At a recent show with Catch 22 and Reel Big Fish, I was able to interview Gabe and Rob of Midtown. See what they had to say.

Midtown Interview

Question: How did you all meet?

Gabe: We were all when we were younger, we grew up in the New Jersey scene and we were all in bands and all our bands played together. We all became friends by playing together.I left my band because I didn't like it. I knew Rob was out of Ruckers and I was entering Ruckers and I knew Tyler was entering Ruckers too, and I talked to them, but they were in their old bands, and eventually their bands broke up or fell apart and we just had Midtown. .

Question: What is your favorite place to play?

Gabe: New Jersey is our favorite place to play because that is our family back there. Not our real family, but our fans and friends that all support us. Every time we go back there, the shows are bigger and better.The kids are crazier and more fun.

Question: What is somewhere that you would like to play that you haven't yet?

Gabe: Australia. We went on tour in Japan, and we were supposed to be there for 4 days, but we got there like 8 days early so we had a chance to hang out and see the country, because we are on tour a lot.

Question: How did you decide you were going to be a musician?

Gabe: When I was 11 or 13, i always liked music, but I never thought I would be a musician. I loved Bon Jovi and Whitesnake growing up. Then Nirvana broke out, and they showed me, that if you love something and you love what you do, you don't have to be a good musician, you don't have to be a producer or manufacturer. Just go out there and pour your heart into something and something good will come out. I just saw all these garage bands that were getting big and that was an inspiration to me to go out and play. I had no training, I had horribe rythm. It was retarded, but you are banging it out practice, practice, you slowly learn something. The money is ok, but it is all about the heart, you have to have the heart.

Question: What do you think of Napster?

Rob: Basically the best thing about it is going on tour and having kids that have never heard your music before there to see you. Say we went on a European tour and no one had heard our music, they could easily get it from Napster. I think that Napster or just Mp3's in general give every band the opportunity to get their music heard by anybody in the world. The only people that are complaining about Napster are the ones that are super big bands that are millionaires anyways, so it doesn't make any sense for them to have any say when in fact there is in fact that Napster might be helping their band by getting their music out. Too many times people have come up to me, and it's a good thing, that have said that I heard your music off Napster and I want to buy your CD. It's great.

Question: How did you decide to sign with Drive-Thru Records?

How did you decide to sign with Drive-Thru Records?

Rob: Gabe knew them from a few years ago, and he was great friends with them. We knew they would work hard for us.

Question: What is the weirdest thing that has happened to you during a concert?

Gabe: Tonight was pretty crazy. Tonight these kids started this Ska gang with the stupid Ska jackets and....

Rob: I would just like to say that I used to be in a Ska band and anything that Gabe is saying to alienate any Ska fans out there I can say something back.

Gabe: No listen, it's not. It's fun. I like ska bands and all. But to go around and dress like you are in Ska and I don't know what these kids were doing, but anyways, they are starting stuff and talking shit to us and throwing stuff at us and I don't really mind, you can say you don't like the music and "Fuck you" and all, and I won't mind, but they were talking shit the whole time we were playing and throwning stuff at us and I said I am not going to have that. So I jumped into the crowd to try and kill those kids, but then i had to deep playing, so I said I would go and kill you after we are done playing and the Bouncer is like, "Let's get these kid's kicked out." I was like alright and that was it. Then one of the kids comes up to me and is like "sir, sir". I said, "Don't you call me sir, when five minutes ago you were saying Fuck you to me." That was pretty crazy. Another crazy thing that happened to me was on my 21st birthday, was in Jacksonville Florida when we were on tour and I got really trashed while I was playing because everyone kept buying me shots and I hardly ever drink so I had a really low tolerance. I started acting retarded and crazy and during the middle of our last song, I climbed up the wall to the balcony and I started playing on the balcony.

Rob: Reminiscent of Eddie Vedder in the "Even Flow" video.

Gabe: So that was pretty cool.