September 25th, 2014 
Corey From 
Modern Baseball is, by and large, one of the most important breakthrough artists of this year. If their first album, Sports, didn’t prove that, the band’s 2014 release of You’re Gonna Miss It All should have.
Not only is their recorded music perfect for singing along and laughing, but this honest and witty four-piece perfects their live set. All over people were talking about Modern Baseball’s Riot Fest set and how it was one of the best of the day. Between picking a perfect mix of songs, to cracking potty jokes, to kissing each other onstage, they know how to entertain.
Before their set on Sunday, UTG had the great opportunity to sit down in the grass on a sunny afternoon with the band and talk about their huge year.
With Sports and now the new album, what was the difference in preparing for You’re Gonna Miss It All versus Sports since you’ve grown in popularity?
Brendan Lukens (lead vocals/guitar): As far as the songwriting process goes, we were kind of writing continuously after Sports came out, as far as going into the studio…
Jake Ewald (guitar/vocals): We demoed all of the songs before we actually recorded them, which was really helpful. For the first record we had like the shells of the songs, then went into the studio and did everything there. So for this one, we like demoed it all, figured out what we wanted to do, then brought in ya boys, Sean (Huber) and Ian (Farmer), to rock the parts. So a lot more planning.
Ian Farmer (bass/vocals): also, when we recorded, it was much more organized. For Sports, we didn’t know what we were doing at all. We just kind of went in and recorded things one at a time like super, super late at night. We’d leave the studio at like eight in the morning.
BL: Dude, it sucked.
IF: It sucked. And it was kind of spaced out all over like one month. When we recorded You’re Gonna Miss It All, we were able to book studio time for like two and a half weeks straight and like hammer things out throughout the entire day. We could go home at the end of the night and actually have your night to like relax.
BL: Yeah we would go home and actually be like, “Cool, we ate three meals today. I’m going to sleep in my bed now.”
Sean Huber (drums/vocals): Lots of wah-wah.
BL: Jakes dad hung out with us one day. He’s chill.
Did he cook anything for you?
JE: He brought us a pizza.
All: Good dad.
Having food ready is never a bad thing.
BL: Yeah. NEVER.
I read the POZ interview, and you talked about how with touring you’re really busy, but you’re trying to continuously write and keep that fresh. Are you still writing?
BL: Let me first start off by saying, we have no plan on recording a new record anytime soon. But Jake and I have been fiddling. The tour thing, we’ve never written while this busy. So it has taken some getting used to. But we just had a little bit of time off, that we did some stuff. So yeah, we’re still writing. But we want to sit on You’re Gonna Miss It All, umm…for a nice minute. We love the songs, we love playing them.
JE: We have the time to tour now, so we want to take advantage of that. Because we didn’t before.
BL: Now we’re like playing almost all of You’re Gonna Miss It All. We’re excluding two songs. So we’re excited to play everything, and watch Ian dance.
JE: It still feels new to us.
It’s still fresh. With only a year overlap between the records, did you get to tour much on Sports?
BL: We did a full US tour, but I mean, since both of the records are really short, it’s like we play for an hour and get to play a lot from both records and the split we put out. It’s nice. This new record definitely helped us fill time.
JE: We play more than 20 minutes.
BL: Hey can you play a thirty minute set?
ALL: “Ehhhhhhh…”
JE: We learned Bob Marley covers.
[Sean starts singing “Santeria” by Sublime]
SH: For the next record it’s all Bob Marley covers.
BL: #legendz with a Z at the end.
So I wanted to ask you about school. You’re in the music industry program. Are you trying to take that beyond personal benefit, besides for the band and reach a little further into the industry?
JE: Yeah, it’s cool because we got to record our band, which was awesome.
IF: Jake and I both record other bands using what we know.
JE: It’s sweet that we get to tour and make friends with other bands, and so we know each other. So it’s like “We know each other and you’re in a band. We can record your band if you want.” And they’re like *high pitched squeak* “Oh, yeah cool.”
