BAND: Straylight Run
INTERVIEWER: Ray Cantor (ray@bandvibe.com)
INTERVIEWEE: Shaun Cooper of Straylight Run
DATE OF INTERVIEW: 10.16.08

BAND MEMBERS:
John Nolan: Vocals/Guitar/Keyboard
Shaun Cooper: Bass
Will Moon: Drums

Ray: How's the tour with Anberlin going so far?
Shaun: It's been excellent, definitely one of the best tours we've been on. Unfortunately, we haven't had the chance to do many support tours. So we feel very fortunate. All the shows have been huge. All the bands have been great. Everyone has been super nice.

Ray: How are the fans reaction at the shows been so far?
Shaun: Some shows better than others. Like last night was L.A, and the L.A crowd is a little more jaded I guess. I can't complain. Like Salt Lake City is one of the best shows we've played. It ranges you know, every city is different but it's been very good so far.

Ray: Any crazy or funny stories this tour?
Shaun: No, not really. Last night we went out with drinks with everyone. It was just good hang. Not really anything funny or crazy on tour.. I'm trying to think if there's anything but no. It's pretty routine.

Ray: How was the recording process like for your current EP "Un Mas Dos" different from the rest of your albums?
Shaun: Well, this one was weird the way it came out.. We worked with Matt Squire, but we recorded down at his old studio in Maryland, and he was in Los Angeles. So we emailed the thing's we were doing back and forth so he could listen and kinda direct us. It was the first time we worked with a producer in that kind of capacity, which worked out surprisingly well. We didn't know if it was gonna be awful or he was gonna have time to do it because I think at the time he was working on the new "The Used" record at the same time helping us out. It was very relaxing too. We gotta stay at his house, and we were only there for a week, and our friend Brian we engineered a lot of previous stuff was the engineer on it, so it was really comfortable environment. Also, we had to write a lot for this EP in the studio, which we have never done before. We added a couple of bridges and thing's to the songs in the studio, so that was interesting. I think it forced us to work in a really cool way to just come up with stuff on the spot and hoping. Because with the last record, we really flushed thing's out. We had all had the songs written, some like two years in advance before we got in the studio. So haven't really worked intensively in the studio. It was cool and it worked really well for us.

Ray: Since this EP was only 3 songs.. Are you guys planning to release future work like this?
Shaun: Yeah we're gonna try. Depending on when we get our act together and keep recording new songs. We're gonna keep trying to put out 3 or 4 song EP's every 3 to 4 months. Just keep the cycle going like that as we release them. And maybe we'll compile 'em? I mean it's all coming from our own record label so have all the freedom in the world do whatever we want.

Ray: I love the cover art on the EP, with all the 3's! What's the concept behind that? (Except the obvious 3 songs on the EP)
Shaun: Oh thank you! That was a Will Moon concept. He dreamt that up and seemed kinda fitting since Michelle left the band there's only 3 of us, and we planned on doing 3 songs. So it was just one of those things that kinda worked. There's a lot of ways you can put 3 into each picture.

Ray: What are some of your favorite songs to play live?
Shaun: Umm.. I still really enjoy playing "Sympathy of the Martyr". We haven't been playing it much on this tour, but on headline sets we always play it. Yeah, for some reason that song always worked well for me. Also, "Existentialism On Prom Night" and "Hands in the Sky" because those are the crowd favorites, they have the most energy. It's a toss up between those three.

Ray: I read you and the rest of the bands on tour were doing a HALO 3 shoot 'em up with your fans for one day on X-Box live! How was that experience?
Shaun: (laughs..) You know what? It didn't work out and it sucked a lot. We left the hotel really early, and we only got six hours of sleep and drove to the show in Denver. For some reason, when we got there they couldn't get the X-Box connection working, and they were having technical difficulties. We got there all early and we were excited to do it, and we ended up not doing it.

Ray: Aww that sucks! Do you guys plan on doing it anytime in the future or is it up to whoever was running it?
Shaun: Yeah it's up to who was running it. Unfortunately, we couldn't play Halo. But I've never played it before and doesn't really matter we would've gotten our butts kicked anyway.

Ray: What's currently playing in your iPod or music player?
Shaun: Surprisingly I love the new "Kings of Leon" record. I didn't really ever listen to them before and didn't really think I liked what they did but I guess I was stupid because I really liked that record. That's the newest record and only one that stands out in my mind.

Ray: Any bands or artists that you guys would like to tour with in the future?
Shaun: There's millions of them.. There are so many bands we'd loved to tour with.

Ray: What's next for Straylight Run?
Shaun: We're gonna go home from this tour and start working on some new songs to get it together for the next potential EP. The next tour we have isn't till February and that's in Australia. It'll be our second time there, we went there with Matchbook Romance in spring 2006 and that was phenomenal, and we love the country! And now we're on this giant fest and I think Nine Inch Nails is headlining so it should be really bad ass, we're looking forward to it!

Ray: What would you like to say to your fans at Bandvibe?
Shaun: Thanks for reading and thanks for having us we appreciate it!

For more official information on Straylight Run, please log onto:
http://www.straylightrun.com/
http://www.myspace.com/straylightrun

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