Catch the Breeze with A Shoreline Dream - An Interview

Denver, Colorado é o lar do cultuado A Shoreline Dream mesmo refutando a ideia do shoegazer os americanos Ryan, vocais, guitarras e teclados, Erik, guitarras, Enoc baixo e Jennifer bateria, evocam as as mais classicas caracteristicas do shoegazer com albuns absolutamente intrigantes e densos, Avoiding the Consequences e Recolletctions of Memory fora o soberdo EP Coastal, por vezes cristalinas e viajantes camadas de guitarras e drones repetitidos, por outras tensas e densas sequencias em crescendo em altos decibeis fazem do mundo dos sonhos do A Shoreline Dream tornar-se extremamente peculiar e atrativo. Aproveitando o lançamento de Losing Them All To this Time o novissimo album dos caras o TBTCI mais do que depressa apresenta a todos o mundo particular dos sonhos deste prediletissimo da casa.

***** Interview with A Shoreline Dream *****

Q. When did A Shorilne Dream starts, tell us about the history...

A. A Shoreline Dream began back in 2005, with the first album being released in 2005. It started with a member of my previous band, Drop The Fear, and was quite literally a sound we had been striving to try out for many years. Something lush, something dark, and something that had an endless space to fill. We began with a remix we were working on titled "motherly advice". At the time it was just the two of us, but as we found the tone we were hoping to achieve, we realized something was missing. That being more instrumentation, and a live feel, since it originated as an electronic oriented project. I got ahold of a member of another project I was in for many years called Pure Drama, and soon we found ourselves working with Erik Jeffries, and Enoc Torraca, who was a fan of Drop the Fear. This began a summer of live experimentation in my home studio, and after some stoney sessions, we realized we had all stumbled upon a sound we all loved. Something bigger than we ever imagined. The production really brought it all to life, and soon thereafter we felt so confident in what we had, that I took a loan out, and we started our own label, latenight weeknight records. We figured it wasn't really worth shopping our disc around to countless labels, only to become aggravated in a market that was struggling to survive. We just wanted people to hear what we had created, and we wanted to remove the step of finding an investor. We invested in ourselves, and still do to this day. We've made some amazing alliances through it all, and we've released nine discs thus far through the label, with this new album "losing them all to this time" being the third full length album for a shoreline dream.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. This is a great question, as to be totally honest, when we first started this up, my biggest influence, and one which probably influenced our whole production style more than any other was Dead Can Dance. Not all of their work has appealed to me, but their first disc is still to this day one of my all time favorites. The spacial qualities, and the overall tonality revolutionized the goth genre, while not being goth. It was something entirely new. It was something that still hasn't been recreated to this day, and I love it. That along with The Smashing Pumpkins, Tori Amos, Depeche Mode and even bands as obscure and different as Morgoth and Cynic, all lead to the influences that you hear in our music.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…
A. Wow, this one is difficult, but I'll try. This list could change tomorrow ;)

5. Depeche Mode - Violator
4. Type O Negative - October Rust
3. Engineers - Engineers
2. Iron Maiden - Iron Maiden
1. Dead Can Dance - Dead Can Dance

Q. How do you feel playing alive?

A. Playing live is something I can't explain. Everytime it happens I can't remember. It goes by so fast. It's such a huge release of emotion and of frustrations. It's amazing. I couldn't live without it. It's a life force all within itself. When we played with Chapterhouse last fall I had a somehwat holy experience, and I'm not even religious. I don't know how I could ever do another gig as amazing as that one. I found myself falling on the floor with my guitar in hand on numerous occasions.

Q. How do you describe A Shoreline Dream sounds?
A. Our sounds are strange. I always like the melodipsych term. Someone called us that once and we always go by it. Obscure enough without sounding pretentious. I personally think we sound like a band playing at the bottom of a well. The vocals are layered, and the tones all play out handing off to one another. We're like a train passing by at 100 miles per hour.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the albuns, What´s the difference between them?A. All of our material has primarily happened in a similar way. We have a permanent setup at my studio where we literally just jam away in, recording everything that happens. Sometimes we'll come back after one session and realize we have a song done. Other times we might find parts that we dig, and we'll expand on them. It totally depends on our moods, the time of year, and the sound quality of the room at the time. Ona few occassions, such as last year, songs have come together outside of the studio. I travelled to London and wrote a track with Ulrich Schnauss in his studio. It's good to mix it up. Sometimes the vibe of the city comes through in the power of the song. On this new album we literally had songs that happened in one take, and some which we worked on for months and months.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
A. I still don't entirely understand what shoegazer really means, or what the sound really is when someone says it. I've never really considered ourselves a shoegazer band. I don't know what the hell we are really. But if someone says we are playing classic shoegaze, and they like that way of describing us, I'm all for it. I think all music is really up to interpretation. Some might say we're progressive. Some might say we're goth, while many might consider us shoegaze. It doesn't really matter what you call us, as long as you're listening ;)

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
A. So many great acts out there. I'd say Engineers for sure if you haven't heard of them already. Digging Serena-Maneesh as well. Jaga Jazzist is outstanding. A few bands from our hometown also shine quite brightly, such as Moonspeed and Hearts in Space. Of course, as a self plug I must also mention Brim Liski. It's a side project of mine with another artist in the Denver area named Cacheflowe. Even though it's self produced, I've been listening to it quite often.... Hope others do as well!

