MuchMusic.com: There's a lot of news right now about how guys are "burning up the charts". What do you think about entering the belly of the beast - all these popular acts that you're feverishly against?

Corey: It's a little weird! We certainly weren't expecting it, let's put it that way. We just wanted to do well, and we've done better than well. I look at it as like infiltrating, throwing around a lot of expletives and just talking smack. There's just not enough danger in music anymore and if there is, it's pre-packaged - it's like safe danger. It's pretty danger. When the most dangerous thing about you is your haircut, go home.

MuchMusic.com: So even though your album is diverse, you didn't expect it to be embraced by different radio formats like it has been?

Corey: No, the main thing that we wated to do was get it out there for the people and then let them decide. The greatest thing that you can do is sell albums cause that's the fans, and that's them making a statement about it. We didn't really think a lot about radio, so when it happened we were kinda like, "whoa. where'd this come from?" Obviously we're happy.

MuchMusic.com: What music video images get your goat the most?

Corey: Stupid dance routines piss me off so bad. A lot of the bling bling crap, dudes show up and they've got the big, sprawling 80 room mansion. Meanwhile, they're living in an apartment in LA. You wonder why kids are so f***ed up about it, it's cause what they think is real life is NOT real life. That's not how it is. I'm sure some of those guys have really nice cribs but for the most part they live regular lives. It's all a lie!

Josh: They sign image contracts and then they're portrayed as having this and that. Then whatever exec in the office is done with them, they kick 'em to the curb. All the stuff that was theirs for that month becomes somebody else's.

Corey: Exactly! It's almost like assisted living. I think if people were a little more honest about it, we'd be better off. But I don't see that happening anytime soon.

MuchMusic.com: Do you ever have inner fights with yourself about being a part of this business or are you in it to make yourself heard?

Josh: I'm a part of it cause this is what I want to do. I don't really care about the outside stuff or the glamour. I want to write music, and that's it.

Corey: The lifestyle's very attractive. I was caught up in it for awhile. When the smoke clears, you get yourself healthy and go, "jesus christ, I became as bad as the people I was raging against." And that kind of makes you even more angry. I don't really struggle with that so much anymore as I do struggle with the people that kind of want to make us conform and make us a part of the machine. F**k you. I've wanted to do this since I was a kid, because I wanted to make music. I wanted to contribute to music and leave something behind that meant something. Everything that we earn we don't take for granted, we respect it, and we try to hold on to it for as long as possible.

MuchMusic.com: Corey, you're starting a label to represent bands from the midwest. Do you think bands from that area have more to say?

Corey: I think they definitely have no qualms about saying it. I don't know if they have more to say, but I think they have a little more respect and integrity. But then again I only know the bands that I've worked with. I don't know if half the bands aren't just in it to make a fast buck. I do know that the bands that I really love from the midwest are very genuine, very different, and they definitely have something that they wanna say and that the world should hear. And let me just say that the record label was accidental, let's put it that way. It's not even really an official record label, it was just something so I could release the album that I produced with Facecage. Because I shopped it around and it was so different and so out of the mainstream that no record label wanted to touch it even though it was really good. I was like, maybe I don't want the record labels get their hands on this cause they won't know how to work it, they won't know what to do with it. So we said screw it. I'll put my own money into it, I'll press a couple thousand and we'll take it on the road.

MuchMusic.com: When you went to Japan earlier this month, did it overwhelm your senses?

Corey: I've been there many times, but it was his first time!

Josh: It was like being on a whole other planet. I learned that it's basically all one big bridge built on trash, everybody's about five feet tall - it was a culture shock. I'm still all messed up a week later! It was insane. I don't know how else to explain it, you have to experience it.

Corey: There's so much information, it's just coming at you, whether it's ads, or being caught in a crush of people. It's very Americanized but at the same time they take everything from America and they shoot it through this filter that makes it completely like, "is that how you see us?" But it's also a lot of fun. The kids were insane. We went on at 11:50 in the morning and there was still like 12,000 people out there so it was like, wow. We've never played there before with Stone Sour so to get that kind of reaction that early, it made us feel really at home.

MuchMusic.com: What was the last CD or DVD you were excited to buy?

Josh: I got Paul Gilbert "Get Out Of My Yard" in Japan, which is really cool cause it's not released for another couple of weeks here. So I got it early and with the bonus stuff cause the Japanese love bonus stuff.

Corey: The last DVD I was excited about was "House" season 2. It's one of my new favourite TV shows, me and my wife really got into it. I picked up the first season on a whim cause I had never watched the show, and we devoured it in two days. She's watching season 2 without me, so I'm really mad. When season 5 of "24" comes out, you better keep your hands out of my mouth cause if you don't, I'll chew 'em off to get to it.

~Wendy Heisler