Friday, October 3, 2014

Interview: Geoff Garlock (Ritual Mess, Orchid, Panthers)



"You just want that conversation to end immediately."
(Photo by unknown.)

Ritual Mess makes it sound effortless. A listen to Vile Art and you'll scratch your head, "Why don't more bands sound this good?" Why don't more bands sound this good? Well, they probably haven't been strumming away at fast tempos for over fifteen years.

That was just one theory I had. So I tried to get down to the bottom of it all with Geoff Garlock. I called him on his day off of teaching at UCB. His day off, before I interrupted it, was spent writing for a web series and writing riffs. Sounds like a total dream. But the questions needed to be asked.

The questions were asked and Geoff Garlock answered. He had a lot to say. A lot to say about the end of Orchid, the other Orchid, the transition from Panthers into UCB, and of course, the rituals of Ritual Mess. I'm sure you don't want to see selfies while I talked on the phone so I looked around the internet for photos of Geoff Garlock. None were by me.


Stream the entire Ritual Mess record, Vile Art, via Bandcamp.

Painful Burning:
Why did Orchid break up?

Geoff Garlock:
When we stopped playing it was really just because it felt like the right time. We were out of college. Salane, Jay and I had moved to New York because Salane was starting grad school, Jay had dropped out, and I had wrapped up. Will was staying in the area where the rest of Orchid had been. We had already started Panthers and Orchid had just run its course at that point. We all still loved each other and liked each other, but it just didn't seem feasible. We were just at the point where we started to have a desire to explore other musical ventures. I didn't stop listening to metal and punk. I was starting to think about other types of music as well. I didn't care as much about the hardcore scene, I just liked the music. It was just the right time to not be Orchid anymore. We had just put out the self titled and we were psyched on that. Even the self titled was showing that our thoughts on how we played the music was different.

Painful Burning:
So what series of events lead to Will, Jay and you getting together to play music as Ritual Mess?

Geoff Garlock:
I wasn't on the seven inch. Ritual Mess really came together because James, the other guitar player, was in town visiting. James lives in Australia but had become friends with Will on an Ampere tour. James and Will had written all initial songs together. Then Will was thinking, "Jay's voice would sound really good on this." I remember for the seven inch Will just came down to New York and recorded the vocals in Jay's apartment one day. He didn't even do them in a studio. I went over to just hang out, to say hi to Will. I ended up helping Jay with phrasing, and not even that much. Then they put out the seven inch.

Painful Burning:
How did you come to be a part of the band?

Geoff Garlock:
James was coming back from Australia to visit America for a while. And they had started talking like, "You know, while we're all here we should write a full length album." I was hanging out with Jay and he just asked, "We didn't have a bass player on the last one, would you want to do it?" It sounded like a fun idea. At first Will had the worry that it would get people clamoring for an Orchid reunion. Having three members of Orchid all of a sudden together again it gets weird, fanboys going. That was his only worry because he loved playing with me. But we were just like, whatever, it doesn't matter. And we just ended up doing the record.

Painful Burning:
How was the recording process considering the twelve year break between the last Orchid album and this?

Geoff Garlock:
It was really natural. Recording didn't take that long. James and Will had written most of the songs. I met James for the first time in New York and we drove up to the North Hampton area, where Will lives. We completed the writing all the songs in one weekend, the weekend where we had that giant blizzard last year. We wrote two or three extra songs on top of what James and Will had already written, riff wise. We just kinda collaborated. Then I went home. James stuck around and they recorded the drums and the guitars. Two weeks later I drove up from New York, recorded all my bass tracks in five hours and went home. Jay went up at some point and recorded his vocals separately. I didn't even know he did it. And then all of a sudden I got an e-mail from Will saying, "Jay did his vocals, they sound great." I said, "Great, sounds cool." In some ways it felt like the best way to do a band at this point in our lives, being old men with various things going on. We just wrote it all, we didn't really think too much about it and it turned out better than any of us thought it would.

Painful Burning:
Maybe I don't understand the band name but it sounds like it wasn't a mess at all.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, it definitely was the opposite of the band name. I don't even know where the band name came from. I think it was just some band name that Jay had, or Will came up with. Again, they came up with it before I was even in the band because it was just supposed to be a seven inch project. It felt like a bunch of adults playing hardcore because we were just like, "Well, we have this time and let's just be logical about it." There was no dicking around. There was no, "We have to sit and think about this," it felt really natural. I think that's because we were tapping into what we do anyways. It wasn't that hard. It was a pretty easy record to write. Will is an amazing guitar player and a riff machine. He's always been that way and he always will be. It's incredible. And James is great too, James is a great riff machine as well. But that's what Will does. He decides to write a record and he writes a record. And that was refreshing for me. I was playing in Panthers for long, and we would hem and haw about everything. It would take so long to write records and write songs. It was the same with bands after. There was this band Dark Vibe with Jay and it was the same deal, and The Year Is One, this grindcore band, was the same deal as well. But Will's a machine in the best way possible.


Geoff Garlock playing bass in Orchid.



Painful Burning:
You mentioned James lives in Australia so does that mean there are no plans to tour?

Geoff Garlock:
No. Not at all. In the weekend we recorded we kinda talked about playing one show but I don't even know if we'll do it. If the opportunity arises, if we all happen to be in the same country or if there's some sort of reason. But it's hard, we all have different lives. It's especially hard with someone in a different country to block off a bunch of time to play some basements. It sounds both fun and not enticing to me at all. It's the love hate affair I have with touring. To say to my wife that I'm not going to see her for a couple weeks because I have to be in a smelly van.

Painful Burning:
Because you need to see a series of assorted basements on the East Coast.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I've been in enough squats, I get it. Punk houses feel a little less charming when you're thirty six. I've eaten enough punk stew and dealt with enough punk time in my life. I love all that as well, but it's also hard for me because I have to stop doing comedy stuff. It's hard to block off that time when I have all these other things I'm focusing on.

