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Interview with
TOM MAY
from
THE MENZINGERS

(19th October, 2023)

Interview with Shaquira Hobbs and Dave Bruce

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Dave – Hello and congratulations on your seventh studio album being released today. Can you tell us a bit about the inspiration behind the album and the title?
Tom – Sure. Thank you. Thank you very much. So the inspiration for the record, I mean, it’s our seventh record. How do you stay inspired and not let it become like monotonous? Do what works and don’t try anything new situation.
We did that by working with a new producer. We went and recorded down in the desert in Texas, 30 miles west of El Paso on a pecan farm that is cut up down the bottom part of it by the U.S.-Mexico border. So it was being from the northeast up in the mountains.
It was a completely foreign landscape and geography on top of being like a new experience. For the first couple of days we tried to make something that works for everybody. And it kind of like shook us out of our regular situation and comfort zones.
That really helped make things happen for the title. So we were talking about how when you watch like a sitcom or police drama or something, and then in the beginning, it says, you know, some of the characters are based off of real people and the dates and names have been changed. Then we kind of like spiraled that idea out into the idea of some of it was true.

Dave – How did you get over? How did you get over the border with the big wall that Donald put up (smile)?
Tom – Well, that is funny. You know, there’s always been a wall. There’s no wall that runs the whole way. It’s fucking massive. But my favorite part about Donald Trump’s effort to put up a wall is that to build a wall, you have to create an infrastructure of roads and gas stations and things like that. And by adding all that additional physical wall parts actually increase the ability of people being able to traffic weapons and drugs and themselves over.

Shaquira – When you’re creating, do you go down to this isolated area for creative potential because of the studio, the producer or is it the environment?
Tom – You know, it’s all three. So the studio itself is run by this wild ass character who legend has it that he inspired the “Bill” in the “Kill Bill” series. I don’t know if that’s true. He looks just  like him and he has a sword that he pulls out once in a while.
But as for the studio itself, they created an environment with like a top down culture of this creative space and it was near nowhere. Nothing is near there. So everything’s unlocked 24 hours a day. Everything. No people anywhere.
So you can walk in and out of the studio at all times of night. And that created a like a mystical experience. And the people, you know, working with the new producer, Brad Cook was somewhat hard, but incredibly disarming. And get to the business situation when you are with somebody that you don’t know, that you’re going to try to pour your entire heart and life into. And you’re like, OK, well, I guess we’ll just get past talking about the weather and dive into this. And he’s a person who’s extremely good at that and incredibly empathetic and talented individual.
And then being in the actual desert, everything’s just so, I mean, you guys got the desert. It’s a place where you can really be extremely grounded. Just you and the music rather than all the all the other things going on. ‘Hope is a Dangerous Little Thing’ has confessional lyrics to it.

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Shaquira – Could you share the story behind this?
Tom – Sure. So interestingly, when we had written that song, it was one of the ones that we started to write at the beginning of writing the entire record. We had “Hope is a Dangerous Little Thing’, kind of intro and chorus idea. And it wasn’t fitting into the boxes that we wanted to put it into. And then we eventually were like, no, this is catchy. We love it. We don’t want to have it be. We don’t want people to leave listening to our record, feeling bad about themselves or not hopeful. So we want it to be at least cathartic in some way or at least commiserating in some way. And eventually we sat down, changed the key, changed the tempo, spread it out. And we’re like, OK, we can actually make this a song.
Just let it roll into a reflection of the lives of the people around us and the experiences that we’re having right now. And it and it worked. There’s there’s a little bit of a hope in the catharsis of it.
I mean, it’s like, you know, what do you call it? An emo song or something. But it’s what made it.
It was there and that was it became so catchy and it became such a pain in the ass to love it and not be able to fit it into a box. And as soon as we were able to fit it where we wanted it, it was like a release. Yeah, it was awesome.

