Interviews

Focused Minds

Drew Wilkinson from Run With The Hunted

Careful planning and preparation haha. As long as I get a solid 8 hours of sleep every night and eat adequately I can handle any tour. When I book our tours, I purposely route them to have the shortest drives possible so we can all stay rested and not get sick. Alone time is crucial as well and I try to make time for myself when I can. One person usually sleeps alone in the van; it’s kind of like having your own personal apartment for a night. I find that reading helps a lot too because for the few hours a day I can do it, it allows me to escape the reality of the tour – I’m stuck in a metal box on wheels for weeks or months at a time away from most of the people and things I love. Immersing myself in a good book is a nice break.

Those moments do happen every once in a while. Usually they are the low points of tour when things are continuously going wrong and morale is low. Those moments are important in their own ways though, they really test your conviction and intentions. They bring everything into focus and purify the experience by boiling it down to its simplest elements. There have been times when I feel like the hardcore community has moved so far away from what it was (and what I would like it to be) that I feel disheartened and frustrated. I meet plenty of apathetic and ignorant kids at shows on the road. I guess I deal with it by doing my best to inform and inspire kids like that to look beyond the surface of things and try to extract a deeper sense of what’s going on in the world. I want to give people a different perspective and get them to question their own beliefs and create their own sense of reality instead of relying on other people to do it for them.

We’ve been really fortunate as a band in this sense; more people than I ever would have imagined have taken us into their homes (as complete strangers), cooked us food, and just gone above and beyond to make us feel welcome in places that couldn’t be farther from home. We had a really bad show in Bremerton, WA last summer and we were on tour with a band from Sweden called Anchor, so money was tight. Our friend Brian put us up at his house and made us shit tons of amazing food the night before and then the show just tanked. I was starting to get sick and morale was really low, I think we got like $20 between the two bands. After the show, Brian just walked up to me in the van and handed me an envelope with some money in it and just said “Take this.” I protested and protested but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. It brought me to tears that someone would be willing to give us their hard earned money to help us chase our dream; that kind of thing just doesn’t happen every day you know? There have been a lot of people who have done extraordinary things for us on the road and we’re eternally grateful to all of them.

Honestly no, I don’t see myself touring in five years, at least not full time. There are other things I want to do with my life most of which can’t start until the band ends. Right now I love touring and it makes sense for what I’m trying to do but I don’t know if that will be the same in five years. Who knows though, I guess it really depends on what happens with the band. If the opportunities are there, why not? Most of that is out of my control though. I think for certain genres of music touring is essential; punk and hardcore is definitely one of them. But I never want to be that band who keeps putting out music and touring long after their prime; I don’t want to outwear our welcome and beat a dead horse.

Occasionally yah. We meet and stay with a lot of really creative and progressive people and often times, they inspire us take some of their ideas home with us. We’ve stayed in some really awesome collectives and squats and that lifestyle is really interesting to me. Anchor loved to play Frisbee and now we never go on tour without one. As a vegan, I get to try a lot of new and interesting food on the road too, and I definitely implement new recipes into my life after tour. Some of the promoters and venues we play in are really inspirational too; oftentimes they exist completely outside of the control of any single person or corporation. The most inspiring thing about punk and hardcore to me is that it is (still) a community of young people who are creating and controlling something themselves. The goal isn’t profit or making a smart move for your future – it’s based purely on passion, on doing something you love for the simple fact that you love it. People who take that kind of control of their lives and make things happen for themselves really inspire me, and I try to take that attitude home and implement into my own life. DIY is a lifestyle – not just a way to book shows.

Amp Magazine

IAN (guitar) and JASON (bass)
Interview and Photos By Dan Gonyea

Arizona’s RUN WITH THE HUNTED has been touring heavily in support of their self-titled album on Panic Records. Just off a full US tour, the band will be a part of the first ever Panic Records Showcase in May as part of Seattle’s Rainfest weekend. Their guitarist Ian and bassist Jason took some time to chat about their recent touring and latest record.

What were the highs and lows of the huge tour you guys just wrapped up?

IAN: The tour was great and a huge success for us. I can’t really think of too many low points about it to be honest. It was definitely our best tour as a band thus far. Most of the shows had good turnouts, and more people were coming out to see us since the last time we went out. Of course there were a few shows that weren’t the greatest, but even then, it gave us the opportunity to play to some new people that had never heard of us before, so that still made it worthwhile.
I guess one low point that I can think of was for our guitarist Jonathan. He sprained his ankle during a very intense game of “Frockey” (which for those who don’t know is a hybrid of ultimate frisbee and hockey) against the guys in ANOTHER BREATH and MAYFLOWER. We had quite a hefty lead, and we still think Teddy took Jonathan out on purpose. So for the next few shows, Jonathan had to either sit down or stand in one place during our set. Sadly, that is about as exciting as one of tours gets, aside from us arguing about movies, music, and politics with each other.
Do you have a niche of kinds of shows you enjoy playing the most?

