Coat by Yohji Yamamoto; tank tee by John Varvatos;
THE INTERVIEW|TYSON RITTER & WILL WOLFSLAU
You had your first show opening for blink-182 on their reunion tour last night. How did it go?
It was great. Crowd was great. Covered my body in glitter and went out there and scared the shit out of the kids.
Is the glitter a new thing?
Yeah. I went dancing in Germany one night, it was about 3 in the morning, and all of a sudden this girl just pours this massive bag of glitter over my head. I get home, take off my shirt, and I go ‘oh shit, this is happening from now on. I love this.’
Is it weird playing with blink? They were one of the biggest acts around when Rejects were just starting out.
It’s surreal. I was throwing CDs at these guys’ feet when I was fifteen. Ten years later I’m playing shows with them. I never would’ve believed it if you had told me.
How is being a successful rock musician different then you imagined at fifteen?
Rock and roll is a little changed, right? It used to be this decadent, drug induced, sexual rampage. Now it seems … maybe it’s a little safer now. But we’re trying to mix it up as much as we can. I never really thought I’d be here, so I never had any expectations outside of grabbing a microphone, whipping my hair, all the superhero shit you think about.
I feel rock musicians also have a very different relationship with fans today. With all of the changes in media, in access, with MySpace, streaming video, Twitter...
You kind of have to smother them. You have to be all over them.
How do you feel that these new relationships benefit the band?
The kids that are interested in getting a little further in touch with us, to feel out what we are, as a band, personally. If they need that sort of attachment, we’re definitely there to give it to them. I’m pretty much an open book. And I think it’s cool to interact with our true, diehard fans. We want to do what we can to make them feel special, to make sure that they know we appreciate them, because we wouldn’t be doing what we do, what we love, without their appreciation.
You’ve diversified your projects outside of the band recently, appearing in ‘The House Bunny’, fashion editorials...what would you say has been your most rewarding ‘extracurricular activity’?
Things have kind of snowballed now. The fashion work has probably been the most beneficial, to actually grow my career a little bit in the fashion world. It’s probably my favorite thing to shake in front of a camera and find out if the photographer is gonna shake with me. There’s this great line along which rock n’ roll and fashion have always influenced each other. Bowie, Freddie, Keith...those guys have always been rock stars in fashion as well as music. I always think back to that Scott Weiland Prada ad. And when I was I kid I was like, ‘I want to be that. I want to do that.’
I think it’s cool for fans to have a gateway into fashion via someone they admire.
It’s cool when you see it, it’s classy, but it’s also kind of dangerous at the same time. Like those Scott Weiland Prada ads. You knew he was fucked up, but he looked so good, that it just made it even better.
And then you have your first film role, in last year’s ‘The House Bunny’.
It was fun. I happened to be hammering nails in the house that day, and I got a call to come over to some random building, and all of a sudden I’m standing in front of Adam Sandler. And I’m like ‘Oh. So this is happening!’ Did a read and got the part. Everybody on set was great. I did a comedy, I think that was cool. But I’d like to dive into a role sometime that’s really, really tortured, something messed up.
A darker turn?
I kinda need to exorcise those demons.
You don’t work them all out through the music?
I think you’re always working demons out everywhere you can.
I noticed that the music video for “Gives You Hell” and one of your AAR TV episodes both feature two Tysons. Is there something going on there?
There may be, maybe subconsciously. I think when you live on the road as long as we have, we’ve been at it for ten years, in between tours we take three or four months off at home. And I think you do have this Clark Kent/Superman split ego. You have a normal life, and a life that’s so different from that.
I like to think that we’re sailors on the sea. We travel in vessels, we stay under deck, inside all day, and then we play our hour in the sun. And you lose complete touch with reality. Maybe there are two people in you, it’s probably three. It’s fun to bounce back and forth.
You did a live performance on ‘The Today Show’ quite recently, and you’ve produced several concert DVDs. Do you perform differently for the camera?
Yeah. I definitely do. You choke up a bit. Not in a bad way. You get a little less fluid, a little mechanical, a little tense. But going from playing on Craig Kilborn’s show seven years ago to ‘The Today Show’ two weeks ago, I was cool as a cucumber on ‘The Today Show’. I feel like that was probably the most comfortable we’ve been on television. It depends on the gravity of the show, who’s going to see it. But it’s always different when the camera’s on.
Have you been song writing on the current tour?
Everyday. Everyday I’ve been writing. It’s been crazy. We’ve been having some really fortunate opportunities to write with other people. It’s the first time that I’ve been brave enough to let go in front of complete strangers.
Are you more productive on tour because of the exhilaration of the live performances, or worn down from all the waiting...
A little bit of both. You wait so long all day to play that you can get pretty self-destructive. But for the most part it’s productive. When it’s not productive, that’s when it’s time to stop.
I’ve always been struck by the playfulness of your public appearance. You always seem like you’re having fun.
We are having fun. I always hate it when bands are afraid to step beyond the fact that they’re cool as shit, and just show themselves to people. A lot of bands guard themselves so people can’t know them personally. We’re just four guys from Oklahoma. Yeah, we are playful! We’re having fun out here, man. It’s the best tour of our lives, the best run of our lives.
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