Tuned In - Something Corporate

They're label-mates with New Found Glory and The Starting Line. They're Warped Tour veterans. And they just kicked off a tour with pop punk heroes Good Charlotte. But make no mistake: Something Corporate is not a punk band. "It's our fault," says singer/pianist Andrew McMahon with a laugh. "If we didn�t want people to think that we were a punk band, we shouldn�t have signed with a punk label and toured with punk bands. But people will hear our music and they�ll eventually know what we�re all about."

And what are Something Corporate about, you may ask? Oh, just remarkably tight musicianship (driven by Andrew's piano skills), epic choruses, and poignant songwriting that belies their ages (none of the members are older than 22). The Orange County, Calif.-based band got a big chance to show off their piano-infused pop rock last week when the video for their single "Space" was shown during The O.C. The single reflects the darker tone of their upcoming disc North, a much moodier offering than 2002's sunny debut, Leaving Through The Window. The melancholy tone comes from a year-long, self-imposed isolation: Andrew, guitarists Josh Partington and William Tell, bassist Clutch, and drummer Brian Ireland holed up in a house right outside Seattle. "The whole band lived in the house," says Andrew. "We would basically wander downstairs, get a cup of coffee, and go into the studio for thirteen to fourteen hours a day just because there was really nothing else to do."

But although the solitary confinement helped them concentrate on getting the job done, it also drove deeply personal songs like "Down." "I had a girlfriend for the past two years," says Andrew, "With that song, I had just come home and I was so glad to be there but I felt like I had pushed myself further into a corner and further away from people." It isn't the first time that Andrew -- or Josh, who penned "Space" -- have drawn on real life for the record. Most memorably, they called out a high school bully in their breakout hit, 2002's "iF U C Jordan."

"I�m a really selfish writer," says Andrew, who peppers his lyrics with specific places and names. "Don�t get me wrong, I love to share my music with people. But to me, the only way to do that is to be as honest to the exact thing that I�m feeling. Sometimes, I just can�t avoid talking about these specific places or people because otherwise it would be leaving out the most important part of the story to me. And strangely enough, the songs that I do that on are the ones that people tend to come back to and somehow go, 'Thank you for writing that. That�s the story of my life.'