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Since lead singer Matt Pryor walked and the Get Up Kids disbanded in 2005, countless emo acts—including Fall Out Boy—have cited the Kansas City pop-punks as an influence. Now, Pryor’s band has reformed to commemorate the 10th anniversary of their seminal disc “Something to Write Home About,” which will be reissued Sept. 8 with bonus material, including a recent live presentation of the album.
“We’re kind of playing all of the songs except ‘Long Goodnight’ and ‘The Company Dime.’ Neither of those are that interesting,” Pryor explains, talking about the group's latest live shows. “But you never know, they may come up. We could play 90 percent of the record in our sleep.”
The Get Up Kids will be in town Sunday, Nov. 8, for a show at Newport Music Hall with Kevin Devine and The Life and Times.
Metromix spoke to Pryor, who was at his home in Lawrence, Kan., by phone in August. We were supposed to talk about the upcoming Get Up Kids reunion tour, but it was Pryor’s first interview following some controversial comments made by his bandmate Jim Suptic about groups the Get Up Kids have influenced—specifically some, like Fall Out Boy, that the band played with earlier this summer at the Bamboozle festival in New Jersey in New Jersey. So you can guess what took up most of the conversation.
It should be noted that at the end of our interview, Pryor asked for Metromix to clarify that he wasn’t angry about the state of emo. He just finds the whole thing “hilarious.”
“Something to Write Home About” celebrates its 10-year anniversary this year. Do you still relate to those songs?
I feel like a lot are kind of angrier than I necessarily try to be now. There’s a lot of discontent. [Laughs] But there aren’t any songs that I completely go, “Oh God, that’s so dumb.”
What’s the relationship like with your band mates backstage and on the tour bus?
We drink a lot and make fun of each other. We just bust each other’s balls all the time. Everybody is real mellow—mellower than we were when we broke up.
What prompted the Get Up Kids to break up in 2005?
I quit.
But why?
I was really miserable and getting ready to have my second child. I didn’t want to go on tour. I needed a break. I was very lonely on the road and unhappy. They called me out on it. They said we need you to give 100 percent or not do it at all. And I said, well, then, let’s just not do it at all. It probably could have been avoided—but it was a dark time.
Did you guys stay in contact during the hiatus?
I didn’t talk to Jim [Suptic] or James [Dewees] for a long time. I had contact with the Popes [brothers Rob and Ryan] but it was very unnerving and stressful—like we really weren’t getting along very well. But then one day we went to go see Robbie [Pope], who plays in Spoon, play here in Lawrence and we all got together for a beer after that. Enough time had passed that all of that tension had melted away—99 percent of it.
And that’s what led to the reunion?
Yeah, it was, kind of. A big thing for me was that everyone had moved on. I didn’t want it to be like, “Oh, we don’t have any money, so we need to get back together.” I wanted to be like we all have our own lives outside of this but this is something we enjoy doing. It had finally gotten to that point. We had talked about if we were going to do anything for the 10-year anniversary but we’re just using that as an excuse [to tour]. We don’t actually care about the 10-year anniversary of the record.
Jim Suptic was recently quoted in an interview he did with Drowned in Sound as saying of the current emo scene, "If this is the world we helped create, then I apologise." Was Jim quoted correctly?
Ah, yeah. I mean, the people coming to our headlining shows—the three or four we have done—as far as the audience goes, seems to be more our peers, and our friends and people we relate to. The Bamboozle fest was fun but it definitely made me feel old. [Laughs] I didn’t really get it. It wasn’t my scene at all. I don’t know? Everyone just wants to lump us in with bands that have said they’re influenced by us. I think we have thought this for a very long time, just never said it in public.
So then I take it you agree with Jim’s statement?
Oh, absolutely. Completely. The way I took his statement, was really just kind of like when they ask about the current state of the [emo] scene, he doesn’t have an opinion on it, he just looks out and says this doesn’t have anything to do with who we are—or who we were.
Right. But the way it has played out in the media, and the way I see it, is as an apology for bands like Fall Out Boy.
I don’t necessarily mind Fall Out Boy. I don’t own any of their records or anything but I don’t think they’re that terrible. I think there are a lot of other [emo] bands other than them that I’m not a fan of…ah, I’m not explaining myself very well. Let’s try this again. Ask me the same question again.
Do you feel a need to apologize, whether sarcastically or seriously, for all the bands that have cited you as an influence?
I don’t think the other bands are even really relevant to who we are at all. I mean, I don’t think we need to apologize for anything. Jim’s comment was made in sort of a tongue-in-cheek kind of way. We don’t even acknowledge the people who say we’re as influential as we are—we just are what we are. We’ve always just done our own thing.
