Rohan Kohli
10/13/08, 01:10 PM
Click here (http://www.absolutepunk.net/showthread.php?t=596512) to read Part 1 of this interview.
AP.net: Do you or any of the other members ever feel a sense of jealousy towards Pete?
Patrick: No, we're pretty defensive when it comes to the way he's been portrayed. Pete's my best friend, I was the best man at his wedding, I love that man to death. I'd take a bullet for him. But, I hate the way that the Pete Wentz that actually exists never gets covered, it never gets spoken of. There's so many accusations that are so ridiculous about the guy that are taken as the gospel—people just assume that he posted pictures of his penis on the internet. That is the stupidest fucking thing thing I've ever heard. Why on earth would you ever do that? His parents were gonna see that, come on. Have some common sense. He is actually a human being. Would you want your penis all over the internet? Probably not. He probably doesn't either.
This is another little interesting factoid about Pete: he quit the band. I had to talk him back into the band after those pictures got out. It nearly broke the band up he was so devastated. He had to claw his way back up from massive depression to even make fun of it.
Anyway, no, we are not jealous of him. If anything, I would want people to know the real Pete Wentz. I get the impression that people don't really want to know him, because he's not the bad guy on the reality show. He's the most loyal guy I know, to a fault actually. He's one of those guys who will never stand against his friends. Here’s an analogy. If he’s gonna make some money off shoveling coal, he's gonna bring his friend on with him, and his friend is gonna shovel coal. If the friend's not good at shoveling coal, Pete will shovel more coal to make sure that guy gets his share, even if the guy is doing terrible work. The guy could sit down, relax, and open up a book, and Pete's still gonna be shoveling coal for that guy. He is the most loyal guy I know. He reminds me a lot of the portrayal of Frankie Valli in Jersey Boys just in the way that in Jersey Boys, and I don't know if this is the true story, one of the other singers in the Four Seasons racks up this huge gambling debt and Frankie Valli is like, "We'll pay for it, we will never ask for it back, we'll just pay for it, he's just gotta not do it again," and that's the kind of guy Pete is. I will never be jealous of him.
AP.net: Do you ever feel underappreciated?
Patrick: No, I feel overappreciated, if anything. I think Joe's underappreciated, I think Andy's underappreciated, I think Pete's underappreciated, I don't think people know how good he is. I think Neal [Avron]'s underappreciated, but if anything, I feel overappreciated. I think Patrick Stump gets enough attention.
AP.net: Do you ever feel that Pete's other business ventures (Decaydance, Clandestine, etc) take away from Fall Out Boy's music?
Patrick: I think people can misinterpret it very easily. Pete Wentz is not a very good entrepreneur, he's a good friend. He believed in Gym Class Heroes, The Academy Is, and Panic At the Disco when a lot of other labels wouldn't, and they were our friends.
Maybe sometimes it gets in the way of the record, of the music - not with making it, but with people's perceptions sometimes, it can be kind of daunting. But at the same time, I applaud him for doing it. I think the way he does it is totally awesome. Really, his whole MO is: when we were getting signed, we got dicked around by labels, so he decided to start a label that doesn't fuck bands over. When everybody had a clothing company, he was like, "Well, I want to make a clothing company that makes something I actually wanna see." I think people think he makes a lot more money than he does, and I think that's one of the misconceptions, is that he does things for money. If he did things for money, I would hope he'd make more [laughs].
AP.net: Do you know what's going to happen now that Ashlee is expecting - how does that affect your upcoming touring plans?
Patrick: I think we're going to be touring a little more lightly than would be planned otherwise, but I don't know that it's going to be noticeable necessarily. I think the way that we structured it I don't think there are going to be huge gaps, it's going to be more scheduled around accommodating Pete if he needs to go home for anything. This is the first time anyone has had anything really important, has had a really good excuse to drop out of things for a minute [laughs], and we're not ever gonna play without him, so we scheduled things so that if he's needed somewhere, we're not too far away, and if we are too far, he can fly home at a moment's notice. It hasn't been too detrimental; it doesn't really feel too different. If anything, it just feels more organized.
AP.net: How much has touring non-stop taken a toll on the band?
Patrick: It can be a pain in the ass. There's a lot of things about touring that can cause for ups and downs. International touring is always rough and it's always a challenge for a band because it costs so much to go to another country. We paid for those international tours. We totally paid for it out of pocket and we're in debt to those tours. One of the problems is that sometimes you want to put on a show, you want to put on something cool, you're playing a certain size venue, you want to have a certain caliber of a show, and you just can't afford it. It's not even possible. That's one thing that gets really grueling - I hate disappointing people, and I don't want to feel like I'm disappointing people, so we have to work that much harder to not disappoint people on the international tours, because everything is coming out of our pocket.
