How did you guys meet and end up starting the band?
Johnny/Guitar:
I know Danny and Reise from High School. I actually didn’t meet Cole until I was formally invited to the band, like the first practice, and I didn’t meet Hendrick, who’s our lead guitarist who isn’t here because he’s at college in the midwest, until our first show. We met up at our first show at Cafe Purg’s in Santa Cruz and he was like “Oh hi I’m Hendrick” and I was like “Hi I’m Johnny!” and that’s kinda how it went!
Cole/Drums:
I went to Highschool with Hendrick, who once again isn’t here, him and I had been friends for a long time and we started really being friends when we started a hardcore punk band my senior year, his junior year. Hendrick and I have been playing in bands ever since August 2014. I met Danny through another hardcore band which I also started with Hendrick. I met Reise just through Hendrick, Reise will tell his part of the story, but I don’t know how exactly we met. Then Johnny and I met through these guys. But for the formation of the band, it started out as me, Hendrick and Reise. I remember me and Hendrick were hanging out and we met up with Reise we were like “wanna get together tonight and record some music?” We ended up recording the entire first demo version of “Easy Swimmers”, which was never released because we basically recorded the entire thing, it sounded terrible the first time around, so we worked on it and then put it out. That’s basically how we formed, we just kinda got together one night and recorded a couple songs and were like hey this is good, let’s do this.
Danny/Bass:
I was born in 1998 and raised in a small town called Santa Clara, California. Ahaha. Anyway, I actually went to highschool as Johnny said, with Riese and Jonathan. Hendrick was pretty much the staple of grouping everybody, socializing all of us together and getting all of us together. I met him at a show, I played an acoustic show, which he also played, and he was like “Oh I didn’t know you played an instrument, I just saw you on social media, let’s link up and build.” So Hendrick picked me up for that hardocre punk band Cole was talking about earlier and that was actually the first band I was ever in and then actually, I don’t remember any other bands I’ve been in other than that one and this one ahaa. As Cole said, they recorded the demo and they released it, as soon as they released it I was like who is on this because I want in! I pretty much hit them up and was like begging to be in this band and Hendrick was like of course, I was gonna text you actually. So that’s how I came to be about and that’s my story. Next on 48 hours...
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
I met Danny through friends of friends at Willowglen, and I met Johnny in my Honors Chem class at Willowglen. Ahaha Honors! I got a C, so I just passed. Cole decided to erase this from his memory, but I met him at a concert.
Cole/Drums:
Oh yeah, I do remember that.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Yeah, I met you at live 105’s Punk Rock Picnic in 2014, asshole! Aaha.
Cole/Drums:
Oh and I remember you guys were like “Are you excited to see The Story So Far?” Haha.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Oh yeah, I was like fanboying over The Story So Far like “Oh fuck I’m gonna see them play for the first time!” And then we asked Cole “aren’t you excited?” and he was like “nah, I fucking hate them.”
Cole/Drums:
I like them now!
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
I also met Hendrick because of social media, I met him in person at like Warped Tour one year aha. And then he would just message me sometimes like, “oh do you wanna start this band?” and I’d be like “yeah sure,” but I never ended up doing it. I was gonna be in one of their hardcore punk bands they were talking about, Mentality, but basically how this all started is that I was working one night at good ole Togos, the good ole days aha, making some subs. So they came after closing and it was so inconvenient, but I let you guys in and Hendrick was like “I have this idea for a music project, it’s like surfy, poppy, kinda like emo” and I was like “yeah sure I’m down, my parents aren’t home we can use my room to record.” And so basically it was him and Cole and we went back to my house and recorded the very very rough draft of Easy Swimmers and even though it was a shit recording and we had to use apple earbuds to sing and record guitar and stuff and you can hear the metronome in the background, we still thought it had potential. So we were like okay let’s try this again and put it out and then once that came out, Danny started being apart of it and a light bulb popped up in my head and after we went to hang out with Johnny randomly one day, I saw his guitar there and I was like let’s give it a shot, and ya know, the rest was history!
Danny/Bass:
Then we all kissed! Ahaha
What bands or artists are your guy’s biggest influencers?
Johnny/Guitar:
We take a lot from Porches and Turnover and like modern indie bands, but also take a lot from older like Beach Boys.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
We take a lot of older influences like melodically and theme wise like The Beach Boys and Brian Wilson, we like to twist it with modern stuff like Porches and Turnover. Porches being electronic, Turnover being very dream poppy and yeah, Beach Boys, just having that fun summer vibe, very vibrant. We covered surfing USA at our first show! We also take like emo influence from Joy Division and all the sappy emo bands we listen to. And The Cure.
Do you think your city or community has had an influence on the type of music you play?
Everyone:
Fuck no, that’s a fat a no.
Johnny/Guitar:
I think we take more influence from Santa Cruz than anywhere in the Bay Area because considering the beach.