Shaquira – That’s cool. So it’s been four years since ‘Hello Exile’. How do you think the band’s creative direction has changed since then? Or evolved
Tom – Sure, that’s a great question. We were actually stuck in Australia when everything went down (Covid). We had the day the prime minister came on TV and shit and was like, OK, tomorrow, nothing over 400 people capacity anywhere or whatever. So we’re like, OK, thankfully the show is today. So we had to book a last flight the next the next day and get the fuck out of Dodge.
And we came back and then we all know the story of the next two years. But the creative direction changed because part of it was we got older and part of it was also because we had to do things differently. We would normally just get into a room and hang out with each other, you know, talk shit, shoot the shit, get like figure out jamming.
And we started to use new stuff, like we’re on Zoom right now. We didn’t use Zoom, but we use like Dropbox and different ways of sharing stuff, things that we were working on. And what came out of that was that we had to be more articulate and intentional about what we were doing.
So we used to rely on just the body language of each other in the room. And then we had to actually talk about the parts of the songs that we were doing. So when we were able to write a new record again together, we were able to combine, you know, 15 years of playing in a room together with this newfound vocabulary and also the like a little bit of technical, you know, skill to be able to combine those things to write better and faster.

Shaquira – Was that evolutionary or was that actually Covid related?
Tom – That change, you know, I guess I’ll never be able to say it wasn’t Covid related. But I would say, yeah, no, it was Covid related because we needed to do something that we couldn’t anymore. So we reimagined the record that we released before this one. That was called ‘Hello Exile’ so we put out one called ‘From Exile’. And when we were working on that, you know, me and one of the other guys went to the studio, we grabbed microphones, we dropped them off at everybody’s houses, you know, like covering our mouths and shit. And then we linked up on the computer and had to rework the songs and have each other send the files. And so, yeah, COVID forced us to become more technically proficient, which worked really to our benefit.

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Shaquira – Where are you housed? Where are you guys situated?
Tom – So we all live in South Philly within, you know, a mile of each other. Yeah. Philadelphia.

Shaquira – Can you share some specific sources of inspiration for the album?
Tom – Yeah, sure. You know, we were in our mid and late 30s. I think a lot of people start to…

Dave – Boys. You’re just boys lol.
Tom – Boys. Yes, boys. Mid to late 30s.

Dave – So I keep on thinking, when you think you’ve had a life in your mid 30s and all that sort of stuff, you look back when you’re 50 and 55 and wonder what you were doing at 30 and 35. So sorry to jump in there, but, you know, it’s just the old man in me.
Tom – No, that highlights perfectly what we’re talking about. So this is the first… You know, we know it’s going to change when we get older. And this is the first time in our lives where we’ve seen so much change. We’ve seen so many people come and go and, you know, people pass away and people get married and get divorced. And it’s so good. It’s so good.

Dave – You don’t realize, because especially you guys, you’ve had a lot of highs, you’ve done a lot of stuff. You’ve achieved a lot of stuff. People have slapped you on the hand and you think we’ve made it sort of thing. And really in the evolution of your life, there isn’t any making it. They’re just the next moment, the next moment, the next moment. And as soon as you let your mind get stuck into the measurement, you’re really out of being present. And really, if you were on stage thinking about what you were going to do next, you’d never be on stage because no one would come and watch your show. So you’ve just got to get into it and sort of do your stuff. So sorry to rant.
Tom – No, that’s totally what we’re saying. So that realization is the main thing I was getting at was that the only thing we kind of realized that’s going to be a constant is the change itself. So we’re trying to reflect that back into into this record.

Dave – You married…kids?
Tom – Married. Yeah. No kids yet. I got seven nephews and a niece. But yeah, got married last year after a little bit of a delay.

Dave – All ahead of you, all ahead of you. Again, sorry. Not trying to be a guru here.
Tom – Yeah. Yeah. You’re this is a great interview.

