Vol. 2 Issue 2
honduras
paperhaus parlor walls
VOL. 2 ISSUE 2
CONTENTS
TEAM EDITOR IN CHIEF
ASSISTANT EDITOR ART EDITOR
DANNY KRUG
2 PARLOR WALLS
MADELINE BABUKA BLACK
PHOTOGRAPHY
DANNY KRUG
LOGO DESIGN
NICOLE CODY
WRITERS
MUSIC
JAKE SAUNDERS
4 DOG 6 ADVERTISING 8 PAPERHAUS 10 BIG MUFF RADIO
ISAAC GILLESPIE
14 HONDURAS
JAKE SAUNDERS EDDIE HUDDLESTON
EXTRAS
DANNY KRUG MADELINE BABUKA BLACK
18 SOME PICTURES 19 SOME ALBUMS
CONTACT info@gigawattsmedia.com facebook.com/gigawattsmag instagram @gigwattsmedia
EDITOR S LETTER WOULD YOU RATHER...
stay inside your house for days on end or experience the true cold that has fallen upon our city? I’m not made for the cold. I’m from California, spent time living in Texas and Las Vegas as well. Cold isn’t my thing. I also work from home. This is a dangerous combination because as I write this now, I’m on my fourth day of having not left my house. It’s great for productivity, but I’m pretty sure it’s horrible for my overall mental well being. When the city gets like this, it’s easy to only go places that you’re required to go and then retreat to your apartment at all other times or only venture within a few blocks of where you live. However, that’s shitty. As I sit here right now, it feels shitty. I know tons of stuff is happening even though the city feels like a giant ice cube. I guess what I’m trying to say is that, despite this shit, there are bands in this city that are busting their asses every night lugging gear from practice spaces to venues to play shows. If they can do this, we can all do it. Don’t let the weather affect you going out and supporting the bands and people you care about. If a band you like is playing a DIY spot tonight, go. The cheap beer will keep you warm. Got a friend with a gallery opening? There’s probably free wine that will make you less cold.
All I’m saying is that at times like this, the allure of delivery and netflix at home becomes really enticing. But those seasons of Friends will be here for you months to come and Bushwick chinese food is going to taste the same for centuries to come. Bands around these parts are much more fleeting than those things. Whoever is playing out at the Silent Barn or at Baby’s All Right might not be around anymore by the time the weather warms up. Get out there. Support people. Support bands. Bring a good coat. Drink a couple extra shots of whiskey. I’ll be breaking my hermit streak this week with the KITTEN residency at Baby’s All Right. See you there? --Danny
Also, I could be totally crazy here. I might be the only one thinking this and everyone reading this letter might have jobs that require them to run around the city all day. Those people are probably like, "stfu dood."
1
PARLOR WALLS granny
words by isaac gillespie photograph by danny krug
8
When I tried to get in touch with Alyse Lamb, the dynamic singer/guitarist and one half of Parlor Walls, I ended up having to get in touch with a straight-shooting business woman named Linda Collins. "Linda Collins is my high-powered business-suited shark lady who gets shit done. She is on call 24/7." says Lamb. "If someone needs a W-2 from me to get paid for an article I’m writing - she gets it done. A 4-week tour doesn’t plan itself... she gets it done. If my soundcloud broke and it needs to be repaired... she’s on it. So many business-y things." Collins helps Lamb manage her obligations fronting two bands - noise-pop trio EULA and now even-noisier-pop duo Parlor Walls - while also running Famous Swords, an arts collective/record label/t-shirt design entity. She also exists only within Lamb’s mind -- Linda Collins is Lamb’s music-business alter-ego. "I think we all have duality in us. Mine is fleshed out so that I can see a clear distinction between the two conflicting personalities. She’s always around, always thinking... and she jumps into action when its appropriate." If Lamb is so steeped in creative projects that she needs to invent personalities to help her manage them, it’s a problem of her own making. If you’ve ever seen EULA live, it’s hard to imagine Lamb making a bigger sound with fewer people, but that’s exactly what she does alongside drummer/keyboardist Chris Mulligan with Parlor Walls. "We wanted everything totally stripped down. We wanted to fuck around with different sounds we get out of 2 people making music." Lamb and Mulligan first met when EULA was sharing bills with Shark? who Mulligan had been playing with at the time. "When I first met Chris, he was playing this percussive, an-