And the schedule can be really hard. Sometimes you can be in a place where you don't speak the language and you don't know what you're doing, you don't know how to get around, etc.
We’ve been touring pretty much nonstop up until Infinity, and that was pretty rough. After a while it got really rough. That last tour that we did, the one with Gym Class and Plain White Ts and Cute Is What We Aim For, I think we all looked at each other at the end of that one and were like, "Dude, let's fucking go home." It was a great tour - technically on paper that was the best tour we've ever done, but it was just the end of it. We were so tired.
We're older, and I think that's one of the things. Joe has gotten to be such a good dude. It's cool watching your friend grow. Pete's gonna be a father. Joe has a house. That's insane to me. It's cool watching where everybody’s going. Touring hasn't been a big negative for us, if anything, it's been really awesome to watch us grow. We're definitely brothers, it's definitely a very familial thing. God forbid, if anything ever happens and we break up, I think we'll still be really tight. We'll break up for other reasons, but I don't think we'll ever not hang out.
AP.net: After a tour what do you do to unwind/decompress? What do you like to do when you're at home?
Patrick: I collect movies, I still buy records constantly. I collect musical instruments and most of my time I spend making music, it's pretty much what I do 90% of the time I'm home. Aside from just normal stuff, I walk the dog, I hang out with my girlfriend, get dinner. Pretty mellow stuff. Right now I'm in Hollywood—I don't like Hollywood, it's not really my style. But I've found my own little niche here where it's not bad. It's one of those things where I've been on an extended work trip here for 2 years [laughs]. I still technically live in Chicago and I'm dying to get back. That's one of the big things for me, I go back to Chicago when I want to hang out. I'm weirdly very proud of my city, and I hope, God willing, I die there. That's kind of one of my big things.
AP.net: How many b-sides does Fall Out Boy have? Do you ever plan on releasing them if you do have any?
Patrick: We have a lot of stuff. I couldn't even put an estimate on how much music has been written for Fall Out Boy that hasn't been released. I really don't know if we have any plans to release them or not. Pete and I haven't really talked about it. We're always finding stuff too. The other day I was talking to Andy and he had on his iPod a bunch of demos we'd done years ago, probably before Take This To Your Grave. I'd forgotten about all that stuff. I don't even know. There are probably hundreds of songs that exist. Will they ever get released? I don't know. The other thing is, I probably don't even want them to be released, some of them are pretty bad [laughs].
AP.net: Have you ever considered a solo project for music that might not fit into the vision for Fall Out Boy?
Patrick: Before Fall Out Boy I wanted to do a solo record and write songs. But again, I didn't really want to be the singer. I've been asked that and my feeling is that there's only two reasons to do a solo project - either you are totally full of yourself and you want to be the star, or you have a bunch of music that you want to get out that your band either won't let you release or can't pull off. I don't feel like I'm in either situation. I feel like I get to express myself in a better way. I mean, at the end of the day, yeah, Paul McCartney's awesome, but wasn't he better with the Beatles? Not to say I'm anything close to that. I think really fruitful partnerships—and I consider Pete and I to have a fruitful partnership, I'm happy working with him—I always think fruitful partnerships are going to be better than the partners without each other.
If it ever came up and it ever made sense, I might consider it, but at the moment I'm way too stoked on our Fall Out Boy record to even care about that [laughs].
AP.net: Any plans to work on any albums on the producer side in the future?
Patrick: I know Cobra Starship's talking about going back to the studio, I'm trying to work on some stuff for them but I don't really know if I'll have time. Right now is a really bad time for producing because I'm gonna be on the road. But I like producing, it's a cool job, it just depends on the specific act and the specific thing. I don't have anything planned right now.
AP.net: How do you decide what bands you work with?
Patrick: I found that seeking out bands never works, it always ends up being forced and weird, so usually I wait for stuff. I'm in an awesome position, I just wait for it to come to me and then I get to cherry-pick—and I know that won't last very long. In the world of production that only lasts for a couple years before people stop caring, once you stop making hits [laughs].
I know this sounds self-serving, but I really like working with bands on Decaydance because there's a lot more freedom there. I know everybody that works at the label, I don't have to argue with anybody about why this lyric is cool etc. I had to do that with some other projects that ultimately got aborted; I haven't really done any records outside Decaydance. I've tried a bunch of times and it's been a bum-out. And also, that's not to say I wouldn't love to do records outside Decaydance, that's just the thing that's worked out the best for me so far.
AP.net: Would you ever produce a Fall Out Boy album yourself?
Patrick: I would think that'd be a very bad idea. I think that'd be really arrogant to do. I don't see the need for it, I don't value my opinion that much to want to do that.
AP.net: How did you first get involved with producing?
