Interview: We're Trying Records

Life is a struggle. If you're not trying, you're dying. And if you're Jordan of We're Trying Records, then you're thriving in a labor of love, attempting to bring the very best of DIY punk and emo to the masses. I always like it when people send me music, but whenever I see the WTR logo in my inbox, I get genuinely excited. Jordan has introduced me to some amazing acts over the last several years, and I am incredibly thankful for his efforts. To commemorate his previous ten years of doing-it-'cause-no-one-else-will and get to know the man behind the music a little better, I had Jordan on the podcast to talk about the label's origins, his general philosophy, and what he'd tell his fromer self about where is now if he had the chance to shoot backwards through the veil of time.

Featured tracks: 

Townies - Gallows

95Corolla - No Coast 

Scarlet Street - Victory Speech

If you're in Chicago, you can celebrate We're Trying Record's 10th at the Subterranean on August 29, 2025. Doors, 6:00 pm, show, 6:30 pm. Get your tickets here. 

Interview: 2:00AM Wake Up Call

Had the chance to talk with Emily about her latest LP with her 2:00AM Wake Up Call project, called Dead City- an examination of abandoned places, distant pasts, and a contemplation on the inevitable revolutions of time- often towards death, but also towards a fresh flowering of life when circumstances conspire to allow it. Emily has such an eclectic sound, combining early '00s pop, folk, and indie with contemporary approaches to emo, pop-punk and electronic music to create a sound that is intrepid in its pursuit of the novel modes of popular expression that still achieve some semblance of the familiar. I really didn't think I could do Dead City with a review alone, so I'm thrilled that Emily was willing to mic it up with me and offer her insights as well. Check out our conversation below: 

Listen to Dead City below. It's self-released, so be sure to show her some love. 

Interview: Andy Loebs

Andy Loebs is the first goocore artist I've interviewed for this blog's podcast (but hopefully not the last). I'm very smitten by the luster of his incredibly imaginative and dream-like productions and it was very cool to finally have a chance to talk with him about his process and his latest album Cercopithecoid (SIR-koh-pi-THEE-koyd). It is out on Orange Milk, the gooey-ist label of them all. Check out our convo below: 

Listen to Cercopithecoid:

 

Interview: Pete Min of Colorfield Records

I've been a fan of Pete's work with artists since the start of this blog. His work with Colorfield Records is completely in line with the ethos of my own blog, and in encountering his discography, it made me realize that I am not alone in championing the deserving but underrecognized talent of the world. He gives session musicians and unsung studio heroes a chance to really test their limits and craft music that is challenging to make but easy to enjoy. There are far too few people doing what Pete is doing, but the world is made much more interesting due to his efforts. Check out the interview below: 

Featured in this interview is music from Nicole McCabe's recent Colorfield Records release, A Song To Sing. Check it out here: 

This episode is, in part, dedicated to the great George Lowe, one of the greatest comedic voice actors of all time. Leaving us far too soon, he's returned to his home (Cartoon) planet for a well-deserved rest. RIP (1957-2025) 

Interview: ESP Mayhem

Deploying a sonic barrage of culture-jamming ballistics from the savanna of perdition that is Neo-Melbourne, ESP Mayhem is the EVP of the ghost in the machine. On a day like today, and in an age like our own, we are all plugged in like flesh transistors neuralinked into a info-validating supply chain that stamps the leveled realities and hyperreal phantasms auto-generated by smiling maskless faces acting as temporary receivers of a transient silicon-threshed symbolic order with the briefest of imprint of our consciousness before consigning these bubbles of fleeting joy to the abyss along with a fragment of our souls- like gum smeared on plywood. ESP Mayhem extends themselves through the gates, ports and check-passes of the nauseatingly manifold mirage of digital excess and unclarity that define the quicksand-like qualities of the concrete world to bully the leveler pullers and burst the tension of the spell that's been cast over us- finding salvation through sublation and recuperating their humanity through agitated accelerationism. Their latest EP Cyber Bully emerged in 2024 to shake down crypto nerds and relieve them of the burden of their hallucinatory lucre while reshuffling the static of stultifying overexcitement that snow blinds our perception in the hopes that a dose of the right kind of chaos can produce an epiphany of eschatological significance... that and they really just like to fuck shit up. You can check out my interview with the band below; it reads a little like the manifesto of a terrorist sect that Johnny Mnemonic might have had to rely on in a pinch for information and logistics. It gets giga-gonzo, you've been warned. 

Who participates in ESP Mayhem, and how do they contribute?

Bruce - Synth; Clock - Vocals; K@rrl - Synth; Klown - Synth; Ralph - Drums. We might change the names and/or people around in the future.

What is the thesis or animating logic behind the group?

In our view, extreme music is an arms race. It's a race that can never be won because the escalation will never stop. The goal is to make the most unsentimentally rageous [sic] and mechanistically horny music we can. Even if we do something that reaches the goal it’s already history because it’s just a matter of time until it’s surpassed. The only options are to go even further or give up. Hyperextend until you explode.

How did you settle on your name?

We decided our logo should combine a metal band’s logo and a logo from outside that world. The combined logos had to form a phrase or word that worked as a band name independent of the source material, and the component logos had to have finger-snap recognisability. There was a very short list of bands, brands and logos that worked. We appropriated Mayhem and ESPN as a graphic shorthand for sonic extremity on the one hand, and the sublimation of violence through spectacle on the other. We chopped “ESPN” down to “ESP”, in the sense of “Extra-Sensory-Perception”, to underline the psychic dimension. Hence ESP Mayhem. The name means no distinction between our music and everything else in the product-scape, no brakes on our out-of-control hubris, and no limits on what we’re prepared to steal.

Why grindcore?

Grindcore is obsessed with aggressive hyper-velocity, instantaneity and disposability. It’s also very information-dense, lots of notes in a hyper compressed burst. Tension, information overload, everything moving too fast - those are the only things in our lives anyway so it’d be dishonest to fuck around with anything else. It’s no accident that mass-entertainment is taking on more and more grindcore-like proportions and gestures. Because everyone feels and thinks this way now. It’s basically the most realistic music of all time.

Are you inspired by the work of other metal performers, or do your influences lie mainly elsewhere?

