The Chinese Telephones

The first time I finally saw The Chinese Telephones was at last year’s Insubordination Fest – technically, I missed them play the “real” show, but I ended up seeing them the next day at the Charm City Art Space, and if I didn’t know any better, would’ve sworn they were playing a packed club even bigger than The Ottobar. Yeah, it’s a cliché thing to say, but it was true. The Chinese Telephones are a band of guys that know what they like (punk, pop punk, and power pop and garage rock, for starters), and they go and play the hell out of it.
Interview by Joe Evans III

Justin: Guitar and vocals
Daniel James: Lead guitar

Joe: Which of you have been accused of being terrorists?
Daniel James: I don't know if any of us have ever been outright accused of terrorism, but... Andy and I used to live in this house in the summer of 2003. We would book a lot of shows there, and one of those shows was supposed to take place on September 11. Annihilation Time was supposed to play along with High On Crime, Holy Shit!, and a band called Attack. Someone reported the flier to Homeland Security and our house got all fucked up and we were all kicked out onto the street. Luckily Annihilation Time still got to play at the Robot House that day. I also had a huge ordeal trying to get my passport when we went to Japan. I think it's because my beard made the government think I was a terrorist.
Joe: How important is the band Hot Carl in the formation of the Chinese Telephones?
Dan James: I had seen Hot Carl once at that same house that Andy and I got fucked over at. I wanna say they played with Fleshies, Toys That Kill, and Rivethead. It was a pretty awesome show, and a lot of the songs they played that night ended up becoming Chinese Telephones songs. I had met Justin maybe once or twice before that at various shows, but this was the first time I had seen him play a show. I dug the songs, and if I didn't I would have never volunteered to play in his new band
Justin: We don’t play any of the Hot Carl songs anymore, though, because they aren’t very good. I think Hot Carl played an important part in getting people in Milwaukee to hate Chinese Telephones from the get-go. I guess we did play one of those songs in Japan. It was pretty bad.
Joe: Did you tour Mexico?
Daniel: We've never toured Mexico. We played in Juarez once on one of our first tours. It was with The Answer Lies. It was pretty cool. We parked our van across the border in El Paso, and we just wheeled our amplifiers across the border on skateboards. Then when we got there, there were a bunch of kids hanging out outside the club and they greeted us with hugs and stuff. My Spanish is pretty bad (and since then it's probably gotten worse) but I was able to talk to a bunch of kids with the little bit of Spanish I knew and the little bit of English they knew and it was pretty fun.
Justin: My mom and step-dad were there for a little while that night, ‘cause they were visiting my uncle who lives in El Paso. After they left, I remember doing drugs with a couple nice ladies in the girls bathroom, then the bartender came in and made me get out because I was a boy. Also, the piss trough in the men’s room had a broken pipe, so urine was oozing out all over the floor and into the bar. I think we were paid in 40s of Tecate that were sitting on the floor in the piss, under the pool table that had a piece of plywood over it. That’s where the drummers played. On top of the pool table. One guy fell off and hit his head on the back wall.
Joe: Is Justin solely responsible for the Potential Johns playing today?
Dan: Probably.
Justin: That’s silly. He had so many songs that he never planned on releasing. He would just record them to give to his brother and some friends, so I asked him if he’d do a split with us, and he said if it was only on vinyl he would do it. I did my share of bugging him to get a band together, but I’m sure lots of other people did, too. I’m just glad that it finally happened.
Joe: Who named Daniel James “The King of Rock and Roll”?
Dan: That was solely a self proclaimed thing. When I was a little kid (ages three to six) I was way into Elvis. I wanted to be him. It comes from that. I had similar infatuations with the Incredible Hulk and when I was in second grade, I more embarrassingly thought I should be the new Jon Bon Jovi. I like to forget that part though and just remember the time I wanted to grow up and be the next Elvis.
Joe: I’d say that’s not out of the question. What’s your current band count at now?
Dan: I'm currently in three bands. I'm in Chinese Telephones, and I play bass in a band with my girlfriend called Jack Moves. I also do the Daniel James Gang which started out as a bunch of four track demos of just me doing everything with a drum machine, which is where the egotistical name came from. Now I got a full band playing the songs with me though.
Joe: Why did it take so long for the full length to be released?
Justin: The mixing took a while, because Jeff and Mark who recorded it were busy with work, school, and their own bands, so they couldn’t get together very often. They would mix a couple songs and email them to me, I’d have to get together with the other guys and listen to the songs, then tell Jeff what we thought should be done differently, and the process would start over again. All of that made things take quite a while.
Dan: We needed to find a label to put it out. I owe Adam from It's Alive! my soul now.

(Originally published in the 2008 Insubordination Fest Zine)