Revered Cali punk band Face To Face is celebrating 25 years of bandom on a new tour in support of a 2016 LP, Protection, which finds frontman Trever Keith & Co. teaming back up with legendary label Fat Wreck Chords. The tour finally hits Tampa Bay on May 18 for a nearly sold-out show at Crowbar.
Joey Neill caught up with Keith, 47, who detailed the tour, new music and more. Read the entire Q&A below, and get more information on the show via local.cltampa.com.
We were just talking about the Econolive tour and the VIP access you’re offering this time around. When you guys did the “Triple Crown” back in 2015, that was a pretty special thing for fans, did that help drive this tour you think? Or was it more of just going back 25 years ago for the Econolive tour.
I think the Triple Crown tour definitely helped us get more in touch with what works in terms of doing shows. Right now, what seems to work is a lot of the people that have been supporting us for a long time and are older like we are, ya know, a lot of people don’t go to shows every week or as many as they used to when they were younger.
It’s really important when you’re a band that’s been around as long as we have that when you come out and do a tour, that you try to make it special.
So it’s competitive out there, and I know that there’s going to be lots of bands that are actually out in the U.S. around the same time as we are too that are also bands like us. There are a lot of great tours going around, but yeah you’ve got try to be smart about putting things together. Things that people really want to see, and I thought that Econolive was one of those ideas that I think will get people out to come see the band in a more intimate setting and be able to have more access to us, to talk and hangout, or whatever.
So that’s what we’re doing for this record Protection and for this cycle and I’m hoping to come back and do a larger package tour sometime before the end of the year or early next year, but this is the one that we came up with for this time. So yeah, to answer your question, doing those Triple Crown shows did certainly form this idea.
When you did the Econolive tour, you did that live 10-inch before you put out the self-titled. Are there any plans to do live 10-inch for this one, like another anniversary package?
We thought about it, but we’re doing so much other stuff. Like we just reissued our first three albums on Fat [Wreck Chords], and instead of that we have a 7-inch single that releases just before the tour. We [also] have a special flexi disc which is a B-side from the Protection record. So instead of that we are keeping everything focused on Protection right now. We’re kind of in between writing songs, so unlike the first Econolive we don’t have a bunch of new songs that we can play and record, so yeah, like I said we’re keeping everything a little more focused on our current record which is Protection.
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Those two tracks that you are doing “I, Me, Mine” and “Wake Up”. Is there anything else in the vaults from that session in the Blasting Room?
There was one other song. We had three outtakes, and there will still be one unreleased track floating around out there somewhere. Off the top of my head, to be honest with you I can’t remember what the song was called. Maybe it will show up somewhere eventually.
You mentioned the whole aging with the band and all your fans getting a little bit older. You still go out there every night even though people aren’t going crazy and moshing because it hurts now that we’re older. Do you mind people sitting in the back just enjoying a beer, or do you get irked by people just not going nuts? What’s your take on the new live show that you experience over the years?
You know, I don’t really get irked by anything. I think there may have been points in our career where I might have been so serious about everything that I might feel like our band wasn’t doing it well if we did a show and people weren’t going off. But, at least in the last five years, I think that all of us have kinda taken a little bit of a different attitude about the band in that we don’t feel like we’re part of any real competitive thing with other bands or even against ourselves with our success.
We’ve all become pretty comfortable with the body of work we’ve created and the band we’ve become. We kinda get to do it for the love these days. In the early days we were, at least I’m guilty of this, I was doing it for the love but I was also doing it for the success and the drive. I was really motivated to reach some arbitrary level of success that I set for myself. It was in my brain, but it didn’t even really exist. I think as you get to be a little older and wiser you start to be happy for what you do have instead of what you’re constantly trying for.
So like I said, I think later in our career, I think we begin to appreciate what we do have. So there’s a lot less anxiety and stress in trying to become what we’re not. So as long as people are enjoying themselves at the show, I’m happy. They don’t have to be running circles or going crazy or any of that kind of stuff. The direction of the music with people is what’s meaningful, and to know that we’re creating music that is meaningful to people, and that they’re deriving some joy out of it, that’s really what it’s about right there.
So sit back sip your beer and enjoy the songs at the show. That’s equally as good. That’s an amazing energy right there just having people sing along.
I’m somewhat concerned because I remember at Econolive 20 years ago everybody was maybe a little more fired up back them, I had to have one of my crew guys just sit in front of my mic and hold it just so i wouldn’t get constantly hit in the face because the crowds were so rowdy. I’m hoping it won’t be like that but I have a suspicion the danger is a lot less there than it was 20 years ago.
After this whole run of tours you’re doing, you got other things coming up, you’re going on the Warped Cruise. How’d that happen?
It was just one of those things where our team found out about the Warped Cruise and we got an offer and asked if we’d want to do it and we said yeah we’ll give it a try. We’d never done a cruise before, so it’ll be a lot of firsts. The fact we’ve never gone on a cruise and played music — and it’s the first Warped Cruise that they’re trying.
It’s interesting the lineup of bands they’ve chosen, it’s somewhat a little bit out of our wheelhouse. At least Less Than Jake is on there, I feel like we have more in common with them than any other bands in the package. But I’m looking forward to meeting some of these other bands in the package.
You did a solo record in back 2008. You have anything else up your sleeve perhaps once you’re done with Protection? Would you want to break away and do something different?
I just don’t know if I have the time or energy for another solo record at the moment. The short answer is that right now I’m pouring all my resources into writing new Face to Face songs. That’s where my focus is right now. I couldn’t say I would never do another solo record, but its not something that’s on the drawing board at the moment. Face to Face is my main focus.
\\This article appears in May 11-18, 2017.