Brian Fallon

RBMA

Let’s welcome to the stage Brian Fallon of the Gaslight Anthem. [applause]

Yeah. It’s good to see you.

Brian Fallon

You too.

RBMA

Did you come out of the kitchen there?

Brian Fallon

I came out of the kitchen.

RBMA

Back there making yourself a grilled cheese?

Brian Fallon

Cooking something.

RBMA

Very nice.

Brian Fallon

Always cooking. Anybody want a Red Bull?

RBMA

You’ve been back living in New Jersey for almost a year. Is it good to be back?

Brian Fallon

Yeah, yeah. That’s forced relocation though. I didn’t intentionally find myself living in New York. I went on tour. I came back with an apartment that I didn’t pick. It was in Brooklyn. I had to learn a zip code and everything.

[laughter]

RBMA

Now you’re back here. Did you find the right pizza place in your neighborhood and everything?

Brian Fallon

No, I go to Brothers Pizza.

RBMA

Very nice.

Brian Fallon

I’ve been going there since I was little.

RBMA

Right, right. I’m sure the folks over at Brothers will be very happy with that.

Brian Fallon

They don’t treat me that good.

[laughter]

RBMA

No?

Brian Fallon

They don’t treat anybody that good.

RBMA

That’s a shame, man.

Brian Fallon

Good thin crust. Service is lackluster at best.

[laughter]

They should have been nicer ‘cause now it’s public. What are you going to do?

RBMA

You did mention their pizza. They got to be pretty happy about that.

Brian Fallon

I kind of did.

RBMA

Guys like that, I don’t think they care that much. They got good pizza.

Brian Fallon

I like that stuff with the olives in it, too. And the ham that they cut up? It’s like a salad, but it’s antipasti. My uncle orders, I don’t order. He always orders. I don’t know what it is. I get and I eat it. It’s nice. It’s usually a Spanish girl that waits on us. She’s patient, I’ll give her that. The hostess could be nicer.

[laughter]

RBMA

This is a place that you’re going in and sitting down all the time, not just a slice from the counter?

Brian Fallon

No, I don’t get a slice from the counter. I want to soak in the atmosphere and the local drunks, soak it all in. The sports games are not very good on there either.

RBMA

No?

Brian Fallon

No. Anyway. I like the Yankees. You like the Yankees? [applause] Yeah. I just went to spring training. Derek Jeter, he looks OK, maybe a year left. That’s about it. Mariano Rivera snaps that ball like a champ. Alex Rodriguez is a bum. Golden Glove winner Curtis Granderson’s my man. I’m sorry, I hijacked your interview.

[laughter]

RBMA

This couldn’t be going any better as far as I’m concerned. I got boring questions. This stuff is great.

Brian Fallon

Going great in my mind.

RBMA

This stuff’s great.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, maybe tomorrow. I’m not going to think it was so good though when I see the video tape. Can we play back the first 15 seconds? [looks behind at RBMA sign] I just noticed that’s nice.

RBMA

Some of your words up there.

Brian Fallon

Is that mine? I’ve never recognized my words. People send them to me all the time. People feel the need to send me my own words. I appreciate it. It means something to them. At the same time it’s creepy.

[laughter]

That’s it.

RBMA

People send me my words sometimes, but only because they’re wrong.

Brian Fallon

What did you say?

RBMA

Just if I get something wrong. I’m a writer so they always tell me, “Hey, this thing, this is wrong. You know this whole rest of the thing, this is OK. But, this one thing is wrong and I take real issue with it.”

Brian Fallon

Punctuationally or otherwise?

RBMA

Just usually something like, “You wrote something about my neighbor and I don’t really like it.” Something like that. Just amazing New Jersey stuff.

Brian Fallon

My neighbors find my address and send me letters and they think that’s cool.

RBMA

People right on your street?

Brian Fallon

No, people from the town. One guy sent me a letter. He said, “I work for the town so I got your address.” So I have two big dogs now, big pit bulls for real. For real. They’re real nice dogs, but they’ll mess you up if you come in my house.

RBMA

Fair enough. Let’s talk a minute about New Jersey. I think we get this reputation around the world for being an awful place. People land in Newark airport. They come out of the city. They get on the turnpike there. They see that Linden Co-Generation plant. They see the smoke stacks over here. Somebody cuts them off from three lanes over. They take this mental snapshot. They’re, “That was New Jersey. I’ve seen it.” That’s the thing that they carry with them and they tell their friends all about it. But I think we’re also developing a rep for being some hard workers. You’ve done a little hard work.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, there’s a picture of me on the Internet fixing my door.

[laughter]

I’m serious. It was from last week. I didn’t find that funny either. I had this screen door. I live in an older house. I got a friend who lives in Bradley Beach and he’s my role model for houses. I listened to what he said. I bought a house that looks just like his house. Except for my screen door doesn’t work. It’s heavy and it ripped out. Four screws came out. I found out that whoever drilled it in it was crooked. They went like this in. It was really interesting. I was fixing my screen door. There’s a picture of me on the Internet fixing my door. I don’t know if I got a drive by or I don’t know how. I didn’t take that picture myself, man.

