BRAZIL! GET PUMPED!!! Interview with Nick Woods from Direct Hit

Direct Hit! is a pop punk band from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA, pretty fucking awesome.

I met it through Twitter, when Nick Woods - guitarist, singer and lyricist of Direct Hit! - Began to follow me there, out of the blue.

After a few months listening to the EP "#3" from his amazing band and changing some messages, I decided to invite him to give an exclusive interview here to Fish and Candy, which is for my happiness, the first given to a Brazilian blog.

So if you like Bomb The Music Industry!, Teenage Bottlerocket, The Lillingtons, Green Day, Blink 182 and bands like these and which talk about zombies, aliens and fun things, I recommend you know Direct Hit!.

Myspace | LastFM | Facebook | Twitter

And download the EP "#4" for free or donating: http://directhit.bandcamp.com

Read the interview that I did with Nick, on March 5, where we talked about various subjects, such as idols, inspirations and plans for future release on vinyl, zombies, aliens, Brazil and of course, That '70s Show.

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Angelica (Fish&Candy): First, I would like to know how the band started, when it happened and how many EP's do you have released [4, am I right?].

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Direct Hit started while I was still playing with my old band, The Box Social. I had a few songs written that were a bit too loud and too fast compared to the rest of our material, and so our drummer, Brian, and I just did it on our own for a while, for fun, with our friend Jackson playing bass. Brian was actually the one who came up with the name, back in 2007 or something. Since then we've had a steady rotation of different members (Brian and Jackson aren't in the band anymore), and we hadn't really locked down a consistent lineup until a few months ago, but we've managed to record four online-only EPs that we sell for donations.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): Who are the band members? And they are your childhood friends or school/college...?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Direct Hit is Nick Woods, Danny Walkowiak, Mike Esser, Robbie Schroeder and Alex Hill. Direct Hit has had a ton of different members, so how we came to this lineup is a little bit convoluted... I met Danny at a show Direct Hit was playing with our friends Bust! while were kind of in-between drummers, but I had known he and Robbie's previous band, The Accidents, for a long time beforehand. So Danny tried out on drums, and joined shortly after that. And when our bass player at that time left the band, Robbie came in to play bass too. In the mean time, I was looking for another guitar player to make things sound a little bit bigger live, and met Mike through a friend of ours who introduced us. We played as a four-piece for a while, but I had started adding keyboard parts to what we were recording, so I asked Alex to play keyboard, who I had known since I first started going to pop punk shows when I was 15 or 16 years old. All of this took a pretty long time to come together, but things have been pretty steady for a while now.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): I want to take advantage and say that the EP "#3" is addictive and amazing! It's great to listen on several occasions. I really think this is a fucking awesome EP! They Came For Me is one of the best songs I've heard in these recent years and I am happy to have discovered the band because of this. By the way, how often do you intend to release the EPs? They'll always have numbers in the titles?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Thanks! Every EP we've done has had different people playing the tunes, so I think we're gonna take a break from putting EPs out after DH#5, which will probably be sometime this summer. I really want to re-record all of the songs we've written since the beginning with this lineup, mainly because I'm a narcissistic prick and want to hear the tunes on record with the best musicians I've played with. Once that's done, I'm hoping we can put out a full-length of the best songs, and put out the rest on vinyl. Those releases will have real names though, no numbers. :) We're also putting out a split 7" record with our friends The Transgressions, and we're working on a split 7" with another group of friends from down in Illinois. So to answer your question - Our releases aren't always going to have numbers in the titles, but we'll probably come back to doing that once we get bored and have to write new songs again.



Angelica (Fish&Candy): Now, recently, on March 2, you released the "#4" EP [which includes the song Monster In The Closet, which is incredible. It's my favorite of this new EP]. What are the plans for this release?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): We don't really have plans for any of our releases to tell you the truth. Making and carrying out plans is a lot of work, and we try to distance ourselves from everything that feels like work. Having fun is pretty much the #1 goal with Direct Hit, so we just kind of record stuff when we have the time and money, and then put it up on the Internet for whoever wants to listen to it. That's pretty much what we did with #4, and I've been pretty surprised at how positive the response has been. It's weird how much you have to coerce people into listening to new music these days... There are so many bands compared to when we all were first learning how to play our instruments, and they all want attention. I think I got over that with my last band, so I've made an effort to care about as little as possible with Direct Hit besides writing catchy songs, and having good recordings of them to listen to when I'm old and boring.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): How came this partnership with the Death to False Hope Records and how you see the band's future?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): One of the guys who runs their label sent me an e-mail out of the blue saying how much he liked DH#3 and #4, and asked if he could help get them stuck in a few more brains. We don't leave our old material up for people to download for a number of different reasons, so they ended up offering to help us out just with #4 since it was the newest.

