Radio Interview at Messiah College (Apr 2000)

Joe ::
90.7, my name is Joe Pollock and that was Waterdeep. Hopefest 2000 is this afternoon-- it actually started about a half hour ago. Writ is on stage right now. We have Forever Moon here in the studio. We're going to be playing one of their songs right now then we'll be speaking live to them. So lets go out and listen to some Forever Moon, here on the V, 90.7.

[station played Fly Away]

Michelle ::
You're listening to the V, 90.7 and we're here with Forever Moon ... and Joe.

Joe ::
I'm here too.

Michelle ::
Alright, today is Hopefest 2000. It's beautiful outside, so if you're not listening to us in a car heading to Hopefest, you better head that way right now. Messiah College on Eisenhower Lawn, if you need directions give us a call.

Joe ::
It's going to be a great afternoon of music. Writ is on stage right now and we have a bunch of bands following up after them and one of those bands is with us in the studio right now, Forever Moon. Fellas, can you hear us?

Scott ::
Yeah, everything is great. Thanks.

Joe ::
Alright, well, tell us a little bit about the band Forever Moon; maybe how you guys got started, when that was and just about how you guys as a group got together.

Scott ::
Well, basically we've been playing together for just a little over a year. The four core group of us, Danny, Andy, myself and Sean got together a few years back when we were working as volunteer counselors at a summer bible camp. We basically just started playing some praise songs and then we kind of moved into the contemporary Christian market, playing some songs by groups like Jars of Clay and Smalltown Poets and so forth. Then a little over a year ago just decided to start pursuing it a little more full-time. We started writing our own music and we've been playing out in public for a little over a year. And we added a drummer, Danny Zaverl, who I met through Young Life. The 5 of us have been together now for a year and going strong.

Joe ::
So where are some of the places you guys have played together as a group? Have you played anywhere as a group?

Sean ::
No this will be our first time. No, that's actually not true.

Andy ::
Well, this will be our first time here at Messiah. We've played a lot of places around Baltimore and local areas. We've gone as far north as I guess Lancaster.

Sean ::
We played last night in Allentown last night and TV 60 up there, a TV show. Played in Virginia, there's a nice little place called Jammin' Java.

Joe ::
I've been there.

Sean ::
There's one in Kent Island and there is one in Vienna, Virginia and we've been to both of those. Just different coffeehouses and churches around the state.

Scott ::
I think we've stayed regionally a lot just because of the fact that we're in college and its hard to get around a lot, but we've just been really blessed with a lot of good opportunities. The past few months we've opened for Out of the Grey and Clear and it's just been really exciting.

Joe ::
Well, some of our listeners are probably wondering who are these voices behind these microphones, so why don't you guys introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about where you from and stuff like that.

Andy ::
I guess I'll start. My name is Andy Flynn and I'm the only one of the members' who goes to Messiah and I play guitar and do background vocals. The guy right next to me is Sean Patterson he's from Baltimore. He goes to St. Mary's College and is about to graduate. He plays guitar and does backup vocals. Then there is Scott Patterson, his twin brother, also goes to St. Mary's. He does lead vocals. Then behind him is our drummer who is from Virginia. He just has the conga and a couple other things.

Scott ::
His name is Danny Zaverl.

Andy ::
Yeah, we have 2 Danny's. My brother plays bass, Danny Flynn.

Dan ::
Dan.

Andy ::
Yeah, he likes Dan. Dan Flynn.

Sean ::
That's a recent change, we're still getting used to that. Dan-- he's all grown up now so we can't call him Danny. We get confused so we just call our drummer "Z" to keep it straight. Keep it real.

Joe ::
Alright. So that's the group? Has there been any members that have gone in and out of this group, any plans for new members? Any plans too-- I'm not going to ask that, but to give the boot to somebody?

Sean ::
Actually, we're booting our drummer out after today. Surprise Danny!

Michelle ::
Aww

Andy ::
Yeah, we're searching for a drummer.

Scott ::
No, I think we're very pleased where we're at right now. Like I said, Andy and Danny-- Andy and Dan-- Sean and myself, we've all grown up together; we've known each other for 11 years and this is kind of a common vision we've shared for a while now and I think we're all pleased with where things stand right now. Sometimes we like to add complimentary musicians. We have another Messiah Alumni, Derek Armstrong, who will come and play some songs with us every now and then, just adding a different dimension. He plays the viola and we just like to try to use different things and just be creative and explore different avenues.

