>(Gareth) I'm Gareth and I play bass.

>(Ryan) Uhh... I'm Ryan... Drums

We have been fans of you guys for years now. Being from across the pond, is there a huge difference from the UK experience and the US experience when dealing with fans, tours, venues etc?

>(Ryan) It's not very different.

>(Gareth) Yea... Not much really. The kids are always very into what we do and we're thankful for that because we enjoy doing it.

>(Ryan) We're also viewed as more underground in the states where as in the UK we're considered mainstream.

Your music seems to evolve with each and every album, specifically your latest "Tales Don't Tell Themselves," which has a more mature sound than the efforts before it. What was different this time around, in the writing and recording process?

>(Gareth) Mainly we were trying to gain back some excitement. There hasn't nearly been as much as there was when we started. Like we had a record out, we just signed a record deal and setup our first major tour and we were all still pretty young and we were all really excited by everything that was going on. So when we sat down to write this one it was a lot different, we didn't have as much going on all at once.

This time around you worked with Gil Norton on the producing side. How different was it from working with Terry Date on Hours?

>(Ryan) Gil is just more of a rock kinda guy than Terry who did the "Hours" record and Colin who did our first record and of course they were really good producers, but didn't really have the same sort of reputation as Gil. He had a lot more rock and he focused more on the basics, like getting the tempos right and making sure everything was together, so it was different in that way.

How has Atlantic been in realizing the vision you guys have set for the band and your maturing sound?

>(Gareth) Uhhh.. they've been great, they've kinda taken on our change a bit and that's pretty satisfying. The new record like Ryan said makes us seem like a new band or underground in the US and it's about getting over here as much as possible.

Since you guys tour with a lot of metal bands, how do you deal with the attitude that many metal fans seem to have with you? Even going to some lengths as to call you guys things like "sheep shaggers."

>(Ryan) *laughs* You know the truth is, we go out and do our thing. We're never gonna change the way we are, we are what we are, you don't have to like it, I mean we love it.

You guys have been nominated 'Best British Band' by the Kerrang! magazine awards for 3 years in a row, awarded "Best UK Newcomer," and you are the first band to be on the cover of Kerrang! before actually releasing an album. Have you guys gotten to know the people behind the periodical pretty well? Since they pretty much fancy you as the best new wave of Post-Hardcore out there and we would have to agree with them!

>(Gareth) Wow, that's news to us. We didn't even know that. Well we've got a lot of friends in the UK so we get to know everybody pretty quickly, especially when you see them 4 or 5 times a year. Which is more than we even get to see our families. It's nice knowing all of these people, but I don't think it really has an effect on their opinions. They're journalists and that's what they get paid to do, say what they feel and that's exactly what they're supposed to do.

>(Ryan) With all of the magazines in the UK, the community in the UK is pretty close. Generally people hangout in London. But I mean you guys probably read about that in magazines. It's just really a close community over there.

We saw that some rabid fans of f4af had figured out the dial tones of the number that was dialed at the beginning of your song "Streetcar" turned out to be Matt Davis'(Lead Singer) phone number. How fast did it take for people to start spamming your phone and what did you do?

>(Gareth) Well we did that song as a demo and we were gonna change it for the record but we forgot about it. But before we realized it, since today it's all dial-tones today, kids realized that if you just literally hold up the speaker to the phone, the dial-tone will actually dial the number. The phone itself doesn't actually function off the numbers, it's just the tone. So one day somebody held the phone up to the speaker and Matt answered and was like "Hey it's Matt" and the person was like "Matt Davis?" and he's like "Yea" and the girl just shrieked and Matt put the phone down. 10 Minutes later he gets another call, and another one, and another.

Well was it a Cell phone or a Home phone?

>(Gareth) It was his cell phone.

Well at least it wasn't his home phone.

>(Gareth) Yea that would have sucked, it would have been a lot more work to get the number changed.

The band Fightstar is in the same style as you guys and even covered your song "She Drove Me to Daytime Television." Are you guys friends and ever think about touring with them? I'm sure that would be an awesome bunch of brits packed into one venue.

>(Ryan) Yea... we've toured with them plenty of times. Before we joined the Warped tour we did a little headlining tour in the US and they were the support on that tour and they've been with us in the UK before as well and we've known those guys for a long time and we're big fans of their music. They have a new record out and it's really great.

I hear that most of the band isn't fond of the song "The Getaway Plan" and rarely play it live despite countless requests. What is the reason?

>(Gareth) It's not that we don't like playing it live, it's just that it's old Funeral For A Friend and that song wasn't released on a wide scale you know, and there's a lot of old songs that we don't play a lot. It's not that we don't like them, we just don't feel that they represent us as we are now.

Even though the year is more than half way over, what is one of your most anticipated releases of 2007?

>(Ryan) Yea... like the Fightstar record is really good, uhh... and the new Recieving End of Sirens record.

>(Gareth) There's so many coming out.

The guy that wrote this's personal favorite song is "Escape Artists Never Die." What is your personal favorite song in general and which is your favorite to play live?

>(Ryan) Umm... I like playing that one.

>(Gareth) Yea.. that's definitely one of our favorites, if not, definitely a big crowd favorite and I don't think we've ever played a show without it since it's been released.

>(Ryan) I mean yea as far as new stuff though, I get a kick out of playing that stuff because there's so much off there that is so different than what we usually play.

Seeing that you guys are taking a more polished and collected take on your music for your most recent album, is there any chance that we could see the harder side of f4af come out again, like we remember from songs like "This Years Most Open Heartbreak" and most of the songs from the early EPs and "Casually Dressed and Deep in Conversation?"

>(Ryan) There's always room for that.

>(Gareth) Yea, I mean we've never sat down while writing a record and said "Ok this one's going to be really heavy" or "This one is going to be really melodic," it just comes out as it is you know. If it sounds good, then of course we're going to use it. If somebody comes up with a riff that is seriously fucking brutal and it sounds good and we feel it, then yea we'll use it absolutely.

>(Ryan) We still play a lot of our old stuff live you know it's just a collection of all of our stuff. We don't shy away from any style as a band and if something's good of course it's going to make it to the record.

So you guys really just play how you feel at that moment then?

>(Gareth) Yea... and that's how everybody should.

Well that's about it, Thanks so much for taking time out of Warped to answer our questions. Is there anything that you guys would like to say to the readers of Skylinepress.net?

>(Gareth) Thanks a lot for your support. The new record is out now so go pick it up.

One last thing though. Pernell from Skylinepress wanted me to mention something to you guys at the end of the interview. So here it is "Keep up the good work and keep making awesome music that we will bump in the backseat, which IS all the rage."

>(Ryan) *laughs*

>(Gareth) Haha I got what he was doing with that.