For any band, a reliable crew can make all the difference between fame and never quite making it. In a tenure spanning over thirty years years now, Texas pop-punk outfit Bowling For Soup have forged a path by excelling in the production of both upbeat comedy-laden anthems and heartfelt emotional balladry, taking them all the way from the likes of Jim’s Diner in their beloved home-state, to the lofty heights of packing-out London’s Wembley Arena, and everywhere in-between. Now set to embark on perhaps one of the most packed years of their career as a band to date, with shows across the US, Australia, the UK and Europe, sharing stages with the likes of Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls and Simple Plan, we sat down with frontman/guitarist Jaret Reddick, and the band’s newest recruit, photographer/videographer Amy Russell to get the lowdown on everything going on in their world, and what it takes to be become part of the “BFS Family”.
Rock Sins: Jaret, it’s been said before by both you guys in the band, and the people around you, that Bowling For Soup as an entity feels like one big family for everybody involved – how do you feel about that assessment?
Jaret: The truth is that we are a big family and most everybody who ends up here doesn’t start out in any capacity to do the job that they’re doing right now”. So like Daniel Cotton never expected to be an assistant tour manager and I believe the first time Amy toured with us she didn’t even own a camera yet. But what happens is, you know, as people do become family and they develop these skills or they’re asked to do something for us, you know, and then all of a sudden it’s like, oh my gosh, this is a very valuable thing for us. And in Amy’s case, just the fact that she just understands what it is that the band is all about. What it is we like to give our fans as far as content is concerned. How it is we like to look. And she can do all that, you know, I think because she was a fan first and then now, you know, as being part of the family she’s just fine tuned it because she has, you know, she gets to get the instant feedback from us”.
If you go if you look at look at our crew, you know, Dave Hale started out doing merch for us in 2005 and he’s still tour managing us, you know, today and though actually did start out as a sound guy and he’s still here. And like I said, our assistant tour manager in the UK is Daniel and he started out as a fan and just came along with me, honestly on an acoustic tour just to kind of come along and see what it was all about and have some beers. And then he started working and then it was like, well, wait a minute, we need this guy. And then Dave Kai Piper was the next to sort of jump in and start doing graphics and stuff. And then now we’ve got our rock star, Amy Russell; we’ve never gotten the kinds of comments that we get from the content that we’re putting out there [with her]. And all of that is because she she was joining us on a tour and helping, you know, and ended up sort of just taking over the whole media team. And now she’s invaluable to us. I mean, I don’t even know what we would do without her!
Amy, for anybody not familiar with you and your work, how did you first get involved with photography, and subsequently Bowling For Soup?
Amy: God, I don’t know how to summarise it. So like, I did start out as a huge fan and just to clarify, I’m still actually a fan. That didn’t change. But that would have started for me when I was like 12 years old and my dad would take me to all the shows every time they came to the UK, we’d go to like at least two shows on the tour. We’d always try and meet them afterwards, because that was when like they used to be able to, they would literally sit around in the venues until they got kicked out pretty much meeting every single fan after the show that wanted to meet them, which is possibly one of the most unheard of things in the music industry. And then as I got older, I think as a response to that, I wanted to get into, I wanted to find a way into the music industry. And I always had a weird passion for writing. So I started going down like the music journalism road and worked really hard at that when I was a kid. And I basically have done this for my entire life, but I used to just blag my way into shows to interview people to review their gigs. I blagged my way to get published in magazines in the UK and international music magazines and stuff when I was like 17. But for whatever reason, that all kind of fell apart.
I had been out of that world for 15 years and it sort of found a way back to me again. And I found photography was something I’ve always enjoyed and loved. So I picked up a camera and fortunately, my partner is a merchandise manager and does merch for BFS in the UK, so that was my in. Jaret let me kind of come along and help out, do some merch for some shows. And I ran around with a camera a little bit and he was like, I like what you do. And I was like, I like doing this. Let’s do it some more.
