Andy Z - NoEnemy! officially formed just over 2 years ago but is more of a culmination of the past 15-20 years. after "exploring" other sounds Andy M and myself agreed to do what we do best. punk rock. fast, hard, catchy punk rock. we had played together over 10 years ago in a punk band and have remained friends. When his AMAZING band Central Standard/Ostello parted ways, he suggested we start a band and write about getting old and dying. He brought his cousin/drummer pat along who was also playing with Ostello and I harvested my new find Trevor from my last failed project, to play bass. it didn't take long before we found exactly what we were looking for.
Andy M - Andy Z and I had played in another, actually two other punk bands ten years ago and thought it'd be fun to do again. We wanted to approach a punk band from a new type of angst that was different than when we were in our late teens and early twenties. We thought it was this original approach, but once we got out and saw that most other people still playing punk we're at the same mental place as us, we realized the genre had just grown up. I think that's a cool thing. I'm far more concerned about losing my health or my job these days than if a girl thinks I'm cool. Those are the sorts of things we write about.
CM: The bands new single, "Disagree To Disagree", was just released. And I gotta tell you, it's damn good. Was this put out on your own? Or do you guy's have a label who releases your material?
AM: Thank you. It's self released, but all we really did was post it on band camp. I still have boxes of CD's from all my old bands and I didn't want anymore. We printed just 300 copies of our Life Waster CD and made it only available at shows so we had something people could leave with if they saw us live the first time. Other than that we like the idea of being able to cheaply put out as much music as possible, and to make it as easy as possible to have.
AZ: Actually, D2D is our first start to finish, No Enemy! production. Written and recorded by us at the flower shop(our practice space). Our previous 2 releases were recorded by Nat Wright, of Shot Baker, at Moon Conspiracy studios. The Unwind EP and D2D are available for FREE at our Bandcamp page and our full length Life Waster can be purchased for next to nothing on iTunes or any other music download site.
CM: Who are some of the bands musical influences? And how do those influences contribute to the songwriting process?
AZ: I'd be lying if I didn't say Screeching Weasel. Personally, NOFX is my favorite band, but I do listen to an embarrassingly large selection of music. Yeah, I'm going to say Screeching Weasel. that's it.
AM: Definitely a ton of early 90's era punk. A lot of the Lookout stuff like Weasel, Vindictives, MTX, etc. I was always a bit more into the less bubble gum stuff like Pegboy, Raygun, and a ton of Jawbreaker. I think that stuff plays a huge influence on my songwriting, but lately I've been listening to a lot of late 60's and early 70's pop. They were doing a lot of interesting stuff song structure wise that wasn't just verse chorus verse chorus but still super simple. I like super simple.
CM: You guy's have played shows with some great bands like The Bomb, Vacation Bible School and The House That Gloria Vanderbilt. Who are some of your favorite bands to play with?
AZ: I loved playing with Dear Landlord. As far as current bands they really impressed me all around. Our 3rd show ever was opening for the Falcon at AAA and it is still one of our best and most remembered performances, but the New Years Eve show with Shot Baker and Pegboy is still my most memorable. Larry was awesomelarious!
AM : I'm totally honored to have played with some of the bands I grew up listening to like Pegboy, and although The Bomb wasn't around back then, Jeff Pezzatti is like a punk rock King Midas. What's really been cool though has been getting introduced to a whole new crop of bands like The Dopamines and Dear Landlord when we got to play with them. Starting No Enemy! got me to pay more attention to the bands playing now and there's a lot of great stuff out there.
CM: I know the bands done some gigs in Indiana and Ohio. Are there any plans of taking the show on the road for a mini tour of the Midwest in the near future?
AM: When we first started I had the idea that we'd play about four times a year at whatever dive would have us. Then our fourth and fifth show we were going on a weekend warrior trip with Shot Baker around the Midwest. That changed the momentum quite a bit so that now we play out as much as possible. We've talked about touring more, but for now we'll keep getting out as far as we can on the weekend until we think we could potentially draw in Columbus on a Tuesday night.
AZ : Most of us have jobs and wives that we love too much to really go for it...however if there's a demand, we've got weekends AVAILABLE!
CM: Will there be more local shows as we draw closer to years end?
AZ: We're playing at Quenchers on Thanksgiving Eve with the Safes and The Sonnets. I'm pretty sure all Quenchers shows are free too. There'll probably be something in December as well.
CM: With a couple full length albums already under your collective belts, are there any plans for a new full length in 2012?
AZ : Right now we're really into the EP's. The pressure a full length brings is more than we like to bare right now. Our songs come in bunches and we love sharing them as soon as they're ready. another full length will definitely be released as soon as it happens. Until then just expect a ton of songs in small, tight, hard bunches.
AM : I'm pretty convinced the best thing to do these days is to constantly be coming out with new stuff. It's easier for us to produce smaller blasts of songs, and I think it's good to continually be releasing new stuff rather than one record a year at best. I think if we do another full length it'll be because we just wrote to many songs to fast or we actually wrote a cohesive album.
CM: Is there a website you guy's wanna plug? Where we can get up to date news on upcoming shows, releases and merch?
AZ: bandcamp. facebook. computer.
AM: Yep, or whatever the next flavor of the month will be. We'll be there trying to get you to listen to us.
CM: Thanks again for talking with Critical Mass. The new single is great, and I'm looking forward to seeing you guy's live in the near future. Thanks again guy's.
AZ: You're the best!
AM: Thanks for taking the time to talk with us.
No Enemy! is awesome.
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