Patrick: Producing is weird because I don’t really think I wanted to do it. I credit our booking agent actually with telling me "You will love producing, you should produce." And I was like, "I don't really know about that." So I went ahead and tried it, I did the Hush Sound record with Sean O'Keefe, who did Take This To Your Grave, and it was really cool. I loved working with Sean, and I loved the Hush Sound, but it was kind of a tough time to make a record. During the weekends I was flying to New York to do Gym Class Heroes. So I was doing two records at once and I think that's the only reason I'm still producing.
I had 2 completely different experiences. I thought the end result with The Hush Sound is amazing,I love that record, I'm so proud of them - it's not even really me, I didn't have much involvement in writing the songs or anything, they really did it. I think Sean did a great job, and Manny the engineer did a great job. And then I would go over to New York and work with Gym Class Heroes, and it was just fun, I just had a blast. It happened so fast. I remember "Clothes Off" basically happened because I was just singing it around in the hallway and Sam [Hollander] goes "Yo, come in and sing that man, that's so good," and it was just really organic and really real. I think that's how I got into producing, I had those two experiences right away.
I'm totally lucky to even get to do it. Sam's an awesome dude and Sean's an awesome dude, and it's really cool that I get to work with these people.
AP.net: Are you very hands on when it comes to production or do you focus more on the larger vision of the song/album - the vibe/etc?
Patrick: I think a producer should be like water, and whatever the shape of the glass is, he or she should fill that. If they need you to be the engineer guy--typically I have an engineer--I work at that stuff. If they need you to be a songwriting help guy, I work on that. If they need you to be a vocal melody guy, I work at that, etc. I kind of look at whatever a band needs out of me then I try to give it to them.
On the new Gym Class record, I really thought the band needed to be heard, because I thought there was a lot of really cool stuff going on and I don't really think people realized how much of that was coming out of the band. That was my job on that record, was to get the band there. And that was really all I wanted to do, I wasn't looking for hits or anything like that. The Cab, I really wanted people to know how good Alex is as a singer - he is really amazing and that's one of the things I really wanted to get out there.
AP.net: What are some of your favorite albums production-wise?
Patrick: Oh man, that's like asking what my favorite records are.
AP.net: Or what are some cool albums you've been listening to lately that you dig production-wise?
Patrick: There's this new producer Space Cowboy, he's from Europe, and he does pretty much exclusively dance-y stuff, but he is blowing my mind right now. Everything he does is awesome. It's like Timbaland meets Jamie Lidell—and Jamie Lidell, his records just blow my mind, everything he does is smoke. As far as modern producers, I really love Pharrell and the Neptunes, I really love Timbaland still, he does awesome stuff, I love Kanye. There's Tony Visconti who worked on Bowie records, or Nick Lowe who did all those Elvis Costello records, or Elvis Costello who did Squeeze and the Specials, there's Phil Spector, the list goes on.
AP.net: A couple of our readers were wondering if you had any vocal tips for up and coming singers.
Patrick: The human voice is pretty much the wussiest thing in the universe. It's so fickle, and you have to treat it really well. Basically, I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't go to clubs and stuff like that. I don't ever go to bars because if you have to yell to the person next to you, it's never good for you. I don't whisper, I don't eat dairy within a few hours of playing, usually if I have anything dairy it'll be after a show or in the morning. Basically, the only two things that your voice really wants are relaxation and water, and not cold water, not hot water, just room temperature water. Keep hydrated, and just rest your voice, because that's the biggest thing. The singer never gets to party [laughs].
AP.net: I know this was from way earlier, but you said you guys recorded Take This To Your Grave in 9 days?
Patrick: Yes. "Dead On Arrival," "Saturday," and "Homesick at Space Camp," were recorded as a demo session in two days, almost a year earlier, and "Where Is Your Boy" and "Hey Chris" were recorded in another demo session. Those were demos, that's the thing, we paid for those. When I say Take This To Your Grave was recorded in 9 days, the rest of the album was recorded -- I think it was 7 songs in 9 days. I remember the computer crashed so we lost all the harmonies on "Saturday" so I had to go back and re-sing "Saturday," we made a couple guitar tweaks and things like that to "Where Is Your Boy" - we recorded something on every song in the span of 9 days.
AP.net: Can you tell us a little more about the short you directed, when it's coming out, and what you hope people will take away from it?
Patrick: The short, oddly enough, kind of says a lot of the same stuff the record says right now. So I was really hoping to get it out around the record, but I don't think that's gonna happen yet. We're still finishing it and getting it edited-you want it to be the right thing.
It was kind of an experiment for me, because I was trying to figure out what I like doing - I knew I wanted to contribute to film in some way, but I didn't know what I felt the most comfortable doing, what I was the best at, what my place was - but I wrote it, I directed it, I acted in it. Basically, the same thing I was saying about the record - it's kind of a satire on consumerism and the idea of valuing things over experiences, and conversely, trying to make experiences into things, which is the worst thing ever. So the story is about this artist who only does art for the reward, so he can pick up chicks or whatever, it's a comedy.
