warped rock- the jacksonville connection

two famous local bands, two different outlooks on fame
By:kellie abrahamson
From: EU

The Vans Warped Tour has been coming to Jacksonville since 1996 but never with a homecoming quite like this. Local boys turned national treasures The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus and Yellowcard performed for a crowd full of people who, not long ago, watched these bands go from local venues to MTV. EU got to speak with lead singers Ronnie Winter of RJA and Ryan Key of Yellowcard during the tour’s Jacksonville stop about how far they’ve come, how our local music scene contributed to their success and where they are going.

EU’s Interview with Ronnie Winter of The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

At this year’s Warped Tour, EU had the privilege to speak with Ronnie Winter, lead singer of The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. Here’s the complete interview:

EU: How’s the tour going?

Ronnie Winter: Well, I gotta be honest with you; it’s amazing, other than the heat, which I’m used to because we’re Florida boys. I’m 24, I’m not gonna lie, I’m not a [sic] 18-year-old fresh out of high school. All of us in this band have been in many bands since we were 15, playing live venues like Jack Rabbits, playing The Art Bar before it was closed. That’s something I’m proud of, we were one of the last bands to sell that venue out, we were stoked about that. We’re glad that this year we play the main stage; that we’re on every date. It’s like a dream come true. I mean, what can you say? Warped Tour, main stage. That’s what every band like mine, whose grown up listening to punk rock and just rock music in general, that’s like your goal… We’re pretty damn happy.

EU: You guys are killing in the Energizer Encore Competition (an online contest where concert-goers vote for the band they want to play for an extra 10 minutes). This was you’re 8th win, right?

RW: It’s 8 or 9 out of, like, 12 or 11.

EU: That’s incredible.

RW: Well, the people have spoken, you know? The only reason why we’re on the radio is because we’re the band people are actually calling in and asking for. It’s like we’re bring it back to the mid-80s and 70s when people called in to pop radio stations and asked for a rock band and we’re proud to be that band. It doesn’t bother me. I don’t care if people think that’s not cool. I think it is cool and it was cool at a certain time. There was a time when rock music was popular on pop radio and if we’re the band to bring it back then so be it. I’m glad to be part of the revolution. Bands like us, Fall Out Boy, and Panic! At the Disco, it’s rock music being played on pop stations. For me, that’s a battle won. I don’t look at that as a negative at all. To me, we’re representing our side of the world… The only reason why we got there is people called in. The only reason why we won Energizer is because people clicked on their mouses [sic] and voted for us. So, obviously, the people have spoken. We’ve won this many times because they want to see us play longer so, thanks to the people, man. That’s the other reason we submitted to be in the contest, because it was real. We knew that it was real votes from real people and that there were people watching the contest so it couldn’t be fixed. That’s all really important to me because we’ve been part Battle of the Bands [competitions] before and been shafted like every other real local band has, a lot of its politics. This is a real competition so we said “yeah, we’ll do it.” We’re 100% confident that we have a lot of fans because I’ve met most of them. That’s what happens when you tour for two years, you meet a lot of people, really cool people and most of the time if you’re cool to them, they’re cool to you. It all comes back to you.

EU: Where are you guys from the band playing two years ago in Jacksonville? What’s different, what’s the same?

RW: Well, I can tell you the first difference is we’re so much better as a band which I’m excited about. As a musician you always want to better yourself first, that’s the main goal. So, we’re way better musicians… I’m a better singer, our guitar player’s better, the drummer’s light years better, so it’s fun for me because I’m watching all of my friends, and myself, get better. That’s just cool, you know. We’re writing better music and just having a good time… In October, finally, we moved up into a bus… We got out of the van finally, which was righteous and we’re a lot more relaxed now, I’m not gonna lie. It’s a lot cooler, sleeping instead of driving eight hours straight, being able to sleep and having a driver, that’s definitely a blessing. Other than that we’ve sold a lot of records and we’ve been on the radio a lot and we haven’t stopped touring at all.

