Interview by Amanda Starling
The first place You Blew It! frontman Tanner Jones is anxious to go when gets home from tour is his Orlando apartment, then to visit with his girlfriend. It doesn’t take many weeks on the road for the homesickness to kick in, especially for cheese pizza from Lazy Moon Pizza. It’s the strong ties to their hometown scene in Orlando and a need to break through that has catapulted You Blew It! from a group of college kids connecting for gigs into a national headliner act.
Jones originally met his band mates while studying in Orlando. As You Blew It! came together for practices, and eventual gigs and popular live music spot Uncle Lou’s, they realized that being a successful band meant making connections and traveling to new cities. Since 2009, You Blew It! has cranked out a unique emo-punk energy that has complimented the Orlando music scene. From a self-titled EP in 2009 to their latest EP, Pioneer of Nothing, the band has churned out a refreshing, introspective, and fine-tuned voice. After a wicked homecoming set just days before, Jones talked to us about the changing music scene in Orlando and his memories of the early days of You Blew It!
So when you got back into Orlando Friday night, what were you most anxious to see?
On a personal level, obviously my girlfriend and my apartment. On a band level, just the atmosphere at the show. It’s very exciting coming back home. Leaving home is always exciting, too, because there’s something to look forward to in all of these places, but after about a few weeks you get homesick. It’s just the whole vibe of being home and in familiar places, like Will’s Pub. The knowing the landscape and geography, that’s one thing that’s kind of irreplaceable. Obviously, we look very forward to that.
So where is the band all from and how did you all come together?
Half of the band is from Miami, half is from Fort Myers. We all came here for college or for other reasons. It was like any other band story, really. It was four guys who wanted to write music and play shows for the fun of it. It was very easygoing. We’d get together when we could and practice. Things started picking up and we got more opportunities, so we got more serious. [Guitarist] Trevor [O’Hare] was the only one I knew before we started the band. We all essentially met before or in college, and we started the band when we weren’t taking classes and stuff like that.
Since you weren’t all originally from Orlando, what were the steps you took to initially get involved in the scene?
We just started paying our dues, kind like what we did back in our hometowns. We just started playing any shows, meeting people, showing our interest. Once we became better friends with the people we were going to shows with, we started asking if we could play the shows they were booking. As we played more shows, we started to get to know more people and the whole networking story. We met more people, more people started liking us, so more opportunity.
What was your first show like? Was it in Orlando?
Our first show was in Gainesville, at placed called Wayward Council, rest in peace. Our second show was in Fort Myers. We didn’t play Orlando shows at first; later we played at a place called Uncle Lou’s, but I’m not sure who with. But that’s where we first cut our teeth in Orlando, at Uncle Lou’s. It’s kind of a dive-y, really dirty, small bar. It’s actually just doors down from Will’s Pub. A lot of times we’d be playing Uncle Lou’s while bigger band would be playing at Will’s Pub. No one would come to our shows because they’d all be over at Will’s.
And then you guys started to creep up the road to Will’s?
Yeah, we started playing Uncle Lou’s more and more often. As we started to get to know more people, we started to book bigger venues, which so happened to be a block down the road. It happened so slowly, it’s hardly to pinpoint the time that we thought, “Wow, maybe we could do this forever.” For our growth, we gauged it more on the type of bands we were playing with. When we played at Uncle Lou’s, it was small touring bands and local bands. We started getting offers to play with some of our favorite bands. At one point, we played with The Get Up Kids, which I think is more a telling side to us than the amount of people coming to shows, because even now we’ll play a show to 1,000 people, and then we’ll play a show to 20 people. I think we gauge it more on when we get to play with the bands that we really enjoy.
Now you were the headliner and the big guys on tour. What did that feel like?
Absolutely surreal. It’s a little bit stressful because being the band that plays last you’re biting your nails that hopefully everyone will stick around. At the end of the day, it’s always a great feeling and it’s very, very flattering to know that you’re essentially the reason that the show is happening. I feel kind of oddly egotistical to say that, but it’s a nice feeling overall.
