an interview with bay area’s kilroi

Mac
Aug 13, 2018
7 min read

(From left to right: Jack(Bass), Max(Guitar/Vocals), Shane(Drums))

How did you guys meet and end up starting the band?

Max:

Me and Shane have been kinda just doing stuff with music together, like little cover bands and stuff, since we were in like 3rd grade. We have always played together. The first iteration of Kilroi was with our childhood friend Michael who played bass and he went to college. And we had Bailey fill in for a bit and he played on the EP and stuff, now Bailey is doing some other stuff and Jack is playing with us. Jack is a homie and played with a band called Special Guest, we played with them in Martinez a lot, so we kinda all met and became friends.

Is there a backstory behind your guy’s name?

Max:

The story behind our current name is random, me and an old member of this band who is not in it anymore were going over band names and I was watching some CSI crime show and someone got murdered in a museum and so this had nothing to do with the plot of the show, but I saw this little doodle on the wall it was the little guy peering over the wall, the Kilroy was here. And I was like, “That could be a band name and we could take that little guy and put him on a T shirt.” And we did that for a bit and that’s where the name comes from.

When I first heard your guy’s name, I thought you were from Gilroy! Haha

Max:

Dude we’ve gotten that so much! We just did an interview last Friday and the guy was like, “When I first saw your guy’s stickers I was living in Gilroy and Gilroy is a shit town so I was like ‘I hate those guys!’”

Shane:

If you live in Gilroy I feel bad for you.

What bands or artists are your guys biggest influencers?

Shane:

I don’t listen to the same type of music that Jack and Max do. As a band, when were together sometimes we all listen to some of the same music, like we show each other songs we like, but in general I listen to Rap and RnB and I do like some Rock and Classic Rock.

Jack:

I don’t know about music that inspires me because I listen to a lot of music, like Jazz, and a lot of blues, but right now I’m listening to a lot of Badbadnotgood because they make really good music, so that makes me want to play music I guess! Ahaha

Max:

I feel like there are two different types of influences, the stuff you grew up on and the stuff your into in the current moment. When I was a kid my Dad would play Led Zeppelin and AC/DC, I feel like a lot of people who listen to this music now grew up on that music. It was weird, in middle school I was a total Hiphop head, I didn’t really listen to music from bands, I was into the whole Odd Future thing. Then in High school I started listening to Front Bottoms, Modern Baseball, like that whole scene, I was like, “Oh this is cool!” Now I listen to, well some of the bands that have been really inspiring my writing in recent times are Car Seat Head Rest, Walmelda, Florist, and Pinegrove.

Do you think your city or community has had an effect on the type of music you play?

Max:

The city we live in, Concord, hasn’t really effected our sound or music at all, but definitely being in the Bay has pushed me to want to do more different things from what other bands are doing and experiment and play around, we're surrounded by other bands doing that, like Weird Fun and stuff like that. It’s like creating cool sounds and I think the Bay has been a big part of that.

Jack:

I’m not from Concord, I’m from Martinez. Martinez is a refinery town, it’s cute, it’s fun, it’s also smack down in the middle of everything so you get to see all the cool bands. Weird Fun is dope, I love Peachy, Peachy is so good. You just see what other people are doing and most of the people are friendly and like talking about what they do, so it’s fun to talk and share ideas. I just love that about the community.

Have you guys always sounded the way you sounded, or have you guys had a lot of growth and change in your sound?

Max:

That’s a good question! I think we’ve definitely been growing and changing throughout our history of bass players changing, like a bass player has a huge effect on the sound and I’m really happy with Jack’s playing so I think that’s definitely changed. I think the stuff that we have out right now, it’s a pretty similar sound, I guess the EP and album are a little bit different, but that’s more recording quality, but I think the album we’re about to put out right now is a lot, a lot different than like some of the stuff we’ve been doing as far as the tones and stuff, I wrote the our first album my Sophomore year of High school, so much has changed, we’ve grown since then. So I’m excited, I’m really proud of the record.

Shane:

Well yeah, we used to be a cover band.

Max:

Yeah in like 7th grade.

Shane:

More like 3rd grade!

Max:

That’s not really our sound though. Ahaha.