gular, wiry guitar in Shark?. I really loved it. Come to find out, he was a drummer too. And a keyboardist. It was crazy." The two started playing together and found an instinctive common ground "Not only can he be really rhythmic and percussive, he also knows mood. and that’s huge to me. Mood is like my number one priority when creating a song. So we do fit like little puzzle pieces in Parlor Walls." Mood and percussion are part of Lamb’s DNA, having studied dance from a young age "I took ballet since age 5 for many years. Lots of other various-type dancing in between too; dance was huge for me as a kid. I moved around a lot and I knew tempo, phrasing, rhythm from an early age. So I am a very physical being. I think that definitely shaped my musicianship." But beyond talking about big concepts like "rhythm," don’t ask Lamb about her influences. "I didn’t want to learn anyone else’s songs [growing up]. I know that sounds strange. But I had an intense aversion to spending lots of time dissecting other music. "Which is not to say music wasn’t around, "My family were big music-lovers, so there was ALWAYS music on in my house. My mom loved Elvis, Joni Mitchell, Nancy Sinatra. My dad listened to Pink Floyd, Cream, The Cars -- so I loved all of that. My brother would blast Wu Tang or Public Enemy and I loved that too. And my sister was a dancer too, so she listened to Janet Jackson, Madonna, Lisa Lisa, Michael Jackson, etc. and of course I loved all of that." But when it came time to learn the guitar, Lamb wanted to do her own thing. "People would tell me, ‘Alyse, if you learn other songs, you’ll be a better songwriter’ and I just didn’t get it. I was more about mood anyway." While her compatriots were trying to perfectly mold their fin-
gers to bend like Jimi or shred like Ginn, Lamb was developing her own unique approach to the instrument. Her parts eschew the typical guitar habit of centering on a specific chord and then ‘riffing off’ of it. As a result, the melodies sound freer not anchored in any one mode, but moving freely in their own space. And in a two-member group like Parlor Walls, the effect becomes guitar lines that feel less like commentary and are, instead, the statement itself. "Yeah, I like to jump around," says Lamb. "I’m not a fan of chunky power chords or the anticipated chord structure. Sometimes rhythm conjures up a melody for me other times the words come first and I arrange them into a melody." That said, all the songwriting in Parlor Walls is totally collaborative. "Parlor Walls is 50/50, we both collaborate equally. We are a stripped down unit." Throughout Lamb’s karate chopping guitar licks, Mulligan is laying down a bed of cover through an avalanche of drums and simultaneously played keyboards. And Parlor Walls works the duo angle well. Where EULA’s power is in a frenetic storm of sonic lightning bolts, Parlor Walls feels more like a barrage of great tumbling boulders. The absence of a bass guitar creates the space for drums and guitar to just be louder. So the sounds are fuller and they have to make broader strokes. So while Lamb’s Parlor Walls playing retains the nimble quality familiar to EULA fans, one is viscerally reminded of why people started calling rock music "heavy." It’s a lot to take in. But don’t take my word for it. As if you couldn’t tell from the spectacle of two people filling a room with sound, Parlor Walls makes it plain in the chorus of their song "Seeds," "It’s working all the time! It’s working all the time!"