EU: So you’re still the same guys as you were back then?

RW: I mean, you tell me, man. I don’t know, I feel the same, you know what I mean? I still hang out with the same people. I still live in the same house. Still walk the same dog down the same street so as far as I’m concerned I’m as ‘Burg as they come.

EU: Are you guys still living in town?

RW: We all still live here, man. What do you mean? All our family and friends are here. This is our home. We all lived here for years before so it’s not like we can leave everybody we know.

EU: The lure of fame and fortune isn’t that strong yet?

RW: Well, we seem to be doing quite well by staying home. We seem to be taking a different approach at it, I guess. We’re just taking it one day at a time and touring as much as possible, which is why we haven’t stopped for two years.

EU: How did you go from playing local venues to signing with Virgin Records?

RW: Persistence. We had a lot of hurtles. We actually got passed 6 times in a row by six different labels and we just didn’t give up. That’s just the classic story, you know. This is my third band, it’s not the first go-around for any of us in this band and I just think that finally we got the line-up right, finally we got the music right, finally we got the vibe right and once the vibe was right people started believing it because it was real. It really wasn’t ever too difficult. We made music, we played shows, people loved us. It was awesome. But you know it took two failures before this band to get all that right, to figure it out. My two bands before that, I think that they had to fail. Duke’s bands before this had to fail and Elias and Joey’s band together, which was coincidentally our first track on the record “In Fate’s Hands,” had to fail so that we could succeed, you know what I mean. You learn from your mistakes.

EU: Let’s talk about the next single. You guys have a website (whokilledronnie.com) just for that song. Who came up with that?

RW: We’ve been interested for quite some time and pretty active in charity work. Basically we’ve come up with an idea to involve real, everyday people who want to make a difference. And also on top of that we allow them to be part of our street team which is called “The Alliance” which was all basically spawned off of this crazy idea we had with our song “False Pretense,” which was our second single. So what we’re setting up, which I don’t want to give too many details away now, is an exciting place where not only can you be, if you’re just a fan of The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus but if you’re a fan of what we stand for and if you’re a fan of what we’re trying to accomplish as far as being normal and bringing back the days of good old rock and roll, you know what I mean, back to how it used to be. If you’re down with that then a lot of people who also listen to us are so it’s kind of like a community almost. A lot of our fans are friends with each other, they know each other, they hang out on the weekends not at Red Jumpsuit shows just because they meet like-minded people. Somehow, crazily we’ve established this connection with all these people who seem to have similar beliefs which is probably why they like us and now they’re all hanging out. So we’re giving them a place to do that through the band that way we can also contact them. Send them free merchandise; send them posters if they want to be part, if they want to help us out, most of the time they do. It’s not like we have to convince them. They’re like “you send it, we’ll put it up,” we’re like “here you go.” So half of it is the street team community, half of it is something way more that I’m building. It’s going to be something that’s around a lot longer than the band, in other words, hopefully for the rest of time, if that makes any sense. It’s something that’s an extremely long goal… One pebble in a pond, that type of deal.

EU: Along the same lines, in “Face Down” you guys speak out about domestic violence. Tell us about that.

RW: We’ve been hooked up with the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence since December and we’ve sold a shirt featuring the lyrics of our first song “Face Down” and basically what that means is every time we sold a shirt we sold it for $10 more that way real people’s actual money is being donated. So when you bought our shirt, not only were you buying our shirt, which helped us out, but you were actually sending your money in. so through that we were able to raise, through our fans, since December, I believe it’s $19,000 for the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence just by people basically, whether they knew it or not, they donated $10. We didn’t trick them into it but we helped them be part of something… most people did know and willingly bought the shirt which proved our theory: if you give people an opportunity to make a statement, they will.

EU: Are you going to continue to use your celebrity to speak out on issues like this in the future?

