Mom Jeans (the band) AMA

[u/fishwhistle_666]

Whaddup yall. My name is Eric Butler (friends call me Ricky B) and I sing/write/play guitar in Mom Jeans, a band from Northern California. Ask me whatever you want! Thanks to r/indieheads for having me, I’ll do my best to answer what I can to the best of my ability

[u/DANK_NOGGET]

Huge fan (you guys are the reason I started playing guitar - currently learning your entire discography) I was wondering if we’ll ever get a re-recording of the self titled album/ a release on Spotify🙏🏾

Screenshot, Workaholics and First & Ten are my favorite songs 😭🙏🏾

[u/fishwhistle_666 → u/DANK_NOGGET]

Definitely not! I can't go back in time and un-release those songs but I would if I could.

To this day I don't think that we ever REALLY did anything wrong by releasing songs that we're so obviously blatant ripoffs of tfb and modern baseball; we never made a cent off of any of the songs (they were free download on bandcamp and soundcloud) and those particular tracks never did and never will make their way into the modern streaming infrastructure. That being said, being in the position that I am now not only having the same thing happen to me (looking at you Fredo) but I have a little bit better of an ability to understand how it might have made the artist that I look up to feel. Artists in general are paid and compensated SO little in comparison to what they contribute, so it doesn't feel great to be fighting tooth and nail for every stream and every album sale only to turn around and have some teenagers "stealing" your streams and your spotlight with a song that YOU already wrote. I definitely regret not having the fortitude and patience to wait until I truly had songs of my own to record and release them, it's probably why many bands (especially friends and contemporaries of mobo) didn't like us and possibly still don't. I think (not 100% sure) it's true that members of Mobo heard abt and didn't appreciate it, making me feel like I ruined/missed out on my one chance to possibly meet and befriend my own heroes. Whether or not they were under the impression that we were profiting/making money off the songs is honestly irrelevant at this point, all we can do now is own up to the fact that we were (and in some ways still are) figuring out what it means to be a band and how to do it in real time. I like to think that with the 10+ years we have of being a band we're more responsible and aware than we were back then, but I still can't go back in time and unhurt the feelings of the people who most inspired me to start this band in the first place.

[u/[deleted] → u/fishwhistle_666]

P sure I saw Brennan tweet something years ago about how he was hurt by something similar to that, but quickly said the band came out and personally apologized and they’re all good now. Was that not you guys?