interview NOAH DEWITT

Oregon Voice: It sounds like you come from a pretty “groovy” background.

Henry Church: You’re talking to the dude with tie-dye sneakers.

OV: How did you go from studying shamanism at NYU to being in this band?

Mickey Church: Yeah, it’s always interesting talking about it in hindsight because to me it was always separate. Shamanistic ritual kind of was happenstance. My advisor was the teacher of shamanistic ritual at NYU, so I just decided to take a course that my advisor was teaching, not even knowing what it was… Because he happened to be a Ph.D. in shamanism, or whatever you want to call it, and he was a shamanista himself, I took the class and really connected with it and connected with him. On the first day of school, it was a bunch of nervous kids who are in New York City for the first time, and we’re sitting in this classroom for our first class of our first day. And the teacher is nonexistent. And 10 minutes go by. Fifteen minutes go by. And after 15 minutes, this crazy guy bursts through the door, covered in dust with a  doctor’s mask on and a flashlight on his head, with his friend who had these crazy, piercing blue eyes, who’s also covered in dust. And he says, “True story, true story: We just got back from Burning Man. True story: Janis Joplin was in eagle form flying over the RV the entire way home.

By the next class a lot of the kids had dropped it, like, “I’m spending my tuition money on this?” But the people who stayed in the class are some of the only people that I became friends with in the entire university for the entire four years I was there.

That’s just one thing that happened that led me a certain way, but it could have easily not gone that way.

OV: What about your name? Is it an archery thing, or is it more like a computer mouse white arrow?

MC: It’s actually neither, or both if you guys want it to be. It’s just abstract, and whatever meaning it had when we came up with it — it’s kind of always changing based on what people assume it is or ask what it is. So I kind of like to keep it as abstract and free-formed as possible. If people want to take it literally, they can.

OV: I know you two are brothers. Are you all family?

MC: J.P.’s a half-brother by blood. We’re like cousins. And we all met through friends, and it was pretty kismet. Like how rare is it to find people, especially later in life, who are all on the same page as you. It’s like past the age of 16, I’ve made maybe 10 friends in my life, two of which happen to be likeminded individuals who want to play a similar kind of music and have the same outlook on life and the journey.

OV: How written are your songs when you step into the studio? Because your songs are really intensely produced.

MC: We write as we record. It’s all home studio stuff.

Andrew Naeve: We just write and record, and what needs to be rerecorded later, we’ll touch up after the song is written. We’ve probably recorded vocals like three different times, before just tossing it and starting over.

JPC: It’s like one of those gem tumblers, where you put in all the geodes and precious rocks, and you just tumble it and tumble it and tumble it. It takes a long time, and they turn into these beautiful smooth rocks.

OV: You’ve referred to yourselves as tropical crunk music?

HC: Many times.

OV: What aspects of crunk do you guys adapt to your style?

MC: Mostly the dancing.

AN: Mostly nothing. Besides the vibe. We don’t have crunk cups.

HC: I do.

It was an emotional night at the Goodfoot bar in SE Portland, as The Water Tower Bucket Boys bid farewell to one of its founding  members. I’m not actually sure which member, or why said member decided to leave the band, but I can confirm the four-piece outfit, is now down to three.

As some of you may recall, Water Tower Bucket Boys, used to bring life to the UO campus playing bluegrass renditions of Snoop Dogg, Sublime, and of course, whatever band wrote ‘Wagon Wheel.’ They were also known purveyors of hashish.

More recently, the WTBB have been touring all across the US and Europe, playing original songs, and slanging records, not thc.

Unfortunately, free beer at pre-show party got the best of me and I was forced to leave the show about halfway through the set. But from what I saw, I can say with confidence the Water Tower Bucket Boys was worth the cost of admission. (Which in this case, was about two minutes of haggling, because, my name wasn’t on ‘the list.’ What the Fuck band promoters? Get your shit together!)

words JOSEPH DE SOSA
art IMOGEN BANKS

Are you tired of Rolling Stone? Do you want a music magazine that doesn’t feature an interview with Eddie Murphy as the feature in its latest issue? If you do, I know the magazine just for you. Its name is MaximumRocknRoll.

