Chris Payne

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About a month ago, I was able to chat with author Chris Payne about his new book titled Where Are Your Boys Tonight? The Oral History of Emo’s Mainstream Explosion 1999-2008. In this interview, I asked Chris about how the book came together through his unique interviews with artists and people that were around the scene, how he narrowed down the bands he wanted to target for this book, how he found his “writer’s voice” through this writing process, as well as some other questions about what Chris enjoys most about this genre of music. The book is available today at several retailers, with the full list located here.

Thanks for your time today, Chris! Let’s start by discussing the research you did on your new book called, Where Are Your Boys Tonight? The Oral History of Emo’s Mainstream Explosion: 1999 – 2008. So how did you initially get started on writing about this great topic?

Well, the start is 2018. I was a staff writer at Billboard then. And I had just done an oral history on the 2005 Warped Tour. Because the Warped Tour had just announced that it was ending and this was an oral history to go along with the last running of Warped Tour and it seemed like a big deal. MCR and Fall Out Boy were blowing up that year on the tour. And from talking to <Kevin> Lyman over the years, I learned that it was their biggest year, by far in terms of attendance and profits. I was like, alright, this would be a sick thing to do for the last reading of work. So I talked to a bunch of the bands for the oral history on the Warped Tour that year, and it was a really good reception to that. And Meet Me In The Bathroom, the Lizzy Goodman book had come out, not that long before that, and I was just starting to read that. I had it on my desk when I was writing that oral history to sort of be like, how did she do this? How did she weave this narrative? How did she make these quotes all play off each other? So I was really feeling the oral history thing. And the 2000s Emo boom definitely deserves this…this book doesn’t exist. I want to make this happen. But so I kind of like to share them together with what I thought was a book proposal, and I didn’t really know how to do one. I kind of just Googled “how to do a book proposal,” and did something. But it was pretty clear that I didn’t have the time to do it. When I was on Billboard, it was a full time job. And I was interviewing a lot of these people anyway for Billboard stuff. So it would have been kind of weird, doing a side thing. But Billboard laid me off with a bunch of people in April 2020. And I was like, Okay, time for something else. And right away it became clear that that something else was going to be this book.

Interesting. Yeah, that’s kind of cool how it all led to that moment. Approximately, how many interviews Did you conduct for this book?

About 100-165, or something like that.

Oh, wow! Was there a certain interview or two that vividly stands out in your memory? And if so, what made it so memorable?

And it’s got to be the Mikey Way interview. I mean, they <MCR> basically didn’t do any press during their reunion. So I got in and talked to Mike, and he was really special. And he was a great interviewer. We chatted three or four different times, about all sorts of stuff. And I really wanted to get to stuff that he hadn’t spoken about before. Because with a book like this, or any book, when people have wikipedia, it’s just aggregated from so many little anecdotes and factoids people have heard so many times before. Especially if they’re big fans of MCR or whomever. So asking him about other bands like, “Were you at this famous Thursday show at the basement? Or what record stores did you go to?” Or asking him about when he met Panic! at the Disco for the first time. A lot of what was really interesting about all these interviews was asking people from bands about other bands. Because when they were interviewed back in the day for their press, during a press cycle around their new release, typically Pete Wentz wasn’t talking about the new Taking Back Sunday album. So getting to hear people’s takes on other bands was pretty interesting.

Is that how you approached most of the interviews for this book? Or did you kind of get a basic template in place? How’d you approach that?

Yeah, everyone was different. I did a lot of podcasting when I was at Billboard. So I think the way I do interviews, for better or worse, often end up sounding like a podcast interview where it’s chit-chatty. And there’s pros and cons of that. The cons are sometimes you come up with something that sounds kind of interesting. And you’re like, “Oh, that was a good conversation.” But then you go back to it looking for quotes that’ll look good on the page.

And it’s like, it’s not what you wanted, right?

Yeah…I had talking points for all the interviews. And fortunately, I had a pretty good idea of how the chapters were gonna flow. Even early on, I knew which things I wanted to hit on for the band interviews, of course. A lot of it was about their own releases, but also the bands that I knew that they toured with the bands they shared a label with.

So how is this book constructed? Is it organized by time period?

So there’s five sections. It’s organized by time period. There’s an opening where I wrote an opening essay. The first section is 1999-2000 and the next section is 2001-2002. The third section is 03-04, the fourth section is 2005, and that is the only section with one year. And the fifth section is 06-07, and then there is an epilogue included.

Okay, interesting. So I understand you’ve written for other outlets like Vulture, Alternative Press, Stereogum, and you also mentioned Billboard, too. How did that experience lend itself to completing this book?

