Over It - Nick Bailey

NICK BAILEY: Great dude. We are in the studio working on the new record, and we leave on tour on Monday of next week. We are stoked about that; it's going to be great.

NICK: Yes, this is the Virgin Megatour College Tour with Yellowcard and Mae. It's about a twenty-day tour so we'll be out for a while, and then we'll be playing the Bamboozle and Flipside Festivals as well following that tour. We're really excited, and we'll be out for about a month to five weeks.

NICK: Yes, we are only going to play one or two new songs. It'll be the first time we'll be playing the songs though. It's kind-of a weird time for us, since we are still promoting Silverstrand and have all this stuff going towards the old record. It doesn't make as much sense to play new songs so we have to go through a transitional period before we start playing new songs a lot.

NICK: We all grew up in northern Virginia, and with that, we had our school, family, and work. There was only so much we could do for the band. We were balancing everything else. When we moved out here, right after we put our first album out on Lobster a good two years before Silverstrand came out, we really started to take the band full-time. We became really dedicated to the band with it being our full-time jobs. Doing that, it really helped us grow and just be as productive as possible. Once we moved up here three years ago, we kept working and being dedicated with making the most out of the good opportunities coming our way. We're all about keeping the music fresh and making sure we keep evolving and keeping things new and exciting. We're constantly growing so we want to keep up with the music. Now that we have that opportunity, and our album came out last year, and we got signed to Virgin and everything, we have had a lot of opportunities to work on the new album. This is one of the things where it all worked out the way it did.

NICK: Oh yeah, it's been incredible. You know, not to say anything bad, but I'm really happy with the team at Virgin. There's a lot more involvement with the band over there. We have a lot more capabilities with Virgin obviously because they are a major label. They have more budget and more connections so for us, we want to make the most of that. Lobster's a cool label, but there's a certain level that they can accomodate what we wanted to do as a band with their size, but with a huge label, the sky's the limit. We're really excited about it. There's so many great indies out there, but we think for us, as Over It, Virgin was just the perfect fit for that.

NICK: I would say there is a little bit of everything. I think it is hard to write the same old stuff, as musicians, songwriters, the band, etc, and we've been listening to a lot of new stuff lately. All that comes through in our writing process. We just have such an appreciation for music nowadays. Growing up, we all were into punk rock; that was big and everything we really started on. I mean, we still love our punk rock, but now we can appreciate so many different kinds of music and pull out the things about it that really attract us and incorporate that into the new stuff. I think it's really going difficult until we see the end result. I haven't gotten to just sit back and see what's happening. I'll let you decide, but we're very excited about it and are guarenteed that it will be the best stuff Over It has put out yet.

NICK: Yes, we're going to have Ryan from Don't Look Down joining us on this tour. We're really excited about that because we've been really good friends with Ryan and with the Don't Look Down since our band started. They are great musicians, and we are fans of the band. When Ryan approached us about playing in the band, we thought it would be a great opportunity for us and could really capture the energy and sound we want live. Plus the new stuff has some piano parts and more guitar layering with acoustic and stuff. We'll be able to emulate that live. Ryan also has a great voice so the dynamic vocally will be so much better now.

NICK: A little bit. Unfortunately, Ryan still lives out in New Jersey. Maybe two weeks ago we did some stuff with him. We're leaving Monday, but we've gotten a lot of work done. It's not completely finished yet. Basically we finish all we can, and then we sit on it for a month, think about what we like, what we want to change, etc. He's definitely going to be involved in that process. When we come back to finish in May before Warped Tour, he'll definitely be in the mix and call some shots. He's definitely one of my best friends so it'll be really cool to get him involved and everything.

NICK: With the whole new situation, we want to go beyond anything we've ever done before with the street team. It's hard to do what we want to do with it because of the cost of posters, stickers, etc. It's kind of hard for smaller bands to do that when it's so expensive. We still love keeping in touch with everyone, and now we have a little more room to play around with. I think our street team efforts are going to be much stronger and harder this year and next year. It's very exciting, and I love street teams a lot.

