The boys are back in town folks. The “boys" in reference here are the boys of White Reaper [4]. Sam Wilkerson, Nick Wilkerson, Tony Eposito, and Ryan Hater have returned home after several tours over the months of April, May, and June. While they may be a bit worn down and eager to return to the road, the band's homecoming is no small event. Twins Nick and Sam celebrated their 21st birthday last Tuesday; their debut album, “White Reaper Does it Again“ [5] releases July 17th (with a release party at Guestroom Records [6] on July 16th); and shows at both Forecastle’s WFPK stage and Forecastle Late-Night [7] show at Headliners. We caught up with the band to talk everything from turning 21 to touring to being a part of Forecastle for the first time.
Louisville.com: So, Nick and Sam, you just turned 21. What did you do to celebrate the legal drinking age?
Sam: The night of, we all went to Nachbar and got trashed.
Tony: Not really.
Sam: I got trashed.
Louisville.com: What about [Nick]?
Sam: Nick also got trashed.
Nick: No I didn’t. I did not “get trashed”. Don’t laugh at me like that, it’s your fault.
Tony: We had a pretty good time.
Louisville.com: Did you guys do any gross b-day shots?
Nick: Any gross ones?
Louisville.com: Birthday shots. You know how people buy you crazy shots.
Sam: Oh, a lot of them I didn’t know what they were, but I know each of them were different.
Nick: I had one that was—
Tony: Cynar. [ED: CHEE-nar]
Sam: We had Cynar.
Tony: CYNAR
Sam: I’d never heard of it. I hear it’s some kind of fig extract?
Louisville.com: Fig extract? That sounds disgusting.
Sam: If somebody reads this and it’s quoted, I’m going to sound like an idiot if I’m wrong, but you can put it in there if you like. [ED: Cynar is in fact actually derived from the artichoke.]
Tony: It’s just Cynar.
Louisville.com: You guys just got home from touring. What was your favorite part about being on the road?
Tony: Not being home.
Sam: Yeah, not being home. We can live for free on the road.
Ryan: When we’re on the road everything is free. Which is tight.
Sam: We live like kings actually, but when we’re here—
Tony: We don’t have any money.
Ryan: If we had some money we’d have beers all over this table. I tell you what. [ED: Collectively the guys have to two beers and one peach margarita on the table.]
Tony: If we were in another city right now everybody would have an appetizer and I’d be three beers deep already.
Sam: We’d be staying at the Meridien with 20-foot high ceilings and chocolates on the bed, but right now I live in a basement.
Tony: When we’re home, no money.
Louisville.com: Is there anything you don’t like about touring? Perhaps laundry?
Nick: We don’t do laundry.
Sam: We’ve never done laundry on tour. We go on tour for weeks at a time and never do laundry.
Tony: Yep, never done laundry.
Sam: The worst part about tour, a few days ago at least, was being 20 years old being escorted out of venues because I wasn’t 21 and having my f*cking hands “X” out every time I played a show.
Nick: At some venues we were only allowed in the venue before and after we played. Like right before and right after. We couldn’t be there unless we were playing.
Tony: When you’re not 21 some venues don’t let you in. They let you in 5 minutes before you play and then 5 minutes after to get all your shit off stage.
Sam: When it happens it’s the worst feeling. You feel like you’re not even playing in the band that night. I don’t know, I feel like an asshole, but now that’s never going to happen again.
Tony: For me, the worst part of touring is trying to park. Cause you never know.
Louisville.com: What’s the weirdest show you had on tour?
Sam: On this last one we played in Salt Lake City one night. It was f*cking weird.
Tony: It was weird, but it was awesome.
Ryan: That’s true. That’s probably the weirdest one and also my favorite one.
Tony: We got f*ucked up. There was this bar called Area 51 and during our set apparently the stage lighting crashed.
Sam: It was constant strobe lights and we couldn’t really see what we were playing.
Tony: When it first started I was like “shit” I’m going to f*ck up so bad cause I can’t see what I’m doing, but it ended up being fine. It must have been a crazy show for people to watch.
Sam: The strobes were going off the whole time and there was so much fog.
Louisville.com: I’ve heard similar stories about too much fog.
Tony: We love fog.
Sam: Sometimes we ask for more.
Tony: I mean, we never get enough fog. I’ll say one thing: as a band we’ve never had enough fog.
Sam: And there was a shit ton at Area 51. When you have the fog and the strobes that’s when you’re really struggling.
Tony: That’s when you know you’re in Area 51.
Louisville.com: What do you do in your down time on tour?
Together: We go to malls.
Louisville.com: Do you shop or do you just go to them?
Ryan: We hardly ever shop. Sometimes if we all need pants, we will buy pants.
Nick: We know so much about malls. We’ve been to so many.
Sam: We go to malls in mostly every city we go.
Louisville.com: What’s your favorite mall?
Ryan: Well that’s easy, Mall of America.
Nick: It wasn’t that good, but it was the best.
Sam: It was our first time there this year.
Ryan: They have no sales tax and they have roller coasters.
Sam: But their roller coasters cost a lot.
Louisville.com: I don’t think I’m fully understanding the mall thing.
Ryan: It’s a free place you can walk around.
Louisville.com: So are parks?
Ryan: I’m not really into parks.
Nick: Yeah, I don’t think we like the idea of the outdoors.
Sam: We just get drunk and go to malls.
Louisville.com: Is there a store that’s in every mall you go to?
Sam: Hot Topic.
Nick: They all have the same things.
Tony: And we all do the same thing in them. We walk in and then we walk out.
Sam: We walk in, don’t buy anything, and walk out at most stores.