The Next Chapter; An Interview With The Story Changes

During the better part of the last decade, Dayton-native Mark McMillon has brought his penchant for penning bare-knuckles indie rock and pop songs to the makeshift stages in bars, all-ages show spaces, and basements of the Gem City and beyond. Along the way, his band, The Story Changes (formerly Rod) earned the attention and support of one-time indie powerhouse label Glue Factory (who released the band’s full-length), spent months criss-crossing the country with friends in The Slackers, Gameface, The Stereo, Hey Mercedes, Reggie And The Full Effect, Thursday, and countless others, and have done some serious bro-ing down with their homies at Bettawreckonize fanzine.

But it hasn’t been all smooth sailing. Countless line-up changes, small-town scene in-fighting, sudden staff-changes and inactivity at their former record label, and burning vans have threatened to squeeze the life out of McMillon and TSC’s musical ambitions on more than one occasion. Despite facing nearly every one of the pitfalls of being an indie rock artist in the 90s and 00s, McMillon’s hopes are still high. His high spirits are in no small part due to the fact that he thinks he’s found the rock-solid line-up that will allow The Story Changes to make the significant mark on modern music that he knows the band is capable of.

When changes in their own Dayton-based punk and hardcore bands left them looking for a new musical outlet, or gave them the freedom to pursue other avenues, bassist George “Gee Gee” Bradley (formerly of Sourbelly), guitarist Lokie Lewis (formerly of When Sparks Fly), and drummer Chris “Poppy” Popadak (formerly of The Stoics and Gun Medal Gray) joined up with The Story Changes camp. And by McMillon’s account, things are better now than they ever have been. Using their considerable musical backgrounds to their advantage, the bands is rocking harder, make in-roads with other independent labels, and are putting considerable miles on the van in order to bring their aggressive rock music to both new and old faces.

Perhaps most importantly, their latest record isn’t of the phoned in, half-assed variety music critics (and I can say this from experience) are getting all too used to hearing these days. As someone who’s listened to countless screamo and hardcore records this year, and who was disappointed over and over with the direction in which these efforts are going (do we really need another high school dropout with a diary and a cute haircut screaming out of tune about the girl that dumped him?), Watch Out! nearly single-handedly renewed my faith in an entire genre that I was nearly certain I’d outgrown. Though the screaming, aggressive riffing, and big, tumultuous rhythms are still here, the strong, Sunny Day-worthy melodies, and thoughtful lyrics immediately separate AOF from their peers. Their live show isn’t to be missed either.

Bettawreckonize recently had the opportunity to catch up with The Story Changes guitarist/singer Mark McMillon over a couple of Miller Lites and some Friendly’s ice cream. Among the subjects on the agenda were TSC’s release and tour schedules, the new faces in the band, and Dayton’s indie rock legacy.

Interview conducted in person by Tim Anderl. Pictures provided by Clark.

Name: Mark McMillon
Band: The Story Changes

BW: So you guys just finished a short warm up for your fall tour, which starts September 17 and goes for three weeks. Who did you play those warm up shows with and who will you be out with for the next three weeks?

M: The weekend was really good, but it was very long because we didn’t sleep. Friday was with Hawthorne Heights, which was good because we hadn’t seen those guys in a while and then Saturday and Sunday were with The All-Time Low, which has Matt who played drums on our CD behind their kit. So we stayed up really late with those guys. Sunday was also with Limbeck. So ofcourse that was an all-night party.

Bernie’s, where we played on Sunday, was Bernie’s. It is really hit or miss there. And you have Batman and the sound guy is a crack addict, but it was a lot of fun. There were a lot of kids there so it was a good time.

Friday we leave for tour. We’ll be supporting the Slackers. They are flying out and starting the tour in Phoenix and then it curves back up through Salt Lake City and Colorado and then up to Northern, California and back down. Friday will be a driving day for us, Saturday we’ll be in Omaha, and then the next two days will be spent driving through the desert to hook up with the Slackers.