Painful Burning:
Thirty six, or any age past twenty one, you have to start prioritizing things in your life and can't just endlessly tour.

Geoff Garlock:
That's the thing, it is around that time you have to start prioritizing, and I don't think I even started doing that until I reached twenty eight to thirty. I extended my Peter Pan leaf much longer than I probably should have. It's not that I'm still not a glorified hobo, I still am a glorified hobo in a different capacity. But I was never going to be a lifer in that way. At a certain point I realized that I'm not going to be the weird old guy, who still has a Crossed Out butt flap, taking photos at like an ABC show, and be like, "Hmm, things still smell the same." That being said, if there's still a good show at ABC No Rio I'll go over, I just won't be as happy about it.

Painful Burning:
You just won't wear your butt flap.

Geoff Garlock:
I'll leave the butt flap at home. I'll still love Crossed Out in my heart more than anything but I'm fine not having weird dreads and smelling.

Painful Burning:
Do you think recording was much easier for you because the project won't be a number one priority and there won't be touring?

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah. There was no pressure to the idea, that's also why I agreed to it. I've still been playing music, but I haven't been tour since 2007 and haven't put out a physical record since the last Panthers record. It didn't feel like there was any pressure which was nice. That did start to be a part of the stress of Panthers in some ways. It was a band that never was going to be big but there was a bit of an idea of, "Maybe we could do something with this." And we did do stuff with it. I'm still psyched on everything we did with Panthers. Even if some people hated it and some people really liked it, I still got to go on tour with High On Fire. That's the best thing ever. But there was a lot of undue pressure on that, which is again, the same pressure that can happen in comedy. Where you just get to that point where you're like, "I have to make this into a career... Somehow. Make all the hours I put into it viable." That fear and that push never end. I approached Ritual Mess how I approached my high school hardcore bands or Orchid, we played because we played. Which is also how I've been trying to approach comedy. Back then there wasn't an end goal of fame and fortune. You have to remind yourselves of that aspect and then actual good stuff comes out. That's how I feel like with Ritual Mess. We put out a great record, it's one that I'm really psyched on. And it didn't have to come about because I put a weird pressure on my brain. So yeah, a lack of pressure is great.

Painful Burning:
Orchid seemed to combine influences from many different regions. Ritual Mess seems to be playing an homage to San Diego, to the particular sound of Gravity Records. Was that purposeful? To awaken that part of your past with this particular sound?

Geoff Garlock:
I think that was a part of it. I remember Jay describing the band as, "Will wrote a bunch of these songs that he thinks sounds like Gravity Records stuff." It was just like, "Okay, that sounds cool. I love Clikatat Ikatowi still. I love those Swing Kids records. I love Antioch Arrow." They were all really great bands. As you get older, there are those certain records where you feel like, "I loved that but it's of a time," and it doesn't hit you in the same way. Then there are those bands that feel a little bit more timeless. Clikatat Ikatowi is one of those bands where I still listen and I'm like, "I'd like to rip that idea off... Now." As opposed to when I was sixteen. That was the idea behind those songs, thinking in those terms. When we were writing them I certainly was like, "Let's make this part a little more Swing Kids." Or, "What if we had a weird chanty thing like they do at the beginning of Orchestrated & Conducted by Clikatat Ikatowi?" But for me in Ritual Mess I think those influences came out a lot more than they did with Orchid. We're just all a collection of our influences so why not embrace them? I'm very happy with everything we did in Orchid. I do think it was just a nice mix that worked for the kids at the time. There was a lot of repurposing of a certain style that worked out well. There was German hardcore from Bremen on Per Koro Records and Canadian hardcore from Ottawa. That was Orchid to me when we were in the band. I was like, "I love One Eyed God Prophecy more than everything. Not enough people have heard One Eyed God Prophecy or Union Of Uranus. Same with Systral or Acme from Germany." So I was like, "Let's play those riffs." And it just worked. To toot our own horns, we're all pretty good musicians, Jay's a great vocalist, Blaine's an amazing drummer, Will's an amazing guitar player. It just worked out. For Ritual Mess I would almost say it felt like there was more of a purpose. Maybe it was partly just being older and acknowledging that, "We're just doing this. Isn't it fun to play this style? Let's play this style."


Geoff Garlock playing bass on stage.



Painful Burning:
Aren't you worried about putting all this work into Ritual Mess so that in ten years a doom metal band will steal your name again?

Geoff Garlock:
Jesus Christ, you know? What are you going to do? They're a totally fine band. It's frustrating because that skull does really look like our skull. It is a fine line, do skulls all look the same? Yeah, sure. But it is a little weird. I would be hard pressed to find out that at least one of them wasn't a hardcore kid at one point.

Painful Burning:
And if not, they're not worth listening to.

Geoff Garlock:
Orchid's not that surprising of a name. What are you going to do? There was also a Panthers. We didn't get yelled at by that sixties French pop band, the Panthers.

Painful Burning:
That is a bit more obscure.

Geoff Garlock:
It is a little more separated. I don't lose much sleep over it. I saw the other Orchid and was like, "Oh look at that. That's fun." I remember someone from Vice years ago, when Orchid first came out, was like, "You should sue them." And I was like, "What? No. I don't care. That's for other people. It's not that big of a deal."

Painful Burning:
Does the situation arise when you mention that you were in Orchid and people think you're talking about the other Orchid?

Geoff Garlock:
No. I don't know if I'm talking to any people who know the other Orchid. That being said, I don't even know if I'm talking to that many people who know my Orchid. Most of my world is UCB. If people are aware of me in the UCB community, because that's my main hub of the comedy world, they're aware vaguely that I was in bands and that I'm the guy who likes metal. There's a small punk and hardcore contingent of UCB which is also why we did the hardcore improv set at DCM this year and last year.