BL: Especially since a lot of our friends are trying to do 7-inches or just little stuff, and it’s nicer than-
JE: *high pitched squeak again* “Hey whats up?”
[The band all bursts out laughing]
JE: Sometimes with a lot of kids in our program, it’s a great program and you learn a lot, but it’s hard to get into a space where you could have access to bands that need to be recorded. That’s the great thing about touring, that we meet so many bands, and we’re like, “Hey, need any help? We’re right here.”
IF: Yeah, and then we do cool stuff with cool friends and cool things happen. But we’re not cool one bit.
If people want you to record, you’ve gotta be doing something right.
JE: Who knows? We just bring snacks.
SH: They just love us for our wah-wah.
[Jake grabs the microphone and nearly deep throats it]
I’m going to include that.
[The group bursts out laughing again]
One thing that really turned me onto you guys is just the brutal honesty in your lyrics. I love that you talk about Instagram photos in your lyrics.
[The band celebrates by becoming Woo Girls]
It cracks me up, but at the same time, it’s really accessible for everyone. What goes into the writing process, as far as lyrics go?
BL: For Jake and I, when we started this band, we wanted to write songs about what we had going on at the time. The Instagram and Twitter stuff, is just ’cause I’m on that stuff like every day. It’s a part of things that I do now, so not writing about it would be weird. But it’s cool, ’cause people will be like, “You guys have GIANT BALLS for saying Instagram and Twitter in songs and no one questions you.” And I’m like, “YEEEAAAHHHHH, I wanted to do that.”
JE: I did it on purpose, I look cool.
BL: It’s really nice that people connect with us. We just write to get things off our chests.
SH: JUST SAYIN’ WHAT WE MEAN.
BL: Say what you need to say [laughs].
That’s going to go on the Bob Marley cover album.
SH: We must be the worst band in the world.
JE: [Into the mic] We’re very sorry.
Where do you guys think your place is in the emo revival? Do you consider yourself a part of that? Do you care?
BL: We get bunched into a lot of stuff. We just think it’s kind of cool that anyone is listening to us, and getting bunched into things is nice. We get the pop-punk thing, the emo revival thing- we just get punk; the UK for whatever reason thinks we’re a straight punk band.
[All laugh]
BL: Then we occasionally get the indie-folk songwriting thing. So that’s really cool.
JE: And we got to play with The Get Up Kids on Friday. So that was like…
BL: So let’s talk about emo-revival real fast. Yesterday when The Get Up Kids were playing their set, they were like, “We’re talking about emo revival stuff, and no one’s getting married on that fucking ferris wheel right now while we’re playing. We’re not doing our jobs.” And I was like “OH, MY GOD.”
How was that show on Friday?
BL: We started playing shows with bigger bands, and we started getting hit up for our guests list. And for that Get Up Kids show, I had to have like 20 texts messages.
JE: Can you please?
SH: We got Kid Rock in.
JE: We did get Kid Rock in.
JE: And Carlos Mencia.
BL: Yesterday I had a lot of adult beverages, and at the end of the night, I’m waiting at the exit, and the Riot Fest staff is like, “I see you have an artist band, are you OK? Do you have somewhere to stay?” And I’m like “Yeaaaahhh, I’m just waiting for my friends.” “If they don’t show up, we’ll find something, just let us know.” And they’re just pointing and looking at me the whole time.
SH: I didn’t have any beers yesterday till about 1 am. And by that I mean I only drank Jameson and coffee all day.
I’m not on your level.
SH: I kissed Ian the other night. It was great.
Do you want to talk about that?
BL: I’ll talk about that really fast. During our set, when you two kissed, Ian comes up to me afterwords and goes, “He just put his tongue against my teeth.”
Are you going to do that again? Is this a reoccurring thing?