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Dave – Did you think you’d be here where you are now? 17 years ago.
Tom – That’s a great question, because 17 years ago, I did think I was going to be here now. Maybe 10 years ago, I didn’t. But when we were when we were starting the band, we just assumed that we threw everything else out. So we moved. We grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, which is like two and a half hours north of Philly. It’s like a hour and a half west of New York. And we moved down to Philly right at the beginning of the global financial crisis.
It was perfect timing. We all moved into a house together. And the whole plan was we were going to be musicians. We’re going to be able to tour. We’re going to sell records. That’s what we’re going to do for a living. So that made total sense. We were like, yeah, of course. But then, like in reality, looking at it and seeing the steps that we had to take to get to it and the luck that we had to have.
Yeah, I would not have thought that we would get here. We were extremely lucky and we are extremely appreciative about it. But at the very beginning, we did decide that’s what we were going to do.
And I can’t help but think that maybe that helped a little bit because everybody was like, you know, whatever other dream you had or whatever thing that came up, we would handle it together and make sure that we were able to get over it so we could do this.

Dave – Were you all schoolmates or something or end of uni mates or something, or did you find each other through music and then stick together?
Tom – So the drummer, Joe and I, his grandmother grew up on the same street as my grandmother. So they were best friends. We met when we were like 12, but we would only meet once every couple of years from that. So we knew each other in that way. But we met through music. So we started to with like we came from a punk rock background, we’re still a punk rock band. And within that world, there’s very much an ethos of a do it yourself approach to things. So we would book things that we have for VFW halls, FOE halls, church basements. We booked them ourselves and have shows and people come up and then you meet them. And that was how we that’s that’s how we met Greg, the other singer in our band. He was in a band with my brother and we kind of poached him. And that was that was how we met there.
So, yeah, we were we met through music.

Dave – So you’ve got a brother who who didn’t have a successful career as you’re having now?
Tom – Well, he’s got four beautiful kids and he’s a brilliant chemical engineer. So he did all right.

Dave – But every time you’re having a barbecue out the back and he’s got a beer open, he’s looking at you and he’s saying, “if only”.
Tom – He doesn’t live through our achievements. Maybe he lives through our musical achievements a little bit. But he sees the guts of it. And he’s like, I don’t know. That’s for me. But he you know, he he played in a bunch of different bands. And yeah, we were incredibly close. And he actually just brought all those kids down to see us play another place that’s kind of long story short, it’s within driving distance of everywhere.
And he brought them all down. And we got to see a really cool show. And it was it was a wonderful thing.

Shaquira – Fantastic. So you have a huge dedicated fan base. I did a quick scroll through TikTok and there’s some wild ones out there. So how do you stay dedicated to your fans while still discovering new music, like putting a new spin on your music?
Tom – Yeah, that’s like we’re at the age where, you know, social media, we grew up with it. Facebook started when we were college age. We needed a college email to be able to sign up for it. I remember that. So we’ve kind of like seen that become a whole thing. But we’re also at the age where we’re a little bit older. Don’t like give a fuck about TikTok and Instagram and things like that.
And we’re getting badgered by people like, you know, Neem here, maybe, and our manager and stuff like, hey, you guys can post. And we’re just like, I live in the world. But staying engaged with fans, social media is one of them. And the other one is which was COVID, you know, all that stuff put a really big damper on as we first started touring again. We wouldn’t go hang out with everybody. And, you know, we’re also popular enough now to where we can’t hang out with everybody.
But one of the ways that we stay connected with fans for sure is to hang out at shows to it doesn’t take that long to answer emails and messages and stuff on social media. So we just answer them usually. And we also try to keep in mind that the whole thing that we’re doing, essentially, we’re like we’re playing songs and, you know, playing shows.
But the entire thing is based off of people’s connections to those songs. So we try to keep a top down kind of cultural idea that this is what we’re doing it for with our fans. And thankfully, our fans are very much like us.
They’re pretty normal people, and they’re really fun to hang out with and easy, easy to easy to deal with in a sense.

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Shaquira – And lastly, for me, what do you hope fans will take away from this album?
Tom – You know, I don’t know. I hope it brings them a degree of joy that it brings me to listen to it. And I hope it brings them a degree of joy that it brings me to listen to a lot of my favorite records or a lot of my favorite bands records. So I hope they can listen to it and makes their day a little bit better.