Painful Burning:
Which was what?

Geoff Garlock:
It was Provcore. This guy John Sartori had gotten it together with all of the people who were involved with UCB and also hardcore kids. We did a hardcore improv set. We had three or four mics out. This year I wore my Earth Crisis shirt. We would just do terrible scene work and whenever we pointed to the booth and it would go into a full improvised hardcore singalong. That was great.

Painful Burning:
It was a firestorm to purify the longform.

Geoff Garlock:
It really truly was. It was the most fun I've had on the UCB stage. I blew my voice out immediately. I really started to sound like Jake from Converge towards the end. I usually have a low bellow that I do but I lost it right away in between trying to do terrible scenes about a tag sale or something.

Painful Burning:
At five in the morning.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, last year was at one thirty in the morning. The year before was seven or eight in the morning. I woke up, got out of bed, drove in, went back home, and slept. But it was fun. Most people don't know, and I don't expect people to know.

Painful Burning:
What's so funny about nobody know about Orchid is that there's such an extensive Wikipedia page on the band. There's so much history. And you're surrounded by people who at most have heard of Minor Threat.

Geoff Garlock:
It's a complicated world. It's like talking to family members. It's just easier to give the broad strokes. Like you said, just be like, "It's a punk band like Minor Threat or Black Flag." I remember Will Hines was talking about how he wanted to do a video that never came to fruition of me and Don Fanelli, this performer at UCB, and it would be a split screen where one on side of the screen is Don Fanelli talking about the different subgenres of chilis that you can use in cooking. And on my split screen would be me talking about the subgenres of metal and hardcore. Because every once in a while he would ask me about this or that and I would be like, "The thing about doom is that there's also funeral doom." It's easier to just be like, "That's a metal band," and, "That's a punk band." When I have to start explaining, "Well, there's hardcore and then there's the DIY basement hardcore scene. We were in a thing called screamo and we never even liked that thing but now it's a different thing then you know if you've heard of the word screamo and some people use the joke term skramz but it's all kind of bullshit in the end." Then they want to walk away and not be talking about it anyways. Then I feel self conscious because I don't necessarily even want to be talking about it. It's like when you're doing a temp job and your boss finds out you play music, it's bad news. You just want that conversation to end immediately.

Painful Burning:
And while you're having this conversation with me there's some guy in Belgium and some guy in Chicago arguing on a messageboard about what genre a band you were in fifteen years ago should be categorized as.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah. It's all messageboard culture that I can get sucked into and I don't want to.


Geoff Garlock hanging out with Jerry Seinfeld and some guy with a staring problem back in 1999.



Painful Burning:
How did all your background in punk prep you for doing comedy?

Geoff Garlock:
I don't know honestly. I don't know if it ever really prepped me for it. I didn't do comedy in college. I wasn't that guy. I kind of hated the improv groups. And it all seemed very sweaty to me in college. I didn't think about it. In high school I did a bunch of acting. I went to acting school in my last year. I did plays and musicals and all that shit. In college I was just like, "I'm a hardcore kid. That's what I do." I was very shortsighted. Even though I loved comedy and had been watching SNL, SCTV and Kids In The Hall since I was eight years old and was obsessed with standup comedy it just never seemed like something you could do. Then I went to school for film and realized that my short films were sketches. I thought I was going to do film. I just didn't really think that ahead. I was just like, "No, I'm in a hardcore band." I joined Orchid towards the end of college and before that I was just going to shows, going through the motions. Then I joined Orchid and was like, "I'll be in Orchid, that's what I'm doing." All of a sudden Orchid went right into Panthers so I was like, "I'll be in Panthers."

All my films were just sketches but I didn't do anything with comedy, it just didn't make sense. Me and Jay always thought about taking classes at UCB. I'm very territorial, I just don't go out of my zone a lot of times. So I didn't go to a show until after 9/11 where our drummer, Salane, got me to go with him and his wife. I saw The Swarm, the improv group, for the first time. I was like, "This is really great, maybe I should finally do this." Me and Jay took classes between doing stuff. We went through three levels of improv together. I was terrible at it. I wanted to do sketch but they didn't have a sketch program really. We tried to start a sketch group but it fell apart really quickly. Things Are Strange came out and I didn't do anything, I stopped doing it. It felt like I dropped out and I was like, "Well, that was a fun little valiance." Then at some point they started teaching sketch classes and honestly I was pretty depressed. I wasn't doing much besides Panthers. My now wife, girlfriend at the time, got me a gift certificate to a sketch class. I took my first sketch class with Chris Kula. And then I just kind of fell in love with it. I always loved sketch and I always wanted to be writing sketch. I had tried before but I couldn't wrap my brain around it completely. And I had never even completely pursued film stuff. Again, I was mostly doing temp work. In some ways now I look back it feels sad that I didn't do it. I didn't bother with trying to get production work or anything. Even though I realize now I lived one block away from four production studios in Greenpoint but I was too lazy to find them. I think I turned down a Sopranos job once as a PA because I didn't want to get up that early. I sound like an idiot punk and it drives me nuts now. But either way I ended up taking the sketch class and then that was it.

I kept taking sketch classes. At that point there weren't Maude teams, the house sketch teams, so there wasn't an end result. I was just doing it because I liked doing it. I had taken every sketch class while we were still touring, we were still doing shows, I would just do it in between. I started taking the classes because we had a break, we were in between the touring cycle of Things Are Strange and writing The Trick. Eventually I was done and I was like, "What should I do?" Chris Kula was like, "They're starting these things called Maude teams. You should try submitting for that as a writer." And then I did and then I got on Maude. Then I was on Maude for five and a half years. I eventually became a teacher and started doing my own shows at the theater. I did a couple runs there. This was all during the time I was still touring. I missed my first Maude show because Panthers was on tour with Big Business. I bought my first laptop so that I could write sketch from the road. We were in Texas at a rest stop and I called Joe Wengert to get notes on a sketch so I could write while we were driving. And then during the High On Fire tour, same deal, I was sending in sketches every week. I would clear it with the Artistic Director and just be like, "I know I'm not supposed to miss this amount but I talked to my team." So I'd be sitting in Houston while High On Fire was playing, writing sketches to send to UCB.

