30/12/2023
We love the Nerf Herder and we love Linus Of Hollywood!
It was 1996. I was writing new songs for my band at the time, Size 14. I had one I particularly liked called “Old Van Halen”. I didn’t have all the lyrics yet but the chorus was “you make me feel like I feel when I listen to Old Van Halen.” As I was picking away at it, I turned on MTV2 and there was a video by a band called Nerf Herder with their debut single…“Van Halen”. I was like “GOD DAMMIT” but of course I loved the song and subsequently fell in love with their self-titled album. They were pretty much doing the “funny Weezer” thing that I wanted to be doing. They were very smart and clever and their whole “rich nerds from Santa Barbara wearing golf shirts” shtick was unique and charming. Needless to say, I rewrote the lyrics of my song (it ended up being “Let’s Rob A Bank” in case you were wondering) and went on about my business. Fast forward to 2003, I was at SXSW and getting ready to see Nerf Herder play at the Fat Wreck showcase. My good friend Carl texted to see where I was at and I told him that he’s gotta come down and see this band. He immediately fell in love with them too and bought a ton of their merch. He ended up getting in touch with Parry and in 2005 his label Oglio released “For Those About To Shop”, an album that laid the groundwork for Parry’s current uber-successful kid’s music career. Carl in turn introduced ME (personally) to Parry. We hit it off and by 2008 I somehow found myself playing shows around SoCal with the original lineup. I’m not sure if I realized I was “in” the band but I guess 15 years later, it’s safe to say I passed the audition. After many years of various live adventures with Parry, Steve and Ben (including a tour of Japan), we made the album “Rockingham” in 2016. I remember it being fun and easy and filled with laughs (Parry’s improvised guide vocals always have us dying)…we recorded the basic tracks (live and all together as a band) at the Lair in West LA (between many lunch and coffee breaks) with Larry and Lizzy helping out on the sounds. We also did a few songs at George Lucas’ Skywalker Sound near San Francisco which was a pretty mindblowing experience. After polishing up the recordings at our own home studios, we sent everything off to our buddy Jay Ruston (Steel Panther/Anthrax) to mix, and the rest is pop/punk history! I guess it’s about time to do another one?