Joe ::
So tell us a little about some of the music you guys play. Maybe some of the bands that influenced you guys and your music. Some of your favorite bands, things like that.

Sean ::
Sure, I think one of the bands that has influenced at least Andy and Dan, and myself included and probably Scott is PFR. They're kind of not around anymore, but they are a really good band and that's kind of how I got interested in Christian music. We like anything that is good music really. On the Christian band side I really like Clear a lot, Smalltown Poets, Jars of Clay, Caedmon's Call. A lot of different bands, I even like Silage, even though we don't write songs like that, but it's still a good influence. Everything, you know, from like the Beatles to Goo Goo Dolls, or anything like that, it's just a little bit of everything.

Joe ::
No Garth Brooks?

Michelle ::
Please Joe. Alright. Now we've heard from you guy a little bit, and we're in anticipation, give us a little taste of what we'll hear later when you play.

[Sean plays 3 chords]

Sean ::
That's what you're gonna hear later when we play.

Scott ::
You'll hear some guitars, there might be some drums in there.

Michelle ::
Ha ha.

Sean ::
That's just a snippet.

Scott ::
I might sing a little bit.

Michelle ::
Don't make us beg, guys.

Scott :: Ok, actually the first song we're going to do for you, if we get the opportunity to do some more... this one is called "Refined" and basically, just a little bit of what it's about, is the fact that we're a work in progress basically. God doesn't expect us to be perfect in following him, but he's continually refining us to be more like his son, so that's what this song is about. This song is called "Refined."

[FM plays Refined]

Joe ::
Wow, very nice fellas. That was actually the first time I heard you guys because, Michelle tries to play this tape all the time, but the tape just isn't good quality, so that was the real first time I heard you guys and I was very impressed, so good job.

Guys ::
Thanks.

Joe ::
So now what are some of your goals? Maybe a vision you have for this group Forever Moon? What is it that you guys want to do? Is this just a college thing? Do you guys plan on going on with this?

Sean ::
I think we're going to continue for a while. Our immediate goal is to go ahead and record a CD. We're not going to do a full length CD, we're going to do like a demo CD, 5 songs or so, and we're planning on doing that the end of next month, we're going to go down to Georgia, down to Atlanta to do that. Long term, I'm not exactly sure what the future holds for us, but we have no plans to stop in the near future, so we're just going to keep going and have fun with it and see where the Lord takes us.

Michelle ::
Alright, how has God blessed your ministry? You guys have come a long way and I'm sure God has moved you in many ways. Just give a couple of examples of how he's blessed your ministry.

Scott ::
That is probably one of the most amazing things as we've gone along. I think that when we started a year ago, if someone would have told us that we'd be to the point we are today, at that time, we would have been pretty pleased. I think that kind of getting into the music business is difficult and challenging for a lot of different reasons, especially the Christian market. You know, trying to build a fan base and trying to share it with the secular crowd as well. I think the Lord has blessed us tremendously, like I said earlier, we've had the opportunity to open for a few national bands and the Lord has just really continued to bless it even as we've gone through college. It's a struggle to balance exams, and schoolwork and a social life while playing 2 or 3 shows a weekend. But he's continuing to bless us, it seems that the little bit we've been faithful with, he's blessed it and multiplied it back to us. As Sean mentioned earlier with the demo CD, we've just been really blessed with the opportunity, we're actually going to go down to Atlanta, Georgia the last week of May to record our demo with a few of the guys from the band Smalltown Poets. We've just befriended them over the past year and they've just been very generous towards us and they've invited us down there for the week, so we're excited about that opportunity. They're a great band, they come with a good background, critically acclaimed (they were nominated for a Grammy), so it's an honor for a small time regional band like us to get that opportunity and we feel confident that the Lord is going to bless that.

Michelle ::
Well we wish you the best. Your name is Forever Moon, can you tell us how you got that name?

Scott ::
The name comes from Psalm 89, which is a psalm of David, and in that [God] is promising David that his line will continue to endure forever like the moon. And we really see ourselves a lot in the analogy of the moon, in that we're not the source of the light, but we're continually refined by God to reflect the light of the sun in the darkness, much like the moon reflects the light of the sun at night.

