Westender is technically catching PUP drummer Zack Mykula at home in Toronto when he answers his phone, but you could make the argument that the percussionist's full-time quarters are wherever he sets up his kit. Since the spring release of the pop-punk band’s second album, The Dream is Over, he's been bashing out beats in countless venues worldwide. Two days removed from a U.S. tour that wrapped up in Pennsylvania, and just a couple of days from starting up a leg of Canadian dates, Mykula's return to civilian life is feeling a little weird.
"When you're on the road for so long, it kind of takes over your life and you forget how to function otherwise," the musician explains, admitting that despite trying to get some rest and relaxation in T.O., he's actually been spending his brief reprieve working out the details for a hometown show in December. "When you get back from tour – readjusting, kind of decompressing – it can result in what they call post-tour depression."
PUP are definitely a dedicated pack of road dogs, but judging by their latest record's opening track, "If This Tour Doesn't Kill You, I Will," their day-to-day travels might not always go smoothly. Smarm-and-distortion-driven, the song is a psyche-damaged ode to the rigours of spending too much time in a band’s close-quartered van. Singer/guitarist Stefan Babcock drives it home with snotty-but-sweet melodies about how another PUP member's idiosyncrasies make him want to gouge out his eyes with a power drill. Although delivered tongue-in-cheek, Mykula notes there's some truth to the tune. "You have to co-exist without driving each other nuts. I tell everybody it's like being in a family, and you're basically travelling with your siblings. You know exactly how to piss each other off, but that's not a power that you should be employing habitually.
"There's no ritual other than wake up as late as possible and get out in time to get to the show," he continues, after being pressed about the coping mechanisms within the combo. The trick is to just stay the course and give each other space when needed.
Considering PUP are booked well into the New Year, the quartet have clearly worked out whatever problems they may have. And when they come together, they have a hell of a good time. This is obvious through the album’s various high-energy pieces about dead pets ("Sleep in the Heat"), getting caught masturbating ("My Life is Over and I Couldn't Be Happier"), and drinking too much ("DVP"). Live shows are a blast, too – try searching for a recent video of Babcock crowd-surfing to the back of a club mid-song to grab a shot from the bar.
"They run the gamut from respectfully rowdy, kind of staying in place and playfully shoving each other, to going off the rails completely," Mykula says of the crowd reaction his band receives. In particular, he praises some punks in London, England, for attempting a reckless double-decker stage dive, but badmouths a fan in Philadelphia that was ejected from the venue for getting too disorderly and taking a swing at a security guard. The key, ultimately, is to have fun.
A well-reported element to the PUP story is that the group were faced with the prospect of calling it quits last year when frontman Babcock received news that he had a potentially career-clipping cyst on his vocal cords (The Dream is Over takes its name from what a doctor said to him). Instead of resting, he opted to run the risk of permanent damage by going out on tour, and somehow his voice came back on its own. "It was scary, but I think we were more concerned with whether or not Stefan was OK," Mykula remembers, adding that Babcock has, miraculously, almost completely recovered since then.
Even through the internal squabbles, the monstrous tour schedules, and health issues, PUP are sticking together. If these things haven't killed them yet, it's hard to imagine what will.
PUP play the Cobalt on Monday, Nov. 21.