Jaret: Well, I guess I think the good thing about Amy too is that, you know, she is happy to help. However, like she said, she started out as helping with merch and then helping, I think maybe with VIP photos or something like that, and then just running around and like and just being useful. But then it was just like, you know, I think, hey, we need somebody to edit this video or we need somebody to do these graphics or whatever it is. And then like I said, just made herself so valuable to us over there. And then it was just like, “hey, do you want to just go tour the world and see everything?”. And so, you know, that’s we’re working on that now, actually. Trying to get that done. But we’ll be going to Australia in a few weeks and she’ll be right there alongside us. And you know, what’s great for me is that we’ve had great media people in the past, but for the most part, they need they need a lot of direction, you know, and I think a lot of that is just because, you know, they want to make us happy.
I definitely understand that the thing about Amy is that she’s just like, hey, you want me to just do what I do on this project or you want me to just do my thing on this or how about I just run with this and then not bother you with it. And even with grandiose ideas I come up with, I’ll be like, hey, tomorrow get with me and we’ll do this. And then I sleep late and she’s just done it, you know. And she works her ass off, but secondly, she loves what she does, you know. And again, I think when you “get that”, that’s the good thing about our team and the good thing about having people that start out being fans or just wanting to to come along for the ride for a bit or whatever. And then finding “man, I really like being here”. “I like being around this”. And then they just want to make the day better. And now I have a whole crew full of those of those people. Another example, Ian, my guitar tech, he’s just a guy that was a friend of ours or a friend of Rob’s from childhood and now he’s been our guitar tech for years and his whole thing is just trying to make our day better all the time. And and I think we’re very blessed to have have a crew like that. And Amy certainly fits into that that fold.
Speaking loosely from a personal perspective, I don’t think I have ever had like a more positive experience dealing with like behind the scenes and crew and that than I ever have with the BFS crew…
Jaret: And you know what? I’ll say this, you know, that is by design. I mean, I will say that, you know, people who work here have to check their attitude at the door. And it’s not preached per se. But it is certainly one of those things that’s expected. And it’s been so long now. I think people just fall in, you know, to it. It’s like, oh, OK, we’re the nice guys. But, you know, like I said, my sound guy who’s been here since 2003 or so. You know, he’s from New York. He’s a bit abrasive. He’s could be a bit of an angry sort. And that is something that that I had to work on with him, you know. But I mean, I didn’t really work on it. I just basically said, hey, we’re the nice guys. When we leave here, I want to be everybody’s favourite band. But I don’t mean just from the stage – I mean, from load in to load out. And, you know, that was something he actually gives me a lot of credit in, you know, other jobs that he’s had because he learned that here, you know, that like, okay, this is how we’re going to deal with things. You know, we’re going to deal with things in a positive way. We’re going to be kind and so to hear you say that, that always makes me feel like a proud papa, you know, that like, oh, my babies are doing so good. You know? I always try to say, like, you know, your experience usually is based upon how the tour manager feels that day, you know. And unfortunately, my tour manager is not allowed to have bad days. You can behind the scenes, but, you know, with respect to people or whatever. It is a thing. Again, I I’m so proud that that we have that reputation, that we have the reputation of being not only the band that that other that other bands want to tour with or that journalists think are nice or that, you know, fans know that everybody in my camp is approachable and all of that. But at the same time, just that everybody feels so at home here. And it’s a place where I mean, quite frankly, there has not ever been a person that has left their job here that hasn’t wanted it back at some point. And and that is another thing that I really pride myself on.
Amy: So I have still have (and I actually still wear it because Jaret will probably contest to the fact that I stopped growing at 12 years old) a T-shirt from 2004 that just says “Bowling For Soup – Nice Guys” And it’s like my favourite bits of merch you ever did. You are…
Jaret: That was our our first ever slogan we had as a band. Nice guys.
Amy, are there any particular career goals for you now in terms of moving forward with Bowling For Soup?
