Kevin: Can you introduce yourself to the readers?

Jim McDonald: I was supposed to catch up with you guys at Purple Door. How did that go? 

Tony Chavez: Purple Door went really good. It was our fist year playing and it seemed like there was a really good response and we sold a bunch of stuff and met a lot of new people, so that's always good. It went really good. It was definitely really muddy, but other than that it was really fun. 

J: So are there more tour plans coming up? 

T: Yeah, actually, we're fixing to go out with Anberlin, Noise Ratchet and the Beautiful Mistake. That tour starts September 21 and that'll be going for a few weeks so that'll be really good. 

J: I heard you're going to be playing with Anberlin on the tour.

T: Yes, I'm going to be covering for them playing guitar on that tour and as soon as that tour's done I'll be with them about another month going out on the Nintendo Fusion tour with Story of the Year, Lost Prophets and My Chemical Romance. 

J: How did hooking up with Anberlin come about? 

T: Well, we've been friends with Anberlin for a while starting back I guess when their album came out. I think we played our first show with them sometime last year and we've just been pretty good friends since then and played quite a few shows with them and they just asked me to cover for them for about a month and a half.

J: My editor sent me a copy of your new album and I must say I'm really enjoying it. 

T: Awesome. Thank you very much.

J: You've got a really modern sound, it really is quite enjoyable. Tell me a little about who your influences are. 

T: Some of our influences would definitely be like Foo Fighters, Jimmy Eat World... U2 is definitely a big influence. Even going as far back as the Beatles and different bands like that. 

J: You've got a little bit of a hardcore sound now and then, are you into some of that? 

T: Oh, yeah. A couple of us actually used to be in hardcore bands. Definitely as far as newer bands I'm into Underoath and Further Seems Forever and Noiseratchet and all those bands, so all those bands are definitely an influence as well. 

J: It shows now and then. 

T: Cool. 

J: Tell me a little bit about the title of your album. 

T: Well, the title of the album is "A Man Can Change His Stars" and that's basically a line out of a movie. It's that movie "A Knight's Tale" and it really goes along with the common thread throughout the album which is a hope that you don't have to just settle for what you're going through in life. That if you're not happy with where you're at you can definitely change it. We'd been thinking of some different titles that definitely were going along with that and "A Man Can Change His Stars" just kind of fit, so we went with it. 

J: I had wondered if that was a reference to the movie. 

T: Yeah, I mean we all liked that movie, and we just kind of got the idea from that movie. 

J: I heard that Jon Bunch from Further Seems Forever stopped in on your recording sessions.

T: Yeah, actually Brandon and I had to fly to Orlando, Florida, that 's where we were doing the album. We had to fly down there to finish a couple songs and while we were down there Jon was actually recording the vocals for the new Further album and we just kind of met down there and hung out and kind of hit it off and I guess he was inerested in doing some background vocals on a couple songs, so we were definitely honored to have him do that. 

J: What songs did he perform on? 

T: He did some harmony parts on "April Dream" and he also had a part in "Lies and Jewels". 

J: Nice. The song "Glorietta" really stuck out on your album. It's really an interesting song. Is the guitar riff on that intentionally reminiscent of Van Halen? 

T: Actually, we've heard that a lot. When I wrote the guitar riff I didn't really intentionally think Van Halen, but it definitely has that party rock kind of vibe to it. I guess as I was writing it, as it was coming about it definitely reminded me of that, but it wasn't like an intentional thing at first. 

J: I was reading through the lyrics of that song. What does it mean to live a "glorietta life"?

T: Well basically, it means to live a peaceful life. That's what glorietta means, peaceful. The song is kind of a worship song. It's basically talking about God's mercies being renewed everyday, how you can go to bed feeling it's a really, really bad day. You might have gone through a lot of stuff that day, but it's good to know that when you wake up the next morning that it's a new day, and that it's a day full of opportunities and you know there's always another day, no matter how that day went. That's basically what the song is about. 

J: Very cool. I like that. 

T: Cool. 

J: A lot of your lyrics seem to be really personal, lyrics about faith experiences. Do you write from a lot of personal experience?