Dave – OK, a couple of a couple of quick questions here for you. Best thing about performing to a live audience?
Tom – Oh, my God. Hearing everyone sing along, hearing people sing in unison. So us four playing and, you know, not everybody’s the best singers, except for the Irish and the Spanish, the Irish and the Spanish dead on always.

Dave – Hearing people sing in harmony together, like a Live Aid thing with Queen, where, you know, the crowd sings and moves like a wave.
Tom – Yeah, exactly. Everybody’s connected. That’s cool.

Dave – OK, piece of advice you’d give to because you’ve got a lot of experience there and you sound like an intelligent person. What advice would you give to, you know, some some artists that are trying to follow your trail?
Tom – Two things, one practice and the other, keep your relationships open. Don’t burn bridges. Yeah, absolutely.

Dave – Connect. That’s good. I’ve got some more really quick questions here, which are the shit questions that no one wants to answer lol. So that’s why we put them here. Favorite album.
Tom – London Calling by The Clash.

Dave – Ah, well, that goes back. Favorite artist.
Tom – The Clash.

Dave – Favorite movie.
Tom – Children of Men.

Dave – Favorite place to visit.
Tom – New Orleans.

Dave – Why New Orleans?
Tom – Parties. It’s a magical place. Something weird there. You don’t even have to party. It’s a vibe.

Dave – Favorite venue to play?
Tom – Probably the Fillmore in Philadelphia. Yes, Philly.

Dave – Favorite food.
Tom – Mexican food. For sure.

Dave – Favorite drink. You would have had a lot of that when you were making the album, I presume.
Tom – Cider.

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Dave – Favorite person in history. Who’s the guy that you refer to when you say, you know, I say Mandela or I say Dalai Lama. Who is your favorite person?
Tom – You can’t it’s so hard to frame somebody in like broad history by like today’s ethical and socioeconomic standards, you know. I’ll tell you what, I don’t have a favorite one, but right now I’m reading a autobiography by Ulysses S. Grant, which is a U.S. president. He was the guy who was the main general in the Civil War. What a time.

Dave – What a time. Isn’t he isn’t he one of the four sculptures?
Tom – I don’t think so. I don’t know. He might be. I might have it wrong. Sorry. Yeah.

Dave – Favorite tattoo. (displays tattoo) Oh, oh my God. You have one. 
Tom – I have a tattoo. Yeah, I got one here. That’s my favorite. Yeah.

Dave – All right. What is it?
Tom – It’s a vulture eating. Well, this is going to sound fucked up, but it’s a vulture eating out of the eye socket of a skull.

Dave – That sounds completely normal. What are you talking about! “Mum, I want to get a tattoo of a vulture eating. Can I do that before school? Yeah. Right. That’s it. When I eventually do my podcast, I’m going to be doing in-depth sort of stuff. So I’m going to come back and I’ll get you for a, you know, deep and meaningful, because you sound like someone that’s that’s thought about that a few times in your life. Thank you.
Tom – Thank you. I would love to do that. Thank you very much.

Dave – Oh, yeah. Thank you. Thank you, man. Sorry we got a rush, but we’ve got to get to this other thing. You’ve been spectacular.
Tom – The Phillies are in the fucking playoffs in ten minutes. I got to go, you know?

Dave – No, go Phillies. You know what the hat is (I ask Tom about the cap I am wearing)?
Tom – What’s that? I don’t know. Is it that temple?

Dave – The Tennessee Vols, Tennessees football team.
Tom – Oh, yeah. Oh, OK. Oh, yeah.

Dave – Nice talking to you, bud. Nice meeting you. Nice talking to you. And we’ll be back in touch.
Tom – Awesome. All the best. Thank you. Nice meeting you both. I really appreciate it.

Dave – Thank you.
Tom – Thank you guys. Thanks so much.

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Follow THE MENZINGERS
Website – Instagram – Facebook – Twitter

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Press Release 15th October 2023 (below) HERE

THE MENZINGERS
release new album
‘SOME OF IT WAS TRUE’

Out now via EPITAPH

+ Watch new music video for ‘TRY’

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AMNPLIFY – DB