(This interview took place on May 28, 2002 outside the El-N-Gee Club {sort of})
Matt Smith
Josh: I guess
we’ll start with the differences in the bands that you’re in. I think of
Liars Academy as a melodic rock band and then Strike Anywhere is definitely
punk. I mean, as opposed to being in two bands that sound the same,
you’re in two bands that are quite different.
Matt: I honestly listen to everything. I listened to a lot of rock stuff
before I even got into punk. All those guys have listened to
punk. It’s just such a small world with music. The way that
it all happened was I started with Strike Anywhere and we had been playing for
a couple years and we had played shows a couple times with Cross My Heart, and
everyone else in Liars Academy was in Cross My Heart. The drummer from
Strike Anywhere, Eric, and I were both really big fans of Cross My Heart.
I had just graduated from school down in Richmond, Strike Anywhere had been
going on for about two years, and I just really wanted to get out of there, I’d
been living there for five years. I had enough of it there and wanted to
try something new. I went to Baltimore and met Ryan. I had met him
before from playing shows and he’s just a really cool guy and he was like, “You
can move in with me if you want for a hundred dollars a month”, and so I moved
in with him. Cross My Heart broke up a couple days after that, and I
really respected him as a musician, and I was like, I want to be a part of
anything you’re going to do. And so we started this band the next
day, after Cross My Heart broke up. It was just me and him playing
with a different drummer, and then we ended up getting Evan, who was in Cross
My Heart, Chris also much longer down the road was in Cross My
Heart. It worked out great, we were already good friends.
It’s pretty cool. It’s great playing in two bands that sound nothing
alike creatively. If I was in two hardcore bands, trying to write stuff
for both bands... It’s just cool to have two creative outlets that are so
different. Liars Academy is cool because musically, it’s slower,
and there’s a chance to do more. And it’s almost limiting trying to play
music that’s so fast and make it interesting and creative. So it’s
fun to do both. They both have their great points. It’s very
fufilling to play in two bands that are two different types. I’d much rather
do that than play in two bands that were the same genre.
Josh: It’s weird to think that you’re in two bands though. It’s
like, “Is he allowed to do that?”. Because it’s not like you’re in one
band that’s big and popular and really good and then the other one is just a
side project and okay and not as well known-- both of them are really
good. They’re both connected by you.
Matt: It’s really, really difficult now. When Liars Academy first started
it was kind of a side project thing and we’d play around Baltimore when I
wasn’t on tour. Everything worked out great. Then we got a record deal
and a booking agent and we started getting all this pressure to tour. And
it’s really, really difficult juggling both bands. In a week, after
we play our DC show, I have to fly out to California and meet Strike Anywhere,
so Liars Academy’s gonna do about three weeks of shows without me, as a three
piece. And Strike Anywhere is touring out to California without me, doing
six shows, as a four piece. Everyone tries hard to make it work out and
to make compromises, but some times it doesn’t always work out and we have to
get fill ins. It’s really stressful trying to coordinate both with
pressure from all sides. But it’s fun, there’s nothing else I’d
rather be doing. It’s just very stressful. Being that both
are real bands.
Josh: They should just put them on tour together.
Matt: Yeah, I tried to do it many times. It’s going to
happen. Mark my words, it’s going to happen. But it hasn’t happened
yet. We played like, two or three shows together but that’s
it.
Josh: It must be easier now with Chris though, because then they have him
too.
Matt: Yeah. We were a three piece on the album, it was just me, Ryan and Evan,
and I was going on tour with Strike Anywhere in Europe and the Liars Academy
album was ready to come out and they really wanted to tour. So they
were like, “Is it ok if we get a fill in?”, and I was like, if you’re going to
get a fill in, I want you to get Chris. Because I knew he was the bassist
in Cross My Heart and we talked about trying to get him in on bass as
well. He filled in for that tour and as soon as I got back, we tried it
out as a four piece with me playing guitar and I think it worked out pretty
well. Now we’re a four piece band and all the new songs are written
together and now he’s as much a part of the band as anyone else. It’s
great that they are able to do that right now because I don’t want to hold them
back. I feel bad for having to do so much with Strike Anywhere.
I just do what I can. It’s challenging.
Josh: Do you think people at all feel cheated when they go to a show for
either Liars Academy or Strike Anywhere and it happens to be one of the shows
you’re not playing and they’re like, “Where’s Matt Smith?”?
Matt: I think people think that I just grew a lot and got really buff and got
tattoos. ‘Cause Chris is kind of like a giant version of me with more
tattoos. I don’t know. I don’t think a lot of people know now that
Liars Academy is a four piece. People who have heard the album but never
seen the band live or people who have never even heard of the band before will
see us at a show and not know that there’s a fourth guy. That
hasn’t really happened yet, but I’m sure it will. Ryan has actually
said people have come up to him and said, “Isn’t someone from Strike Anywhere
in this band? Is he not here?” I try to keep everyone happy. I want
to clone myself so I can just go on tour with both bands and have a
blast.
Josh: What’s interesting to me is that on the Liars Academy CD you played
bass and did some of the guitar parts. In Strike Anywhere, you’re a
guitarist. And now you’re playing guitar in Liars Academy. Do you
consider yourself to be more of a guitarist than a bassist?
