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Chillin' Wit' Aaron Weiss, vocalist for mewithoutYou

Before his upcoming tour, Weiss is enjoying the simple things.

YESTERDAY, Aaron Weiss, vocalist for Philly folk-rock band mewithoutYou, and his newlywed wife sat in their Upper Darby kitchen chowing down on eggs drizzled with sriracha while sipping on fresh smoothies. The berries were found while dumpster diving. Some of the veggies in the scramble were picked from their garden out front.

Weiss, 35, is a simple man. He doesn't own a car or a cellphone, he uses his leftover egg shells for compost and collects rainwater for his plants.

"I don't feel very connected to my band life when I'm at home," Weiss says while his cat, Emma, sleeps quietly in the chair across from him. "I'm more thinking about painting the porch."

"Ten Stories," the band's fifth studio and first concept album, released two years ago, tells the story of a derailed train carrying cars of circus animals and features guest vocals from Paramore's Hayley Williams. The band has booked some studio time next month, but in October they'll head out on tour to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of their second album, "Catch for Us the Foxes."

MewithoutYou is famous for its heavy instrumentation and spoken-word vocals, which often allude to a relationship with God or are inspired by literary work and puns.

"Even if I got away from using religious language, to me there are all the questions that religions wrestle with, like, 'What's the truth?' and 'What's the purpose of life?' or 'What's the right way to live?' " Weiss says while stepping around paint cans and equipment on his porch. "Religion really tries to get to the core of human experience - the deepest questions we have about death and meaning and identity."

But lately, Weiss says he hasn't been writing quite so much. Right now, he's focusing on other things that make him happy and keep him busy, including his marriage and his doctoral studies at Temple.

"I wanted to step back from things in my life that were familiar. . . . You sort of do certain things as a matter of pattern or habit, and I wanted to step back and evaluate," Weiss says.

- Patricia Madej