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
A. We recently did our first cover, that being "the chain" by Fleetwood Mac. Had a great time with that one. Love taking older songs and giving the beef in production value.

Q: What´s the plans for future....
A. We're looking to play out again once the dust settles, and do a US West Coast tour, or possibly hit up the East Coast as well. We'd love to get out of our country and do some gigs around the world as well. One step at a time...

Q: Any parting words?
A. Please people, keep buying music. I know it's easy to steal, and it doesn't seem wrong, but it is. Lotsa hungry, talented musicians out there, and they depend on you to help keep them going. It's damn near impossible to survive off of music these days, and I blame it all on the internet.
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Thanks Ryan!!

http://www.ashorelinedream.com/RECOLLECTIONS_SITE/index.html

Fait Accompli with Blindness - An Interview

Novidade absoluta, cortesia de meu queridissimo amigo desde os tempo do Club AC30 Matt Wyatt e seu gravadora White Label Music e é o seguinte primeiro ep da ex Curve/SPC Eco Debbie com sua novissima banda, Blindness, o som, well o som é um thriller eletronico e noise como nos bons tempos do Curve, mais pesado e caotico, dá para sacar pelas influencias das meninas, que voce pega na exclusivissima entrevista com essas garotas que perpetuaram os desejos da galera, sem mais conversa, Blindness.

***** Interview with Blindness *****

Q. When did Blindness starts, tell us about the history...

A: At the end of 2007 when I left my previous band I started learning to use software. I knew Debbie from Curve and Kendra from her previous band Flame On and knew I'd like to work with both of them. Debbie was playing with Dean Garcia's band SPC-ECO and I went to see them a few times and eventually approached Debbie about playing on some tracks of mine. She agreed to have a listen and after that agree to do some recording, so I took a the tracks on my laptop to her flat and we did loads of recording in an afternoon.

I asked Kendra about playing but she was tied up with Flame On at the time. A few months later she came back to me as Flame On was starting to wind down and said she'd be up for playing so we got practicing and booked our first gig as an all-girl three-piece in May 2009.

Later on that year, Debbie ran into Alex, who she had played with years previously in Night Nurse, and he said that he was looking for a band so we got him down to practice and rest is a very noisy history!

Q: Who are your influences?

A: Kate Bush, Nine Inch Nails, Curve, PJ Harvey, The Jesus & Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Garbage, The Fall.

Q. Made a list of 5 albums of all time…

A: Hounds Of Love - Kate Bush

VU - The Velvet Underground

Pixies – Doolittle

MBV – Loveless

NIN – The Fragile

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A: Alive. And sweaty

Q. How do you describe Blindness´ sounds?

A: Electro filth, walls of guitar, girly lushness vocals, pounding rhythm section.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the debut ep?

A: Guitars were mostly recorded in my living room. The neighbours are very understanding.

A: The programmed drums, synths and vocals were recorded in my living room and then I took them to Debbie's living room where we recorded guitars. Bass was recorded in Kendra's living room and then it was mixed by Jim "Ping" King and myself in Finsbury Park.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to Blindness?

A: Floppy fringes, long-sleeved T-Shirts and Home Counties accents, mainly.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A: The Koolaid Electric Company, Pope Joan, Teeth Of The Sea

A: Blindness. Oh, apart from us? Hold Kiss Kill.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A: We've done a few - Pet Shop Boys, Slits, Beyonce.

What´s the plans for future....

A: To have a good time. All of the time. That's my ambition, Marty.

Q: Any parting words?
A: WALLOP!

A: "Everyday, once a day, give yourself a present."
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Thanks Blindness....and thanks Matt!!

http://wlmshoponline.co.uk/

Never Lose That Feeling with The Ludvico Treatment - An Interview

Ludvico Treatment, soa desconhecido para você?! Pode até soar, mas não deveria, ainda mais se estamos falando de shoegazer clássico, layers e mais layers de guitarras, muito Ride e Swervedriver condensados e expurgados diretamente para 2011, vinte anos após a era clássica a profecia continua, e vem em grandioso estilo o segundo album do Ludvico Treatment é literalmente uma obra de arte, a começar pela concepção uma luxuosa embalagem em limitadissima tiragem de 100 copias que é melhor colocar uma foto para ter a real noção do capricho e bom gosto, sem contar a sonoridade que pelo inicio do texto já dá para ilustrar bem a vertente dos canadenses, se o primeiro album Romanticism já deixava clarissimo que além dos shoegazer classicos citados a crueza de um Smashing Pumpinks fica elucidade definitivamente nessa epopeia chamada Politeia, um daqueles albuns que poucos irão ouvir, mas quem ouvir certamente vibrara exaustivamente tamanho a grandeza das canções, e aproveitando o ensejo o TBTCI rapidamente publica a todos mais uma das classicas entrevistas, desssa vez com o grande, mais muito grande Ludvico Treatment.