RBMA

You doing work?

Brian Fallon

Yeah.

RBMA

Good street cred.

Brian Fallon

It’s street cred, but it’s also creep cred.

[laughter]

Somebody’s a weirdo. There’s baby pictures of me on the Internet. I was a baby, man. Leave me alone.

[laughter]

I’m just like you. I don’t want to be bothered at the 7-Eleven either from New Jersey. You know what I mean?

RBMA

Absolutely. Tell me a little bit about this work ethic. It’s a real point of pride that we can fix our own doors in New Jersey.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, yeah. That’s how a lot of us, at least the people I know were raised. No one’s going to give you anything. You got to go get it. There’s probably a lot more people with their opportunities that have had a lot more chances than anybody I know. They went to the right schools and they had the right last name or whatever. They expect things to come to them. It’s just people that I know. They’ve had a certain sense of, “I expect this to go because I’ve got the right credentials.” My friends and I never had the right credentials. It was just you had to do it. You had to just do it yourself. Hopefully somebody would notice. If you made enough noise they would. While you’re waiting to get noticed you have to do other things. You get good with your hands. My hands are still chapped up. I still know how to work. No matter what I do and no matter where we go I think that stays with you. That’s a good thing to keep with you. It helps you stay grounded and not ordering green M&Ms and freaking out like Van Halen. I like Van Halen. Everybody knows the green M&Ms story. “Panama” is cool. I never been to Panama but I like the song.

RBMA

You’re a guy who has done some work. We’re talking about…

Brian Fallon

Some?

RBMA

You’ve done some work.

Brian Fallon

Yeah. I worked on the Dave Franklin construction organization for a little while.

RBMA

I just want to skip the rest of these questions and just hear about that.

Brian Fallon

Actually, no, seriously the thing was when we started out, we didn’t make any money. It was tough. When we came home from a tour that was it; that was your money. It’s gone. You’re paying your gas. You’re working ahead of time. Then you would save up that money and go on tour with it and pay for your gas and pay for your tolls on tour. Pay for your food and your hotels or whatever or you’re staying with your friends. Then you’d come home. You’d have to call maybe two weeks before you got home from tour. You always find me on phoning my friend Matty. I’d be like, “Matty, you got any work? You know you need anything done? I’ll shine your shoes or whatever.” Those guys, my friends, they kept me employed. They kept me able to feed myself and able to continue on in my band. I know for a fact that they didn’t need me. I couldn’t really do anything. They would always find something for me to do. They would always keep me working. Not only does it keep you having food on the table and being able to pay your bills but it also keeps a sense of pride where you don’t have your family or your wife telling you, “What are you doing with your life? You’re 26/-7/-8/-9 years old. And you, you don’t [work].” I know that’s funny. When you’re trying to be a musician, it’s funny. Your dad gets real serious when you’re 29-years-old and you want to be a musician. College is different. It’s not an acceptable thing. It seems like a young guy. If my kid was 29 and he was like, “Guess what? I’m gonna be a musician, dad.” And the only place he’s playing is his room, I’m going to thump him. That’s for real. You don’t have your family looking down on you like, “What a bum. You know, he’s not doing anything.” Getting worried about you like, “You know what’s he gonna do with his life?” These people really helped me out. That comes from that kind of thing too. Everybody has that work ethic where they know, “Look, this is all we’ve got.” You got to help out your buds. You got to try and keep them afloat too.

RBMA

Right. You’ve obviously taken that with you, that ability to overcome those hurdles. You came out with three Gaslight album records in four years. You did a complete tour cycle with each one. You did the Revival Tour. You found time to release this record with The Horrible Crowes. When do you sleep?

Brian Fallon

At night. [laughs] I sleep but I got to work. I got to do this. I don’t know if it’s going to be here forever. I don’t know if five years or two years from now that any of you guys are going to come and see me yap for 45 minutes or whatever. You’ll be here. You got a job. You got a good job. You’re a writer. With me it’s popular opinion. My whole livelihood is based on popular opinion. When I was in high school I was very temperamental, very temperamental. You’ve got to keep that because the minute that you get that sense of “I’m here and it’s OK,” that’s when you end up putting out the bad albums.

RBMA

You get too comfortable.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, you put out the no good records. There’s a lot of those. A lot of guys who kind of said, “Well, you know I could do it on my own. I don’t need anybody.” It doesn’t work.

RBMA

I don’t think anybody has ever called a writer a good job decision before. Thank you. I really appreciate that.