Melbourne has produced some great grindcore bands so we were lucky to see the style played by some of the best to do it. That’s the foundation of how we understand fast music and how we think it should feel. But we always want something more absurd and more brain-cracking. So we also plagiarise from the most antisocially jacked up, hyperactive dance music - speedcore, anything out of Newcastle (NSW) etc. There’s some worthless computer-world dross mashed in as well, nightcore and ear-biting 8 bit arpeggiation, high-fructose trash sounds designed to fry your pleasure centres [sic] into pouring more money/time down the shitter. Other than that, we just regurgitate the rising tempo of the sensory pummelling we’ve endured our entire lives, in the same way you might make yourself throw up after ill-advisedly eating a mysterious wrong-address delivery meal you find on your doorstep. IE an unpleasant but necessary action to avoid shitting yourself later on.

Was it a deliberate choice to exclude guitars from your ensemble, and if so, why?

It was an accidental, revelatory, bad, great idea. We happened to plug a synthesizer into a guitar amp and discovered you could make noise that lands like a tungsten cube dropped from orbit. No nuance or warmth, just pure force. But none of us had any experience playing electronic music. We don’t really understand how the instruments work, and we’re all intellectually paralysed from too much high pressure/low duration media (grindcore and grindcore-ized media in general) so it’s nearly impossible for us to learn. But synthesizers are just too loud and we’re addicted to power so we can’t stop. If someone accidentally bumps their instrument it instantly blows everyone’s ears out and we all scream in pain. It’s awful.

What was the thought process going into your latest release, Cyber Bully?

We wanted it to sound like Megatron trying to auto-fellate and accidentally machine-gunning his own head off. More piercing sonic aggression, more jarring speed-to-dance transitions, more blatantly ripping things off, more gleeful mockery and disrespect, just more. There’s no point or really any possibility of subtlety or thoughtfulness now so we always want to go as far and fast in the wrong direction as we can.

What are your thoughts on the circularity of time and history?

Time and history are circular, but also linear. We have no evidence to back this up, we just infer it from the overall feeling of constant upheaval combined with total inertia.

How do the contradictory but intersecting modern phenomena of stultifying boredom and constant excitement and/or agitation play out through your work?

Things are so continuously exciting now that excitement itself has become experientially boring, because it never lets up. Like when was the last time you didn’t feel angry, horny, scared or otherwise wound up. And it’s not just you, everyone is sitting there in a state of private agitation. But it’s not like you can opt out of the situation, so why not go further. There’s an episode of the TV show Max Headroom, where watching a high speed advertisement is found to spike the viewer’s nervous system to the point that they spontaneously combust. Ratchet up the boredom, ratchet up the pressure until the whole thing explodes in media-induced, self-obliterating tedium. You should be trying to cross that line, one way or another. Extreme boredom makes extreme music.

How does your work draw attention to the invasive nature of technology and underscore our intimacy with it?

Our band setup is like reverse-cybergrind, we kept the drummer and replaced all the guitars with prosumer electronic equipment. IE more unwanted and unasked-for change for the sake of it masked as “innovation” and “development”. It’s like what we see with technology, but even more stupid. People don’t really want it but we keep pushing it on them and eventually they give in. A few people might say it’s good, they don’t really think that, we just shoved it in their faces til they thought they did. After we convince them, it's not too long til they think they convinced themselves. But unlike the technologists we make no claim to be improving anything. We’re making things worse and more difficult, so perversely actually making things better.

How do you think our interactions with information technology, particularly social media, transform and augment our sense of identity and place in the world?

The Self As Asset has been realised through social media - the kipple machine that crushes everything into advertising, as it simultaneously crushes advertising into everything. The term Personal Brand used to get thrown around but you don’t hear it now cause the concept has become so internalised that it’s redundant - of course a person is a brand, why bring it up. Between Personal Branding and Corporate Personhood a circle is completed - on the one hand people take on the characteristics of brands, and on the other corporations take the characteristics of people. We’re encouraged to understand ourselves through the language of therapy but we should use the language of marketing instead, it’s more accurate.

How does the concept of "junkspace" relate to your approach, outlook, and output?

Neo-Melbourne is a quintessential junkspace. It’s like living in a big cardboard box full of print-on-demand neon signage. All lowest-bid-contract dross stretched over the skeleton of a failed plan. Nothing rings true here and things don’t work out for the good. So ESPM makes something else from the junk. We grab whatever we like and use it however we can to advance our project. You see the bare bones of everything we ripped off and how starkly we smashed it all together, a junkspace aesthetic. But it conforms to our logic now. The incongruities made sense all along, we are just stacking the pieces up in a way that makes the pattern reveal itself.

What is the value of novelty in popular culture at this moment? Is it still attainable, is it worth pursuing?

It’s not attainable but it’s worth pursuing. With pop culture It’s more straightforward and more rewarding to repeat things, and in life it’s easier to do nothing at all. But tomorrow will arrive whether you want it or not. And you have to put an idea forward if you don’t want more of the same. If we have to live in a bullshit future then we’re gonna try and make it our bullshit, not someone else’s, stinking the place up. And everyone else’s bullshit is ours now anyway. Intellectual property is theft and anyone bristling at their art/bullshit being stolen is dumb for imagining they’re losing something and a cop for caring. All we have ever done is lift so many touchstones from the manic ends of popular culture and music scenes into the one mix, so there’s nothing really new. But on paper ESP Mayhem is a novelty act because of what we steal and why. We would go further and say that now, every act should be a novelty act, and this is the only way to stay ahead of the kipple machine. Realise your own delusions or steal ours and turn it into something else, we don’t care. But you are either a novelty act or you enter the kipple factory, that’s the choice.

What if any, are the beneficial and ethical uses for AI in art and creative endeavors at this stage of its technological development?

There’s no ethical use for AI because it’s a big machine for ripping things off. ESPM is in direct competition with AI in that regard. And we are winning. With all the money and raw intellectual horsepower sloshing around in the AI industries it should be the other way around but no, we can rip things off faster, more totally and more fluently than the stupid AIs. That’s where we’re at, historically speaking. The great white hope of technological advancement has been outperformed by a synthgrind band from the Cleveland of the southern hemisphere. It’s a grim outlook.

What does the term "cyberpunk" mean to you in relation to your work, if anything?

