Soulja Boy’s Br00tal Makeover

February 19, 2008 by stephanie  Send to a Friend

“Crank dat Calvary Boy”

Begin laughing……………………. Now.

You all know that annoying rap song “Soulja Boy?” Well, two awkward looking kids from Miami decided to put their own spin on it, taking the song to a whole new level on their laptops by creating their own hardcore version that makes you just want to break shit. Posted only a few months ago on Myspace, the band has received millions of views on their profile and are now in hush hush discussions with a prominent record label because of the fame the song has brought them. Lucky bastards.

I spoke to the guys a few weeks ago for their first interview ever. Cute, funny and just plain fucking weird come to mind during almost two hours on the phone with the band. The following is a shortened excerpt of the interview I wrote:
(Reproduced courtesy of The Aquarian Music Magazine)

“Soujla Boy up in dat ho/Watch me crank it/Watch me roll.” Those words are not just pure poetry, but are also the opening lines to the single most downloaded song of all time, “Crank That Soulja Boy” by Soulja Boy (It has been downloaded over three million times to date). After hearing the infectious club anthem in the car one day, Maimi, Florida native Matt Mihana decided that he and his fellow band mate, Nabil Moo, in I Set My Friends On Fire should cover the song- brutal hardcore style. After convincing Moo to start the band off by making this cover as their first song, I Set My Friends On Fire became a household name. With Moo reconstructing the song’s beats on his laptop and Mihana providing the raw intensity of rough throaty vocals, the boys’ do-it-yourself take on the anthem, known as “Crank Dat Calvary Boy,” became an instant viral hit through Myspace with almost 900,000 plays to date (although the actual number is much higher since the band’s profile has been deleted three times because Myspace believed the band was using Internet cheat codes to gain plays) even though the band has never added friends or promoted the song.

Excited, yet nervous, about their first interview, Moo and Mihana discuss the band’s enormous internet popularity, their apprehension about playing The Bamboozle Festival, penguins and manatees and the original music of I Set My Friends On Fire that allows them to break away from the pack of rising young unsigned bands and stand on their own.

So, for starters, how old are you guys?
Matt Mihana: I’m a senior in high school.
Nabil Moo:I’m a freshman in college. I go to the University of Miami.

How did you two get started as a band? Was it originally a joke?
MM:We actually had a band before this. It was called We Are the Calvary. It was a five piece band. What happened was that we were going to get signed, but kind of not really. We just had that band dream. Three of the members went to college and one of them went to the Grand Canyon or something…
NM:Our drummer took three months off to go to the Rocky Mountains on an outdoor expedition thing. The plan was originally, when we were reaching that time where we were all separating, that we were going to hold off on the band either recruit new members to try and continue the band, but we found that kind of pointless to just wait around for three months for everyone to come together and find new members.
MM:Pretty much, I made Nabil promise me that we would continue doing music without the members because they weren’t there. He has all the equipment that we used to record for the old band, so we didn’t plan on playing shows, but instead, just make the music we like and put it all into one song. We weren’t playing shows, so our limitations were endless.

As for “Crank Dat Calvary Boy,” were you scared you were going to be sued when you first posted the song?
NM:I spent like two hours listening to the song over and over again and actually remade the drumbeat. All the drum stuff I programmed, so that way we can’t be fully sued. What we do now though, because we sell the song is that we pay royalties to whomever owns the song.

How have your friends reacted to your sudden notoriety?
MM:To be honest with you, we don’t have that many “friends.” We’re kind of anti-social. We are just really choosy with our friends. We have this one friend though, whenever we are with him in a mall or some shit will walk 20 feet in front of us and then hide behind something and yell, “Oh my god! I Set My Friends on Fire! Oh!” just like mocking us. Laughter.
NM:We know a lot of people, but the people we really care about are just a close group. There has been a lot of people that have come out of nowhere pretending to be best friends because I’m in this band.
MM:The same goes for girls. You don’t know who wants you for you or for your music. As for me, I have a girlfriend, so I’m straight. But as for Nabil, there have been some weird cases.
NM: I am single by the way. Let that be known.

If you could put a fact about I Set My Friends on Fire underneath a Snapple Cap, what would it be?
NM:Matt’s not Jewish.
MM: I am actually from Eqyption descent.
NM: Also, I’m not Arabic. I’m a mutt.
MM: Oh, and also we didn’t take our band name from Aiden.
NM: Ok, I got it. We want to live in a world where manatees and penguins could live together and can prosper and frolic on the Earth without any consequence.

For more songs, videos and to verify the fact that the band is indeed this popular visit myspace.com/isetmyfriendsonfire

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