What’s up, bud? It’s been a while. A long while. Okay, I’ll admit it-

We’ve never met.

That’s not to say we haven’t been very close in the same rooms. If you add up the last decade, we SHOULD be friends, or at least distant “what’s up” acquaintances. We have many mutual friends and have for some time. Let's take the fact that at the Extinction/Disembodied show at the Foxfire Coffee Lounge in 1998 you kicked me in the face. Then you add to it the last Harvest show when you, again, kicked me in the face (I’m pretty sure you made eye contact with me before doing it)- we’ve got a history. In fact, you can watch this video here and reminisce. It's low resolution, but you can see both of us...see? I see you! I mean, I expected to get hurt at hardcore shows back then so I’m not complaining, it just helps explain why when Fall Out Boy started, Bill Smiles was complaining about screening fall out boy thong underwear at the screen-printing shop and he explained it as “the hyperactive dude from Extinction with dreads-it's his pop-punk band” when the name “Pete Wentz” didn’t register. “OHHH, THAT guy!” and that was that. AND, I almost forgot, when I was in Martyr AD, we both toured the UK at the same time, and our bus pulled up into the same cargo bays as your bus for the first few nights. So we figuratively slept right next to one another. I could go so far as to argue we’ve possibly toured together....maybe.

So, now that this introduction and cred session is out of the way-we need to talk. Besides, it’s late, I got two hours of sleep last night and it’s raining outside so what else am I going to do? I’m pretty sure you are all about unintentional promotion and you won’t mind this, and I’m all about writing rants out for no reason other than to entertain myself and get a few text messages or emails.

Background: -There was a conversation that was had between friends back in late February. This is a dramatized transcript. You weren’t there, and the names are hidden to protect the guilty.

Person 1: We should do a music video for our EP. We should have it be the “Easycore” version of a hardcore tough guy video. We should look all hard, and smash ice cream cones, pick on kids, steal purses, car jack high-end cars, and then have the footage look like a mix of home videos and a Madball video, but goofy and silly and awesome.

Me: Kick ass idea, Gad Chilbert!

So with that said, I just caught your new video for “I Don’t Care” and we need to both acknowledge an undeniable fact: You don’t care what I think as long as it’s about you.

Okay, there’s another fact we need to go over:

This is more or less the exact same concept we shot for a band this spring.

While yours is with a visibly bigger budget (I’d hope that Jay Z could pony up a bigger video budget than us) that doesn’t change the reality that I was under the impression that the year 2008 already filled the quota of “hardcore dudes in non-hardcore bands not taking themselves too seriously, being dicks to people and pulling pranks in funny, mostly harmless and non-threatening ways” videos and I just thought someone should address this out in the open.

I acknowledge it’s not the SAME video. There are the differences: Our video was intentionally shot to be un-airable on television. The painful irony is that we made a CENSORED VERSION at Mr. Chad G's suggestion (you can buy it on Itunes for $1.99)specifically in the off chance that FN MtV would air it. You didn’t. Not a big deal. Let’s move on.

Additionally-color toned film. You had that. Your wardrobe budget was bigger than ours. We had a screen-printing shop print windbreakers. We didn’t have special effects and cameos from record producers. We had a huge graffiti wall. We didn’t have cameos from a Sarah Palin impersonator or Flesh-Beard from the Hills. We DID have cameos from Toby Morse of H2O and Mitts and Freddy from Madball. We had actual AK-47s without firing mechanisms. You had a mime and Gilby Clarke. We had….actualAK-47s without the firing mechanisms that were pointed at a child’s head while the kid’s dad laughed his ass off.

However- like our eventual President Barack Obama says, let’s focus on how we’re ALIKE, not how we’re different. There are some similarities-some pretty striking- and I’m not just referring to the genre-reference of soft, easy or another wacky word antonym to ‘hard’ core and we're moving beyond the general theme of “funny video with dudes being rude and playing pranks for no reason other than entertainment”

Sad faced children whose days were ruined by the only straight edge member of the band?

Yours

Ours

Check.

Gratuitous ice cream destruction?

Yours

Ours

Check

Theft from innocent women bystanders?

Yours

Ours

Check

Ending the video with a band member getting beat up by a bigger dude they were fucking with earlier in the video, to provide a comedic “unexpected twist" ending?

Yours

Ours

Ding

We can continue this all night long depending on how detailed or meticulous I want to be. I mean-theft of a PT-Cruiser isn’t the same thing as theft of a walker-but one could try to stretch that argument if they/I wanted to.

But hey, this is all good, man. We put this EP out by this band simply to have fun. Originally, it was only supposed to be a 4-song cover 7” limited to 1000 copies. So anything after that has just been fun to be a part of. We intentionally did some shit that, to the confusion of our distributor and friends, intentionally kept this thing under the radar a bit. The video was one of the most ridiculous experiences I’ve ever witnessed. So at the end of it, my day won’t change, your life will go on in total privacy and seclusion somewhere in the woods of Illinois, but like two secret lovers on the football team, I needed to profess my feelings out loud so you know how I felt.

Now that it’s out there, let’s just wink at each other and know that we both know the truth, and if we ever have to share the shower again, let’s try not to be awkward and pretend this never happened. Or, if we can’t do that, at least promise me you won’t kick me in the face again when Disembodied and Unbroken play Jim Grimes’ show next April in Chicago should you make it.

Thanks buddy.