SH: We were out in Toronto, and I’m like, “Ian, let’s kiss.” And then after, I just thought, I can’t imagine how many girls are jealous that I just kissed Ian.
JE: Dude, he’s untouchable.
BL: Ian’s mom, my mom, Sean’s mom, all the moms.
My mom. For real, though.
BL: For real though [laughs].
SH: It’s an open-ended relationship.
JE: We don’t like to label things. Unless it’s the emo revival.
SH: Emo survival.
BL: God, we’re getting so off track. We’re really sorry.
It’s fine [laughs]. So what’s the favorite tour you guys have been on?
BL: Like the run we just did. [Lifts the couch] Holy shit, I just picked up this entire couch.
I think it’s a single chair.
BL: Oh, making me seem less strong [laughs]. The run we just did with I Am the Avalanche was so much fun.
JE: They were the best.
BL: The Wonder Years tour was great. Dude, honestly. We love every tour we’ve been on.
SH: We have been so fortunate that every band we tour with are our best friends. It’s been incredible. It’s one of those things that we naturally find ourselves surrounding ourselves with nice people. And really good bands.
It could be really shitty, that is fortunate. Last question. What does Modern Baseball listen to in the van?
BL: Let’s all do this. We all have pretty similar, but different tastes.
IF: There’s an overlap, but we all listen to very different things outside of that overlap.
BL: It’s cool when we talk to bands about what they listen to, because they’re just like…we do a pretty good job at mixing it up.
JE: The Menzingers are at the center of the Venn diagram. Along with The Killers.
ALL: WE LOVE THE KILLERS.
BL: I’m jamming the new Alex G record, DSU, this dude from Philly that’s getting a lot of cred right now, which is really tight, ’cause he’s played our basement like three times. So really great guys, really cool record, not like Modern Baseball. And then Joyce Manor. I’ve heard their tour with the Exquisites is like nuh-nuh-nuh-nuts. So…yeah. I can’t imagine how many songs they play.
IF: Also a shout out to our boy Evan who’s on tour with Joyce Manor right now. Evan Bernard.
JE: Look him up.
BL: We listen to his band a lot, The Weeks. His band is so good.
JE: I’ve been listening to a lot of old Death Cab again, for the #seasonaleffect. So that’s been chill.
IF: I’ve been listening to a lot of Television and Torche. Also this new band from Philly that just popped up, called Human Shapes. They’re so heavy and so good.
JE: Huber?
SH: Literally all of my favorite bands are playing right now. Today. My favorite band, on this planet, Dropkick Murphy’s. I just saw Billy Bragg backstage and I about lost my shit. If Bruce Springsteen was playing today, I would not be able to survive.
Could you even play your set?
SH: No. We had to play this tour, playing with I Am the Avalanche every night. That was the hardest thing I had to do.
JE: The gleam in your eye was absolutely incredible. I just wanted to cry.
SF: We have our own classic stuff we like, but we listen to all the bands we tour with and it’s fucking sick.
BL: Avalanche put out such a fucking sick record this year, and the band that opened for that tour, Beach Slang. So good.
IF: Shout out to Beef Slang.
BL: Beef Slong. Look them up on Facebook, Beef Slong.
SH: We really credited The Menzingers for not hating us.
JE: We played it cool; like Riot Fest, we’re just hanging out. And then they went up to play and on the side stage we freaked out like “OH, MY GOD!”
BL: What a great fucking band.
It’s fun to still be able to be a fan despite being professional.
SH: It bums me out with every band we become friends with means I can’t get them tattooed on my body. It would just be embarrassing.
- LIVE REVIEW: Middle Of The Map Fest (05/04/16-05/07/16) - May 20, 2016
- REVIEW: The Fall Of Troy rip and shred through ‘OK’ with purpose - April 25, 2016
- Diarrhea Planet “Let It Out” with new single from ‘Turn To Gold’ - April 11, 2016
Posted in 
Tags: 