There Were Penises Drawn on My Face
An Interview with the Riddlin' Kids
March 2, 2005

We are at the House of Blues in Chicago, still nearly an hour early, even after ducking into the west side to find a camera at the last minute.  My camera commander for the night, Cole, and I take a seat at the bar to kill some time.   The national juggling championships were on, so that was tits. I call Jay, their esteemed tour manager damn near 15 times.  No answer.  Finally, he gets a signal and runs into the lobby to hear and I spot him.  We hug and head backstage.  

Getting a hug from a tour manager is a great sign.  They are generally a degenerate, bitter crew, but Jay is top notch.  After a maze of stairs and fifteen security guards, we reach the cleanest dressing room I have ever been in.  All the furniture was in the correct place and there were no broken tortilla chips.  To be honest, it made me nervous.  Was this a whole new breed of clean, smart, well mannered rock stars?  I guess you’ll just have to read and find out.

XROXX:  What do you guys think of the new CD?
Mark:  Best CD ever.
Clint:  It’s brilliant.  No, it’s awesome.  We are really proud of it.  We worked really hard on it.  Everyone else seems to like it, so that’s cool too.

XROXX:  How do you think it compares, musically, to Hurry Up and Wait?
Clint:  I think it’s different.  We put a little more thought into the writing.  We’ve been playing for a lot of years, we know each other a lot better personally and musically.  And, I think it shows in the songwriting and the way it came together.  Last time, we just threw a bunch of songs on tape that we had already written years before.  This time we kind of developed the songs in the studio.

XROXX:  This year you have been on the road with acts such as Lit and American Hi-Fi.  What have been some of the highlights?
Clint:  Compared to the year before where we took a year off, it went a lot better.  Although I do enjoy playing video games and going to the movies, I’d rather be touring.  We’ve toured with a lot of great bands in our career; we are lucky that way.  We love going out and playing in front of people and then hanging out with the other bands.  We’ve made some of our best friends on the last few tours we have done.  Lit, American Hi-Fi, Denver Harbor and The Matches are all great people and we enjoyed being around them.
Dustin:  I don’t get to answer very often.  This tour is the first time in a long time that we have been put together with bands that we fit with really well.

XROXX:  So, if you could build the ideal tour, who would it be?
Mark:  I think this is it.
Clint:  This is pretty good.  The whole thing has been almost sold out.  The fans are amazing and have been really open to us.  People that have never heard of us are rocking out and buying our CD.

XROXX:  What are some of your guilty pleasures on the road?
Clint:  Masturbation.  Just Kidding; I don’t feel guilty about that at all.
Dustin:  Sleeping, because if you are sleeping, you are not doing what you are supposed to be doing.
Mark:  I don’t really have a guilty pleasure on the road.
Clint:  I do; all the beer I have been drinking.  It’s pleasurable and kind of a necessity.  I can tell you that our livers are hurting on this tour.  We’ve drank more than we have in a long time.
Dustin:  We’re trying to keep up with Bowling For Soup.
Clint:  I drank like crazy one night and only had like an hour of sleep the night before.  I was very delirious and started getting really drunk really fast.  We played the show, but I didn’t sweat out the alcohol.  So, I was still drunk.  We end up on the bus with BFS and passed out with my shoes on.  (*Cannot disclose rules about tour buses, sorry*)  I woke up in the morning in our van.  I was real stiff and then realized I was dressed and had on my leather jacket, and I was really cold.  I leave the van and go inside to take a leak.  Then, I look in the mirror and see my whole face is covered with writing.  There were penises drawn on my face, eyeballs drawn on my eyelids.  On my forehead, it said “I sing well.”  MC Lars wrote that.  BFS gave him the marker, but he wanted to write something nice.

XROXX:  Who are you guys listening to right now?
Mark:  I cannot get enough of The Format.  Also, someone dropped this band called the Secret Handshake on me, and they are weird, but I like it a lot.
Dustin:  The new Denver Harbor is good.  Their drummer is like phenomenal.
Clint:  I have been listening to Muse a lot.
Mark:  The new Unwritten Law is awesome too!

(MC Lars begins to play, so we wrap up.)

Clint:  That went well.

Riddlin' Kids are serious about making good music, but are also a delight to be around.  Clint played mercilessly on his laptop the whole time, but other than that, it was all good.  I was promised strippers and lunch meat if I returned later that night to the dressing room.  If you are looking for fun, Riddlin' Kids are your band.  Thanks Jay for getting everything together and the Ken Phillips Group for letting me interview these guys.

Jayne*Star
jayne.star@XROXX.com