Shane:

That’s true. Ahaha. So yeah we changed and definitely, I would say, the meanings and lyrics behind our songs have become much deeper.

You guys said you’re working on a new album, do you want to talk about that?

Shane:

It’s classified.

Max:

Ahaha. So we actually recorded the whole thing already except for vocals, but we decided to scrap it! Haha

Shane:

Yeah, MAX decided to scrap it.

Max:

It’s funny because we did the same thing with our first album, we did everything then erased it and started over.

Shane:

Max erased it. Haha.

Max:

Ahahaa. We are about to go redo it in August, so pretty soon. There were just a lot of things that weren’t quite there for me, like there was an amp I was playing out of that I really enjoyed the sound of live, but it didn’t translate well on the record for me and Jack also joined and was doing a lot of cool things on the bass I wanted to recreate, I think in general, we know the songs so much better now because we’ve been playing them live, we just went in a little bit too soon in general. We also kinda reorganized the record and I think it flows a lot better now. It’s gonna be worth it to redo it! Hopefully it’ll be out like late winter? Or like early…

Shane:

Early 2021? Hahaha.

Max:

The record won’t be out until Kanye is president! Haha. But no ahaha, probably like end of this year, beginning of next year!

What are your guy’s local venues to play at or to go see shows at?

Shane:

Well for me, when we first started, Red House in Walnut Creek, love playing shows there, all the homies would come. Sadly it’s closed now. Now we tend to play at Gilman a lot, whether it’s no people or a lot of people. It’s in Berkeley, I enjoy Berkeley. Favorite place to see shows I would say is the Fox Theater, I enjoy all the sculptures and architecture. I saw 21 Pilots there and the sound was really good. I know obviously it was 21 Pilots, but just the sound production and show un general were good.

Max:

There's so many venues it’s hard to pick a venue, but as far as venues I like to play at I definitely like to play at the Gilman and Honey Hive is usually fun to play at if you an pack it. I really enjoyed playing at the Silver Sprocket the other day. I love playing little random things like that, house shows or a comic book store, whatever, it’s always cool.

Jack:

The silver sprocket show was dope, I really like the DIY shows, those are fun, and like small places like Subrosa. Gilman is always going to be cool. For seeing shows, the Fox is hecka cool, can’t really have a bad show at the Fox unless the person is awful.

Max:

Rickshaw Stop is cool!

Jack:

Yeah it is. I don’t know how I feel about Slims honestly.

Shane:

In San Jose a great place to play is Art Boutiki.

Max:

And Jeff’s House!

Are there any local bands that you guys draw inspiration from or really enjoy?

Max:

The band called peachy from San Jose. They are really really talented musicians and great song writers. They make cool sounds and inspire me to push what we are doing sonically. Weird Fun is a band that especially on record is always experimental with cool soundscapes and different abstract things that always separate them from a lot of other surf punk bands that are out there, I really appreciate that. Any local bands that are experimenting and have lyrics you can connect with are great. Small Crush is great, too.

Jack:

I’m gonna say Peachy, too. Peachy is legit, they do the coolest weirdest Math Rock, but it’s really good. Math Rock runs the lines of people doing too much stuff and there’s way too many weird things going on, but Peachy is just the perfect touch. The whole band also communicates so well, you can tell they’re good friends and having a great time and I love that! Small Crush is cool, too. Carpool Tunnel is awesome.

Max:

There’s too many to shoutout, so go to your local shows so you can see all the dope bands because we can’t tell you about them all!

Shane:

Not really a local band, but my old drum teacher, he definitely inspired me to change up my tone a little bit because I like to play a little bit of Jazz kinda so that defiantly inspired me to do that infused with my rock kinda funk, I don’t know what to call it really, it’s kinda just this weird thing that happens.

Max:

He is a weird drum player.

Shane:

Yeah everytime I get up from the drums everyone is like, “Oh my god you’re so tall!” Haha.

Max:

You can’t really tell when he’s playing! You should see how spread out his drum set is, there’s so much room. Haha

Jack:

When I play on his drum set I have to reach. Ahaha.

Shane:

Anyway, I was also going to say The Cautious, I’ve always liked them as a band, they have a great singer, Max, the whole band is great, they’re very tight and I enjoy their lyrics a lot.