FIREWORKS
FIREWORKS is a pop-punk band from Detroit, Michigan, and their often fast and infectious music reminds me much of SET YOUR GOALS and early FALL OUT BOY. The title of their new record borrows and rearranges the line “I Have Nothing to Offer Except My Own Confusion” from Jack Kerouac’s “On The Road.” All I Have to Offer is My Own Confusion is their version of the famous quote, and the name of the new album, which was produced by Chad Gilbert of NEW FOUND GLORY, and is being released on Triple Crown records. After conducting the interview with FIREWORKS’ bassist Kyle O’Neil, the use of Kerouac’s wisdom made more sense to me. It wasn’t just a pretentious ploy for attention, or a gimmick to separate FIREWORKS from the swarming pack of pop-punk dummies. O’Neil is a thoughtful and humble musician with a genuine desire to keep the message at the fore-front of FIREWORKS’ music, a notion that became clear as my interview with him progressed. O’Neil was good company during our relatively short conversation, and I think you will feel the same way if you plan to read on.
Pastepunk: When’s FIREWORKS’ next tour?
Kyle O’Neil: April 14th.
Pastepunk: April 14th. And where is that going to be?
Kyle: It’s going down to Florida, then up the east coast, back to Michigan.
Pastepunk: What are you guys doing in preparation before the tour?
Kyle: Well, we just got a new van, so were gonna get that ready. Getting it taken to the shop, and making sure everything is cool with it. We’re going to be rehearsing some songs from the new record to play on the tour. We have to do all the normal tour preparations; get merch printed, and just make sure everything is set to go.
Pastepunk: Is the new van going to be an improvement?
Kyle: Yeah. To say the least.
Pastepunk: What was the old one?
Kyle: We had two old vans. The first van we had, I think, was still a little nicer than our second van. But the second van had more room. That’s why we got that. We got a really good deal on it. They were both old, like mid-nineties vans. Since we’re going to be touring so much, we thought we’d just get an upgrade. A more comfortable van.
Pastepunk: Maybe a little bit more dependable?
Kyle: Yeah. Definitely more dependable. Except the brakes are sounding weird. They’re not suppose to do that, so…
Pastepunk: Yeah. That’s true. That’s a necessity that will hopefully get fixed before the tour.
Kyle: Yes. I’m doing that tomorrow.
Pastepunk: So, the title of the new record is All I Have to Offer is My Own Confusion. Do you help write lyrics, and stuff like that, or is that all the singer’s duty?
Kyle: Yeah. The lyric process is Chris, myself, Brett, and even Dave helps a little bit. We just kind of sit around, and we kind of have an idea for a song. We have a bunch of stuff and we just fit it together to make it sound like something. It’s definitely a group effort.
Pastepunk: That’s interesting. I haven’t talked to many bands that write lyrics in a group. Is that a new experience for you?
Kyle: That’s just how we’ve always done it, even on the EP and the demos before it. We’re good friends, and we experience a lot of the same things. We care about the same things, and we express the same things. We all care a lot about the lyrics. Dave (FIREWORKS’ singer) will write lines here and there that we’ll use, but he’s mostly the music guy. He mostly comes up with the melodies and the riffs. Then Chris, Brett, and I are more into the lyrics.
Pastepunk: What’s the title… is it about like objectivity? What does the title mean to you?
Kyle: The title comes from Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road.” It’s not that exact quote, it’s just kind of paraphrased. It just kind of sums up the record. Growing up and dealing with life, and the stuff that happens to people. You just don’t know what is happening and stuff like that. Kind of a coming of age thing, I guess.
Pastepunk: Like there’s no literal advice you can really give everyone except your own experience? That kind of thing?
Kyle: Yeah. Exactly.
Pastepunk: The lyrics in general seem a little more, I don’t know if clever would be the right word. It seems like you guys are well read. Do you take more influence from books and the lot as opposed to songwriters?
Kyle: I think we’re all more influenced, as a whole, by different bands and messages that they’ve gotten across. We’ve used stuff from Vonnegut, Kerouac, and Bukowski. That has definitely influenced some of our writing. We’ve stolen stuff from them, or put them into our own words, and what not. But we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for bands. We wouldn’t want to say the things we want to say if it weren’t for bands in the past that have influenced us.
Pastepunk: Right. Not to discount the influence that music has had on you. How long have you known that you’ve wanted to be in a full-time band?
Kyle: Pretty much my whole life. It’s always been a thing that I’ve wanted to do, since I was younger. I think that the same goes for the rest of the band. I mean, besides playing hockey when I was little and wanting to be an NHL star. Playing in bands is pretty much all I’ve wanted to do since I was like 12.
Pastepunk: That must be pretty exciting. You’ve been in bands before this, right?
Kyle: Yeah. We all have.
Pastepunk: That must be pretty exciting to be living that then.
Kyle: Yeah. It’s hard to believe sometimes. I mean, who knows what’s going to happen, but so far so good.
Pastepunk: You recorded the new album in Orange County, California. What did you think of the OC as opposed to Detroit?
Kyle: It’s way different. The weather is way nicer, and the traffic is way worse. The people… Orange County’s not as bad as LA as far as fake people go. There’s a lot of that around. Over all, it was awesome man. It was nice to get away. I’d rather record a record far from home so we don’t have the distractions of home. I can’t imagine like, going home to my house after a day in the studio.
Pastepunk: That helped you focus then? Not having the old patterns around and stuff?