Brian Fallon

I think doing whatever you want to do and making that happen. I got a friend who wants to be a writer right now. He wants to write books. He always says, “You know, I can’t wait to be a writer, but right now I gotta work for UPS,” or “I gotta work for whatever.” The thing is is you are a writer, you’re only UPSing on the side. That’s what you’re doing to pay your bills. You’re a writer. Just do it. That’s the thing that keeps you going is that you if you know, “I’m going to do this,” everyone will tell you no and that you can’t do it and you’re no good at it. But you have to be honest with yourself. If you’re lousy at it, don’t do it. I don’t want to read it. If you’re good at it, then do it.

RBMA

Absolutely.

Brian Fallon

You know? [applause]

RBMA

I know, I know. When this thing’s over I actually got to get behind the bar and pull some pints for a little while. Tell me about this decision to record in Nashville.

Brian Fallon

Nashville came up because being from New Jersey we thought it’d be cool. We’re, “Nashville, country music, OK. That’s got to be cool. There’s got to be some mojo going on down there. We don’t know anybody. Nobody’ll bother us.” We made the last record in New York. Everybody bothered us. All our friends were coming by. People think musicians; they come to your work all the time. I don’t sit on anybody’s desk on Monday morning. Why are you bothering me, man? It’s weird. I’m trying to concentrate here. I know it looks like tomfoolery, but it’s not. That’s why we picked Nashville. We were like, “It’s far enough to where if somebody’s house is on fire, we can catch a quick plane back home.” Fourteen hours is a long way to drive, you got to really be dedicated, so nobody showed up, which is good. That’s Nashville. That’s why we picked Nashville.

RBMA

Nice, yeah. Did you get your hands dirty in a little bit of the history down there?

Brian Fallon

I looked at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, I thought about going. Or the Country Music Hall of Fame, I thought about going there a lot, but I didn’t go. We were busy. It was a good time. Apparently, Rick Springfield played one of the nights. I said, “What’s he going to do? He’s going to play ‘Jessie’s Girl’ and then I’m gonna leave.” That’s it. No, no, I didn’t really do anything. Made a record, that was it.

RBMA

What I’d like to do now is play a short little clip from the record, The ‘59 Sound, “Film Noir.” We’re just going to listen to this real quick, the middle of the song.

(music: Gaslight Anthem – “Film Noir” / applause)

All right, you got the idea. You get the idea because you wrote it.

Brian Fallon

It’s been a minute since I’ve heard that.

RBMA

I play that because go back to 2007, Asbury Lanes. I had just written a review of your first record, Sink or Swim. We went out to the car to get the magazine I was going to show you and at the time you were really more excited about writing the next record already. You were so excited. You told me, “We’re going to bring together Sam Cooke and Hot Water Music.” I was like, “That’s insane. What is that? I don’t even know what that means.” And I think you really did. Do you feel like you’ve achieved that sound?

Brian Fallon

I do. On that record in particular we achieved exactly what we were going for. I’m not sure that we knew what we were going for when we did it. We were going for something and we definitely got it. I think everyone was equally surprised and not surprised. Because we knew we had something when we were doing it. We were chasing something for a really long time. That was the coming together point of everything. That’s the point where I based all future work off of, whether is it as good as that or is it? Sometimes the answer was no. Sometimes the answer was yes. That was the big moment. Probably right around the time that you’re talking about there was a little buzz going on between the four of us. We knew we were on to something but we didn’t know if anybody would receive it or what would they think. Was it too weird for 2008 at the time? But it worked.

RBMA

That’s fine. I feel the Gaslight Anthem is always mentioned in the context of your influences. If we do a quick little exercise here. I’d like to throw out a few artists and maybe you tell me what inspiration that you’ve drawn from each one of them. Can we do that?

Brian Fallon

Yeah.

RBMA

All right, cool. We’ll start with an easy one. Start with The Clash.

Brian Fallon

That’s a big stylistic thing with us. The Clash was a fundamental band for us as far as a lot of people that come from a punk rock scene or anything like that, you’re always told that you can’t succeed. You’re not allowed to. It’s wrong to win. You can’t win. You’re supposed to be the beautiful losers like The Replacements or one of those bands who kind of messed it up but kind of didn’t. The Clash said, “No! We’re going to go play on top of Radio City Music Hall. We’re The Clash. What are you talking about? We’re going to be the biggest band in the world. We’re going to be The Who.” That was Joe Strummer. I dare you to find something wrong with Joe Strummer’s ethics. That was my man. He still is. That’s my guy.

RBMA

All right.

Brian Fallon

Ethically. I don’t listen to reggae music though. That part of the thing, leave that.

RBMA

How about Greg Dulli, Afghan Whigs?