AP.net: Do you see yourself doing more of this kind of stuff in the future?
Patrick: I had a blast directing, and I really think that's the thing I did better. I love acting, it feels really natural, but I don't like me as an actor. I think my standards for actors are so high that I don't know that I meet them. I don't know if I'd do that again. Writing-wise, shoot man, I don't even write the lyrics for my band, so I don't know how good of a writer I am [laughs].
It was really fun and I am really proud of it. I don't know how much more I'll do of it. Maybe I'll direct a music video or something like that, maybe not a Fall Out Boy video, but maybe I'll get into that.
AP.net: How'd you get involved with Law & Order?
Patrick: Well, basically I met this girl on the set of the "Dance, Dance" video, she was my love interest in the "Dance, Dance" video, she's on 30 Rock now, but at the time she was just the girl in the video. So I saw her on Law & Order and I jokingly said to Bob [McLynn, manager], "Hey, if she can be on Law & Order maybe I can get on Law & Order as well," and it ended up happening. I was a total fan, so I kept it going, I was like, "Let’s do this, I wanna do this." They flew me out and I got to be an actor for 2 days, so that was cool.
AP.net: One user asks: "Pete is very vocal on his blogs about artists he loves. Joe has a wicked art collection as well. Besides the giant picture of David Bowie, what's hanging on your walls at home?"
Patrick: I have a [Takashi] Murakami, I have just some really cheap posters of [Roy] Lichtenstein and [Andy] Warhol and Kazimir Malevich. I like a lot of art. I think the band is definitely united in that front, in that we really like visual art as well. Thankfully, I'm not ever gonna try and get into it [laughs].
AP.net: What've you been listening to lately?
Patrick: A lot of Fall Out Boy actually because I've had to approve mixes [laughs], no, but, I've been kind of going back through a lot of the things I was listening to in high school - a lot of Prince, a lot of David Bowie, a lot of Elvis Costello. Those were my big things, Motown, funk, and jazz, Lil Wayne. Kanye, what the fuck am I talking about. Love "Lockdown," holy smokes, that's like my favorite song ever. I've been listening to Jamie Lidell and this Nadia Oh record. Awesome.
AP.net: Who do you think is the best act in pop music right now?
Patrick: It'd probably be Kanye. I think the way he approaches pop music is so awesome, he's doing something that is so high art, so relatable immediately. It’s nearly avant-garde, but then at the same time really catchy. He's also really awesome at collaborating, when he does it, he does it really well.
I can't really say that from personal experience. I'd love to work with him, I've been bugging him about it for years. There's a certain part of me that doesn't want to work with him anyways though, because I want to be just as surprised as everybody else with every song, on every record. I want to be like "Oh man, that's awesome!" I kind of don't want to peel back the veil. None of my stuff ever ended up getting used but I worked on "Good Life," before T-Pain did, and T-Pain's version is better than mine [laughs], but it almost was too close. I almost didn't want to know.
AP.net: One reader wrote "I'm currently majoring in music so I thought it was interesting to read that you're listening to contemporary American composers like Steve Reich. I was just wondering if his minimalist style, or the style of any other contemporary composers, has influenced the way you write/think about/or listen to music."
Patrick: Absolutely. I think one of the things if you look at minimalism or expressionism, there's various movements in modern composition that I think you can see really natural relations in pop music, so I mean I always look to that in pop music. Reich and John Cage were pretty big influences on this record in weird ways in that you wouldn't necessarily hear any of it - nothing ends up sounding like either of them, but I think just methodology and things like that ended up on the record in various ways.
AP.net: Do you guys have plans to go back to Antarctica any time soon?
Patrick: Hopefully. I would love to get back there and I'd love to bring some cameras and show everybody the place is fucking melting.
AP.net: What's one question you've never been asked in an interview that you wish you've been asked and what's your answer?
Patrick: You know, I pretty much just got it about Steve Reich, cause that's pretty cool. Honestly, I'd like to have more questions asked about the rest of the band and the rest of the dudes. One thing that's really easy in interviewing is to have a story written and be like, "Well these guys suck and this is how I'm gonna say it." I wish more people knew about the real Pete and those were the questions that got asked.
AP.net: That about wraps it up. Anything you want to say to the AP.net readers?
Patrick: First off, thank you man for doing this interview. I knew I took up a lot of time - I figured, I had a free day, and what the fuck else am I gonna do with 2 hours [laughs]. I hope I didn't make an ass of myself [laughs]. I read AbsolutePunk.net on a semi-daily basis, I still check out what's going on. I still click links and see new bands off of it, and a lot of times I get my news off of there, so I'm just as much a reader of AbsolutePunk as anyone else. Thank you to anyone who read this interview, it means a lot.
