In the spirit of midterms, the Daily sat down with the Pop Tards, a pop-punk band composed of sophomore Korey Aaronson, junior Garrett Wojcik and West Connecticut State University senior Chris Morano, and gave them a written test about their recent album "Extra Fun Party Time" and their history as a group. Actually, it wasn't so much a test as it was an interview, but somehow these irreverent rockers still only barely managed to pass.
Tufts Daily: Give us some background on The Pop Tards.
Chris Morano: Well, the band is: Garrett on drums and vocals, Korey on guitars and myself handling the bass and vocals. For live shows, our friend Andrew fills in on drums and Garrett switches to rhythm guitar (and vocals).
Korey Aaronson: Yeah, I met Chris when I was a freshman in high school back in Conn. He was a couple of years older than me, but we were both on the same soccer team. One day we got into this huge argument on the bus over whether or not M?¶tley Cr??e was better than Good Charlotte (like that's even a question, long live the Cr??e!!).
Anyway, we ended up playing in some really bad bands together, none of which worked out. We continued to make some music with one another, but nothing serious. Garrett, who lived in my hall in Hodgdon last year, heard some of the demos we had done and really dug them. He lives in Conn. too, so he asked to play/record with us and The Pop Tards was born.
TD: What are your goals as a band?
Garrett Wojcik: Well, we definitely don't take ourselves too seriously. We try to write really catchy pop tunes with dumb lyrics about drinking and teenage angst.
KA: We're just a bunch of friends making fun music to party to (hence the name of the album title). All three of us go to school full time, so we try to write individually when we can and bring it all together every once in a while.
CM: We have goals?
TD: Could you describe your sound?
CM: One part Weezer, two parts high school party, 10% sweet guitar solos, a teaspoon of Johnny Depp-like attractiveness, and a couple gallons of female rejection. Might as well throw in some Blink-182 in there too for good luck.
TD: What are your major influences?
KA: Vengaboys, Ricky Martin, the soundtrack to "A Goofy Movie" [1995] ... pretty standard I'd say.
CM: I'm always under a lot of different influences, which explains why I don't have a drivers' license anymore.
GW: I am the influence. Next question.
TD: What are your plans for the future?
KA: Well, we have a 21 song CD, "Extra Fun Party Time," which we just got finished up, so we are trying to promote that. It was recorded last summer at Garrett's studio, but we just put it out recently. We played our first show in January, so we are going to work on playing some more; maybe even play Battle of the Bands here at Tufts. I am also working on possibly setting up a mini tour for us down the East Coast in May/June.
GW: Yeah. We also have almost enough material for the next album, which we will probably start recording in May.
TD: Any last comments?
GW: Check us out at http://www.myspace.com/thepoptards.
KA: Come see us at Battle of the Bands. We will dress up in silly outfits.
CM: Don't drink and drive.
-by Jacob Worrel