RW: We don’t plan anything out. That was our first single, they contacted us, we got involved with them, we did as much good as we could in this situation and as we continue I’m sure we’ll plan on always helping them and always being involved with the NCADV but obviously this song’s been written, the statement’s been made and we’re going to more on. We already have moved on. And we’re going to continue to be a positive light no matter what issue we’re talking about, whether it’s the NCADV or the state of teenagers in this country. We did a tour in February, the Take Action! Tour, which is a tour that was for the 1-877-YOUTHLINE, which is a suicide prevention line. I was certified as a crisis intervention counselor by that organization. I mean, I’m proud of it, it’s not something to boast about, but it’s something where our actions speak louder than our words… Regardless of what people think about us we’re going to do what we want and our theory was while you’re rocking out and having a good time, you can do good too. Why not? Why not do it? Why doesn’t everybody do it, you know? The best way to show anybody to do something is to lead by example. I know we’re making a difference because I talk to these people everyday and they tell us that we are. So I believe them, not critics. For every 10 people that hate us there’s [sic] 10,000 that love us, so who cares?

EU: What did the local scene do for you?

RW: It’s everything, you know. I can’t stress that enough. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for people who basically convinced us that we were good enough to make it. When we saw the amazing response that we had from CD sales, we sold so many of our CDs to willing kids because they knew who we were and that we were real, that inspired us to continue when the times were hard. There wasn’t a day that we took it for granted. The local scene is why we’re here. If there wasn’t a local scene, we wouldn’t be here, it’s that simple. Yellowcard wouldn’t be here without it, we wouldn’t be here, Limp Bizkit wouldn’t be here, Cold wouldn’t be here. Lynyrd Skynyrd is from Middleburg, they wouldn’t be here. There’s obviously a local scene, you’ve just got to have your ear to the ground and know what’s good and what’s not. That’s your choice. But, trust me, the people around here know what’s up, obviously, or there wouldn’t be such great bands coming out of the Jacksonville area. The scene speaks for itself.

EU’s interview with Ryan Key of Yellowcard

During their last stop on the Warped Tour, Yellowcard front man Ryan Key took a few minutes to talk to EU about where the band has come from and where they’re going. Here’s the complete interview:

EU: So, welcome home.

Ryan Key: Thank you.

EU: How does it feel to be back home?

RK: I don’t know yet. I haven’t seen my family, I haven’t done anything. I’ve been right here. So, I just feel like I’m on Warped Tour.

EU: Do you have any plans after your set to head into town?

RK: I’m probably just going to go back to my parent’s house and hang out. We were talking about maybe going to Bukkets and getting a beer. Try and stay away from the Ritz if possible. We say that every time and we always end up going there and I hate it. The Ritz is a place where like a kid from middle school that pushed you around all the time because you took ballet for 10 years or you were a singer or you were an actor and wanted to go to Douglas Anderson instead of Episcopal because you hated it there and they’re like “What’s up, Bro! How’ve you been, man?” And you’re like “You think I just forgot that you tormented me my whole life?” You know? But, wherever, I’m sure we’ll end up there tonight somehow.

EU: I have to ask you a really weird question. There’s a rumor online that you’re in the trailer for that super secretive JJ Abrams movie advertised in front of Transformers.

RK: I was there.

EU: Can you give us any dish?

RK: Nope. I don’t know. If I knew I still wouldn’t be able to tell you anyways, but I don’t know what it is. I don’t even know the name of the movie. Never saw a script, nothing.

EU: Were the rest of the guys in it?

RK: No, just me. It was fun. I had a friend who works for him and I got to hang out on the set and jump in.

EU: This is your homecoming. Are you staying in Jacksonville?

RK: Just tomorrow then we’re flying back to LA. We have rehearsal and then we’re headed to Japan and Australia for a couple weeks.

EU: Tell me about the new CD. Where are you guys from the band playing in Jacksonville to now?

