The songs also have this feeling of being young and, like, having a relationship end and feeling like your entire world is crumbling. Have you changed emotionally or matured in that way?

At the time it was all very dramatic, but now my world's expanded. Whatever that guy was going through were just growing pains of growing up. That part of the challenge of doing the new record. We had to ask, "What is the voice of this guy who went through this shit 20 years ago?" I just sang about what's going on now, my older guy problems.

Was there a conscious effort to connect the two personalities of these two albums?

I was aware of it. I would just sift through notes on my phone and think, like, "Oh this could be American Football, this is sincere." There's some Owen stuff that can get sloppy or a little crude, but that doesn't sound like that [American Football] guy anymore. I would sort of edit it towards American Football, I didn't write to it.

So, the new record is really, really good, and the reason I say that is—

The bass lines? [Laughs and looks at Nate, American Football's bass player.]

[Here, I completely forgot my question. So GQ.com photo editor and Mike Kinsella superfan Matt Martin chimed in.]

Matt: You said emo has changed, but I feel like it's kind of coming full circle. How does it feel to be handing the torch off to dudes like Evan Weiss who are little more true to form?

I don't think about it. Obviously we are happy there's any interest in this thing we did so long ago.

Matt: As a fan, I just think it's nice to see the style be a little more earnest and not so stylized.

But no one likes that mall shit. I like more earnest music than produced music. Evan, as you mentioned, he was one of the first guys who played some acoustic stuff and I was like, "Oh that's cool. This guy sounds like some of the bands I used to be in." He does the drop-D [guitar tuning] stuff, the weird time signatures—it's just, like, in his blood.

Jake: What's an album you like that's come out in 2016? One people might not expect you to like?

I have no idea. Name some.

Did you listen to Frank Ocean's new album?

I heard it in the car. My wife likes it. It's cool. Though I'm confused as to why that's so popular.

What's confusing about that?

I'm confused why anything's popular, my own bands included.

I think it's popular because he released a really good album four years ago and then went into a hole, and that fascinates people.

Yeah, he seems honest. He's not trying to sell something, and I think that's cool. Nate, do you like it?

Nate: Yeah I heard a track on it, and I was excited to hear that it sounded kind of weird. It was outside of the box and there were a few lines that I thought were dark and serious and I thought that was cool. I respect that.

But isn't that also a reason why American Football has so much interest surrounding it? You guys did this one album, and then you left.

Mike: And then we never listened to modern music again. [Laughs.] No, I mean, I think that's part of the story. But I have no idea why this happened.

"We're just guys and we like doing it. We're not trying to conquer the world. If you don't like it, that's cool, but it's weird to hate a thing just because it's been seventeen years."

Well, back in 1999 the internet wasn't as vast and there wasn't a lot of information out there about you as a person. Did you make a concerted effort to not put yourself out there, or was it natural?

Pretty natural. I think if we were the same band today and recorded the same songs and played some shows and broke up, it would just die. Like, we played a bunch of bad shows back then. We played them poorly, and we recorded quickly. It really is just people are giving us good will because it's honestly young and naive.