3
4
Here’s an idea: bands are more enjoyable and relatable to see live when you know the musicians playing in them. You might not really know them know; you might see them walking around before/after the show, you might catch one of them them in some other band they play in, or maybe you find one of them bartending at the very same venue his/her band played at the night before. A greater level of transparency reveals itself and allows for a greater connection between music and listener simply because you know a little bit about how the musician(s) click; what grinds their gears, what gets their goats. You have a stronger idea of the very reason they are making sounds in the first place. And then comes along a band you know nothing about, which is cool, there are a ton of bands in New York, you can’t get to know all of them or the people in them. But it was a band like Dog that got me thinking about how that added level of mystery can enhance a performative experience. There’s room for interpretation, which can be a personal experience as you project your own ideas onto what an artist is doing. I learned in art school you weren’t supposed to project yourself onto another person’s
work when you’re critiquing...fuck they’re not in your face with how that shit, all you have is yourself. mysterious they are. It’s authentic. I really don’t know much about the three members of Dog, and My initial reaction to Dog was that it’s possible there’s some Freud- they’re a scary band...because ian shit going on and I’ve kept it the unknown is scary! Each song that way for a reason, simply be- is bathed in a sea of screeching cause the mystery of the band is tones, set into rhythm by their so exciting...I mean I’ve had the powerhouse of a drummer, Devin. opportunity to introduce myself Tess, their singer and front womto them, they know who I am (I an, enters another dimension as think), but it’s almost like the she moves about the space, conmusic has kept me at a place torting her body and her limbs as where knowing who they are the music enters her being and would make Dog a different band exits out of her mouth. Her vocals for me. In a world where we take are an other worldly assault, defacebook presence for granted void of humanity, as if she’s pos(as in: you don’t exist if you don’t sessed. Her movements are cruhave a facebook), Dog’s lack of cial to communicating the harsh internet presence makes me world that Dog occupies. think maybe they don’t want me to know much about them. They From where I stand, Dog toes the didn’t even want to do an inter- line between what we believe is view for this piece! Whether or sustainably human and the realnot what I’m about to say is the ity of our somewhat ignorant and actual case for Dog, I’ve interpret- artificial existence. Today, we reced this band as one that feeds on ognize a band exists because we mystery, which adds an element read about them on the internet. of unpredictability and in turn a It’s ten times more special when whole sea of choices to choose the only time you can experience from. It’s a tricky business play- a band, one that pushes bounding with ambiguity; there’s so aries, is in a strictly live setting. much room for misinterpreta- Because recordings are forever, tion, but Dog plays the ambiguity but the moments are fleeting. card with grace, simply because words by jake saunders
5
ADVERTISING
I met Ricky Ricardo and Joel lestial Shore. I got there early, It was one of the moments that Heath for the first time during was just chillin’, drinking a beer, helped me value the simple yet CMJ week last year. Still be- waiting for Zula to come on. My powerful decision of going out, increasingly judgemental and cynical ears were expecting the next band to not be that great until Nate from Zula came up to me and said to watch out for the next band because they’re pretty good. "Pshh," I think "how many times do I hear that at a show?" Well...that band was Advertising and they turned out to be pretty I was at a show at some spot damn good; the night was not a called The Flat, Bushwick’s next loss. shitty restaurant/bar venue, mostly there to see Zula and Ceing fairly new to the whole music press gig, I was pretty bitter about the whole week; the corporate undertones, the general lack in attention to decent local bands, the business cards which I would later tear up for spliff filters that evening.
6
and I think a lot about how much more important that is today especially. The internet has too much power to fool us into liking or disliking something. If I hadn’t gone out to that show I wouldn’t have met Joel and Ricky, never would’ve found out how nice those guys are or how great their band is. It was the quick and linear melodies caught me in the gut. The
songs had power and the guys behind them were powerful. Ricky’s bass playing was interesting, his hands tilted almost parallel to the strings as he kept pace with Joel’s spastic guitar riffs, driving the songs forward with these rapid, attention deficit structures. Bouts of dissonance would flow in and out of quite beautiful and meticulous melodies; there was a perfect balance of precision and open-endedness. They had only been a band for a couple of months before they recorded Pull, their tape off the homegrown label, Prison Art. The songs on Pull are spastic and lingering. The sound is somehow bright and muffled simultaneously, Joel’s vocals swim in a sea of reverb, but the intention is all there. There are songs that sound
like they could from an early Beatles record until they snake off into darker, dissonant territory. Comparisons have been made to their contemporaries, Palm, but the relation might be only coincidental. Almost too technical to have a full blown no wave comparison, yet natural enough to make me think of the intuitive weirdness of The Lounge Lizards or DNA. Pull, as Joel loves to tell me, is the sound of a band still finding their sound.