AP.net: Do you or any of the other members ever feel a sense of jealousy towards Pete?
Patrick: No, we're pretty defensive when it comes to the way he's been portrayed. Pete's my best friend, I was the best man at his wedding, I love that man to death. I'd take a bullet for him. But, I hate the way that the Pete Wentz that actually exists never gets covered, it never gets spoken of. There's so many accusations that are so ridiculous about the guy that are taken as the gospel—people just assume that he posted pictures of his penis on the internet. That is the stupidest fucking thing thing I've ever heard. Why on earth would you ever do that? His parents were gonna see that, come on. Have some common sense. He is actually a human being. Would you want your penis all over the internet? Probably not. He probably doesn't either.
This is another little interesting factoid about Pete: he quit the band. I had to talk him back into the band after those pictures got out. It nearly broke the band up he was so devastated. He had to claw his way back up from massive depression to even make fun of it.
Anyway, no, we are not jealous of him. If anything, I would want people to know the real Pete Wentz. I get the impression that people don't really want to know him, because he's not the bad guy on the reality show. He's the most loyal guy I know, to a fault actually. He's one of those guys who will never stand against his friends. Here’s an analogy. If he’s gonna make some money off shoveling coal, he's gonna bring his friend on with him, and his friend is gonna shovel coal. If the friend's not good at shoveling coal, Pete will shovel more coal to make sure that guy gets his share, even if the guy is doing terrible work. The guy could sit down, relax, and open up a book, and Pete's still gonna be shoveling coal for that guy. He is the most loyal guy I know. He reminds me a lot of the portrayal of Frankie Valli in Jersey Boys just in the way that in Jersey Boys, and I don't know if this is the true story, one of the other singers in the Four Seasons racks up this huge gambling debt and Frankie Valli is like, "We'll pay for it, we will never ask for it back, we'll just pay for it, he's just gotta not do it again," and that's the kind of guy Pete is. I will never be jealous of him.
AP.net: Do you ever feel underappreciated?
Patrick: No, I feel overappreciated, if anything. I think Joe's underappreciated, I think Andy's underappreciated, I think Pete's underappreciated, I don't think people know how good he is. I think Neal [Avron]'s underappreciated, but if anything, I feel overappreciated. I think Patrick Stump gets enough attention.
AP.net: Do you ever feel that Pete's other business ventures (Decaydance, Clandestine, etc) take away from Fall Out Boy's music?
Patrick: I think people can misinterpret it very easily. Pete Wentz is not a very good entrepreneur, he's a good friend. He believed in Gym Class Heroes, The Academy Is, and Panic At the Disco when a lot of other labels wouldn't, and they were our friends.
Maybe sometimes it gets in the way of the record, of the music - not with making it, but with people's perceptions sometimes, it can be kind of daunting. But at the same time, I applaud him for doing it. I think the way he does it is totally awesome. Really, his whole MO is: when we were getting signed, we got dicked around by labels, so he decided to start a label that doesn't fuck bands over. When everybody had a clothing company, he was like, "Well, I want to make a clothing company that makes something I actually wanna see." I think people think he makes a lot more money than he does, and I think that's one of the misconceptions, is that he does things for money. If he did things for money, I would hope he'd make more [laughs].
AP.net: Do you know what's going to happen now that Ashlee is expecting - how does that affect your upcoming touring plans?
Patrick: I think we're going to be touring a little more lightly than would be planned otherwise, but I don't know that it's going to be noticeable necessarily. I think the way that we structured it I don't think there are going to be huge gaps, it's going to be more scheduled around accommodating Pete if he needs to go home for anything. This is the first time anyone has had anything really important, has had a really good excuse to drop out of things for a minute [laughs], and we're not ever gonna play without him, so we scheduled things so that if he's needed somewhere, we're not too far away, and if we are too far, he can fly home at a moment's notice. It hasn't been too detrimental; it doesn't really feel too different. If anything, it just feels more organized.
AP.net: How much has touring non-stop taken a toll on the band?
Patrick: It can be a pain in the ass. There's a lot of things about touring that can cause for ups and downs. International touring is always rough and it's always a challenge for a band because it costs so much to go to another country. We paid for those international tours. We totally paid for it out of pocket and we're in debt to those tours. One of the problems is that sometimes you want to put on a show, you want to put on something cool, you're playing a certain size venue, you want to have a certain caliber of a show, and you just can't afford it. It's not even possible. That's one thing that gets really grueling - I hate disappointing people, and I don't want to feel like I'm disappointing people, so we have to work that much harder to not disappoint people on the international tours, because everything is coming out of our pocket.
And the schedule can be really hard. Sometimes you can be in a place where you don't speak the language and you don't know what you're doing, you don't know how to get around, etc.
