The Ataris

What can I say looking back at this all those years ago? Some cool stories, but I was still figuring out what and how to do interviews and make them interesting. You can see some of the out of the box ideas like, “What kind of video game would the Atari’s be?” And things like that. I do remember Kris being very kind to us, and I really remember leaving this chat enthused. I also stole Kris’ Porn Star T-shirt. I later tried to give it back to him some 10-15 years later and he politely declined it and we had a good laugh about my dumb ass fanboy stealing clothes right off a touring musician’s back (or in this case the sweat soaked shirt was left on the table where we had our chat.) Photos also by Damian, who never really did master how to be a concert photographer.   I had the chance to see The Ataris, back in August of ’99, when they opened for Good Riddance at the Galaxy Club in Dallas. I was impressed by their show. I was surprised to learn of their chance coming to Longview, Texas and I jumped at the chance to interview Kris after the show. Currently the band is signed to Kung Fu records with two releases, “…Anywhere but here,” and “Blue Skies, Broken Hearts … Next 12 Exits.” They also have an EP out on Fat Wreck Chords, “Look Forward to Failure.”-Damian– Damian: So Kris. How many times have you had your heart broken?Kris: Hmm… About four times that really mattered. Damian: It seems every song on the new album is about a girl. Any particular reason why?Kris: I wrote most of those songs over like a couple year period and I was going through a lot of changes in my life. I think that it was basically that the record was a transition from like moving from one place to another and getting over past things and trying to move along with my life. There were a lot of things I left behind when I moved.Damian: SO, How is your relationship with Kung Fu Records?Kris: We can’t complain too much. They definitely got us to where we are today as far as they helped me start and move out to California and get our first record out. You know we basically did all the other work ourselves. Went out and toured ourselves. We fuckin played shows for five people across the country a couple of times and once we put out the EP on Fat, that boosted our sales a ton and Fat Mike was kind of responsible for the ripple effect of us actually starting to blow up a little. So I give Kung Fu some credit and I give Fat some credit. Now the only problem we have with Kung Fu is that kids are telling us theat they can not find our records on Kung Fu, but they can find the one on Fat. So we’re working with Kung Fu. We’re trying to make the best of this situation. We’re doing fairly well as it is. We want to keep eye to eye with our label.Damian: Now I heard you guys were suppose to do a full length on Fat, but something happened with the EP and Fat canned ya’ll.Kris: Nope. That’s completely false. We never had any kind of intentions of doing a full length on Fat. We have one more record on Kung Fu and weather or not what we do after that is unknown. We’d like to do a full length on Fat after that and I’m sure that it would probably work out but that is sooo far away. I’ve got the whole new record written and we probably won’t record. We’ll just be touring for the next year, I’m sure. We’re probably going to go to Europe and tour and probably Australia and come back for another U.S. tour. Then we’ll probably record. So our next record probably won’t come out till 2001 at this fucking pace.Damian: Now I saw you guys play with Good Riddance in Dallas, there seemed to be more of a hardcore type audience, did you feel alienates in any ways playing with them?Kris: well you know some crowds are hit and misses. All the other shows we played with the Good Riddance have been excellent. We’ve done a lot of shows with them. Same way with a lot of other bands. We’ve toured a lot with The Vandals, We’ve toured a lot with Lagwagon, A lot with the faster Fat style punk bands or whatever they tend to draw a more punk, you know, whatever type of audience. And We’ve grown on people like that. Its like we can’t win every audience over. We just take the good with the bad and try to make the best of every situation. If one guy is being a fucking chump, that’s fine. Let him be. In the end, we’re still gonna have a good time.Damian: So how have you evolved as a sing writer since the first album?Kris: I think that when I recorded most of the first record I recorded it probably from like sixteen till, actually fifteen till nineteen or something and during that period most of my musical tastes were pretty standard. I didn’t branch out and listen to a lot of variety. I was pretty Ramones, The Queers, Decedents, The Misfits. That stuffs all pretty good. Now I listen to such a wide variety of things that I’m influenced by so many different types of music and so many different types of bands. That’s definitely helped my song writing as a hole and also learning stuff from being in the studio with different people. Working with Joey Cape in the studio was a hole big learning experience. That guy is one of my best friends and I totally respect him as a song writer. He’s given me a lot of tips … Read moreVintage Interview: The Ataris in Longview, Texas circa 1999. Interview about Hotel fireworks shenanigans.