show as a four piece--they have recently down sized to three. As much as I was into their live set, Ricky and Joel are in the process of molding their band, which can be a really fun thing to watch, as each performance is a learning experience and a work in progress. What’s even better is their attitudes are totally welcoming to the idea of being a band in progress. Lucky for us, Advertising has a lot of potential, and whatever happened to all that "it’s the journey not the destinaFollowing their set I ran into the tion" shit anyways? two of them outside the venue. After introducing myself we chatted a little bit about I don’t know... probably Richard Hell or some words by jake saunders photost by danny krug shit like that. We exchanged contact info and we went on our ways. I caught Advertising at an interesting time; it was their last
13
words and photography by danny krug
8
PAPERHAUS "Sweet guitar part but you didn’t do the fucking dishes." Being in a band can be tough, but living together can make things even tougher. Add to the mix that the house you all live in is also a DIY venue and you’ve got an idea of what Paperhaus was going through during the recording of their first full length, released earlier this month. Washington DC’s Paperhaus is a band and a venue. Their most recent album was recorded live to tape at a time when the band had just returned from a two month long tour, tensions were building and the band had started to splinter. "The record is a document of a time and a very interesting energy, we had all lived together for two years and worked together in a [show] space," says Alex Tebeleff. "At one point on the record you can hear the point where one of our other members leaves the band," adds Eduardo Rivera.
like now these songs live have a whole new energy and we’re already getting ready for the next record," says Alex.
The Paperhaus (the venue not the band) is at the forefront of DC’s growing DIY scene and has been active for four years. "The cops don’t really care. They’ve come to multiple shows at my house but they’ve never broken up a single thing, they get that there’s more important things for them to worry about," says Alex. Since the beginning of the Paperhaus, dozens of other house venues have popped up in DC. "There are all these people who, on their own, made the decision ‘I like this. I wanna put on shows in my house.’ And they did it," says Alex. DCDIT is an organization run by Alex and Matt that focuses on DC’s scene and adding a bit of cohesion to everything happenAfter the recording of their album ing. "Originally we were going to and the departure of two mem- get our own space, but we realbers, Alex and Eduardo recruit- ized how costly that would be and ed Danny Bentley on drums and how much trouble it would be. Matt Dowling on bass. According We kept booking shows at Paperto the band, this is the strongest haus but also expanding to othlineup they’ve ever had. "I feel er spaces and acting as booking
and promotions for a number of DIY spaces," says Matt. "I think in any urban area where people are interested in real estate, if you’re just relying on one space, it’s going to be really hard to sustain," he adds. The Paperhaus certainly isn’t the first DIY or house venue in the DC area, they were preceded by places like Paper Sun, Rocketship and Gold Leaf Studios. The Paperhaus came about because the band found a house that they were able to rehearse in and the shows grew out of there. The band has plans to tour all through March with a few dates in April as well. They’ve also been writing new material and are planning to get into the studio later this spring or in early summer. It’ll be the first recorded material to feature Danny and Matt. The current Paperhaus record was recorded in 2013 and just released earlier this month, but the band is confident that there won’t be as much time in between creating these new recordings and when listeners can get their hands on them.
9
BIG
MUFF RADIO
16
Nick Noto, the singular mind behind lo-fi electro-pop outfit Big Muff Radio, tells me to meet him in The Future. It’s
are often simultaneously beautiful and disquieting; it’s a fine line on which Noto is more than happy to land.
exactly the sort of name Noto would give his studio space; over the top, monolithic, vaguely sci-fi. Later that day I’m a bit surprised to actually find myself standing in front of a luxury high-rise apartment building in midtown Manhattan called The Future. Following the abrupt relocation of an extended family member, Noto has found himself temporarily squatting in the building with his brother Vin. On the cold January morning that I’m visiting, Noto and bandmate Dave Stagno are in the process of moving equipment from Noto’s studio in Greenpoint into the new space. For the record: it’s most commonly referred to as "Muff Mansion".