T: Oh yeah. I write most of the lyrics, but Pat, our bass player, writes some of the lyrics as well. We definitely, I think both of us have a similar writing style as far as like we definitely write off of experiences that we're going through at times in life. I mean, I definitely find just life in general is an influence on my writing. I always try to be aware of what's going on in life, and I just like to write about it. 

J: Is there any story behind the name of the band? Mourning September is a really interesting name. 

T: Actually, there is a little bit of a story. We had a show coming up in the first few months that we had started the band and we didn't have a name yet, so we were kind of trying to think of a name. We were trying to think of names that kind of had the month type of thing, you know, that kind of vibe to it. I had actually gone through a pretty rough month that September the year that we had started the band. Like, in my personal life I had gone through a pretty rough month, so it kind of fit the sound we were going for and it kind of had a meaning behind it. Not to mention the things that were going on with the nation, cause it was the same year that 9/11 had happened. I mean, that's not the reason we named it that, but it fit the mood. Kind of in rememberance of a rough month, I guess. 

J: That's interesting. I read a couple reviews of your album, and it seems to be getting lumped in with the current wave of emo bands. What do you think of current rock music? 

T: Actually, I think there's a lot of really good bands out there. It seems like a lot of bands are trying a lot of new stuff and mixing new elements of music. I think as far as anything super original, like lately it seems like it's getting harder and harder to do that. The way I look at it, and the way all of us look at it is if it's good music then I like to listen to it, you know? I mean, every band draws influence from another band. You always are going to get music where you listen to it and you can compare it to something else. As long as it's really good music and it has some kind of originality to it then I like it. 

J: Who are some of your favorite current bands? 

T: Let's see, I'm definitely really digging the new Further Seems Forever record for sure. There's a band called Acceptance that's really cool. A band called Recover, I definitely like them. They're kind of an underground band, not a lot of people know about them but that will definitely change, hopefully when the new album comes out. Number One Gun, which is a band we've toured with. They're really, really good. Good guys. We've had a chance to hear some of their new stuff that will be coming out and I think everyone's going to be into that. You know, the new Jimmy Eat World that's coming out is really good. There's tons of stuff that I'm into right now. The new Futher Seems Forever is really good. I think this new album they put out is some of their best stuff. I mean, that's just my opinion, but I really like it a lot. 

J: I have a theory that emo is what happens to punks when they get old. Do you think that's valid? 

T: (Laughter) I guess that kind of makes sense. I mean, some of us came from punk or metal or hardcore bands, so it kind of makes sense I guess. I guess the genre title emo is weird to me just because there's so many bands that could fall under that even though they don't consider themselves an actual emo band. I don't know, I guess emo actually started with punk anyways, so that kind of makes sense. 

J: At this point it's a very broad category. 

T: Oh yeah, for sure. Whenever you're younger and you start, whether it's punk or just rock or hardcore... In my own personal experience I was definitely into the more hardcore, sloppy punk kind of music. As I got older I was definitely more into tightening things up a little bit and making the music make a little more sense. 

J: How's the new album being received so far? 

T: It seems like it's been received really well. All the reviews that we've gotten back have been really good, and all the kids that have been coming out to the shows have been really into it. Honestly, we haven't really heard anything bad yet, and that's almost kind of scary. I mean, normally you hear a good bit of both, but it seems like there's been really good response, and there's been a good demand for it, so hopefully that'll just continue. These tours we have coming up, hopefully that'll help a lot as far as getting the record more places. 

J: What do you plan to do next? 

T: Like I was saying, we have these tours lined up in September and October, so we'll be back here by November. Then I know we're setting up our November tours as well, so we plan on touring a lot, and probably going to take the month of December off and write. I'm starting to write some new music for a new album that we'll probably start working on the middle of next year. So that's it, we're just planning on touring as much as possible to promote this album and when we get a chance we'll start preparing for the next one. 

J: Do you have any final thoughts to leave our readers with? 

T: Well, if there's anyone out there who's just now being introduced to us, the band Mourning September, I just want to say thanks for taking the time to read and learn about us. If you get to hear us thanks for listening. As far as to all our fans out there that actually do have the album and listen to it and come out to the shows we really appreciate everyone and we couldn't do it without you.


Aaron: Hello everybody. Thanks you for reading and listening. ~1340mag