Amy: To not lose my job? *laughs* I mean, it is one of those really weird and wild things because like, yes, it’s quite obvious that I am literally working for my absolute heroes and starting out with absolutely zero knowledge of what I was doing – I still maintain I don’t actually know what I’m doing. So moving forward for me is just constantly just continuing to learn and just just keep trying to push the boundaries and just say it’s a really exciting journey to be on because like, Jaret is so enthusiastic and he’s so good with content as well. And I see how on it he is that it really kind of drives me to want to be like “how can we make this so much better?”. And also, like, in terms of how valuable content and social media actually is to bands and to help push them forward now is really wild. And honestly, one of my big goals is I want us to have a TikTok trend. Like, I want to be a part of that. Yeah, that’s that’s my goal, just to keep my job!
Jaret: I will say, she brings a lot to the table as far as her ideas, her way of also coming to me and going “Hey, this is something that’s happening over here. Like, maybe we should think about doing something like this?”. And that’s all that’s all social media is. But social media and actually content in general is just as important as touring. And for some bands, it’s more important. You know, it just depends on where you are in your journey and where you started and where you’re hoping to go. So I mean, when I talk to young bands, I’m like everybody in the band needs to learn something else besides being in the band. That’s the world we live in. Somebody needs to learn how to use a camera. Somebody needs to learn how to do taxes. Somebody needs to learn how to edit video. But that’s how important it is, you know, like literally it’s just part of the thing now, you know, and whereas we used to get in the van and leave for six to eight months at a time, now it’s like, hey, you really need to be spending that time and effort on building this social awareness and it’s because the world is our audience now.
And that’s why what Amy contributes to us is so important. And that’s why it’s got to look a certain way. It’s got to feel a certain way and all of that. And what I really love about working with her is that I I don’t have to think of all of it, you know? Like, I don’t have to come up with this and I don’t have to do this. There’s a what if this or can we reuse this for this? And, you know, those are things that are so valuable to me because I will say that if I’m not the busiest person in this business, I really feel bad for whoever is because I really, really do not have a spare moment ever. *laughs* So anything like that, where from the creative side, where someone like like Rob [Felicetti, BFS bassist] starting to help with the production of music and even the writing. And he does the set lists and like all of those things, though, they might seem small to somebody else, but to me, they’re huge. So not to have to get up every day and find 10 things for Amy to do because she just figures it out is so valuable. It’s SO valuable.
Jaret continued: And, you know, my guys, the truth is, and this is OK – they hate it. They hate social media. There’s a certain amount they want to be involved because it’s part of our job now. But they don’t; they have zero interest in the creation of it. They have zero interest in any of it. And sometimes actually, I think maybe even they can have sort of a negative feeling about it. But I understand that because I think there’s bands young and old. I think a lot of people would be like, “yeah, it’s because, you know, you guys are old and you don’t get it”. No, young bands hate it too. It’s just such a part of my personality – I was an actor as a kid. So like, doing 30 second videos and sending them out to hundreds of thousand people is awesome to me., I’m just like, I’m going to talk about spilling these beans on Easter, you know? So it’s nice to have a partner in that. And that’s what I feel like Amy really is, she has really come in and just been an extension of what it is I was already doing. But now we’re better at it because she’s getting so good.
And I love the feel of our videos and all of that content that we’re putting out. And as I said, even our people who have been following us forever, people that we’ve worked with, people who just over the last couple of tours that Amy has been a part of will hit me up and be like, “Who is doing your social media? Holy crap, it’s so good”. And, you know, I do send her those messages because I feel like, you know, she should be able to see that. But I don’t tell Edo that everybody said we sounded good the night before because he…I’m just kidding, I do tell him. *laughs*
The gradually-increasing look of embarrassment on Amy’s face right now as we talk about this is wonderful…
Jaret: She’s learning to take compliments.
Amy: I’m getting better! *laughs* Jaret sends me those messages and I’m just in my bunk crying.
