Despite life still being very uncertain right now, bands are finding different ways to reach audiences while proper live shows are not possible and are writing/recording music remotely, while sometimes being in different locations with different restrictions. One such band who're picking up after line-up changes and finding ways to perform are Geist. I recently did a short interview with frontman Ian about how things are going and what they have planned.
TNIO: Last year I did a series of interviews about mental health in music. With the current Pandemic still at large, it seems apt to ask you guys about your experiences during lockdown and beyond? What have you been doing as a band and how have you kept your motivation up?
Ian: Lockdown for each of us was quite different. We received the news of Luke’s departure quite early in the National lockdown so we had to focus on a replacement, but not knowing when it would end was stressful. The motivation was finding someone who would fit seamlessly with our mould as it’s worked for so long. Thankfully we had material on the go from just after Swarming Season, so that left us motivated throwing ideas around and started talks of what was next (when time allowed it).
You’ve recruited Andy Findlay (previously of Crossburner/Legions) as your new bass player. I first discovered Crossburner thanks to Footloose Records, when the band released their self-titled 10” in 2014. How did this new partnership come about and what does Andy bring to your sound?
My old band Cholera toured with Crossburner way back and we stayed in touch since then. Pretty much up until Andy and I started another heavy band together. Obviously I was aware of what Andy brought to the table from a players perspective but his work as a producer is amazing too. We had a few auditions prior to Andy, but something here or there was swaying our decision.
In terms of Andy and what he brings to Geist, only time will tell, but he’s super keen and everything he’s suggested so far has materialised into something positive. He sent us an audition video nailing probably the hardest song from Swarming Season, and looked in his element playing it. Then at his audition he’d learned a further two more songs and again dialled in a huge tone, and played them with ease. He hit it out of the park and we all feel reinvigorated.
I’ve read on social media that you’re going to be doing a special live session soon. How much are you looking forward to that and will there be any new material aired during the session?
So the live session is being tracked and filmed November 2nd and will be aired shortly after. We’re all really looking forward to showing you that things haven’t slowed down for us and show Andy off a bit. There’ll be a mixture of songs on there and indeed we will be playing a brand new song. This is essentially the first time we’ll play “live” since we toured in February before the world as we knew it ended. So there’s definitely an itch that needs scratching there.
I know 2021 can’t come soon enough but do you have any plans yet for next year? I’ve seen some bands publicising gigs already (even though things are still uncertain).
So we’re not actively booking any shows really. 2021 is still uncertain and with Andy being new to the fold we’re exploring all avenues of creativity. We were going to release a 7” to break the gap of Swarming Season and the next thing but writing is going so well, we couldn’t find a natural cut off. That being said, we made the decision a week or so ago to continue writing and release another full length. By the time the music scene is able to be a thing again, it’ll be knocking on 2 years since Swarming Season was released so we felt a 7” wouldn’t cut it. We’re currently 5-6 tracks deep with bare bones ideas for new songs so not that far to go really. Now we know what we’re working towards, there’s an end goal and with everyone being so inspired, things are moving into the unknown really quickly.
All that's left for me to say is thank you to Ian for answering my questions and keep your eyes peeled for Geist's live session via their social media pages, including Facebook here - https://www.facebook.com/ukgeist/
In 2019, I embarked on an interview series called Mental Health In Music: A Musician's Perspective. I have no idea about the impact of that set of interviews; however small, until Frenchie from Manchester's post-metal band Agvirre wrote to me and expressed his thanks for doing it. We talked and that talking turned into an interview about the band's new EP and also about the themes around mental health, which have been woven into Agvirre's music. Below is that interview, along with a review of Silence, which was officially released last Friday. Please read on and I hope that you can get something from it, just as I did.
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TNIO: Please can you talk about how Agvirre formed and who is in the band?
Frenchie: Agvirre kind of came to me in April 2018. I was going through one of the scariest bouts of depression I had ever experienced. I'd been making and performing noisy industrial and electronic music under the name Hexagon Trail for a couple of years and I'd started to lose my tether with it, and ultimately packed it in after a show supporting GosT in the same month. It felt like everything was falling apart at this time and I was being swallowed into an abyss, but I was very determined to not succumb to my depression and fought hard to keep my brain active. I distinctly remember feeling miserable and numb on my couch, staring at my dusty electric guitar which I had barely touched in the last two years because I had been playing synths instead. I decided to plug it in and the basis of the songs that make up the Silence EP came pouring out of me very quickly. They came together faster than I'd ever written songs before and in a weird way it felt like those songs had already existed somewhere inside of me and were just begging to be poured out. It's safe to say that Agvirre really helped to lift me out of my depression and in return I've poured my heart, soul and energy into it ever since.