RK: I sort of have a three step process in explaining it. Ocean Avenue is a record about leaving home and finding your place in the world and discovering what it is that you want to do with your life and overcoming a lot of the obstacles you have to face to do that, to have the confidence to step out and do that. Lights and Sounds became kind of the story of getting lost along the way. Lights and Sounds was very much more of like a personal experience. That record was for us, for me, not so much for the fans of the band and I don’t say that in a malicious way or a vindictive way, it’s just that’s the way you sometimes have to make music. I personally really went through a really tough time in my life, sort of an identity crisis as far as “who am I now and what does this all mean to me” and that’s what Lights and Sounds is about. And Paper Walls is sort of this triumphant story of finding yourself again. It’s where we are now. We’ve sort of like traversed all these super highs and super lows and learned a lot along the way so that’s what Paper Walls is about.

EU: What went on during that “tough time”?

RK: It’s post-success syndrome. It’s like, 24-years-old, 25-years-old and your whole entire life’s been flipped turned upside down. My biggest problem I think was the fact that so many people decide who you are and what you stand for before you’re old enough and mature enough to decide for yourself. I fell into a lot of pitfalls that go along with that, whether it was substance abuse or self-indulgence, whatever. But at the same time I always had a very strong conscience about it and that’s what Lights and Sounds is. It’s like, my inner struggle with things I knew were not in my character, they weren’t things that I set out to accomplish. I was very lost. And that record is like the search to get back to something and it was just a weird time. I think some people are fortunate and they get to make it through their success without having those struggles. At the time I didn’t know I was struggling and that’s why I like to listen to the record because I can hear the struggle then. I the time I was just freakin’ partying and having a good time and spending too much money and being an idiot. But I think at the end of it when I got back into the studio to record for Lights and Sounds when I started working on the lyrics I was like “I’ve got to get my feet back on the ground here. I have got to deal with some of this stuff.” And I think what ended up happening was that record was very confusing and a bit less optimistic than what Yellowcard fans were used to. It was a very different experience, the whole thing and, like I said, it was so much more a record for me to get through some of my own issues and put it into the music. [With] Paper Walls there’s a genuine sense of forward-looking and forward-thinking to the future and having your feet on the ground. It’s not something we went in and said “we need to write this way because that’s what our fans want to hear.” Most of the lyrics I didn’t finish until pretty close to the end of recording Paper Walls. It was another sort of journey of figuring out where I was at as I went. I don’t know. People are already reacting in a really positive way to it.

EU: The cover art is terrific. Who came up with it?

RK: My friend Bill McMillian and I, who actually I graduated from Douglas Anderson with him and he still lives on my same street in Hollywood now. He’s lived on that street in Hollywood for like four years and I found a house on the same street and I actually got it right away because it’s really nice to have your friends there. I have a couple of friends from Jacksonville that live together there and it’s nice to have your friends to kind of keep you grounded and focused amidst Hollywood. He’s a visual artist, graduated from Douglas Anderson. He does set design and art department on music videos and stuff like that and so we just talked to the record label and said “we have a good idea and we can do it cheap because it’s a good friend” and they were totally into it. It’s a shame because it’s the best artwork I think we’ve ever done and it’s gonna sell the least amount of records because people don’t buy records anymore. People are actually least concerned with actually going and seeing the art work and it just sucks because we’re more proud of the art work on this record than anything.

EU: And Jacksonville’s right there in the middle of it.

RK: It is. It’s in the background.

EU: What’s the story it’s telling?

