Blacklist Royals on their return ahead of Wednesday’s Farewell show

Blacklist Royals. // photo courtesy the artist

Nashville punk rockers Blacklist Royals have been on hiatus for a while now, but thanks to NOFX frontman Fat Mike, the band is back on the road and playing shows for the first time in ages.

The band’s emotionally honest and forthright rock ‘n’ roll saw the band signed first to Paper+ Plastick, then jumping to Universal Music Group for their critically acclaimed Die Young With Me LP. That LP was nearly a decade ago and while Blacklist Royals have released a single here and there, with their last, “Doomsday Girl,” back in 2021.

Blacklist Royals hit Farewell this Wednesday, July 17, on their way to play the Punk in Drublic Festival in Denver, so we hopped on the phone with brothers and band members Nat Rufus (vocals, guitar, harmonica) and Rob Rufus (drums, percussion, vocals) to see what’s been up lately.

The Pitch: Your last single was three years ago. Your last LP was a decade ago. What has brought Blacklist Royals back?

Nat Rufus: Honestly, man, in short–Fat Mike put us on one of these NOFX farewell shows kind of out of the blue. We’ve been working with him, my brother and I, on another project. He just sent us a text and said, “Hey, Blacklist Royals is on the Denver Punk in Drublic,” so we just got the band back together.

We’ve been working on some new tunes and are going to be putting a new EP out sometime relatively soon. But yeah, you can blame Fat Mike for that. He just hit us up out of nowhere and it was a good opportunity though, to get back and play some punk rock again.

You all have had various solo projects and side projects and things like that, but what else have you all been doing in the interim?

Rob Rufus: I’m also a writer and in the last ten years, I’ve published three different books. My memoir, Die Young With Me, was the biggest one and won an American Library Association medal. That was about Matt and I starting to play punk rock music when we were teenagers and then me getting diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer.

Then I wrote two novels after that and then got into writing screenplays, have two TV series in development right now. I’ve mainly been working on this. I was backing that up on all these different musical things. We’ve actually just this year started working on a musical version of my memoirs. That’s been a whole new, whole new challenge, but we’ve been keeping busy, man.

As you are twin brothers, I have to ask: Nat, what is it like for you to have read Die Young With Me and read your story through someone else’s eyes who is so close to you?

Nat: I guess I’d just say it was a trip, and I’m just glad he made me look cool, is all I can say.

When was the last Blacklist Royals show?

Nat: We played a festival maybe two years ago or something. We did a 10-year anniversary show of our first record. So, like two years ago or something, but we haven’t played a show in fucking 10 years or something. So it’s going to be fun, man. I think last time we played Kansas City maybe was with the Ataris in 2015. Oh, wow.

I always like to ask bands who have had their music used in movies or television shows this question how they feel what the experience is like when a song they wrote about a very specific moment or feeling that you had gets used to soundtrack something totally different.

Nat: Every time our stuff’s been used in movies and TV, it’s always fucking hilarious just because we’re either sitting there going, “I think I can hear it. I think I can hear it in the background” or–I remember the funniest one.

We had a song on Sons of Anarchy and they would feature songs and it would break artists and shit, so we thought it was gonna be this amazing thing and and our song was on for about ten seconds after this guy got shot in the head and then it cut to commercial, but it’s amazing though. I love it.

Rob: That ten seconds paid for our first European tour, so I can’t say fuck it, you know what I’m saying?

You’re doing a tour and you’re playing clubs and then you’re ending up playing in front of thousands of people for this festival. Are you preparing for the dissonance between the crowds and whatnot?

Rob: Yeah, we knew we needed to do some shows to knock the dust off. Punk in Drublic came about kind of last minute. But, yeah, I’m prepared for the dissonance. Back in the day, you know, we’d play Redding and Leeds one day, and a basement the next day, and a women’s prison in Germany the next day, and you just never knew. I mean, the high is there, and it’s real, but we are very prepared to, to come back to the clubs before and after that. Honestly, as long as we’re getting to play at this point, we’re just thrilled.

Blacklist Royals play Farewell Wednesday, July 17, with Red Kate and the Uncouth. Details on that show here.