Well, basically I was at Billboard for seven years, and I started the book right after I left. So it was just pulling from a lot of Billboard experiences. All the connections that I built up in my time there. I interviewed Fall Out Boy a bunch of times, and I started on staff in 2013. So the same year that Save Rock and Roll came out, the beginning of their resurgence, Paramore’s Self-Titled came out that year. Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die by Panic! at the Disco came out, so their second resurgence was just starting too. So I hopped in at a fortunate time for Billboard work. But then by 2013, when I was on staff, I was kind of coming around. I said, this stuff is important. And also lots of other people my age are starting to as well. So yeah, to answer your question, I kind of was able to document a lot of these bands from the book in the 2010s, when they were starting their second waves, and kind of re-engage with it as a music journalist after being a fan of the 2000s. And also, I made a lot of important contacts on the label side, and the management side. Billboard’s obviously a very industry-centric publication. So I think having some management contacts with the people behind these bands, the labels behind the bands, knowing how publishing works, or things like that helped bring this together.

That’s cool. Were there any artists you weren’t able to connect with that you wanted to include in this book?

Yeah, it was interesting how each and every artist responded to it. Because being from Billboard, there are probably a bunch of artists I interviewed who didn’t even want to be doing the interview, but their manager or publicist said, “Oh, this is Billboard, you have to do this interview.” Whereas for the book, I don’t think anyone was pushed that way. Basically anyone who did the interview for the book, wanted to do it. For Taking Back Sunday, I chatted with John Nolan, and I’ve chatted with Adam <Lazzara> in the past. It would have been great to have Adam. And Fred, the former member of the band and Eddie Reyes. Skrillex would have been cool, Sonny Moore; that one did not happen. I get that people don’t want to do interviews, or they’re just busy. But I reached out to Coheed & Cambria, they passed on it. I think anyone, the bigger bands who you don’t see the person interviewed, rest assured that was made to get their voice in there.

And to that point, is there a possibility of going further down this genre’s path and possibly writing a sequel at some point? Or, a “Where are they now,” kind of thing?

I would love to. I mean, I know there’s someone else who was interviewed for the book, who is in the early stages of working on a cool book, also about Emo, but kind of a different side of it. So that’s exciting for me. And yeah, I definitely want to write more books. But I only have very loose ideas right now. And honestly, I’m just starting “press mode.” So yes, I’m definitely planning on writing more books. As far as any specifics. Nothing to share. There’s specific figures in the book, for instance, that I think could be booked onto themselves. So, who knows?

What did you learn about your “writer’s voice” while writing your first book here?

That’s a good question. So as far as my voice, where that comes out the most is in the intro essay, and the epilogue essay. And those are only about like three to five pages inside the book. So honestly, I think those two essays are some of the best things I’ve ever written. But still, it’s only two brief essays. So I feel like I still have so much more to learn about my voice. And really, writing for Billboard was a great platform, and I’m so eternally thankful for all that came with that. But since it’s not really a critical platform, it’s not like Vulture or a New Yorker where people read it for the witty, critical voice. Billboard, it’s an industry mag. In some ways, when you’re writing full time for a publication like that, especially for so long, there are sides of your voice that you can’t really explore. So in a lot of ways, I’m still working on it. And then covering When We Were Young for Vulture was so much fun. That probably is, as far as talking about my writer’s voice, that I think is the best example of what I’ve done so far. Alex Susskind, who really helped me with that piece helped bring out that voice. But it’s also reading. A lot of my favorite authors now are nonfiction authors, critics, and a lot of times when I’m kind of getting in the groove of writing something on my own, I’ll just read writers I like. So I’m reading Shay Serrano’s book about basketball and the rap yearbook, especially as far as voice, that’s a big influence for me. The critic, Lauren Euler, who’s also a fiction writer, she’s a big favorite of mine, Greg Jenkins at Vulture, and Ian Cohen, who’s in the book. Rebecca Jennings, she writes about internet culture for Vox. And might get her who is kind of an old punk scene guy who grew into a magazine writer who was also someone who I chatted with for the book. He was someone who I really enjoyed because I wanted to pick up his newest book. When I was writing the essays for my book to kind of read that first and get into that mindset of someone who kind of has the Zine voice from being a punk guy in the 80s. And also grew into someone who was like writing for publications later on, and also was on a major label and is someone who kind of had both sides, the punk side and the industry side, which I think was pretty important for a book like this.

Yeah, definitely. Were there any lessons learned that you picked up from either talking to those authors or things that you put back into your own writing?

Yeah, totally. It’s funny, and it’s just the way I am. Even when I’m spending a lot of time with a person, I just kind of wind up talking like them, without even trying to or anything. It’s sort of the same way with writers, I think, where it’s this osmosis thing, where if I read something enough, or whatever book I’m reading at the time, I start seeing the little quirks, the little narrative devices, the sentence structures…

Sure, and there’s even some bands who have mentioned that they won’t listen to a certain genre of music when they’re going into the studio, because they’ll feel like they’ll emulate some of that stuff, too.