Brian Fallon

A guy that I like a lot, but don’t necessarily want to be like. You don’t want to emulate Greg Dulli. Got himself into a few troubles. Greg Dulli was a poet, but he was unafraid to say the things that regular people thought and you’re not supposed to say. I think having that at such an early age, the Afghan Whigs, when I was maybe 12 or 13 shaped a lot of the thoughts that I had about what you can do as a band and what you can say. That definitely brought me into the soul music side of it. I know everybody says that they had Sam Cooke records when they were 10, but that’s not true. I would listen to the Afghan Whigs and they would cover these songs. They would cover “Come See About Me” and I would find out about Diana Ross and The Supremes. From their little records that they had, mostly EPs and 7”s that they did and live footage, whatever I could find. That was a big part of me finding soul music. I would say that Greg Dulli and then mixed with the Joe Strummer and everything else, that’s what led me to where I eventually would go.

RBMA

How about Morrissey?

Brian Fallon

Not so much with me. No.

RBMA

How about the rest of the band?

Brian Fallon

Yeah, Alex in particular loves The Smiths, Alex Rosamilia. I listen to The Smiths. There’s too much tape on the body, shirts off and roses in the teeth. It wasn’t my thing. I get it.

[laughter]

He’s got nice hair. He’s got a cool voice. I guess he gets the chicks, but he doesn’t care, does he?

[laughter]

I don’t know. He says he doesn’t like boys or girls. I don’t know, what do you like? TV?

[laughter]

Red Bull?

RBMA

Maybe we should be talking about your prior work experience.

Brian Fallon

I don’t know. Morrissey’s cool, I don’t want to diss the guy. I like him. As far as if I shook hands with him, that’d be cool. I would talk to him. I would be, “You need to get over it and get The Smiths back together though. That’s what seriously...” Johnny Marr, did you hear what he said recently?

RBMA

I haven’t.

Brian Fallon

He goes, “We’ll get The Smiths back together when the English government surrenders...”

RBMA

I did hear that, yeah.

Brian Fallon

“… control.” I’m, “You’re a crazy person and you dress like a kid, man. You’re not young no more.”

[laughter]

RBMA

How about Pearl Jam?

Brian Fallon

I love Pearl Jam. That’s my favorite band. That’s my guys. Those guys, I don’t know, man. That was my music. I didn’t find that because of my mom or because of my friends. I found that because that was my generation’s music. That was our thing. That was different than everything else, Nirvana, and Soundgarden and Pearl Jam. Those are the bands that you being a punk rock kid you weren’t allowed to like. I was, “What are you talking about? I like Pearl Jam, that’s a good band and they have long hair and they wear flannel shirts and I wear...” All of a sudden I was cool. My grandmother had been dressing me in flannel since I was six. Everybody was making fun of me. All of a sudden I was so cool. I was, “Thanks, Eddie Vedder, that’s cool.” I don’t know, man. He was different. Everybody was singing with this high voice. He comes in with this low Jim Morrison thing. They changed all throughout the years. They always kept you guessing. What’s your next record going to sound like? What are they going to do? Am I going to hate it? I got a ukulele now. I don’t know. I don’t know. Can you hang? That’s what their whole deal is, can you hang with us? We’re not going to give you the same stagnant thing over and over. We’re not going to play “Jeremy” for 10 years. We’re not going to give you that record over and over again ‘cause you already have that record. I like that as an artist. I probably would hate that as a fan. But I don’t I buy their records and I love them. I stuck with them even through the weird periods.

RBMA

That’s good of you. How about Jawbreaker?

Brian Fallon

Yeah, Pearl Jam really appreciates me staying with them.

[applause]

Jawbreaker’s good. Jawbreaker, there’s a couple bands where people think, everybody, the Internet’s probably going to go bananas. Jawbreaker and The Replacements, they’re all right. They’re OK. Whoa, OK, all right, that’s cool. Guess what? They didn’t sell that many records because people didn’t like them that much. They got a couple good songs. It’s true. That’s what I think. You came here to hear what I think. I’ll listen to you later. That’s what I think.

[laughter / applause]

RBMA

The Punk News server just exploded when you said that.

Brian Fallon

I don’t care. “Yo, Punk News, The Replacements aren’t that good.”

[laughter / applause]

They got a song called “Tommy Hates Music” because it’s got too many notes. That’s cool. The thing about those bands is Jawbreaker and The Replacements is when they were on, the reason that people think that they’re so great and that they’ve survived, and the reason that I have 10 of their songs on my iPod is because when they were great, they were better than anyone. But 90% of the time they were awful. That’s the thing. Without songs like “Tommy Hates Music,” a song like “Unsatisfied” wouldn’t be as good. And that I didn’t think of myself, I read that in Rolling Stone Magazine.

[laughter]

I did one time. Those kind of bands, I mean, I bought it. I liked it when I was a kid. Then as I got older, especially now, I got a little sour on those things. I’m just, no.

RBMA

How about if we shift over to Mark Knopfler?

