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OC Weekly: What are some crazy tour stories?
Tim Hatch: I never want to go near Tacoma, Washington, again.
Lauren Curtius: I don't think people who live there want to go to Tacoma.
Brayden Ward: Tacoma is scary. I lived near LA my whole life, and I never thought I was going to get stabbed, and then I went to Tacoma, Washington.
Hatch: The nickname we heard from a local gas station was “Tacomp-ton.”
Brayden: We were in an area of Tacoma we were not supposed to be in.
Camron Ward: We almost got murdered in Washington. We're in this gas station [a few miles from the Oregon border], and these girls roll up, and they're pretty good-looking girls–
Hatch: Also, this is, like, 3 a.m.–
Camron: With this guy [who] gets out.
Hatch: A lanky and creepy motherfucker.
Camron: He's sweating and says, “Hey, you guys on a tour?”
Brayden: I'm like, “I don't know what to tell him. Tell him yes?”
Hatch: He's says, “Can you give me a ride?” Here's how I felt: Brayden and I were inside.
Curtius: I was going to the bathroom.
Hatch: So he says, “Where are you guys going?” And we're like, “Oh, we're heading down to Portland.” Then he starts going, “Hey, can I get a ride?” And my first thought was “NO.”
Camron: We were all at the same time, “No, nope.”
Hatch: He was like, “Can you give me a ride to my house? I just live like two blocks away.” We were nice about it: “We only have four seats. You can see it's packed full of our stuff.” He's like, “It's okay. Well, have fun.”He goes inside, and Lauren is still in there, so I'm like, “I'm going to go check on Lauren.”
Brayden: When we're inside, he's like, “Where you guys been? Did you kill anybody?” “No. No.” “Well, if you do, call it the 'Scene of Allen Alan Young.'”
Curtius: I come out of the bathroom, and Brayden is freaking out: “Let's go!” I'm like, “What's wrong?” He told me what happened, so I start freaking out because I watch too many episodes of I Survived.
Brayden: So we're like, “Camron, drive!”
Curtius: And Camron's like, “No, I have to eat this burrito!” I'm getting mad. “Camron, what's more important? Your burrito or us dying?”
Camron: I'm sitting there going, “This diarrhea-inducing burrito!”
The first time I saw you was at Moon Block Party. It was really fun, but I wish the management had given you a bigger room to play in. I had to stand on the arm of a bench outside to see you guys.
Hatch: Pomona has been good to us. When you play shows in Orange County or LA, [people] will stand there with their arms crossed. “I like it, but I'm not going to show any emotion.” Pomona is just a bunch of kids just out of high school. They're all-age kids. They're there for music, not to party. With Moon Block, there were jam/psychedelic bands onstage, and they put the garage rock bands on the side stages. I tend to like that better. You're more connected to the audience that way.
Curtius: You're on their level.
Hatch: There's nothing static at our shows.
Brayden: It's not like “During this song, Camron is going to bash a beer and throw it on the floor.”
Camron: I don't think anyone expected us to have that kind of a draw there. We didn't expect it.
Curtius: Pomona's been good to us.
What do you do in your spare time?
Brayden: I quit school to work. As soon as you do, two weeks later, you're like, “I want to go back to school.” I write an excessive amount. Especially lately–we're doing stuff for our next record.
Hatch: I'm thinking about doing that, too. We've been so busy lately, and I have my own job. School has not been my priority at all.
Curtius: I don't want it to be my priority. I'm supposed to be transferring to wherever the hell I get into, I guess. I'm applying this semester. That's stressing me out. But I don't want to do it at all. I want to do this for a living, but I just can't bring myself to not go.
Camron: I'm going back to school, but it's hard because we have that big tour [SXSW in Austin] in March.
What is the craziest thing that has happened at one of your shows?
Brayden: We used to be in a band before this.
Curtius: I wasn't in the band, but I knew them, and I went to see them at the Knitting Factory. I was waiting outside by where the box office was, and this girl–tall, she had red hair. She had a dress on. She starts screaming at the top of her lungs and pulls whatever she had on all off. She's completely naked. I don't know how she got it off so fast. I'm watching security try to put something over her so they can tackle her. She just kept screaming.
Brayden: The guy comes running out–he had been kicked out of the Knitting Factory–cursing at security. “Fuck you. I hate you. What the fuck are you doing over here?” The security guard is getting into this confrontation, and the girl comes running up yelling, “Don't touch my boyfriend!” That's when she just started screaming. Someone yells, “Hey! I can see your tit!” And she's like, “Oh, yeah? Well guess what!”
Curtius: Nothing that crazy has happened at one of our shows.
What did you want to be when you grew up?
Camron: When I was around 5, I wanted to be an archaeologist.
Did Indiana Jones have anything to do with it?
Camron: Yeah, we're the biggest Star Wars and Indiana Jones fans–and Jurassic Park! At some point, I wanted to be an actor. By 13, I started playing guitar and it went on from there.
Hatch: I didn't have any ambitions.
Camron: Way to go.
Brayden: I wanted to be a pilot when I was 3, then an architect, then I wanted to architect planes. I started playing drums, and from then on, I wanted to be a poor loser for the rest of my life.
But a well-dressed poor loser.
Brayden: He may be poor, but he looks damn good in those jeans.
Curtius: I actually wanted to be a doctor.
What kind of doctor?
Curtius: I didn't get that far into it. I was premed for a few years. Then with the music, it was too strenuous. At the time, I was interested in doing reconstructive surgery for birth defects. I didn't want to give people bigger boobies. I didn't feel like that was my calling, sorry. I want to transfer to UCLA because they have a music history major. We're trying to sign with a label, and it's really interesting to me. I'd rather know a lot more about it so we don't have to get a lawyer.
Brayden: Lovely Bad, Esquire.
That would be helpful to know the ropes so you can recognize when someone's trying to screw you.
Camron: Everybody's trying to screw you. If you go into this business thinking that, you will be pleasantly surprised.
Is there anything specific you'd like to accomplish with this band?
Brayden: I'd like to establish a country.
Curtius: What would we call it? The Lovely Bad–
Camron: That's too easy!
Hatch: I'd like to do this for the rest of my life.
Curtius: I'd like to make enough money to keep this thing going. I'm not in it for the money.
Brayden: I'm in it for the money. And the women.
When not running the OCWeekly.com and OC Weekly’s social media sites, Taylor “Hellcat” Hamby can be found partying like it’s 1899.