I went to see my good friend Ricardo who I'd already made music with over the years and played him these songs and he felt that they had potential, so throughout 2018 we worked on making demos for them. We originally decided it would be a studio only project called Aguirre, The Wrath Of God, named after the 1973 Werner Herzog movie, but it proved to be a bit of a mouthful to say out loud so we shortened it. Somewhere along the line, we felt that we were really proud of how these demos were sounding and that they deserved to have proper studio recordings and also be performed live.
Later on we found our lovely and wonderfully talented violinist and vocalist Robin by reaching out online. When we first spoke she was a Jersey girl living in Germany, but happened to be moving to Manchester soon. The first day we met, I took her to a Deafheaven concert where we went back-stage and interviewed drummer Dan Tracy. We hit it off and she agreed to help us out. From the start we wanted to work with another good friend known in the local scene as Badger. He is the go-to extreme metal drummer 'round these parts and was already playing in about four or five bands at the time so we were scared to even ask him, but luckily he ended up coming to us and said he wanted to get involved and was looking for a new challenge. We're still fine tuning our live line-up right now so who knows we might see more performers joining our ranks in the future!
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You’re about to release your first EP (Silence on 24th January). How does it feel to be releasing it and what was the writing process you all went through to create it?
We're all incredibly excited about it. It's been a long hard road. We all perform in other bands and have jobs and busy personal lives, so things have come together slowly, but we feel that it has been worth the wait. We said from the start that we wanted to have a finished record to release to people before we ever performed live and we've stuck with that. We're incredibly happy that two wonderful DIY labels have got behind us, with Trepanation Recordings releasing the CD and Surviving Sounds releasing the cassette tape, and their very first release no less. Dan and David respectively have been very patient, very hands on and have worked really hard with us, as well as being super passionate about what we do from the first time they heard us. We really hope other people get into our strange music and connect with the themes that Silence expresses.
As for the writing process, I guess it's a bit strange. We aren't at all a jam band and nothing is written in the rehearsal room. Both me and Ricardo will write our own songs at home, play them to each other and then add our own little insights and fine tune them. If we think it sounds great, then we will work on recording demos together, and once that is done we'll pass them down to the other band members so that they can inject their own magic. Even when we came into the studio, there were parts that ended up growing and changing right at the last minute, which keeps things exciting.
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I originally wanted to interview you as part of my “Mental Health In Music” series and you mentioned that the topic was one of the main subjects that Agvirre covers. Can you expand on this and talk about how you’ve woven it into your music?
I was really drawn to the interviews you have hosted on This Noise Is Ours, and I would like to commend you for bravely taking on such an important subject. The reason the EP is called Silence is because I feel like this word in particular has been following me and haunting me for a few years now. Agvirre wouldn't exist if I hadn't have fallen into a deep and dark depression, so I knew from day one that this is what our lyrical themes would be about. Being a diagnosed sufferer of mental illnesses, it's something I have to live with and think about every day, so I very much wanted Agvirre to talk about real, every day, down to earth things. It's been a very, very cathartic journey for me and I feel like the intensity of our sound and our performances reflects this. It's a safe place where I can pour my heart out and we also want to connect with other people through our music.
Silence can be a killer for those struggling with anxiety, stress, depression and suicidal thoughts and it is even more prominent in males who feel like they cannot talk about their deepest, darkest feelings of sadness and fear. We live in an overly masculine world where society can look down on men who express their deepest emotions. Of course this doesn't just affect men, but a lot of people feel like they can't truly express their darkest feelings for many reasons. It could be out of fear of becoming vulnerable around their friends and family, or perhaps not wanting to burden others, or even the fear of looking like a "woe is me" kind of attention seeker. But in reality, the worst thing a person can do is bottle up their feelings, because that shit can end up devouring you from the inside out. This was very much the lyrical basis for our song 'Muzzle & Mask'; it's about how people might feel awful inside and overwhelmed by these negative feelings, yet still they feel this need to put on a fake smile in order to face their friends, family and colleagues and try and cover up what is really going on. The suicides of Chris Cornell, Robin Williams and Chester Bennington really, really shocked and affected me. Nobody really knew about the internal turmoil that these men were facing, and we knew there had to be a change in the way society perceives mental illness to stop deaths like these happening further. The message hit home even harder when a dear friend and local scene legend, Eytan took his own life. Our record is dedicated to all four of these men.
We think of Agvirre as a collective and because our songs talk about the experiences and struggles of living with mental illness, we chose to reach out to other people who are struggling. Because I work as a music journalist, I really wanted to find a way to incorporate my experiences of journalism into our music, so I held interviews with friends and asked them about their own experiences with mental illness. Some of these responses have been incorporated with permission into our teaser trailers and into key moments of the songs themselves, adding extra texture to the record.
