Jere: Hey Brad. Thanks for calling me.

Hargreaves: Sure, no problem.

Jere: So you guys are coming to Birmingham soon?

Hargreaves: Yeah, on the 25th. That’s coming up soon, I guess.

Jere: You guys have never been here before, have you?

Hargreaves: No, I don’t think we have. We did a limited run of the South in July, but Birmingham wasn’t one of the stops.

Jere: I just heard that "Semi-Charmed Life" is the song that’s been played on the radio the most in 1997. That’s impressive.

Hargreaves: Yeah. We won the Billboard "Song of the Year" for that.

Jere: That song’s been pegged as this year’s "feel-good hit," but it’s really a pretty dark song when you read the lyrics.

Hargreaves: People always say there’s this dichotomy to that song, but for us, that song was sonically written to portray how speed feels it’s the bright, shiny drug. So I don’t see any real paradox in that song.

Jere: I kind of see it as the ‘90s version of Lou Reed’s "Take a Walk on the Wild Side."

Hargreaves: Yeah. We used the "doot doot doot" part of that song. It definitely was inspired by that song. Definitely.

Jere: Have any censors given you a hard time over the song’s content?

Hargreaves: Yeah. MTV beeps out a lot of the words. And when we do TV shows they beep out some of the words. They often ask us to change them, but we just say no (laughs). It’s their show if they want to beep out some of the content, that’s fine. But we’re not gonna change the lyrics to fit some kind of TV format.

Jere: With that song’s huge popularity, it’s amazing how many people don’t really know what it’s about.

Hargreaves: Right. It’s not a song advocating drug use or perverted sex in any way, shape or form. It’s more of a cautionary tale than anything, so I guess the message is really kind of positive. Some of the references are a little more graphic than the average radio song.

Jere: It’s probably been a while since Billboard’s "Song of the Year" contained references to crystal meth and fellatio

Hargreaves: (Laughs) Yeah, yeah. I’m so happy about that (laughs).

Jere: This has really been a wild year for Third Eye Blind. You came out of relative obscurity to score the year’s biggest song. What’s been the most amazing moment for you personally?

Hargreaves: Well, there have been a lot of amazing moments. You go through this whole process of gaining success, and there’s always these milestones along the way where you realize, "Wow, this is really going." Most recently, I’d say it was the first night that we opened for U2. That was at the SkyDome in Toronto. We went out on stage, and we were just looking out at this abyss, this big, massive crowd. The SkyDome is this huge place, and we’d never played that type of venue before. I was actually pretty nervous. And it’s been a while since I’ve been nervous playing the drums. But that was exhilarating, and it was a good experience. The next night we played much better. We were less nervous. I was thinking, while I was playing, "I’m opening up for U2 right now!" I’d always wanted to do that, and suddenly I was. It was really surreal. But that’s not the best mindset to be in when you’re playing rock and roll (laughs). It was still interesting, nonetheless.

Jere: Were they a band that you listened to quite a bit when you were growing up?

Hargreaves: Yeah, I was into U2. I stopped listening to them after The Joshua Tree. But I went to their concerts back then, and I always thought they were a great live band. And they continue to be.

Jere: Did you spend much time with them while you were touring together?

Hargreaves: No, not a lot of time. Bono came by our dressing room after the second show. He talked to us for about fifteen minutes, and he was as nice and gracious as he could be. It was really cool because it was just a down-to-earth, musician-to-musician exchange. There were no egos or anything, and that was cool. Then Adam Clayton came by and said hello. It was nice. It was the kind of situation where you don’t go to them, they come to you, you know? But they were nice enough to do that.

Jere: Those shows were probably a good warm-up for the shows you’re opening for the Rolling Stones.

Hargreaves: Right. We did our first Stones show last Friday, in Tempe, Arizona. That was great.

Jere: That had to be a different environment.

Hargreaves: Yeah. The Stones are cool, but they’re a little before my time. I never listened to ‘em that much. But there was a real sense of rock and roll history at those shows. Even moreso than with U2. I mean, U2’s been around a long time and all, but the Stones are unparalleled.

Jere: How did those shows go?

Hargreaves: They went pretty well, actually. We’re adjusted to playing big stadiums now. You have to play to really get the songs across. Of course sound is a major issue in those stadiums. It just bounces all over the place. It’s a difficult challenge because we don’t have as much of a chance to sound good as they do.

Jere: Due to setup time and all that?

Hargreaves: Yeah. It’s hard to sound really good in a stadium when you’re an opening act.

Jere: Who will be opening the shows that you’re headlining?

Hargreaves: We’re doing a few headline dates between the Stones shows, but we’re not bringing anybody along with us. We’ll just have local opening acts. The routing for this Stones tour is so crazy that I don’t think any opening band could really afford to follow us around in their vans or whatever. The next tour we’re doing, we’re going out on the road with Smash Mouth. That should be fun. I think that’ll be in February.

Jere: You guys are fiercely independent D.I.Y. attitude and everything. But have you found many other bands that you really feel a connection with?

Hargreaves: The bands we’ve met are definitely among our peers. There’s a common ground in that you’re all trying to do the same thing get your songs played on the radio and get people to come out and see your live shows. I sense a real camaraderie with a lot of bands. If there’s good songs, there’s always room for new bands, you know? It’s not really this big competition.

Jere: You guys even built up some of that camaraderie with Oasis, a band that’s not known for liking other groups.

Hargreaves: Yeah. Kevin, our guitar player, spent a lot of time with them. Web eveloped as much camaraderie as you can with that band, I guess (laughs).

Jere: They seem pretty adversarial.