BW: So the date in Omaha is just you guys?

M: Yeah, it will be us with some local support. We’ve been out there once before and the show was really good.

BW: You have some new folks on the road with you this fall. George Bradley, your new bass player, has been with the band the longest out of the other three guys?

M: He’s been with us almost two years now. We spent the better part of one of those years just getting things ironed out.

You know Rod was never really a band. It was intended to be a band, but with all the line-up changes, we just couldn’t make it work. When I finally had what I thought was a solid line-up we decided to change the name to The Story Changes. It made sense at the time because we didn’t really sound like Rod anymore. It was my voice and my songs, but we just didn’t sound like that anymore. So we decided to change the name. But then things started getting weird again. People were losing interest and though the name change was our way to try to jumpstart that energy again, it didn’t work. At that point everyone had career goals and had sort of figured out what they wanted to do.

So when those dudes (Jeremiah Stikeleather, Chris Commons, and Mike Ingram) left, George came on board and we spent the better part of a year just doing weekends regionally and recording, and we put out a split CD with Sparechange 00, but it never really felt like a band again until Lokie Lewis (formerly of When Sparks Fly) came on board. He just made it a band again and started to take the reigns a little bit. Also, now that Poppy (drums) is on board, things are running great.

This is the first time I can remember where the week before tour, when I have this mountain of things to do, I’m constantly getting phone calls from the other guys wanting to know what they can do, and they’re asking what they can do to help. It gives me a little extra time to do stuff like come over here and drink a couple beers with you, and answer a few of your questions.

BW: Was it a tough decision to add Poppy to the band knowing that he is a young father with a lot of responsibilities?

M: In all honesty, that is why we didn’t add him to the band two years ago. In the past, when people would leave the band we were always looking for people who were good of course, but we always had such a rigorous schedule, that when someone would join we’d have to rush to get them up to speed. There’s only ever been a personal issue between me or someone else that has caused someone to leave the band once or twice. The reason people always left was because they couldn’t commit to all the touring. That is sad because we’ve had so many friends in and out of the band, and so many people who I’ve developed friendships with because of the band and bonding over traveling and stuff.

When Kevin Priest, who was our drummer for years, left the band, Poppy was our first choice. He could play the drums and came to all of our shows and was just such a positive person. But at that point he had two or three other bands going on, and we just didn’t know him as well so we didn’t ask him. Then when Chris Commons left the band, we actually asked Poppy to play with us. At that time he had some personal stuff going on, his son was really young, and he just couldn’t swing it. We all totally understood. This time around we spent the better part of a year auditioning drummers, we’d get someone to come on board, spend a month working stuff out, and then go on tour. Then their first time doing a tour with us they’d realize how much work it is and would bail. This time around, Poppy actually got ahold of Lokie and said, “I don’t want to miss out this time. I want to do it.” And he came in and just nailed it.

You know, we just trusted him when he told us that his family commitments wouldn’t be an issue. And it hasn’t been an issue once. It really helps that his ex-wife is so supportive and is still a really good friend of his, and loves the band. In fact, she used to book us at the Tumbleweed. He’s really good at balancing his time. He’s always the first one to show up for everything, and he’s really good about spending extra quality time with his son if he knows he’s going to be out on the road with us for any period of time. He brings his son over for rehearsal sometimes and he plays the drums with us and stuff like that. So it’s cool.

BW: As soon as you get back from the tour then you’re going to start recording new material?

M: Yeah.

BW: Is that for a split or EP or full-length?

M: As far as what’s coming up, we have several different options. I’m always bad about saying, “This is coming out,” and forgetting that we’re dealing with small labels and how quickly things can change. One thing we’re definitely doing is a split with The Unknown on a European label. That’s just a few songs apiece covering each other. We’re talking about all covers with that one. We are going into the studio to record six new songs. Two songs will be on the reissue of our split with Sparechange. We have someone wanting to do a full-length and it will be ten songs, but we are doing a few label showcases on this tour so we haven’t fully committed to that yet. Ideally I’d like to think that by February next year we’ll have a new EP, a split, and a full-length out. Which is great because we’ve sat on that split for a year and a half now.

