3OH!3

July 31, 2026

Interview by: Ally Arens

Album artwork for “MY FRIENDS,” released July 24, 2026

Musicians Nathaniel Motte and Sean Foreman, better known as electronic alt-pop duo 3OH!3, have been continuing to make waves in the music industry since their breakout 2008 album WANT and iconic scene collaborations with artists such as Katy Perry and Kesha. They have just released their first new music of this year on July 24 with the single “MY FRIENDS”, and are in the midst of a cross-country North American tour alongside fellow Warped Tour veterans Simple Plan and Bowling For Soup, playing for eager fans every night. While on the road, The Encore Nights got to (virtually) catch up with the duo to talk all things 3OH!3, and get a sneak peek of what’s next for the duo.

The Encore Nights (TEN): So first, last week you all released your first new single of the year in the form of “My Friends.” What was the inspiration for the song?

Nathaniel Motte (NM) : The inspiration was, I was sitting around in the living room with my family, with my daughter. I was banging around on the guitar, and we were just laughing, having fun, and we just started just kind of rapping about her friends, who are all wild people. I think when Sean and I started working on the song for our stuff, we just kind of extrapolated that to some of our friends who like to go real, real hard, and sometimes it’s hard to be at their level. 

TEN: I love that, love that. And “My Friends” follows a pair of singles that you all released last year, “Hit Me Harder” and “Slushie,” which were your first new songs since your 2021 album NEED. Are these singles a taste of more to come?

Sean Foreman (SF): I’d say yes. You heard it here first. We’re finishing up an album. So these are three that will be on there, but there are a number of songs more. This touches on different spots of the type of vibe, but they’re pretty expansive. The album, it goes different places. 

TEN: Are there any that you’re excited about that you maybe haven’t put out yet? What can you say about what’s coming?

NM:  Yeah, there’s a lot. There’s a lot. I mean, we’re currently on the road, and hypothetically, have to finish and turn the album in on the road. So we’re trying to figure out how to get that done. But it’s been great. Sean and I have been working, definitely differently than we used to because we both have a couple of kids and we’re pretty much full-time dads with a hobby in music at this point, which is great. It’s exactly how we want it.  Working on it was a little bit more peaceful between naps of the kids, and we’d get two or three hours here and there. But it’s kind of back to what we always love doing – that’s having fun in the studio, you know, feeling creative. I think, especially on this, kind of trying to harken back to a lot of our earlier music and really not second-guessing too much, for better or worse. Definitely working and reworking, but not doing that obsessively, and trying to just capture our sense of joy and fun and creativity, and hopefully that lends itself to people digging the music as well.

TEN: That’s awesome. And kind of in that vein, how do you keep things fresh creatively and ensure that you’re putting out the music that you want to put out, while also staying true to the sound and the vibes that fans have come to expect?

NM: Going on a lot of dates.

SF: We, you know, sometimes we just put words in a hat and then pull them out and see what it inspires. Like you know, we had one that just said Sisyphus in it. Yeah. So that may or may not be a clue to something. No, I think if we had the answer to all that, to touch in on all that stuff, then it would be easy for us. But we just like to have fun, and honestly, we’ve kind of gone back to this first thought, best thought mentality of  putting stuff up without getting too in our heads about how it looks or sounds, and then refining it after. But just making sure, in the moment, in the couple hours that we have together, that we just create something and it’s fun. And if it never sees the light of day because it just doesn’t fit, that’s fine. But I mean, honestly, it’s been pretty natural for us to find this.

NM: A lot of dates too. We set up romantic dates. Sean will make me dinner sometimes. Get a bottle of wine.

TEN: I love that. And with the rise of social media platforms like TikTok, some of your older tracks, such as “RICHMAN,” have kind of been seeing somewhat of a viral resurgence. So, how does it feel to have your back catalog being revisited by old and new fans alike, over a decade later?

