How did you start out?

Justin:

Jeff and I played in a band before and it just sort of was going no where and we were having fun with it and we decided we wanted to keep playing together and going in some different directions because there were different types of music that we liked a lot and just wanted to try those things out. And Jeff had played in a band with Drew before, gave Drew a shot, and Drew blew my mind because I’m a drummer myself and I’m particularly particular about drummers. And… it was awesome! And we just started getting together and just playing, not knowing where it would go. And the things that we were coming up with were really cool. And it’s been going well ever since for the past couple of years now.

Where do you practice at?

Justin:

(laughs) All over the place! Jeff is the typical rocker in “living with his parent’s” status, so we’ve been practicing there for a while. When parents get pissed at him, we do it at our label for a while. When our label gets pissed at us, we do it at some one else’s house for a while. We just sort of jump all over the place.

Yeah, so that’s how that works What inspires your music?

Justin:

Anything. Everything. Honestly, in song writing I try to stay away from the typical love song. But it’s all about relationship situations. Honestly, that’s a very strange question. I honestly don’t know what the song is about until it starts coming out of my mouth, and then it just sort of works it self out. But it really comes from the depth of my nothingness. Abyss of nothing. Everything just sort of starts with the music and we just start playing around.

Jeff:

We just start writing stuff together and the music will start playing. And Justin will start humming the melody. And we’ll complete the music well before we’ll know what he’s going to be singing. And then just one practice we’ll play the song through and he’ll start singing and we’re like, ‘alright the lyrics are there.’ And we don’t really worry about that, and he worries about that and the only thing we do pretty much do is the music. And he’ll come up with the lyrics and I’ll just start singing the back ups. And if we find that nothing’s done in a practice and nothing’s written, it just changes over time.

So you record it, and that’s how you know what your lyrics are for the future?

Justin:

It’s not actually in the recording, it’s just that we’ll get together, start with an idea, and we’ll just flesh that idea out over the course of maybe two months. Me personally I’m much more into the way music and rhythm makes me feel in a song, not necessarily the words. Just so that I’m happy with ‘the groove,’ and what we have going then sort of vocals will come in as a new instrumental, if that makes any sense. It’s very sort of stream of conscious, fluid way of song writing.

How do you remember it for the future?

Justin:

My lyrics literally until the day that we lay them down are always constantly changing and evolving much like the song it’s self is very fluid like the writing process. It will build and change as we play it more frequently. And only when we’re finally happy with something that we’ve done, do we play it out, or lay it down. When we feel like it’s complete and ready. But up until that point, it’s a constantly changing entity, if you will.

What if it’s really good and you didn’t get it on tape? Wouldn’t you want to record it so you can get it down?

Justin:

No, we honestly don’t lay down ideas as we’re writing them, it’s that we pick up from what we remember from last week. If it’s good, and we did it last week, then we’ll remember it, if that makes any sense. If it’s no good, then we don’t remember it. I don’t understand where you’re from.

Justin:

Where we’re from originally? Where we lived? I actually live in West Philadelphia now. I’ve lived there for the past few years.

Jeff:

Suburbs. Right outside of Philly suburbs.

Justin:

And we do most of our practicing in the suburbs. I’m from West Chester originally, so this was my old stomping grounds. Born and raised.

Do you guys go to college in PA?

Drew:

I go to college in Collegeville, which is a great place for a college, I guess. I go to Ursinus.

Justin:

I went to school in State college, also a great place for a college--and I graduated.

Jeff:

I went to high school, and I like music.

How’s the tour going for you?

Justin:

The shows have been going well. We’re not actually on tour right now. Actually right now we’re in the process of getting together and writing again. Our writing process is really slow, but now we’re sort of getting together and concentrating on writing the second album already. And we’re all really excited about that whole thing and have been dedicating a lot of time to that recently, and it’s been working out well. Slowly, but really well.

Jeff:

We’ve been slowing down a bit because we have a new album coming up and our songs do take a while to perfect to the way we like them. So we’ve decided that a tour wasn’t the wisest thing to do yet. We were jumping the gun. And there were too much of our lives at the moment at stake. Like Justin’s got a really good job that he couldn’t afford to give up on the chance that do the tour. And I really wasn’t in the financial position to go on tour. Just we weren’t in any situation to afford or sacrifice our daily lives for the band. So at the moment we’re just trying to concentrate on the next album and our music and maybe after that when we all have something better and more stable we’ll take it further, but right now, we just don’t know what’s going on, so…

Justin:

We sort of want to put out this full length and see where that goes. At the moment we’re all scraping by, so… that’s sort of what we’re concentrating on right now.

I heard that your music is described as sounding like the Pixies.

Justin:

Yeah, we’re all really into the Pixies and that sound. Just into messy, alternative type music. We’re really into the Police, too. Pixies and the Police are two big influences on us. That’s really the direction that our music has sort of ended up going. And everybody should listen to the Archers of Loathe. Cause Archers of Loathe are good. And that’s had a big impact on recent writing as well.

Drew:

And I think one of the big things is like we have so many different influences that really try to make each song different. I think that you can really hear our influences, but I think that we really try to make our own sound, so… That’s one of the big things about us, too.

Anything else?

Justin:

Visit us at thedangeros.com or myspace.com/thedangeros. It’s eating the world. Everyone’s on it. It ate us, too.

Transcribed by Hannah Wagner