Brian Fallon

Dire Straits, see, that’s what I’m talking about though. Dire Straits, that’s a killer guy, killer musician. He knows his background. I’m not saying that any of these other guys don’t but I think there’s some depth to a Dire Straits kind of band. Where, I don’t know, man. I sat there for probably three months trying to learn “Sultans of Swing” on the guitar. That’s all I would play for three months. Even still, that kind of stuff inspires me. There’s a song called “On Every Street.” I think that’s one of the finest written songs in the world. He’s talking about somebody that he misses and he hasn’t seen in a couple years and he lost track of that he’s looking for on want ads. That’s pretty profound.

RBMA

Since we’re right in the area, how about the Bouncing Souls?

Brian Fallon

One of the best bands ever, period.

[applause]

That’s what I’m talking about. Don’t talk to me about The Replacements. Talk to me about the Bouncing Souls. That’s a band who’s been around for 20 years that has released great songs. I don’t know, what have they got? About 100 records out? They’re good. They’re really good. They’re continuing to give you something different. They haven’t bought into their own nonsense and joined Guns N’Roses. You know what I’m talking about. You can be a band like that. That’s a band who fundamentally we’re different than. We want to go big. I want to play Giants Stadium. They wanted to stay what they were. They always stuck to it. They never listened to anybody else. The best thing about Mike, and Greg, and Pete, and Brian is that they’re honest guys. You’ll never ever hear them say a bad word about another band, ever. They’re never trying to step on anybody’s back to get where they were. They just were, “We’re the Bouncing Souls. We drink beer. We wear Adidas.”

[laughter]

RBMA

Take anything from The Pogues?

Brian Fallon

Don’t drink too much.

[laughter]

No, yeah. The Pogues are a good band. I love The Pogues. I still do. There’s a lot of bands in that genre that unless you change that genre a little bit, you’re just trying to be The Pogues. It doesn’t work out so good. They have inspired some really cool bands. When you go, and the interpretations that have come from the Pogues and the lineage that they’ve left, if you go to a Dropkick Murphys show and you see them ever do a Pogue song, it’s mind-blowing. It’s so intense the way that these songs translate. You got this big punk rock band, then you have these Irish folk songs. Shane McGowan’s a train wreck. He wrote the most beautiful songs in the world. That’s the thing, man. That’s the one thing that Paul Westerberg has, too. It’s they write those songs that change peoples’ lives. Then they write a bunch of weird stuff too.

RBMA

All right.

Brian Fallon

He did a duet with Sinead O’Connor one time.

RBMA

How about your mom? What inspiration did you take from her?

Brian Fallon

My mom, she was a gospel singer. Yeah, she sang in church. She wasn’t like Odetta or anything. Yeah, she sang in the church. She had a group, I think around here in the Red Bank. Her and her friends had a little folk group and they used to sing. They got two records. I don’t know how that happened or where they were; whether they were in stores or what the real deal was. I haven’t really dug too deep with her. But, yeah, she’s a singer. My mom played The Monkees and Jesus when I was a kid. That was it, “Amazing Grace” and “Daydream Believer,” that made me realize that music was awesome. That was it.

RBMA

Thank you for doing that with me.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, sure.

RBMA

A few years ago, you were playing a solo show at the church, First Unitarian Church out in Philly. There’s a guy out in the back of the room. He’s just screaming, “Bruce, Bruce.” He had probably been tailgating at an Eagles game all day. He still had some cheese steak dribbling down his chin and everything. And you stopped dead in your tracks and you were like, “Hey, man. I got my own songs.” That was a pretty incredible moment. Especially recently you guys have, as a band, come past that point of the constant association with that.

Brian Fallon

I don’t know. JBJ’s been 30 years and he can’t get away from it. The guy’s the best. You can’t take it away from him. You, Bruce and Elvis and The Beatles, that’s it, man. You can’t get better than that. There’s a certain humility to finding out that a guy like that likes your songs. Wanting to get away from it is a purely artistic thing. It’s not a, “Oh, get away from me.” That’s the best thing in the world to have is that embracement from a guy like that. It’s just because I don’t want to walk in to a store and apply for the job and get it because five minutes earlier my dad went in there and gave him 50 bucks. I don’t want you to come to Giant Stadium because Bruce told you to. I love Bruce. If you did show up, that’d be cool. Somehow it would feel like it wasn’t really mine. That’s something that we have to earn. That’s not something we have to shy away from. It’s something we definitely have to earn. That’s going to take time. But on the other hand, too, I don’t mind. He’s pretty decent. People say I remind them of him. I’ll take that. Why not?

RBMA

If someone were to tell the story of the Gaslight Anthem history, it would seem like four boys playing punk music, New Brunswick basement scene. You guys, as you came out of that and matured, you discovered soul music, folk music, blues, and a wider spectrum of rock. But you particularly had a pretty long history with Americana even before you were coming out of those basements.

