Pitchfork

On one hand, Be Your Own Pet are just a bunch of kids having fun and playing the shit out of any stage that will have them. On the other hand, their tongue-in-cheek violence/revenge anthems are so extreme that Universal-- label to Eminem, 50 Cent, and Marilyn Manson, and parent of BYOP's Ecstatic Peace! home-- won't release them in the U.S. The songs in question are "Becky", "Black Hole", and "Blow Yr Mind", and while they didn't make it onto the U.S. version of the band's sophomore album, Get Awkward, they have made it here digitally thanks to the XL EP Get Damaged, which is out now digitally and comes out physically on June 24.

I spoke to BYOP frontwoman Jemina Pearl about the frustration of having to leave that trio of tunes off the U.S. release of Get Awkward. We also talked about lighting things on fire, puking and bleeding on stage, their label making them play the Warped Tour, getting bad directions from Stephen Malkmus, and a pair of BYOP concertgoers' very literal interpretation of an Usher lyric.

Side note: Former BYOP drummer Jamin Orrall (who, along with Pearl, received the aforementioned bad directions from Stephen Malkmus) has a band with his brother Jake called JEFF the Brotherhood. On July 29, BYOP's first label, Infinity Cat, will release their "ten-track maxi-EP" called The Boys R Back in Town on vinyl.

Pitchfork: Tell us what happened when you found out that the songs were going to be taken off of the American version of Get Awkward.

Jemina Pearl: One day in January, it seemed like it was going to be a normal day. Then I got a phone call from my manager, and she said that three of the songs had to be taken off the album because they were too violent and there was nothing we could do. We either had to change the lyrics or take them off the album.

So we decided to take them off the album, and, since then, we've been struggling to figure out how to release these songs. For a little while, we were going to put [the EP] out on Ecstatic Peace!, but then there were restrictions on how many copies we could make and all this different stuff. We were thinking about starting our own label, putting it out on that, but XL really pulled through for us and stuck it out with Universal even though Universal's trying to make it a little bit difficult for them to release it. But now it's coming out, so we're all pretty happy and excited about it.

Pitchfork: Did you guys realize at the time you wrote the songs that the label might not like them?

JP: No, it never crossed my mind at all that there were going to be problems with the lyrics. Maybe it was silly not to think that, but I never thought people would think there was something wrong with them.

Pitchfork: The lyrics are definitely par for your course, which makes it seem like Universal didn't know what they were getting into.

JP: Yeah, it's also strange because the first album has similar ideas and lyrics. It was really frustrating that "Becky" couldn't be on the album, because it was really important. It's not like all the songs weren't important, but that one's especially important. And that one is such a-- the song is just so funny, at least to me, and so it's a bummer that these people at the top of the label with no sense of humor read the lyrics and were offended by them or something.

Pitchfork: I like the idea of these three songs being a slippery slope for you guys to turn into this murderous Swedish black metal band.

JP: Yeah! Really ridiculous!

Pitchfork: As a band, do you actively cultivate this dangerous reputation, or do you feel like it just follows you?

JP: I mean, we like to live dangerously, but I don't think we're trying to necessarily appear that way. We just do the things we like to do-- like set things on fire. That's what we did last night. We set a box on fire on the steps of the venue. It was really fun. We had a bus call at four in the morning, and we were really bored. We didn't have anything to do, so we set stuff on fire.

Pitchfork: I saw a couple of your sets this year at South by Southwest, and one of them was when your bass player Nathan Vasquez's finger was, like, falling off. The skin was peeling. It was so bloody.

JP: Yeah, he gets bloody sometimes at shows.

Pitchfork: Is that the most intense bodily-fluid-related stuff that happens at your shows?

JP: I don't know. I mean, I've puked onstage before.

Pitchfork: Intentionally?

JP: No, not intentionally. Just from feeling sick and then vomiting everywhere. You know, if you eat too close to a show or drink too much before a show, you're going to puke. One time, Nathan's eye...this dude punched him, and Nathan's eye bled everywhere. We had to take him to the hospital and get stitches. But I can't really think of anything too gnarly that's happened.

Pitchfork: You guys are on tour with She Wants Revenge now, right?

JP: Yeah. She Wants Revenge, the Virgins, and Switches.

Pitchfork: Is that strange? Because She Wants Revenge is a pretty different band than yours.

JP: All the bands on this tour are pretty different from each other, music-wise. I think it's pretty interesting that we're all on this tour together, and we all have different fans out in the audience. It's been an interesting experience. We're sharing a bus with the Virgins, and they're total assholes. We hate them so much! They're so mean to us. No, I'm just kidding. They're in the room right now. They're awesome! They're our new best friends.