***** Interview with Ludvico Treatment *****

Q. When did Luvico Treatment e starts, tell us about the history...
Alex: Adam & I met in 2000 through mutual friends. He had formed a makeshift band and when it turned out that the bassist wasn't going to work out, those mutual friends pointed out that I could play guitar. After a year or so of creating strange glam punk / metal fusions of obnoxious noise the band broke up. However, Adam & I had suddenly found a style and method of working that fit us rather well. All this happened in Calgary, Alberta, but after years of writing and recording material, our unsuccessful struggles to find musicians for a live band resulted in Adam leaving to find fresher pastures while I stayed behind to finish my English degree. We maintained a writing relationship and Adam formed various excellent line ups to play the songs in Vancouver. The live band really was excellent, and did things with our work that I wouldn't have believed possible. And now we're here. Adam is living in Montreal and I am just about to move to Toronto. The writing and recording continues.

Q: Who are your influences?
Adam: When we first started writing Ludvico material in 2003 we wanted to make loud rock music with a bit of electronics on the side. Turns out The Cooper Temple Clause beat us to it and definitely influenced us. Aside from the big names in shoegaze (My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive and the like), we’ve taken a lot of influence from The Smiths & Manic Street Preachers, and our mixing tendencies of loud drums & guitars comes from Nirvana.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…
Adam: David Sandström – Om Det Inte Händer Nåt Innan Imorgon Så Kommer Jag (a big influence on how our album Politeia turned out), Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – Let Love In, The Magnetic Fields – The Charm of the Highway Strip, Spiritualized – Pure Phase, Slowdive – Souvlaki.

Alex: Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible, Refused - The Shape of Punk to Come, Mansun - Six, My Bloody Valentine - Loveless, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Murder Ballads.

Q. How do you fell playing alive?
Adam: Well, I’ve always been in charge of the live band (though Alex joined us for our final show in Vancouver) and nothing beats the feeling of a successful gig. I have to say that some of my best experiences with the live band were in the practice space though; there have been some great feedback-laden jams over the years, particularly when we had new guitar pedals to play with. Makes me wish we recorded our practices!

Q. How do you describe Ludvico Treatment sounds?

Alex: I think the simple answer here is that Adam and I share a passion for trying to put the ugly and the beautiful together. I did this with the lyrics of our latest release, Politeia, by telling what is quite an ugly allegory in a form that I tried to make as beautiful as possible. As for our sound, we try to couple loud, abrasive noise with beautiful melodies. I like to think of the noises that Adam creates as glacial, both beautiful and terrible, in the sense of terror-inducing, at the same time.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?
Adam: This new album (Politeia) is a bit odd as we started recording it back in 2004 and I added bits and pieces to it over a very long period of time, usually recording in basements & home studios with borrowed equipment. The songs were basically written and mostly complete by the time our first album was released but I felt that the production wasn’t perfect. It started to feel like what Brian Wilson must have felt with the Beach Boys’ album “Smile” and I started feeling like the album mixes would never match the sounds in my head. Then in 2010 we opened for Adam Franklin from Swervedriver- that gave me the inspiration to just finish Politeia and just put it out, perfect or not. His band had this amazing rawness to it. After that show I plugged in my old Echoplex tape delay, added some new guitar parts, remixed a few songs and released it.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
Adam: 1991-1993 is the ‘classic’ period for us. The press backlash against shoegaze was at its peak in the UK which might explain how so many great albums came out in those years... perhaps the backlash spurred those bands on to greatness! Loveless, Just for a Day, Raise, Lazer Guided Melodies, Going Blank Again, Souvlaki, Mezcal Head, Ferment- not to mention all the 12” EPs that came out in that period. Wow.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
Adam: The Hope Slide is the new electro-gaze project by the singer and lead guitarist from Hinterland who were a great Canadian shoegaze band. Cruyff in the Bedroom from Japan have been around a while but they still amaze me. The drumming on the first two albums is unbelievable.

Alex: I've been finding my head turned by quieter electronica-laden work at the moment. The band Guerre is going to become something quite lovely, I think. I've also been listening to the album by Spider and the Flies a lot. They're made up by two of the guys from the Horrors using sounds inspired by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in the 60s. Really interesting.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
Adam: Our live sets often started with Angel by Massive Attack and we recorded Reptile Smile by Th’ Faith Healers for our Myspace page, both are great songs. Right now we’re recording our interpretation of a David Bowie LP (Earthling) just for fun. I love that album but the production feels a bit mismatched with the songs in some places. We’re hoping to finish it & post it online by the end of the summer… it should be interesting to say the least!

Q: What´s the plans for future....
Alex: We have a habit of working on our next project while finishing our current one. We did that with our first release, Romanticism, and Politeia, and we've done it again. Work is already well underway on our third album, as well as our re-envisioning of Earthling and a couple of other projects. I'm incredibly excited about the directions Adam and I have gone recently. Look out for something (relatively) soon.

