Drain

One of the most significant hardcore records that was released in the middle of the pandemic crisis & the quarantine that followed was Drain’s ‘California cursed’ by Revelation Records. One of the best records released in the past years, in my humble opinion, bringing a fresh air to the hardcore scene of double twenties. Sam Ciaramitaro, Drain’s singer, was kind enough to reply to our questions from his home in Southern California.

Interview conducted in early April 2020. Artist photo by Malachi Green Live photo by Sam Jameson

drain831.bandcamp.com www.facebook.com/drain831 www.instagram.com/drain831

Hey hey! Welcome to Soulcraft fanzine 2! Do you follow hardcore / punk / whatever fanzines?

Hello! Thank you so much for reaching out and having us! Truthfully, I really don’t follow any fanzines. I have always enjoyed ones that I’ve been apart of, but with regrets, I do not follow any.

Can you introduce Drain and its band members to the readers of our zine? Who’s in Drain, when and where did you form?

Drain is Tim Flegal on drums, Cody Chavez on guitar, and I’m Sam and I front Drain! Drain started in 2014 in Santa Cruz, California.

‘California cursed’ is the title of your debut album. What’s hidden behind the lines of the title? What influenced to write a record like this both musically and lyrically?

Most Drain songs are just written by me about things that I personally feel, but the title track for the record was based off of a recurring conversation we would have with each other when we were on tour. It is difficult to juggle finances when playing in a touring band, and a lot of that has to do with how expensive it is to live in California, conjoined with how saturated the state is. The thought of being able to live in a place with really cheap rent always sounds great until we get there and realize how good we have it at home. Santa Cruz is one of the most beautiful places in the world in my opinion, and it can be a real love / hate relationship at times, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Since writing the song, I actually moved down to Southern California and miss it terribly, the lyrics mean more now than they even did when I was living there.

How were the vibes in the studio when writing the new record? You co-operated with Taylor Young (Nails, Twitching Tongues, etc.), one of the most hard-working guys in the scene now. Give us some behind the scenes info of the recordings!

The vibe was great recording this latest record. Aside from our very first demo in 2015 that no one has ever heard, we’ve done every release with Taylor, so we came in feeling super comfortable. Taylor has watched us grow and our sound changed over the years too, so it’s been really awesome to get in there and get all of our brains on these tracks and do whatever we can to make them the best we possibly can. We came in with a vision for what we wanted the record to sound like and Taylor captured it and then went beyond. He is just super knowledgeable in the genre as well as his craft, so he knows exactly what to do to make the parts that need to stand out, sound huge.

I definitely believe that your sound is super fresh, something that the current affairs of the worldwide hardcore scene was missing. What’s your opinion on today’s scene? Any stand-out bands?

I honestly love today’s scene. I feel like there are a lot of bands that we sound similar to, but we also have something that makes us stand apart from the rest, and it’s great. I also think it’s so rad that there can be a festival where every band sounds different from each other but no one sounds out of place on the bill. We have been very fortunate in meeting so many amazing people who play in great bands, through touring and festivals, that it makes it very difficult to just pick out a few stand out bands, but I’ll give it a shot. We recently toured with a band called Life’s Question who has a super unique sound combined with unmatchable live energy and feeling. They have been on repeat for me for months now. There is a band called Simulakra from Delaware that we have had the pleasure of playing with a few times over the past months, and I cannot get enough of them. It’s pulverizing heavy hardcore and their live set exceeds their recording. Lastly, there is a band called Poor Choice from Long Island that just dropped a single called “Elevate” that I have really been enjoying. I can’t finish this without giving a shout out to our really close friends who feel like extension members of Drain: Hands of God, Gulch, Absence of Mine, Scowl, DARE, Lead Dream, and Sunami.

You have signed with one of the most, if not the most, legendary, hardcore labels in the world, a.k.a. Revelation Records. How did it happen? How do you feel being in the same roster as Gorilla Biscuits or Youth Of Today? Do you ever feel that you are carrying the torch of these bands?

I met Adam from Rev years ago through a mutual friend in Santa Cruz, and we had loosely remained in touch through him. I would have my buddy send him all of our new releases and see what he thought, but it never amounted to much. It wasn’t until we played Sound and Fury 2019 that we won him over and had him want to make a record with us. It is honestly the craziest feeling to think about it like that hahaha. The first time that it really hit for me was when we got to meet some of the folks at Rev and we got lunch. I was sitting next to Sammy Siegler and he was talking about playing drums on the Project X record and that was one of the first hardcore records I got into when I was like 14 years old. My gut kind of dropped haha. I’ve honestly never really thought of us as torchbearers, but I guess to some degree we are! We all try to stay pretty level headed and down to earth, so that thought has never really crossed our mind! The thought of kids remembering us in 15 years, the way that we all know past bands on Rev’s roster, really trips me out! It’s totally surreal!