Pitchfork: I ask about She Wants Revenge because since they're this very put-together, L.A.-crafted band, it seems like they'd be aloof or something. Are you a fan of their music?

JP: I'm not necessarily a really big fan of their music. Watching them play, it's very different from us. They've got what they're going to do every night and the way things are going to sound down to a science, which is not how we are. But you can respect a band that's a well-crafted machine, and they've been really friendly. They're not assholes. Sometimes you open up for bands, and they're just like, "Oh, who are you? We don't give a fuck." But they've been really sweet to us.

Pitchfork: Have you ever opened for a band you would have thought you hated based on their music but who ended up being nice people, and when you listen to their record again, you think, "Oh, that's not so bad"?

JP: Yeah, all the time, because I'm a pretty picky music person. Like, "I hate that, I hate that, I hate that." And once you get to know people and you listen to it, you understand that you made too quick of a judgment on someone. That happens constantly for me. I'll be like, "Oh, that band sucks," and then you meet them and feel like a really big asshole. You're like, "Oh, those people are really awesome and really nice!" I totally have to put my foot in my mouth. It's a lesson I've learned over and over again touring. You shouldn't judge bands.

Pitchfork: Which bands have you judged beforehand only to have them prove you wrong?

JP: I'll feel bad if I say it!

Pitchfork: Well, you can make up bands, like Pavement. Just say Pavement.

JP: Stephen Malkmus was actually really mean to me. He gave me bad directions in New York.

Pitchfork: Really?

JP: Yeah!

Pitchfork: Did he know who you were, or did you just run into him?

JP: No, we didn't realize it was Stephen Malkmus until we were asking him for directions, and he gave us really bad directions. Then we saw him again playing a festival, and we were like, "Hey, do you remember us? You gave us really bad directions in New York." He was like, "Oh, I remember you guys. You guys were so fucking lost! I went home and told my wife about it and laughed!"

Pitchfork: Wait, so you just randomly ran into Stephen Malkmus?

JP: Yeah, it was two years ago, maybe. It was 2006, I guess, and we were lost. It was me and Nathan and Jamin [Orrall], our old drummer, and two of our friends. We were lost, and we were like, "Oh, there's a dude. He looks kind of shady. He's got a big parka on, and a hood." But he was the only person around, so we asked him. And then while we were talking to him, we were like, "Oh, wait a second. That's Stephen Malkmus!" And he gave us some directions for how to get back to our hotel.

We walked that way, and then we realized we were going the complete wrong way. It was pretty funny, though. Then later we ran into him at Bonnaroo. Thurston [Moore] took us to meet him, and we were like, "You gave us bad directions!" He said he made fun of us and laughed at us because we were so lost.

Pitchfork: Are you guys psyched to play the Warped Tour? It seemed like a weird partnership at first, but it's kind of perfect for you guys.

JP: No! Oh my God, you're going to make me kill myself! Warped is perfect for us?

Pitchfork: I mean, in the end, it's just about having fun and being a teenager, right?

JP: Yeah, I guess. I just associate it with a certain look and a certain style and the kind of kids at school that I thought were-- this is really bad, I'm sure-- the kind of kids that were dumbasses wearing Rancid t-shirts who thought they knew what punk rock was and threw things at people in the cafeteria. So it's like, okay, now we're going to be performing for these people. Our label is under the impression that we're going to play one date and then automatically sell 100,000 more records. They gave these examples: "This band did it, and they sold this many more! They had this many more digital downloads!" And it's all these bands that seem like they fit with the Warped Tour. It'll be interesting to see how people receive us, but I guess any show is a good show to play.

Pitchfork: I definitely can relate to seeing the kids in Rancid shirts, but you guys have a song about bicycles, and BMX is an extreme sport, right? Plus, it should be an interesting experience to be on the other side, influencing those future Rancid-shirt-wearing kids and maybe helping them turn out a little better.

JP: Yeah, maybe I'll be eating my words later, but all those bands have this very specific look and sound and style. It's like the new hair metal or something. There are like 10 different rules about how you write a song and what everything sounds like and looks like. I'd like to imagine that we're very much the opposite of that. It'll be interesting for us to go in there and just try to put on a really awesome live show, maybe turn some people on to our music that wouldn't have listened to us or liked us before.

Pitchfork: What I'm waiting for is the inevitable show reviews where you guys get compared to Paramore just because both bands have female singers with brightly colored hair.

JP: Oh yeah, that'll be great. That'll make me really happy [laughs].

Pitchfork: Your live show is pretty intense, but have you guys ever felt upstaged? Either before you go on, you're like, "Shit, now we have to top that," or afterwards, you're like, "Man, that band totally blew us away"?

