GO ON!


EE: Okay, so you heard, do you care?


Jeff: No, i mean, it’s a little weird to be historically and culturally irrelevant from now on, but it’s nice that we were culturally relevant for like, a year or two, you can’t ask too much


John: It’s not like it was our idea to put music on the internet


Jeff: Yeah, like Brian Jonestown did it for free, so like, you know, fuck it, whatever man, we didn’t know about it, so fuck it, wave of the future


EE: So, you finally pressed records.


Jeff: Well, we don’t, Mike [Asian Man Records] does. I didn’t think we’d get signed, so i asked, and he said yeah, not like it mattered cause we were still gonna put all our shit out for free, but he said he’d do it, so i said shit yeah.


EE: And this is the first album that you recorded in a real studio right? Not your bathroom on your Macintosh


Jeff: “Studio” is a really subjective term, we had more real equipment this time, the drums were recorded in a real studio, I’ll give you that, but everything else was recorded in a warehouse in Georgia, Joel Hatstat has a bunch of expensive stuff, we get along well and he makes other bands i like sound good so yeah. We didn’t pay him much or anything, and it’s not like we went in there and said “Yeah this is a real deal thing, we’re making a record for Asian Man” We were making a record and somewhere in the middle i asked Mike if he’d do it, and he said yeah. One thing really doesn’t have much to do with the other, but we still have yet to record in a real studio, which is a shame, but fuck it, because doing it ourselves is easier. You get to take your time, me and Joel stayed up every night for a month til 2AM, woke up at 8, worked, then recorded, then worked again, practiced with Pegasuses. It wasn’t like “well if you need another four hours we’re gonna need another hundred bucks” BTMI is never ever ever gonna be able to work in an environment like that, cause we have too many fucking parts.


EE: And the other three records you just did yourself?


Jeff: I just recorded our half of a split all by myself except from the drum tracks, and we had someone real master it and it came out kind of bad. We couldn’t have done [Get Warmer] without Joel, but it was more like a friendship thing


EE: Who does the art for your records?


Jeff: This one was supposed to be a comic book but it didn’t work out, and i’m psyched that we have a CD so i could do the cover art. That’s the one thing about not having merch that sucks.


John: This stencil (which they use to make shirts for fans) has a BOMB in it, and when we were in Canada the stencil said “Bomb le Music Industry”


Jeff: There’s only so much you can do when you’re not very good at using an xact-o knife


EE: How many times did you play Showerbeers tonight?


John: Like, 6?


Jeff: Yeah, we didn’t play it on tour yet, so now we’re stackin em up.


Showerbeers is a 52 second song about drinking beer in the shower. Apparently they hadn’t played it on tour yet, so they felt it necessary to play the song 6 times to extend the show. It worked! After the fourth time you’d think it’d get old, but there’s really nothing like gang-chanting “THE ONLY REASON I TAKE A SHOWER IS SO I CAN DRINK A SHOWERBEER!!!”




Here's a BTMI live clip of a song about how their bass player almost joined Every Time I Die.


Bomb the Music Industry Mainpage - where you can stream or download every one of their records for free.

Asian Man Records

MP3 of "Unlimited soup, salad, and breadstick days" off Get Warmer

DOWNLOAD GET WARMER

big thanks to Jeff and John for the interview, and to the rest of the guys and gals in the band for coming to Boulder and rocking like hell.