Matt: I’m definitely much more comfortable on guitar. I’ve been playing
guitar since I was twelve years old. It’s something I’ve always
done. The only reason I played bass on Liars Academy is because when we
started the project, it was me and Ryan and we knew a guy named Chuck who came
to play drums, but there was no one to play bass. I wanted to play guitar
originally, but when we wrote the first songs I was playing bass. It was
pretty good and we were like, you know what, fuck it, let’s just keep it like
this. So I had to buy bass equipment-- I had never played bass in a band
before. I just kind of did it out of having to. I definitely am glad
going back to guitar. I feel a little more comfortable and I think Chris
is a much better bassist than I am. It was fun, it was really cool trying
to learn a new instrument. It was the first time I had ever played
bass on anything recorded or in a band and it was really challenging and
fun. Now I think about if I play differently because of trying to
approach stuff to write on the bass instead of guitar. I had to
think of playing bass like a bass player and not like a guitar, which was hard,
especially for a guitar player. So it was fun and it was
challenging, but I’m glad I’m playing guitar now because I’m more comfortable
at that.
Josh: Most bands are a part of one label, but you’re actually a part of
two different labels- Jade Tree and Equal Vision- what is it like to have two
labels and such different ones at that?
Matt: It seems like the bands should be on opposite labels. I don’t
know how it worked out like that. You would think that the bands
would just switch. Maybe we’ll do like, a trade. Maybe we’ll just
swap out. The thing with Equal Vision was, I had met the Equal
Vision people through Strike Anywhere when we were looking for record labels
and I really liked the guys but we ended up going with Jade Tree. I
sent them a CD and they actually wanted to put out the Liars Academy
stuff. It was our best option, so we did it. They’ve been really
awesome. This guy named Jason DeRose- Jason, if you ever read this, you’re the
best, you’re so awesome- works so hard. He’s such a hard working
guy. He’s so dedicated. He’s always on the phone and he’s
always thinking of new stuff. I’m really glad that I’ve had the
experience to be able to work with him and I didn’t think that I was going to
get to. It’s really cool. The Jade Tree people are really
great too for Strike Anywhere. They’re both great labels. Good
people.
Josh: Jade Tree did this CD recently and I guess they’re doing a series
of them where they have more popular bands cover each other. The one
right now is Alkaline Trio covering Hot Water Music and vice versa. Have
you ever thought about doing anything like that, like a split with Liars
Academy covering Strike Anywhere and Strike Anywhere covering Liars Academy?
Matt: That would be pretty interesting. I think that would be
pretty cool. I would be down for it. That would be a
blast. It’d be fun trying to rewrite the songs to make them fit the
style of the other band. We should do a split 7” where we have each
band covering two songs of the other band. I think that would be
awesome. That would be really fun. We were going to do that with
our bass player in Strike Anywhere’s (Garth) band on Indecision called Count Me
Out. Strike Anywhere and Count Me Out were going to do a split 7”
where we covered each others songs, but it never happened. But I definitely
think it would be more interesting for a Strike Anywhere/Liars Academy
split. Maybe I’ll start a record label and put that out as my first
release. Or we’ll just do a Liars Academy 7” with us covering like,
five Oasis songs. We could do that too. That would be my second
release, actually.
Josh: Who are really some of your influences as a guitarist? What
made you decide to want to play guitar?
Matt: When I was young, in seventh grade and eighth grade, sixth grade, when I
was really, really young, I listened to Metallica, Guns’N’Roses- when “Appetite
for Destruction” came out, that made me want to play guitar. Slash
definitely made me want to play guitar. That was before I played guitar.
I’d say Guns’N’Roses, early Metallica and early REM, stuff like that.
I’ve just always wanted to play, as long as I can remember, this is always what
I’ve wanted to do. I feel pretty lucky knowing what I wanted to do from
an early and now actually being able to get to do it. I’m only 24, so I’m
still pretty young, but tons of people my age and older than me still don’t really
know what they want to do after they finish college. They’re bartending
or waiting tables at a restaurant, trying to figure out what they’re going to
do with their lives. I mean, I hope I can do this for as long as I can,
I’m definitely going to try. I don’t want to be like, 50 and still up
there. But hopefully for as long as I can.
Josh: It’s weird though because you’re not just in one band that’s
putting out CDs and touring. You’re in two.
Matt: It’s cool. I stay on tour twice as much but that also helps because
it’s twice as much time that I’m gone. I get to make enough money to pay
the bills because I’m touring in both bands so I don’t have any other job right
now. I’m barely making enough to pay the bills, but I am making enough to
pay the bills. But I have to stay on tour seven months out of the
year. Which is cool, but you miss loved ones and family. I have a
dog and a cat.
Josh: It’s like, if you want to make it in this scene, you have to join
more than one band.
Matt: If you want to survive playing only in an independent band, you have to
play in a couple to make ends meet.
Josh: Now, it’s not likely for you to join a third band.
Matt: No.
Josh: But some time down the line, do you think of ever having your own
band in the sense of fronting a band where you get to write lyrics and maybe
even sing?
Matt: That would be cool. I definitely think that if both bands broke up
I would probably move to Europe or something. I’d try to move to England
and live there for a little while just because I’ve been all over most every
state in the United States, most of lower Canada near the U.S., and I’ve toured
Japan and Europe and all of the U.K. and I think the U.K. is the coolest place
I’ve been. I love it there. I would move there and probably
just live there for a year and maybe try to start a new band over there.
That’s probably what I would do if the bands broke up. That’s my tentative
plan for right now. But hopefully they’ll both keep going for a little
while. Starting over is so hard.