Q: Any parting words?
Adam: I’ve had the good fortune of getting production advice from Graham Lewis of Wire on a few occasions and it has always proven invaluable for us. Despite the recent trend of D.I.Y.-everything in the music industry (which we do as much as anyone), an unbiased perspective is still crucial when making an album. The wisdom of an experienced producer can transform a decent album into something truly excellent.
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Thanks guys!!!

http://theludvicotreatment.bandcamp.com/

Behind Us Now by Skylight - An Interview with Perry Pelonero & Brent Martino

A era clássca do shoegazer trouxe-nos inumeros clássicos MBV, Slowdive, Chapterhouse, Ride, Swervedriver, enfim os top of the tops daquela epoca, porém o submundo dos bons sons também esta completamente recheado de pequenas obscuridades tão maravilhosas como as principais, é o caso do Skylight, pequeno combo noise shoegazer, imerso sob microfonias, loops, eletronices caoticos, dream pop, ou seja todos os elementos fundamentais para se criar obras primas do genero. 1991 foi o ano que Perry Peloreno colocou suas excentricidades em forma musical, inumeras formações e singles, eps, passaram-se na tumultuada trajetoria do Skylight, que contou ate seus ultimos devaneios com o proprio Perry em companhia de Brent Martino e ja em seu final com Kim Wesh, após o Skylight a junção de Perry e Kim transformou-se em bliss.city.eat grandiosa banda dream/shoegazer/electro/noise nos moldes de SVI e mais ainda Morpheme e a junção com Dean Garcia ex Curve e atual SPC Eco junto com Perry e Kim, sem perder o folego, vamos a entrevista historica de Perry e Brent para o TBTCI explicando definitivamente o porque o Skylight tem uma cultuada gama de seguidores no qual eu me incluo, além de causos de Perry com Swervedriver, MBV, Mercury Rev e outros masters da epoca, desde já entrevista que virara cult aqui TBTCI.

***** Interview with Perry Pelonero (Skylight/bliss.city.eat/Morpheme & Brent Martino (Skylight/ The Scarlet Mouning *****

Q. About the early years of Skylight, tell us about the beginning, when did the band starts?
Perry: Some mixed up memories.

The band started around 1991 when i met Mike Bunnell through some friends. I had just moved to the Boston area after leaving New York City. In NYC i was heavily involved in the punk rock hardcore scene and by the late 80s, i was sick of it.. At first me and Mike started making noise tracks with a sampler and whatever else we had laying around. We eventually shared an apartment together and we used to record via a radio shack mixer into a cassette player. It was fucking weird, but it worked well. Mike was one of the first peoplei knew to make loops with a guitar i think... Using an Alesis sampler. We started listening to music coming out of the UK that i guess was called shoegaze? We had already been heavily influenced by bands from the UK .. Echo and the bunnymen, the cure etc... But this stuff was different. We put a band together and brought some different people in and got a manager who in the end fucked us pretty hard after moving to NYC and vanishing. He even stole our original recordings. His name was Howard... And i would love to kick his fucking ass inside out to this day. We recorded a demo with him not long after meeting him. Mike had this great idea of running his guitar through this old yamaha noise keyboard synth after i found we could input the guitar with it... It gave us that string effect for the original As you leave recording. Amazing stuff it was for us. After recording the first demo, we added two new members to the band. A friend of ours Marie played guitar along with Mike, and a drummer. We practiced in the basement of this house we were all living in. We had no money at all, and had to fill our oil furnace with diesel fuel because we could not afford oil. We had a house full of cats as well, because they kept having kittens... We had one cat that used to jump off the roof of the house into a flower pot. People would come over just to see it.

Really it was kind of fucked up. Everybody was fucking everybody, strange people showing up to our house, people getting piercings in fucked up places on their bodies... Everybody in the house got crabs at one point because somebody had dropped some in our house. Me and Mike made up strange games to play during the day to keep us busy. Like tossing super balls in cans. We had a car that would not start unless one of us pushed it down a hill. So every place we went we had to park on a hill. We lived next door to this asshole with a ham radio and giant fucking antenna. He use to come through on all of our recordings the signal was so strong. We asked him to stop but he never did. Instead he would talk about us on his radio and we would hear him. We tried calling the FCC but that failed. So one day we cut and spliced a bunch of his words that we had recorded on a tape. We arranged the words so he would call himself an asshole. Making him say he ate his own shit and stuff. Really funny things... But some drums and keys behind it... We then made a tape and put it on his front door and rain his doorbell. He was so so mad. He even called our landlord... But to us it was funny. We laughed for days about it. He never turned his fucking radio down though.

Before our first show we really wanted video playing behind us so we came up with some cool ideas. We went to the library and rented a film about nature. Flowers, birds etc... We then took a camera and took all sorts of weird photos. Like close ups of wonder bread bags and windows etc. We turned those photos into slides. And ran the slides over the nature film which gave this really cool effect. It really went well with our live show actually. Trippy. Our friend had made a video of it at one point, but it’s long gone now. Kind of sad, because i would give anything to see it again.

