COURTESY OF RUDY ARCHULETA Senses Fail will play a special all-ages show next Wednesday.

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In your face

Buddy Nielsen uses music
to vent his rage

For a supposedly angry guy, Buddy Nielsen is really rather pleasant. Nielsen, the leader of emo/hardcore band Senses Fail, apologizes when his cell phone cuts out, when he is uncomfortable talking about a subject, and when he cannot be heard over a public announcement at the Garden State Plaza in New Jersey, where he is hanging out on a Saturday night with his girlfriend and her sister.

Hard-core rock STAR 101.9's Band Camp 2005 featuring acts including Go Jimmy Go, Mad Caddies, Senses Fail and Pepper Where: Kapono's, Aloha Tower Marketplace When: 8 p.m. June 15 Tickets: $25 presale and $30 at the door, 21 and over; available at all Ticketmaster outlets, toll free at (877) 750-4400, and online at ticketmaster.com, the Blaisdell Arena box office and all Local Motion surf shops Call: 591-2211 Info: www.star1019.com Note: Also all ages pre-show with Senses Fail from 5 to 6 p.m., $12 presale tickets only available at Local Motion shops and $15 at the door

He is barely audible over the foghorn-loud PA, which might be a call for a lost child, but he really can't tell.

"I'm really sorry," he apologizes between blats. "I think it's almost over."

Nielsen chooses to express his dark emotions in more acceptable outlets such as art, writing or music. With songs like "Tie Her Down," "You're Cute When You Scream" and "Buried a Lie" off the band's debut album "Let it Enfold You," it's obvious that the music offers him a release.

After all, Nielsen is a guy who looks up to legendary barfly poet and novelist Charles Bukowski, who lived for the dark side and documented it in works such as "Poems and Insults."

"I just really got a lot of anger," said Nielsen. "I'm not a positive person. People bite you in the back. I'm often uncomfortable and pessimistic. But sometimes people are so phony and I hate that. And it just comes out in a very bleak way. I wish I was more optimistic."

THIS FROM a group where only two people, Nielsen and bassist Mike Glita, have even hit the two decades-old mark. Nielsen's literary leanings might not reflect the average 21-year-old's interests, but he's loyal to his younger fans, many of whom can't come to the 21-and-over Band Camp show next Wednesday that features Senses Fail. So he's happy (relatively speaking) to also do an all-ages concert earlier that day.

Since the release last year of "Let it Enfold You" -- a mixture of heavy punk and catchy melodies -- the five-piece band from northern New Jersey has toured mostly nonstop from September of 2004 in promotion of the album, augmented by two videos for the songs "Rum is For Drinking Not For Burning" and "Buried a Lie."

The video for "Buried a Lie" was directed by Nielsen's mother, an actress on the soap opera "Guiding Light."

But "I don't really want to talk about it," he said. "We're not getting along right now. I'm sorry."

Nielsen is happy, however, to promise that Senses Fails' next CD, a narrative piece due out next summer, will be even darker. "For where we were at the time when we did ('Let it Enfold You'), it's good. But I'm kind of tired of it and (want to) focus (on the new material). I know what we're capable of."

He also perks up when he talks about the upcoming Vans Warped Tour with My Chemical Romance, MxPx and All-American Rejects among others, which kicks off in Columbus, Ohio, three days after the Honolulu shows.

"I'm really excited to be doing it," said Nielsen. "We're going on tour with a bunch of our friends. We're getting paid to work."

He is also energized when he talks about what he did on a whim, right before going to the mall that night.

"I just got my arms waxed. I got my hair shaved, too. Yeah, there wasn't a whole lot to do tonight."