Rooney’s Robert Schwartzman and Ned Brower – HuffPost 5.26.10
Mike Ragogna: Now, despite having the best slacker anthem with “Don’t Look At Me,” what’s your advice to up-and-coming musicians who don’t want to be slackers? What’s your advice for young acts who want to get into making music professionally?
Ned Brower: Find a new profession! [laughs] We’re still trying to figure it out. When I figure out the answer, I’ll let everyone know. I think there’s obviously a dynamic new world that you can explore–everything’s at your fingertips. At the same time, it’s very hard to get any attention with such an over-abundance of information. It’s very challenging, but it’s also really rewarding.
Robert Schwartzman: Well I did a thing online where I asked people that I Twittered if you wanted to interview me, feel free to, and then e-mail me the questions. The main question I read was “How has the band changed from the first album?” It’s kind of hard to analyze yourself and go like, “How have I changed?” When I looked at a picture of me from then, I felt like, “Oh wow!” Like my hair looked different and I look skinnier. I look younger. I don’t realize what’s changed, but I feel like ’cause we’ve toured a lot since then, we learned a lot about ourselves as people–about things we want out of this business, what we want for ourselves, what makes us happy, what doesn’t make us happy. For me, it’s the kind of songs I want to be working on or focusing on, things I want to improve on, becoming a better singer, a better guitar player, a better piano player.
I think if an opportunity like The O.C. came up today, I’d still take it. I didn’t learn that I didn’t want to do those kinds of things ’cause I know how effective it was for us to have been on that show and how effective it is to get our name out there. My overall thing is I love music. I want to be making music for the rest of my life. I hope people will be interested in what I’m doing. I’d like to see our band grow as far as our base, and be able to reach a really healthy place where we can have a solid base where we can put a record out and know we’re going to sell this many records or we know when we tour we’re going to play for this many people. I think since The O.C., I just learned a little bit more about what I want out of my music and out of this career.