Pete Wentz Is a 'Hero,' Addresses Fall Out Boy Rumors

By Melinda Newman Posted Nov 13th 2009 04:15PM

Fall Out Boy may be on hiatus, but you wouldn't know it. The pop-punk group has two songs on Activision's new video game 'Band Hero' and a greatest hits set, 'Believers Never Die,' out Nov. 17. FOB co-founder Pete Wentz is a longtime gamer and he shares with PopEater his earliest gaming recollections as well as his look ahead into the band's somewhat cloudy future. Plus, he discusses playing Wii Tennis while toasted, the art to sliding across a slippery floor and debates who is more mature: your average band or a one-year-old.

How did your involvement in 'Band Hero' come about?

People call us and ask us for certain songs for certain things and usually, depending upon your relationship with your publisher, you say yes or no. We said yes. It's a great new avenue to get your songs out there, starting with 'Tony Hawk' and then it went to 'Madden' and developed into 'Guitar Hero.' It doesn't make a lot of sense to fight it to me; it makes sense to me to do it and do it on your own terms, you know.

What's doing it on your own terms mean?

You don't have your label or your management saying 'You have to do this like this or your song should sound a little bit more like this because then it will fit in on that thing,' whatever. As a band, we've never really conformed to the mainstream, but at the same time I don't think there's anything dirty about the word "pop." It's not a dirty word to me.

What video game did you first fall in love with growing up?

My first was probably 'Super Mario Bros,' and then I quickly moved on through all the Nintendo games from 'Top Gun' to 'The Goonies II' to 'Contra' and moved into Super Nintendo. I was into Sega Genesis and 'Sonic the Hedgehog' and then I left. I kind of got into girls for a little bit ... Then we did the Nintendo Fusion tour and Nintendo sent us these Wiis and we didn't know anything about what they were, but I just fell in love with it. I threw my back out playing tennis.

You know you can actually play real tennis.

Yeah, I do both but the best thing with the Wii is I play it when I've been overserved a little bit and I'm in my own house and there's no paparazzi there. It's great. Whenever I go play tennis, I'm always in some dumb outfit and get some stupid picture taken of me. You gotta do it sober. Not as fun.

You, Weezer's Rivers Cuomo and Blink 182's Travis Barker back Taylor Swift on her hit 'Love Story' in the 'Band Hero' commercial, which spoofs 'Risky Business.' That's not a song I would think you would normally pick up your bass and play.

It was interesting because as the day went on, we kind of got more comfortable in goofing around and [director Brett Ratner] was like, 'This is the deal: You're not Taylor's backing band. Each of you guys is an individual personality and you're playing a Taylor Swift song. I'm more interested in seeing how you guys would actually play it." It was honestly fun to do and I couldn't get the song out of my head after awhile. As the day wore on, we came out of our shells.

Is it true that you slide on the floor by spraying Lysol on it?

Yeah. It's so much harder to do than I thought from seeing the previous commercials. We're musicians so we should have a good sense of rhythm and it was tough for us to do. Most of the time, me and Travis would crash into each other so we'd end up laughing. There should be a great blooper reel.

'Band Hero' allows people to feel like they're in the band. If you could insert yourself in any band throughout history, what band would it be?

It would be Guns N' Roses and it would have to be the 'Welcome to the Jungle' era, but I don't know if they'd think I was that cool.

You think Axl Rose wouldn't think you were that cool so they wouldn't let you be in it?

Maybe not.

For most acts, a greatest hits symbolizes the end of a chapter for an act. FOB is on hiatus. What's the band's next chapter?

It's so hard for me to say. The biggest thing is that people want us to give a definitive [answer] -- when we'll go on tour again or when we'll put more music out -- and there just isn't one. If I said one, that would be a lie and if I said that there wasn't going to be one, that would be a lie too because I don't really know.

Watch Fall Out Boy's 'Alpha Dog' Video

The greatest hits includes a new song called 'From Now on We Are Enemies.' That title leaves a lot of room for people to come up with their interpretation. Anything you want to set the record straight on with that one?

No, because I really want people to discover this. It's really hard to find. It's an interesting story. The closest thing that comes to explaining that are the lyrics are the thoughts of two different men and the perceptions of each other.

Everyone's assuming it's you and [FOB lead singer] Patrick [Stump].

(Laughs) I'm not going to confirm or deny. If the people really investigate it, you can figure it out.

Panic at the Disco, who are signed to your label, Decaydance, recently lost two members when Ryan Ross and Jon Walker left to start the Young Veins. Why didn't you sign their new band?

What we said was if you want to be on Decaydance, that's fine with us, and if you want to go elsewhere, that's fine. That part I can tell you for sure. I'm not sure what [distributing label] Atlantic has said because they'd upstreamed to Atlantic.

So it wasn't like some horrible split?

No, and people really want it to be. At the end of the day, two different groups wanted to play different kinds of music and wanted to do different things and that's all it was. Everyone likes the controversy, everyone likes for it to be big and weird, and honestly, it's not like that. I talked to Ryan on the phone the other day.

What is the hardest part about running a label?

Boys in bands are more difficult to deal with than one-year-old babies. I've been one of them and I am one of them, but it is the truth. I gave everybody too much room to call me at 3AM and whine about this or that -- I'm always talking them off the ledge. At the end of the day, we're more of a gang than a label, but I end up being not the godfather but everybody's big brother. Everybody calls me up and goes 'This thing's happening; it's the end of the world" and I'm like "It's not the end of the world because your record's leaked, everyone's record leaks now."

Pete Wentz as therapist. How about that as a new career during the hiatus?

I figure I need to make myself a little less crazy first before they'll let me sign up, but that's a possibility (laughs).

Watch Fall Out Boy Live at Sessions

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