NM: It’s amazing. It’s amazing. It’s so incongruous and so cool. Yeah, that “RICHMAN”” moment has just been so … it’s been wild to have people who knew our music obviously when it was coming out, and then people who were discovering our music for the first time, appreciate it, and again, have fun with it. And this one, the trend that popped off was doing a dance with yourself in the background. It’s heartwarming for me because it’s just like, oh shit, this is why I started making music, so that people could have fun, so that I could have fun, so that I could extrapolate that to other people having fun with our music, and so there’s nothing better. It’s also like, as an artist, it’s sick because the creative work is done already, and it’s 20 years done almost. So yeah, we’re just trying to find, creatively, other ways to reinterpret that song, rework it, and re-promote it. I think it’s one that we’ve always played at our live shows a lot, and then stayed in our set and the forefront of our minds. But yeah, it’s wild, man. It’s wild to see, and it’s just amazing.

TEN: I love it too, especially as somebody who was probably like late elementary school, early middle school when y’all first popped off. So it’s just been so nostalgic. And speaking of set lists, if you could construct your dream set list, what are some deep cuts that you don’t get to play as much that you would like to include, and conversely, are there any staples that might get cut?

NM: That’s a good question.

SF: I mean, we’ve been lucky because we’ve been playing some shows in the past couple years where we we actually literally put as many songs as we could on a on a wheel and spun it for one show, and we basically had to learn songs that we had never performed live, back catalog stuff, and yeah, it’s fun. I mean, there’s songs  that we put out and never played, so it was nice to try and touch on those and play [them].

NM: We always joked about, back in the day, putting our tracks on an iPod Shuffle and just letting them play. 

SF: Yeah, just seeing what comes. But you know what the setlist that we are playing on this tour actually is pretty fun. I mean, obviously, we only have so much time, but we hit a lot of songs that I feel like we love, but also the crowd loves, and that honestly brings me a lot of joy when the crowd loves a song. It’s not like I like to be someone who just plays something that I love and could give a crap if anyone else loves it. It brings me a lot of joy to see people enjoy a song. So I think we hit a lot of those markers and infuse a little bit of the newness in there, but not enough to lose anyone. And yeah, I think honestly it’s pretty close to my dream set right now of what we’re playing.

TEN: That’s amazing. Yeah, I love it when bands will sprinkle some like surprise songs in there every once in a while, or just like when you can tell that they’re playing the songs that they want to play, but also playing up to the expectations because obviously there’s songs that, like, if y’all didn’t play “DON’TTRUSTME,”  there would be a riot. (laughs)

SF: Yeah, we know that.

NM: That’s why we play it four times in our set.

TEN: (laughs) And if you could cover any song, either live or in the studio, old or new, what would be your go-to?

NM: Well, we started covering Smash Mouth’s “All Star” on this set until we realized that Simple Plan’s covering it, so we stopped.

TEN: Y’all should just bring them out and do it all at once!

NM: I don’t know. Speaking for myself, I’m horrible at covering or remixing songs

SF: Yeah, we do our own songs only so well, can’t expect us to do any other person’s song that much better.

TEN: Fair enough!

SF: My karaoke go-to is Seal’s “Kiss From a Rose,” and let’s just say we should let Seal sing that one. Sometimes we attempt in-between songs just like, off the cuff, some covers, but…

NM: They’re all pretty bad. And pretty short, thankfully.

TEN: If you could collaborate with any artists, either legacy acts or up-and-comers, who would be somebody that you would love to work with?

SF: Man, this is always tough. I mean, we’ve been lucky. We’ve got to work with the people that we really love, like Lil Jon, Andrew W.K., obviously Kesha and Katy Perry.

NM: Kasey Musgraves.

TEN: Iconic collaborations, by the way. 

SF: Thank you so much. But, like new artists, there’s a lot. I really like Dominic Fike. 

NM: Angine de Poitrine, French-Canadian band, microtonal. We could do a microtonal collab.

TEN: That would definitely be interesting. In a similar vein, if you could tour with anyone you wanted that you haven’t toured with already or haven’t been out with in a while, who would you want to go out with?

NM: Man, we played Summer Sonic. It’s like a very cool Japanese festival in 2010, and we watched Nickelback’s set, and it ripped. It was so fun.

TEN: They are so good live!

