Our interviewer Krislyn got a chance to interview The Groundbreaking Ceremony, a band from Pennsylvania. You can check out their music on Facebook which you can find here.

Q: State your name, what you do in the band, and a random fact about yourself?
J: I’m Jonnie, I’m the lead singer and one of the primary lyricists for The Groundbreaking Ceremony, but I wear many other hats as well, including but not limited to booking shows, networking, and setting up lovely interviews such as this one : ) — a random fact about me would have to be that I graduated from Penn State University with two bachelor’s of arts degrees – one in Japanese, and the other in East Asian Studies.
D: My name is Dirk i play drums and do percussion in the band and I love all mario games
S: I am Scott, and I play rhythm guitar, and I’m currently eating a piece of pizza and it’s fantastic.
C:  Hi, my name’s Chas.  I play lead guitar, sing back-up vocals, and write songs in The GBC.  I have a psychological condition called Synesthesia that causes me to hear music in color based on the key of the song.  Yes, it’s real.  Go look it up on Wikipedia (after you’re done reading Valley cover to cover of course).

Q: How did you guys start and how did you come up with your band name? 
D: Actually I came up with the band name I was sitting in typing class my senior year and the topic was the groundbreaking ceremony. I liked and it stuck ever since.

Q: Who are your biggest musical and non-musical influences? 
J: My absolute biggest musical influences come from other vocalists, because I think they’re who I identify with the most. So for me, Patrick Stump from Fall Out Boy, Gavin Hayes of dredg, and more recently, Jeremy McKinnon of A Day to Remember, all come to mind as a varying top three favorite vocal influences. Musically, I love everything from the deftones, to All Time Low, to blink 182, to Scary Kids Scaring Kids, to Honor Bright, and many more.
D: My two biggest influences are Travis Barker and Buddy Rich. Amazing drummers. As far as non musical influences,  I really don’t listen to anything that doesn’t influence me.
S: blink-182, Pete Wentz, Steve Jobs. 
C: Well, like a million band-boys before me, I’m going to say blink-182.  They were the reason I picked up a guitar a decade ago, and a microphone after that, and a bass after that, and drumsticks after that.   I wouldn’t be the person I am today if it weren’t for them.  However, I’m not interested in shamelessly rehashing what blink has already done like some other bands do.  I want to innovate.  Everyone always answers, “I want to be the next blink-182.”  I don’t want that.  I want to be The Groundbreaking Ceremony.

Q: What are the best and worst things about being in a band?
J: I can’t speak for what some of the best and worst things about being in OTHER bands are, but certainly one of the best things about being in The Groundbreaking Ceremony is that it’s never a dull moment. We always, whether it’s true or not, have felt like we’ve been on the verge of something bigger and better. Every minute, hour and month all feels like it’s leading us towards bigger and better things. It leads sometimes to the worst things about being in the band, and those moments include having opportunities fall through, or fall apart altogether, that could’ve taken us to the next step. Either way, it’s all a part of the building process that is “being in a band” and so far, so good, for The Groundbreaking Ceremony. We try to not sweat everything that doesn’t happen for us, and try instead to focus and stay excited and proud of the things that might happen for us. That sounds a little sad, doesn’t it? hahah.
D: The best part of being in a band is getting to meet new people and making friends. I love every second of it. As well as seeing our fans sing our songs back to us. It’s a high that no one can ever replace. And I would say the worst part is all the work you have to put in — but when you see results it’s all worth it. 
S: I pretty much love it all, it’s challenging, but it’s definitely something we all believe in. I guess the worst thing is having to load our heavy equipment all the time. Then again, I also have trouble picking up a 5 pound weight.
C: Oh man, I honestly love every aspect of it: writing, practicing, recording, performing, touring, and just having fun with my friends.  If I had to pick one thing, I’d have to say seeing faces in the crowd singing our lyrics. Seeing someone connect to something you helped create is an amazing experience.  The only bad part is that it can get a little stressful at times.  I work very, very hard in this band.   We all do, but every ounce of effort is completely worth it.

Q: What has been your biggest challenge as a band?
J: Your biggest challenge as a band to me, is proving your worth. To everyone. To the new people you play to every night, to the bands you surround yourself with on tour, or just at one-off date shows, to promoters, to management companies, booking agencies, labels – all of them. You have 20-30 minutes to prove to kids that have never seen you before that you’re not only good, but worth supporting. You have to prove to promoters that they can depend on you to show up on time, and bring a great live show, that keeps kids wanting to come back for more. You need to show management companies that if they invest a little time and energy into you, you’ll be worth the investment. And the same goes for labels – they want to see that you’d be succeeding even without their help, but that with it, the success can be measured in bigger quantities – and that usually equals dollars. Your biggest challenge as a band is showing everyone that you’re real – that you’re not cashing in on a fad, or a trend that’s popular at the moment, just to get recognized. You have to prove that you’re real, and that you mean every word, every guitar note, every drum or crash cymbal hit that happens, with every fiber of your being. You overcome the challenge when they believe you.
D:  I think my biggest challenge has been finding a line up that works well together and that gets along well. I mean, to overcome that, you really have to ride out the wave, but I really feel strongly about the members we have now and how we get along. I wouldn’t change any of my band mates for anything. Well, maybe Scott — just kidding!
S: Definitely finding the right line up, it’s been awesome watching everything just come together as a band over the past year.
C: There was a bit of a revolving door of members before The Groundbreaking Ceremony became THE Groundbreaking Ceremony, and that’s Jonnie, Scott, Jett, Dirk, and myself.