“Neo-Melbourne” alludes to the idea that all those old Cyberpunk stories have been more or less realised in our present day. But the term cyberpunk is historical now, it makes sense as a pinterest moodboard but doesn’t quite capture the flavour of this moment. We need a new anachronistic portmanteau to describe a world of grinning human sharks swimming upstream in a sea of techno-garbage. It should keep the “social technics vs music subculture” form of “Cyberpunk”, but instead blend the relentless pumping of uptempo hardcore, with overblown CCRU-style net-mysticism. Something like Xenodonk, or Deus Ex Makina.

What is the most dystopian part of living in Melbourne?

Smelling the countryside burn as you walk past 3-million-dollar townhouses in your old neighbourhood.

Interview: Career Day

Had the pleasure of connecting with Desmond of NYC emo outfit Career Day to talk about their 2024 EP I'll Always Be This, and just life in general. I did not realize how much hockey meant to Desmond before we got into our dialog or how deeply involved he was in activism out East. This conversation was more or less destined to happen after I wrote a very positive review of the band's EP Pride Was Somewhere Else for New Noise back in 2021, and I'm stoked that Desmond and my mutual appreciation of each other's work eventually led us to have such an in-depth discussion about his life journey, band and career. I didn't think it was possible, but I definitely admire what Desmond and the band are doing more now than ever. 

Listen to my interview with Career Day: 

Hear their latest EP I'll Always Be This:

 

Interview: Deludium Skies

Now I'm not an expert in geology or ecologist, but I'm fairly certain that there are no deserts in Austria. I get my confidence in this claim coming from a country that has a lot of dusty planes within its borders. So I'm pretty impressed that a guy like Karl, an Austrian guitarist whose project Deludium Skies has developed from a simple droning tonal experiment, into a hauntingly doom-laden descent, can capture the essence of those endless empty steppes and vast overbearing sheets of sky of my homeland in a way that kind of makes you feel like you're on an empty highway, driving endlessly, cutting through a looming nothingness and overcome by its enormity and the boundless breadth. His guitar work has a crushing softness to it that resembles the incremental weight of a thousand grains of sand gradually pooling over your feet and between your knees- immobilizing in its casual accumulation of presence and patient-fated tumble. It's not the kind of blues you'd hear in a Tennessee gin joint- more like the kind someone might coax out of the dark as they watch said watering hole burn to the ground from the vantage of a seedy hotel. There may be something that only someone on the outside of this house of tinder and yellowing playing cards we call a country that can only truly be captured from a distance... I needed to know, so I asked Karl... what is illuminated under the rolling thunder of those Deludium Skies?

How long have you been working on Deludium Skies as a project?
Should be 15 years by now. I started with the first tracks in late 2010 and then released two EPs in 2011/2012 with relatively raw drone stuff done only with guitar and occasional synths. That question made me listen to some of those tracks for the first time in many years by the way; there are still some cool parts here and there, but all in all I'm not too happy with the sloppy transitions and the production value in general...

How has the project changed over the years?
It started with lo-fi doom/drone/ambient soundscapes, later evolving into more refined and versatile, often melodic, tracks, mixed with much more influences like folk, jazz, blues etc. - also a broader range of instruments.
I guess Aspirations from 2018 was the first major step towards the current style of DS.

Has it always been a solo endeavor? When do you feel compelled to rope in collaborators?
Yep, it started as pure solo project. More out of lack of opportunity, living in a small town with a few thousand people, not knowing anyone personally who actually plays an instrument and is into the more experimental side of music. There's always been guests on the albums in the last five years, though.
Not sure if "compelled" is the fitting description there... I always love to bring in external creative input and many different instruments, especially those I absolutely can't play, like all kinds of wind instruments.

How did you learn guitar, and who were your primary influences?
I got my first e-guitar as young teen (cheap brand strat-type) in the 90s, but wasn't too motivated, I was almost twenty till I approached it more seriously, learned at least a few chords and basics from one of those beginner's books. I still don't know that much about music theory to be honest, I prefer to just fiddle around and come up with something by myself. That's why I never invested much time in learning other's songs either, which makes the external influences hard to pin down, but I guess I was mostly into metal back then, mainly goth/doom/black.

How were you introduced to the blues?
I started to really appreciate it in my mid twenties, when I dug deeper into 60s/70s folk rock releases, they're heavily influenced by blues, like Bob Dylan, Davy Graham, Tim Buckley. Then soon stumbled over some cool more recent blues infused stuff as well, like Mark Lanegan and Songs: Ohia.

What would you consider to be your major influences, music and otherwise?
Like already mentioned, it's not so easy to exactly pin down. I love to listen and discover various forms of music, probably many of them had a bit of an influence, direct or indirect. A selection of artists I always come back to, aside from the already mentioned: Tom Waits, Pink Floyd, Bardo Pond, Portishead, Esbjörn Svensson Trio, CAN, Black Sabbath, Miles Davis.
I also do enjoy a lot of movies; Cronenberg, Miyazaki, Gilliam, Malle, Melville, etc.

Would you consider what you are doing "metal"? If not, how would you best describe it to the uninitiated?
Well, there are a couple of quite thick and heavy sounding tracks that might as well pass as doom(ish) metal, overall I'd see it more as heavier experimental rock, or drone rock.

Is there precedence in Austira for your style of playing and approach, or do you feel like you're breaking fairly fresh ground?
I don't think there is, in fact the only other Austrian drone act with a heart for experiments that spontaneously comes to my mind is Goddess Limax Black. No wonder, it's a usually a monotonous and minimalistic style, not exactly predestined and known for getting too adventurous, so there won't be that many comparable acts on an international scale either. I'm like a tiny niche inside already niche music - hence the huge success, I guess...

How does the symbolism of mountains inform and elevate your latest release, Stardust Echos?
Sometimes I got a distinctive theme in mind before or early during the recording of an album, but in this case I already had finished at least half of the tracks before I came up with titles and a cover concept, and it was done pretty impulsive within a day. I initially thought a desert themed cover would fit to the music, but that seemed too close to the cover from the 2021 album Destination Desolation. So I altered it and ended up with a mountain in a desert landscape (inspired by the Hoggar Mountains in Algeria), combined with a psychedelic spacey sky above.

Is there a particular mood or state of mind you are hoping to induce within the listener with this release?
Never thought about it. Relaxed and open minded would be my instinctive answer.

