MXPX 'Secret Weapon' Bio

MxPx Secret Weapon
Mike Herrera: Bass/Vocals
Tom Wisniewski: Guitars
Yuri Ruley: Drums

Sometimes you can go home. Just ask the iconic, idyllic punk/pop stalwarts MxPx, who have returned to the almighty Tooth & Nail Records for their exhilarating, dexterous eighth studio album, Secret Weapon. Long on the highly-charged, infectious anthems that made them scene favorites and boasting a smattering of adventurous, classic pop-inspired winners, the trio – consisting of frontman/bassist Mike Herrera, guitarist Tom Wisniewski and drummer Yuri Ruley – has delivered what can only be called its most accomplished and cohesive disc yet.

As Secret Weapon uncorks with the 1-2 punch of the title track and “Shut It Down,” it’s hard not to think masterpiece as the Aaron Sprinkle (The Almost, Anberlin) produced set unfolds. If Wisniewski is a little too humble to agree with that notion, he does call the disc’s double-whammy opening, “a face-melter.” Counting a guitar solo from Bad Religion’s Brian Baker, “Secret Weapon,” the incendiary, attention-grabber also finds MxPx wielding its infamous, optimistic tack.

“We’ve always been a band that’s tried to focus on the sunny side of life,” acknowledges Herrera. “But we try to do it in a way that’s real to people and not cheesy. We kind of embrace the dismal and the uplifting at the same time. And “Secret Weapon,” the song and the album, sums up where MxPx is right now.”

The aforementioned “Shut It Down” is an equally blistering homage to the Clash replete with soaring choruses, thundering drums and a vocal cameo from Sugarcult’s Tim Pagnotta. Launched with the proclamation, “This is a public service announcement with guitar!” – a line excerpted from that seminal quartet’s 1982 effort Combat Rock – its an endearing acknowledgment to Strummer/Jones.

“Aaron and I were listening to a playback of our song, waiting for Mike at the studio,” Tom explains. “And it just popped into my head. I was thinking of “Know Your Rights,” so I started shouting it over the song. And Aaron’s like, ‘Dude, that’s sick.’ So when Mike arrived, I was like, ‘Okay, get in front of the microphone.’ And that’s how we paid tribute to my favorite band ever.”

Suggesting kids give up their incessant texting rituals and forgo time in the chatroom for time with their families in the living room, the song’s message is a thought-provoking commentary on technology’s impact on society. “Everyone’s seen that cell phone commercial where the whole family is sitting at the dinner table,” says Tom. “The kid’s asking for the salt or whatever and the dad’s just blowing him up on the text message. And he’s like, ‘Dad. I’m right here.’ Sure it’s funny, but it’s also kind of sad.”

Not so for the alluring contagion “Top of the Charts.” An acerbic look back at MxPx’s frustrations with the music business and its tenure at a major label specifically, it just may be the band’s most accessible number ever. “It’s absolutely based in reality and our experiences with the whole major label world,” says Tom. “It was actually written a while back, after we parted ways with A&M. You know, they’d tell us, ‘Oh, the record’s perfect. It’s great. Then two weeks later they’d be back in touch and say, ‘Yeah. We don’t hear a single. Can you get back to us with a couple more songs.’ Like, ‘I know you just spent the past year writing songs but now can you pull an amazing single out of a hat? Can you just do that for us real quick? Thanks.’”

“It’s one of those things that we almost left off the record because we didn’t want people to think that we were jaded or that we blamed other people for us not having a big hit single,” Mike explains. “We don’t blame anyone. Things just sort of fall where they do and roll with it.”

That’s not to say MxPx hasn’t had its share of triumphs in its decade and a half in operation. Founded in July 1992 by Herrera and Ruley, the Bremerton, Washington-bred band’s line up has remained constant since Wisniewski joined in 1995. Counting a series of alternative radio and video favorites like “Punk Rawk Show,” “Chick Magnet,” “Move To Bremerton,” “I’m Okay, You’re Okay” and “Responsibility” over seven extremely popular studio albums, an array of EPs, plus one live disc and a DVD.

