Warped Sportz's own Dan Napoli wurde vom PBStar interviewed. Wir haben das komplette Interview für Euch:
Pbstar: So Mr. Napoli, we meet again for the first time for the last time…
Dan: only if you don't believe in reincarnation, otherwise neither of those statements may be true.
Pbstar: You wear a lot of hats in the paintball industry. Can you go into great detail and tell us about each of them? Personally, I prefer beanies.
Dan: I’ve always been a baseball cap kinda guy, but I seem to gravitate toward beanies more now as I'm getting older. I have no idea what that means really.
Ok, well currently I am the producer/ co-owner of the Jawwbraker Video Series, Marketing Director for Warped Sportz, which includes assisting Avalanche in its marketing and promotion.
I also work for P8NT Magazine in several different roles, including Music Editor, managing some of the advertise accounts, and assist with the marketing & promoting the magazine itself. Like P8NT just totally restructured its subscription program, making it like $9.99. So I assist in some of those concepts and promoting it.
Pbstar: Did you ever notice if you reverse your first name and last name, you would be Napoli Dan. Then if you exchanged the 'i' in Napoli for the letters 'eon' and reversed the 'an' in Dan, added a 'y' after the 'D' and then finished it off with the letters 'mite' you’d be Napoleon Dynamite? Pretty sweet huh?
Dan: Well, not as sweet as this lyger I drew last night, but pretty sweet.
Pbstar: Ok, your turn. My real name is Enis Plicker.
Dan: is this a family site? 'cause that names sounds pretty dirty. [lol]
Pbstar: The Jawwbraker DVDs are this combination between action clips, music videos, and paintball magazines (the good magazines at least…). How did you come up with the idea to do a paintball DVD unlike anything else and what kind of impact do you think Jawwbraker has on the paintball lifestyle?
Dan: second question first…As for impact, I just hope we do justice to telling people’s stories. I don’t know about a particular lifestyle, but I hope it shows that there really is a paintball LIFE that these pros lead, it might not be super-glamorous, but it is pretty cool. I hope we make kids stoked about playing paintball, about aspiring to one day to be pro, because you can’t possibly image doing anything else with your life except traveling the world with your boys and besides playing paintball 24/7/356, and to do anything else seems like slow death. So you’ll wash dishes, sleep on people’s floors, whatever it takes. That kind of conviction is really amazing to me.
It's the same kind of conviction present in underground musicians and skateboarders that inspired me growing up. So hopefully we inspire some kids too. And they get to see great action and amazing production values.
People focus on our storytelling, which is cool, but we do have great action put to killer music with amazing production values too.
Which is where Jawwbraker really came from. There’s this long-ass description on our website (www.jawwbraker.com) of where it all started if anybody cares to read it.
Basically, I loved seeing those stories in skate/surf/snow/music world. Then I realized the same types of stories were occurring in paintball, but they were rarely getting told to people. So we wanted to tell them.
Pbstar: Warped Sportz has grown a lot in the last few years. How many stores, and in how many states is Warped up to?
Dan: There are stores in LA, Mississippi, KC, Indiana, Tinley Park/Chicago, Germany, Austria, and the HQ in Nebraska.
Pbstar: Can you tell me why nobody ever died on GI Joe even though there were so many gunfights?
Dan: didn’t like only the nameless, Cobra soldiers get shot? But primary dudes like Zartan or Storm Shadow were untouched. You know, this very question has plagued me since I was about 10 years old.
Pbstar: I hear you’re a music connoisseur, can you tell me why do birds suddenly appear?
Dan: You want me to bust out and sing some Carpenter's lyrics for you over the phone?
Pbstar: What song are you listening to right now?
Dan: "Into You Like A Train," by the band Jawwbreaker, [who we totally copped our name from, thanks Adam] which is cover of an '80s song by the Pyschedelic Furs.
It’s in an I-tunes mix with "Give It All" by Rise Against, "Old School Reasons" by Alkaline Trio, and "Feed The Monkey, Drown The Worm" by The Falcon.
Pbstar: Who is better, Led Zeppelin or Quiet Riot? "Come on feel the noise" or "Stairway to Heaven"…it's a tough decision.