Nick Noto speaks in a frenetic, staccato rhythm that betrays his Staten Island roots. Born and raised there, it’s those from home with whom he surrounds himself and with whom he most frequently collaborates - the current lineup of BIG MUFF RADIO consists of Noto, Stagno, and each of their younger brothers ("the bros"). It was also where he formed and fronted his first band, The Delay, a more-than-competent pop punk outfit. It’s the most straightforward music Noto’s released, but you can hear some of the avant-noisiness and melodic weirdness, later featured so heavily in BIG MUFF Radio, sprinkled throughout the band’s otherwise digestible power-pop anthems.
When I meet Noto, he’s dressed, as usual, in all black: black Spyder jacket, black imitation Balmain designer jeans, black crocs, black Ray-Bans. It’s the same pattern that emerges in his music: the re-appropriation of a handful of seemingly incompatible, uncool elements rearranged to embody Noto’s bizarre future-Gothic vision. BIG MUFF RADIO, as a sound and overarching concept, can be tough to put into words, and Noto seems delighted watching me try. The music, which he described as a "transparent techno pop nightmare," features heavy use of vocal processors to create an electronic, falsetto voice that’s become BIG MUFF’s sonic trademark. The best MUFF tracks
Noto started BIG MUFF RADIO in 2011 while studying Music Production at SUNY Purchase. The creation and early recording of BIG MUFF also coincided with Noto’s exploration of home recording. Heavily influenced by home production pioneers Joe Meek and Ariel Pink, Noto purchased a 4-track tape recorder and began experimenting with new sonic concepts. The ensuing years were prolific for BIG MUFF RADIO; he’s released nine albums and "mixtapes" since 2011.
tars, drum machines and synthesized, effeminate vocals. The result is a hard-to-place collection of musical red herrings. The first thirty seconds of early MUFF track "Hold My Hand" wouldn’t sound far from a dreamy, Seventeen Seconds-era Cure anthem until Noto’s otherworldly, gender-bent vocals begin weaving throughout the track and rearranging the whole song. Life Is Easy, released in January 2015, marks an instrumental and stylistic departure from the earlier BIG MUFF material. For all Noto’s flippancy ("Everything I do is slapstick"), the album constitutes his most focused and emotionally evocative release yet. The "darkness of Big Muff" to which Noto so often refers is fully palpable for the first time. The songs are lyrically concise but poignant, articulating the latent anxiety of life and a longing for psychic calm: "What it takes to find? / The only thing that gets me through / Only some of the time" (She Said) "I long to find some peace of mind / Through wind and snow, I know it’s out there somewhere" (The Fool)
The music was almost exclusively recorded on a synthesizer and written in session with Stagno, a first for BIG MUFF RADIO. The album’s drum tracks were the first parts chosen and came from a The original BIG MUFF sound handful of brazen samples, most came from Noto combining and notably Nine Inch Nails’ "Closexaggerating his musical ideals: er" and The Cure’s "One Hundred heavy fuzz bass, washed out gui- Years." Noto is unapologetic;
11
using such potent, vibe-heavy source material informed and enhanced his song-making process. Most importantly, the finished results eclipse the tracks from which the drums came.