MRR began in 1977 as a radio show in the Bay Area, at a time when Bay Area punk bands like Dead Kennedys and Flipper were getting their starts. The radio show was ultra-popular, and in 1982 MRR magazine debuted as a music news insert in a compilation album by Alternative Tentacles (the label started by Jello Biafra, singer of the Dead Kennedys). Before his death in 2008, MRR founder Tim Yo would donate the magazine’s profits to smaller start-up zines and DIY ventures, like the legendary 924 Gilman St. in Berkeley California.

Today MaximumRocknRoll stays true to its DIY roots. It is an independent, not-for-profit underground music magazine operated entirely by volunteers that publishes submission-based band interviews. MRR releases issues monthly.

words COLETTE LEVESQUE

The West Palm Beach, Fl. foursome Surfer Blood released their first full-length album last year, Astro Coast. It sounded so good my ears wept. This past month, Surfer Blood released their first EP, Tarot Classics. It’s deadly. It has four tracks; 15 easy minutes with a steady beat, a good rhythm, and what I like to call “grown up lyrics.”

Even though Surfer Blood still abides by its beach rock roots, as a band they show maturity in their lyrical expansion. The first track, “I’m Not Ready,” which could easily be placed in Astro Coast, deals with a former friend, “sooner or later they will find out what you’re made of”. Without their frontman, John Paul Pitts, I’m not sure Surfer Blood would make it. It is his engaging harmony that shines through as he pours his broken heart out, “how can you say to me that it’s not meant to be.” The intimacy has a slacker charm, but the seriousness of friends, bad decisions, and failed relationships are extremely prevalent. The next two tracks “Voyager”, and “Drinking Problem” have an even deeper feeling. Staying true to the innocence of the ‘90s, Surfer Blood has done it and done it well. Tarot Classics, included with the four originals has two extra remixes plus a few bonus downloads.

Rated: If I had to eat 10 cookies, I’d only eat eight.

Last Wednesday night, a whiskey sour in hand and my wrists inky with stamps of various woodland creatures, I grooved to Memory Tapes as they played at the Doug Fir Lounge for the first time in Portland.  I say ‘they’ because it was not only Dayve hawk, the one man behind Memory Tapes and other projects such as Memory Cassette and Weird Tapes, but a bass player and percussionist backing him as well. Much to my surprise, they played a live show which sounded, to me, only distantly like the highly produced chillwave loops I was used to from his first album “seek magic”. Live, the sound was definitely funkier, quite bass heavy, and initially it was hard to identify each song with the tracks from his records. The familiar hook lines and beats in the background eventually clued me in, and overall the sound wasn’t unpleasant, only the show might have appealed more to a crowd looking to rock out rather than the dj set I was looking forward to. They opened with a track off his just released album “player piano”, played a handful of songs from “seek magic”, and ended with the upbeat track “bicycle”, playing for about 45 minutes in all. Another element worth mentioning were the crazy lights, which saturated the backdrop and players on stage with vivid patterns ranging from Indian rug and kaleidoscope, to something akin to the old OMNIMAX theatre intro of the  psychedelically colored tunnel through space. In all, an interesting show. Not exactly what I expected, but I still bought his LP. 

Margot Denman

If you’re up in Portland tonight, the southern garage rock band The Black Lips are playing at the Wonder Ballroom on tour to support their new album, Arabia Mountain. As the Lips are well known for their rowdy performances (which I’ve personally experienced and can vouch for), I would highly suggest that you roll. To read a review of Arabia Mountain, you can peep it here. It’s only 15 bucks, doors open at 8. Stay tuned to the blog for a live review tomorrow.  See you there.

je s u s ▲ by b <– listen/download on Bandcamp

RJD2 mini-interview/performance @ Mallard Madness.

