Misquoted: w/ Pepper
(ah we've finally come to the end of my Mile High Music Festival coverage. It was a good time. Here's the last interview)
Have you guys noticed any trends in music recently, and, if so, how do you guys feel like you fit into them?
Yesod Williams (Drums): Well it's moving away from the whole "emo" thing, it seems like.
Bret Bollinger (Bass, Vocals): There's always going to be these certain trends that will stick throughout history no matter what. I'm talking about the "Walt Disney" "young kid" act,
Kaleo Wasman (Guitar, Vocals): Jonas Brothers
BB: That trend will always be present no matter what era of music we're in.
YW: Hannah Montana
BB: Right, right. They've been around forever. Boy bands or girl groups, you know like "power! yay!" Those trends will always be around. We're just looking for the next trend that'll really shake things up, until the corporate world grabs them and makes them stupid, just like everyone else.
YW: It just turns it into a mass produced product
KW: The only thing I have to add to that is that a lot of music, just popular music, even some music that I've grown up with, it seems like everyone's just like "what do we have to do to make this work?" … Everything sounds more and more like a commercial to me. But, like, not as good. Like Meow Mix, Meow Mix is better to me than a lot of Top 40.
Where do you guys think you fit into that? Like, how do you write your songs? Do you focus in on a certain type of music or genre or…?
KW: I think every artist has a place that they can go to where they feel the most comfortable, so maybe they'll go to a certain type of beat or whatever to make sure that their writing isn't really inhibited. They're like "okay, I don't have to concentrate on this new beat, so I'm able to write a little more." I think certain artists have a niche that they can fall into just so they're comfortable and they're able to expand. But that's the thing, they're able to expand off of that, and keep letting it expand and expand.
YW: And always inevitably it has to do with what you're listening to at the time. Say you're listening to "this" type of music at "that" time, it inevitably comes out in your own music, even unconsciously.
What kind of stuff are you guys listening to these days? Like recent stuff that is really changing the way you think about music?
KW: I'll be honest, and this is one of the ones that is more mainstream and has been around, but I've really been enjoying the Kings of Leon a lot.
YW: Yeah, I've been listening to them a lot. I've been listening to a lot of Muse. Muse is awesome.
Is there old stuff out there that is still changing the way you think about music?
BB: All the time. There's all those bands … well, for instance, Tool that we watched last night. That was the first time for us to see them after all these years.
YW: They'll continue to blow everyone's mind for the rest of Earth, you know what I mean? Their music is so timeless and powerful.
BB: Here's something cool about Tool: you put on a new record, and you're like "oh yeah, it sounds exactly where they just continued off of their last record." And then it goes somewhere else too.
YW: Yeah, whether it's like 5 years between releases or whatever.
KW: It's like they're writing an amazing book or creating an amazing story.
