This Record Changed My Life: Vic Fuentes, Pierce The Veil

Third Eye Blind
Third Eye Blind
(1997)

I first heard it hanging around one of my best friends, Curt [Peoples]. We had grown up together since we were in kindergarten – we played in our first band together [Three Simple Words], playing four-hour cover sets in bars. I remember covering some Third Eye Blind songs amongst whatever was big in rock at that moment.

They were one of my favourite bands growing up. I remember I went to a dance in high school, it was a blind date with a girl from Curt’s school and a group of six of us. I remember after the dance coming home and us listening to that album. We had it on the whole night for the aftermath. It’s one of the coolest memories of my youth, of having that night be so exciting and now it being a nostalgic album.

It sounded like they did a lot of experimenting [on Third Eye Blind]. There’s a lot of guitars that don’t even sound like guitars – they must have done it on like, 20 pedals to create the sound.

I reference that record a lot when we’re making records of our own. I say to the producer ’This is one of my favourite records sonically.’ I think it’s a masterpiece. I think their producer captured some really special things in that band. The other thing that has always stood the test of time with me is the lyrics. [Stephan Jenkins] is my favourite lyricist; I’ve always tried to emulate a bit of his style in the sense that he likes to be very poetic but then he’ll hold back by speaking to you like you’re talking to your best friend. I always loved that combination of not going too far poetic andnot trying to go too pretentious with it and say a bunch of shit that no one gets.

Between me and my best friend Curt we have a lot of links with Third Eye Blind now. Curt helped me write King For A Dayand our new single Circles;we’ve done a lot of co-writing together over the years and we’ve continued to make music since we were kids. Curt lives in LA and I live in San Diego but it was just by chance that our friend Jamie starting dating and eventually marrying the drummer from Third Eye Blind, Brad [Hargreaves]. So by default, we have a friend in Third Eye Blind, one of our favourite bands.

Brad is one of my favourite drummers – aside from my brother Mike in our band of course – but I love his drumming; I think it’s creative and really different. So we all thought it’d be cool to write together. So, me, Curt, and Brad got together at Brad’s house in LA and we wrote a song called The Divine Zero which is on our album [Misadventures]. So that song was actually a full circle of us being able to work with one of our favourite bands of all time and make a song together. It was such a special thing.

Things get weirder; Third Eye Blind was trying to finish their new record and Curt ended up helping them do some writing. So it’s just been a really wild life. We constantly say to ourselves ‘Holy shit, this is so crazy.’ We’ve gone from just being kids and loving their records to actually creating a song with them and doing so much more.

Pierce The Veil kick off their Australian tour in Brisbane tomorrow with Silverstein, Beartooth and Storm The Sky. Tour dates below.

AUSTRALIAN TOUR DATES

EATONS HILL, BRISBANE
TUESDAY AUGUST 16 – All Ages

BIG TOP AT LUNA PARK, SYDNEY
WEDNESDAY AUGUST 17 – All Ages

THEBARTONTHEATRE, ADELAIDE
THURSDAY AUGUST 18 – All Ages

170 RUSSELL, MELBOURNE
SATURDAY AUGUST 20 – All Ages

170 RUSSELL, MELBOURNE
SUNDAY AUGUST 21 sold out! (18+)
*MONDAY AUGUST 22 new show! (18+)

ASTORTHEATRE, PERTH
TUESDAY AUGUST 23 – All Ages

Tickets on sale now

For complete tour and ticketing information, visit:
www.piercetheveil.net