BW: What are the new members bring to the band and how do you see The Story Changes’ sound evolving?

M: We actually talked about this the other day on our way home from Huntington. I think the songs are definitely more aggressive now. We’re all really happy about where this is going. Everyone coming into the band really liked the Rod stuff, which was sort of gritty and fast, with harder elements. When we went to the early The Story Changes stuff it was almost super pop. There wasn’t any screaming and it was just me trying to sing basically. The new material is….well Gee Gee has definitely put a lot more umpf into what we’re writing. He’s definitely challenged me to do more riffing. It’s not so straight-laced. With Poppy behind the kit too, he just brings tremendous energy and there is just that much more behind it. Everytime I turn around he is just going off. Lokie, if anything, has just made me feel that way that I felt when I first started doing this so many years ago. I have to be honest, I just got really burnt out with all the touring and going through lineups. Having three other people who write songs has been awesome because I can bring something in and have them tell me what they think about it and what we need to do about it. We are going to incorporate more dual vocals in the newer stuff too, which I think is turning out really well. It was scary at first because I’d never done that, but there are definitely going to be more singalongs and more back up vocals too.

BW: When did you start playing music out at venues in Dayton?

M: I was in a couple of really bad bands that played Rebos. I played Brookwood Hall a couple times with like Liquid Legbone, which is crazy because we still do shows with those guys now. The first shows I did when I really got into it and did early incarnations of Rod were at Hummers. I’m not sure what that place is now, but it was in the building across from Gem City Records in the Oregon District. It used to be called Hummers and we would do shows in the basement. When we couldn’t get a show anywhere, Eric Prudel from Monodelux, who at the time was doing Slapfight, gave us our first show. We weren’t fantastic, but it was fun. I think the Stoics played that show.

BW: So between the four of you….like, I remember seeing some of George’s old bands play out when I was like 14.

BW: Sourbelly.

M: Yeah.

BW: It seems like the lifetime of your band, that all four of you have dedicated to playing music, far surpasses the lifespans of most of today’s new punk and emo bands. The kids who are going to all-ages punk shows and the Warped Tour may not have even been born when you guys started playing out and were getting your feet wet. Has it been frustrating at all not to have blown up in a much larger market yet?

M: To an extent. I’ve been seriously doing this and tour for five years and doing music around town for about nine. I know Gee Gee and Poppy have done this a lot longer than I have. It is cool that a lot of our friends like Motion City Soundtrack, Limbeck and Thursday are just huge. That is great. But, yeah sometimes you just get tired of those one-off shows like on Monday night where there was like 20 kids. But at the same time, for the last two years we’ve always managed to come back ahead and to afford to pay our bills, which I remember not being able to do. It wasn’t cool to come back and lose your ass. It is cool. Now more than ever, when the kind of stuff that we’ve been doing forever is huge….but um….

BW: Have you supported bands who maybe got big really fast, but who you’ve managed to outlive too? Do bands who haven’t done the school of hard knocks like you have….

M: Without naming names, there have definitely been bands who we’ve played with where it felt weird that we were supporting bands who were like six years younger than me, but who are huge. You try to talk to them and support them and be honest, and maybe you’ll say something like, “The third song you did tonight sounds like the fourth track off of the Unfun album,” and they have no idea what you are talking about. For the most part, and I don’t know if this is a good of bad thing, we’ve sort of been separated from that. We’ve done our own tours and we’ve picked who we’ve supported. Like when we did the Pollen tour. Those dudes had been a band forever, they’d been around for like twelve years at that point. They’d totally paid their dues. And the stuff with the Stereo was the same way. Even in bands who are our friends, it is kind of frustrating that they’ve been lucky or whatever. But more power to them, because if it happened to us, we wouldn’t turn down the attention, and we’d want the same kind of support from our friends.