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You’ve played alongside and personally know some of the people who I featured in that interview series previously. How important do you think it is to keep talking about mental health, especially amongst the DIY and underground “scene”?
It's incredibly important that everyone who may be struggling feels like they should have someone to turn to and not keep their feelings locked inside. We need to lift this stigma that if people are talking about their pain, sadness and personal woes, they are in no way weak, they're not failures and they're not bad people. Talking openly about sadness, depression, mistakes, regrets, anxiety and negative feelings in general is one of the strongest and most empowering things a person can do, and this strength should not be dismissed or looked down upon by anyone.
I'm glad that there are meds, therapy and hotlines available to help people who may be struggling, but that is not enough. Even though we have those tools to help people out, there are still many people out there who are frightened to be vulnerable and feel like they can't open up about their struggles. It is so very important that we think about others as well. It's not good enough to just post up a status on Facebook with a suicide hotline number and then be able to go to bed and sleep soundly, we need to get active. People who are depressed or feeling suicidal have their own subtle ways at hinting about it, even if it is through humour or something as small as an Instagram post. It is important that we learn to recognise when other people may be struggling and reach out to them. It's not hard to just take a minute to check in on someone, ask how they are doing, maybe even send them a meme or crack a joke that will get them laughing or smiling. We've got to look out for each other and those little things can go a long way to helping out somebody in need, but we also need to know how to look after ourselves. It may sound cliche, but it really is okay to not be okay.
Once again I think the interviews you have conducted have been phenomenal and it is great to see that more musicians are opening up about their own experiences with mental illness. In particular I was really drawn to your interviews with Paul Priest and Andy Curtis-Brignell. I joined Paul on tour last year when Hundred Year Old Man asked me to fill in playing synths across Europe. It was a mind-blowing experience because I'd been a total fanboy of HYOM for a couple of years and befriended the band, so to play in a band I adored so much was a dream come true. Paul is someone whose reputation I'd known about long before I'd actually met him as he has played in more bands than anyone I've ever known! His dedication to music is unparallelled and he is a total legend in the UK underground heavy scene. We got on really well on the tour and he is a very gentle and humble guy. We bonded as we were the only vegans in the van, so it was great to have a buddy to help me stay on track travelling across nine different countries! As for Andy, I used to live on the same road as him in Salford, and I've been a fan of Caina for quite a few years and even supported him a couple of times. Caina was one of the first bands I'd ever heard described as "post-black metal" and he is so fearless and has bravely opened up about his own experiences and struggles with mental illness in both his art and in the public eye, so he is a very inspiring person and another local legend.
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While writing these questions, I was listening to 'Muzzle & Mask', which is currently available to stream via your Bandcamp page. It struck me that there is much more to Agvirre’s music than just post-black metal. Can you talk about what influences your sound and about what other instruments/effects you use in it, besides the usual guitar, bass, drums and vocals?
The common thread that links all of us in Agvirre is that we aren't really full blown metalheads as such. Most of us do really love metal of course, and have played in other metal bands, but we love so many other music genres too and it was important that Agvirre's music reflected this. Both me and Ricardo have made electronic music in the past so we knew that we wanted to incorporate synths and electronic elements into Agvirre. I've always had a fetish for rock and metal bands that incorporate non-rock instruments in interesting ways too, which comes from my love of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Maudlin Of The Well and Kayo Dot, so I began looking for string players and discovered Robin, who comes from more of a folky background. We don't think of Agvirre as strictly "a metal band", but we knew from the start that our music would be heavy, intense and chaotic. I feel like in the future, non-metal genres will play an even greater role in our sound.
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Once Silence has been released, what are your plans for the rest of 2020?
We're playing things by ear really, but what we can confirm is that we have been back to Noiseboy Studios to record a new song that we hope to release later in the year. We are already very much thinking about our debut full length album, with enough songs already written, and we have already started demoing them.
Our first live performance will be in support of OHHMS and Hundred Year Old Man in Manchester on March 7th and we want to travel further afield, so if you like what you hear and would like to see us play your town, please get in touch!
We have other big plans in the works too but for now, we really hope everyone connects with Silence.
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Labels: Trepanation Recordings/Surviving Sounds
Formats: CD/Tape/Digital
Release Date: 24 Jan 2020
Tracklist:
1. Radio Silence (Fill In The ______)
2. Muzzle & Mask
3. Abandonment
Having read through Frenchie's interview answers and felt really moved by the honesty and candour presented, it feels like I'm not going to do this EP justice. It's was officially released last Friday and it marks a big step in the band's progression. Having previously only released a couple of single tracks, including an edited version of 'Muzzler & Mask'. Silence has been released on CD via Trepanation Recordings and on tape via Surviving Sounds (as well as digitally via Agvirre themselves).