Reise/Guitar/Vocal:
What’s funny is that I’m actually doing a project on how stupid the San Jose music scene is. Honestly, San Jose is super fucking boring with the music scene like there is almost nothing beside Art Boutiki and Playback Studios, that even has a venue to play shows. So we definitely take influence from literally everywhere else. Santa Cruz we consider that more our home than San Jose, honestly.
Cole/Drums:
I mean, like San Jose does have some stuff, it’s just not the stuff we play. It’s kinda died out, but a couple years ago the hardcore scene was really strong here, but it’s died out a little bit. There’s still shows that happen here, but they’re not very prevalent. San Jose just doesn’t have the type of music we play, there’s a couple of bands here we could play with, and would work with. There’s this band we play with, Sunday Drive, they’re from San Jose, we played that back yard fest thing, Jeffstock, with a bunch of other San Jose bands. There’s a bunch of bands here that play that type of music, but the shows just aren’t happening here. Like every once in a while there are, like Reise mentioned, the Art Boutiki and Playback Studios, but they don’t really do shows there anymore. Then there’s also 1409 the Quinceañera hall.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals/Guitar:
There’s also Local Color, too, but they’re super fucking picky. The thing with the venues in San Jose is that they’re very picky and they aren’t very welcoming to a lot of different genres. It just leaves the city as a whole as pretty unsupportive in the music scene. I mean a city doesn’t necessarily have to have one genre to define it, but it’s very mixed and very unavailable, I guess you could say.
Danny/Bass:
A lot of it is very DIY stuff ya know, you never really have people reaching out to you, it’s always you trying to search for something to play at. That’s why, as they were saying, Santa Cruz is a really prominent place that we usually go to. San Jose, yeah nobody is never really ever reaching out to you, it’s you reaching out to someone else. A lot of the time it’s really really hard to get a show and you have to know people, you know the nice little ebooking people who book things. You just gotta be cool, just be cool bro.
Cole/Drums:
In the sense of reaching out to people, we do do a lot of our reaching out, I do a lot of this myself because I’ve been booking shows for a couple years. We will personally reach out to other bands and say, “hey do you wanna play this show?” That’s what we’ve done for every show we’ve put together ourselves. Our first ever show, we mostly just had our friend’s bands playing. Our album release show we played in Santa Cruz in November, that was purely us reaching out to our friends bands, asking them to play. So like unfortunately like they were saying there’s not a lot of you getting asked in San Jose.
Johnny/Guitar:
Yeah so fuck San Jose. Ahahaa.
Cole/Drums:
Well not fuck San Jose, but… Ahahaa.
When did you guys first discover there was a local music scene and realized you could actually go out and get gigs? What does this scene mean to you?
Johnny/Guitar:
I think the first show Danny actually took me too, was a hardcore show. It was at the X bar and I was really excited because I was like wow these are people like me and the bands are on the same level I am, they don’t have to be playing on a stage with a barrier or anything and that’s when I really found out the music scene is alive and well.
Cole/Drums:
The first show I ever went to that had a band from my area that had like almost nobody knew them was a local band that was opening for a tour back in 2012. I went and saw Hawthorne Heights in Santa Cruz Ahaha. It was sick, it was at this old venue called The Pioneer which was this tiny room, this was actually one of the last shows there, it was an amazing venue, really sad that it’s gone. The opener for the show was this band that actually is pretty prominent in local Bay Area scene called Worthwhile. Very prominent melodic hardcore band and they recently played their last show at the Gilman, but I saw and was like woah these people aren’t on tour, they’re just here playing the show, they’re from the area. I left that show and was like I wanna go to a local show where it’s just all these kinds of bands. It was the first show I ever went to where there wasn’t a stage, it was literally just one small room and everyone was on the same level. About a year later when I started hanging out with Hendrick more in high school, a couple other of our friends wanted to start a band with Hendrick so when they started playing shows, I went to all their shows. They were playing all these local hardcore and metalcore shows. I never went to one of those shows with touring bands playing, it was always just San Jose, Fremont, Santa Cruz, and all the local cities. It was really cool to see their was a whole other underground level and it’s like you see all these big bands, they seem like they rose overnight, but they really didn’t. These guys having been doing it for five years, they’re just no breaking out of their shell and growing into their scene. People always wonder where these bands come from, it comes from you going and supporting those guys when they’re little.
Danny/Bass:
I think one of my first shows I ever went to was probably a hardcore show, I was always into metal and stuff like that, really early on in Middle School, kinda the cringey days. A friend of mine and Reise’s, he kinda showed me a few of like local hardcore stuff that I thought was sick! The same kinda metalish break down stuff I would listen to, but they were from here! I was like oh damn that’s hella sweet! Pretty much like everyone was saying, I went and saw this band called True Hearted, it was one of my first shows. There was a stage at a venue, but the rest of shows I’ve been to have had no stages. These were people from my area as opposed to going to a concert where people drive from crazy far to just see the Foo Fighters or something, which I would do! Ahaha. Honestly the scene means a lot, it’s really nice to have people there who are in your town who you can still talk too, and they kinda share the same feeling as you, so it’s been a release for me to go to these shows, and to play these shows. Yeah that’s my story, next on 48 hours..
