A conversation with:
Justin Dionisio and Pete Kraynak of One More Weekend
By Hektor D. Esparza

Preface

Hopefully nobody would be so silly as to listen to music they’re not really into just because it’s cool. But then again, have you ever seen some one wearing a leather jacket in the middle of summer? I have. It’s good to remember that nobody has more control over what music we listen to than ourselves. It is our choice.

But what if you didn’t know you had an option, and thought you had to wear whatever clothes it was that Brand X Mall Store is selling, or had to listen to whatever music that Brand X radio station is playing? That would be a drag, but fortunately it’s not like that. We can choose whatever music or fashion we like. It’s only a matter of exposure, and more exposure means more choice.

When I go music shopping now, I look for stuff that I know I’ll like. But I also try to stay open to everything new. Thinking about music, I have mixed feelings. Though a lot of the new stuff I hear isn’t very good, there are always a few scattered gems. There are plenty of old standards: The Velvet Underground, The Minute Men, Public Enemy, Sonic Youth, Bad Religion. And there is still tons of music I haven’t even heard yet. But I have a hunch that long after I’ve discarded my free promo copy of the next hot ”garage band,” I’ll still be digging on some of my favorites.

One More Weekend is a band that’s been around for about three years. Its members have experienced some dramatic changes in the local and national music scenes. Some good, some bad. And when the band started to make changes of its own their fans kept right on coming. At any given show, O.M.W still draws hundreds of people, no small feat considering the fickle temperament of a young fan base.

On a recent trip to Tower Records, I ran into O.M.W’s Justin Dionisio while checking out the music magazines. Justin is an opinionated guy. It’s funny to talk to him while he’s glaring at all these new bands in the music mags. He would say things like,” See this band here, it sucks, so does that band. In fact they all suck.” Well maybe not that severe but almost. It was refreshing to talk to someone who doesn’t pussyfoot around these issues. He tells it like it is and doesn’t care if you disagree. I asked him if he would like to be interviewed for SMASH Magazine and he started ranting right there on the spot about how gay all these guys in other bands looked. I had to tell him to save some venom for the interview. I didn’t even have my tape recorder. So we agreed to meet a few days later and do it proper, over drinks and with another member of the band. And this is how it went down.

One More Weekend is: Nick Faiella vox/guitar, Justin Dionisio guitar, Pete Kraynak drums, Pat Laundrie bass

SM: Would you tell me about the kid who had to change his outfit before going into a show?
JD: I was in my car and I saw this guy go into a show and he was dressed like a skater. He went in and I guess checked things out and then he came back out to his car and put on a messenger bag and changed his etnies (skate shoes). I guess the crowd didn’t fit his vibe. I couldn’t believe it. I was laughing to myself. It seems typical of the Vegas scene right now. No one cares if a band is good anymore. It’s more like, if your friends will like you for liking that band.
PK: That’s why I like where we are at right now. We’ve been together for three years and the couple hundred or so people that come out to our shows are there because they are still into our music. They don’t care what we are wearing. We go on stage in the same clothes we hang out in, that we work in. We just live and play music. We are not trying to be a scene, a style or a “core.” People who come out to see us know that.
JD: I think it takes a level of maturity to know who you are and what you are about. You go to a show and every kid looks like a clone. There are like 300 kids all wearing the same thing and you can’t tell them apart. But I know that when I was 16, I wasn’t like how I am now.

SM: Do you think trying to make music fit a scene interferes with good song writing?
PK: If you are trying to create something to fit a mold, it’s not going to work.
JD: We have no preconception of what we want when we are going in. I think it has taken us this long as a band, to finally develop what we feel is our sound, and what we are trying to get across. These bands that think they are going to get somewhere in three or four months, unless they are really innovative, it won’t work. It takes time to grow.

SM: What are your thoughts on the music you’ve been hearing lately?
JD: I’ve only heard three or so CDs over the past year and a half that I consider good music.
PK: I think the newest thing that I’ve liked is Cursive’s new record and Poison the Well. I think that’s it. I can’t stand the music out right now. I hate it.

SM: What is your complaint against it?
PK: Well, especially in Vegas, it’s all that bullshit that’s on the radio. It’s just watered down fourth generation stuff. The record companies pick four sounds and then duplicate the hell out of them. Pick one thing and make six copies of that band and sell x amount of records. It’s just watered down to the extreme. They want to make as much money as they can at one time. Especially now, because they know it’s all going to shit. People are starting to wake up and use their brains. There’s a revolution coming where people don’t want to buy what they are being sold. You get like Simple Plan, who’s a rip off of A New Found Glory, who’s a rip off of Blink 182.
JD: And they’re a rip off of Green Day
PK: And what’s their name, that blonde guy with the greasy hair, who thinks he’s Kurt Cobain?
JD: Puddle of Mudd?
PK: Yeah, they’re just a wannabe Nirvana, like Three Days Grace, just another rip off of everything that’s happened ten years ago. I mean it’s ok to have influences. There are probably parts in each of our songs where I bit off someone’s drumming style just because I like the way they play. But I don’t copy it and say I want to sound just like that.

SM: So what is a good approach to writing music?
JD: I think the whole purpose of music as an art form, is to try to push yourself and your band to see what you can come up with. To listen to something else and try to write in that style, it totally defeats the purpose. For the most part, when I pick up a guitar it’s more of a natural instinct, whereas when you first start, you pick an influence and draw directly from that. Now I am comfortable with my playing and writing, so I can just pick up and play whatever I’m feeling at the time. It’s just what feels right.
PK: At first we would say this is too butt rock or this sounds too much like another band. And then a couple of years ago we said, ‘Fuck it, who cares,’ we had a talk and said we would just play what we were going to play.

SM: Aside from playing what feels right, isn’t knowing technique important?
PK: I think it’s a mix of both. We’re not the best musicians in town. But we can hold our own good enough to play what we want to play, and write what we want to write.

SM: There are definitely kinds of music that represent a time period, but which bands do you think just made timeless, good music?
PK: Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd
JD: Nirvana, I still listen to them more than almost anything else.

SM: So what’s your advice to musicians and fans about creating something new?
JD: If there is a logical path to follow it is to do what you believe in. I think this is what makes you come up with that thing that everyone else is trying to copy.