NM: Oh yeah, man, they’re really amazing. And after the set, like we were hanging with those those guys.  I remember Chad [Kroeger, Nickelback vocalist] walks off stage, and as he’s getting into the van that is going to transport him back, like it was such a movie moment, and I’m sure he was playing up to it. But like the door’s closing, and he’s like, “Hey, Sean, like we should tour together.” Hasn’t happened yet, but we’re holding out hope.

TEN: That would be amazing. And so your current tour with Simple Plan and Bowling for Soup is bringing you to some markets that you aren’t able to visit as often, like Oklahoma City, because like I looked it up on concert archives and it looks like it’s actually been since like the Streets of Gold tour since y’all have been in OKC proper.

NM: I think we’ve done some like radio promo shows and stuff since then, we’ve also done some military dates on air force bases around there. But yeah, it’s been a while since we’ve done a proper show, that’s for sure.

TEN: So, what’s it like to be able to expand your touring horizons and play for some fans who either haven’t seen you in a while or might even be seeing you for the first time?

SF: It’s amazing, I mean, honestly, it’s hard to keep everyone happy unless you’re just like [a] crazy road dog, like on the road constantly, and places we haven’t been back to in a long time. And we’re just as happy to see people come out and enjoy our music as we are to play it in these places. It really is humbling to know that we can go to different places in the U.S., we can go to Alaska, we can go to Hawaii, we can even just go abroad to different countries, and anyone knows our songs.  It’s really a crazy thing. I mean that this thing has traveled that we sort of just started in our basement for fun. We’re happy to go wherever where everyone wants to hear us. We’re definitely not inclined to just be like, ‘oh, we’re just gonna go to these major markets.’ I think it’s more of the pandemic hit, and then we started having families. So we’re just trying to get out there and do this thing as much as possible to bring some people some joy and hopefully a party.

NM: We did close out our 50th state in 2021, which was cool.

TEN: That’s incredible. And so, kind of piggybacking off of that, obviously being on the road can be kind of grueling, but what is your favorite thing about it?

NM: I think it’s the shows. It’s the camaraderie between us on the road, and it’s kind of a bunch of friends hanging out every day. Our shows have always been about kind of pulling down that barrier between quote unquote performer, artist, and audience, and just experiencing that connection every night is just amazing. And yeah, it can be exhausting, and especially these days it’s tough to be away from family, but also it’s our job, and we consider ourselves really fortunate that our job is basically just to emcee a party every night. So, to get that collective sense of joy, I think that’s why at least I started performing music is to get that rush and to hopefully instill that sense of joy and and merriment and letting go and fun and energy to other people and to kind of catch that vibe collectively is amazing, man. We’re 20 plus years into performing, so it’s something that we’re obviously addicted to in some form.

TEN: I mean, that’s my favorite part of even just going to shows is just the energy and the camaraderie, there’s nothing like it. 

NM: Yeah. I think, some people aren’t musically inclined, or they don’t dig it. That’s fine, but I think if you are, it’s one of the best things in the world.

TEN: And if you could sum up the essence of 3OH!3 in three words, what would they be?

SF: Still.

NM: Around.

SF: Partying. 

TEN: Nice. And is there anything else in the works that you want to share, or plug, or hype up?

NM: yeahY we got a new record forthcoming soon here. Hopefully, not too much longer, and we’re really excited to get back to OKC. We’re really excited to get back to these towns and places that we haven’t been to in a while. And come one, come all, man. I think I can speak for the whole tour too – Simple Plan, Bowling for Soup. I think we all kind of grew up cutting our chops on Warped Tour, and that’s really a tour for everybody. So everybody’s welcome, and we’ll be delighted to see anybody who wants to come party with us.

TEN: All right! Thank you so much!

NM: Likewise, thank you so much, we’ll see you soon!

The Bigger Than You Think! The Sequel tour continues through August 20, including stops in Austin, TX on August 7 and Oklahoma City, OK on August 8, with 3OH!3 also set to perform at all three remaining 2026 Warped Tour shows in Montreal, Mexico City, and Orlando, as well as a scheduled appearance at Chicago’s Riot Fest in September. All of their upcoming tour dates can be found on their website, and stay tuned to their socials to keep up with all things 3OH!3.