I don’t think people realise how much of a help music can be sometimes. It’s no substitute for talking but it’s always there when you need it. EP opener ‘Radio Silence (Fill In The ______)’ is very much a harrowing intro, taking from the band’s history of noise and injecting it with similarly stark voice samples and haunting violin.
‘Muzzle & Mask’ is where Agvirre’s post-black metal begins to show itself and while the band doesn’t want to be confined to that sub-genre, it easy to hear why it’s been described as being part of their sound. The violin played by Robin is effective in adding a calming edge to the music, while the percussion performed by Badger nestles neatly in the background, allowing the rest of the instrumentation and vocals to take more of a central stage. Musically, there are comparisons I could make here but that would be entirely missing the point of Agvirre’s music. The clean, choral vocals that adorn the song are scary and sobering, but even more so are the samples that Frenchie talked about in the interview above. The various movements of the song that are formed by heavy black metal, soothing instrumental passage and an intelligent mix of both of those, turn it into a journey and one that brings a whole host of emotions to bare.
Following ‘Muzzle & Mask” was going to be a hard task indeed but with 'Abandonment’, which also stretches past the twelve-minute barrier, Agvirre once again uses countless layers and textures to bring their sound and their message to life. It proves that it’s not always the heaviest, most aggressive music that hits home the hardest. Sometimes, it’s the more subtle and melodic music that reaches you. That’s definitely the case here. As the previous song was born of a place more angry and violent, ‘Abandonment’ feels more positive and homely. It’s amazing how all of the music contained on Silence can make you think, yet by the end it leaves you not with dark thoughts but with bright and happy ones. That’s really all we can ask for in life.
You can stream and purchase Silence digitally below:-
All that's left if for me to say a massive thank you to Frenchie for taking the time to answer my questions and being so gracious. Also, thank you to everybody who reads this.
Also, if you want to speak to somebody, know someone else who does or just want to donate, please go to either of the below links:-
When I sat down the other day to think about the year end and look forward to 2020, I didn't think that one my last posts of 2019 would include a special stream of a song that has sat unreleased since 2005. In fact, the song forms part of a five song release that was written the same year but never completed until now. It documents a point in time for a German emo/post-rock band that formed part of a network of bands, mainly remaining obscure apart from within their own scene, which included Single State Of Man, Seidenmatt (also known as SDNMT) and Milhaven amongst many more.
You can stream the song Perfect via Youtube below:-
Wishes On A Plane formed initially in 2002, but then they were known as A Life Less Ordinary, The quartet released a three-song demo CD with that moniker before releasing a five-song EP in 2004 with their new name. Line-up changes happened after this and later came various compilation recordings, a 10" called "This Faint Line" (released via Time As A Color and Strictly No Capital Letters) and then split 7"/DVD called "Transparency" with Bail (released via Time As A Color and Canot Pneumatique Records). At this point, I'm not giving anymore of the game away, as I recently interviewed Daniel and Josef from WOAP and you can read what we talked about below.
1. Hi Daniel, how are you? Can you start off by talking a bit about the history of Wishes On A Plane?
D: hi James! I’m pretty good, quite busy as usual though. Thanks for taking the time to sit over this music of ours. Let me introduce my band mates on this release, it’s Andy (guitar), Josef (Bass) and Paul (drums). Josef and I will try to answer all your questions. Basically the four of us started being a band in i guess early 2002 (Andy, Josef and I had already written some songs by the time Paul joined) and played our first show in the summer of 2002, released a 3-song demo CD by the end of 2002 under our first name A Life Less Ordinary, and a s/t 5-song EP as Wishes On A Plane in very early 2004. after that we recorded 3 songs for several compilations, and these 5 we never finished just until now. we played live, around 50 shows I guess with this lineup, mostly local though, as we didn’t have much connection to a scene by then. the farthest we got was Cologne and Siegen. don’t think we made it out of Germany at all. in 2005 Josef and Andy decided to quit the band, so Paul and I started from scratch with 2 new band-members, Anna and Tobi and released some compilation tracks, a 10“ and a split 7“/DVD with Bail, we also toured more than with the first line up, played all corners of Germany and also played in Austria, Switzerland, Netherlands, a few mini tours and a 10-days tour in early 2009, which was our last tour.