RK: It’s just kind of a pretty literal translation of the title, Paper Walls. The song “Paper Walls” is just kind of touching on what it was for the five of us to come together and make the album. We had spent a lot of time apart from each other. We lost Ben Harper, we lost our original guitarist, we went through a real dark time in the band through Lights and Sounds and that’s one of my favorite things about Lights and Sounds. When I listen to it now I can really hear that and remember what it was like to be there and I can hear this kind of somber sadness in me and in us. There was also a lot of experimenting with our musical ability and for me it was lyrics and vocals, for Sean it was the arranging of the orchestra and things like that that we did on Lights and Sounds and a lot of that was real individual efforts. There was so much of a collaboration and coming back together to make Paper Walls. It’s kind of the story of breaking out of the walls we put up between each other and so that’s what the art work is [about]. I love the back where they’re all burnt down. All the houses are burnt down on the back cover. I love it.

EU: Probably the most memorable song from Paper Walls for me is “Dear Bobbie.” What’s the story behind that one?

RK: My grandparents were married for 58 years and family’s always been such a big, strong support system for me and for the band really, from my family in particular. I think we’ve always liked to include that in our music as a theme, as something we hold on to, the idea that there’s still hope to actually have a family that sticks together and supports each other as opposed to one that’s broken and unsupportive. So my grandfather’s kind of the head of the table and I’ve been working on this song forever. I actually didn’t even know if it was going to be a Yellowcard song. I write a lot of kind of like folky, country music kind of in the back that doesn’t ever become Yellowcard music and I didn’t know if it was going to work out to be a Yellowcard song. In the studio I got a lot of encouragement from the band to finish it and make it work. Then I had my grandfather write a letter to my grandmother and read and record it and I think it all just came together perfect.

EU: Was there ever a point during the hard times when you go back and be that band that was playing in Caribbean Connection at the beach again?

RK: I don’t want it to come off the wrong way, but no. I mean, ever since I was a little kid I really wanted to succeed at the highest level of being an entertainer, being an artist. My dream has always been a huge, giant place full of thousands and thousands of people singing along or seeing you in a movie or whatever it is. I’ve just been on stage since I could walk so playing Caribbean Connection at the beach or playing Jack Rabbits, doing all those things were part of the journey to get here. I’m not above doing that again, is what I’m trying to say, but I’ve always striven to continue to succeed and take it to the next level. I just feel like when more people are there it means you’re really reaching out with what you’re doing if it lasts. If you’re like some freakin’ pop [star] and you have some songwriter guy that wrote you a song and it was a big hit on the radio, that’s different. I think if you’re seven years deep into your career and you’re still selling five-, six-thousand tickets a night, which we’re not right now but it would be awesome if this record got us back to that place, that means you really transcended the genre and transcended being a one hit wonder or any of that stuff. That’s what I’ve always wanted to do.

EU: What do you remember about the local scene in Jacksonville?

RK: When I was in high school I volunteered to work at the Warped Tour every summer. Just to be around here and hand out our cassette tapes for whatever band we were in in high school, everybody was doing that. That’s also been like the plague of being called a punk rock band through our career… When I first started playing music I didn’t even know what punk rock was. I’m totally part of the MTV generation… I grew up watching the Video Music Awards and watching music videos all day after school. If it was on there, that’s what I was into, I’ve always been a pretty mainstream kid. Not like Backstreet Boys mainstream, but mainstream rock. That’s how I found my rock music. And then a good friend of mine lent me a No Use for a Name record when I was 15 or 16 and it totally just changed my whole life, you know. Everybody started getting into the Warped Tour thing. Lagwagon and NOFX and the newer Bad Religion records and so everybody starts trying to like emulate that sound. As I got older I think I kind of went back to like the roots of why I started playing rock music, but also kind of had that overtone of that mid-90s skate punk thing. Then all of a sudden you’re a punk band. And I was always like “no, no, I’m not punk rock at all.” That would be an arrogant assumption of myself to say I’m punk rock. Just because I think we write much more pop rock music than we do punk rock music. But, that’s what I remember about the scene, everybody kind of pulling together in the same, everybody trying to emulate the same sound. [The scene] was strong. When I was in high school it was strong. Everybody was playing shows at like 16. It wasn’t like you had to fight to get a show; there was plenty of places to play and lots of kids to come out to local shows. It was great.