After going through rehearsals for our first live show we were ready. Our friend Eric booked us at a club that had just opened. The day of the show came, and the place was packed with people. I think we were a bit shocked. It was time to hit the stage and when we did it all started. First off, our drummer straight off played everything the wrong way. We had been practicing with him for weeks. Complete fuck up. I still say he was nervous and had never played a live show. After suffering through a few songs with him, i got really pissed off and threw my bass on the ground... I came back a minute later and we just started making NON stop noise. For at least 15 minutes. Mind you, this was before MBV had ever made it to the USA . Although i cannot confirm that. I think we had heard stories of them doing the noise bliss though. At this point the crowd we brought in started clearing out. Funny to look back on actually. By the end of the show, our drummer took off. According to Brent a friend who joined Skylight later on, i had been threatening to kill the drummer and he was scared shitless. We fired him after that show and went back to using two different drum machines. We continued to record and play various shows in our living room and other places.Then one day our manager called and said he was leaving and moving to NYC. At this point we thought what do we have to lose by doing the same?? I contacted my sister who was living just over the bridge from NYC in NJ and asked her if we could come down and stay with her for a short time. So we had a huge yard sale and made money. Packed up all our shit. Rented a U haul and drove to NJ. We arrived at my sister’s house in NJ. Not long before we arrived, her neighbor had just blown his heart up by swallowing a couple of 8 balls of cocaine because the cops had pulled him over in the driveway. My sister was visibly upset but also acting really weird about it. I thought to myself holy shit what are we doing here!! Come to find out she was moving because she had lost her house due to a serious drug issue she had so she helped us all find a new place to live which ended up being on top of a strip club in the worst neighborhood in Paterson NJ. It was horrible. Every night the song I LIKE BIG BUTTS would blast through the floors of our apartment. The club was disgusting. Hookers all over the neighborhood tons of crack being sold. My sister had all sorts of weird people coming in and out of the apartment. One of them was this dude who told us a story about his mother making somebody float out from underneath her bed one night. And when we tried to walk away from him, he pulled out a gun and told us to stay. Yeah, it was that fucked up. During this time our manager had vanished into thin air. We tried calling him and he never returned calls. We rented rehearsal time in Hoboken and rehearsed whenever we could. We had no money what so ever, and had to take jobs for a towing service that my sister’s boyfriend at the time owned. We stayed in the area as long as we could. Shows, hanging out at a friend’s record store and making music whenever we could. We saw a lot of cool shows in New York City around that time. And really that time period was just as electric for music as it was in the 80s. Timeless.Eventually after some of us going through some serious drug problems, we packed the band up and moved back to the Boston area. Looking back on this though, we really had a ton of fun as well. I mean we were all about the music, and played whenever we could. The noise man.. the noise man..

Once we got back, we had no idea what to do honestly. We spent a short time doing whatever we could. Until one day Mike just up and left for college. This was around the same time the Brent joined the band actually. I have always been on the same page with Brent musically. All of these years went by and when we started writing together again, it was magic. I would bet it will always be like that... Aside from Brent writing his side of things here, i emailed him the other day and asked him to share some memories of that time period and this is what he sent me. Hilarious to read this because i forgot about most of it! In 1993 Brent said this.

Brent: I came to be in skylght in the spring of 1993 when the band was basically Mike and Perry, I had known Perry for a couple of years through a friend I was in another band with. Shortly after joining Mike left and we became Bloome, we added another guitar player (Sean) and a drummer (Rick), I think mostly because I love to use live drums. Perry typically had bad luck with drummers so we had been using a drum machine but their is just something about a live drummer that pulls it all together for me. We recorded an unfinished 4 song demo and played live once, then things fell apart and we went our separate ways. Perry continued on with other versions of Skylight over the years. Perry and I reconnected through myspace in 2007 after close to 12 years and within a couple of weeks we were trading tracks online and Skylight was once again reborn, soon after we added Pete Kontos on Guitar and Kim Welsh on Vocals


Q. What are the bands influences?
Perry: It is impossible for me to sum up influences. Even in the early 90s i was listening to tons of classic rock. I believe we did a sabbath cover once during rehearsals. All music is an influence to me really... I suppose everything!

Brent: All the usual suspects MBV, Slowdive, Boo Radleys, Swervdriver, all of those late 80's early 90's bands. I think the thing that has always made skylight special is that in addition to our shared shoegaze influences we also all had a very diverse set of other influences and though we were a "Shoegaze" band we weren't afraid to draw on bands outside that genre. For me that is bands like Jane's Addiction, The Sisters of Mercy, Prince, Fields of the Nephilim, and especially The Cure.

Q. Tell us about the Skylight gigs, how is it?
Perry: When we did play it was awesome really. Besides out first show with the idiotic drummer. Once we got the drum machines settled it was cool... We used a boss DR Rhythm and slaved an Alesis via midi.. We tried a cassette once but that failed. We were all about the noise though. Whenever we had a chance we would just make tons of noise. Mike and I would always add extra people when we could but that never really worked out so well. To be honest, Marie was the best we ever had. We taught her all the guitar parts she needed to know. And she would just come out and play. She was into the noise man. She was very talented. Nobody has a clue what ever happened to her actually. I was in touch with her years ago, but her fuck nut boyfriend intercepted emails and said nobody was allowed to email her anymore. Live she was always good... It was about fun for us though. Making noise was all we wanted to do. And that is exactly what we did every time we played. Some loved it, most hated it. Which is exactly what we wanted.

Brent: Because Perry and Kim are in Chicago and Pete and I are in Boston we have essentially been a virtual band for the last few years. We had talked about going out there or them coming here to do a show but life gets in the way and so far it hasn't happened. Back in the day whether writing or recording Perry and I have always been on the same page musically, we have some kind of musical telepathy.