2. You are going to release an LP in 2020. What made you decide to release this music now?
D: Basically I always knew these songs were somewhere on an old desktop computer style hard disk (sata), and sometimes the fact I knew I owed it to these songs to someday see the light of day sort of haunted me. But to me there were a bunch of obstacles, so basically whenever I thought of it it seemed too much effort to find the drive, research how to connect an old sata drive to a modern computer, to then maybe figure out my new pro tools wouldn’t open the old sessions or realise I didn’t know the lyrics to these old songs anymore and wasn’t sure if I ever found them in my records, or maybe I went through all these steps only to realise these songs/recordings weren’t good enough for me to want to finish them. My mind is like that. I guess what made me actually do it was that I coincidentally found the drive like a year ago, shortly before Christmas, where there is a little more free time than the rest of the year, also at a point in my life where I was seeing myself in a similar situation as when I wrote these songs, so after I had found it and researched about how to connect it everything else worked out so smoothly (the drive was still working, files were there, so were the lyrics, and my latest pro tools was importing that old session like a boss), I guess what I needed was a first step and after that every step was followed by the next naturally. Possibly the biggest obstacle in finishing these recordings was remembering how exactly the vocal melodies were for some parts, but I have a crazy talent in remembering these things and after occupying myself with the songs for a bit the memories came back. Of course I had to ask Paul, Andy and Josef if they were cool with finishing them but they were in, luckily.
J: During the last years, we didn't really meet often, but when, we always talked about the good old times playing together. Thereby, Daniel mentioned sometimes some old recordings somewhere in his big hard data nimbus, but it was more like joking around about finishing them. Honestly, i have had no idea about the data anymore. But at the end of last year, Daniel came out all of nothing with the recordings and asked us if we were interested in finishing and releasing them. I guess all of us were spontaneous up with this idea.
3. Is the band fully reformed now or is this just a one-off release? Would you consider doing more with the project in the future?
D: Over the last years I learned to do things step by step and see further. To me it would be great to properly release our earlier efforts, the self titled EP from 2004 and compilation tracks at some point. these would need to get remixed and remastered though, which consumes time and/or money, plus depending on the format different amounts of shares on pressing records, of course. To me personally this would depend a lot on how the new record is being acclaimed by listeners. We haven’t reformed and aren’t planning to release any new music under the name wishes on a plane. In fact only two of us have a saying with what’s happening under that band name, the other two final band members (Anna and Tobi) were ok with us re-releasing what had been released or written under that name before, but I guess if we’d write/release new songs it would be under a different band name. the four of us are in our late 30’s, two of us have kids, one lives in Hamburg, one has a pilot’s working schedule, all of us are fully working of course, one runs a record label and two have another band. There were ideas of us making music together in the future, which today is possible even with living in different cities, but there were no actions to do so yet. It would be cool though.
J: As Daniel mentioned, it is not that easy to come together playing or rehearse songs at a good level because of our different life schedule, but there is always a chance just to jingle or maybe doing a single release show.
4. You’ve been kind enough to allow me to have an advance listen to the songs. I would never have guessed that they were nearly 15 years old. What inspired you at the time of writing them and what were your main influences when writing the vocals?
D: I think Roland Wiegner did a great job mixing our mediocre recordings (to say the least), that coupled with the fact most current emo stuff shares similar aesthetics and the same influences from the 90s makes it kind of fit within the DIY, slightly lo-fi emo bubble quite nicely. I guess a lot of our influences when we wrote these songs are obvious when I name them, Elliott has always played a great role to at least 3/4 of us, as many people know bands like Jimmy Eat World, Christie Front Drive and The Get Up Kids belong to the basis of why I started making music and I guess you will always be able to find bits of these in whatever music I write. You will also find more than bits of Texas Is The Reason in there, Mineral, lesser known bands like Pictures Can Tell or Hudson River School, some falsetto I used for the first time in these songs was even influenced by a local band called The January Flake. there are still bits of emo-punk and pop-punk in there, influenced by bands like The Ataris, No Use For A Name or Midtown. other bands that definitely played a role in making us sound that way were The Appleseed Cast and Further Seems Forever. Considering songwriting to me we were at the best we had ever been, sometimes I wonder where this could’ve gone if we had continued… Lyrics to me have always been and still are super personal, even up to a point where it hit me when I was singing them again during recording, 14 years after, feeling the same pain or at least knowing exactly what I meant when I wrote them. All of these 5 songs we are going to release deal with a major breakup during my late teenager/early tweens time (remember, I was 22 when we wrote these songs). Thoughts or fears of two people being no perfect match but intertwined so deeply you find it difficult to embrace a life on your own. Questioning if you know at all what love is, or even more so, what not loving feels like, and how to know it when love is gone. Possibly a mind vs heart scenario. On perfect, the song we are premiering today, my mind was playing with the word „perfect“, having a very obvious, very cliché meaning of flawlessness, and a rather technical meaning in linguistic, the perfect tense, a metaphor for past, something that had bygone. Superficially, these two terms and meanings couldn’t be more distinct. Then again, when you look at it, when things end, they usually weren’t prefect. But when things are over, what do we tend you remember the most? the good parts. nostalgia. that brownish sepia movie clip in the back of our heads. that’s what this song is about.
