Red Room Where the Writers Are

Issue/Publication: Las Vegas CityLife

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Be Your Own Pet is one of those bands that either makes you feel 19 again, or as if you just checked the mail to find your AARP membership packet finally arrived. The Nashville-spawned quartet's music -- first on its eponymous 2006 debut, and again on its recently released sophomore effort, Get Awkward -- is raucous, immature and relentless. But what else would you expect from a group of musicians who aren't even old enough to drink in most of the United States?

Not surprisingly, age restrictions for alcohol consumption are at the forefront of 20-year-old guitarist Jonas Stein's thoughts, especially after just wrapping up a six-week European tour.

"After traveling around the world, it makes more sense for people to be responsible for drinking alcohol at 18," he says. "Part of the reason why our audience might be more fun and crazy in Europe is because kids who are 18 and 19 are full of energy and angsty, and drinking helps you to express that."

How can you argue with logic like that, especially from a band led by a blonde-topped fireball like Jemina Pearl, who throatily wails lyrics such as, "Next year I'll be 21, look out world 'cause I wanna have fun," over rapid-fire drums and buzzing guitars? Be Your Own Pet's irreverent, 1980s-influenced, thrash-punk sound is full of sing-along anthems covering the basics: food fights, zombie parties and mean girls.

Be glad these kids don't take themselves seriously -- irreverence is rare for a musical group emerging from an art school. BYOP formed in the early years of a shared high school existence at Nashville School of the Arts, inspired by the steady stream of touring hardcore bands coming stopping to play in the basement of Guido's Pizzeria in the earlier part of this decade.

"Anyone could book a show there," says Stein of Guido's. "It was a hotspot for good hardcore, thrash and rock 'n' roll bands to come through -- very positive vibes, crazy mosh pit. That's where we'd always hang out."

These days, the band has grown out of pizzeria cellars and are about to embark on the Nylon Summer Music Tour, with She Wants Revenge, The Virgins and Stitches, playing in mid-sized theaters across America. It's a somewhat mismatched lineup, blending proto-Goth, dance-rock and post-punk, but Stein thinks that will work to the bands' advantage. "Maybe the idea of the diverse lineup is to pull in a bunch of audiences," he says. "Our whole goal is to try to play to bigger audiences this year."

Playing in bigger venues and potentially attracting new fans are worthy reasons to be excited about hitting the road, but Stein is looking forward to touring the United States again for a slightly different reason: "It's comforting that within five exits of a highway, there's going to be a Taco Bell waiting for you."

"It's really hard to be on tour for six weeks in dark parts of Europe," the guitarist adds. "Regardless of how much fun you're having, it sounds a lot cooler than it is. All you're seeing is hotel, clubs and vans. It takes its toll."

If the globetrotting tours, glowing album reviews and endless media interviews become too much, though, Stein assures that returning home to Nashville puts things in perspective for the adolescent band.

"It seems like it's hard for one Nashville band to be big in Nashville because everyone knows them," says Stein, lamenting about the current state of his local hardcore scene. "I think we're kind of in that group. Despite our success elsewhere, our success in Nashville remains the same."