Jaret: I mean, so many things have happened for her, you know, covers and usable photos and photos that we’re sending out to people or whatever. And again, this is; she has a picture of her being 12 years old and laying across our autograph table and her parents over there being proud of her for meeting the band, you know? And here we are now. I think Amy is such a good example of what I tell my kids. And that is just be happy. You don’t have to know what you want to do with your life really ever, you know? Like, just, you can make, you can change your mind all the time. And here’s somebody who she’s a great hairstylist. She’s smart and she knows how to do 15 other things, but decided, you know what, I really enjoy this. And so she grabbed it by the bollocks and friggin’ does it. And now, again, she’s made herself irreplaceable. And I think there’s a big lesson for people who are reading this to learn about that because like I said, it’s one of those things where you can decide what you want to do at 45, just be happy.
I mean, “Get Happy”, if I’m able to paraphrase a certain band’s songs, it’s always been the thing…
Jaret: RIGHT?! You know, my kids only have two rules. Don’t be a piece of shit, and be happy. Now, don’t be a piece of shit is pretty encompassing. There’s a lot that goes along with that. And they understand that, but then be happy too. And if you can do those two things, then I am here for you no matter what.
So, now Amy’s fully ingrained within this BFS family and everything, where are you dragging her off to next? What’s coming up for you guys?
Jaret: We got Australia next. And then we’ve got the UK. And then hopefully some US dates in the future. We’ll see how that goes. And then, yeah, hopefully next year, Japan. Europe is gonna happen next year too, I believe. We’ve got a lot of work cut out for us. So it’s gonna be good. And Amy’s a good tourist too, right? Amy, like you actually will figure out a couple of hours a day and go see shit?
Amy: Oh yeah. I maintain it’s for content purposes, but it’s nice. Like, “oh, I must go get some footage of the Golden Gate Bridge”. That finds its way in there. *laughs*
I suppose from a content perspective, you know, being able to do all these traveling to different places, that’s gonna open up a whole load of crazy ideas potentially to get the guys to do weird shit?
Jaret: Well, you know what? I’ll be honest about something. Like I said, the guys haven’t been all that stoked about social media in the last few years. And now they’ll do it because they know, okay, it’s, you know, and not that they would ever say no anyway. It’s just they do have a good attitude about it now. And even our crew guys will participate in things because they know she’s gonna actually use what she does. That’s another thing that I can say about her is that she’s not just filming for the sake of filming all the time. It’s like, she IS creating content. And you know, we don’t just end up with an endless arsenal of footage that we’re never gonna use – I think that to me, I like that. I don’t like the songs that get left behind. You know, as a songwriter, I’m just like, shit, why didn’t I do something with that? And it’s like, I think back to all this footage that we have from over the years, it just sits there and never does anything. And so, you know, that’s, I know whenever she’s got that camera on that she’s up to something and it’s gonna be awesome.
Amy: I would argue that you don’t see the three and a half thousand photos that I actually get rid of every night..
Jaret: Yeah, that’s true because that would give me anxiety. Terrific. *laughs*
We sort of touched on it before, but I do genuinely think you can see like the step up in terms of the quality of the some of things that have been going out, you know, since you’ve sort of come together.
Jaret: Yep, I agree. I think we’ve got a really good thing going and I’m super happy about it.