aware of and grateful for the exposure and support that Moore has provided BIG MUFF RADIO; the two collaborate regularly, Moore’s voice appears on multiple BIG MUFF tracks, and BIG MUFF RADIO opened for R. Stevie The similarities between Noto Moore when he headlined one of and his admitted hero, Ariel Pink, the final nights at Glasslands. are manifold: their musical outputs are massive and eclectic, Noto’s high-profile musical their catalogues track their de- friendships and collaborations velopments both as musicians seem incongruent with what and recording engineers and, not was, until recently, his obscurity least of all, they’ve both been tak- within Brooklyn music. The exen under the wing of lo-fi legend planation might simply be that R. Stevie Moore. Noto met Moore he’s a musician’s musician – his in 2011, when he curated SUNY propensity for weirdness does Purchase’s Culture Shock (a nothing to alter the respect of bill that would include Cam’ron, those who hear BIG MUFF RADIO The Feelies, and Beach Fossils, and are certain that Noto knows among many others) and com- exactly what he’s doing. His work missioned R. Stevie to host and with R. Stevie Moore would ultiperform. The two developed a mately put BIG MUFF RADIO on fast friendship based largely on the radar of Jay Reatard drumphilosophical similarities with mer Billy Hayes, who in mid-2012 regards to music making and contacted Noto about a possientertainment. Noto is acutely ble collaboration. Hayes began
12
sending drum tracks, often in the form of iPhone voice memos, to Noto, who would in turn write and record music to create the finished song. Soon after the two recruited WAVVES guitarist Alex Gates and officially formed Cretin Stompers. The band’s 15-track debut Looking Forward to Being Attacked features the trademark BIG MUFF vocals over a frantic set of catchy garage punk songs – it was also picked up by HoZac/ Burger Records before they ever played a live show. Though Noto wrote a majority of the album and handled mixing duties, his status as a relative unknown persisted through the release. Pitchfork’s coverage of the album listed Hayes’ and Gates’ musical CVs before announcing that, "now, alongside someone called BIG MUFF RADIO, they’re in Cretin Stompers." The first few times I saw BIG MUFF RADIO live, Noto performed
as a solo act, using only a vocal processor and an iPod. The BIG MUFF solo show encompasses much of the unease that Noto refers to when talking about life and music. He can’t seem to stay put; he paces back and forth on stage, Ray-Bans on, tweaking the positioning of the speakers or leaning over the soundboard and make his own changes midsong. Rarely does he acknowledge audience members. Noto admits that there are elements of "anti-performance" in the act, a mock refusal to acknowledge the context of a show, which then becomes the show itself.
actly one power-stance throughout the set. Dave Stagno spins, headbangs and contorts himself without sacrificing any of the precision with which he plays his guitar. The group’s DJ and hypeman Stephen Stagno, wearing a camo bandana over his face and a BIG MUFF RADIO t-shirt, stands behind a laptop of questionable relevance. He pounds his fist on the table, shakes his head in resigned amazement, and eventually rips his shirt off in a moment of musical ecstasy. Noto draws a convincing energy from his band mates that has him embracing the role of front man and entertainer. The absurd conviction The live act eventually expand- with which each band member ed to include live instrumenta- seems to be enraptured by the tion, and the results feel just as music makes the show a commuch like great live music as pletely magnetic experience. meticulously engineered performance art. Bassist Vin Noto, "I’m out. I’m done after this, this nearly identical to his brother is it." Noto is playing me the first in matching Ray-Bans, exudes a track off his new album and decool apathy as he maintains ex- claring the creative death of BIG
MUFF RADIO. I’m a little too familiar with him at this point to take the insistence at face value; twenty minutes later we are listening to a new, unreleased BIG MUFF track. Still, Noto has his reason to hesitate when predicting the exact future of BIG MUFF RADIO. He’s working on various projects with different musicians, including handling the production of new KITTEN (Elektra Records) material. He can’t say for sure what’s in the cards for BIG MUFF RADIO – talk of name changes and vocal transformations abound – but for now, he seems content riding whatever cosmic rollercoaster got him this far. "I’m ready to see what’s next. There’s been all kinds of crazy stuff happening this year, I feel like I’m only now waking up to it. And we all are, you know? Because we’re all still young, to some degree."
words by zachary o’brien photograph by danny krug
19
words by eddie huddleston photography by danny krug
20
HONDURAS There was sweat, screams, and an elbow to the jaw as blood soaked cigarette butts littered the ground of Bushwick’s Hot 97.4. Gigawatts Fest was beginning to look like a scene from the 1983 movie Suburbia, when Honduras pushed through the crowd to take the stage. Just moments after the first sound left Honduras’s amp, their high-energy tones caused a sonic explosion sending the crowd into a moshing frenzy even more lively than earlier in the evening. Honduras’s blend of punk and post-punk mixed with the occasional krautrock inspired rhythm, kept the motion in the room moving as beer cans were thrown and kids crowd-surfed over my head. Honduras’ set was short and sweet like a good punk show should beleaving the crowd wanting more as they blazingly chanted for an encore.
at Webster hall. This punk rock four piece consists of lead singer and rhythm guitarist Patrick Phillips, Tyson Moore on a Flying V guitar, the humble Paul Lizarraga on bass, and Josh Wehle fervently banging on the drums. Honduras is one of the hardest working bands in New York City as according to Oh My Rockness, having played over 37 shows and releasing two EPs on Black Bell Records in 2014 alone.