When Panthers dissolved I was like, "This is what I'm doing, this is what I love." I just kinda kept going down that track. So it all kind of just intermingled. It still was just performing. It still kind of felt like it was in the same world, in that it was its own little world, its own little subculture. It feels like there's a crossover anyways, people who like punk and music who like comedy as well.

Painful Burning:
It seems like less of stepping stone and the two just happened to coincide together.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, definitely. I think I approached it the same as playing music where it wasn't necessarily a career thing. I see that type of personality as a teacher from students coming through. The people who see it as a career. I don't think when I started it I thought of it like, "That would be cool, to do comedy." Then as I kept getting opportunities, "That would be great if I could make some sort of a living off of this." But also because of years of being in a punk band I never held my breath for that. I just was like, "You can't really make money off of doing stuff that's creative. You can pay rent for a month then have to do a temp job." I have those moments every now and then where I'm like, "I wish I had that personality earlier on of being the work horse. I'm writing jokes every day from the minute I graduate college until I get an internship on Letterman." But, that wasn't the case, I wanted to be in a punk band.

Painful Burning:
We're not all Mulaney.

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, we're not. That's the other thing. That's something my wife tells me all the time when I get stressed about career, "In music you always seem to be fine of just being like, 'Here are all these different levels of bands. I'm in this level of punk band, and I'm in this level of metal band. There are bands like Creed or Nickelback or Katy Perry, and they're in their own world.' And you don't want that world." But when it comes to comedy I set everything on this even playing field. Where I'm like, "I should be like this guy who is the equivalent of Jimmy Page in the music world. I should be exactly like this guy who is a certified genius." I have to remember that we're not all Mulaney. He's a genius, he's great. We're not all Paul F. Tompkins.


Geoff Garlock points off camera with a dog in his arm.



Painful Burning:
Do you think if you started this sketch program when they had had the Maude teams you might not have gotten into it?

Geoff Garlock:
Yeah, one hundred percent. I tell that to my students all the time. As UCB gets bigger every year, and as a teacher I see it, I see it through the amount of students we get every year and the buzz around it. I tell them all the time at the end of my 101's, like, "It's stressful and you're probably not going to get on a Maude team if that's your end goal. It's not to dishearten you but I don't think I could get on a Maude team now." It's hard. It's finding that in between. I don't just want to be a self deprecating punk. I think that's something that carries over from punk that I don't think is helpful for comedy. Especially from the type of punk and hardcore that we were playing, where it was very much like, "You shouldn't strive to be too successful. If you get too successful then it's questionable." I think that doesn't help me for giving myself that drive and confidence to be like, "Yes, I am funny." That being said, I think I'm a very funny man and a very good writer, and I'm not convinced that I would've gotten on Maude as easily. Also, I got yelled at at the beginning of Maude pretty quickly. Just like, "You're not doing good enough work. Work harder." I definitely know that's the case. It's just a lot more competitive. There are a lot more people who see it as a viable career as opposed to the people who are doing comedy because they have to do comedy because that's what they do to survive in the world mentality.

Painful Burning:
In that world before if someone had the attitude that they were going to be the biggest band it was disdained but in comedy if people have that attitude it's welcomed because everybody is trying to make a living off of it.

Geoff Garlock:
I think that's the other thing, it wasn't even like we were involved a world where that was ever an option. I grew up in Connecticut and Jamie from Hatebreed booked all of our shows. He was the godfather of booking shows. But there was some element where you were like, "Hatebreed is probably going to be big if they continue." Because it was fine to have that goal. It certainly was not fine to have that goal in the basement scene. Not that I even had it, but it certainly was a frowned upon thing. I love Ebullition, it's probably still the best label I've ever been on, but it was a world where Ebullition was fighting against of the concept of bar codes. And you're just like, "I don't even know if I care about that, man. That's the issue that we're angry about?" So of course I'm going to feel self conscious if it's just we're too big of a band. Also the proliferation of the internet made it so you could hear everyone's crazy opinions about yourself. I still remember one of the things that broke me for Panthers, we got broken into in Montreal on our tour with High On Fire and got a bunch of our stuff stolen. Then this punk board I used to read I was reading the thread about it because we were trying to find our guitarist's guitar that his dad had made. On the same board and there were all these threads, "Fuck that band, they deserve it. They've got enough money." I was coming home negative. On that tour I had to come home and my wife had to pay our rent because I didn't have any money. And we had just been stolen from and missed a show after because we couldn't get to it because we were trying to deal with the police and all that stuff. I was like, "The hatred out there, fuck this shit." Yeah, it's two different worlds. I think that aspect is the biggest difference to me and can rear its ugly head. But it is hard when you're like, "Well, my friends are on SNL." It's not a crazy option. But also, as my therapist says, "You've got this battle if you want to be in a punk band that nobody knows but also be on the biggest show in the entire world. You've got to find an in between." It's like, "Yeah, I get it."

Painful Burning:
That's a good place to end the interview. Unless there's anything else you'd like to add.

Geoff Garlock:
I feel good. If you feel good I feel good.

-Z

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Crowbar - Symmetry In Black (Century Media) (2014)





Somehow "stagedive" has become a buzzword in 2014. A touring band got fed up with their audience getting hurt because of people stagediving to their pop-centric music and asked people to stop stagediving. That should've been the end of the story but people feel very important. If a band doesn't want you to stagedive and you want to stagedive save your money and see one of the thousands of national touring bands who would love for you to stagedive. But no, everybody feels entitled enough to do whatever they want and whenever they want.