Amy: Like one of the wildest things of this is, and it’s really funny cause I’m like, the response from the fans to just me and the number of fans that message me or like the number of fans that have stopped me at a show and be like, they recognize me is really, really weird. But then I do have to take a step back and remember that I was the person that would also go and ask to have photos taken with [crew members] Edo and Greg Lobdell and Sweet Charlie. It’s like; BFS fans go hard! *laughs*
Jaret: They do. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, and you know what? Again, that goes back to sort of how we started this conversation, you know, it’s, I’m just so proud of the way all of you guys, you know, respond to that. And I love the fact that we’re a family that our fans know the whole gang. Cause there’s gotta be other bands that these same fans go see and they don’t know any of their crew people or their photographer or any of that, you know? And I’m so proud of the fact that, you know, everybody knows Real and everybody knows Ian and Dave and Edo and Amy and Dave Kai Piper. And you know, it just goes on and on – “Daniel Cotton from Twitter”…
It does not feel like I’ve had the proper BFS show experience until I’ve seen “Daniel Cotton from Twitter” somewhere…
Jaret: Right! No, I get that actually, I do. He is another Englishman that…. I just absolutely love having him around. And he works so hard and he’s so good to the fans and, you know, making sure everybody, you know, is informed correctly if something is off. Cause God knows that happens, you know? I mean, communication is hard enough, but we live in very different time zones. And there’s always some kind of confusion about one or two things at tour. And Daniel is so good about catching that, you know, and making sure everybody knows what’s up. And so, yeah, it’s a good family.
And like you say, that’s the main thing that I just always feel the need to highlight with you guys is just how much it does feel that way every single time. Absolutely.
Jaret: Man, I never get tired of hearing that. But don’t, just don’t distract them too much because, you know, they do have to work, you know, during the show. And yeah. And you can always tell when Amy’s at work. So you, because she has her boxers uniform on. And then, so once she dresses up like a boxer, you’re just like, I don’t wave to Amy. She’s trying to take pictures. *laughs*
Amy: I don’t know how that just accidentally became my uniform…
Jaret: Well, you know what’s funny is, is I love that you commented on it, you know, on Wimbledon, you’re just like, you know, I’m ready. When you got the uniform on and stuff. Oh man, it’s so good. I love it. I think it’s what you wear, literally just screams to people, “do not fuck with me”, it really is like, “oh, that’s gotta be somebody, you know, just leave her alone”.
Amy, when did you actually first pick up a camera?
Amy: Geez, it was the February tour before the “A Hangover…” anniversary one. 2025? Early 2024? I’ve done like photography in college and stuff. And I have a qualification in like digital marketing. I used to manage a hair salon and do like all of their social media and like all of that noise. So there’s some background there ish…
Jaret: But you’re so good at it! But that’s how you know that somebody’s got the gift, you know, because it’s, it’s one of those things where…I mean, even my friend Linus, who’s been producing Bowling For Soup for years and years and years, just one day was like, “Yeah, I’m going to kind of start dabbling into photography”. And now he’s got like this whole separate career as a photographer or whatever. I can’t even take a good looking picture on my phone, you know? *laughs* When somebody has the eye, when they have the gift, they just have it, right? I think that’s what’s cool about art, right? It’s just like there is an art to it. And I always tell people, like when I take people through the Punk Rock Museum in Vegas doing tours and stuff, and we get to the section upstairs, it’s just a whole floor of almost all photography. And, I’m like, you know, if you think any of this is easy and doesn’t require like some crazy expertise, some crazy artistic vision, like, you take a picture at a show and then compare it to these! You know, so it is impressive. It’s impressive that, that Amy has developed this skill so quickly. And I feel lucky that we got her when we did. Cause I feel after we’re done, she will move on to some crazy, crazy things. But hopefully that’s not for many years to come!
Amy: I don’t actually think I could ever tour with another band!
Jaret: Atta girl! *laughs*
Bowling For Soup return to the UK on the Bowl My Bones tour, teaming up with their great friend Frank Turner. American Hi-Fi will open all shows. The full list of dates and the tour poster can be found below.
Bowling For Soup w/ Frank Turner & American Hi-Fi – Bowl My Bones UK Tour Summer 2026
25th June – Margate – Dreamland
26th June – Southampton – Guildhall Square
27th June – Lincoln – Live At Lincoln Castle
29th June – Glasgow – O2 Academy
30th June – Halifax – The Piece Hall
2nd July – Scarborough – Open Air Theatre
3rd July – Llangollen – Llangollen Pavilion
4th July – Cardiff – Cardiff Castle
5th July – St. Austell – The Eden Sessions
Remaining tickets can be obtained from Ticketmaster on this link.