How often do you perform these tracks live, and how do you go about recreating the unique atmosphere of the album in a live setting?
So far, never. I was never asked to do so, and honestly, I'm neither used to nor eager to perform in front of many people anyway.
Also other problems would come up: there are a lot of improvised parts on every album and I almost never write anything down. So I'd have to figure out first, how the fuck I played this and that part. Not to mention finding band members, I can only play one instrument at a time...

What is next in store for this project?
Nothing planned so far. That's not unusual though, sometimes I record nothing in months, and then a couple of tracks within a week.
Might take a bit longer this time, I'm not feeling very motivated at the moment, because of shit sales (*nudge nudge wink wink*) and general lack of support.

Check out Karl's latest album Stardust Echoes here: 

Interview : Molly O'Brien of I Enjoy Music + 2024 Recap

Everybody seems set to move on from 2024 already, but I'm not sure why (especially when the future is looking bleaker by the day). A lot of great music came out last year and I doubt most humans on this planet have given it all the fair shake it deserves (I know I haven't!). Even more exciting than the release of some objectively fantastic tunes is the emergence of some truly outstanding trends in style and approach by contemporary underground and alternative artists. Turn of the millennium kosmische continuums have doubled back and invaded the 21st Century in a big and exhilarating way, emo chiptune seems poised to break into the big time, indie cabaret is becoming commonplace, and unpretentious DIY yacht rock is now a thing- in short, creativity abounds and there is no containing the rich imaginative blaze these developments represent.

To get my arms (and head!) around the bountiful brilliance of this past year, I invited the ever-affable and resourceful Molly O'Brien of the blog I Enjoy Music to talk about 5 of her favorite albums from this past year and discuss 5 albums that I thought had something special to say as well. We go deep on each entry on our lists, so buckle up!

Albums discussed in this episode:

Fantasy of a Broken Heart - Feats of Engineering

Dummy - Free Energy

Hey, Ily! - Hey, I Loathe You!

Ludivine Issambourg - Above the Laws

Revival Season - Golden Age of Snitching

Ekko Astral - pink balloons

Jimmy Montague - Tomorrow's Coffee

Sun Kin - Sunset World

Kim Gordon - The Collective

Check out Molly's blog: https://www.ienjoymusic.net/

Interview: Angry Blackmen

I'm very pleased to present to you, dear readers/listeners/faithful kōhai, an interview with two very cool fellas. Despite the impression imposed by their name, Chicago hip-hop duo Quentin Branch & Brian Warren aka Angry Blackmen are super chill and down to Earth dudes who took time out of their crazy schedule (they were prepping for a European tour when we recorded) to chat me up and recap their big year and discuss what they hope to see happen in even bigger years to come. It's a wide-ranging conversation with plenty of insights into their career and music-making approach up to the release of their LP The Legend of ABM and beyond. You can check out the full interview below: 

Listen to The Legend of ABM, our on Deathbomb Arc, below: 

Interview: SkyJelly

I had a delightful encounter of the 5th kind with an enigmatic and musically inclined entity going by the codename SkyJelly Jones. SkyJelly is the ring lead of the (what else) SkyJelly, a merry band of galactic bards who made landfall earlier this year with their album Spirit Guide with the aid and abatement of I Heart Noise Records, delivering a mix of psychedelic desert rock and North African folk that is (literally) out of this world! You can check out my conversation with SkyJelly Jones below: 

Listen to Spirit Guide here: 

Interview: Superdestroyer & Leave Nelson B

Superdestroyer and Leave Nelson B are two underground musicians and high-stats avatars within the greater-online DIY/emo scene. They have known each other for more than 20 years and yet have somehow managed to avoid making a record together all that time. They've released records with each other's help and guidance, of course, but they've never combined their talents before into a single project... something that's left the world wanting in its absence. That all changed this past February when Nelson dropped in on Superdestroyer for reasons that the universe has destined but not disclosed, and Nelson Come to Visit is the result, a hip-hop saturated smorgasbord of heterodoxical chiptuned emo-pop that roguishly appropriates Sega Genesis sounds to tell a SNES compatible story of IRL cooperative play with friends who are making the most of what little time they have on this hazardous and obstacle-laden map we call "Living on Planet Earth." We get into some surprisingly deep lore about the album in my recent interview with both of these gentlemen, so you might want to put on your hard hat before you dig (dug) in.

Lonely Ghost Records is where bonds are formed and futures are forged.

Listen to Nelson Comes to Visit here: 

Interview: Saajtak

Credit: Karl Otto

Back in 2022, Detriot four-piece Saajtak released their LP For the Makers on American Dream Records. Built primarily on improvisation, the 10 tracks on the album present a flavorful and exotic breath of cosmos-spanning operatics and sinewy, sweat-and-blood stained pit-orchestrations, with the vibrance and chaos of a clique of early '80s post-punk musician squatting in a dilapidated machinist's loft. Somewhere between Bjork's '90s work, found sounds collections, clambering echos of post-industrial-folk, the local philharmonic, and the brazen, worn-heal boogie of Primal Scream, For the Makers crystallized as a singular axis point of clear and constant creative energy. 

I was able to get in touch with the band for an interview about their LP around the time of its release, but for various reasons, I wasn't able to post it until now. For the Makers is still a wonderful album, and I think the life of everyone who hears it is slightly richer for having encountered its strange and incongruous grace. Anytime is the right time to let an album like this one fill your ears and preoccupy your waking mind with dreams. 

AK: Alex Koi
JBT: Jonathan Barahal Taylor

BW: Ben Willis
SAA: Simon Alexander-Adams

How did you settle on the name Saajtak, and what does it mean?

JBT: There’s some amount of mystery enshrouding the origins of the name, and that’s kind of the point. The sound of it (pronounced sahge-talk) rolls off the tongue and to me elicits a feeling of deep presence, like a sacred space. On its own it means nothing but in the context of our music it somehow describes everything.

Tell me a little bit about what it has been like for musicians in Detroit these past couple of years.

JBT: I don’t think it’s been appreciably different than in other cities: Everything ground to a halt [during COVID] which was hard for everyone, then after a few months people started to emerge and there were all of a sudden a slew of lovely and creative performances in non-traditional spaces. I participated in and witnessed some really wonderful shows in various public parks that drew a much broader slice of the community than your typical club or performance space, which was very refreshing. Detroit is a place where you can make your own opportunities, and I think the pandemic reinforced that conviction. I also noticed, at least among those closest to me, a clarification of purpose. Detroit values the hustle and musicians in particular can really spread themselves thin, so it was nice to see what could be accomplished when people finally had time to figure out what matters most to them. A lot of friends abandoned the things that no longer served them and devoted themselves wholly to making the most affecting, impactful and personal work that they can.