BW: You guys did have some label support from Glue Factory for a while. What happened with that?

M: We really lucked out in that that was our first time….when we signed with Glue Factory, we were selling a decent amount of CDs for what we were doing. We were going through a couple pressings of the first independent thing that we put out. We were doing these diehard self-booked tours through the Midwest and on the East Coast, but we’d never dealt with someone on that level. It was between them and a couple other smaller labels who wanted to do it, but we were basically in awe that Glue Factory wanted to do something with us, so we just did it. We were lucky in the aspect that a lot of bands who in a similar situation end up getting screwed. They just sign whatever contract they’re given and ofcourse they’re going to do it. We lucked out in the fact that we had a really good contract and the people who worked there were super supportive. There were many times when they didn’t need us, but we obviously really needed them and they always came through. Whether it was shipping us money to fix a van, money that they knew they weren’t going to recoup for a while….In the same aspect, we recorded our album so cheap, and the way our contract was set up, I guess coming into it they didn’t have so much invested. They mainly did this because they like our music and we ended up surprising them and selling way more than anyone though we would. We stayed on the road eight months. So, they more than made what they expected back, which was cool.

And we definitely made a lot of friendships through that.

As far as what happened to them….we were going to do another record and there was talk about going to Ed Rose and doing it in Kansas and we were all about it. So we came home from tour and were getting ready to do it when someone who was playing drums for us at the time decided that being on tour wasn’t for him anymore So while we were looking for his replacement, Glue Factory asked us to hold off for a little while. Over the course of the next six or eight months of playing out and getting stuff together, when all the label merges and stuff went down, part of their share or whatever….I don’t know what the technical term is….anyway a lot of people lost their jobs, our main guy was gone, we didn’t know anyone there anymore, and we had an option that said if he ever left that we could walk. I think we could’ve done another record there or we could’ve walked away and still been Rod, but we decided to change our name and leave. To this day everyone we met through that is great. To this day I still see Kevin Knight and everyone that worked there and they are amazing. We’re actually playing some shows that Kevin set up on this tour with Rock Kills Kid. They’re a great label, but I think they’ve decide….the people who own it also own Olio, which is a comedy label, and I think they’ve decided that the Pixies Tribute on Glue Factory and the Braid live CD and the Operation Ivy Tribute CD will always make enough money and that they don’t want to invest any more into it. They’d prefer to just rest on the back catalogue.

Those CDs will always be pressed and will always be in stores, but I don’t think they’re going to put out anymore CDs by us or anybody else.

BW: Once your new record is finished are you going to do another eight months on the road?

M: I think so. Now that everyone is gung ho about this and everyone is booking shows and it isn’t just me, and now that everyone in the band is excited and are using all their resources to get us out there I think it will be much easier to do this. We’re a lot smarter this time around and I think we’ll hit it this time. Gee Gee’s toured for years, and Poppy obviously has a lot of responsibility here and Lokie does too….I just think we’re all at a place where we really want to do this and we’re going to do whatever it takes to make this work. We’ll be a lot smarter about it financially, and we’re only going to do what we want to do. There is not going to be any pressure from anyone to say that we have to stay out for x amount of days. We’ll see. I’m sure we’ll be out for a long time. They’re already pressuring me….this tour wraps up mid-October, then we’re home to record, then we’re back out with Let It Burn in November, then in December it looks like we may have some good support stuff that will have us out until Christmas. And that is all before our record ever comes out.

I know everyone says this, but it is like when you’re out you can’t wait to get home and then as soon as you get home, five days later you’re ready to go back out.

BW: Do you have a lot of pride in being from Dayton since Dayton has such deep indie rock roots?

