Kelly: What made you guys –
Ry Ry: I went to Disneyland and I was like “Disneyland is not as tight as I thought it would be.”
Kelly: --decide to reunite—
Tony: I’m not gonna do like, 10 years of interviews that are just gonna be just completely stupid. This is our last chance. We’re not gonna have anymore of these start-over interviews…
Ry Ry: You said you LIKED Pirates of the Carribean! Accept me. Accept me for who I am.
Aaron: Allllright.
Ry Ry: Okay, what’s the first question?

Kelly: Okay… What made you guys, Tysen/Holyfield, decide to reunite?
Tony: We couldn’t deny each-other. Literally. Or musically.
Aaron: Personally I feel like with any other musicians I have ever played with I don’t click as much as I do with these guys.
Kelly: Well, I meant moreso with Corey.
Ry Ry: Cause you’ve never played with Corey…
Aaron: OH! Well I don’t give a shit about Corey.
Everyone: OHHH!!! (laughter)
Aaron: I’m kidddinnggg. Okay well you guys can deal with this question.
Corey: I’m gonna answer this question. Tysen ended, Holyfield started, and for reasons that I am sure everyone is familiar with, Holyfield ended. Tony went in a direction that nobody was kosh with, I think including himself, and an opportunity arose for people who loved each-other to come back and create something great.
Tony: Well that was a little drastic…
Corey: That was kind of the opportunity that was presented to me to create a band. The people that are in this band were the people that were contacted.
Ry Ry: I know me and Aaron were playing in Burning Tree Project for a couple of months, and nothing against those guys—we spent the summer in the hot, hot southern Californian heat, and those guys were cool, but it’s like Aaron said earlier, even if the guys are cool and you like everybody, sometimes artistically and musically it doesn’t click. We weren’t playing in a band anymore that we did click in, and then we started playing in a band, and we just kind of felt after some tours that it wasn’t really the best for us, so we came back home after the tour a little bit discouraged and that’s when I got a phone call from Tony.
Kelly: It was meant to be.
Ry Ry: It’s true. It’s like a romantic comedy.
Aaron: It really is.

Kelly: What makes the sound of Vision & Valor different from Holyfield and Tysen?
Tony: I wouldn’t say it’s that different, it’s kind of like a mix between the two.
Ry Ry: Here’s what it is. Tysen had a lot of raw energy, and Holyfield was a lot more poppy and I guess we were going for a more “pretty” sound if you will. This is kind of a mixture and we took aspects from both and put them together and tried to find out what would happen.
Corey: The “blender” effect.
Ry Ry: Just basically put it in a blender and threw in some paprika, and here we are.

Kelly: Perfect. Is there a message you want to convey with Vision & Valor that differs from that of Holyfield and Tysen?
Tony: I think we are always try to deliver the same thing we always have, you know? Let kids know that there’s hope out there in the times that we live in these days. God’s there for everybody and I think we are all just on this earth to be here for each-other and love each-other. That’s what we try to express through our music.
Corey: In addition to that, I think the whole name of this band has a lot to do with our individual lives and experiences with each-other. Vision & Valor is, what I get out of it, I think an opportunity that we have always had but we haven’t been able to overcome obstacles that kind of left the bands where they fell out. So with anything in your life, you can kind of take that idea and apply it and really put life to it.

Kelly: If your name, Vision & Valor, were an attack in a video game, what would it do?
Ry Ry: Lots of blue flame, probably, is where I would start with that. Maybe some flips involved.
Aaron: All I know is it’s something you don’t want to be on the business end of.
(Laughter)

Kelly: Alright, so hypothetically speaking, say you got a major record deal with millions of dollars, worldwide tours, buses, helicopters, the works—but, the only catch is that Miley Cyrus is in your band. Would you do it?
Aaron: Oh hell yeah!
Ry Ry: Yeah! Where’s the downside?
Aaron: Miley Cyrus!
(Everyone starts cheering)
Tony: We’re actually trying to get on tour with her.
Ry Ry: Miley, if you’re listening, there’s an open spot.
Aaron: You can hit the 808.

Jessie: How was working with Andrew at the Complex?
Aaron: Andy is always the joy of joys to work with. I’ve never had a bad time working with Andy, ever.
Tony: Yeah, he’s speaking for all of us.
Aaron: Yeah, Andy Shim!
(Applause)

Kelly: Alright, so can you guys explain your writing process? Not just lyrics; everything…
Aaron: Usually it all sprouts from Tony’s mind, and Tony will write acoustically. Most of the time. At that point he generally takes it to Ryan, who adds his lead line parts and thickens the melodies up. Lately I’ve been recording that and taking it home and writing drum parts to it at that point. Then me and Tony and Ryan will all get together, and we will all lay it down. They all give me suggestions as to what to change, and I will suggest things to them that might sound better. Then Corey comes in with his bass parts based on that and we will kind of sync up his bass parts with my drumming. Usually with our songs we will have a good three versions of each song before the final version comes out.
Tony: Yeah, we really like to dig into it.
Ry Ry: Lots of times we will switch stuff up as we are tracking it. It’s kind of cool to see how it kind of takes its own life and see how it turns out.
Tony: We don’t really fight too much, either. I know that a lot of bands, like Underoath, will go into the studio and get totally pissed at each other and won’t talk to each other. We’re just trying to write some good music, ya know?
Aaron: I think we all kind of just trust each-others’ judgment. We’ll accept suggestions and if there’s things that somebody absolutely has to have but the other guys don’t want it, we’ll try it out first. It’s a good measure of give and take as far as that goes.
Ry Ry: You gotta trust people too, and kind of know what their strengths are. For instance, if Aaron wants to do something crazy or weird, I’m like, okay I know that Aaron’s a good drummer I’m just gonna have to trust him on this and know that it will turn out good. So far with everyone I haven’t been let down!
Kelly: It’s always interesting to see how different bands write their music.. Everyone has a different process.
Aaron: I feel like we like to write separately more than anything else.
Ry Ry: Yep, and bringing it into one big pot.
Kelly: Ha, yeah it seems a lot of bands go into the studio with like, no material.
Tony: We always go in with material. I’ve got like 40 songs in the vault right now for Vision & Valor record two.
Kelly: That’s cool! You guys talking to any labels?
Tony: We’re talking to people.
Aaron: We’re talking to people, but we can’t really discuss anything.
Ry Ry: We haven’t signed anything yet!
(More murmurs)
Tony: We have some tricks up our sleeve, lets put it that way.
Aaron: But those tricks happen to be Miley Cyrus.
Ry Ry: If you could send her this interview that would be great.
Tony: If you’re playing five-card draw we’d have at least a pair.
Aaron: Wow, that was a good analogy.
Tony: If you’re hungry, and you want something in the shape of a fish—
Aaron: We’ve got meatballs.
Tony: --We have goldfish.
Aaron: Oh and if you could get this out, we have really been trying to work on getting a Chipotle sponsorship…
Tony: www.myspace.com/visionandvalor Chipotle we love you!
(More clamor about Chipotle)

Kelly: Alright, do you guys have any final words?
Tony: Basically, we’re gonna take this band to the next level no matter what it takes. We are going on tour really soon. We’ll be in your city.
Aaron: And we’ll always be bad at interviews.
Tony: www.myspace.com….
Ry Ry: slash give us a Chipotle sponsorship!