What is your favorite place to play in Detroit?

BW: Trinosophes has an energy that can’t be beat, it’s been a special place to me over the years, and playing there is always a treat.

AK: I like Trinosophes also - they have great programming. We haven’t played at Third Man, but I’ve enjoyed going to shows there.

Where do you like to play in Chicago?

BW: There are many lovely spots in Chicago. My favorite shows with Saajtak have been at the Hideout and Empty bottle, where the sound and vibe were really excellent. I’ve also had many great experiences at Elastic Arts – and sharing shows with Chicago bands is always fun and surprising.

JBT: Also have had great experiences playing at Cafe Mustache and Constellation. Always floored by the number of amazing spaces to play in Chicago.

How did you get connected American Dreams?

BW: I believe we first met Jordan at a bill we shared in Detroit with ONO at the Strange Beautiful Music Festival. We stayed in touch over the years, and set up some shows for each other in Detroit and Chicago – I remember Jordan telling me he was starting American Dreams when we played with him at Cafe Mustache, on a really cool bill he’d arranged. I’ve admired the work that Jordan’s done platforming and creating interesting music, and he’s built up a real nice team of folks at ADR. It was a real honor that they had room for our project by the time we had For the Makers to offer.

Which "Makers" is For the Makers dedicated to specifically?

BW: For me, the time we were writing the music of FTM was a time of deep reflection on those people who’ve kept me going over the years, and who have been examples of the kind of person I’m aiming to be. There have been numerous times for me when life has felt like a slog, and some creative person empowered me to push through: bandmates, inspiring performers. The first person to do this for me was my first role model, my sister. She’s now an educator and mother in Detroit.

AK: Our album is for the Ancestors, to those who came before.

JBT: We started working on this music at the height of lockdown, when there was really nothing going on. I felt extremely fortunate to be engaged in this project with people I loved and to have meaningful creative work to take my mind away from the crippling uncertainty we all faced. So many friends and artists experienced profound pain without that kind of outlet, and they were also the “Makers” that I had in mind.

What are some of the music reference points and influences for this album in particular?

SAA: We all have relatively diverse music tastes and influences which all come together when we collaborate on our compositions. At the time we were writing this music I was listening to a fair bit of Floating Points, The Comet is Coming and Amon Tobin’s side project Only Child Tyrant. I’m sure there are subtle elements of these artists that made their way into my own contributions to the album, though it is always difficult to point to specifics in the way such things go.

BW: When writing and working on music I tend to explicitly avoid drawing specifically from any particular influence, because I feel like it’s important to allow the music to lead me into its own space. While we were writing this album, I was not listening to much music, but when I did, I was almost exclusively listening to the music of Antonio Carlos Jobim and Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. A few artists who I have found really inspiring musically and otherwise over these past few years are Ingeborg von Agassiz, Annika Socolofsky, Anna Meredith, clipping., and My Brightest Diamond.

How do you think you've grown as artists since 2017's Spokes EP, and how do you feel that growth manifests on For the Makers?

BW: Over the years, we’ve continuously grown and evolved our voice as a band. There is some consistent musical language from Spokes EP through the present, but to me, For the Makers feels significantly more mature and intimate than our previous music. As we crafted this album, I was consistently surprised and impressed to hear the best work that I’ve heard from my companions: Alex’s lyrics and melodies, particularly (for me) on Leak in the Shielding and For the Makers, have reached new levels of wisdom and personal expression. Jon’s explorations of timbre and orchestration, adding electronics and vibraphone on tracks like "Mightier Mountains Have Crumbled," and "Oak Heart," extended the emotional reach of the worlds of these songs in new ways. Simon’s part writing was really essential to heightening the impact of the forms of these songs, and his instincts for crafting sound worlds is ever sharper. Working with this band always makes me reflect deeply on my musical practice, and makes me challenge myself to reach for more.

JBT: Our group dynamic, both musically and interpersonally, has developed so much since Spokes. Back then we were just starting to understand our group sound and figuring out how to work with each other. Collaboration requires so much patience, compassion, clarity and compromise, and can be fraught with tension without open communication. Crafting For the Makers was a very long process that included a lot of deep, passionate, and sometimes uncomfortable conversations. It could be frustrating at times for all of us, but I have no doubt that it made the music stronger. To me that reflects the profound trust in each other that we’ve cultivated over the years.

Are your compositions still largely based around improvisation? What is it about this writing style that suits you?

AK: Improvisation serves our music most when we’re composing together in the same room and when we’re performing. When we’re improvising, our four voices are simultaneously establishing the atomic structure and characteristics of the sonic elements in a song. Because For the Makers was recorded and composed remotely, we played individual executives in one-on-one time with each track, and could make personal decisions on the very nature of the song’s elements. FTM became thus less improvisational as a whole than our previous work. Improvisation has suited our music because it supports every member’s authentic voice to be heard. The flexibility of improvisation has taught us to be truthful and thoughtful in each moment, which lets our songs be malleable in a live setting, which is more fun to me than playing a song the same way night after night.

JBT: For me it comes down to intent and sincerity. From a process standpoint, I don’t see much distinction between a spontaneous and immediate improvised musical setting and plotting out a composition over the course of days, weeks or months. In either case I’m focusing on making decisions that resonate with me emotionally in the moment and that I feel genuinely compliment the surrounding material. The only real difference is temporal. Improvisation is at its core the practice of being present, which is extremely powerful in all aspects of life. Musically speaking it (among other things) keeps ideas from calcifying and to that end, I think one of our strengths as a band is our willingness to change our material, sometimes drastically, to better suit the energy of the moment.

BW: For me, the process of writing this album felt like a protracted improvisation lasting the entire year. I’m probably the only one, haha. Improvisation is the core of my musical practice, and so it is the starting point for anything I would try to do.

Do you see For the Makers as a different sort of album in terms of your general discography, and if so how?