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
What’s funny is that the same friend Dan and I shared at the time, was showing me a ton of like hardcore, all of us kinda learned about shows through hardcore and metalcore. I didn’t end up going to a local show until I was 18, but he introduced me to Hendrick and was like all these kids your age and their playing shows in San Jose. I opened my eyes because I didn’t know San Jose had something kinda cool about it, I just thought that it was just buildings and businessmen, I didn’t think there was a music aspect about it.
Any plans for a second album?
Johnny/Guitar:
Right now we are working on another EP, we’re writing right now. We hope to record with the guy who mastered Motion of the Ocean. He does a lot of local stuff, he recorded Get Married, which is the band we just toured with. Our priority is to hopefully get signed to a label.
Cole/Drums:
Like Johnny said we are working on a new EP right now, and when I say that I mean Reise is pumping out songs and sending them to us. Haha. We’ve got like four rough drafts, four solid ideas, maybe work up two more max. Yeah, so it’s probably gonna be a summer release and if we get the chance it’d be cool to hop on another tour. We just went on a really short tour with Get Married last month, they’re our really good friends. I’ve known those dudes since 2013. Randy their guitar player is a really good friend of mine. If not them we also have friends in a band from Los Banos, their style of music is a little bit different though.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Dan, Hendrick and I are pretty much writing songs and we’re gonna take the songs to Ryan Ellerly hopefully over the summer. And that’s pretty much it!
What bands touring right now do you idolize?
Johnny/Guitar:
I take a lot of personal influence from metallic hardcore bands because I’m really into that stuff. It doesn't show in our music, it’s just personal, we’re all working on hardcore side projects.
Cole/Drums:
For me personally, I play drums and I’ve been trying to teach myself bass, and I do vocals in a couple bands, I guess I can kinda talk about certain influence on the certain instruments I play. I take a lot of influence from hardcore bands, like Cold World. Which is the best harcore band of all time. Haha. When it comes to drums though, my music taste can be kinda lame, I take very big influence from Andy Hurley of Fall Out Boy because that’s like my favorite band ever. I take a lot of influence from Andy Hurley’s style, but I don’t translate it a whole lot into this because it’s mostly just me trying to replicate the beats that Reise makes while adding my own flavor to it.
Danny/Bass:
When I first started playing instruments, I started out on the drums. I loved playing to a lot of indie-alternative actually like the 1975 and The Neighborhood, those type of bands. I started playing drums with that then, my grandpa gave me a guitar, that’s how I started playing a stringed instrument. I didn’t play those on guitar, but for the bass, I really seriously love alternative music, how funky it can be or intricate, so I really take in a lot of that. I love Indie music. I love cheese also.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
He is a big fan of cheese, I tell ya that folks… Haha. I listen to a lot of music, but as of right now I’m in a big Smashing Pumpkins phase. I fucking love shoegaze music. My favorite band is Blink 182, so I always try to work off of that.
Everyone else in the band:
*imitating emo voice” Where are you? And I’m so sorry!
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Yeah that’s pretty much it… and Beach Boys fuck!
What are your favorite local venues to play at or go see bands at?
Everyone:
1,2,3…
Johnny/Guitar:
Gilman!
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Purg’s!
Cole/Drums:
SubRosa!
Danny/Bass:
SubRosa
Danny/Bass:
Okay well Purg’s is done now!
Johnny/Guitar:
Purg’s is dead!
Johnny/Guitar:
I do like SubRosa, but I feel like it’s a little too small for me.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
Oh you’re a big guy huh? You think you fill up the room huh?
Johnny/Guitar:
I say one thing and everyone attacks me, this is how it usually goes. Haha.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
You think you’re fucking smart huh?
Johnny/Guitar:
Would you guys consider Berkley local?
Everyone:
Yeah!
Johnny/Guitar:
Then definitely I really like the Gilman, it’s an iconic venue.
Cole/drums:
I play at SubRosa fairly regularly, I’m there very often. I’ve been going to Gilman for a couple years now, I’ve played there with three different bands, every single time it’s surreal to be on that stage because of how absolutely legendary it is. Honey Hive is a fantastic place to go play, I’m friends with one of the managers there, Daniel is a really nice guy and always cool with me booking my shows there. 1409 in San Jose, it’s a giant fucking warehouse, I went to the Gloss show with Pure Disgust and Fire Walker two years ago. Probably a good 200 people there, at least. It wasn’t packed, the room was half way full, it’s insane, it’s literally a warehouse. That venue is purely 100% DIY.
Danny/Bass:
I’d have to say one of my favorite venues is SubRosa. It’s an anarchist library as google would describe it. Community center by night, anarchist library by night.
Reise/Guitar/Vocals:
So probably the Quinceañera Hall and Gilman, they’re the most open venues I’ve played at and been to for shows.
Okay that’s it guys, thank you so much!
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