UN: This past year has been a very busy year for the band seeing you guys playing all over the world. Looking back does it seem like you guys really accomplished a lot last year with the band? Does it surprise you at all how far you guys have come?

Chris: Yeah totally, when we started this band we hoped we would be able to travel and tour and go places we wouldn’t normally be able to go to, but leaving the west coast, let alone the country was such a huge goal. We always wanted to go to Europe at least, but now we have gone to Australia and Puerto Rico and we are heading to Japan and Korea soon. We all love touring and feel really lucky to be able to do it as much as we do.

UN: What are your thoughts on the current hardcore scene? Do you think that the scene is becoming at all too violent? You seem to hear much more about fights right now and it seems to go against what hardcore is all about. It is violent music and people dance. But hardcore stood against violence and gang mentality. Some people are becoming no better then the “jocks” that they are supposedly so against!

Chris: Yeah I get bummed out when I see some things, or hear the way some kids talk, I think its stupid. I'm definitely not a pacifist by any means, but fighting at shows does so much damage to our scene and ruins shows. I mean if a fight breaks out at a show its just not the same after, the whole feeling that I love about hardcore is gone and its just a bum out. Kids fighting or intimidating other kids at shows is so self destructive it's ridiculous.

UN: How has the response to Promises Kept been so far? I think it’s one of the most urgent albums the scene has had in quite sometime. Is it important for you guys to maintain the old school sound? You guys have heavy moments, but there is definitely nothing metal about Champion.

Chris: It's been awesome, the kind of support we've been getting. We worked really hard on this record and we are really stoked on how it turned out, but when you see kids going off freaking out to the new songs live it makes it that much more rewarding. As far as the old school sound, that's just the kind of hardcore we like to listen to so we play it. There's nothing new or original about the style we play, but we put our whole hearts into it because we love that style.

UN: Do you think that being a straight edge band allows you to hopefully bring about a change in people? Some people still do not know what straight edge is, but might be open to the lifestyle if they are introduced to it. That said though, do you ever feel like playing to hardcore kids in like playing to the converted? Playing to different crowds might introduce the concept to a greater amount of people.

Chris: We started this band at a time when it seemed like there weren’t very many straightedge bands, so it was important for us to be a straightedge band.. and again it kind of seems like there aren’t many sxe bands around right now.. It's always been kind of important for us to represent a positive lifestyle and be a positive voice for the hardcore scene, we aren’t really on a mission to convert anyone to sxe or anything like that, I think we are more a voice for individualism, saying that its okay to choose the way you want to live your life, this is the way we live ours, but live yours your way. That being said, I do love playing shows where non hardcore kids can see us play, mainly because I love it when a kid will come in and see all these hxc kids freaking out stage diving, singing along, going crazy... I would rather convert someone into being a hardcore kid than into being sxe.

UN: What can we expect from Champion in 2005? Will it be like 2004 and basically the band will live on the road once again?

Chris: Yeah pretty much. We are going to Japan and Korea, doing a few North American tours, going back to Europe, and hopefully hitting Australia again around December. I think we are going to take a few months off this summer to work on some new songs. We want to record another LP in the early 2006.

UN: Are you guys excited about the upcoming tour with 7 Seconds? They are definitely one of the landmark bands for straight edge music and to see that they are still around doing it today shows how dedicated they are to this style of music.

Chris: I'm beyond stoked for this tour, ever since we started this band we would talk about "dream tours", and mine has always been 7 seconds. If I could tour with any band in the world, it's them. They are one of my favourite bands of all times and I always thought that they have always represented that idea I was talking about earlier about making positive changes and living your life for yourself, maybe more than any band ever in my opinion.

UN: Are you surprised by how music seems to break all barriers? You can play in many different countries and people still understand the music and like what the band is doing. Are you excited to see how the Japanese tour will be? Japan has an amazing punk and hardcore scene, which a lot of people really don’t know about.

Chris: Well music is the universal language says H2O. It's just crazy to think that hardcore kids are everywhere.. It really is an amazing thing to go to different countries and see that, and see that kids on the other side of the world share the same love you do for this thing that was started by a bunch of kids in their garages in the early 80s. I love it.