We’ve been touring pretty much nonstop up until Infinity, and that was pretty rough. After a while it got really rough. That last tour that we did, the one with Gym Class and Plain White Ts and Cute Is What We Aim For, I think we all looked at each other at the end of that one and were like, "Dude, let's fucking go home." It was a great tour - technically on paper that was the best tour we've ever done, but it was just the end of it. We were so tired.
We're older, and I think that's one of the things. Joe has gotten to be such a good dude. It's cool watching your friend grow. Pete's gonna be a father. Joe has a house. That's insane to me. It's cool watching where everybody’s going. Touring hasn't been a big negative for us, if anything, it's been really awesome to watch us grow. We're definitely brothers, it's definitely a very familial thing. God forbid, if anything ever happens and we break up, I think we'll still be really tight. We'll break up for other reasons, but I don't think we'll ever not hang out.
AP.net: After a tour what do you do to unwind/decompress? What do you like to do when you're at home?
Patrick: I collect movies, I still buy records constantly. I collect musical instruments and most of my time I spend making music, it's pretty much what I do 90% of the time I'm home. Aside from just normal stuff, I walk the dog, I hang out with my girlfriend, get dinner. Pretty mellow stuff. Right now I'm in Hollywood—I don't like Hollywood, it's not really my style. But I've found my own little niche here where it's not bad. It's one of those things where I've been on an extended work trip here for 2 years [laughs]. I still technically live in Chicago and I'm dying to get back. That's one of the big things for me, I go back to Chicago when I want to hang out. I'm weirdly very proud of my city, and I hope, God willing, I die there. That's kind of one of my big things.
AP.net: How many b-sides does Fall Out Boy have? Do you ever plan on releasing them if you do have any?
Patrick: We have a lot of stuff. I couldn't even put an estimate on how much music has been written for Fall Out Boy that hasn't been released. I really don't know if we have any plans to release them or not. Pete and I haven't really talked about it. We're always finding stuff too. The other day I was talking to Andy and he had on his iPod a bunch of demos we'd done years ago, probably before Take This To Your Grave. I'd forgotten about all that stuff. I don't even know. There are probably hundreds of songs that exist. Will they ever get released? I don't know. The other thing is, I probably don't even want them to be released, some of them are pretty bad [laughs].
AP.net: Have you ever considered a solo project for music that might not fit into the vision for Fall Out Boy?
Patrick: Before Fall Out Boy I wanted to do a solo record and write songs. But again, I didn't really want to be the singer. I've been asked that and my feeling is that there's only two reasons to do a solo project - either you are totally full of yourself and you want to be the star, or you have a bunch of music that you want to get out that your band either won't let you release or can't pull off. I don't feel like I'm in either situation. I feel like I get to express myself in a better way. I mean, at the end of the day, yeah, Paul McCartney's awesome, but wasn't he better with the Beatles? Not to say I'm anything close to that. I think really fruitful partnerships—and I consider Pete and I to have a fruitful partnership, I'm happy working with him—I always think fruitful partnerships are going to be better than the partners without each other.
If it ever came up and it ever made sense, I might consider it, but at the moment I'm way too stoked on our Fall Out Boy record to even care about that [laughs].
AP.net: Any plans to work on any albums on the producer side in the future?
Patrick: I know Cobra Starship's talking about going back to the studio, I'm trying to work on some stuff for them but I don't really know if I'll have time. Right now is a really bad time for producing because I'm gonna be on the road. But I like producing, it's a cool job, it just depends on the specific act and the specific thing. I don't have anything planned right now.
AP.net: How do you decide what bands you work with?
Patrick: I found that seeking out bands never works, it always ends up being forced and weird, so usually I wait for stuff. I'm in an awesome position, I just wait for it to come to me and then I get to cherry-pick—and I know that won't last very long. In the world of production that only lasts for a couple years before people stop caring, once you stop making hits [laughs].
I know this sounds self-serving, but I really like working with bands on Decaydance because there's a lot more freedom there. I know everybody that works at the label, I don't have to argue with anybody about why this lyric is cool etc. I had to do that with some other projects that ultimately got aborted; I haven't really done any records outside Decaydance. I've tried a bunch of times and it's been a bum-out. And also, that's not to say I wouldn't love to do records outside Decaydance, that's just the thing that's worked out the best for me so far.
AP.net: Would you ever produce a Fall Out Boy album yourself?
Patrick: I would think that'd be a very bad idea. I think that'd be really arrogant to do. I don't see the need for it, I don't value my opinion that much to want to do that.
AP.net: How did you first get involved with producing?
