A brief chat with Lagwagon’s Joey Cape

Yellow Scene: We spoke to you a year ago and you were on tour with the Swingin’ Utters, and now you’re going back out with those guys as well as a bunch of other bands – is it cool to tour with friends?

Joey Cape: Oh yeah, it’s awesome. Especially bands like the Swingin’ Utters, who we’ve known for so long and I consider to be really close friends. It’s just gonna be a lot of fun. Maybe too much fun. Too many friends in one place every night can be a bad thing. It should be special.

YS: Are you looking forward to coming back to Colorado?

JC: Oh yeah, always. Denver is definitely on of the best cities, and has always been, for us on this continent. I don’t think we’ve ever had a bad show there. I can’t remember any show we’ve ever played there that I didn’t walk from thinking, “That was great.” It’s a good town for us to play, so I imagine that the Fat show should be great there. I’m excited.

YS: Have you been working on a follow-up to Hang?

JC: I have. I’ve done a lot of writing since I finished writing that record, but for the most part, everything I wrote ended up on my latest solo album that I just finished. That comes out in September. I have written some stuff since then. It might be a little while. We tend to keep our time. I’m always writing songs, but it’s just whether they end up getting recorded or making it down the whole road.

YS: What can we expect from the set this time?

JC: Well, actually it’s funny because I just talked to the label and we haven’t announced it yet, but we’re doing something special for the tour. Our set is special. But we haven’t announced, and so I actually can’t say. But I can say it’s special. I think that’s fair. I don’t know what else to do. It’s sort of intriguing, but in the end, it’s like, “Who cares.” It’s one of those things where you feel like you’re holding on to a Christmas present that isn’t that great. It’s like, “I have a present for you, but it is what it is.” We’re excited about it. We’ve been rehearsing and we’ve got this thing down. It’s not like it’s that vague. What do bands do when they do these things? I imagine anybody could guess. I just can’t be specific about it yet.

YS: When the Fat Tour is done, what’s next?

JC: Just after the tour ends, I just go back and do all of these states again. I’m doing a solo acoustic tour, when my solo album comes out. Shortly after that, Lagwagon resumes touring again and we’re going all over the world, again. I think I’m on tour until almost Christmas time. That’s how it is. When we put out a new album, we tour a lot. After a new record, generally it’s about two solid years. I don’t have another job so, when we’re not touring, I just book other tours. I’m that guy.