Last night I saw Descendents featuring a rotating cast of singers. After every song a guy in the front row would take a selfie with the leaving singer. People booed at first but by the second time it was just something that happened. This all leads to Crowbar of course.

Back in May, Crowbar was playing when some guy tried to stagedive. Security tackled the guy and the singer/guitarist of Crowbar, Kirk Windstein, proceeded to kick him in the head. On one hand, that's awful. On the other hand, is it that surprising that the guy who sings for Crowbar would act irrationally angry? His guitar sounds like a garbage truck coasting in first through a bayou. Crowbar are experts at making Supreme Ignorance. Equal parts heavy and groovy. No contemporary band pulls off the Supreme Ignorance quite like Crowbar.

Symmetry In Black is a return to form for Crowbar. I haven't listened to Sever the Wicked Hand in a few years but Symmetry In Black has been thorough 2014 listening. Maybe Symmetry In Black wouldn't have been as good if Kirk Windstein hadn't kicked that guy in the head. If Kirk Windstein got too level headed maybe the riffs would plummet and be replaced with logical and sensible thinking. The Descendents wouldn't kick some guy in the head. What I'm saying is, I wish Kirk Windstein had kicked that guy in the head last night and grabbed the closest guitar and riffed everybody away with the Supreme Ignorance.

-Z

Monday, September 29, 2014

Sheer Mag - Sheer Mag 7" (Wilsuns RC) (2014)



Stream Sheer Mag's debut seven inch via Bandcamp.

I got a late night FB message that was like, "I hate power pop. It sounds like being stuck at the Beauty Bar in SF on a Sunday and drinking too much cuz its miserable there." The reference went over my head but he sent me the Sheer Mag link and was like, "It's really good, I just don't like power pop." So I clicked play and was instantly blown away.

Four songs of mix worthy guitar licking bangers. If the Exploding Hearts played on a boat riffing down the Mississippi River it would sound like Sheer Mag. There's a touch of Big Star pop sensibility. It's all there.

So I asked a friend who runs a label if he had heard them. He responded with, "No, but you're like the fifth person to ask me that in the last day." Hmmm. You better buy the seven inch before you have to wait for the next pressing! What a complete gem.

-Z

Saturday, September 27, 2014

Botanist - VI: Flora (Flenser) (2014)



Stream the entirety of VI: Flora via Bandcamp.

People worry too much about what is and isn't black metal. Black metal has the most pretentious fan base. You thought the genre jockeys of punk were bad, they don't compare to those of black metal. Put a bunch of those guys and gals in a room and close the door. Mention Deafheaven and when the door is opened you'll have zero survivors and the walls will be dripping red. For fans of music, none of this matters. For fans of something different, give Botanist a stream. For fans of fans, enjoy the last week or two of summer.

Botanist takes the mood/feel of black metal but without the guitars and replaces them with hammer dulcimers. This is zero guitar riff metal. Does that sound intriguing? Does that sound terrible? Either way, VI: Flora is Botanist's fifth album so they have at least figured out what they're trying to do.

-Z

Friday, September 26, 2014

Iron Youth - Iron Youth 7" (Video Disease) (2014)





The opening chords to Iron Youth might sound like a Brainbombs song but once the vocals kick in you're moshing. Listen to Iron Youth at maximum volume with your head in a garbage bag, minimal breathing. Harris growls about every day being the same and endless self suffering. Harris also fronts premiere hardcore outfit, Glue. Iron Youth shares at least one member with Institute as well. All these bands are good.

There's also a Nazi band that shares the same name, Iron Youth. This Iron Youth sounds much angrier, much more hateful, than that Iron Youth. That Iron Youth is terrible. Both bands like to wear black. I'm still listening to that Iron Youth on YouTube. The worst part about being racist has got to be the awful music. The artwork isn't bad though.

Back to listening to this Iron Youth. I remember in the eleventh grade David had a giant bump on his cheek. One day in class the bump opened up and something in between green and yellow poured from the side of his face. In that moment of anguish if he put on a leather jacket and hit the pit I'd hope Iron Youth would be playing. This happened in 2001 so that's impossible but forego time logic and pretend. His face eventually stopped secreting fluids. I'm sure he's happy by now. I'm up at 4:44 a.m. writing about this wonderful new seven inch. Oh, to be happy.

-Z

Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Ritual Mess - Vile Art (Clean Plate) (2014)



Listen to Vile Art via Bandcamp.

Orchid was an incredible American hardcore band. They were equally as intense as they were engaging. They sounded like Crossed Out covering "O Fortuna." Going back and listening to hardcore from the late 90's/early 00's can be an embarrassment inducing exercise in regrettable nostalgia. The same cannot be said in regards to Orchid. Not only do they standup but they still sound better than everything else. In 2014 we have Ritual Mess, who are the next best thing.

Ritual Mess has the singer, guitarist and bassist from Orchid. Instead of just rehashing their successful sound they have taken a step back, revisiting the early 90's sound of San Diego/Gravity Records. With Vile Art it's very obvious that these guys listened to Swing Kids and Antioch Arrow. Fast, frantic fervor. It's all there. And it's fucking great. Gone are the pretentious lyrics. There's no "...And The Cat Turned To Smoke." The record cover doesn't have a skeleton or a flying cat on it. That was then, but Ritual Mess is now. They haven't slowed down, they haven't given up.

While there are no plans to tour, a show is only one night. Vile Art is an album that we'll be listening to days and nights on end. Band reunions suck and Ritual Mess shows us how to properly return to a past sound.

-Z

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Interview: Al Montfort (Total Control, Dick Diver, The UV Race)



"Dolewave, that's funny."

Al Montfort was the Unofficial Australian Of The Year in 2013. He plays in a lot of bands. I've been fortunate enough to see a few of his bands play. Total Control released the best punk song of the past ten years, "Carpet Rash." Nothing else matters really.

