IE: “American Oblivion” the video essentially takes the song’s lyrics and brings them to life. In regards to the storyline of the video how easy or difficult was it to take a 2 plus minute song and tell its story?

Jesse: David Acampora, the director came to us with a bunch of ideas after he'd listened to the song and we brainstormed and wrote down a bunch of ideas. We looked at costume options and shopped for props and stuff for the various outfits and scenes. It was a collaboration between him, myself and Joe mostly. For instance, David wanted the BBQ scene, and knew he wanted specific details, like: the money instead of lettuce on the burger, and the dad puking oil. He also wanted the cell scene with the “smear” walls and me covered in oil crap (that wasn't much fun, especially when my eyelids stuck together). Joe hung the light bulb low in the cell scene and it all came together - a real collaboration.

David also knew he wanted to do the cloning effect and we did some tests to see how to do that right. We reshot it again and now it looks great. The storm troopers stop and search scene was my idea and weird surveillance guy was a collaboration between all three of us. Joe made that costume with contractor bags, coveralls, CCTV cameras, a gas mask and some Lacrosse pads! The scene with the snow - I mean nuclear fallout ash - was just a lucky accident - it was the first test shoot we did it just started to snow.

David found the two quotes used towards the end (Kennedy and Reagan) which I think add another level to the song. I suggested the Ben Franklin quote because I really think it sums up the point. I'm not sure why we couldn't find a sound bite of him saying it… I guess he's not on You Tube.

IE: It seems the band was fortunate in a few ways, one being that you were previously in bands with the videos director and are good friends. How was it working with David on this project?

Jesse: David was really generous with his time. It was great working with someone so talented and enthusiastic. He had a ton of ideas and understood what the song was about right away. He framed great shots and made them even better in post-production - he's a one man army!  He was willing to work on this during his (very rare) free time and he owns the equipment, so we got totally hooked up. I think he is psyched to have something a little less mainstream that he can add to his portfolio. We're old friends and we were in two bands together: Blaze Camo and Mind Control Assassins. I probably owe him my first child so it’s a good thing he doesn't want kids (yet).

IE: The good fortune didn’t end there as your bass players company also contributed to this video as well... can you tell us about that?

Jesse: Joe (our bassist) owns a set building and prop company called Readyset. He has always joked that if we ever made a video he could hook it up - and he did! I knew he was talented but it was pretty amazing to see him in action. We shot the storm trooper cops across the street from his work shop and he thought one of the cops should have a riot shield. He disappeared into the shop and came out 45 minutes later with a curved plastic shield with handles and rubber border and a riot stick - like magic! He was also great on set (we shot a few scenes in his workshop) wetting the walls to makes them look sweaty and creepy and generally making everything look a lot better. He was able to make David’s crazy ideas a reality.

IE: Where did you guys do the filming for this video?

Jesse: We shot in Bushwick, Greenpoint (Brooklyn) and Long Island City (Queens). We tried to find locations that weren't very busy and where we wouldn't be hassled (we didn't have any permits). The shoots were always very efficient but we had to shoot when all our schedules allowed it. David is kept busy with paid work so he worked shooting our video in whenever he could and the band is all tied up with their own lives as well, so organizing a show was often a shit show on our part. The last month we were just waiting to shoot the last clone politician scene and it only took a just couple of hours when we finally had the opportunity.

IE: Who are the other people in the video including the family in the backyard as well as the black uniformed storm troopers as you have called them?

Jesse: In the BBQ scene, Jay (or drummer) plays the dad, Joe's girlfriend Tracey plays the mom (we considered using our guitarist Steve in drag but thought that would be too distracting). The twin girls are Jay's friend Pat's daughters: Fiona and Lorelai. They look so great, they didn't enjoy skipping much, but David knew it would look extra creepy! The storm troopers are Ryan (singer of Dead Serious), Jason (singer of Miscengenator) our old friend Beven, and John - who was also our unpaid lackey (poor bastard). Jay plays himself on the drums (although he tried to hide that fact by pulling his Yankees hat as low as it could go) and Joe and Steve play themselves as well. I played everyone else because I'm a ham like that, and the director is my mate!

Steve: It's tough for us to say really. I think there's a fair amount of our audience who are socially and politically conscious to a certain degree, and these kinds of lyrics could resonate with them because they're paying attention to what's going on. We hope too that it inspires people to research things like this further. Then again, our lyrics also have a certain degree of opaqueness to them, so the lyrics could really be open to different interpretations, which is something we also encourage. We're not one of these bands that hit you over the head with very direct lyrics like "Reagan's killing you with toxic waste"; we sort of lay out puzzle pieces and leave it up to the listener to draw their own conclusions. Some people have reached out to us and wanted to know what a certain song “meant”, but we say "well, what do YOU think it means?", because that's really more important: what the listener gets out of the songs. Contrary to legend, we don't have any one concrete political or social agenda with the band- we're 4 different guys with varying views on the world around us. If anything, we all agree that many things happening around us and inside us are worth questioning and examining.

IE: It has been a year now since this EP hit the streets and your initial run of shows to support it including a run to Europe. What is next for Yuppicide?

Jesse: We've taken some time off playing shows to focus on writing some new material. Steve never stops writing music and he is an inspiration to the rest of us. He commutes two hours each way to practice – that is dedication. So far we have about 8 brand new songs that we're working on. We'd like to have enough for another album, and that’s what we're working towards. Once we release that we'd love to go back to Europe - but it’s tricky to organize because we all have work and family responsibilities outside of this crazy hobby.

Steve: The thing that is really on our radar now is new material, and a LOT of it. I don't want to jinx us and paint a “bridge too far" scenario, but we're working towards a new LP. We have a whole bunch of new songs that we've been playing for a while and that show up in our live sets, and we have even more new stuff in development. As a lot of people have noticed, we've stepped back from live shows and we've been focusing really on this new material. It's really only recently that we've all actually agreed that it was going to be an actual LP. Initially we were thinking an EP or 2, or an EP and some splits- but the way we're headed, it's looking like it could be an LP which, if you think about it, is kind of an audacious goal, given the reality of 4 guys getting up there in age and with a gazillion things going on in their lives, not to mention I live a solid 2 hours north of the other guys.