Joe ::
Some of your guys' lyrics and things like that-- who writes the songs? Do you all have input? What's behind those? Is it personal experiences or stories you've heard from other people?

Sean ::
Well, this is Sean. I pretty much do most of the writing right now. Basically my inspiration comes from my day to day life. I just find the things in my life that are good or bad, or could be better, I just write my thoughts down and kind of pen some lyrics and put it to some music. And then pretty much we don't get a lot of time to practice together, like the 5 of us together in one room so what happens is, I'll finish the song on my guitar and me and Scott make sure that it's pretty much where we want it then we put it on a tape and it goes out to the rest of the guys. Then, they just have their own input and are creative on their own to do what they want with the song. I just give them what I'm thinking about the song, and they just use that to do the rest. So it starts off with pretty much just me and then everybody gets their chance to, I guess shine and do their own thing, and its not too restrictive so it gives everyone the chance to be a part of the song writing process. So, it seems to be working out well right now.

Andy ::
And even when its done, we've gone through changes afterward once we've all thought about it and put our input into it, vocally and also with the rest of the music.

Scott ::
Especially lyrically too, I think that we have a very high standard for the music but the lyrics as well. There's a certain level of responsibility when you're proclaiming Christ to people, we want to make sure our message isn't too vague and that we're speaking the truth. We don't want there to be any gray areas that we're kind of glazing over. We want to make sure that it's lyrically sound and biblically based.

Joe ::
That's very important, I think. I think that's an acknowledgeable thing on your guys part and I think that its important that you keep doing that. I guess, not just what's coming out of your life but make sure you base that on something so I commend you guys on that. So is there another song you guys would like to play now?

Sean ::
Yeah, we'll play another song.

Joe ::
Sorry, spur of the moment.

Scott ::
Actually we'll go ahead and do the song that was just on the radio a little while ago. Sean, why don't you talk about it.

Sean ::
Ok, even though you just heard it, we're going to do it live... and it will be better! This song was really just written about someone who was close to me this song is about depression more or less than anything else. I just really noticed a cycle with them that once they were out of the depression stage per say, they always seemed to fall back into it. To me, I really saw it as a circular type of situation where although they would get out, they would end up in the same circle. And I really think that happens in everyday life. You know, after I wrote it and really thought about it, I thought I could really relate to this in my own life with my own struggles, especially with sin and things like that because I fall into those same patterns all the time, as most people do. So this song really has two meanings, the first being depression and the second is our struggle with sin, so this song is called fly away.

[FM plays Fly Away]

Joe ::
Yeah! Good job fellas! And what was the title of that song again?

Scott ::
Fly Away

Joe ::
Fly Away. Well we are here with Forever Moon, we're going to talk with them a little more but we are going to head out, give them a little break so they can get a glass of water and things like that. We're going to listen to a little "Hands and Feet" from Audio Adrenaline, here on the V 90.7.

[Break for song]

Michelle ::
If you're liking what you're hearing today with Forever Moon they will be playing from 3:20 to 3:55, possibly a little later since we're running a little late today.

Joe ::
Like always on the radio. So fellas, you have a website I hear. You want to tell us about that?

Sean ::
Yeah, we do have a website, the address is www.forevermoon.com, so there should be no problems finding it. On there we have band bios, pictures, just information about us, you can email us, you can leave a message on our message board which we like a lot.

Scott ::
If we have a lot of hits and requests, we might put some baby pictures of Andy on there.

Michelle:
Aww...

Scott ::
And then you guys can blackmail him since he goes to school here.

Joe ::
So if I'm listening to the radio right now and I think you're voice sounds nice, I can go to the website and check out your pictures?

Scott ::
That's right.

Joe ::
Wow

Scott ::
Or you can check us out this afternoon at Hopefest..

Joe ::
Hey, I'll see you guys later, I'm going to check it out.

Michelle ::
Alright guys, are you going to play another song for us on the way out?

Sean ::
Sure, absolutely. This song was written not that long ago, kind of a new song and I don't think we're going to play it later so we'll let you hear it now, a little acoustic version. This song is called the Lord is Love.

[FM plays Lord is Love]