NICK: Oh, good question, I love making mix tapes. Let's see.... I would start out with some Acceptance because I love their new record and they are good friends of ours. I really like the new All-American Rejects record so I'd put a song on there. One of my favorite bands is from Australia and they are called Bodyjar, so I'd put them on there. There's a new band from LA called Clearstatic that just got signed to Maverick Records. They have kind-of an 80s sound so I'd definitely put them on, and you should check them out. Some Descendents for some old-school. Some Feeder from Europe, they sound sorta like Coldplay. I love Goo Goo Dolls... Strung Out, they are definitely a classic, one of my all-time favorites. There's so many; I love everything. Maybe some old stuff too like Pearl Jam. I'd put my boy Kanye West on there; I love Kanye. Maybe a couple classical tracks.

NICK: I'd say all of them have an influence, some more than others. At the same time, the sound we have in our new songs will make us different than anything else. We're starting to get to a point where you will be able to put us in a style of our own. We have a little bit of a new hip-hop appreciation mentality, especially since it agrees with us on the road when driving. Not to say we're going to have remixes on the album *laugh*

NICK: We're going to spend our time between this tour and Warped Tour finishing up our record. After Warped Tour, we hope to play more shows in the US that we can support our new CD for, which should be coming out this summer. Maybe a tour in Europe or Japan would be cool too.

NICK: Mike Green. He did work with Paramore, The Matches, October Fall. He's done demos with Yellowcard, Good Charlotte, and Matchbook Romance.

NICK: We bring in our material and he always critiques them and says how we can make them better or whatever. He keeps us excited about our material.

NICK: *huge breath* That's a tough question... I have to give it up for our home town. I love New Jersey, and I love southern California. I say those are my top three. This year, our top shows were in Hawaii and Japan. They were so much fun. It's hard to say, but we have a lot of great shows around there.

NICK: Siren On The 101. It's our \"first single\" so we enjoy that one a lot.

NICK: All kinds of crazy stuff. I'll have to shift through the memories in my head and see what I can find. I can tell you about one time in Japan, not this last time but the time before, and it was my birthday. I had some drinks, and we went back to the hotel to grab something, I forget what but we were going to grab something and go back to the bars. We were... well, we weren't sober, I'll tell you that much. There was a fire extinguisher at the end of the hall. James thought it would be funny if he pointed it at me and squirted me. He thought there was going to be water inside. It wasn't water. It was that crazy foamy white powder stuff that fills everything. He let that off but then it turned out the room right next to it was this WWF pro wrestler reject guy who was in Japan getting money. He came out totally pissed and threatened to kill us and held James up by his shirt and everything. Eventually our promoter came up and calmed him down, but we had to pay the hotel for the clean-up and pay the wrestler guy because we supposedly \"broke his computer.\" We got the donkey end of that deal. We try to behave ourselves as much as possible but sometimes things happen. *laugh* We like to be serious and silly. We do a little bit of everything.

NICK: Man, if we were all on an island... I don't think we'd be able to eat each other. Drive together, die together. That's what I say.

NICK: Wow, what a funny question. Can I pick the female? I would be Kira Knightly and just stare at the mirror all day because I think she's so hot. Or I'd be Skye Sweetnam for a day and come talk to me because I'd think it'd be cool if she'd talk to me.

NICK: Pineapple. Or wait, coconuts, those are the ones that grow on palm trees. I think palm trees are the coolest thing ever. For sure, coconuts.

NICK: Yes, Silverstrand is actually a beach outside Ventura that we use to hang out and surf at all the time. We named our record after it. There were definitely some good palm trees there.

NICK: I want to say that we're so excited to be here and thank you for reading this far. We just can't wait to have the record come out and have you all hear it. Come out to a show and see us. We'd love to have you show up and hang out and everything.