Dan: My inner 80's metal-head says Quiet Riot, but obviously Zep. Did you know "Come On Feel The Noise" is actually a cover. Originally it was done by a late 70s English punk band, I wanna say Sham 69, but don’t quote me. Yeah, I'm a giant music nerd. Sorry.
Pbstar: You have an inside view of paintball and the tournament world. What's the craziest thing you’ve ever done or seen? And none of this, "I've seen some crazy stuff" and leaving it at that…
Dan: That's cool. I was at a New Year's Eve party once and watched somebody do something that involved lots of alcohol, a five-pound monkey wrench, and genitals. Don’t anybody ever try to sweat how crazy it can get in the Midwest. Lots of snow and below zero temperatures make you do some weird things.
Pbstar: Have you ever worn Spandex? You seem like a spandex kind of guy. Bet you're wearing it right now…
Dan: Only when I went and saw Poison in 5th grade. Open Up and Say AHHH tour.
Pbstar: Best team in paintball…
Dan: It's hard to say an absolute with two different formats, and where not all of the better 5 or 8 teams play both formats. I guess you'd have to say Dynasty, because they keep winning, and in both X-Ball and 7-Man. '05 should be a tight year though, because you have Avalanche right on Dynasty’s heels, plus XSV, Arsenal, Infamous, Russian Legion / Boston Red Legion. This is super-cool for fans. Don't you wish Baltimore Trama and Detroit Strange got to play all those, too.
Pbstar: Best player ever…
Dan: That's impossible to answer.
Pbstar: Most influential player…
Dan: Again, impossible to pin point.
Pbstar: X-ball or 7man man?
Dan: Both formats have great benefits, but personally I like to watch 7-Man.
Pbstar: Dark Shocker or Dark PGP?
Dan: Dark Shockers.
Pbstar: Be honest. This is the worst interview you’ve ever done…
Dan: No. Between Jawwbraker and college radio I've interviewed tons of drunk bands that were worse. Peeing everywhere, total A.D.D in full effect. This is only the worse one I’ve been the interviewee for [laughs]
Pbstar: I'll try to do better with the next few questions, what teams does Warped sponsor and what kind of teams do you look for to sponsor?
Dan: teams that play pro, am, or novice on either or both of the two national circuits.
Pbstar: Can you tell me why all the Avalanche guys wear face camo? Is it to cover up obscene acne?
Dan: It's an insider secret, they don’t even tell me! Those dudes are great. They are always doing cool stuff to express themselves and have fun, and Ed Poorman’s cool enough to let them just roll with it. I loved when they all spray painted their shoes gold last year.
Pbstar: So if a team wanted to get sponsored by Warped Sportz they should contact you? At home, preferably during dinner-time right?
Dan: totally. Call me at 310-914-5555. No seriously, younger players should work through their local field or core shop. It's the best way to go. Be a good customer or supporter. Talk to them about how much, Ref their tournaments or clean the field in exchange for cheap paint. That’s the biggest mistake I see with young players. Manufacturers are looking to super-visible avenues like guys getting on tv, competing for a national title in one of the divisions.
Work with local stores, build a relationship.
Pbstar: I don't have time to play for a team anymore, but I have this sweet Autococker with a pre-Brass Eagle revolution hopper held on using duct tape (pink duct tape, because pink is hot), and a 4+1 harness. I'll wear your stickers and tell all of my friends to buy Warped stuff. Would you sponsor me?
Dan: I’ll give you demon logo duct tape. How about that?
Pbstar: No thanks, I’ve already got a duct tape sponsorship with Home Depot. Would you like to add anything else? But be careful if you ad, our rates have gone up to $1.76CPM.
Dan: Our new DVD, Ep # 4, is outstanding, the best we've ever done. And the story of Mapp Chhim is incredibly inspiring. The picture quality is amazing. If you’re new to jawwbraker, it's a great place to start. You guys have clips that kids can checkout, right?
And finally, we really appreciate the stores and kids who support Jawwbraker and are into the dvds, and the pros who let us come in their house and tell their stories.
Pbstar: We do have some killer Jawwbraker clips now that you mentioned it. But that ad will cost you a penny for the 2 people who read this interview…