Mikey is most famously known as the Drummer/Front-man for New Jersey’s own Power-Pop Punk Rock Group extraordinaire, THE ERGS! Not to mention Mikey plays in way too many bands to list, and we tried! Some of those groups include: WORRIERS, Jon Snodgrass, All Away Lou and oh so many more! In this late night call, we sit back and sip IPA’s and chat the night away. We cover a lot of ground. We talk about SPARKS, Growing as a songwriter, Working with Steve Albini, Descedents and oh so much more! But most importantly we talk about one of the BEST pop-punk bands of all-time, THE ERGS, and how they came to start (occasionally) playing/recording together again! THIS INTERVIEW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED AT MOSTLYHARMLESSPODCAST.COM. I fell in love with Mikey Erg in 2005, and my life has been better for it ever since.  The Ergs were touring through Southern Colorado with the “nerdcore” hip hop superstar, MC CHRIS. I went to the show that night, at the Black Sheep with the purpose of interviewing MC Chris for my then, Mostly Harmless Magazine!  I liked Chris. He was goofy and weird and wrote rap songs about Star Wars, Robotussin and Blizzards! He even worked on two of my favorite cartoons, SEALAB 2021 and Aqua Teen Hunger Force!  MC Chris was burnt out on interviews and we did not want to chat. Instead of letting it get me down, I took my tape recorder over to the merch table for The Ergs and introduced myself, asking if I could interview them after their set. Thankfully I had listened a little, and written a few notes. We gathered outside the Black Sheep and I fell in love with the three loveable boys that were Joe, Jeff and Mikey. It was also the start of a lifelong obsession with THE ERGS! I’ve gotten to spend time with Mikey all over the country. Whether in Chicago, Gainesville, New York City or Colorado Springs… Anytime I see Mikey out on the road, he greets me with a hug.  As I was gearing up to restart Mostly Harmless for a third or fourth time, I was having a crisis of confidence. I wanted to do this thing that I’ve loved since I was 16, but at 40 years old.. I’m too old right? But here was Mikey, still out there living his dreams. I had wanted to learn more about the Who and Why behind the man who has written so many of my favorite records, and inspired so many wonderful adventures! Thankfully Mikey was once again on board and we jumped on a late night zoom call,  sipped on a couple of delicious IPA’s and shot the shit and called it an interview. I’m so god damned lucky to be able to call this Saint of a human being a friend of mine. He makes my life, and my music collection oh so much better by being a part of it. He inspires and encourages a number of my dumb ideas and my late night record purchases. I hope this chat teaches you a thing or two about songwriting, or what you can learn by working with a pro like Steve Albini. Maybe you’ll even decide to check out a SPARKS record or two, but we both agree, you should definitely check out SPARKS BROS, the killer documentary directed by Edgar Wright of Shaun of the Dead/Hot Fuzz fame. It’s streaming now on Netflix, and we both have the Blu ray on our Christmas list.  If you would like to listen or read the original Ergs interview, conducted in 2005 outside the Black Sheep in Colorado Springs, you can read that interview here: Or listen at: http://mostlyharmlesspodcast.com/flashback-episode-1-w-a-wilhelm-scream-the-ergs/ This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Hey, buddy, what’s going on? So good to see your face! It has been a very long time! What is it 18 years since I last was interviewed by you? What was that? That was the MC Chris tour, So, 2005!? I was I was fortunate enough to see The Ergs twice in Colorado Springs of all fucking places. Once with MC Chris and another time with Hunchback at JJ Nobody’s Triple Nickel Tavern. You were at the Triple Nickel! That was a night. There’s a famous among us- It’s not a famous photo or anything- There’s a famous photo of all of us cheersing Whiskey River, Willie Nelson’s whiskey at the Triple Nickel. We stayed at JJ’s that night. We got to see the infamous collection. I’ll say no more. I mean, yeah, if you know, JJ, Nobody… then you know…. [Laughter] The other day I was watching the Sparks documentary [The most excellent film directed by Shaun of The Dead/ Baby Driver director Edgar Wright] and I assume you are a Sparks fan? Oh, not only am I a Sparks fan, but you probably know this about me: I am a consumer of music and also of rock documentaries of musicians that I love… And I think that the Sparks documentary is the best rock and roll documentary that I’ve ever seen! They did it so right, where they didn’t skimp. It’s two and a half hours long. They don’t skip over even a millisecond of their career, but it’s concise enough where the average person can get into it. There’s been a lot of talk about GET BACK [the Peter Jackson directed, 9 hour long Beatles Documentary]… If you’re a casual Beatles fan. It’s probably not the movie for you. But as a massive Beatles fan, I’m so glad that they left all that shit in. But no one wants that from the Sparks documentary. Even as a massive Sparks fan, there was stuff that could have been talked about, but this is the perfect documentary. It’s got everything and it’s got some stuff that maybe massive fans didn’t know. Have you been a Sparks fan for a long time? I got into them…not a long time ago. I