Photo by Andrew Sexton

While I enjoy news stories about ASUO drama and fluffy opinion pieces, “The Weekend Police Blotter” is my favorite part of the Oregon Daily Emerald. If you don’t usually make it past page one, the blotter is a list of the weekend’s most serious — or most comical — police reports. Yesterday’s blotter contained this gem:

Incident: Disorderly subjects

Time: April 2, 12:55 a.m.

Location: 1626 Willamette Street [The Veteran’s Memorial Building]

Description: An individual who said he was a bartender at [Mac’s Restaurant and Nightclub] reported that a large illegal rave was going on at the Vet’s Club. He said there were multiple minors at the event and that pills and illegal drug use were present. Caller said there were between 100-200 individuals and the event was “explosive.”

A large illegal rave? Illegal drug use? Minors? Sounds awesome. Unfortunately, the event was not nearly as “explosive” as the bartender alleged. I would know. I was there.

The so-called “illegal rave” was actually a totally licit performance by three DJs: two local jockeys from Eugene, Sassy Mouff and Champagne Front, and one L.A.-based big-timer, Paul Devro, Creative Director of the Mad Decent label. (For info on Devro’s work, click here.)

After getting “disorderly” with some friends, I arrived at the venue around 11:30 p.m. The attendance was well under 100, and I’d estimate the average age to be somewhere around 17. Pubescents danced freakily on the ballroom’s sparse polished floor.

Soon after we arrived, Devro took to the turntables, and despite the smaller-than-anticipated turnout, he gave us two energetic hours of pounding bass, hair-bending synth, and records and riddims from all over the globe.

Why so few Eugeneians showed up to see one of the world’s most influential DJs spin escapes me. Perhaps it was the $8 cover, the presence of minors, and the relatively unknown venue.

But the lack of turnout did not fetter those present in getting down. Once most of the minors left to observe parent-imposed curfews, my party of eight enjoyed a near-private club experience. I for one bumped, grinded, slid on my knees across the floor, accepted a challenge to a friendly jerk battle with a kid who looks like this, and got served.

“Everyone in there was going buck,” said Devro after the show. “Last week I played to 1200 crazy-ass college kids, and tonight I played to like, I don’t know, under 100 kids, but everyone was just going crazy.”

When the bartender downstairs at Mac’s got fed up with the booming racket of techno, he called the police, and soon the party was shut down. Devro and his two hosts, Sassy Mouff and Champagne Front, headed over to The District with the intention of taking over the turntables. Just outside of Eugene’s premier nightclub, I asked Devro, “What are your last words before entering a vortex of Greek-life insanity?”

“Uh, I love my mom, I miss my dad, and hope my brother and sister live forever,” he replied. He stoically entered The District and commandeered the sound system, although this time he played noticeably more mainstream records. Listen for yourself.

Paul Devro @ The District

Butterfly Bones – “♥“

If you listen to KWVA regularly, this synth-pop band may sound familiar, as their delightfully bouncy “xoxo” received quite a bit of airplay last spring. On their “Pretty Feelings” EP, the band employs retro synthesizers to make Cyndi Lauper-inspired pop tunes with light psychedelic touches. Because of this, I often think of Butterfly Bones as a groovier version of Portland’s Starfucker.

Butterfly Bones – “xoxo”

On paper, it seems like it should be easy to dislike this band. A more cynical critic could write a list of complaints without much effort. They have song titles like “xoxo” and “♥.” Their Facebook page lists their location as “San Frandi$co.” And how tired must music critics be of using the phrase “The Eighties” when describing a band’s sound these days? But Butterfly Bones succeeds simply because they lack the condescending snarkiness of many other 80s revivalists. They remind me of Passion Pit because they make cheerful and bittersweet synth-pop without any hints of it being some kind of ironic joke, but they never really delve into the same heart-on-the-sleeve emotionality of Passion Pit. Butterfly Bones just wants to have fun, write love songs, and groove to low-key dance music. What’s wrong with writing happy music for happy people?