J: Basically in the beginning the three of us listened to the bands Daniel mentioned (especially Elliott), me not that intense as Andy and Daniel, as I also listened to stuff like Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Green Day and even sometimes some old school hiphop. But when Paul joined our team, at that time he drummed in a funk and soul band, he brought occasionally some funky elements in our writing.
5. Was this style of post-rock/emo popular in Germany at the time when Wishes On A Plane was active?
D: to be honest I’m not sure if I at all had been in contact with post-rock at that time we wrote these songs. at least not much. I remember one of the earliest post-rock influence of mine being Red Sparrows, however at the soundless dawn has only been released in 2005, so if at all the post-rock influence had only been minor or subtle by then. As it appeared to me this sort of indie and rock-ish emo was super unpopular at that time. there was a bit of a scene in Munich that was evolving around red can records, and we played with bands like Jakov Goodnight once or twice, there was also a bit of a scene around Nürnberg/Regensburg area labels millipede, dancing in the dark and plane records (we played with bands like La Par Force, Kenzari’s Middle Kata and Squarewell), but most these bands played, even though under influence of emo, more rock-ish or screamo-ish or a more edgy style of emo, not the „polished“ clean sung understating style like Christie Front Drive or Jimmy Eat World, although bands like mentioned JEW and Get Up Kids were gaining more attention at that time. Possibly if we had kept on in that line-up a little longer we would’ve found more bands like us or more niches to fit in. I started Time As A Color in 2007 and although I guess screamo was a bigger thing in the 00’s I think we would’ve at least halfway fit into that scene if I had found out about it 2-3 years earlier.
6. I love the idea of someday building an archive of obscure and DIY music, whether it be punk or metal (to be general). I think a lot of it captures an important moment in time. Is it important to you, being able to release this and do you think you’ll release more in the future?
D: To me, it obviously means the world these songs are finally going to be released, because as you say, they document us, document me at a certain moment in time, and by now, that moment had been hidden from the public, as if it never happened. Anyhow, running a label for over 12 years now I am absolutely aware this is mostly happening because I am stubborn, idealistic and not thinking very economically when it comes to the label, especially when it comes to my own music. I am grateful having built up some sort of network to at least spread the music to some people, but in the end what I will be able to release and on what format depends on if people care about what I or we have to say, if the documents of our lives matter to others. I don’t really think that sort of emo is any popular at the moment, but I’ve never really given a shit about feeding certain drawers, neither with the label, nor with the music I make. Of course I will continue making music, and releasing music, but the more people give a shit in what I do, by spreading the word, putting on shows, writing a zine or blog, buying a record, the less I have to work and make money to make these things possible, and the more time I have to actually do something meaningful, meaningful to me, and potentially meaningful to others. This scene depends on people taking part. Fundamentally, it consists of people taking part…
Perfect will be given away on a special promo cd-r that will be limited to just 44 copies, when people order from the Time As A Color webstore here - https://timeasacolor.com/shop/.
The lyrics to the song are below and will also form part of the inlay for the cd-r:-
perfect
falling through the easy selection
bent in between
the end and the everything
of the heart that made you leave
but haven't I heard you laughing?
haven't I always heard you?
fall into my certainty
certainly
we're the end you wished
I'll sign in with whoever decided
that nothing feels better than this
all you need me to is falling
when all I want
when all I heard in you
were the words that made me whole
but haven't I hurt you, laughing?
haven't I always hurt you?
Keep your eyes fixed on the Time As A Color bandcamp page, as the download will be made available shortly after this post has gone live. It will be made name-your price and proceeds from downloads will go towards an eventual vinyl release of the full EP.
All that's left for me is to say many thanks to Daniel, Josef and Wishes On A Plane for allowing me to share this song with you all and for also answering my questions, which were slightly cobbled together the other day.
Here's the latest interview from my Mental Health In Music and this one comes from longtime (Internet) friend Christer Lunnan-Reitan. Christer used to contribute some reviews to this blog and has been a constant source of new music ever since. A little while ago, I asked him if he wanted to share his thoughts and experiences around being a musician and coping with mental health along the way. He was kind and gracious enough to say yes, so here it is.
