wanted his voice to be heard for the first time. He also decided to sing differently. Then, to me, I thought those songs could benefit from some precision." In the months leading up to the album's release, a number of music publications positioned Jawbreaker as the next stars of the Bay Area punk scene, sometimes referring to them as "the thinking man's Green Day". When Dear You was released in September 1995, however, its polished production and clear vocals strongly divided the band's fanbase. "[Dear You]'s production glistened and gleamed," says Greenwald, "Schwarzenbach's voice was sanded and smoothed, and the songs were mellow, introspective affairs. The reaction was harsh—those who had entrusted their emotional lives to Schwarzenbach, had viewed him as a tattered, secular priest to lay their burdens on, felt betrayed." Ben Weasel was so displeased with the album, particularly the sound of Schwarzenbach's singing, that he wrote Pfahler a letter detailing his complaints with it. Despite a music video in rotation to support the single "Fireman," sales of Dear You were poor, and only sold 40,000 copies in the US. As the band toured in support of the album, audience reaction toward the new material was either lukewarm or outright negative. "I have never seen anything like that—before or since", said Kates, "There was a point where they were headlining the Roxy and there were kids sitting on the floor, with their backs to the stage, when they were playing songs from Dear You. I'm not making that up. If you were to try to explain that to somebody now, it would make no sense." Jawbreaker continued touring in 1996, opening for the Foo Fighters that spring, but audience reception did not improve. Samiam's Sergie Loobkoff cites a show at The Warfield in San Francisco as a turning point: "That is when I knew they were definitely going to break up. It was their hometown; they had put out the big major-label record. But then you're looking around and it was like no one cared." Attitudes between the band members continued to sour, particularly between Bauermeister and Schwarzenbach, who took to traveling in separate vans. Tensions came to a head in Salem, Oregon, culminating in a fistfight between the two which spilled out of the van and onto the sidewalk. "I remember just calling Blake a 'fucking prima donna' and a 'stupid son of a bitch who thinks