Q: What has been the most embarrassing thing that has happened to you while playing a show?
J: I don’t think that I’m the center of attention by any means, but I think I catch a lot of it, just being a front man. Some of my more embarrassing moments are just stupid things like me jumping and slipping when I land, and falling over. I’m fairly well known for saying stupid things into a microphone between songs. Repeatedly. Excessively. When we opened for Allister this past year, I was actually in the bathroom pooping when we were supposed to be sound checking, and when I heard Chas playing a pretty familiar sound check riff, I knew that meant we were on stage, and that I was missing our sound check. The sound guy was a dick, and wouldn’t let Chas check my mic for me, so the boys all had to wait until I came out of the restroom for me to check my mic, for us to start playing. Pretty embarrassing.
D: The most embarrassing thing to me, that we’ve ever done, was before we decided to really start taking things seriously, was having some of our guitarist’s equipment stop working, or fall apart on stage. It makes you look so unprofessional, and it’s just embarrassing. But at the same time, I’d say it’s paying your dues. You have to be humbled when you’re playing in front of bands that have made it. Every band has to start somewhere and work really hard for the things they want. But it’s embarrassing sometimes when you’re on the bottom.
S: What Chas said… And when Jonnie was in the bathroom when he needed to be sound checking.
C: You know, I don’t think I’ve had an embarrassing moment on stage with The GBC yet.  Can I talk about Scott instead?  This one time, Scott told the crowd to “give it up for him.”  You could hear the crickets.  It was awesome.

Q: If you could have any one of your songs be played in a movie of your choice, what song and what movie would you pick? 
J: This is a pretty damn good question. I think I see our song, “What The Hell Is A Jiggawatt? (Ride It Out)”, being played during a montage sequence, in a movie about nerdy kids. And while we’re talking about Jiggawatt, I’d like to announce officially that Nick Walters, the guitar player for our band that’s responsible for naming that song, had that named picked out about a year and a half before Four Year Strong came out with it on Enemy of the World. If they’re anything like us, you just understand that THAT name for a song is just fucking awesome.
D: I would pick our newest song “Don’t Be A Dream.” It’s my favorite one to play and I would put it in the movie “Grind.” I feel like the concept of that movie and the concept of that song would go really well together.
S: Fight to Stay Alive should be in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, mainly becuase there’s fights in that movie obviously. But also because I have an undying love for Michael Cera and that movie.
C: Everyone always says that Lost and Found should be played in an American Pie movie, so that would be really sick.

Q: If you were to be stuck on an island with one person in your band, who would you choose and why?
J: This is a tough question too. It definitely wouldn’t be Scott. If he had no cell phone, he’d be dead in the water. Chas is pretty handy, but I’m not sure about his nature survival skills. I’m going to have to lean towards Dirk. He’s our mountain man of the band, I would have to say. Or island man, in this case. I just have the feeling he would know what plants we could smoke, or what things we could eat. Honestly, any of us stuck on an island with any one of us is a bad scenario. We’d all be dead within a few days anyway, hahaha.
D: I would choose Chas so we could drink mass quantities of rum, so we could be pirates and write new music together. Not saying that the other band members don’t help but, usually the foundation of a song starts with Chas, and then my two cents come in, afterwards, and so on down the line. 
S: I like Chas’s answer here, it would have to depend on what else was on the island. I don’t choose favorites! ;)
C: You know, it depends on what we could bring with us.  If we had a TV with hockey on, I’d choose Jonnie.  If we had all the blink-182 albums, I’d choose Scott.  If we had our ladies, I’d choose Jett.  And if we had a Super Nintendo, I’d choose Dirk.

Q: What does the future look like for you guys? (New music, touring, exc…?)
J: We did just record two new songs for our upcoming EP with John Naclerio (Senses Fail, My Chemical Romance, Brand New, Freshman 15), to get a feel for the studio, and we were pleasantly surprised. We love the sound of our music from his studio, and definitely intend to wrap up our next EP probably by the end of this year. For the  most part, the future looks like it’s going to be holding a LOT of touring, and a lot of promoting. It’s an uphill battle for us, for at least a little while, but we’re all down for the challenge.
D: TOURING!! We’ve worked very hard to be tour ready and after lots of hard work and financial investing, we are ready to start doing some serious touring. That, and we actually just got out of the studio with two new jams we are very excited about.
S: We just finished recording with John Naclerio, so we’ll definitely have new music out this year and we’ll definitely be touring a lot, so make sure you come say hi!
C: We just recorded new songs with John Naclerio, and we think they could unlock some pretty big doors for us in 2011.

Q: Anything you’d like to say to our readers?
J: If you haven’t gotten the chance to come see us play, or to meet us and talk to us, please do. The only reason we were given the opportunity to do this interview is because Krislyn Rogofsky came up to one of us and said hello. We’re so thrilled to meet everyone we play in front of, to see what they thought. You’re our best gauge of whether or not we’re a good live band, or a good band period. So don’t hesitate. Come up to the merch table and say hi, let us try to sell you a few things, and when you realize you don’t want to buy anything from us because we suck, you can at least take solace in the fact that you met a couple of really nice dudes, doing their best to make the dream happen. :)
D: Thank you to you for reading this whether you’re in a band, are a fan, or are just reading this. Thank you for your support and I hope to see you at a show sometime soon, because without people like you, we are nothing.
S: Check out our EP, add us on Facebook, etc. We love to talk to everyone!
C: I can’t wait to play our next show in State College and see some of you there.  We might be from all over Pennsylvania, but Happy Valley is definitely GBC headquarters, and you guys are the reason.  Your support is what makes this possible for us, so thank you.

We’d like to thank the guys for taking time to answer these questions. Again to check out some of their music go here.

(Source: shameless-media.com)