IE: What’s your name, age and what do you do in the band?

Cody: My name's Cody, I'm 23 and play bass in Better Times.

IE: Who are the other guys in the band? Ages and what do they play?

Cody: Frank-vocals 23, Drew-drums 18, Jason-guitar 30.

IE: How long have you guys been together?

Cody: Better Times formed in January 2011.

IE: Is there an overall message that you guys try to put out through your music?

Cody: We're a straight edge band so that has a lot of influence on our lyrics.

IE: How has it changed for the band from the beginning to now as far as people coming out to see you play?

Cody: When we first started out there weren't a lot of local hardcore bands in Buffalo, so the shows were awesome because people were stoked to come out to shows. Now there's a ton more bands and shows are even better. The scene has supported us a lot since we've been a band.

IE: What are the goals for the band in the future? Things you guys want to do?

Cody: We have a 7" coming out on State Of Mind Recordings. Pre-orders should be going up within a couple weeks. We've been focusing on that pretty hard so we don't have many plans beyond that besides tours to support the record.

IE: When you say tours to support your upcoming record what are the expectations and where would you like to go with the tours?

Cody: We plan on going down to Florida and back sometime this summer.

IE: What attracted you to straight edge? Where you always straight edge? Is the whole band straight edge?

Cody: I've never drank, smoked, or done drugs but didn't know what straight edge was until I was about 13. When I found out about straight edge it made sense to me because I identified with it so much. Then I found out about the music and everything that went with it. The entire band is straight edge.

IE: Who helped you discover straight edge and hardcore? 

Cody: Minor Threat was the first hardcore band I ever listened to and was hooked ever since. Through talking with friends and other kids I found out about countless other bands.

IE: Do you remember what the first record or CD you bought was?

Cody: Minor Threat discography CD when I was about 14.

IE: What’s the hardcore scene like in Buffalo, NY? Is there a big straight edge scene there?

Cody: The scene here is awesome. Most of the hardcore scene is straight edge.

IE: I see in your song “Better Measures” you talk about venues getting shutdown and how that’s now changing. What was happening to cause the venues to shut down and how has it changed? Are there more places to play now?

Cody: For the past few years there has been a couple venues being shut down. There are fewer and fewer venues around and it's hurting the music scene as a whole. A new venue is opening April 1st so hopefully that’s the start to a few more venues.

IE: If someone was new to Buffalo where should they go to see shows? Any good record stores?

Cody:  The Funeral Home is the venue to go to for punk and hardcore shows. There are a couple cool basements around but the Funeral Home is the spot. It's a punk house run by this dude Clint and there are at least 3 shows there a week. Clint takes pictures and video of EVERY band at EVERY show. It's an awesome place and Clint rules. Spiral Scratch Records is a great record store to check out.

IE: Does The Funeral Home have any ties to being a funeral home in the past? 

Cody: Yeah that's where the name comes from. It was actually a funeral home at one time. They turned the downstairs into a venue, built a stage in one room and have rooms for merch on the opposite side, and people live upstairs. The basement still has stuff from when it was a funeral home. There's a big ramp where they would roll the caskets down, there's a wash tub and table where they would prepare the bodies, and other kinds of stuff you'd find in a funeral home. It's pretty creepy down there but also pretty badass.

IE: You guys have this graphitti style logo for Better Times. Who drew this and is graphitti something the band is into? 

Cody: Joe at Positive Approach drew it for our first show. He booked the show and did the flyer and we liked it and the logo kind of stuck. We liked the logo because we feel it's well done. There are plenty of bands that have graffiti logos and some are good and some aren't. When it's good, it's awesome, and when it's bad, it tends to be really bad.

IE: Some of you guys were in a band called Our Times. Who was in that and what happened to that band?

Cody: Just our guitar player Jason was in Our Times, he was the singer. That band was one of my favorite Buffalo bands ever. I wish they could have been around longer. They were also a straight edge band and broke up because they couldn't find a drummer that was edge.

IE: Tell us what releases you have out now and I believe you guys have a new 7” coming out soon. Who’s putting that out and when will that be available?

Cody: We self released our 2011 Demo, which was later put out on a 7" through Press Gang Records. Our Better Measures tape was put out through Like Glue Records and then by Commitment Records on a 7", and we have a new 7" titled "If Not Us" coming out on State Of Mind Recordings within a couple months.

IE: How can people checkout your music and keep up to date on your happenings?

Cody: All of our music right now is available for free download on our bandcamp:

www.betterxtimes.bandcamp.com

Check us out on Twitter:

 @BetterTimesNY

and on Facebook

 www.facebook.com/betterxtimes