Who did you feel was the breakthrough band that you played with?
The Get Up Kids, for sure. It’s like a pinpoint opportunity that ended up being a huge thing. They were here playing for two nights and the opening band’s van broke down a couple of days earlier, so we were asked by the promoter to fill in. That was definitely a huge opportunity.
It sounds like you’ve made some great connections. How did you develop a repertoire with the promoters in Orlando over the years?
The way we got that Get Up Kids show, this guy named Jason Ferguson used to run the music department for Orlando Weekly. He’d been poking around, coming to shows once in a while. In our heads, we were like, here’s this older guy coming to our shows, that’s cool. It turns out that he was scoping out for us, and it turns out his friend was the promoter for that Get Up Kids show. When she found out that opening band couldn’t play, Jason told her about us. That was kind of the spark, that connection. That was the tree that branched off.
Based off of that, how would you describe the ability to break into the Orlando scene?
It was actually really, really tough. Most of the people who were running the scene back when we were getting started were kind of in an old boys’ club. You had to please certain people, or you had to get certain shows. It was about two years after the band had formed that we really were able to break into the Orlando scene.
That’s some solid dedication to build off. How has being in Orlando and experiencing the city influenced the band?
It’s played a huge role. Obviously, had we grown in up a scene like Philadelphia, New York City, California, Chicago… those are really, really great music scenes and those are the top four places when you think of great music scenes, and Orlando is definitely not on that list. If it is, it’s way, way down at the bottom. It’s like that feeling of being the underdog, being the band that’s getting started in a place that’s not really thought of as a great music scene. It lead us to be a little more aggressive, a little more pushy. It forced us to be more confident in what we were writing. That’s the best way to describe how Orlando shaped our sound; we always feel like we have to prove ourselves.
Tanner Jones at recent homecoming show (photo: Amanda Starling)
Where’s your favorite venue to play in Orlando?
Will’s Pub, actually. We really love the sounds. We really love the staff and that area of town. It’s the perfect venue for us; it’s not too big, it’s not too small. The only thing that was holding it back was that they allowed smoking in there, but they stopped about a year ago and it’s been up and out from there. If there’s a show there, I’m always there just because I love it. It’s got a great layout and a great vibe. It’s not too pushy. Some places are just one big room and you’re forced to listen to the band, but Will’s has separate rooms where if you want to go to the bar and talk to a friend, you can. When we were were booked there, we were really excited because, to us, that’s a bigger room, so getting to play what we thought of as a legitimate venue with legitimate bands was exciting. Now as we get booked there, it’s really nice. For us, it’s like we get to go back home and play where we started and spend some time with our roots.
What was the best show you’ve played in Orlando?
The Get Up Kids was a great one, just for the implications it had for us as a band. The most recent one was also really important to us because it was our first headliner. My favorite show we played in Orlando was a record release for our album Grow Up, Dude, our first LP. I think the venue might’ve sold out that night. That night always felt like a huge turning point for us because that night took us by surprise. I think we were expecting to play to an empty room, to people who had never heard these songs. But when we played, it was almost like it was on Friday night, where everyone was jumping on top of each other and singing. Everyone was having a great time, and that was probably the first time a reaction like that happened for us. That was absolutely incredible.
Now that you guys have broken through and navigated the Orlando music scene, what advice would you give emerging Florida and Orlando bands?
I want to say get out, but that sounds bad. The best thing we did for this band was get out and tour. Go see the rest of the country. It’s good to get that experience and practice. I think touring is by far the best thing a young band can do for themselves, because it makes you hold your city so close and even if you hate your city, there’s things you love. You model yourself after that. It’s just a great way for a band to find themselves.
You Blew It!’s Pioneer of Nothing EP is out now on Jade Tree Records.
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