Hargreaves: Yeah. But a lot of that is just hype. When it comes down to it, at the end of the day those guys are pretty nice guys. We met ‘em all, and they were pretty mellow. I wouldn’t say we spent a lot of time with them. That was just a gig we did before we even had a record deal. That was another one of those milestones we were referring to. We played for 9,000 people that night, and the biggest show we’d done before that was for maybe 100 people. We had a really good show that night, and we won over the crowd. We sort of realized at that point that Third Eye Blind might be able to succeed at a higher level than the underground club scene.

Jere: You’ve been touring with this album for a while now. Is there one song that stands out for you as your favorite on the CD?

Hargreaves: That changes from time to time. I enjoy playing "How’s It Going to Be" and "Motorcycle Drive-By." "How’s it Going to Be" has a really nice, mellow groove. Some of our stuff is really high energy, so it’s nice to kind of relax during that song. "Motorcycle Drive-By" has a lot of different sections and a lot of different moods within the song, so it’s fun to make that song come alive every night.

Jere: Speaking of your playing, your drumming style sounds like it has been somewhat inspired by the jazz style of drumming. Is that true?

Hargreaves: Yeah. That’s very perceptive. Before I was in this band, jazz was all I played. They have a pretty healthy jazz scene out there. It’s as healthy as a jazz scene can be, I guess (laughs). That’s how I paid my bills all through college and even after college until I got into this band. Third Eye Blind came along for me on a whim, really. Kevin told a friend of mine from college that they needed a drummer, and a mutual friend of ours recommended me. They originally had me just come down to play. They said they had some gigs to play, but their original drummer lived in L.A. and couldn’t make it. I was only supposed to play a few shows, but it just kind of worked out from there. I went in with the attitude of, "let’s just see if I can get in a rock band." I hadn’t played that kind of music seriously since high school. I just wanted to see if I could do it, and I really wasn’t all that serious about it. It’s funny how those things work out. I’m sure a lot of drummers would want to kill me for saying that (laughs).

Jere: Maybe I just spotted that jazz influence because I listen to jazz from time to time.

Hargreaves: Who do you listen to?

Jere: I like Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, Fats Waller, Dizzy Gillespie

Hargreaves: Wow. That’s cool. I’m more into the ‘60s stuff. Of course I love Charlie Parker. I lean towards the more avant-garde stuff. I try to let the parts that I play come naturally. I’m glad that you can hear some of those influences in my playing.

Jere: Even though you don’t write the lyrics yourself, do you still feel a personal connection to them?

Hargreaves: Yeah. It’s funny, but a song like "Losing a Whole Year" that song was written during my first rehearsal with Third Eye Blind. Those lyrics could have been about a relationship I had when I was 19. It fit perfectly, right down to the Prozac (laughs). I think that’s why people can relate to our songs.

Jere: So you guys gelled pretty quickly, right?

Hargreaves: Yeah. They had been through a lot of drummers. They often say that Third Eye Blind never really happened until I joined the band, because that’s when they really felt a connection between all four members. We all had a common ground, and I really felt that, too. I played with a lot of different musicians in the jazz world. Sometimes it happens, and sometimes it doesn’t.

Jere: Do you guys ever discuss what the songs are about?

Hargreaves: No, not really. It’s funny. We never discuss a single part of what we do musically. Our music comes about totally naturally and organically. Everyone is given free reign to come up with parts that they think fit the music. Everyone’s trusted to create parts that work. That’s as far as it goes.

Jere: That can be the most rewarding way to do it.

Hargreaves: Yeah. There’s this real connection. When we have the time to write nowadays, it just comes out pretty naturally.

Jere: Some critics have referred to Third Eye Blinds lyrics as "depressing." Do you see that?

Hargreaves: No, I think the songs are more about a cathartic release than about being depressed. We don’t try to tell people how to hear our music. If they see things that way, then they see them that way. We can’t change that. My uncle, for example, is an Episcopalian priest, and he’s one of our biggest fans. He sees a real message of hope in our lyrics.

Jere: I remember back when you guys first signed, a lot of people were surprised that you signed with Elektra. What led you to sign with that label?

Hargreaves: That’s funny, because they were very passive in the way that they pursued us. Especially compared to some of the other record companies. That impressed us. Someone from Elektra said to us, "Any company you sign with is gonna be good for you guys, but we just hope you choose Elektra." And they allowed us to have all the creative freedom that we needed. It was a very easy choice for us.

Jere: There are a ton of Third Eye Blind fan pages out on the internet. Do you guys ever check those out?

Hargreaves: Yeah, I do, actually. My brother and I designed our official Web page. My brother’s really into it. I’m a fledgling computer nerd, I guess (laughs). Trying to be, at least. I’m always impressed because, every time I check those pages out, there seem to be one or two more. I think there’s about 10 now. It’s pretty funny, because the stuff we put on our Web site seems to end up on those fan sites pretty quickly (laughs). We’re totally flattered by the fact that people want to create Web pages about us, dactually. It’s often young people, too, which is encouraging to see.

Jere: Some bands I talk to are really into the Web, and others are like, "I don’t even have a computer" (laughs).

Hargreaves: We have a mail site set up in ours, and I try to answer as many of those as I can. Obviously there’s way too much for me to answer, but I try. A lot of times, that’s where we get some really nice compliments and some very thoughtful insights into our music. I guess the people with computers are the more intuitive segment of our fans. It’s a cool way to communicate with them.

Jere: One last question, and this is to satisfy my wife’s curiosity: Where did the name Third Eye Blind come from?

Hargreaves: Um, well, Stephan came up with name. It doesn’t have any specific meaning. It kind of mirrors some of the paradoxes you might find in Stephan’s lyrics. It’s not any kind of mission statement. It’s just an idea that represents the way that some of Stephan’s lyrics work. It’s not really a serious name. Sometimes when we get asked that, we just say, "It doesn’t mean anything" (laughs). It just is. It’s not important, really.

The End.

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