Patrick: Producing is weird because I don’t really think I wanted to do it. I credit our booking agent actually with telling me "You will love producing, you should produce." And I was like, "I don't really know about that." So I went ahead and tried it, I did the Hush Sound record with Sean O'Keefe, who did Take This To Your Grave, and it was really cool. I loved working with Sean, and I loved the Hush Sound, but it was kind of a tough time to make a record. During the weekends I was flying to New York to do Gym Class Heroes. So I was doing two records at once and I think that's the only reason I'm still producing.
I had 2 completely different experiences. I thought the end result with The Hush Sound is amazing,I love that record, I'm so proud of them - it's not even really me, I didn't have much involvement in writing the songs or anything, they really did it. I think Sean did a great job, and Manny the engineer did a great job. And then I would go over to New York and work with Gym Class Heroes, and it was just fun, I just had a blast. It happened so fast. I remember "Clothes Off" basically happened because I was just singing it around in the hallway and Sam [Hollander] goes "Yo, come in and sing that man, that's so good," and it was just really organic and really real. I think that's how I got into producing, I had those two experiences right away.
I'm totally lucky to even get to do it. Sam's an awesome dude and Sean's an awesome dude, and it's really cool that I get to work with these people.
AP.net: Are you very hands on when it comes to production or do you focus more on the larger vision of the song/album - the vibe/etc?
Patrick: I think a producer should be like water, and whatever the shape of the glass is, he or she should fill that. If they need you to be the engineer guy--typically I have an engineer--I work at that stuff. If they need you to be a songwriting help guy, I work on that. If they need you to be a vocal melody guy, I work at that, etc. I kind of look at whatever a band needs out of me then I try to give it to them.
On the new Gym Class record, I really thought the band needed to be heard, because I thought there was a lot of really cool stuff going on and I don't really think people realized how much of that was coming out of the band. That was my job on that record, was to get the band there. And that was really all I wanted to do, I wasn't looking for hits or anything like that. The Cab, I really wanted people to know how good Alex is as a singer - he is really amazing and that's one of the things I really wanted to get out there.
AP.net: What are some of your favorite albums production-wise?
Patrick: Oh man, that's like asking what my favorite records are.
AP.net: Or what are some cool albums you've been listening to lately that you dig production-wise?
Patrick: There's this new producer Space Cowboy, he's from Europe, and he does pretty much exclusively dance-y stuff, but he is blowing my mind right now. Everything he does is awesome. It's like Timbaland meets Jamie Lidell—and Jamie Lidell, his records just blow my mind, everything he does is smoke. As far as modern producers, I really love Pharrell and the Neptunes, I really love Timbaland still, he does awesome stuff, I love Kanye. There's Tony Visconti who worked on Bowie records, or Nick Lowe who did all those Elvis Costello records, or Elvis Costello who did Squeeze and the Specials, there's Phil Spector, the list goes on.
AP.net: A couple of our readers were wondering if you had any vocal tips for up and coming singers.
Patrick: The human voice is pretty much the wussiest thing in the universe. It's so fickle, and you have to treat it really well. Basically, I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't go to clubs and stuff like that. I don't ever go to bars because if you have to yell to the person next to you, it's never good for you. I don't whisper, I don't eat dairy within a few hours of playing, usually if I have anything dairy it'll be after a show or in the morning. Basically, the only two things that your voice really wants are relaxation and water, and not cold water, not hot water, just room temperature water. Keep hydrated, and just rest your voice, because that's the biggest thing. The singer never gets to party [laughs].
AP.net: I know this was from way earlier, but you said you guys recorded Take This To Your Grave in 9 days?
Patrick: Yes. "Dead On Arrival," "Saturday," and "Homesick at Space Camp," were recorded as a demo session in two days, almost a year earlier, and "Where Is Your Boy" and "Hey Chris" were recorded in another demo session. Those were demos, that's the thing, we paid for those. When I say Take This To Your Grave was recorded in 9 days, the rest of the album was recorded -- I think it was 7 songs in 9 days. I remember the computer crashed so we lost all the harmonies on "Saturday" so I had to go back and re-sing "Saturday," we made a couple guitar tweaks and things like that to "Where Is Your Boy" - we recorded something on every song in the span of 9 days.
AP.net: Can you tell us a little more about the short you directed, when it's coming out, and what you hope people will take away from it?
Patrick: The short, oddly enough, kind of says a lot of the same stuff the record says right now. So I was really hoping to get it out around the record, but I don't think that's gonna happen yet. We're still finishing it and getting it edited-you want it to be the right thing.
It was kind of an experiment for me, because I was trying to figure out what I like doing - I knew I wanted to contribute to film in some way, but I didn't know what I felt the most comfortable doing, what I was the best at, what my place was - but I wrote it, I directed it, I acted in it. Basically, the same thing I was saying about the record - it's kind of a satire on consumerism and the idea of valuing things over experiences, and conversely, trying to make experiences into things, which is the worst thing ever. So the story is about this artist who only does art for the reward, so he can pick up chicks or whatever, it's a comedy.