Q. What´s your favourite Skylight song, why?
Perry: As You Leave and Winter Lights. As you leave because it was one of the first that me and Mike ever wrote together. And Winter Lights because it was the first Kim wrote after joining Skylight. Those words have special meaning.

Brent: It's a tie between Winter Lights and Tigerlily. Winter lights because it was the first thing Perry and I wrote together after not talking in over 12 years and tigerlily because I love the atmosphere it creates.

Q. Made a list of your top five albums from all time
Perry: No fucking way. You and i both now that is totally impossible J As much as i would love to do that.. How about anything Led Zeppelin did? Or Killing Joke?? Or T Rex. Or The Cars.

Brent: As I said I have a wide range of influences but I will narrow it down to 5. If you asked me again tomorrow it would probably change. These are 5 that I love and had the most influence on my playing over the years.

The Cure, Disintegration
The Sisters of Mercy, First and Last And Always
Slowdive, Souvlaki
Jane's Addiction, Nothings Shocking
Asobi Seksu, Citrus



Q. Skylight emerge during the classic era of Shoegazer, do you have some histories with bands like MBV, Slowdive, etc…
Brent: Perry has a lot more other band stories he was always more outgoing then me and always knew everyone. The one story I have was spending an evening drinking with Swervedriver at the Rat Skellar in Boston. Perry is friends with them and we had gone down to see their show with the Smashing pumpkins but due to a series of crazy mishaps the show was cancelled. So instead we drank, talked about our mutual love of Alice Cooper and their bass player gave me some great relationship advice, LOL.

Perry: We were lucky in that sense. Wet met Swervedriver early on and i became friends with Adam.... What a wonderful person he is really. I actually love his solo records so much maybe more so than the swervedriver records. Although they both are different to me. I was going to play with him a couple of years ago when his bass player broke his ankle or something. In the end the Churchs keyboard player filled in which was good because i had two days to learn the songs and one of those days we had a power failure at our house.

I spent a lot of time with swervies in the 90s. For various reasons and have some funny stories about being on tour with them. One of them was the great stolen camera incidentJ.. A good friend Claire was with us on tour in 94 and we were in Rhode Island. Swerves had a merch dude Matt. He was incredibly funny this guy. So one night Claire went off some place and Matt grabbed me with a sharpie in hand, and Claires camera. She had left it with Matt to watch. So Matt takes me outside and said this. You take this sharpie, i will pull down my pants and you write HELLO CLAIRE on my ass. Take a picture of it. So Matt rips down his pants, i write HELLO CLAIRE as big as i could, and i took a picture. After the tour back in England, she got the photos developed and we were in Swervies managers office and Claire comes in and said MY PARENTS almost saw this!! Or maybe they did. I cannot remember. It was a classic moment though.

The great thing about the folks in Swervedriver is they were just cool people to hang out with. Never any bullshit with them. The music they made was just always there man. Mezcal Head being one of the best rock records done in the 90s in my opinion. An album that still stands up and can be listened to over and over.

We spent a lot of time with MBV and Mercury Rev as well. Rev were really cool and MBV smoked a shit ton of weed man. One joint would go out and another would just be passed around. Debbie is/was the best person in that band really. She was incredibly sweet and spent a lot of time talking with us in Canada one time. I remember bringing Skylight demos to them as well.

It was funny seeing MBV with DINO JR when we did, because Dino Jr just blew them off the stage. I was always convinced that Kevin Shields made all that noise knowing full well they did not even compare to DINO JR live. When MBV did the reunion i had NO interest in seeing them. I actually agree with what Alan McGee said about loveless which was basically that he cannot stand to even listen to it. And truthfully i feel the same way. One note from loveless and i am ready to vomit. I can listen to the early Eps though. Without the vomit . Some records from back then stand the test of time. That is not one of them in my opinion. Not much different from how i feel about slowdive actually. GAK.. I think its cool Kevin went on to do things with Primal Scream though. I love Primal Scream. We met Bobby and the rest once when they played with Depeche Mode i think it was. He could hardly stand up. He was wobbling back and forth but incredibly nice. And they were almost always good live when we saw them. We have a number stories from back then. Maybe we should write a book or something.

Oh, i almost forgot about Brad and the Medicine folks! Awesome people and fun to watch live!!! As i said i should write a book!!!!!!

Q. Why Skylight RIP?
Brent: Though at the moment Perry would likely disagree I would never call it dead, maybe in a state of suspended animation. Skylight has a way of popping back up when we least expect it. At the moment though perry is busy with his other bands, Bliss City East and Morpheme and Pete and I have a new band called This Scarlet Mourning (along with Don Barry on Bass and Katie Bunting on vocals). We are planning to hit the studio in July for a new single called Stupid World. As for Skylight you never know it's only ever one Facebook message from Perry away from waking up, we may be in an old age home when it happens but who knows "elderly gaze" might catch on!

Perry: Skylight has been following me on and off for a long time. I appreciate people remembering the band, asking us to do shows as well. But i kind of felt with Brent doing his own band out east now, and me and Kim doing bliss.city.east and morpheme with Dean i just cannot see time doing anything else. I am not saying its over completely. I mean, we were asked to do a show in Chicago as a reunion kind of thing, but really it would only be me as an original member. I am not saying NO but i am also not saying YES. Depends on my mood.

