Interview conducted with Orville Neeley (Guitar/Vocals) and TV's Daniel (Bass/Vocals)
Orville: Daniel and I met in 2004 at UNT in Denton, Tx. He had another band called The Wrists that I went to see several times. At some point in 2005 Daniel talked about doing a more rock’n’roll style band with Mike from the Wrists and I basically begged him to let me play in the band. As far as I knew, there was nothing like that happening in Denton. I wasn’t yet familiar with the Marked Men, but I would be soon. These were the days of “dance punk”, emo, and grindcore. Most of the shows I saw in my first year in Denton consisted of some such bands and I was pretty sick of it. Lots of Modest Mouse and Franz Ferdinand wannabees around as well.
Fast forward to summer of 2007; I had just gotten back from a disastrous first tour with another one of my bands. It looked like that band was done and I started writing and recording four track demos that I knew right away wouldn’t work in my existing bands. So I brought a tape or a cdr over to Daniel’s house and played it for him.
Paul Parks, the singer for Wax Museums (who lived with Daniel btw) listened while I played the track in Daniel’s room and when it was over he said “you guys should do a new band” and that we should play more stuff like that. And I’m pretty sure that was “All The Time”, which we rerecorded after Greg joined on drums.
Shock Treatment: So the band is based in Denton, TX, the Halloween capital of TX I”ve been told! Have you guys participated in the Halloween festivities of your home town at all or is it kind of on the lame side?
Orville: WAS based. First of all, I should point out that Denton is not anyone’s hometown in this band. Well, maybe nowadays. Our current drummer grew up there. Secondly, none of us live there anymore and haven’t for a long time. Thirdly, the official Bad Sports anniversary is on Halloween. Because that’s when our first drummer, Greg, officially joined AND when we decided on the name. That marks it. October 31st, 2007.
To answer your question, no I’m not a big Halloween celebrator per say, but I do love horror movies. And I enjoy that time of year, and spooky things and candy. Not much of a costume wearer though.
Daniel: I think they adopted the Halloween capital moniker after we all moved away. We were more of a New Year’s band, anyway.
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| Bad Sports Live in Dallas! Photo by Jason Hensel |
Orville: The radio and my parents’ tape collection. Road trips as a young kid meant rolling around in the back of a suburban with the first Boston album cranked and faded all the way back to drown out the kid sounds while my parents crushed Coors lights. Then at some point I heard the Beatles and oldies radio. Classic rock radio dominated my listening eventually. My family moved to Houston, Tx from Tulsa, Ok in 1990 and the radio was always on so I was inundated with all the pop leftovers of the 80s, as well as classic rock and Steely Dan and whatnot, plus the oldies station and my parents tapes of Foreigner, Def Leppard, Boston, etc etc, Then in 1991 Nirvana happened, as we’re all well aware and the radio changed drastically and I kept listening to all this new “alternative” stuff, until sometime in 1996 or 97. Whenever the Goo Goo Dolls got big on the radio, I reverted to the classic rock station.
But yeah, pictures I’d see in Guitar World made me wanna play guitar and bass. Kiss made me want to play drums, even though Peter Criss is not virtuosic by any means, I liked his style. When we got cable some time in 96 or 97, I started watching MTV and VH1 as much as I could. Metallica was kind of the gateway to punk for me, or underground music. Anyway yeah, what these rock stars were doing usually looked cool, usually sounded cool and seemed like a lot of fun. Who wouldn’t want to do that?
Shock Treatment: Speaking of gigs, you guys recently played a string of shows with Spiritual Cramp! How did you guys get that slot and how did the shows go?
Orville: I play guitar in Spiritual Cramp. So, when asked who should go on this tour, I offered Bad Sports. I don’t mind doing double duty. We’ve done a lot of that when Bad Sports tours with Radioactivity (who also played some dates on the tour). Back in the fall of 2018, Radioactivity played a string of shows with Spiritual Cramp opening. That’s how we met them. I live in LA, they’re originally from San Francisco. The singer, Mike B, moved to LA a few years ago, played bass in my other band Memo PST for a few months early on. Then at some point they asked me to fill in on bass for a summer of tours in 2024. Now I’m in the band on guitar.
Anyway, I think the shows that Bad Sports did on this past tour were my favorite ones of the whole trip. We were cooking. I was singing better than I have in a long time, I think.
Shock Treatment: Your last release was a digital only single for the songs “Stuck On Loop” and “Run and Hide”. Both of those songs are killer tunes! What led to the decision to release it only digitally and not get it out on vinyl?
Daniel: We recorded the songs and wanted to get them out as soon as possible. We heard digital was the wave of the future.
Orville: Making records is expensive, especially if not enough people buy them. I’ve got boxes of records from my other bands you can buy.
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| Bad Sports Live in Austin! Photo by Casey Chumbley |
Shock Treatment: And speaking of which, how did the song “Stuck On Loop” end up on the Netflix show Tires?
Orville: We have a publishing agent for that.
Daniel: That track plays over a triumphant monologue given by Thomas Haden Church in that show. Fun fact: he also went to UNT and lived in Denton. You can’t escape the Denton connection. There’s a Whataburger in Denton that’s filled with pictures of famous celebrities that lived in Denton. I used to sit in the booth under the Thomas Haden Church picture every week after work, since I was a big Wings fan.
Shock Treatment: Tell me about Bad Sports “alter ego” band Annoyance? Did Garth Brooks’ alter ego Chris Gains have any sort of influence in this?
Orville: That was the show writer’s choice. We had nothing to do with the band name. I told the people we talked to about doing the show that we’re totally fine with using our actual band name, but the writers had already worked “Annoyance” into the script. There was some joke in the dialogue they were really proud of.
Plus, not using our real name placed us more squarely into the lore of “fake punk” bands in TV shows, cop shows especially. An aspiration of sorts for Bad Sports since the beginning.
Personal favorite: Quincy M.E. had a band called Mayhem in 1982 with songs “Choke” and “Next Stop Nowhere” (the title of the episode). I’ve still never watched an entire episode of that show haha. It was before my time.
Shock Treatment: I know you guys get a lot of Ramones comparisons, but what bands have an influence on Bad Sports music that you think people might be surprised to hear?
Orville: These days, what sort of thing could or would be a surprise?
Daniel: Tons. I think our eclectic influences kinda helped out the longevity of this band. We try to incorporate some different styles and influences, but in the end, it always ends up filtering out to sound like our style. In the beginning of Bad Sports, we were listening to all the bands that predated and influenced the early punk records (rock, garage, glitter, etc.). So, unknowingly, our first stuff kinda sounded like early punk records.
Shock Treatment: So what lies in store for Bad Sports in the near or not so near future? Can we expect any new music from you guys?
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| Bad Sports Live in Atlanta! Photo by Matt Benedictis |
Orville: We have an EP on the way soon. Not sure about a physical release for that yet. Will definitely be streaming. Maybe we can get an album together before too long. No shows or tours to announce at the moment, but we’ll make sure to let everyone know when we got something on the books.
Shock Treatment: Where can people go to hear your music or buy your records?
Orville: Anything out on Dirtnap records can be found at their website. Otherwise, you can buy some music directly from us through bandcamp. If you want anything not on Dirtnap, I suggest Discogs. When we get on the road again, you can buy records from our merch table.
Follow Bad Sports on Instagram: instagram.com/badsportsband