Good Charlotte

The name Good Charlotte may be unfamiliar to you, but I guarantee that it won’t be for long. Fronted by twin brothers Joel (vocals) and Benji (guitar), Good Charlotte is living proof that the adolescent rock ‘n’ roll dream is still attainable. Just four years ago, Joel and Benji were going to high school in Waldorf, Maryland, playing baseball, and not really thinking about music; neither brother was in a band or had even ever played an instrument. Fast forward to 2001 and they’re on tour with MxPx, making guest appearances on MTV, and being touted as " A band you’ll be hearing more of," by the New York Post. Their eponymous debut on Epic Records was produced by Don Gilmore (Lit, Eve6), and showcases Good Charlottes rocking pop-sensibilities.
But along with this meteoric rise to the upper echelon of the music world comes negative side effects; especially for a band competing in the modern "punk" market, success can be almost a failure. At first glance many, including yours truly, found it easy to label Good Charlotte as bandwagon jumpers, a major label assembled, punked-up boy-band. The good looks, the studded bracelets, the catchy tunes, the major-label promo machine was working full force behind them; it was just too easy to discard Good Charlotte as corporate drivel. So when I got a chance to review Good Charlottes CD, instead of emphasizing the strength of the music, I instead chose to focus on the apparent shallowness of their image. Big mistake. Lots of angry emails, six months of wearing out their CD in my truck, and one interview with lead vocalist Joel later, I’ve most assuredly changed my tune. Good Charlotte rock, and soon the world will agree.

Your bio says you guys are a mix between The Clash, The Cure, and The Beastie Boys, but I don’t really see that.
We’re not ones to label ourselves or describe ourselves. When someone says The Cure or The Clash, I’m honored to have those names thrown at us because I love those bands. But we don’t really subscribe to any of that, you know, we just do our thing, play our music. We’re not claiming to be anything profound or prophetic, we’re just five guys that wanted to be in a band, so we started one. We’re just playing, having a good time, hanging out with kids and that’s what we’re about.

So you’re not too worried about it?
We’re not trying to say that we’re something new or something different or say that we’re the next anything. We’re just playing shows and touring, because that’s what we love to do. So when someone says The Clash or The Cure, I take that as a huge compliment, but we never really thought about it ourselves.

I always see you guys on tour with punk bands, but I can’t really see you guys as punk either.
I totally know what you’re saying. We’re always thrown in with punk bands and labeled as punk music, and we take that as a huge compliment because we love punk music. But when I talk about punk, I think of a band like Rancid. We never call ourselves punk, but if kids think we’re punk, and if that’s what we are to them, then we’re punk, and if a 21-year-old thinks we’re rock, then we’re rock to him, I mean, we never really pay attention to that kind of stuff.

What about people who want to label you guys as "sellouts?"
I don’t know what we’d be selling out. That’s one of the biggest bullshit terms I’ve ever heard. I mean, there is such a thing as selling out if you change who you are (or) change your music, but our band is real. This is us. We’re just five kids in a band that want to have a good time. We’re the same as our fans; if we weren’t playing onstage, we’d be at the show watching. We hang out with our fans before and after the show and that’s what we’re about.

It just seems kind of misleading that you guys are marketed as a punk band. My favorite two songs on the album, "Motivation Proclamation" and "Seasons"…
Definitely aren’t punk songs.

Exactly.
That’s just how record labels work. They’re doing their job, trying to promote, trying to find out where they can push us. But we’re definitely not mad at them. Our record label kicks ass for us, and we love them for it. We just do our part and play the shows, and if people want to come then cool. Like last night, this kid asked us, "Man do guys ever get pissed that so many 15-year-old girls come to your shows?" And we were like, "No, you know, a 15-year-old girl has just as much right to come out to a show and rock as anyone else." I think the problem is that everybody always tries to over-think everything, We don’t think about it, it’s always everybody else that labels us, or does this or that, but their just doing their jobs to. We could get mad at critics like a lot of bands, but they’re just doing their jobs, they’re criticizing.

It’s just that with a song like "Little Things," which is all about being a loser in high school, I take a look at your promo picture and I have a hard time believing that you had a hard time getting a date for a high school dance.
"Little Things," is the realist song. People are always like," Y’all didn’t have a hard time in high school," but they weren’t there with us. Every line in "Little Things" is true. But if you think about the title, it’s called "Little Things," because those things are all trivial. We weren’t total losers, you know, 90 percent of kids are (losers) where we were in high school, but there’s always that group of kids who ruin it for everyone, those 10 kids who decide what’s cool and what’s not and who to mess with. High school was a rough time for me for a lot of reasons, my family was really screwed up, we didn’t have any money, and this those kids just made it harder. They find your weak points at poke at them. I was glad when it was over and once I got out I just didn’t ever look back.

So your success now is kind of a big "fuck you," to all those kids who messed with you.
I don’t really think of it as that. Every single day, when we’re driving to the show we talk about how lucky we are and how we need to work harder. We never really talk about where we are and where they are because honestly — we don’t really care where they are.

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