Ready to bang again?  Sountracks & Bands is back with more about the music you love to game to and the folks behind the tunes.  If you’ve played Madden NFL 10 or Rock Band, then the name may be familiar.

Fancy a little Bang Camaro today?  Get ready for geekdom, crazy humor and some very real talk from the guys in Bang Camaro!

The Band – Bang Camaro

The Game (s) – Guitar Hero 2, Rock Band, Rock Band 2, The SIMS 3, Madden NFL 10

The Song (s) – Push Push (Lady Lightning), Pleasure, Rock Rebellion, Night Lies, Revolution

The Interview – Bryn Bennett (Guitar), Morgan Brown (Vocals)

First off, let’s get those who aren’t familiar with Bang Camaro up to speed about you guys. What’s the skinny on Bang Camaro?

BRYN:  We’re a rock band from Boston that does our best to show our love for the classic bands of the ’80’s.  We’ve been lucky enough to be everywhere from Rock Band to Guitar Hero to Madden 10 to the Sims 3.  

We’ve been on the cover of Billboard magazine, and we have played to 8 people in Amarillo, TX. Every day with Bang Camaro is an interesting one.

Eight people has to be a record in Amarillo I think.  So which of you guys is the gamer in the band and what do you play when you have time?

BRYN:  That would be Morgan… Hey Morgan!

MORGAN:  Right now I’m playing a lot of Battlefield 1943, a little Marvel vs. Capcom 2 when I need a game to frustrate me and turn me into the devil, and I recently finished my annual Castlevania: Symphony of the Night marathon.  I’m always hard-up for a game of Carcassonne and Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix and I don’t get why more people aren’t playing those games.

I played Glen Fant a few times in ‘Puzzle Fighter’ recently and made him rage-quit. Anyway, for the amount of time and money I have, the XBLA games are ideal–my dollar goes a long way and my gameplaying stays varied.  I did treat myself a little this summer and got Ghostbusters (a boon as a long-time passionate fan of the franchise), Madden NFL 2010 (not just because we’re on the soundtrack with Mastodon and 2Pac), and I’m about to sit down with Batman: Arkham Asylum and The Beatles: Rock Band.

There’s really not enough time in a day.

You’ll love Batman: Arkham Asylum.  It’s nice seeing a band embrace the ways of the internet like Bang Camaro has with your music. Do you feel like it was a necessary evolution to have your music in games?

BRYN:  For years now, people have been talking about how the internet would revolutionize the music industry. It definitely has changed it.  Record labels don’t sell many CDs anymore so bands have to figure out how to get their music out there.  Being a bunch of geeks, video games were the obvious choice for us.  It’s funny how long it took the music industry to figure that out.

Do you remember Guitar Hero when all the songs had to be done by a cover band because “music industry executives” didn’t see the potential in games?  Ridiculous.  But yeah, the games have done great things for us.  I don’t know where we’d be right now if not for the games.

I remember that quite well.  How has having your tracks on video games helped the visibility of Bang Camaro?

BRYN:  Immensely.  Because of the games, we’ve been able to appear on Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Kimmel as well as play at Lollapalooza and appear in Rolling Stone.  We run our own record label out of our house, so it’s not like we have this big machine behind us.  It’s just me and Alex and the guys getting our music out there and being lucky.

Impressive! You guys have been in Rock Band, Rock Band 2 and now Madden NFL 10. Is the approach to choosing a track any different if it’s a sports game as opposed to a music game?

BRYN:  Definitely. Music games are about having fun by interacting with the actual music.  Sports games are about getting more into the game because of the music in the background.  “Revolution” is cool in Madden 10 because it has a big angry chorus, but there isn’t a lot of shredding going on in the solo, so it might not be as fun to play along with in a music game.

The band has been successful releasing tracks via the internet. Do you think at some point fans will see a Bang Camaro track debut in a video game?

BRYN:  We’ve talked about it a lot. I would very much hope so.  A bunch of other bands have already done it including Motley Crue and (the fake) Guns ‘n’ Roses. Personally, I just want our music to get out in front of people.  Bang Camaro is not about shoegazing and sitting in your room and writing music for the art of it.

It’s about getting a bunch of guys up on stage and rocking the crowd until all the boyfriends in the crowd feel nervous.  Of course, they have nothing to worry about because we’ll just go back to our vans and play our DS’s anyway.

Some bands have said they’d never put their songs in a video game for whatever reason.  Have you ever run into a case where other bands criticize you guys for having your music in games?

BRYN:  A number of bands have said negative things about the games and still had their songs in them.  That’s what I find to be very hypocritical. (HEY JACK WHITE!) I personally haven’t heard anyone criticizing us, although I do sometimes feel that it happens.  Here in Boston, we were a bunch of guys in different indie rock bands who thought it would be awesome and totally punk rock to start this strange arena rock band.

No one thought people would like us. When things went well for us, and we got into a few video games, there were definitely a number of people in the area who considered us “sell outs.” I find that hilarious. I mean if I was trying to sell out, I definitely wouldn’t have started an ‘80’s metal band and called it Bang Camaro.  I probably would have started a “30 Seconds to Mars”-esque band and tried to get plastic surgery to look like Jared Leto.

The bottom line is that people are always going to complain about what you’re doing, so it’s better to just have fun.

What’s your favorite track from the current album and which would you hope to see in a future game?

BRYN:  I would like to see “Blood Red Rock” in a future game. It is one of the more aggressive songs on Bang Camaro II. It has nearly an old “Live Wire” feel to it. (A song by Motley Crue of “Too Fast for Love.”) I also think our song called “The Hit” would get more girls to talk to us.

More girls can never be wrong.  What would you like to say to those who are hearing your music for the first time?

BRYN:  I’m sorry.