Q. About bliss.city.east, when the band starts?
Perry: Bliss started a couple of years ago with Kim Welsh my girlfriend and baby Mama We did it so we could play live shows mainly. But as it turns out, we just love making music together. We spend an incredible amount of time together. We have a studio in our house, so we record whenever we feel the need. Its awesome actually. I could not ask for anything more with Kim. She is perfect. We went through some other members during this time. None of them really worked out until Eric D’Asto joined the band, who has also been PERFECT. He just adds to everything we do and makes it perfect always.

We had another dude who was in the band for a short time but was a horrible musician. When we listen back to his tracks on our recordings now, its just awful. He has also been stalking us via the net for a couple of years now. Non stop. Put our music up on his site as well and its blatantly obvious its me playing guitar. He is a real sick fucker actually. He even sent threatening emails about shooting us and stuff. It’s been taken care of, but you really need to watch out who you invite in the band these days!! bliss started off with Gail and Reuben in the band. Two people that helped out so much and did a ton. We see Reuben all the time but Gail just kind of vanished a year or so ago.

I love bliss though. Our live shows are always shitty, but we have fun doing what we do and that is all that matters to us. It’s perfect.

Q. How you define bliss.city.east sounds?
Perry: I have NO idea. Its just whatever comes out of us at the time. Black and Blue was our tribute to The Cars. If that helps at all. I suppose maybe Dream pop??? I hate genres even though i know they are needed in some way. So yeah, Dream pop.

Q. Tell us about the process of recording the songs...
Perry: It’s been tough with no drummer i can tell you that much. If we had a drummer things would be different. But i have BAD drummer luck. I cannot stand most of them. They either cannot keep up with us, or are just flat out fucking weird. So i gave up on finding one. I do most of the programming of drums myself here at our studio. Most of the time it would be writing the base of the song and then have Kim and Eric come in behind me and add parts. This year though, we have been running drum tracks and all writing together. This is something i truly love and plan to continue. We have a ton of songs, none of them are ready. We are in no hurry to release anything.

Q. The split with Vigulgi OoyoO is a masterpiece to me, do you agree?
Perry: A masterpiece? I don’t know about that!! But thank you!!! We appreciate it! Vidulgi had some great tracks on that album. So did we actually .Nothing ever came of that record. We had a label in England who supposed to release it on vinyl and CD but they ended up just fucking us over completely. Honestly, i am kind of disgusted the way the whole thing was done in the end. Music was great on it though...

Q. What do you think about the classic Shoegaze era?
Perry: It was electric. The shows, the people most of the bands. We were lucky to be front and center when it all went down. I miss that time and i miss a lot of the bands as well.

Q. Which bands would you like to do a cover version of?
Perry: The only cover song we would ever do would be something from The Cars J. we are working on our version of moving in stereo. Although, i would love to cover Higher than the sun by Primal Scream.

Q. Which new bands would you recommend?
Perry: Screen Vinyl Image for sure. Jake and Kim rule and put on one of the greatest live shows. Love Culture from Ohio. Great people and a good band. Tom Lugo and Stellarscope! Plus his label Patetico!!! Music for headphones as well!!! Man the list goes on, and i am sure i am missing some.BLOODY KNIVES. !! Great people and fun to play a show with... Presents for Sally as well. Matt Etherton is a really great person. I heard this band SPC ECO was good. Try them out. So many awesome people involved in this scene these days though. The folks from when the sun hits, Paul Lopez who runs the shoegaze collective. Ambient Airwaves, all of these people working hard to support the bands. My apologies to bands i missed. If you know me well, then you will understand I have a hard enough time remembering my name!!!

Q. About Morpheme, what´s the concept of the band and how´s working with Dean Garcia?
Perry: AS long i do not have to hear THE C WORD ( Curve ).. Don’t get me wrong, Curve did some great things no doubt!! Seriously though...Working with Dean is awesome. We are good friends besides. We have a really cool chemistry between us in music and friendship.. It’s like we read each other’s minds when it comes to music as well.So much has changed in the music business. So its much different than either one of us are used to dealing with. Honestly, we should have been doing this in the 90s!! But its just perfect writing with him. We never really had a concept. Although Kim has been getting a bit political with her lyrics. We all just write what we feel. I pop it off to Dean, he sends it back. Kim adds her lovely voice to it and Bobs Yer Uncle Kim has been doing our videos as well. The video for stratosphere was banned from facebook! Rock on...

Q. What the plans for the future?
Perry: Finish the Morpheme record with Dean and Kim. Finish the bliss album with Kim and Eric. Raise my beautiful daughter. And that is about it.

Q. Any parting words?
Perry: Yeah. I want to take a moment to thank all the people out there supporting all of our bands. Buying our music. Stealing our music whatever. You guys are all awesome. In Chicago i wanted to take a moment to thank Arunas from Darkroom and DJ Scarylady Sarah, William Faith and Philly Peroxide for putting on a great two day festival of bands last month. It was awesome. They have a once a month shoegaze thing here in Chicago at Late bar called Shimmer. So if you are in Chicago, you should go to this.!!! Joey Levenson from SPC ECO for always adding his bits to bliss music. Again i am sure that i am missing people i should be thanking. I am a scatter brain!!!

