Pop-punk band bringing the heat to Honolulu

By Derek Paiva
Advertiser Entertainment Writer

Even though they haven't enjoyed the multimillion album sales of other such groups, New Found Glory is still finding success. Its third disc, "Sticks and Stones," debuted on Billboard's album chart at No. 4 in July 2002, and the group will begin rehearsals for its next album after its Hawai'i show. New Found Glory 7 p.m., Thursday Pipeline Café Sold Out 877-750-4400

First off, for a pop-punk band that didn't match the massive CD sales of peers such as blink-182 and Green Day, there were an awful lot of kids in attendance. Not a sellout, but better than the band expected.

Second, the crowd knew the words to all of the "skaters-and-the-girls-who-love-'em-and-best-buds-who-stiff-'em" anthems on NFG's self-titled 2000 sophomore disc, and even some stuff from the band's 1999 debut "Nothing Gold Can Stay." Again, better than anticipated.

Fact is, Pundik had only one complaint about his last trip our way.

"It was hot, man! Really hot!" said Pundik, modestly carping about the former World Café's sauna-like environs and some unseasonably humid late-November Honolulu weather. An odd comment from the lead singer of a band whose members met and were raised in Coral Springs, Fla. — about 75 miles north of Miami and, to borrow a new-school meteorological term coined by a friend of mine, "freak-nasty hot."

"Hopefully no one forgot about us," said the soft-spoken Pundik from his San Diego home. "There's so many good bands that have come out in the past couple of years."

Pundik would be better off just thinking about the weather ... again.

After all, New Found Glory returns to town next Thursday for a show that sold out long before the band — in addition to Pundik, guitarists Steve Klein and Chad Gilbert, bassist Ian Grushka, and drummer Cyrus Bolooki — could even start deciding what to pack.

The reason for the newfound interest in New Found Glory? Perhaps the band's half-million-selling third disc "Sticks And Stones" had something to do with it. The CD debuted on the Billboard album chart at No. 4 in July 2002, just below Eminem, Korn and (whoo-hoo!) a "Totally Hits 2" CD featuring R.E.M., LFO and TLC.

Its first single, "My Friends Over You," a kicky pop-punk anthem aimed at a new generation of testosterone-charged teenage misfits suffering the pains of squeezing time with the new squeeze into space once reserved solely for the dudes, was all over modern-rock radio last summer. That relationship's eventual break-up song, "Head On Collision" also proved a minor hit.

Still, NFG's disc sales have yet to reach the multimillion sales peaks of old-school influences such as blink-182 and Green Day. And upstart new-school contemporaries such as Good Charlotte and Sum 41 have received far more media and MTV attention for their amped-up, semi-juvenile reminiscences.

By comparison, NFG's brand of sincere, sensitive, relentlessly energetic pop punk has more in common with the bittersweet musings of unsung emo pioneers The Get-Up Kids. More adult probs are on the way, too.

Pundik, 23, said New Found Glory's fourth CD would continue to explore the mature subject matter that "Sticks" tracks such as "Sonny," a poignant ballad about the death of the singer's grandfather, only hinted the band was capable of. Rehearsals of the more than 30 songs written for the CD so far will begin after NFG's Hawai'i show.

"I think it's gonna be New Found Glory on steroids!" said Pundik, a genial conversationalist but, for better or worse, hardly a quote machine, even after six years of interviews. "The songs are a lot riff-ier. The lyrics are going to touch on a lot more stuff, too, as opposed to, 'Yesterday this girl dumped me/ And there was a drunk guy on the street/Blah, blah, blah.' "

While waiting for the new CD's release early next year, Pundik said the band is giving serious consideration to recording a sequel to its 2000 EP, "From The Screen To Your Stereo." That EP collected seven amped-up, pop-punk covers of band members' favorite movie songs — "Glory of Love" from "Karate Kid 2" and "My Heart Will Go On" from "Titanic" included. It was a fan favorite and a welcome break for the band while bored between its second and third CDs.

Band members were still narrowing down a long list of potential movie tracks, but Pundik already had one selection he planned to fight for.

"That Bon Jovi song ... 'Blaze of Glory' from 'Young Guns,'" Pundik said.

"'Young Guns' is an awesome movie!"

Yes, he was serious.