Brian Fallon

I did and that was something that I didn’t know what to do with. A lot of the music that I had listened to when I was younger I didn’t really know where that fit in with punk rock. Like I was saying, there’s a lot of rules put on that. Bands like The Bouncing Souls and there’s Against Me! or Lucero or those kind of bands, they were a little bit ahead of us. They broke that ground where you could say, “You know maybe the first was...” I can’t even say who the first was. I don’t know. There was a lot of bands. There was even Lifetime, who did something a little different where it was a little off kilter from what you were supposed to do. There’s a lot of rules for punk rock. I don’t if you guys know about that. All the anarchy and stuff is very confusing because there’s so many rules that go along with all the rulelessness. That Sons of Anarchy’s pretty good though. I watched four seasons in two weeks. I want to join a motorcycle gang.

[laughter]

I’m going to clean up the clubhouse. That’s what I’ll end up doing.

RBMA

How do you look in that cut? In that motorcycle cut.

Brian Fallon

Yeah, that scary. I don’t like words like that, cut. Like what do you got to do get a cut? Could you be in a gang? I don’t think I could.

RBMA

I don’t think so, no.

Brian Fallon

No, me neither. I’m a chicken.

RBMA

I don’t think so. You certainly write about your own experiences. At the same time you have become an amazing storyteller. I could think of 10 people in this room who are carrying on the tradition of storytelling whether it’s through art, music, writing, photography. It’s a great tradition especially in our area. How do you make something that’s so personal into something that’s so universal?

Brian Fallon

I think the misunderstood understand the best. The people that go through high school and college and they feel; they’re just the kids that nobody understands. They’re the ones looking at everything because nobody’s looking at them. They have time to process that kind of thing. Loneliness is a funny companion when you’re young. That’s when you’re forming your ideas about the world. When you’re just on the outside, maybe not even so much that you get picked on, but just because you don’t even get noticed for that, you have a lot of time to watch the world. You get to form an opinion. You really learn, if you’re paying attention, how people react. Once you join the workforce and you find out that there’s other guys just like you that have lived, and this goes for people who were popular too, it’s not this exclusive club. “Look at me, I got so downtrodden that you rise above,” or whatever. Everybody’s got that. It’s common. That’s why they call it the common man, songs of the common man. It’s everyone. Everyone understands that, from bankers to the street sweeper. They get it. I don’t even think there is street sweepers any more, but it sounded cool, didn’t it?

[laughter]

RBMA

They got a truck that does that now.

Brian Fallon

That’s a cred word. There’s cred words. Did you know that, singer, songwriter cred words?

RBMA

Couple of points there, a couple cred points.

Brian Fallon

Like troubadour, troubadour, flannel. You know what I love? I love the word I heard on the way down here, the word “troubadour” in a Billy Joel song. There’s two versions. There’s the Steve Earl version in the Talladega Nights, the last of the hardcore troubadours. Then there’s Billy Joel where he said, “Say goodbye to Hollywood.” That song, which no one would think of Bob Dylan and that kind of thing in that. He says the word troubadour. I thought that was funny.

RBMA

All right. Learning all sorts of stuff tonight.

Brian Fallon

I got more if you want.

RBMA

You are a wealth, you are a wealth...

Brian Fallon

I’m a wealth of something.

RBMA

We’re going to wrap it up with this one. Everybody said the world was going end in 2012, right? I hope it doesn’t ‘cause there’s so many great albums coming out this summer. You guys have an album coming out. Tim Barry, Hot Water Music, The Souls, Neil Young. I heard talk of a new Black Star album possibly. What albums are you most excited about right now?

Brian Fallon

You just said them. You took them all. You took everything.

RBMA

Sorry.

Brian Fallon

Greedy. It’s a greedy list. That’s a good list. The Mayans didn’t invent the Internet, why do they know everything?

[laughter]

Seriously, you couldn’t even get ESPN in Mayan town.

[laughter]

How are you going to watch the sports ball?

RBMA

No idea, Yankees box scores, huh?

Brian Fallon

No, they don’t have it. You couldn’t see them when they have a good game or a bad game. Mayans don’t know anything. Calendar. Who reads a calendar? I don’t have a calendar. I have an iPhone, stupid Mayans. [laughs]

[laughter]

If the world blows up, the Mayans are not going to be kind to me. That’s cool. I got stuff to do. The world can’t end, I got stuff to do. Mayans. I learned about that in fourth grade, in the history book. It’s a big one, blue book. They said the Mayans and the Mayan calendar just stops. Maybe because they died of something like penicillin would’ve cured. Maybe you should’ve worried that instead of doing a calendar. One Mayan was like, “Yo, the world’s gonna end in 2012.” Other dude’s like, “I don’t care, man. I got pneumonia. I got bit by a mosquito. I need some penicillin, you know.” They didn’t even have shoes. Get out of here. Come on, Mayans.

[laughter]

RBMA

All right. Is there any chance that you want to play [a few songs for us]?

Brian Fallon

I’m on a space oddity.

