Midnight Norma Lane is Laila Mendoza, Jonah Perez and Jeff Gomez
1) What do you want people to hear most when they hear your music?
Jonah: I want them to hear the emotional journey the music can take you and the honesty of every story in each song.
Laila: I get sick of hearing bands singing about scenery and shit they don't care about. I want to people to hear something honest. There's this scene in in the film Running with Scissors that I love where the mother Deirdre Burroughs says "if Anne Sexton writes about flowers, the poem isn't about the goddamn flowers." It's funny but it's true, I want to be that kind of writer.
2) Having music on Band Camp, along with other such platforms in music right now such as Sound Cloud, Spotify and others, do you feel that music is moving into a virtual age? Personally, I fully support the idea of downloading songs for free from Band Camp and then if I like them buying them on vinyl.
Laila: I do feel like music is moving into a virtual age. The old business models are dying and new ones are being born but the future of the industry is still unclear. We put our first EP Moxy Kid for free up on Bandcamp. We wanted to put our music out there and we know people love free stuff (as do we) so it felt like a good idea to promote our music and not expect someone to buy music from a band they had never even heard of. I wish making music and recording was free but it's not. It may not be the greatest idea financially but the artist in us, is more like a child so it's hard to think, hey how do we pay for this record? The answer is we can't, at least not until we re-think how to adapt the virtual age.
3) How important of a factor do you feel that record labels play in music these days when pretty much anyone can put their music on the internet as opposed to having to hand out demo tapes at shows, the distribution record labels can offer, etc. It just seems like it’s a bit easier these days to succeed as a band- and even build up a strong fan base- before a label possibly comes calling for you.
Laila: Labels are just the old way of thinking, really. I think right now, distribution and licensing are the only real roles they play. Unlike before they pretty much dictated careers and since the only way you could really find out about a band was on T.V. or the Radio, the medium was limited and they were the gatekeepers. Now the medium is massive because of the internet. It's amazing and daunting all at the same time. I first started playing music during the heyday of MySpace. I made all my connections and got all my shows by simply recording a few tracks on a small mic I bought at Wal-Mart. Jonah's band Since Always and Forever, found great success through Myspace. He had fans in Japan!
4) If you could tour with any single band or musician who would you pick and why?
Jonah: Deftones, I love their heavy melodic sound. I've been looking up to them since I was a kid so it would be a dream come true!
5) Who is your favorite New Kid on the Block?
Laila: You know I missed out on that band, it was a little before my time. By the time I was old enough to listen to music, Backstreet Boys and N'Sync were all the rage.
Jonah: Don't have a favorite, but I remember there were cartoons. I wasn't a boy band kind of kid. I did watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. And I saw them in concert at Astroworld 1991 I think.
6) Who would win in a musical fight: Jack Black or Jack White?
Jonah: Jack Black for sure. I think he can win over more people.
Laila: Jack White is the real thing. Who knows? that would be a great show either way.
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