Interview and Ventura Warped Tour photos by Kenneth Morton

From South Wales to your town, The Blackout from South Wales were one of the best surprises on the first half of this year’s Warped Tour. Their new CD The Best In Town has just been released on Epitaph Records, featuring hit-worthy songs such as Save Our Selves, Top Of The World, and Children Of The Night. We caught up with vocalist Gavin Butler on Day Three of the Warped Tour in Ventura, CA to find out more about your soon to be favorite new band…...

Is there any story of concept behind the CD title The Best In Town?
It’s kind of a tongue-in-check, cocky title, if you will. From where we are – we’re from a small town in the UK in Wales. For some reason, if anyone does well and starts making something of themselves in what they love doing – whether it be music or sports or anything – there’s a small percentage of this really small town mentality that try and pull that away from them. They’re not very supportive of people getting out of this small town and doing stuff that they love doing. So it’s kind of a jibe at that. It’s really petty and small minded. There’s a couple of songs on there as well that kind of deal with the same issue. It’s a lyric that comes from the first song and we used that as the album title.

What is the song Children Of The Night about and where did you come up with the ideas for that one and for the kid chorus in the beginning?
We had been talking about it for so long – and we watched The Lost Boys one night – we had been talking about how none of us had seen it for ages. It’s not exactly what our life is – we do sleep most of the day and we’re up all night – but we don’t actually bite people’s necks and stuff. It’s good to know – but I think that’s the next step for me. But it’s kind of that idea of just sleeping all day and partying all night. It’s a big party song very much.

Where did you get all of those kids to sing in the beginning?
We were lucky enough – one of our best friends from back home – his mother is a head teacher at a Primary School. She was like, “Yeah, come to the school and we’ll record all the kids together.” We made a day of it. We were going for the freaky, eerie, as soon as you hear it, throw the hairs in the back of your neck up. And I think kids whispering, “We are the Children Of The Night” pretty much does that.

Has Katy Perry heard your cover of I Kissed A Girl?
I don’t know – I don’t think so. We love Katy Perry because one, she’s beautiful and two, her voice is beautiful as well. We haven’t heard anything off anyone saying, “Oh, by the way, Katy’s heard your cover.” I’d like to think that she would like it. She seems a bit of a rebel.

What was your experience like touring in Japan?
We just came back in April – it was our second time out for us. It’s strange – our Japanese label is here today – I think they have a few bands who are on Warped that they do over in Japan. But it was totally surreal. With Europe shows, you could always get away with speaking a little English and pointing at things – it’s kind of like the same kind of place, but with just a different language. Where in Japan, it’s just totally different. Everyone is so polite out there. Like in between songs, it’s dead silence. Out of respect for the band, that won’t speak over them if they want to speak – but as soon as the song kicks in, everyone goes crazy and everyone is jumping up and singing the song. It’s surreal to say the least. The last time we went over there was our first time back on the road for a while, cuz we’d been writing and recording the album. I think I had cabin fever, so as soon as I got on the road, I sort of hit the partying a bit too hard. I slept like four hours in 48. One morning I ended up in the fish market in Tokyo at four o’clock in the morning trying to get fresh sushi – which I did, and it was delicious!

How are you doing out here? Has the time difference affected you at all?
The first day I might have been jet lagged. But with Warped, you’ve gotta be up pretty early anyway, because you’ve gotta find out when your stage time is. I’ve been up half past seven every morning. I was going to go into the sea this morning, but it was a bit chilly and there were a lot of people surfing. I don’t know the etiquette – if I could go in or not, so I left that. But it will take a day or two until we finally get into it.

What was it like working with Lost Prophets and how did you meet them?
It’s strange you ask that question, because two of them are in our bus playing us the new album now actually. We don’t get a chance to see them because most of them stay here in LA now, because their wives are American. We were originally massive fans of Lost Prophets. They came from literally 16 miles down the road from us. We saw them explode and it was amazing – for us, it was an inspiration. These guys from Pontypridd, which is 16 miles down the road from us – and they were doing it – they were out there playing shows and getting on tours. They were one of the reasons why we all got in a band. And pretty much stalking, we became good friends. Me and Sean were at the Kerrang festival down in the South of England – we were just talking to Mike the guitarist for a while, and I think since we were from the same area, we just hit it off. I was in University and living in Pontypridd which is where they’re from. He said, “What are you up to?” and we were like “Playing video games” and he was like “Mind if I come over?” It was the most surreal moment of my life – just opening the door to one of my idols and like, “Whoa, this is crazy!” But it’s moved on from there and now it’s best friends and stuff. We love those guys to bits.

Do you know the guys in You Me At Six – they are going to be on the Warped Tour at the end. Will you get to see them?
We jump off – then there’s a couple of days and then they jump on. They’re sharing the same bus that we’re sharing – and we’re sharing a bus with a band called Versa Emerge. They’re doing the same thing that we’re doing while we’re not here. We’re not going to see them at all, which is kind of gutting. We are good friends with them – they are nice guys. It would be cool to hang out in America with them. The only other British band I know of over here is Gallows – and I think there’s a band from Blackpool – I think they’re one of the catering bands who paid to get out here. But there’s not very many British bands on the Warped Tour – it would have been good, but there’s plenty of American bands we could make friends with.

Do you have any messages for people who are reading this who might want to check your band out?
Yeah, check out myspace.com/theblackout – most of the album is up there if you want to give it a listen first. is out now actually on Epitaph Records, so go check it out

The Blackout links

The Blackout on Myspace: The Official Myspace Page for The Blackout!
The Highwire Daze Home Page: Return to the Main Page!

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