1. The idea of this feature is to talk about the problems that musicians face, especially those in DIY or up-and-coming bands. Would you mind talking about your own experiences with mental health?
A. First off, the idea behind the feature series is extremely important and interesting. My own relationship with mental health is complex. I've more or less lived with depression for as long as I can remember, but only recently been diagnosed with it. I also suffer from mild anxiety and avoidant personality disorder, which is basically a way of saying I avoid confrontations, speaking with authority figures and the likes, as well as being overly sensitive to criticism, how I think people perceive me and the like.
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2. Being in a band can be an outlet for people to express their feelings and to help them get over certain things in life but do you feel that it can also have a negative effect? If so, what do think these effects can be and are these linked to writing, recording, touring etc?
Oh, I certainly think so. Being able to express their feelings might backlash due to the sheer fact of exposing them to the world and people around you. But I do think that the overall effect of having creative and emotional outlets via art focuses more on healing than something negative.
In regards to touring and writing, it all depends. I mean, if an artist is having a bad period, earlier material can be a hammer knocking them over their head and making things worse. Touring in a tiny van with people for hours and hours is enough to make everyone fed up, and I recKon it's harder if one is having a bad period in life as well.
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3. How do you deal with things now? Have you got any advice for those who are struggling themselves, musician or otherwise?
I've recently gone to great lengths to get to a better spot in life. I realised that I needed to get something done, or I would just burn out. I'm going to therapy, taking meds, writing music again and so on.
My advice would have to be to seek professional help, as well as find someone you trust enough to share things with. Stuff you find shameful or disgraceful might bring you closer to someone. But of course, trust is crucial.
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4. What more do you think can be done in the underground scene or even the wider music scene to support people who may be struggling?
I think the DIY scene were I come from, or at least the US scene, is focusing on mental health now. But of course, it's hard to go out and write music if you're afraid of being judged by your peers, or it's hard to go to a show if you have social anxiety and so on.
The internet community is really supportive and goes a long way to make people feel included, regardless of skin colour, your gender identity, your mental health. And I think they're good at standing up for the ones that have a hard time, as well as trying to weed out elitist behaviour (the ones that actually might put you down for your music, etc)
In general, I think that the focus on mental health and the importance of helping those with mental health issues should be more prominent in media. Big names in pop as spokespersons is a simple, yet efficient way of getting that done, I think.
I hope you've found this interview and indeed the whole series helpful and enjoyable (if thats the right word). I think I've got one more coming up before the end of the year and once we get towards the New Year, I'll be recapping the whole series. Thanks again to Christer for sharing his experiences. Look out for those around you and for yourself.
Here's the latest in the Mental Health In Music series. By now, if you've been reading the previous interviews you'll know what it's all about but for those of you who're venturing into it for the first time; the series features interviews with musicians mainly from DIY/Underground heavy and punk bands, giving them an opportunity to talk about mental health from their perspectives and offering advice to those of you might be struggling. This interview was answered a friend of mine, who's also a musician from my local town.
1. The idea of this feature is to talk about the problems that musicians face, especially those in DIY or up-and-coming bands. Would you mind talking about your own experiences with mental health?
A. My main struggles in mental health revolve around obsession and anxiety. I was diagnosed with clinical OCD in my early twenties and have been dealing with that ever since. I think it would be fair to say that I’ve always been a very obsessional and emotionally intense person but relationship trauma through my adolescence had the effect of magnifying those negative compulsive ways of dealing with hardship and conflict to the degree where it was really beginning to affect my emotional wellbeing and happiness. Since my OCD diagnosis I have been through some incredibly difficult times but through a great deal of failure and determination as well as three courses of therapy I have managed to find a way to come to greater peace with myself and my mind. My mental health struggles have taught me so much about myself that it would be hard to see my experiences as one-dimensionally sad.
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2. Being in a band can be an outlet for people to express their feelings and to help them get over certain things in life but do you feel that it can also have a negative effect? If so, what do think these effects can be and are these linked to writing, recording, touring etc?
It would certainly be fair to say that I use songwriting as an outlet for dealing with my mental health and where this is mostly positive there are certainly drawbacks. It can be incredibly hard to contextualise lyrics about darker more internal topics to your nearest and dearest, songwriting needs to come from a place of overwhelming honesty, honesty which can hurt or worry those around you. I have also found that It can be very easy to fall into the trap of becoming over immersed in your mental illness when writing about it constantly. Part of my recovery process was putting my OCD into the fabric of my personality instead of having it be my everything, it’s hard to keep your mental health in perspective when you immerse yourself in it to explore it.
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3. How do you deal with things now? Have you got any advice for those who are struggling themselves, musician or otherwise?