SAA: Before this release our method of writing music relied heavily on composing music together in a room. We would improvise together, and through multiple rehearsals and performances slowly hone the form of our songs. Even after recording them they would continue to shift through improvisation and exploration in performance. Because of their fluidity it always felt challenging to fully capture them in the recording process. The songs were created for live performance, and felt best in live spaces. With For the Makers, we were pushed to write music remotely out of necessity due to the pandemic. The change in process led to music that was created as a recording first, and I personally think they are our strongest recordings for this reason. It also allowed us to explore the songs individually for longer periods of time, which meant we could each craft our parts extensively outside of a group rehearsal setting. We’re now in the process of arranging these songs for live performance. It’s been exciting to find creative ways to pare down these songs for a live setting.

BW: Beyond the process being quite different, For the Makers feels to me like the most complete work we’ve been able to make, for the reasons Simon cites. While I’m still quite proud of our other recordings, they were recorded with limited amounts of studio time–and I feel like in some ways they are documentations of songs whose energy was really conveyed in a live setting. With FTM, there were certainly challenges to being separated, but since we were each working in our own studios, we could take the time to state exactly what we meant, and negotiate things to the point that we were sure we were saying what was intended. It was also awesome to have Chris Koltay mixing this record; it helped to have someone we trust to really “get” our music to send these sessions to. We’d started recording a different album in the studio with Chris in 2019 (still finishing that material up!) so we had an established rapport and appreciated his wavelength.

Your music is very easy to move to. In your opinion, is this an intentional by-product or a secondary effect of your music?

AK: Thank you for saying this! I call us a dance band all the time.

SAA: I would say this is an intentional effect of our music. As a performer I’m always moving to the music, and I think to a degree this is part of the process of musical expression (not trying to make any absolutist statements here, just speaking from my own experience.) Some of our music uses odd-time signatures, but it’s important that it’s never done solely for the sake of complexity. The music needs to feel right and at least for me being able to move to it is a sort of subconscious litmus test. If I can’t move to my part—if it doesn’t feel right—then something needs to change.

Tell us about the collaborations and features on For the Makers? How did you approach these partnerships, and what did each bring to the album?

BW: For the first couple of months we were working on these tracks, I don’t think it was apparent we had an album on our hands. The idea to include other friends and collaborators came naturally – Marcus Elliot is a good friend, and we had previously done some live collaboration: he was the first we included in a rotation, and Jon took contributions from Marcus to compose the framework for Borders. Then these songs grew into a set of works, and a title emerged: For the Makers. It was really special for me to have Pat Reinholz play cello on this record – he’s one of my oldest friends, and someone who helped shape a lot of my musical processes and priorities–we lived together and wrote music as a duo for four years in Madison, Wisconsin. For this collaboration, I wrote a poem score dedicated to Pat, that he interpreted while tracking to "Oak Heart." As the tracks continued to take shape, I took all of his tracks off "Oak Heart" and composited them into the layers of sound instead on "Queen Ghost Speaks." Alex had the idea to work with the incredible David Magumba on "Oak Heart," and she worked together with him to craft their amazing duet on that song. Kaleigh Wilder and Kirsten Carey are some of our favorite musicians who we are lucky to have as friends, and we enlisted them to improvise and play with some layers of sound to flesh out "Big Exit" – they both did some amazing work that wound up fitting into the final track. Can’t wait for future opportunities to work with them.

With all your expressive prowess, Saajtak still strikes me as primarily a rock band. What is it about the dynamics of a rock band and rock music in general that is so accommodating to your artistic vision?

AK: Electricity is crucial to the meaning of this band. Electronic processing, manipulation, distortion, echo, delay… There’s a bending of sound and a bigness of sound that makes Saajtak a rock band, absolutely.

BW: The sound of the band has definitely been shaped by the spaces we played and the bills we played on. Most of the spots we’ve played have been rock clubs, DIY spaces, places that it felt right to play loud. In terms of the interaction of our parts and the way we listen as a group, I think we play a lot like a string quartet. But Energy and Heaviness are a big part of what we like to relay, and rock music is great for that.

Would you describe yourselves as avant-garde? Do you think the term is overapplied?

BW: As a band playing music that is more or less outside genre, it is a term that is hard to avoid. It can be a double-edged sword, in that while some find a search for “newness” to be exciting, it can turn off people who connect it with pretentiousness or a kind of adversarial weirdness. And maybe there is something a bit pretentious in describing your own music as “avant garde” because that’s a distinction that might need to be made over time. I think our music is often seeking to find new sounds, timbres, rhythmic combinations, so in that way it’s fair, I think, to describe it as experimental–but these ‘experiments’ are always in service of deepening our expression, and playing off of communicating with each other.

JBT: I don’t find it particularly accurate or helpful. There are so many musical territories that we explore because we feel it makes a stronger album or more complete song, but calling that avant-garde feels like a convenient way to avoid actually dealing with the music. If one song has frenetic textural elements in between a four on the floor repetitive dance groove, does that make it part pop and part avant-garde? At that point it’s easier to just talk objectively about what’s happening in the song and how we respond to it emotionally. I recognize the utility of genre classification for marketing purposes, and if I hear someone describe themselves as a “jazz” artist or a “rock” band or an “electronic” musician, as incomplete and problematic as those terms are, I at least can ground their music to some facet of a particular musical culture and tradition. That would have been the case in the distant past for “avant-garde,” when it connoted a social movement within the arts, but now most people that use it to describe themselves or their work are, in my experience, coming from a place of pretentiousness and exclusivity (on the other hand, terms like experimental music or creative music are more grounded to a vibrant culture, lineage and community). I view it as a reductive catch-all to dismiss something as weird and alienating, when we should instead be speaking about music specifically and on its own terms.

Thrive, don't just survive, with American Dream Records.