With their weighty back catalog of should-be smashes, returning to Tooth & Nail – a label now running circles around the conglomerates when it comes to getting rock albums on the charts by the likes of Underoath, Anberlin and The Almost – made perfect sense for its glimmering but tenacious eighth album. After agreeing to record three new songs last year for an expanded reissue of its B-sides compilation, Let It Happen, the band and label founder Brandon Ebel patched things up for good.

“It’s no secret that years ago we had a pretty well publicized falling out with them but it’s been a long time and things have healed,” Tom says. “We sort of picked up where we left off.” Fresh off the completion of an amicable deal with respected indie SideOne Dummy, MxPx began seriously considering Ebel’s offer to rejoin his label.

“I would say that helped our decision,” Herrera says of Tooth & Nail’s powerful industry position, “but it wasn’t solely based on business. A lot of it was based on redemption and wanting to right some of the wrongs and be righted for some of the wrongs that were done to us. We felt like this was our way to rebuild everything. I think, if anything, regardless of the success of this record, having that relationship with Tooth & Nail again is going to do wonders for our career, our personal lives and the well being of the whole camp.”

Similarly karmic was the decision to re-team with Sprinkle, who handled production duties on MxPx’s 1994 debut Pokinatcha, after he worked with Tom, Mike and Yuri in the summer of 2006 to append new material to the aforementioned bonus edition of Let It Happen. Because Wisniewski didn’t join until ‘95’s Teenage Politics, replacing founding guitarist Andy Husted, he says, “Aaron and realized that although we were friends, I had actually never recorded with him.”

“But he comes from the same mindset as us musically, and he had a lot of great ideas,” Tom adds of the sessions in Sprinkle’s Seattle facility. “And not only is Aaron a man on the rise, based on his credits, he’s able to help deconstruct a song and put it back together in a way that makes a lot of sense.”

Case in point is the adventurous instrumentation the band fused to “Punk Rock Celebrity,” a hard charging rocker that takes a unique left turn at the bridge, integrating piano and a wall of brass. “Mike came in with the song one day and said basically it’s two songs stuck together,” Tom explains. “Once we put it down, we thought triumphant Beatles-y horns and piano would make the song. So once the horn part was perfected, we brought in the horn players. And it worked really well.”

Less designed to poke fun at the punk rockers you see in the gossip rags than to poke fun at the similarities of the bands littering the music scene. “If you look through Alternative Press, every new band looks like every band you’ve seen before,” the guitarist laughs. “It’s kind of the return of ‘80s hair metal in a way. Except now it’s the sideways haircut and the Cyclops look; just slight variations on the same get-up. And we’ve never been like that, one of our favorite bands ever was the Descendents. And they never bought into that image over rock thing. It was all about the music. There was no pre-planned image.”

From the riotous, circle-pit anthem of “Contention,” clocking in at under 90 seconds and which Mike says he wrote “in whole in all of fifteen minutes,” to the stellar harmonies that elevate the lush, splendid “Sad Sad Song” and pay honor to The Beach Boys, MxPx finds the perfect balance of dichotomy and consistency on Secret Weapon.

“Take everything away, the bassline and the lyrics and the melody was all it was,” Herrera says of the germination of the song, which features former Superdrag frontman John Davis on backing vocals and keyboards. “All of the ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ kind of came afterward. It just seemed like with that type of song it had to be something completely different. It couldn’t be a punk song. It had to be kind of oldies sounding. And I think punk and the oldies era fit well together, and of course, The Beach Boys’ – that fits like a glove.”

From the explosive closer “Tightly Wound,” which boasts a guest contribution by Benji Madden of Good Charlotte, to the upbeat punch of “Here’s To The Life”, the men in MxPx – who were handed the Keys To The City of Bremerton last year – have delivered the strongest record of its career.

“We don’t take each other too seriously,” Herrera explains, talking about how the band has endured through the years. “We like to travel and play music and do all the things you get to do being in a band, save for long plane rides. This band is sort of a microcosm of how a lot of people live their lives. And “Here’s To The Life,” kind of speaks to that. “Here’s to the life that we always never wanted.’ Like, This may not always be how we planned it, but it is what it is. We might as well enjoy it.’”

With that credo in place and Secret Weapon under its sleeve, 2007 seems certain to be the year that Mike, Tom and Yuri conquer the world. Onward and upward, MxPx!