Their second EP Morality Cuts, released on cassette, has been locked in my Hello Kitty boom box since its premiere back in February 2014. This 5 song EP is a perfect example of why Honduras has risen through the ranks so quickly compared to other New York bands. The song "Son" Honduras started in 2012 and is a shining example of what quickly stormed the Brooklyn happens when you combine the music scene, playing an array of attitude of traditional Sex Pistols gigs over the years ranging from Punk Rock with more modern basement shows to the studio Post-Punk tones. As "Son" fades
out into silence the third song "Ace" throws you right back into the mix by doubling the energy and kicking in a boost. Honduras’s second EP Break brought the band back to their punk rock roots lasting roughly 7 minutes and only containing 3 songs. This haze of noisy rock and roll peaks with energy on the track "The Program." Lasting less than 2 minutes, this track has all the ingredients you need to capture the raw energy of a traditional punch in the face punk song: an overdriven bass line, wailing feedback, and anxious, emotional vocals. The EP brings it back together with the final track "Mistake," a catchy pop song which brings the EP full circle. When I last ran into Honduras there were preparing to release their debut LP Rituals. Set to be released some time this spring. The album shines on the track "Par-
15
alyzed," an energetic rhythmic bullet that tears through your body. Recorded at a farmhouse in upstate New York on an analog recorder, Honduras employed the infamous Jonathan Schenke to produce the album. Schenke is known for producing Parquet Courts 2012 Light Up Gold, and the vibe of those recordings definitely peaks through on more than one of the new Honduras tracks.
sweaty basement or warehouse venue where they first discovered your music? If you’re Honduras, recording live to tape in a cabin in the woods of upstate New York solves that dilemma. Similar to a live show where you can’t go back and completely change a performance, recording live to tape limits the options for post production on a record. This resulted in Honduras practicing their new songs ad nauseam in the time With their last EP recorded at the leading up to the recording proshiny Converse Rubber Tracks cess so that when the time came studio in Williamsburg, the dras- to lock themselves in that tiny tically different process of re- cabin with Jonny Schenke, they cording the new album shifted could bang out the songs one afthe recorded sound of the band ter another as if they’d been playfurther towards what live crowds ing them their whole lives. in Brooklyn have come to know and love. The balance of creating In addition to making the requality recordings while still cap- cordings feel more authentic, a turing the energy of a live show is process like this makes a band one of the hardest struggles for better as a whole. Obviously, most guitar rock bands. How do practicing makes a band better, you take the listener back to the but so does recording as a to16
gether as opposed to more modern techniques that might allow only a couple members to be at the studio at any given time or in extreme cases where records are made through swapping files over email. Honduras’ time spent up in the woods at the band named "Camp Honduras" has yielded an even better band than originally left Brooklyn. While they were always known as one of Brooklyn’s most energetic bands, that’s been taken to a whole new level with their new level of tightness and the new songs they’re playing. With a new album freshly in the can, future tour dates in the works, and a talent for writing fast and fun songs, Honduras is sure to be blowing out my eardrums, and hopefully yours too, for years to come.
17
some photos shows, parties, and other weird experiences
20
STUFF WE’RE LISTENING TO AND THINK YOU’LL DIG
The Two or Three Moods of The Grand Pantrymen
Ghost Babes Compilation Vol. 1
Zs - XE
Krill - A Distant Fist Unclenching
Paperhaus - Paperhaus
Drake - If You're Reading This It's Too Late
The Two or Three Moods of the Grand Pantrymen coming soon to Gigawatts Cassette