You are playing lots of shows, even from the start, and the release of your first EP called ‘Over thinking’. How important are the live shows for you? How hard is to fit in your schedules daily jobs and touring? Any touring moments that occur to your mind right now?

For us, live shows are everything. We’ve always strived to put out good recorded music, but be able to play it even better live, and I feel like for the most part we hold up to that. There is nothing worse than when you are really excited

to see a band and you know the songs like the back of your hand, and they start playing and it just doesn’t deliver like it should. We try to never do that. Touring definitely was difficult at times, but for the most part we just worked jobs that were going to be flexible with us and our schedules. There has never been a time where we said no to an opportunity because we had to work. I guess that is the one pro to not having a job you necessarily are passionate about. It makes it really easy to pick up and go as needed. I think the harder part of leaving for tour is leaving behind your life to go and push what you are passionate about. For the most part, we’ve all had girlfriends / pets / families that we have to say goodbye to for weeks at a time, which is a lot harder than getting work sorted, but its just one of those things that you have to do when you love this lifestyle and want to push it. As far as moments go, I definitely remember a few situations where we weren’t necessarily on tour, but trying to play shows down in LA and had work the next day in Santa Cruz (roughly 6hour drive). There was one time we did a live set at the college radio station at UCLA at 10pm and had to play / interview and then drive back to Santa Cruz so our bass player could be at work at 5am. That was rough haha.

It’s true that most hardcore bands these days play for a few years, release a couple of good records, then quit and that’s all. We hardly ever see bands lasting for a decade or so nowadays. People get easily bored or burnt out. Why do you think this happens? Is hardcore a passing phase for young kids that fades out at their late 20s?

I feel like it definitely can be a passing phase for people who are here for the wrong reasons, but I feel like the people that have it in their blood will always be there, in some capacity. I feel like its really based off of the short attention span for a lot of hardcore fans. Something can be HUGE for 6 months or a year and then be just a distant memory within like two years. So I totally understand how a band could want to call it quits after a couple of years, because it is really difficult to go out there on the road and play for people (or lack thereof) who just don’t really care. I feel like there are of course the greats that will stand the test of time and will always play to loving fans because of their drastic impact on the genre, but those are dime a dozen and not every band has that impact. To me, hardcore is very much a “time and place” thing, where you just have to be there at that time / place to really see it, feel it, and experience it. And I honestly find beauty in that. Drain has a little bit of attention right now, but that can all go away at the drop of a dime, and if it does, I’ll just be happy that I was there and got to experience it when I did.

The new pandemic has unveiled new options for the music ‘business’ including live streaming of shows and better promotion of e-shops. Culture is devastatingly affected by Covid-19 and it seems we have to deal with a new situation from now on. What’s your point of view on this? Moreover, how hard would be to overcome all this and re-build the social and human relationships and restore our daily lives? Yeah, Corona Virus really has shaken the world up and completely changed the way that we operate. For us, we had to drop two festivals, United Blood in Richmond, Virginia, as well as Wild Rose in Calgary, Alberta. One was going to be right before the record dropped and the next was to be shortly after. We were fortunate in that we were able to sell merchandise that was going to be going for those shows, but it is definitely a bummer. I think that on one hand, I’m really happy that everyone is stuck at home because it means that people won’t have much else to do when this record is released, so they’ll probably give it a spin at home. However, I definitely wish things were back to normal and that we could release this and play some shows around it. I think that the Code Orange live stream was unreal and I really enjoyed the Year Of The Knife live stream, because I love that band, but I don’t think it will be any type of replacement for shows. I think as soon as things are safe, we are going to see an oversaturation of bands going out on tour and people going out to shows. I feel confident that people will jump right back into regular face to face interactions and that relationships between people may even deepen because of the new found appreciation for life as we know it.

I know you had some plans like playing United Blood Fest etc. but I guess you have to re-consider everything. Any plans for the summer or maybe autumn / winter 2020? Coming to Europe maybe?

Yeah, unfortunately everything is off the table for now. We did have a tour lined up for the summer, but it might be getting cancelled as of now. I’m not totally sure what the situation is yet. As soon as it’s safe to, we are going to get out there and do a full U.S. tour, but my next goal is to go to Europe or Japan. I don’t know if we have a lot of fans in either place, but I would be ecstatic to go play overseas. Hopefully we’ll be seeing you out there soon ;)

Good luck with the new record and hope to catch you live soon! Thanks for the interview, last words are yours!

Thank you so very much for your time and for the opportunity to share some about myself and about the band. As some final words, be good to yourself and to others. DRAIN is your friend.