INTERVIEW WITH THE BRIEFS
SEPTEMBER 2004
(QUESTIONS ASKED BY JOCKE FROM SKRAMMELBULJONG/ROCKMIX)

1.When did the members get together and started the band?
Steve E. Nix: The band started in 1999.

2.Was there a particular reason that you’ve started The Briefs?
Steve E. Nix Just a genuine love for punk rock.
When we started, as far as we could tell, not many bands were playing the kind of stuff we’re into.
Like first wave punk rock.
Like songs with hooks.
Our attitude was, and is, “screw all this emo shit and NOFX wanna-be garbage that’s passing as punk.
Let’s play stuff like the Vibrators and the Boys and the Angry Samoans.”

3.The name The Briefs, where does it come from?
Steve E. Nix: The name means ‘short’, or ‘consice’… our first gig was only three songs long, so the name fit.

4.Is Seattle the hometown of you all?
Steve E. Nix: Yes.

5.Who are the members, can you tell me a little about them?
Steve E. Nix: I play guitar and sing, Daniel J. Traventi plays guitar and sings, Lance Romance plays bass and sings, and Chris Brief plays drums and sings.
We are all nervous humans with enigmatic tendencies.

6.Are you making the songs and lyrics together or is it single persons behind them?
Steve E. Nix: Whoever is singing the song usually wrote it.
We all contribute to how the songs end up at rehearsals though.

7.Where does the inspiration to the lyrics came from?
Steve E. Nix: Personally, I usually take a real life experience, and then lie about it until it becomes interesting.
Our topics can be a little absurd.

8.What do you call the music that you play, what name do you prefer?
Steve E. Nix: Punk rock. Like, spazzy first wave punk rock.
Some people are calling it “Now Wave”.

9.Is it easy to play and get gigs with this kind of punkrock in Seattle a town we here in Sweden mostly knows as the capitol town of grunge?
Steve E. Nix: Yeah, at the shitty little bars where all decent bands start out you can be really terrible and play anything resembling punk rock music and get a gig.
We play mostly all ages shows, and over the last few years we’ve built a pretty decent following here.

10.You have toured the U.S at least three times and I think Europe two times. Can we expect you back soon in Sweden?
Steve E. Nix: We’re coming back to Europe in November this year… I don’t think Sweden is on the schedule for this tour though… we will For sure come back though, we had a blast in Sweden!

11.If you are coming back, is it any chance that you are going to visit the northern parts?
Steve E. Nix: We will have to bother our booking agent about that!

12.Have you got some favourite gig through the years?
Steve E. Nix: My favourite gigs were when we toured with the Damned and also with TSOL.
The shows were great because we were playing with our heroes, and also they happened to be really cool guys.
Captain Sensible joined us on stage a couple of nights to perform Jet Boy Jet Girl with us!

13.Have you got any major influences?
Steve E. Nix: Man, we’ve got hundreds of major influences… we are all record collector geeks.
Everything from early80’s skate punk and hardcore like the Zero Boys, to all the Killed By Death type stuff, to the punk/new wave stuff like the Rezillos and Devo, The first wave of English punk bands are pretty much all great and we’re heavily influenced by the great songwriting.
The Heartbreakers and Voidoids… the Adolescents and DI and Youth Brigade and TSOL… the Saints, the Kids, the Real Kids, Kid Rock (just kidding), the Lewd, La Peste, the Weirdos and the Dickies, um….
The Rude Kids, that’s the only old Swedish punk band I’m really familiar with.
I’m happy that everyone in the band likes a lot of different stuff y’know?
I mean, who wants another punker band that sounds just like GBH? I like GBH quite a bit, but, you know…

14.Where do you guys buy your sunglasses?
Steve E. Nix: Thrift stores and gas stations.
Really ugly but cool ones are getting harder to find.

15.Is there any Swedish bands that you have heard?
Steve E. Nix: Yeah, of course. Randy is great. International Noise Conspiracy is really big here in the US.
I’ve got a comp. of street punk from Sweden that has a lot of great stuff on it… I can’t remember the band names though.
Abba. Backyard Babies are from Sweden right?I saw them in Seattle and really dug it.
The Hives are still pretty big in the US.
Hellacopters, Demons, Bombshell Rocks are killer.

16.Can we expect any new releases?
Steve E. Nix: Yeah, for sure. If they still like us, our next record will be on B.Y.O. again.
We like to release a lot of 7”’s as well.

17.The album Sex Objects, what is the public response of it?
Steve E. Nix: Really good so far. When people are requesting the new songs at shows, that’s a positive for us.
Some reviewers think it’s our best record yet.
The reviewers who like Slipknot hate our new record. As they should.

18.What do you think your fans get, if they are going to a gig with The Briefs?
Steve E. Nix: They get one of the best gigs they will see all year.

19.In which part of the world do you think it is most fun to play?
Steve E. Nix: I don’t know… there’s good shows everywhere we’ve been.
The greatest show on the last European tour was in Holland at a little bar. The kids went mad… usually in Holland we find that the kids are way too stoned to dance much…
Germany is always a blast, the US is always good, It’s fun for us to be playing in places like Italy and Spain just Because the cultures are quite different and it’s cool to be there.

20.Can you tell us some memory from a gig that’s really special?
Steve E. Nix: My memory is not very good, but… o.k., One year on Halloween we played in New Orleans dressed as policemen.
I didn’t join in, but I got to watch my bandmates outside the club directing traffic! Everyone in town was smashed and thought they were real policemen.
That was pretty special.

21. If you get the possibility, where would be the most interesting place to be doing a gig?
Steve E. Nix: The moon, or some other planet.
That would be interesting.

22.Besides making and playing music, have you got any other interests like soccer or whatever?
Steve E. Nix: Skateboarding. Reading. Sleeping