On Friday, September 19, Dick Diver played their first show in the US. I was in attendance. They were wonderful. They played the hits off of Calendar Days and some new unreleased songs. They have recorded their next full length. It was recorded in the woods somewhere. They spent six days on it. There are other details about it but I wasn't recording when Al Montfort told me about it.

What I did record was our conversation about his views on touring the US, why he lives in Melbourne, working in a chocolate factory, among other enlightened topics. Enjoy.



Listen to Total Control's Typical System via bandcamp.
Listen to The UV Race's The UV Race via bandcamp.
Listen to Eastlink's "Mosquito" via soundcloud.
Listen to Lower Plenty's "Strange Beast" via soundcloud.

Painful Burning:
Right now you're on tour with Dick Diver. I was researching you guys and came across a quote from the Herald Sun saying that you guys are, "Really good."

Al Montfort:
The Herald Sun said that?

Painful Burning:
According to the Dick Diver Twitter account, yeah. Why do you think they said that?

Al Montfort:
Well, because we are. Also we would put that on the Twitter because Herald Sun is a conservative tabloid out of Melbourne. It's despicable. It's owned by Rupert Murdoch and it's the reason why conservative government is in power in Australia.

Painful Burning:
Comparable to Fox News or NY Post.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, exactly. So to get a good review in the Herald Sun was shameful almost.

Painful Burning:
Is that real though? Did they give you guys a good review?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. They have a rock writer that's pretty good. He's an old Melbourne rock dog who actually was the man inside the Hawthorn Football Club mascot, a giant hawk. He'd do flips and stuff. He's a freak basically.

Painful Burning:
So that was his day job and he'd pursue music writing at night?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. If he does an interview with you he'll call you up and say, "How ya doing, mate, it's Andy. How's rock 'n' rollll?"

Painful Burning:
That's really funny. I think Damian from Fucked Up did some stuff with Fox News.

Al Montfort:
Really, what for?

Painful Burning:
I think one of their journalists loves Fucked Up. I'm not entirely sure. Very random.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, it's pretty random.

Painful Burning:
I'm not sure if you're the person to answer this question, but what do you think differentiates Australian rock from USA rock?

Al Montfort:
Lack of ambition.

Painful Burning:
On the part of Australians?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. Acknowledgment that you're not going to go very far so you might as well try to write something that you really love rather than something that will sell.


Al Montfort playing bass in Dick Diver.



Painful Burning:
Do you think that's why Rowland S. Howard was so weird?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. They loved American music, Birthday Party, but I don't think it was big on their horizons to take over America at the time. I think they would've like to but they only ever moved to England, knowing that they were massive in Europe.

Painful Burning:
That's what happened with Go-Betweens also, right? But they ended moving back because they didn't do that well?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. Because there's that link to the colonial past it's easy to get a Visa and stay there.

Painful Burning:
Because of being in bands you've been able to tour the US a few times now?

Al Montfort:
This is my fourth time. I came the first time when I was twenty one with Straightjacket Nation. Now I'm twenty seven.

Painful Burning:
I saw Straightjacket Nation in New York at 538.

Al Montfort:
That was the second time, that was at the end of the Total Control and UV Race tour.

Painful Burning:
Do you have a favorite part of the US at this point?

Al Montfort:
I really love this part, I really love San Francisco. I love the Bay because I have so many friends there. And I like to go swimming. I like Memphis a lot when we go there.

Painful Burning:
Because of the history?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, yeah. Lots of history. People still seem really enthusiastic there even though it seems really far away from everything. I like Cleveland a lot. Cleveland is probably my favorite.

Painful Burning:
Why do you like Cleveland so much?

Al Montfort:
They really love music. Maybe it's not that they're trying to do, but they're total freaks so they can't help but do weird punk music.

Painful Burning:
Can't go wrong with Clevo punk/hardcore. What about your least favorite part of the US?

Al Montfort:
Milwaukee.

Painful Burning:
Why's that?

Al Montfort:
We just had two of the worst UV Race shows in Milwaukee.

Painful Burning:
Because of low attendance?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. For The UV Race there were more people on stage than in the audience.

Painful Burning:
That's unfortunate, but to be fair you do have six people playing on stage. Even for US bands it can be difficult between the coasts.

Al Montfort:
I don't know, Chicago has always been nice to us. And Cleveland's been really good. Minneapolis... UV Race had a seven inch out on Fashionable Idiots, our third seven inch, and that was great. So when we played there it was awesome. So the Midwest has kinda been good to us. And Texas.

Painful Burning:
What portion of the US best resembles Melbourne?

Al Montfort:
I feel like America has... Each city has a peculiar scene. But Melbourne has such a big scene that it encompasses a lot. Not in a New York way where people are super complacent which is what people have told me about New York. I don't know what you could compare it to. I don't think LA. It's not like LA.

Painful Burning:
I feel like people would assume somewhere in California.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, people have said San Francisco, Oakland, the Bay. People have compared it to that.

Painful Burning:
You could always ask David West.

Al Montfort:
Dave lived in SF and then he moved out. Maybe that's why he moved to Melbourne.

Painful Burning:
You live in Melbourne, right?

Al Montfort:
Yeah.

Painful Burning:
Melbourne and Sydney are relatively close...

Al Montfort:
A ten hour drive.


Al Monfort playing guitar in The UV Race.



Painful Burning:
Why do you live in Melbourne instead of Sydney?

Al Montfort:
Because I was born there. People don't move around as much I don't think. I've met a lot of people in the states who have moved from city to city. Maybe to find a city, a scene, that suits them. But I feel like Melbourne is pretty varied. You can go to a different gig every night. You can go to gigs every night.

Painful Burning:
The reason why you haven't moved to Sydney is because you like Melbourne enough?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, I like whipping myself. Sydney is beautiful and has beaches. Melbourne is cold. It's easy to get around, I don't have a car.