EU: How important is that?

RK: I think when you’re starting out it’s everything because it gives you the confidence to keep doing it. If you live in some Podunk town and you never get to play a show I think it’s hard to get out of high school or college or whatever and think you can go and continue to do that. Honestly, joining Yellowcard was just another chapter. It was like “OK, well, let’s keep playing.” It was like, we already knew how to do it because we started doing it when we were 15-years-old.

EU: Was Jacksonville a good place to start?

RK: Yeah, man, there’s tons of music that comes out of Jacksonville. I think it’s totally nurturing, especially rock music. I mean, Florida as a state has provided, love ‘em or hate ‘em, a lot of massive rock bands so I think the scene of just going and playing shows here in the state of Florida is strong, as long as you’re not in Ft. Lauderdale or Miami. It sucks down there. There’s nowhere to play.

EU: Are you guys still Jacksonville boys at heart?

RK: No, I’m not. I’m almost 30-years-old. That’s one of the things that, honestly, frustrates me about the Jacksonville thing. I love it here and I love my family and I love being able to be here but the idea that you can’t escape and that you have to be so rooted here. I want people here to love our music as much as anywhere else so I think it’s unfortunate when you get stuck in the mentality that “I’m fresh out of high school and 904 represent.” It’s like, you have to grow and change as a person and I think it makes Jacksonville mean more to you when you come back as an adult. When I come here now and spend time at my parents’ house on the beach and just relax it’s a whole different experience for me then being fresh out of high school and coming back here every weekend from Tallahassee and sneaking into bars and drinking with my friends or whatever. I like it better now. I kind of like it that I don’t live here because I enjoy it more when I come home and spend time with my family.

EU: Was it hard to leave? Did you get a lot of negative feedback from fans when you made the decision to go?

RK: I just didn’t let it get to me, you know. We had a vision; we had a goal that we wanted to accomplish. We weren’t going to let people’s opinion of us, like [we’re] betraying them. I mean, I don’t even know you, how can I betray you? So, we set out with a goal in mind and I get to play rock music everyday for a living. It’s nothing personal against Jacksonville that I moved out of town or that the band moved out of town. We had to go to California. Our record label was there. There was one guy working there when we first got signed. I mean, we were stuffing envelopes and sending press kits out and it was just a step in our career. We we’re freakin’ working the kitchen at Chili’s by day and stuffing envelopes at night and Sean and I were sharing a room and there were like 10 people living in Ben Warren’s apartment. We were roughing it, man, we really wanted it. In Jacksonville, you can only play Jack Rabbits once a month. In California you can play freakin’ Ventura, Riverside, Corona, LA, you know, you can play six different cities in a week and it’s all new people coming to see you play. It just made sense for us, you know?

EU: So now you’re on Warped Tour. How’s the tour going?

RK: It’s awesome but it’s over. I love Warped Tour. It’s the perfect way for us to start Paper Walls I think because it’s such a grounding experience. It’s a place to come out and remember, genuinely remember why you do it. The energy you get from fans that come to these shows is stronger than anywhere else you can play. There’s nobody standing in the back or sitting in the balcony. It’s all people that want to hear music all day long. Right now we’re going to go out to the tent for an hour and just hang out and talk to kids. You don’t get to do that as much on a regular tour because you get into town, you do press, you go play the show and you get on the bus and leave. Here you’re here all day so you get to meet a lot of people.

EU: Whose performance on the Warped Tour do you never miss?

RK: Paramore, actually, I’ve been watching everyday. It’s funny, it’s not really something… I like good pop music, I [was just] expecting something totally different from that band because I’d never listened to their record and I just thought it was gonna be much more kind of a “scene” thing. I’ve been really inspired by them. The melodies in their songs are freaking amazing and they’re so good live and they’re young kids and they’re on fire to do it. That’s kind of been one of the highlights of the tour for me.