RBMA

Are you done?

Brian Fallon

Two thousand twelve.

RBMA

Are you done insulting civilizations now?

Brian Fallon

I don’t care.

RBMA

Maybe you can play a few songs for us?

Brian Fallon

I’m not going. I can’t. I ‘m going to write a civilization song between the... Yes, I’m not insulting anybody who... Nobody’s Mayan any more.

[laughter]

Come on. People are too sensitive, too. People are real sensitive nowadays. I want to talk about that for a little minute, just a hot minute more.

RBMA

Go ahead.

Brian Fallon

I’m not going anywhere. You got to ask some questions about it. You’re the writer.

RBMA

It sounds like it’s hitting a nerve there.

Brian Fallon

I got things I got to do. I’m sure everyone else in this room does too. I don’t know. I just don’t like hype. I don’t like this terroristic news thing. “Something you do every day is going to kill you and your kids and more at 8 PM.” It’s like 10 in the morning. You’re like, “What if I die between now and 8 PM if it’s going to kill me?” Everything is so fear-motivated. The world’s going to end. Oh, OK, all right, OK. I’m still going to play my Xbox tonight. All right, because somebody said so. Nobody wants to believe in anything normal like treating people good and voting for the guy who’s not going to lie to you. Nobody wants to focus on that. It’s a good way to sham an election. Keep your eyes off the election. The Mayan calendar says we’re going to die. Oh, man, check me out. I’m sneaking in the White House. Keep your eyes on the prize. Who are you going to vote for?

Audience member

Ron Paul.

Brian Fallon

OK, that’s better.

Audience member

Ron Paul.

Brian Fallon

That’s two for Ron Paul.

Audience member

Obama.

Brian Fallon

Big Ron Paul in this room. Two for Mike Ness, two for Ron Paul. Obama’s got one. It’s getting hot. It’s not looking good. Who?

Audience member

Obama.

Brian Fallon

Obama, two for Obama. There’s one guy that they told me on Punk News that just blew up that wants to take away porno.

RBMA

Rick Santorum.

Brian Fallon

What’s up with him?

[laughter]

RBMA

From what I understand he’s telling Fox News what they should be covering at this point.

Brian Fallon

Really? You notice I’m not saying anything because I don’t know.

RBMA

That was another issue on Punk News recently. It was a good point I believe brought up by Anti Flag. We do have a few questions from the audience.

Brian Fallon

Anti Flag, those guys are very concerned. You know what’s funny, I think that’s funny about Anti Flag? Right before you get to the questions, those guys are some of the funniest dudes ever. Yet they are very serious about politics. That is a funny group of guys. That’s amazing. When I listened to their records, I was, “Boring.” Even though it’s so important, it’s just because I’m not smart enough to follow what they say. They use big words I don’t understand. I met them and hung out with them. Those are the funniest dudes in the world. I had a good time with them. I don’t like to talk about politics. I like to talk about it when it’s funny. OK, hope that guy wins. As long as you’re not trying to kill anybody, that’s the guy I like. I don’t vote either way. I just try to go for the guy that’s going to kill the least people. That’s the safe bet.

RBMA

Solid?

Brian Fallon

Yeah, maybe health insurance, too.

RBMA

Solid as a rock. That’s nice.

Brian Fallon

People could use that. Canadians got that figured out. Maybe we should vote for the Canadian guy.

RBMA

Bring him in.

Brian Fallon

What do you think, a Canadian president? That’s weird.

RBMA

That is weird.

Brian Fallon

Do you have to be born here to be president?

RBMA

I think you do have to be born here. There was an issue about a birth certificate. I heard something about that this year.

Brian Fallon

He was born in Hawaii.

RBMA

That’s in the U.S.

Brian Fallon

Surfing, bud, good.

RBMA

What’s the problem? He’s fine.

Brian Fallon

Nothing, no problem.

RBMA

Hell of a body surfer.

Brian Fallon

People give him a lot of flak though. They give Obama a ton of flak. I pay attention a lot more than I say I do. You would too if you were surrounded by people in opposing views. If that’s what the deal is, it’s hard. You have two completely separate viewpoints. One guys trying to do one thing. One guy’s trying to the other thing. You’re not going to get anything done. It’s like when two cars ram each other. It’s just doesn’t go anywhere. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. We’re not going to get to see the election. Mayan calendar, it’s going to die. [laughter] When do they say it’s going to happen?

RBMA

I don’t know.

Brian Fallon

December?

RBMA

Right after the election.

Brian Fallon

I don’t care. I’ll have my motorcycle license by then. I’ll get a few months riding in, surfing season will be over. Don’t care. December, record will be out. Who cares?

RBMA

All right.

Brian Fallon

Yes?

RBMA

Do you care to talk to the audience a little bit?

Brian Fallon

Sure.

RBMA

Some nice folks here have…

Brian Fallon

I can’t see them.