Yeah, no, I feel that. Also, I never really know if bands really mean that when they say that it’s true.

Or they don’t want to be influenced by X, Y, and Z. You know what I mean?

Or they know their album release sounds like this band. And they know writers are gonna say that anyway. So they don’t even want to put it out there themselves.

Yeah, they don’t want to be in that quote. So what do you love most about this genre of Emo music?

I mean, I love the way it’s played out in the past, like 5,6, or 7 years. Because honestly, back in 07-08, when this stuff was at its commercial peak, and maybe starting to tail off in popularity, I never would have expected that it would have had the critical reappraisal. I remember reading snarky takedowns on sites like Punknews about Fall Out Boy. And people being like, I can’t wait until two years from now where this just goes the way of Ska. It’s like, bro, you were so wrong! (Laughter)

Yeah, they didn’t get that trajectory right! (Laughter)

And some of it is kind of lame, like Emo Night stuff can get kind of cringy. A lot of this, a lot of the 2020s resurgence of this can be kind of lame. But in a lot of ways, that also just means good bands, made up of good people, are able to make a living, doing what they love, and people beyond the level of your MCRs and Paramore are able to keep doing what they love. And I think that’s a really special thing.

Yeah, that’s a good way of putting it. How did you narrow down the people or artists that you want to include in this book?

It really just went with the flow. Okay, so the day after I got laid off, I got an email from Pete Wentz. First, it was basically like “hey man, I saw you got laid off…” Because we had never emailed, but we knew each other from Billboard, but he had never reached out to me for anything. It wasn’t like we were like buds. So I mean, I was like, is someone fucking with me? I was just in a weird headspace. Like, you’re getting laid off, which obviously is awful, but also you’re getting all these people messaging you being like, “Oh my god, I love you so much. I’ll look out for jobs for you!” And where it’s almost like you just got a job or something good in your life because you’re just getting so many people coming out of the woodwork. So my head was kind of spinning, as it was. So I remember Gabe Sapporta calling me, because he and I had a good relationship. He had just started his management company when I was at Billboard, and everyone had a big profile on it. So I was comfortable with just calling him to be like, is this really Pete Wentz’s email? And he confirmed it was, and mentioned that he always liked my stuff, and wanted to stay in touch. And I was like, “Hey, actually I am just starting this book. Would you want to be interviewed for it?” He said yes, so that was my jumping off point. So eventually, Pete and I chatted, and he’s in the book a ton. I love the Pete quotes in the book. Gabe was my first interview for the book, and Gabe was so helpful, not only with lending his time, and sharing his stories, but also connecting me with a bunch of other people. Rob, the drummer from Midtown was the second interview for the book. Rob has a friend that lives not far from me in Brooklyn. So Rob also does a label called I Surrender Records, that puts out a lot of bands in this world. So he also at one point was a manager for Crashing Music. So he had a lot of connections to share. And it really just went from there as far as getting interviews together who was just sort of like this game of telephone or…

It kind of snowballed?

I mean, yeah.

So one of the last questions I have for you is kind of a fun one. If you were to try to narrow down your top five favorite records from this scene, what would they be?

Bleed American, Jimmy Eat World. Take This To Your Grave, Fall Out Boy

That album turns 20 tomorrow…

Yeah! Shout-out to Stereogum writer Ariel Gordon, who just wrote a great retrospective essay on it.

I just finished mine today for Chorus.FM.

Oh nice! I’ll have to check that out. After that, it gets tricky. <Pauses> …Is A Real Boy, Say Anything. Something Corporate, Leaving Through The Window. That’d be the fourth one. And Get Up Kids, Something To Write Home About.

Sweet, I love it! What’s the quick little pitch for people to check out this book?

There’s stuff in here that, if you love this music, there’s one thousand percent stories in this that you have not heard before. And I’m really excited to see what people latch onto and what little photos of pages or quotes from the book, the anecdotes from band members, what shit-talking about certain bands, what makes its rounds. I’m very excited to see that because I know the super fans are out there. I know how passionate people are about this music. I wrote this book, and I wanted it to be mass appealing. But like I said, it’s so easy to just sort of aggregate information from pulling from Wikipedia and pulling from my old Alternative Press interviews. It’s so easy to do that with this music because it’s been covered so much. There was so much mass media back in the 2000s. It was really a big priority of mine to ask these band members questions that they hadn’t been asked before. Whether it was asking Pete Wentz about Race Trader or asking Luke at DreamWorks Records about the bands he was trying to sign, and the bands he couldn’t sign and how much money these bands were being signed for. So I’m really excited for the stuff that has not been out there before that I think will appeal to the super fans.

That’s awesome. Thank you so much for your time, Chris and I wish you nothing but the best. And hopefully it’s a successful launch of your book. I can’t wait to dive into it myself, too!

Yeah, thank you so much. This was fun!

That’s the most important part! Take care.

Bye, Adam!

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