Like Mister Rogers, Andy Warhol and Primanti’s sandwiches, The Clarks are one of those Pittsburgh institutions that the people of the Steel City continue to embrace.

The band has been playing straight-ahead, guitar-based rock ’n’ roll with the same four members for more than three decades now with no signs of stopping.

Along the way they have appeared on David Letterman’s Late Show and received major play on the radio.

On June 22, The Clarks will play Stage AE as headliners of the DVE Rocker.

Lead vocalist Scott Blasey talked with the Trib about the band’s longevity and recording their version of “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding.”

Question: The Clarks have been around for over 30 years, same four guys. The Beatles had the same four guys for 10 years and by the end of those 10 years, they were about ready to kill each other. How have you guys been able to maintain your cohesiveness, your friendship and your creativity through three decades?

Answer: Well, it hasn’t been easy. We certainly had our moments when we wanted to kill each other. But we stuck it out, I think, just because we love the music. We still love playing on stage together. We love to create together. We’ve always had goals in front of us. We never had the success the Beatles had, not even close, but we’ve always had things to strive for, and it was a good way to make a living and we never wanted to get a day job.

Q: Speaking of day jobs, you had one. Thirty years ago you were working for a home medical supply company selling wheelchairs, oxygen tanks, things like that, and you were about ready to give up music to do that. What made you change your mind and stick with the music?

A: We started to hear our songs on the radio. That really turned my attention toward music a little more. I thought to myself ‘well, maybe we can really make a career out of this.’ I loved music but I had a really good job that I loved to do. I worked for a great company and had health insurance. But I started hearing ‘Penny on the Floor’ on DVE and I think I would have gone down that road anyhow. I think music was starting to take over all of my time and attention. We started to play more and more often out of town and was starting to have to take days off work to make those trips. I thought it was time to make a decision one way or another and fortunately, I was young enough and without a family so that I could sort of make a few mistakes if it didn’t work out and sort of go back to that. I’m glad I made that decision, made that leap and never looked back.

Q: Within the last few months since the Tree of Life tragedy you decided to cover the song “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding” in response to that event. Talk about the genesis of that whole idea.

A: Well, it’s a song that we had actually started covering prior to that event. We’d been doing it for a couple of months of live shows. It’s a song that all of us have always loved. It’s written by Nick Lowe and popularized by Elvis Costello and we started covering it. Then the Tree of Life shooting happened and immediately Rob (James) called us and said we should record that song and donate the proceeds to Tree of Life, and we all got on board with that. We were in the studio within days of that happening, putting down the tracks for tha,t and had it out in a week, week-and-a-half after the shooting. With things of that nature time is of the essence. You want to have something out quickly while it’s still in everyone’s consciousness. It was just something we all felt really strongly about, and as Pittsburghers we all came together and certainly we weren’t the only ones who pitched in to help.

Q: You have a quote that I came across that I thought was really interesting where you said, referring to the Clarks’ body of work, ‘our level of success has contributed to our longevity.’ What did you mean by that?

A: I think Greg has mentioned that a few times, Greg Joseph our bass player, that, you know, we haven’t reached the top of the mountain so we’ve always continued to strive to climb up to the top of the mountain. I think if we had reached that peak it might have meant the demise of the band. I might have been like ‘ahhh, I don’t need these guys. I’ll have a solo career now.’ I think the fact that we’ve only had a moderate amount of success has helped us to just stay together and keep going, and still to be able to create together is a wonderful thing.