IAN: I don’t think we have a specific niche or group of people that we prefer playing to over any other. We make a conscious effort to have something that can appeal to a broader spectrum of people; whether it’s musically, or whether it’s something lyrically. We’re not concerned with being “big” or “hyped.” For us, it’s about putting all of our frustrations and passion to music, and as long as people have something they can connect with when they see us live or listen to our records, then I feel that we’ve been successful.
I will say that we typically don’t go over too well with the “tough guy” groups. I don’t think we really consider that a bad thing though.

How important is it being able to tour with bands you get along with vs. new bands you haven’t toured with before?

IAN: It’s always great touring with people you know. I think that is a no-brainer, but I don’t think it’s absolutely necessary. The idea of meeting (or touring with) people you don’t know is one of the greatest aspects of being on the road in my opinion. It gives people the chance to get out and interact with other, and in most cases, make new friends which seems to be something less and less people are doing nowadays. For instance, when we toured the U.S. with ANCHOR, we didn’t know them at all beforehand, but by the end of the tour we had a very solid bond with them. I think the same goes for the guys in THE EFFORT and CHOKE UP. Other than Jonathan, we didn’t really know them all too well. But we played a couple of really fun shows with them here in AZ and had a great time, and now consider them our friends.

How has working with Panic been?

IAN: They give us a lot more promotion and distribution than we’ve had previously. They work very hard at keeping a lot of people up to date on what Panic, and their bands, have going on. Timm has always been a huge supporter and friend of this band. Even as far back as our first EP, he has been helping distribute our records and asking us when we were going to put out a record on Panic. He seemed to actually understand what we were doing, and also appreciate it, so it made perfect sense for us to work with him.

Your self-titled record is now out on Panic Records. How do you think the record came out in retrospect?

IAN: It’s something that we are all very proud of. We all feel that our last release Destroy All Calendars was where we started to finally come into our own as a band, so we wanted this record to not only be an extension of that, but a progression as well. Being that it was going to be a full length, we had a lot more room to explore a lot of new things, and I think we took full advantage of that. I think we all feel that it’s the best thing any of us has ever created musically.

The record’s artwork is pretty intricate. Who did it, and was it envisioned with a certain motif of the record in mind?

IAN: I don’t think we really had a particular idea in mind when we chose who we wanted to do the artwork for the record. We wanted it to be something less typical of most hardcore record covers. That, and wanted to go with an artist whose art we also enjoyed, so we decided to go with Drew Speziale. He has done artwork for many bands like KYLESA, JUNIUS, and CIRCLE TAKES THE SQUARE, whom he is also the vocalist for. We really liked his style, and he agreed to do it, so that was pretty much it.

You guys said a couple years ago that punk and hardcore “was always supposed to be intelligent, poignant, and political.” Is there an emphasis on politics in your band specifically?

JASON: Without question, nothing has had a greater impact on my development than the punk/hardcore community. I can trace the moment I first considered Veganism to the first time I heard ONE KING DOWN. I know that my life long struggles with sexism, racism, and homophobia were birthed through bands like PROPAGANDHI, CRASS, and the DEAD KENNEDYS. I can even attribute the idea that it’s okay to be vulnerable to bands like AMERICAN NIGHTMARE and SAETIA. It’s so disheartening to tour around the country seeing radical politics disappearing from a community that thrives upon it. Our primary focus as a band is, and always will be, based on this premise.

RWTH’s lyrics tend to be on the dark side. Does writing and playing in the band offer a form of self-therapy of the issues often brought up lyrically?

JASON: It would be safe to say that RUN WITH THE HUNTED is a cathartic release for everyone involved. We are often times misunderstood as being a solely political band which almost sells short the aspect of the band that interests me most. While many of the lyrics/themes are blatantly political they come from a place of self-examination and seek to document a personal struggle. For example, Destroy All Calendars was dealing with Drew’s total contempt for being born into a culture that is so utterly destructive. The goal is never to expound some sort of “Anti-Civ Manifesto,” but to help come to terms with and utilize these feelings. So I would say it’s totally fair to call this process: “Self Therapy.”