I would count myself as in recovery, I have some hard periods but nothing like I did a few years ago. I feel like once you’ve finally started to challenge your brain and see its negative patterns as just odd ticks of how your mind works, it becomes very hard to un-learn that and as such, no matter how hard it can get, hopefully you have the tools to deal with it. If I have any advice it would be to never, ever be afraid to seek out help, never feel bad about talking to your closest friends, relatives, partners, they all want to help you and see you happy! You really never need to suffer alone.
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4. What more do you think can be done in the underground scene or even the wider music scene to support people who may be struggling?
Mental health awareness gigs and benefits are a wonderful thing and could always happen more. I think we should aim to perhaps even put on full festivals where the branding, message and bands put on are all there in solidarity with mental health, I like that idea because frankly, everybody struggles and I would like to think that full festival bills of artists admitting that they struggle and that it’s OK to struggle would help remove the stigma around mental health. I think a lot of people would come out of the woodwork to support that, that the public at large would never imagine.
I just want to say thanks to Ashley for taking the time to answer my questions. Also, apologies for the lack of photos in this post. I'm not being lazy but I didn't was to use non-music/performance photos.
Here's the latest instalment in my ongoing Mental Health In Music interview series, focusing on musicians within the metal and punk scenes, talking about their own experiences with mental health and what can be done to help people who're struggling. I have a few more on the way and in the planning stages, but for now please take some time to read Reece's perspective. Note: as with the previous interviews, these are not meant to be about the bands but rather the people and their own feelings.
1. The idea of this feature is to talk about the problems that musicians face, especially those in DIY or up-and-coming bands. Would you mind talking about your own experiences with mental health?
A. I’ve struggled with my mental health my entire life. My depression and anxiety has been a constant. Never really feeling like I’ve quite fit, even in music. In my early teens I turned to self destructive methods, trying to gain some sort of control. Severe Anorexia, drugs, cutting etc. My weight has always played a part in it. I used to have to cancel shows because I didn’t even have the energy to stand up without passing out. Music has been a saviour and destroyer. It’s carried me through my lowest possible lows, and sometimes kicked me down there. I got my first Walkman when I was about 6 and have been obsessed with music since. I’ve been playing in bands since I was 12 or 13 only really finding comfort in screamo.
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2. Being in a band can be an outlet for people to express their feelings and to help them get over certain things in life but do you feel that it can also have a negative effect? If so, what do think these effects can be and are these linked to writing, recording, touring etc?
It definitely can have a negative effect. I found it slightly easier in bands just because you can dissociate yourself from it a bit. When you’re screaming to a room about how you want to die in a band of friends, it’s easier to bare.
I’ve had a love hate relationship with music. I've been writing as Alocasia Garden for almost 6 years now, that’s a big chunk of “important years”. Everything I’ve gone through has been put into this project. I can look back at releases and think “wow, if I didn’t make that at that time, I would of ended my life”. But that catches up with you and it feels like a dark cloud hangs over my desk. Every time I try to write something, I'm taken back to that mindset that I don’t want to be here. Currently I’m at a point where I need to stay away from it for a while, let that cloud clear a little. With that, there’s always a pressure to keep consistent, in your releasing and performing. Music moves quick.
I find performing a really big challenge. I’m completely consumed with anxiety and guilt. “I’m no where near as good as the lineup, I don’t deserve this, someone else should be playing, I should just stay at home and never leave”. When that’s running through your head at 1000mph, it gets hard to hear what your playing.
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3. How do you deal with things now? Have you got any advice for those who are struggling themselves, musician or otherwise?
I'm guilty of putting so much pressure on myself. To stay focused, keep creating. But sometimes, it just doesn’t work. Don’t force it. If you want to stop, stop. Don’t feel guilty. Your productivity doesn’t determine your worth. I’m getting better with that now. I think it’s common for musicians (especially solo artists) to hold on so much with a fear of letting go, even for a minute. A fear of loosing your place. There’s new music and labels every day, some people just instantly click. But it’s totally fine to take a break, or even just stop entirely. If you make sure you’re doing what you want to be doing on your terms, everything will be fine. Make time for yourself.
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4. What more do you think can be done in the underground scene or even the wider music scene to support people who may be struggling?
Just listen. Make it known you’re there for your friends, for strangers. Keep being honest with yourself. What am I doing to help? How can I do more? What am I doing to make a difference? What do I need? It’s amazing how much of an impact those questions can have when you start acting on them. When times are tough, know it will pass.
Thanks go out to Reece for taking the time to answer these questions and for speaking so honestly about his experiences. I'm not posting a charity link up this time, as I realise that donating to charities are a matter of personal preference.