JP: I wouldn't say it would ever make me angry. It's always awesome when you see a band and you're like, "Fuck, we gotta step up our game now." But touring with the Black Lips-- we're such huge Black Lips fans-- every night it was definitely like, "Oh, fuck!" They played before us, and we would be like, "Shit, we really gotta step it up every night, 'cause we're on tour with the Black Lips." They weren't doing as crazy stuff as they used to. By that time, they weren't setting things on fire and things like that, but they were still going real crazy, so there was a friendly back-and-forth who's-going-to-put-on-the-better-show thing. Competition definitely inspires you to try harder and work harder and do better.

Pitchfork: What's the wimpiest band you guys have ever played with?

JP: The wimpiest band? Probably the Virgins [laughs]. I'm just joking! [To Nathan] Who's the wimpiest band we've ever played with, Nathan? [laughs] No, they're not wimpy!

Pitchfork: Who did he say?

JP: He said the Damn Shames, who we just went on tour with in the UK. They're just all really crazy. They all have the most brutal cases of A.D.D. And they're really funny. I don't know. I feel like this is going to get me in trouble if I say a band that I actually think is really wimpy. Someone's going to be like, "Did you call us wimps?!" and they're going to try and fight us after a show.

Pitchfork: Well, my last question is probably the most important one, and it's regarding some stage banter of yours at SXSW. Are you guys still cranking that Soulja Boy?

JP: Cranking Soulja Boy? Not so much anymore. That was back on the West Coast tour. We were cranking that a lot, but now...I don't know. Everyone on this bus wants to listen to David Bowie constantly, so we've been cranking David Bowie pretty much nonstop.

Pitchfork: So there's no Soulja Boy replacement from the pop/hip-hop/R&B side of the spectrum?

JP: Not yet. There hasn't been a real serious replacement.

Pitchfork: Have you heard the Usher song?

JP: "Love in This Club"?

Pitchfork: Yes!

JP: Yeah, I sang that song a lot last night. I think that song's pretty ridiculous. Also, I was really into it because, apparently, when we played a show in Boston, two people had sex in the audience and got kicked out. These two teenaged people.

Pitchfork: At your show?

JP: Yeah, at one of our shows these two people had sex. This girl came up to me, and she was like, "I was having a really good time at your show, and then I looked in the corner and I noticed these two people were fooling around and I totally saw the penetration and it kind of bummed me out!" I was like, "Oh my God, that's amazing that our music inspired two people to go ahead and just fuck in the audience."

Pitchfork: You guys actually had people making love in the club.

JP: Yeah, they really made love in the club. It's pretty awesome. I haven't ever heard of anything else when we've inspired people to have sex, so that was pretty awesome.

Pitchfork: I bet with all the security at Usher shows that even he's never had anyone do that. So, in closing, is there anything else that you want to get off your chest?

JP: Go buy the Virgins' new album.

Be Your Own Pet:

06-13 Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall Ballroom *
06-14 Minneapolis, MN - Fine Line Music Cafe *
06-17 Vancouver, British Columbia - Commodore Ballroom *
06-18 Seattle, WA - The Showbox *
06-19 Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom *
06-20 San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore *
06-21 Los Angeles, CA - Wiltern Theatre *
07-09 Atlanta, GA - Coca-Cola Lakewood Amphitheatre (Warped Tour)
07-10 Orlando, FL - Central Florida Fairgrounds (Warped Tour)
07-11 St. Petersburg, FL - Vinoy Park (Warped Tour)
07-12 Miami, FL - Bicentennial Park (Warped Tour)
07-13 Elkton, FL - St. John's County Fairgrounds (Warped Tour)
07-14 Charlotte, NC - Verizon Wireless Amphitheater (Warped Tour)
07-15 Virginia Beach, VA - Verizon Wireless Amphitheater (Warped Tour)
07-16 Columbia, MD - Merriweather Post Pavilion (Warped Tour)
07-17 Cleveland, OH - Tower Amphitheatre (Warped Tour)
07-18 Detroit, MI - Comerica Park (Warped Tour)
07-23 Mansfield, MA - Tweeter Center (Warped Tour)
07-26 Uniondale, NY - Nassau Coliseum (Warped Tour)
07-29 Pittsburgh, PA - Post Gazette Pavilion (Warped Tour)
07-30 Cincinnati, OH - Riverbend Music Center (Warped Tour)
07-31 Noblesville, IN - Verizon Wireless Music Center (Warped Tour)
08-01 Milwaukee, WI - Marcus Amphitheater (Warped Tour)
08-02 Tinley Park, IL - First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre (Warped Tour)
08-07 Brooklyn, NY - McCarren Park Pool
08-09 Norfolk, VA - Norva Theater
08-22 Reading, England - Reading Festival
08-23 Leeds, England - Leeds Festival

* NYLON tour with She Wants Revenge, the Virgins, Switches