M: The first thing I noticed when we went to the West Coast, we were really lucky that we got to do some dates with Hey Mercedes, and we had a one-off with Limbeck and Thrice, but we noticed that every night we had people coming up to us and asking us about Dayton, and Guided By Voices and Brainiac. I was so proud of Dayton, all of us were, but I guess it never occurred to us that Dayton was such a hot spot. Especially with the other bands on tour, especially with the indie rock bands, everyone thinks that being from Dayton is like this great thing. That’s awesome. You know, The Story Changes Everyday was originally going to be called The Heart of It All. That was sort of going to be our tribute to Ohio. Glue Factory wasn’t really down with it, but we were able to work it into the title of one of our songs from that record.

BW: Do you have a lot of pride that you came up here, and that a lot of the other bands from the area are having success? Or are the bands from Dayton too competitive with each other?

M: As far as competition, I don’t know. It has always been really hit or miss for us here in Dayton. Part of that is our fault because once we got things going we were very aware that bands who were once our friends were jealous or weird with us. With that came the usually drama. We were at fault for saying, “fuck that,” we’re doing really well elsewhere, why should we care? We were throwing our own shows, and we were still playing out in Dayton, but I guess we never did what it takes to have a good Dayton draw. To this day we still don’t have an amazing draw here. I think now more than ever, I think in large part due to the guys in my band, we have a better draw than we ever have here. Hopefully it will increase.

There are definitely rivalries too. We’ve always tried to be that band that stays out of it and just does our own thing, and getting ours, and getting out there. We’ve tried to help out other bands and take them on tour with us too. One thing too, is that we’ve done some stuff with Hawthorne Heights, those guys have taken us out. They could be taking anyone out with them because they’ve reached that higher level of popularity. But they’ve chosen to take The Red Affair out, and us, and they took When Sparks Fly out on their first headlining tour. That is a band who is being supportive of their friends. You know, for a time, no one gave a shit about them. But they worked hard at sending their stuff out, got signed, and now they’re really working their asses off. And I’m proud of them. And it is great that they’re taking their friends’ bands out with them.

But, there is definitely drama. If you go to Elbo’s on a Wednesday night, between all the karaoke music you can hear people talking about stuff. But I’ve learned that you’ll have that anywhere. You’ll show up to like Madison, Wisconsin and the bands will be talking about all the drama in their towns. It’s all the same. You try to sound interested and give those bands advice, but….when people are coming up and playing in bands you put your everything into it and there is a lot of jealousy and it becomes competitive, but it shouldn’t be that way.

BW: What are your highlights for the upcoming tour going to be?

M: I’m excited to see the Slackers again. We haven’t seen them since the last time they came through Dayton. On the last tour we did with them we were very conscious about us being this aggressive modern rock band and them being this old school reggae style band, and we didn’t know how we’d get along as people. But it was just amazing. It is one of the favorite tours I’ve ever done. All those dudes looked out for us and we’re beyond great to us.

We haven’t played Denver in three years, and my cousin, who I’m really close to lives out there so we’ll get to see him, and he’ll finally get to see my band play. Then we have a day off of the tour cause The Slackers are playing – and they won’t disclose who it is for – some big punk rock superstar’s wedding. Anyway, we’re taking the day off and I have plans with my cousin to go snowboarding.

Los Angeles will be cool because we have tons of friends there. We’re playing the L.A. theater and we’re playing the Walls of Jericho video shoot show at the Chain Reaction. That show is already sold out. I guess they’re going to do two sets and film the whole thing for their new music video. I’ve always liked them but have never had the chance to see them play. Plus it is in their hometown and it’s their video shoot so there’s going to be tons of people there who just like music.

Salt Lake – I’m excited about Salt Lake because we’ve only played their once, and it was horrible and everyone was mean to us. Everywhere we went the people were mean and I just walked away with a bad edge. But, I’ve always heard it is cool. So I’m excited about going back through and changing my mind about Salt Lake.

That’s about it.