AP.net: Do you see yourself doing more of this kind of stuff in the future?
Patrick: I had a blast directing, and I really think that's the thing I did better. I love acting, it feels really natural, but I don't like me as an actor. I think my standards for actors are so high that I don't know that I meet them. I don't know if I'd do that again. Writing-wise, shoot man, I don't even write the lyrics for my band, so I don't know how good of a writer I am [laughs].
It was really fun and I am really proud of it. I don't know how much more I'll do of it. Maybe I'll direct a music video or something like that, maybe not a Fall Out Boy video, but maybe I'll get into that.
AP.net: How'd you get involved with Law & Order?
Patrick: Well, basically I met this girl on the set of the "Dance, Dance" video, she was my love interest in the "Dance, Dance" video, she's on 30 Rock now, but at the time she was just the girl in the video. So I saw her on Law & Order and I jokingly said to Bob [McLynn, manager], "Hey, if she can be on Law & Order maybe I can get on Law & Order as well," and it ended up happening. I was a total fan, so I kept it going, I was like, "Let’s do this, I wanna do this." They flew me out and I got to be an actor for 2 days, so that was cool.
AP.net: One user asks: "Pete is very vocal on his blogs about artists he loves. Joe has a wicked art collection as well. Besides the giant picture of David Bowie, what's hanging on your walls at home?"
Patrick: I have a [Takashi] Murakami, I have just some really cheap posters of [Roy] Lichtenstein and [Andy] Warhol and Kazimir Malevich. I like a lot of art. I think the band is definitely united in that front, in that we really like visual art as well. Thankfully, I'm not ever gonna try and get into it [laughs].
AP.net: What've you been listening to lately?
Patrick: A lot of Fall Out Boy actually because I've had to approve mixes [laughs], no, but, I've been kind of going back through a lot of the things I was listening to in high school - a lot of Prince, a lot of David Bowie, a lot of Elvis Costello. Those were my big things, Motown, funk, and jazz, Lil Wayne. Kanye, what the fuck am I talking about. Love "Lockdown," holy smokes, that's like my favorite song ever. I've been listening to Jamie Lidell and this Nadia Oh record. Awesome.
AP.net: Who do you think is the best act in pop music right now?
Patrick: It'd probably be Kanye. I think the way he approaches pop music is so awesome, he's doing something that is so high art, so relatable immediately. It’s nearly avant-garde, but then at the same time really catchy. He's also really awesome at collaborating, when he does it, he does it really well.
I can't really say that from personal experience. I'd love to work with him, I've been bugging him about it for years. There's a certain part of me that doesn't want to work with him anyways though, because I want to be just as surprised as everybody else with every song, on every record. I want to be like "Oh man, that's awesome!" I kind of don't want to peel back the veil. None of my stuff ever ended up getting used but I worked on "Good Life," before T-Pain did, and T-Pain's version is better than mine [laughs], but it almost was too close. I almost didn't want to know.
AP.net: One reader wrote "I'm currently majoring in music so I thought it was interesting to read that you're listening to contemporary American composers like Steve Reich. I was just wondering if his minimalist style, or the style of any other contemporary composers, has influenced the way you write/think about/or listen to music."
Patrick: Absolutely. I think one of the things if you look at minimalism or expressionism, there's various movements in modern composition that I think you can see really natural relations in pop music, so I mean I always look to that in pop music. Reich and John Cage were pretty big influences on this record in weird ways in that you wouldn't necessarily hear any of it - nothing ends up sounding like either of them, but I think just methodology and things like that ended up on the record in various ways.
AP.net: Do you guys have plans to go back to Antarctica any time soon?
Patrick: Hopefully. I would love to get back there and I'd love to bring some cameras and show everybody the place is fucking melting.
AP.net: What's one question you've never been asked in an interview that you wish you've been asked and what's your answer?
Patrick: You know, I pretty much just got it about Steve Reich, cause that's pretty cool. Honestly, I'd like to have more questions asked about the rest of the band and the rest of the dudes. One thing that's really easy in interviewing is to have a story written and be like, "Well these guys suck and this is how I'm gonna say it." I wish more people knew about the real Pete and those were the questions that got asked.
AP.net: That about wraps it up. Anything you want to say to the AP.net readers?
Patrick: First off, thank you man for doing this interview. I knew I took up a lot of time - I figured, I had a free day, and what the fuck else am I gonna do with 2 hours [laughs]. I hope I didn't make an ass of myself [laughs]. I read AbsolutePunk.net on a semi-daily basis, I still check out what's going on. I still click links and see new bands off of it, and a lot of times I get my news off of there, so I'm just as much a reader of AbsolutePunk as anyone else. Thank you to anyone who read this interview, it means a lot.