Painful Burning:
Public transportation is good there?

Al Montfort:
Public transportation is better in Melbourne than Sydney.

Painful Burning:
If you lived in Sydney, and if it's as nice as you're describing, you wouldn't be in twenty bands.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, I'd probably just be at the beach the whole time. I was in Sydney last weekend with Dick Diver. They just always have such great bands. I think because Melbourne is like New York in that it's complacent, you kinda settle into a sound or settle into something. They just have offshoot bands that do amazing things... Like destiny 3000, a new band that's changed their sound. They've been around for just over two years and are amazing.

Painful Burning:
Is that your current favorite of active bands from Sydney right now?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. I'd say them and a band called Friendsters which is Liam from Bitch Prefect, Peak Twins, and he played bass in Kitchen's Floor. Roberta Stewart from New Zealand plays guitar and is the songwriter. And it's amazing. Friendsters... They got a seven inch out on Eternal Soundcheck Records.

Painful Burning:
I'll check it out even though it's so overwhelming to keep up with what's going on in Australia, there's so much good stuff. Because you're in all these bands, do people in the bands with you get jealous?

Al Montfort:
I don't think so... Because everybody is in a few bands anyway.

Painful Burning:
But it seems like you're always in more bands than everyone else.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, yeah maybe.

Painful Burning:
Do you have trouble keeping track?

Al Montfort:
No, it's easy. It's fun.

Painful Burning:
How many songs do you have to know right now in all the active bands that you're in?

Al Montfort:
Heaps. I don't have to remember much else. I just work in a shitty factory job. It's not like I'm a paper pusher or I'm studying or anything at the moment.

Painful Burning:
Did you have to quit your job at the factory to go on this tour?

Al Montfort:
I did quit but they would've let me have the time off anyway. They would've let me have leave without pay because they're a funny hippie spiritual fair trade chocolate factory. Organic.

Painful Burning:
So are you some type of chocolate snob?

Al Montfort:
I don't like chocolate. It's gross.

Painful Burning:
Oddly enough I used to hate chocolate but got a job at a chocolate factory and eating the chocolate there changed my mind on it. Now I don't mind it.

Al Montfort:
Maybe I've started to like it a bit more. Maybe not our chocolate.

Painful Burning:
Not to stress you out, but have you thought about dealing with getting a job when you get back?

Al Montfort:
I've thought about it. I've got a bit of savings, so I can chill out for a bit.

Painful Burning:
Maybe write some more music?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, I'd like to do some more music.

Painful Burning:
Is there someone in particular that's waiting for you back in Melbourne right now?

Al Montfort:
Like a person?

Painful Burning:
Yeah, is there someone who's very excited for your return?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, Amy, my Mrs. Amy. Yeah, but she's busy too. She plays music. When we started going out she had one band. Now she's in five bands. She plays in School of Radiant Living, Constant Mongrel, Toothache, and Backstabbers. Her and I also started a new band with Zephyr, from Eastlink and Total Control, and his partner, Xanthe.

Painful Burning:
What's the new band?

Al Montfort:
The Speedies. Like the New York Speedies, but Melbourne.

Painful Burning:
Wait, when you first started dating her was she in only one band?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, she was only in one band.

Painful Burning:
But after she started dating you she was in five?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, I'm a fucking bad influence.

Painful Burning:
No, you're a very productive and creative influence. Are you satisfied with how Typical System came out?

Al Montfort:
I was pretty satisfied. It got amazing reviews and I'm extremely proud and happy of every aspect of the record.

Painful Burning:
It sounds great. It's not as manic as Henge Beat.

Al Montfort:
Not as urgent.


Al Montfort playing guitar in Total Control.



Painful Burning:
Why do you think that is?

Al Montfort:
We wanted to do something different from the last thing we did. The last thing we did before that was the split with Thee Oh Sees. That had a couple of punk band bangers on it. So we wanted to do something different.

Painful Burning:
I love the songs on that split. I thought that song "Scene From A Marriage" was a preview of what Typical System was going to sound like but Typical System didn't end up sounding like "Scene From A Marriage" at all.

Al Montfort:
The first song, "Bloody Glass" has a drum machine.

Painful Burning:
It's more disco than rock. And especially the second to last song, "Hunter." It sounds like a robot dropped LSD and wandered into Studio 54.

Al Montfort:
I love that song, I love "Hunter" a lot. That's one of Dave's song. That was all in his brain. I don't think it was psychedelic influence, I think it was more isolation maybe.

Painful Burning:
Given the option, would you have U2'd the album?

Al Montfort:
Give it to everyone, enforce it on everyone?

Painful Burning:
Yeah.

Al Montfort:
Georgia from UV Race was around my house the night before. I was like, "Fucking genius, she downloaded a U2 album on my iTunes. That's the funniest gag ever." Then I read the articles. But no, it's a bit imposing. It's funny for a punk band to do that. I don't think it's funny for U2 to do it. He already thinks he's God. Have you listened to the record?

Painful Burning:
No. Have you listened to it?

Al Montfort:
No, I didn't listen to it.

Painful Burning:
We have so much access to free music with Spotify and YouTube why would I listen to it? It's a nice gesture but it's competing with everything else that's already on my computer.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, it's counterproductive.

Painful Burning:
If anything I'd be more likely to not check it out because it feels like they imposed.

Al Montfort:
Exactly, exactly.

Painful Burning:
I'm not sure if it's a snobbery thing but I don't like music being pushed on me.

Al Montfort:
I like the feeling of discovering music. I think everybody likes that.

Painful Burning:
How many interviews have you done?

Al Montfort:
A few. Twenty. I don't know, heaps.

Painful Burning:
When do you an interview what are you hoping for?