Interview: Toby Jeg of Red Scare Industries

When you're a lifer, you're a lifer, and Toby Jeg is a lifer if there ever was one. Incubating his label Red Scare Industries in the early '00s at Fat Wreck Chords, he eventually moved the label to Chicago and then continued to operate it as a rogue cell of international subversion as he traversed the country and later the globe. Over that time, he's nurtured and broke some of the most beloved punk bands of the past 20 years, and also put out some of their best punk records (imo! But, no, really.). He's now (as previously alluded) celebrating 20 years of raucous, drunken revolt with a comp full of fresh new tracks from comrades and cronies alike, featuring contributions from old-school standbys like The Falcon, Cobra Skulls, The Menzingers, Elway, and Bollweevils, recent signees like Laura Jane Grace, fellow prols like Dead to Me, and a whole bunch of people Toby just likes and thinks are cool. You can check out our limited hangout, featuring ramblings and reminding on punk back in the day, signing of underdog superstars from Nowhere, USA, and get an insider's brief on the assembly of the 20th-anniversary comp below: 

Check out the 20th Aniverasry Comp Here: 

And if you're in Chicago there are some shows happening at the Beat Kitchen to celebrate the label's milestone birthday. More details at beatkitchen.com

Interview: Discoholic

Many say that music is like a drug, but few take such a comparison as seriously as the Discholic- a consciously goofy and chaotic force for good in the vast landscape of electronic music on the internet, he is a one-man disco revival that the world never asked for, but so clearly needs. Also, he has a disco ball for a head... which is a good look, honestly. In my conversation with disco-adorned incognito he gives me an overview of his career and insights into the world of discoholic anonymous, while I get to ask him specific oddball questions like, how much does your head weigh, and how/why did you interview the top dog from Doom Trip Records for your comedy stream? I also learned during the course of this interview that it is possible to drive entirely blind... as long as you do it very slowly. Life lessons, am I right? Throw on your best polyester, strap on a pair of platforms, pour yourself a drink and check out our conversation below: 

Check out Discoholic's latest EP Welcome to Discopolis!

Interview: Parent Teacher

Many of us, when we were young, lived in mortal terror of our parents colluding with our teachers to conspire against us and express how disappointed they were in us in novel and aggravating ways. Most of us have survived and moved on, but Parent Teacher still lives with the wounds he suffered as a youngin and bears them to the world through his music. Would you believe that he was well behaved during my conversation with him? Well, he was. And if you don't believe me, you can listen to our conversation for yourself below: 

Parent Teacher's latest album Etheral Collapse is out on Wilbur & Moore Records and Lonely Ghost Records, check it out the record below:

Interview: The Battlebeats

Photo by Fahmi Ramdhani

There is a rumble on the horizon. The scent of blood in the air. A piercing shriek of distortions splits the clouds, and the hammer of the gods comes crashing down- splitting the Earth. Out of this molten wound rises a man with a vision, a plan, a prerogative, and the pig-headed will to see it through. Hero to some and the bain of poseurs everywhere, Andresa Nugraha is chief warlord of the Indonesian garage rock group The Battlebeats- a brashly, unhinged rabble of sonic vandals that mostly consists of... well, Andresa and anyone who he can haul out of the local landfill or the police drunk tank with the wherewithal to hold down a tune (notably, this edgy entourage DOES NOT include a bass player... don't ask). Earlier this year, The Battlebeats redoubled their assault on the world of propriety and good taste with their second LP, Meet Your Maker, a twelve-track takedown of losers, lunkheads, and lubbers too shiftless to hail the dauntless reign of rock and/or roll! It's a tribute to a flagging legacy of international garage rock, as well as an updated reimagining and recasting of familiar idioms armored in black leather, baptized in the jungle heat, and focused through the amber shade of a modish pair of sunglasses, cracked from the relentless combination of reverberations cast off a wall of speakers and the relentless headbanging that such ruckus wavelengths inspire. Live by the axe, die by the axe- die by the axe, live forever. Get ready to meet your (music) maker!

The following interview was conducted over email. I have literally only changed one word of Andresa's responses, and it was merely to make it more grammatical. The purity of his purpose really shines through in his answers and I wouldn't want to do anything to mute the clarity with which he speaks. Enjoy! 

Who does the current Battlebeats lineup consist of?

The current lineup that backs me up for live performance are me, Andresa (guitar, vox), Obi (drums) and Dwey (guitar). I met Obi in some show where we played with our old band years before I formed this project. I really like the way he played the drums, so I asked him to be my drummer in 2021 and he’s been stuck with me ever since. He also has his own solo project, Defectum. Dwey joined the band as a guitar player in mid-2023. He’s in so many bands but currently active in a thrash metal band, Brigade of Crow and post-punk band, Succubus. I think this is the most solid lineup since Battlebeats existed. The band’s been through so many changes. The band has two drummers, and four guitar players so far.

I noticed that your sunglasses on the cover of Meet Your Maker are curved, sort of like the ones Dolflamingo wears. Was this intentional, or is it just a coincidence?

I can’t remember where I got the references for that one. But every time I draw the sunglasses are never the same from one and another. There’s a pointy one that was inspired by Kamina (Gurren Lagann) and the other one just straight from the glasses that I usually wear.

What kind of label support do you have for Meet Your Maker, and how did you work out the details for distribution?

Meet Your Maker was released on a 12” by garage punk label Sweet Time Records from Nashville, Tennessee. Ryan Sweeney, the label honcho, I knew him for the first time from the video of Jay Reatard’s last show on Youtube. Soon I learned he was Cheap Time’s drummer, too. Long story short, we got to know each other from the internet then he offered me to put something out on his label, I didn't even think twice, I accepted his offer because I really like all the music he puts out. At first, I was thinking of putting out like a 7” or something instead of a full-length. All the detail for distribution I let him do the job, he knows best what he does since I also know ST have many distributors across the continent.

You work a lot with independent international labels. What are some of the upsides and downsides or working with labels like these?

One of the upsides are you get your music out there physically and get new listeners across the country who know their stuff. These guys have been super easy to work together with. They don’t even know me in person and they’re on it 100% for the music. The only downsides are there is no money in it, they only gave me a fair share of physical stuff, but I don’t complain since most of these labels I work with are one-man operation businesses.

What is the significance of the title track off of Meet Your Maker, and why is your most recent album named after it?

I came up with a bunch of titles for the LP but ended up using Meet Your Maker. The reason is simple because I really like the song the most. It’s about telling someone I hate to fuck off and die. It sounds so medieval, and stupid. I’m just joking around. I’ve never heard any native English speaker say these words in these modern times. Can you imagine telling people to fuck off by saying “Go meet your maker, assholes!” with two middle fingers in their face. It’ll be freakin’ hilarious.

When did you start work on Meet Your Maker? Or, rather, how long has the album been in the works?

It took like a year or so. Probably it’s in the works after I recorded the series of 7” singles in 2022. I don’t remember it well because I never try to stop writing songs even after I put out something.

Your previous recordings have famously been done on the fly. Did you have a different approach to Meet Your Maker, or were you writing and recording when you had the money and/or time as you have with previous releases?