RBMA

…submitted a few questions. We have Alissa from Asbury Park. Where’s Alissa? Alissa, go ahead and stand up. Do we have a microphone for Alissa?

Brian Fallon

There’s a lot of chatter on that side of the room, lot of chatter. I just wanted everybody to hear you. Speak clearly into the microphone. It might be your last question publically.

Audience member

Oh, God.

Brian Fallon

Might die this year, I don’t know.

Audience member

Probably.

Brian Fallon

All of us, I mean.

Audience member

Yeah. Has there been a big difference in the creative process between when you guys were with an independent label and now on a major?

Brian Fallon

No, truthfully, which I thought that there was going to be. I thought that there was going to be a lot of submitting of things and a lot of asking. Can we do this? Surprisingly, there was none. We got to go and make our record and finish it without anyone bothering us at all. Matter of fact, they came in at the end and heard if we would’ve messed it up. [laughs] Whoa, that’d been bad news. They came in at the end and they trusted us enough to do it. We did think that. You hear stories. You hear horror stories. But in all the horror stories with bands, and major labels, you have to look at the band and the label. You know, every relationship is unique. I didn’t get in this to kick and scratch and complain. I went and said, “I told you. I want to play Giant Stadium, want to be on a major label. I did tons of records with indie labels.” Those guys, Joe and Bill were the best guys in the world. But we gave them what we were supposed to give them. We agreed to them, “Hey, we’ll give you this. This amount of records. When that records is done, we’re going to try something else.” Because why not, man? If I can be the kid that’s on the cover of Time Magazine, I’ll take it. I’ll buy you a drink while I’m at it. All right.

[applause]

RBMA

All right, he’s buying drinks. How about Michael from Montclair? Where’s Michael?

Brian Fallon

Did you purposely pick people in the front row?

Audience member

Hey.

Brian Fallon

Hey.

Audience member

Back when you guys used to open, what’s the one band that you opened for that you learned the most from about the music business? What’s the one band?

Brian Fallon

Oh, that was probably our first tour. Against Me! took us out and they taught us a lot about the workings of music. That was our big educational lesson. That was the first time that we were experiencing managers and booking agents and music as a business in addition to as an art, which those two things live in separate rooms. When you’re in one room, you’re not in the other room. With that tour specifically, we were doing our Señor and the Queen EP. Their tour manager, Jordan, was our label guy. They really gave us the biggest education that a young band could ask for. They really taught us. This is what everyone’s going to be trying to get you. Remember, no one would be your friend if you never put on a guitar. Just remember that. I don’t think we’ve ever forgotten that. That was an incredible lesson on that whole six weeks or whatever it was. That was the biggest one so far.

Audience member

Excellent.

Brian Fallon

I feel like somebody should clap for you. [applause]

RBMA

All right. Pat from Cranford. Where’s Pat? Also in the front row, perfect.

Audience member

How you doing, Brian?

Brian Fallon

Hey, man. Can’t see. Oh, there you are.

Audience member

Just got a quick question.

Brian Fallon

Sure.

Audience member

You toured all over the place, how would you compare touring Europe and the States, pros and cons? What do you like, what do you don’t like?

Brian Fallon

Europe, I love the fact that you can go to a festival. No one can know who you are. They’ll legitimately watch you and make a decision. They’ll get into you even if they don’t know you at all. Con, food, unh, not so great. It’s not great because when you travel a lot, your system goes through all kinds of changes when you move to a different country. You’re eating different food every day from all different places. You don’t have time to adapt. You just get this sluggish malaise that happens to you. That’s the down side. With the States, though, it’s home. That’s just the thing about it. Nowhere else will ever compare because that’s where you [want to be successful]. I remember, the Kings of Leon, people tell this story a lot. They were huge overseas, in England particularly, to the point where they were famous, famous. They were about not that big here during the time that I’m speaking of. All they wanted was to be big in America ‘cause that’s where they’re from. That’s a lot of bands’ cases. You can never really not love playing in your own country. I’m sure people feel that way all over the world. That’s the main differences. People really do absorb more music there. They’re more open to it, to new things. Here it’s just it’s home. I don’t know, I love this place. It’s a good place.

Audience member

Thanks, man.

[applause]

Brian Fallon

Yeah, are you going to ask anybody in the back?

RBMA

No. That’s all the questions we had.

Brian Fallon

You had three? All right.

RBMA

You have answered all the questions about politics, civilization, and music tonight. We’re all set.

Brian Fallon

All right.

RBMA

Is there any chance you’ll play a few songs for us?

Brian Fallon

Yeah.

RBMA

All right.

Brian Fallon

I got to go get my guitar.

RBMA

All right. Brian’s going to go get his guitar. Ladies and gentlemen, Brian Fallon. He’s a handful for the Gaslight Anthem. Thank you so much, Brian.

Brian Fallon

I’ll be back.