And finally thank YOU for doing this interview and waiting for me to finish it!!!

Pardon all my jumbled words and stories as well!!

Peace
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Thanks Perry and Brent

http://skylight91.bandcamp.com/album/behind-us-now

Gone Beyond by PeRPLeXa

Uma daquelas preciosidades que permanecerão obscuras e poucos mortais terão acesso ao sublime mundo de visões enigmaticas, viagens oniricas, anjos, demônios, tudo de forma mezzo post rock, mezzo experimental, mezzo post punk, mezzo psychedelic, assim é o mundo de Jonathan Wald e seu PeRPLeXa, uma celebração movida a ritmos tribais, layers e mais layers de guitarras epicas e cristalinas celebrando tragedias, amores, musica para entrar na alma e não sair nunca mais. Quer conhecer mais a fundo, então faça um grande favor a você mesmo, leia a entrevista que gentilmente foi concebida pelo proprio Jonathan sobre o mundo particular de seu PeRPLeXa, entre nos links, compre o album, baixe, procure, enfim infiltre-se rapidamente e boa viagem.

Detalhe, alguns convidados do album Gone Beyond, artwork by Natty Brooker, Ex Spacemen 3, baixo, Will Carruthers, ex Spacemen 3, precisa de mais alguma coisa!?!?

***** Intervew with Jonathan Wald - PeRPLeXa *****

Q. When did you start to play music? Tell us the beginning...

A. I tried playing clarinet in school when I was 10. On my own, I attempted to play a snare drum at 13. I acquired my first drum set at age 15, sold it at 16, found another at 18, sold it at 20, tried again at 22 and haven't given up since. I never took a lesson, as I found drumming too much fun to complicate with rules.

I create from feel and then visualize a pattern of shape and sound. I begin with a cyclical root pattern, then develop a theme with subtle variations by way of nuance and detail. If I can't feel it or visualize it, I can't play it and don't want to.

Q. When did Perplexa start?

A. PeRPLeXa began in 1994 in Ann Arbor, Michigan

Q. What´s your personal influences?

A. Authenticity, creativity, intuition, truth, heart, rhythm, breath(dth), mystery, and small things.

Q. How do you describe your sounds?

A. Epic, hypnotic, intense, passionate, cinematic, sensual, psychedelic, soothing, tribal, spiritual, and beyond.

Q. What was the process to recording gone beyond?

A. The simple answer...

Gone Beyond started a long time ago the "old fashioned" way... like all of our recordings, we played our instruments while surrounded by microphones and perform our songs to analog tape. I know... sounds strange because it wasn't recorded into a computer, and endlessly looped and edited. Some songs were written and some were improv'd. We tend to avoid most common song writing methods and approach ideas with more of a fine art sensibility. We engineer our music, in our own space, with our own equipment. I took on a much greater role in all aspects of production than I ever had in the past.

Q. What's the differences between the ST debut and gone beyond?

A. Spanning the first two releases, represents a time when we were a three piece band. Essentially guitar, bass, and drums. We just performed and recorded our live set to tape. We were more overt in our way of bringing about sonic intensity. By the time we wrote and recorded our third record, The Sun and The Moon Getting it On, the core of PeRPLeXa was a two piece. At this time, cello accompanied us and together we explored a more crafted experience than our previous recordings.

For our fourth recording, we hope that we've become better at creating the journey we're trying to help the listener experience. Gone Beyond is an infinitely more expansive endeavor, a greater scope, and of course, much more life informed. Gone Beyond still retains the core two piece and cello, as well, many talented friends helped bring about this crazy dream.

Q. About gig´s, what´s your feeling of playing live...

A. Playing live is a wonderfully amazing and inexplicable ride that I love, while at the same time, being so afraid. A very humbling experience that I'm always compelled to engage in again and again. PeRPLeXa has always been a live spectacle and we hope to be so always.

Q. Make a list of your top 5 albums of all time...

A. Absolutely impossible to pick five! Here are some of the records that I have enjoyed for years...

Alice Coltrane - Journey in Satchidananda

Durutti Column - LC

Talk Talk - Laughing Stock

This Heat - Deceit

The Raincoats - Odyshape

Pop Group - Y

Chet Baker - Jazz at Ann Arbor

Crash Worship - Triple Mania II

Can - Ege Bamyasi

Dead Can Dance - Within the Realm of a Dying Sun

African Head Charge - Songs of Praise

...and so many more.

Q. Which new bands do you recommend?

A. I wouldn't know what others might like, but some of the music that I've currently been listening to is all over the place...

Django Reinhardt

Joanna Newsom

Dirty Projectors

Die Antwoord

Name of the Moon

Q. About the future, what are your plans?

A. Well, I live in the moment but if I could imagine tomorrow... I hope to learn more, feel more, love more, and create more.

Q. Any parting words..

A. For your entrancing pleasure, now and always... Gone Beyond

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Thanks Jonathan!!

http://perplexa.bandcamp.com
http://www.perplexamusic.com
http://soundcloud.com/perplexa