As for the second half of your question, I purposely don't try to see into the band's future. Trying to achieve some kind of long-term goal would turn Direct Hit into a job, and I've already got one of those, so I don't need another. It's a lot easier for us to write cool tunes when we're not stressed out about not getting to a certain point in our "careers" in a certain amount of time. I've learned the hard way that thinking about music that way makes music totally uncool.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): What are your inspirations for the lyrics?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): I think asking that question is like asking Jerry Bruckheimer or Michael Bay how they come up with ideas for movies. I think their films blow, but I can sympathize with writing something just for the sheer value of its entertainment, because that's how I write lyrics. I purposely try not to make a statement about any kind of philosophy or deeper truth, because I've always listened to music to escape that kind of thinking. While I don't know the true inspiration behind his tunes, I can almost guarantee Glen Danzig or wasn't trying to make some kind of grand sociopolitical statement when he or whoever wrote "Teenagers From Mars." I come from that same school of thought - It's a lot more entertaining and exciting to hear a song about zombies, or aliens, or murder, or partying than it is to listen to some dumbass spouting off about the war in Iraq. Those are important issues I guess, but I can get that shit on CNN 24/7. I don't need to hear it while I'm trying to get pumped before a Brewers game or something.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): When you started play guitar and whom influenced you to do that?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): I think was 12 - My Mom bought it for me because she thought it would keep me from doing drugs, and because I was really into Metallica.



Angelica (Fish&Candy): What are your biggest influences and how you brought them to the band's sound?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Andrew WK, The Ramones, Bruce Springsteen and Green Day were really the four bands/artists that I wanted to rip off when we first started. But to tell you the truth, I the parts I write are influenced more by Top 40 than anything else. I can't speak for the rest of my band though - I'll come to practice with a structure for a song written, but everyone writes their own parts and draws from a completely different set of influences than I do. Robbie's into more super technical, weird music, like Lightning Bolt and Daughters, whereas I think Mike tends to sway more to modern pop-punk stuff. Danny and Alex have their own favorites too that are probably way different than mine. And I'm sure that influences the way they come up with their parts, but you'd have to ask them. I can only speak for myself. I can say that all of us have a respect for catchy tunes, played well. The compromise between us on what that means exactly is what makes our sound.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): Would you like to share the stage with whom and how is to share the stage with other bands like Black For a Second and The Manix?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): I'd be hyped as fuck to play with Slayer. Or Jay-Z. One of the two. Probably won't happened though. It's a lot cooler playing shows with friends of ours anyway, like the two groups you're talking about. You can afford to black out before you play then without feeling like a total and complete loser when you wake up with all of the furniture in the living room piled on top of your passed-out body.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): Before the Direct Hit, what bands did you have? I know you play guitar with The Saltshakers [which is amazing too], but I don't know who born first. And do you have any other project besides these two?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): All of us have other groups that we play in besides Direct Hit. Danny and Robbie play together, just drums and bass, in a group they call Johnny's Goin Heavy. Danny fills in on drums with Bust! sometimes. Robbie and I have been dicking around with a 2-bassists-1-drummer thing called La Tenia. Alex has a solo project that she's been working on for a long time. Mike has another band called The Latchkey Kid. And like you said, I play guitar with a group called The Saltshakers. I think we'd all go nuts if we could only play in one band at a time. I did that for five years with my last group, and it's been awesome not having to limit myself to just one project.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): I hope see Direct Hit! playing live one day. But until that day comes, tell me how are the shows. You guys do some cover, some version or just play the autoral work?

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Nothing but our own stuff. Learning other people's material is way harder than just making it up yourself.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): What do you know about Brazil? I suppose almost anything, right? LOL

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): I know jack shit about Brazil, except that we've had a few people send us notes about how awesome it is. Buy us plane tickets, and we'll come hang out tomorrow.

Angelica (Fish&Candy): And finally, I must ask this: You are from Wisconsin... Do you watched That '70s show? I mean, do you liked? Because, in my opinion, was the best TV show ever!

Nick Woods (Direct Hit!): Hehe, I watched it back in the day. Mila Kunis is hot as fuck.



Well, thanks for this interview, Nick! Means a lot to me and I hope you enjoyed. Fish and Candy will always have the door open for your projects. And I really hope you come to Brazil soon, with The Saltshakers or Direct Hit!. I wish you the best of luck in your career with your bands. :D

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By: Angelica Albuquerque