Audelio “Junior” Flores was pretty bummed out this past February. The guitarist for pop punk band Set Your Goals was in Australia and had three passes to attend UFC 110: Nogueira Vs. Velasquez. Unfortunately, he was ninety minutes away from Sydney and none of his MySpace friends were willing to attend with him. If he’s given the opportunity to attend an event this summer, then he’ll peel outta the Warped Tour by the afternoon.
FIGHT! Magazine: So when did you first get in tune with MMA?
Junior Flores: I was young, man. I had to have been nine-years-old. My dad is a huge wrestler. When he was a kid, he used to wrestle, and when the UFC started getting more known, my dad ended up finding it and we’d just watch UFC fights all the time. It’s blowing up now, which is awesome. But when I’m home, I train with my cousin. I just roll here and there, and on tour, all we do is try to find bars and places that are televising fights, and go up to see it.
FM: Do your band mates follow it too?
JF: Everyone likes it, but it’s mainly me and our drummer (Michael Ambrose). If we wanna go see a fight, we’ll make it happen one way or another.
FM: So the other guys wouldn’t know the difference between Renzo Gracie and Royce Gracie?
JF: No, they probably wouldn’t (laughs). To them, they watch these people fight and that’s the extent of it.
FM: You were supposed to see UFC 110: Nogueira Vs. Velasquez, but you didn’t make it to the event. What happened?
JF: We were in Australia [and] one of our tour managers, she took Meshuggah to the event and had three passes for me to go to the event. I was doing whatever I could just to make it to the event, but we were an hour and a half away and there was no way of getting there. I was so bummed. I was in Australia, I had three passes, I was offering people, hitting them up online, friends I know, “Hey man, I got these three passes, wanna go? One is yours. Two are yours. I just wanna go the event.” And I never got to make it out. So that’s one of the things … I really wanna eventually just go to one of these events.
FM: You should delete those people off your MySpace.
JF: Oh, I would. I just cancelled my MySpace for that.
FM: See, if they would’ve gone with you to the show, then I’m sure you’d kept it.
JF: Yeah (laughs). I was so angry because once my friend got back, I was like, “How was the food?” I was so pissed off. I ended up watching the fight as they were re-run the same night at the bar, and I was like, “Dude, I could’ve been there.” I had these passes in my hand all day and no one wanted to go, and the only reason I couldn’t go with Meshuggah was because we were playing at different times. They were going early and were gonna leave at the main event, and we were playing right before them. I’d be there for half the show until it ends, [but] we couldn’t coordinate rides, so I was so angry that night.
FM: Are you gonna try to sneak away from Warped Tour to attend an MMA event this summer, if the opportunity were to present itself?
JF: Yes. This time, we’re lucky enough we have a crew to take care of a lot of our stuff and I have a lot of friends like Andy [Williams, guitarist of Every Time I Die]. He’s all about watching fights, so if there is an event and we’re in the city, he’ll be the first guy that I’ll be like, “Hey, let’s go to this event.” He’ll be down. He won’t say no. That’s the best thing about it; we could get a whole group of people and say, “Let’s go to this event.” If we’re in the same city, let’s play and get out of there. I’ll even just go to the people that make the set times, and I’ll say, “Please let us play first. I want to get out of here right away.” My band will be like, “Oh, I just woke up.” And I’d be like, “I don’t care. Let’s just play and have the rest of the day off. I need to go to this event.”
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