When asked why their upcoming fourth full-length album is self titled, guitarist/songwriter Bobby Darling replies "The album is like the band's mission statement, it is music written the way we want it to be rather than written with an audience in mind. This is what Gatsbys American Dream is." Following last year's concept album "Volcano" which centered on the story of Pompeii, the upcoming full-length is less experimental but still focused on a theme. That theme in a nutshell is that the music industry has very little to do with music. Darling asks "How can you take something that is special to us and try to mass produce and sell it like a Whopper or a t-shirt? The entire album is about our experiences in the music business in a satiric way." Through their six year career, the Seattle based Gatsby has had little use for convention in their approach to music. "They'll write an entire album without any choruses and it'll still be one of the catchiest albums of the year" manager Mike Kaminsky comments. The band is currently on a headlining tour that has been selling out 500 capacity clubs through the country. Proving while commercial success may still be long in forthcoming, their music certainly already connects with a wide audience.

The music that Gatsby creates is overwhelming with shimmering vocal melodies, progressive pop arrangements and lyrics chock full of literary and visual images. The group composed of Darling, vocalist Nic Newsham, bassist Kirk Huffman, drummer Rudy Gajdahar (whose brother drums in The Blood Brothers and Neon Blonde), second guitarist Ryan Van Wieringen and keyboardist Kyle O'Quin have been celebrated as a band's band, chosen by such groups as Armor For Sleep, The Starting Line, Matchbook Romance and Emery as tour partners. Playing over 250 shows last year, Gatsby was also on last summer's Warped Tour where they were chosen as a "Band To Watch" by Alternative Press and profiled on FUSE TV. On Warped and festival shows the band got an eye opening as to the state of their beloved punk rock. Darling relates "We are such an odd duck on most fests we play. Every other band is either a similar sounding screamo band or has dyed black hair and does karate kicks on stage, it's depressing. To me punk rock was always about the underdogs and to let the nerds have an outlet. Nowadays the whole scene is run by jocks. I think it's time for Revenge of the nerds." Armed with biting, tongue in cheek lyrics that target everything from labels, booking agents and even their own band, s/t is a musical without actors. Written while on tour, the band was able to jam during sound checks and hear how the songs would sound on a stage. Keeping with that strong live component the band only recorded music that they would be able to recreate perfectly on stage. There is no auto-tuning, punch-ins or any sonic clean up's on this album, all the imperfections and dirty noises are caught for posterity.