Kyle: Yeah. Exactly. The same with the EP, which we recorded in New York. Opposite coasts but same deal. I felt like I was in an awesome place to do it. The studio was great. Paul Miner and Chad Gilbert (of NEW FOUND GLORY) were awesome.
Pastepunk: Was this the first time you’ve worked with a producer, or did you work with a producer on the EP?
Kyle: There was a producer on the EP, in a different caliber. (Our last producer) is a great, but he didn’t do a lot with our structure. He helped with a lot of vocal melodies and little fills here and there, stuff like that. But we went into a practice space for three days with Chad, and just went over stuff. We messed around with everything. It was a completely different experience.
Pastepunk: Was that weird to take songs that you’d written and mess around with them? That sounds like that would be uncomfortable at first. Like, ‘Woah, I wrote it this way, and now it’s turning into this.’
Kyle: Yeah, it was kind of weird at first. We were very nervous going into it because we didn’t want to change too much. But Chad was very considerate of that. Lots of points during the process, he was like, ‘Do you want to go back to the old way? I want you guys to be happy.’ He wasn’t demanding, and we had the last say so everything we did is something that we wanted to do.
Pastepunk: So it definitely helped having an objective ear, and obviously someone who has been involved in that music scene too.
Kyle: Exactly. He’s been doing it for a long time, and he knows what makes a good song. Especially in our genre.
Pastepunk: I was listening to the song “I support Same Sex Marriage” on the new album. There was a quote from Gandi in the liner notes. Whose idea was it to quote him?
Kyle: That was my idea. Chris and I would always talk about wanting to put song inspirations in the album. We think it is super cool when bands do stuff like that, and you can relate with the songs. So we wanted to do that, but we just kind of slacked on it. It got down to the last minute of doing the layout. Chris and I were going back and fourth through emails, and suggesting quotes for all the songs. So he did half, and I did half, and that was the one we decided to go with for that song. It seemed to sum up the song.
Pastepunk: Is that an issue that is pretty big for the band? We’re you guys pretty upset with how the court rulings turned out?
Kyle: Oh yeah. That happened while we were out there recording. You’re talking about the same sex marriage court thing? Yeah. What was that, proposal 8?
Pastepunk: Yeah. Proposition 8.
Kyle: We were there during the whole election, so we definitely saw people passing out literature on both sides of it. It just seemed super ridiculous that people would care so much to outlaw something that doesn’t even affect them at all. It was sad and disgusting actually, that people would do that. The song isn’t really about same sex marriage, It’s more about religion. And we just decided to go with that title. It just kind of tied together.
Pastepunk: It must have been interesting to be around California politics when you’re recording. Hearing about all these issues…
Kyle: Yeah. Because in Michigan, I voted absentee before we flew out there? We had two proposals, or propositions, or whatever. In California, there were like 12, or something like that. So we’d turn on the news here and there, and see people holding signs everywhere. I only paid attention to a few because it isn’t my state. But gay marriage stood out, and it’s kind of upsetting and pathetic the way it turned out.
Pastepunk: This is a really vague, big question, but what did punk rock mean to you growing up, and how has the definition changed as you’ve gotten older?
Kyle: That’s a hard question, but punk rock to me was just a life style. When i was younger it was just something that kept me separate from the rest of the world that I hated; all the popular and dumb kids in high school. It was something that I felt apart of, and that could be my own. There’s a message, something I felt that was very positive. It got out everyone’s anger and frustration, but at the same time it had a very positive vibe to it. Depending on how you look at it, it either fucked my life up or it was the best thing that ever happened to me. As of today I still feel it, since i’ve been doing it for so long, and I’m still here with the same people I was with back then. At the same time, it’s kind of a bummer… well not necessarily a bummer, but I’m not sure how I feel about how it has hit the mainstream. Every mall you can get punk gear or whatever. There’s not the sense of community that there was. At the same time, Detroit has a pretty good hardcore and punk rock scene. When I go to shows here, I do get a sense of community. I’ve been to other places where I felt that too. It still exists, its just a little different, and you kind of have to weed out what’s a fad. Like, are they doing it just because it’s popular, and whose here for the long run?
Pastepunk: I guess the fear would be that the message is being diluted. Obviously it would be good if a lot of people were hearing these great ideas, but at the same time it doesn’t seem like that is what always happens.
Kyle: Yeah. Hopefully the message is still there. I definitely think it is. It’s not as big anymore, but there’s still zines out there. There’s still people trying to make a difference through punk rock. One thing that bummed us out was there were these bands that were getting huge, in pop-punk or whatever, and they were decent bands as far as music goes. But they had nothing to say, nothing to offer anyone except, ‘Let’s party.’ We hope to be a little different than that. I’m not saying we’re going to offer a ton or anything, but we can hope…
Pastepunk: To at least offer some substance?
Kyle: Yeah. At least be honest.
Pastepunk: You said that you were super into hockey when you were a kid. Do you find time to exercise when you’re on tour?
Kyle:I want to, and I try to but sometimes the laziness overrules that. Or the busyness of tour. We try to run here and there, at least I do. Work out, and do pushups whenever. I would really like to play a rocking game of hockey…
Pastepunk: Maybe you could put the word out on tour. Maybe you could find somebody.
Kyle: Yeah, actually a friend of mine called one day and was like, ‘Yeah, I’m going to be playing hockey with Melvin from NOFX.’ He just put out an email saying that he wanted kids to play hockey with when they were in Michigan. I thought that was the coolest thing ever. Maybe I’ll copy him.