Al Montfort:
To not look stupid. I can't help that. I hope the questions are interesting. Sometimes you do interviews and people just ask what's on the press release or what's on another interview, just referring to another interview. We've done a few of them for Dick Diver because we played a festival at the start of the year called the Laneway Festival. And we had to do promo for newspapers, like the Herald Sun, and people don't give a stuff. They just look up a few interviews, see a few words and ask about that. That's a real bummer.

Painful Burning:
The questions are copy pasted but if your answers are copy pasted then you won't seem enthusiastic and can come off boring to the reader. They're less concerned about the questions than the answers.

Al Montfort:
I felt like I was on fire by the end of doing eight interviews in two hours for when we played that festival. The publicist puts them all them together, back to back. The Herald Sun, they've got fifteen minutes. Then The Guardian, they've got fifteen minutes. Then a blog, they've got fifteen minutes.

Painful Burning:
And by the eighth you were just piling on through it?

Al Montfort:
Yeah. But trying to think of good gags at least.

Painful Burning:
Do you ever make up things in interviews?

Al Montfort:
No, because it's printed. And somebody's will say, "This did not happen."

Painful Burning:
Inevitably someone will call you on it.

Al Montfort:
You can do that when you're drunk in conversation but not make up something in an interview.

Painful Burning:
Was there a particularly bad question that kept coming up during those interviews?

Al Montfort:
People kept asking about dolewave.

Painful Burning:
Isn't that a joke genre that you don't want to be associated with?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, it's just something made up.

Painful Burning:
So if someone asks you about it you just don't really answer?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, I don't know. They want you to say something.

Painful Burning:
Because they want to have a quote at the top about dolewave.

Al Montfort:
And it is always the quote. Even if you might've said, "Oh yeah, that's funny," they'll put, "Al Montfort: Dolewave, that's funny."

Painful Burning:
This leads to my next question: What is dolewave?

A brief pause.

Painful Burning:
I'm just kidding. It's not the next question.

Al Montfort:
I was hoping it would be.

Painful Burning:
That would be funny if I was so clueless.

Al Montfort:
One time I did an interview on PBS, the radio station, in Melbourne. It was publicity for a gig that we were doing at a zoo, the Melbourne Zoo. I've been a vegetarian for ten years. I don't really like zoos that much, the idea of caging up animals. I said to the woman, "Can you not ask any questions about the zoo? Because I'm not a raging animal rights activist but I'll probably say something shitty." And then she's like, "No problem, Al." And then like straight away she went, "Al, so playing the zoo on the weekend, how's that? How are the animals?" I was like, "Oh, God."

Painful Burning:
She went right into it?

Al Montfort:
Right into it.


Al Montfort celebrating the 44th president of the United States of America.



Painful Burning:
What did you end up saying?

Al Montfort:
I think I said something sarcastic.

Painful Burning:
I don't think that would've been rude if you called her out on it.

Al Montfort:
I would've been hypocritical, I'm playing this thing at the zoo. They gave us money to play the zoo, a lot of money. I'm already hypocritical, and even more so if I'm acting like it's such a bummer thing.

Painful Burning:
Unless you have no ideals whatsoever, you're going to probably have to deal with hypocrisy if you want to actively tour. It's so hard selling records. A lot of bands now do a lot of product sponsored things, or have their songs in commercials. Not even twenty years ago that was lame but it's so much more accepted now. People are just like, "If you're getting paid, whatever."

Al Montfort:
It's a funny change.

Painful Burning:
Unless you're U2 and you can give it away for free. I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but In America a lot of times people will gravitate towards Australian or international bands in general because it sounds impressive to listen to bands from other countries. Does that happen at all in Australia with US bands?

Al Montfort:
Not as much.

Painful Burning:
Why's that?

Al Montfort:
I think there's less people over there pushing American music. Maybe some promoters are pushing. Mistletone is a label that brings out Sonny & the Sunsets, Ariel Pink and a bunch of that more popular indie stuff. But there's no smaller labels that are doing a lot for it, trying to push. For a while people were trying to get Crazy Spirit out but it just can't happen.

Painful Burning:
Because of the amount of money that it would cost?

Al Montfort:
Yeah, amount of money. People aren't willing to put that up to get them out there. Which is fair enough because it does cost quite a lot. And you're probably not going to make your money back in Australia. That's maybe why we turn to our own music, and turn to our own scene in Australia because we can't rely on American bands because American bands can't afford to come out to Australia so we have to create our own scene. I noticed in traveling through America, traveling through Europe, so dependent on international bands. It's international bands all the time. They're playing, coming through.

Painful Burning:
In the US?

Al Montfort:
Well, in the states it's not even international bands, it's interstate bands. Like a band from New York playing in Oregon. The tour circuit. I'm not sure... What do you reckon about that thought?

Painful Burning:
I'd agree about Los Angeles. In terms of guitar bands there are very few things going on locally that interest me. In terms of punk and all that stuff, LA is very dependent on what you're talking about with out of area touring. I wish I could champion more local music. What strikes me about what you're saying, and that's the problem, is that if your band is too creative, you can't be tacked onto a particular genre. Crazy Spirit, even though they are punk and hardcore, they can't do an Australian tour circuit that maybe Bridge 9 bands would do or Epitaph bands can do. That's the problem, if you're too weird.

Al Montfort:
But then the weirder Australia bands, labels over here in the states, are willing to take a total gamble getting us out here.

Painful Burning:
I think that's partially because of the allure of Australian bands. It's like when Eddy Current Suppression Ring was getting so big everybody would mention Australia when talking about them. Also they're a great band.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, they're great.

Painful Burning:
Finally, is Total Control working on anything for a next release?

Al Montfort:
We're on pause. We're not doing anything at the moment. We didn't work on anything immediately after Henge Beat either. We haven't done anything immediately after any of our releases.

Painful Burning:
There was a three year gap between full lengths.

Al Montfort:
Yeah, we take time. We need time to build up, write some more bangers.

-Z