I still don’t have the money until today tho. Hahaha. The only different approach is I’ve used many different cheap gears to record things because I don’t want it to sound the same as my previous releases.

I noticed that you're going in a much more straightforward garage rock direction with Meet Your Maker and have dropped some of the blues and balladry of your past releases. Why did you decide to streamline things a bit more for this release?

Everything was probably depending on what I listened to during the making of something. I listened to a lot of Tokyo Electron and Jet Boys when I did songs on Meet Your Maker. Even each song in this record has its own references. You know, I used to listen to a lot of 60s garage music and Chuck Berry during the making of my first LP, Search And Destroy. Maybe that’s why there’s a lot of blues and balladry references on that one. I just stole their old riffs and played them faster the way 70s punk used to do.

What is the pace of your songwriting at the moment? About how many songs do you write a day/week/month/etc..?

Whenever I got the vibes, I could write more than five songs in a day, sometimes I don’t write at all for months. You what? I haven’t written any new songs for Battlebeats this year. But I’ve written like 12 new songs right after I recorded Meet Your Maker tho. I’ve been having a hard time writing songs lately. The demos are all on my computer, some have finished, and some don’t have lyrics on it. I haven’t touched it again, no energy to finish ‘em.

How many songs do you end up throwing out or not using, and what makes the difference between a keeper and one that ends up in the trash?

I guess I have a bunch of songs that ended up in the trash. Sometimes I abandon that one song that is almost 50% complete, wishing I can get inspired to finish it tomorrow and then after a 10 minutes break, I write another song and finish ‘em in 5 minutes. Everything depends on my mood at the time I wrote it. I even came up with a cool riff or a singing part which I thought it would make a great song, But I think I’ve heard the riff somewhere and then I opened the voice note recording on my phone and it was the riff I’ve written and thrown away back years ago, because I thought it sounds like shit Back then. Haha.

Photo by Ardita Putri

What is the garage rock scene like by you? Are a lot of people into Oblivians and The Gories, or what are they listening to and being inspired by?

In Indonesia specifically, there is no such thing like “garage rock” scene as far as I know, it never gets popular during its peak. Even when Battlebeats came out, everyone seemed confused because we sound different. I always feel like the music is too rock ‘n’ roll for the punk scene, but too punk for the rock ‘n’ roll scene. That’s why my main focus is to put out records overseas. I’m too tired to explain why I don’t have a bass player or why all of us wear sunglasses.

I believe most people here always rely on mainstream media when it comes to exposure to new things, especially when 2000s garage rock revival was on the surface. Some bands I know were inspired by Jack White/White Stripes, The Strokes or The Libertines. I’m not sure if those people are even listening to Oblivians, The Gories or any 90s garage rock bands. Not many people like to dig stuff deeper on the internet. It takes a special talent to even google something obscure 10 years ago.

Is there still a pretty strong Ramones cult in your part of the world? They always had a strong international following and I've always been curious how they were received in your neck of the woods.

We used to have a lot of Ramones-y punk bands but the one that’s still active and also my favorite band is The Sneakers from Bali. They are a mix between other US Ramones-influenced punk bands like The Queers and Screeching Weasel. Eko, the guitar player/singer, plays all the songs in downstrokes like Johnny Ramone. I never met any person as determined as him. Everyone should check out their Sneakers Freak EP. It’s on my top 5 best Indonesian punk EP list.

Have you been doing much touring lately, and if so, how has it been going?

I just did my first Japan tour in May this year. 5 days, 4 cities (Kyoto, Osaka, Chiba, Tokyo). I can’t bring my usual backing band due to financial issues, so I asked Greg (Supersnazz, Teengenerate) to play drums. I saw him from Teengenerate’s Get Action documentary in 2013 or 2014 on Youtube. I was in my early 20s who just got into garage rock at that time, thinking of having him in my band. I don’t know how, but we manage to get to know each other years later, fortunately he happens to like Battlebeats as well. He agreed to help me out and he told me that his old bandmate, Miyagi (Supersnazz, Texaco Leather Man) is gonna be a great addition to the band. So, we asked Miyagi to join as my guitar player. We only rehearsed two times before the tour started and we did great like we’ve been in a band for a long time.

What was the best date you had on your last tour? Who did you play with/ where was it/ what made it awesome?

The last show in Club Heavy Sick, Tokyo was the best one. I got to play with all my favorite bands like Firestarter, Jet Boys and Angel Face. The show was on Sunday, and the venue was packed with people. It’s perfect. I heard Firestarter and Jet Boys rarely play together but they were there that day. Finally witnessing Onoching (Jet Boys) get naked and shredding radish. I was crying when Firestarter played “Trashy Dreams” because it was so good live! At the end of Battlebeats set, we did an encore playing Teengenerate’s “Dressed in Black” with Fink singing. What a perfect way to end the tour.

Where are your favorite places in the world to tour?

For now, Japan. I love the food and people. I’d love to go back there. I haven’t got a chance to go on tour elsewhere, but I wish to play in the United States one day.

What are your favorite places to play at by you?

Anywhere else in a small city where sometimes only a handful of people come. Interesting and weird stories always come from this kinda place.

Do you ever have issues with people being jealous of you? How do you deal with their envy?

I don’t know for sure, but I think there are one or two or three people who seem jealous of what I achieve in life. I don’t have time to deal with these pathetic losers; I’m just gonna sit around watching ‘em fall in life. Let's see who laughs last.

What is the best compliment you've ever received about your music?

“Battlebeats are the future!” – Eric Friedl of Goner Records/Oblivians.

What is the dumbest thing anyone has said about your band?

I don’t remember if anyone ever said the dumbest thing about the band, but there’s someone who commented on my song “Killed by Boredom” in YT. He/she said it sounds like Ramones’ “Blitzkrieg Bop”. Out of 8.1 billion humans on earth, that person is the most stupid of ‘em all.

What's next for Battlebeats?

I don’t know, maybe put out another record, go on touring, or do nothing at all. Let’s see what the future holds for Battlebeats.

When are you going to open for Guitar Wolf?

Wait. I’ll send Seiji a message to invite Battlebeats to play in Shimane Jet Fest 2025.*

*Editors Comment: It's really going to be Seiji's loss if this doesn't pan out. 

These savage beats are available on vinyl thanks to Sweet Time Records.