Stretch Arm Strong

She’s five. People always say “What do you guys do when you’re off tour?” and I say, “Man I’m a dad and I try to handle things around the house.” My wife’s a schoolteacher so while I’m home I try to pick back up and do my part so I don’t feel like a complete bum.

My daughter just started kindergarten and my wife teaches first grade so she’ll be at the same school as my wife which will be good. When I’m home I take her to school and then pick her up and then run her around and all that stuff. I just try to be a normal dude when I’m home, man.

I got tattoos. I used to have my ears pierced but I took them out after kids at concerts would accidentally rip them out. Or I’d fall asleep on the hotel floor and wake up with my head attached to the floor. So I went down to small plugs and then I lost them. I was like, “Man these earrings are way too expensive to keep losing.” So I was like, “Ah, I’ll just invest my money in tattoos.”

Yeah, it certainly doesn’t sound very rock and roll but it’s the truth. Instead of buying more earrings and piercings I just started getting into tattoos more. So that’s either good or bad depending on how you look at it. I got my chest done and both my arms and the inside of my arms. But I guess what I have is fairly in the grand scheme of things.

Yeah, it’s funny man. We were out front of my house the other day and my daughter had this little scooter and I’m on my skateboard. This guy pulls up in a Lexus or a Jaguar and says to me “Excuse me son, is your mom home?” I’m like, “I don’t know man, I can call her. She’s at work right now. I can find out.” Then he goes “Oh, this is your place?” I’m like, “Yeah dude, this is my place. I’ve lived here eight years.” I figure it’s a compliment.

We just got home from Europe about five days ago. Soon we are going to be touring with Sick of It All.

Dude, I’m psyched man. I didn’t necessarily grow up on the band but I’ve been a fan of the band for a long time so I can’t wait. We toured with them briefly in Europe last summer so I’m real psyched to actually get to do a real tour with them. I think their new record is awesome even though some reviewers don’t like it as much.

Yeah we’ve done some really good tours in the past couple months. We did a Suicide Machines tour back in November. Strung Out in October, went right into a Story of the Year in the States in December. January we headlined in the UK on our own.

Good man. I was just reading the new Revolver about these bands and their inner turmoil with people hating each other and they don’t want to tour anymore. We just don’t have that, maybe it’s because we’re older dudes or maybe it’s because we’ve been at it for a while or maybe it’s because we don’t have any addicts in our band. I don’t say that lightly because we’re friendly with a lot of bands who have those problems. But fortunately we just don’t have that problem and we’ve been at it long enough where if somebody’s acting out of line or doing something that’s just not cool we know each other well enough that we keep each other in check.

Yeah David and I are active in that we definitely support animal rights, all over the world. We got nominated for 1996’s sexiest vegetarian or something silly like that. We support PETA and what they’re doing. We support a lot of groups that are looking out for the well being of animals. Besides us our band actually is made up of meat eaters, which some people find just completely offensive or contradictory, but for David and I, it’s just a personal choice.

Not anymore man. For a while I was a Taco Bell and French fry vegetarian. I was vegan for a while and then in Japan I was unable to keep up my veganism after Japan but I don’t find it difficult anymore. Even Wendy’s sells salads.

I work at a club in Columbia, South Carolina when I’m home and the SuicideGirls tour actually stopped there in so I worked one of the shows.

by Daniel Robert Epstein

SG Username: AndersWolleck