When you start to discover a genre of music, there are certain bands you absolutely have to know. Without a doubt, Mindless Self Indulgence is one of those bands. Attending one of their shows is nothing short of an experience. And while you normally see the people at shows divided by styles of dress or tastes in music and art, a MSI show is a true melting pot. Perhaps a good deal of that can be attributed to the vibe that the band give off; an aura that says they simply cannot find a fuck to give. We sat down with lead singer Jimmy Urine to talk about Kickstarter, their new album, and almost killing concertgoers in the first part of our interview. Check back soon for part two where we discuss video games, stunt doubles, and much much more.
When you did your Kickstarter, did you expect to go $75,000 over your goal?
I didn’t really expect anything. The whole point was to do a hostage situation. We’ve wanted to hold a record hostage before there was Kickstarter, but we didn’t have a venue to do it. Steve came up with the idea. He came into the room and was like “I figured out how people won’t be able to steal our music anymore”, and I was like “How?” He said “We just hold it hostage, and ask for the money first. Then we don’t care if they rip it off or do whatever because we already got paid.” Then Kickstarter came around and we were like “Hey maybe we can do it on this”. And it worked out really well so we decided to keep up that route. Most people say “Oh, we can’t do this to our fans”, but we were like “Fuck you, we’re gonna burn this unless you pay us.” And that’s the great thing about Kickstarter too, is that if you don’t reach the goal nobody pays. And I would’ve just been like “Oh, great. I don’t have to work.” I don’t take your money, and now we’re all good.
I see a lot of bands doing Kickstarter now.
Well, it’s a good venue. I get psyched on all the movie ones. The Goon one looks fucking dope.
And the Veronica Mars one?
Kitty bid on the Veronica Mars one! She got a script. They did two million in one day, and they’re still going. But, unfortunately, no Firefly Kickstarter.
Back on the topic of your Kickstarter, which one of the rewards would you have been most likely to want if you were in the position of a backer?
I think, probably the fuck you in the record. Because it was good and it was cheap. The put your name in a song title one was good, but that’s like a Hail Mary pass. And I met Mark Trezona outside of a show. He was outside in Sydney when we played Soundwave. But, the forty or fifty dollar thing for your name in the record is cool because in every copy of the record is just that big list of names. So I think I would’ve done that one.
Do you see yourself doing a Kickstarter again?
Maybe. We do albums whenever we want to do albums so it could be three years from now. So Kickstarter may not even be the platform anymore. If there are other projects I’m working on that are associated with that would want to be involved with Kickstarter I would be on board.
Tell us about the different versions of the record.
Well, there are three different versions of the record. There’s the Kickstarter version of the record that, if you were smart and very nice and you helped fund the record, you saved from getting killed and you get a really nice version of the CD packaging. And it has a bonus track called Sex for Homework. And if you didn’t and you came to the shows, there’s a tour version that’s available. It’s a regular jewel case, but different art and another bonus track called Seven Minutes In Heaven. And then when the tour’s done, and you didn’t go to the shows and you didn’t fund the kickstarter, there’s a record label called Metropolis and we licensed it to them and they have a different version and a different bonus track.
You could’ve just called it the dumbass version.
I’m gonna have to remember that!
Aside from all of those, are there any other bonus tracks you have lying around that didn’t make the record?
No, I pretty much shoveled everything on there that we wanted on there.
You guys haven’t been to FL in a very long time.
Yeah, I remember. The last time I was here I almost killed somebody.
What happened? Was it by accident?
I found a pipe and I started doing sword work with the pipe. And it fucking flew out of my hand. I didn’t realize it was two pipes in one, so when I started spinning it the other half of the pipe flew out and flew into the audience and hit a wall where nobody was and fell down. If that had hit a kid in the head they’d be dead. So, another kid NOT killed by Jimmy Urine.
Are you planning any music videos off of this album?
I’m planning on going home and having some fun with music videos off of this album. Like, when we did Left Rights, me and Steve got a video budget. And instead of taking that and doing one big video, we made like ten videos. We went to all the guys that we liked working with and gave them all a little bit of money and said “Here, do what you want.” They were all cool, I liked them all. They all got their own little following and got their numbers up. But the one that really nailed it was the I’m On Crack video. It was well worth the money because we were able to spread it around, and someone made one that was just able to connect with the people. People were retweeting it, other people retweeted it from Tosh.0. So I’d like to do something like that again. And it’s very unorthodox, we don’t have anyone breathing down our necks. So I’m just going to casually finish my tour and go home.
Wait a minute, you guys were on Tosh.0?
Just the video for I’m On Crack. I wish I was on Tosh.0, that would’ve been fun.
Out of your new songs, which ones are you most excited to play live?
The one I like to play live the most is It Gets Worse. It just works. There are some songs where you write them and you’re like “This is gonna be good!”. Then you record it and you’re like “This sounds weird.” Then you mix it and it’s like “This is a little better.” And then you play it live and maybe it works and maybe it doesn’t. But that one worked all the way through.