Kinda Cool Magazine: Issue 11

looking into the future with

WATERPARKS uncovering truths:

ORLA GARTLAND's debut album

GLASS ANIMALS

MAISIE PETERS wields power in her words

issue 11

nov 2021

finding inspiration and sparking creativity with

Editor-in-Chief Mary Perez

Contributors

Art Director Rebekah Witt

Gianna Cicchetti, Meg Clemmensen, JenaRose Dahlstrom, Kayla DeLaura,

Sonya Alfano, Mia Andrea, Kayla Aquino-Gualderama, Megan Armstrong, Polina Bakgof, Erica Cardozo, Ravyn Cavanaugh, Brianna Celestina, Lexie Dopwell, Ashley Gallegos, Sophie Harris, Adrienne Joelle, Caitlin Joy, Astrid Kutos, Cailley Leader, Faith Logue, Vic Maltese, Jessica Matilszki, Lexi

Cover photo courtesy of Meredith Truax

Matuson,

Caitlyn

McGonigal,

Natalie

Melendez,

Cyna

McKenzie Moore, Stephanie Nardi, Jayne Pilch, Emilia Rangel, Emily Richardson, Cris Rulli, Ibbi Schwartz, Leeann Spangler, Mallory Thompson, Chelsea Tiso, Mickayla Whitt, Tanya Wright, Anna Xu, Emily Young

kindacoolmagazine.com

@kindacoolmag

check out our latest website features and galleries!

Emily Blue

Stephanie Nardi

Mirzai,

Shadow of the City Sonya Alfano

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38

contents

46

100

issue 11 • november 2021

4 ��������������������������� UNDISCOVERED

35...................The Band Camino

74............The Greeting Committee

11 ����������������������������������� Noah Kahan

38 �������������������������� Orla Gartland

84..................Meet Me @ The Altar

16 ���������������������������������� Julien Baker

46 ���������������������������� Waterparks

92 ���������������������������������������� iDKHOW

20 ����������������������������� Oliver Baxxter

54 �����������������������������������Montero

96 ���������������������Between You & Me

26 ����������������������������������������������Valley

56 ��������������������� Super American

100 ����������������������������� Maisie Peters

ASIAN & PACIFIC ISLANDER ARTISTS

INTERVIEW

SHOW REVIEW

INTERVIEW INTERVIEW

ALBUM REVIEW INTERVIEW INTERVIEW

ALBUM REVIEW INTERVIEW

64............. GLASS ANIMALS COVER STORY

INTERVIEW INTERVIEW

SHOW REVIEW INTERVIEW INTERVIEW

UNDISCOVERED Highlighting and uplifting underrepresented backgrounds in the music industry has always been one of the main goals of Kinda Cool Magazine, and our Undiscovered section is one of our favorite ways to bring attention to rising artists whose voices and stories we love. In October, we celebrated Filipino American Heritage Month by asking some of our latest Asian and Pacific Islander artists to share a little about their experiences within those communities and how their own heritage influences their art. Check out what they had to say!

CEHRYL (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

Being an Asian artist in the context of the Western world means to remember, against all odds, where I came from.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

I grew up listening to Cantopop and Taiwanese pop.

@cehryl

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I think representation matters (and has slowly risen); however sometimes platforms/labels run the risk of tokenizing (as if one Asian face in the X genre is enough!). I think, for artists, having a somewhat self-reliant, supportive community is important. Support your fellow Asian artists and artists from other underrepresented communities, lift them up whenever there's a chance (instead of relying on platforms that have been fundamentally and historically white make oriented).

DAZE (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

Being an artist within the AAPI community is a source of pride for me. It makes me feel like I’m part of a bigger picture that is vibrant and full of love and culture, and being able to represent that is an honour.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Yes, definitely. I grew up listening to old school ballads and R&B, which has shaped my musicality today. Also, Filipinos LOVE to sing. Being surrounded by music constantly while I was a kid naturally led me to fall in love with it.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I think the music industry would benefit from exploring sounds that are coming from this side of the world because it’s a melting pot of a variety of sounds.

There’s R&B, hip hop, techno, alternative, and so many more. The versatility of the artists in this community is super interesting to me and definitely inspiring.

@daisylad

4 • kinda cool.

CA CHRISTIAN ALEXANDER (he/him) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

Being an artist in the Asian and Pacific Islander community in 2021 means a lot to me because our community is thriving. I think this is a great time for Asian and Pacific Islander representation across all creative industries because together we can inspire the next generation of our artists.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Growing up as a Filipino-American in New York City, as a minority, I naturally gravitated to hip-hop culture. NYC is the mecca and birthplace of hip-hop, and my hometown influenced every fibre of my being; the music I listened to, the vernacular I used, AND the fashion I used as a medium of selfexpression.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I think we just need to keep applying pressure by making dope music. All in all, the music is what is immortalized in the industry. The more dope music we make, the more the world will be put on notice!

@ca.christianalexander

@chris_alexndr

CHONG THE NOMAD (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

Every time I would discover an artist like Tokimonsta, Qrion, or Yaeji, I would feel like celebrating. Starting out as an electronic producer in my teens, I wasn't exposed to any Asian women in the industry (at first.)

It was unfortunate that you had to dig deeper to see any representation.

I'm so proud to be who I am in this industry and to see so many Asian artists breakthrough and thrive. I was in LA at a premiere event, and it was incredibly diverse. It's beautiful to witness it in real-time.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Absolutely. I got to dive into Indonesian Gamelan in college. I owe a lot of my melodic ideas to the hocketing of Gamelan's composition: intricate, rich sounds. I grew up performing in an Indonesian band/choir in Washington D.C. My parents are also musical people. I grew up on fusion jazz, new wave, and hymns. They have also led worship at church. I tell people: my mom taught me how to sing, my dad taught me how to listen.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

From my perspective, it all starts in encouraging the youth and giving them resources to pursue their passions. I've been in a lot of "all boys" spaces. Out of the three years it was held, I've been the only femme-identifying contestant in a Seattle beat-making competition. I've seen and experienced efforts to change the environment. I am blessed to have been embraced by people in the industry. There are many organizations (Women's Audio Mission, WeAreSheWrites, etc.) and opportunities created by and for women of color out there. But it all starts at the formative ages, at home. Encourage the next up and put a spotlight on potential.

@chongthenomad

@chongmakesmusic

kindacoolmagazine.com • 5

XELLI ISLAND (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

These days, it feels really special. I love how much pride we have and how much we support each other across platforms. It never used to be "cool" to be different or mixed. Now I feel like all of us mixed kids are having our moment after being overlooked for a long time. It wasn't until I moved to LA 4 years ago when I actually started meeting a lot of other half-Filipinas. It felt like immediate sisterhood because we all grew up with Filipina moms, something so specific that we all share. We feel seen when we're with each other, and it's such a precious thing!

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

It's definitely influenced the way I see the world, which directly influences my music. Last year, I decided to finally write a song in Tagalog, which I had wanted to do for a long time. I'm not fluent so it took me forever to write the lyrics, and I had my mom and my titas help make sure that they made sense, which was cute. I'm really proud of it, and it's been really special to perform live and get to sing something I wrote in Tagalog. I grew up listening to all kinds of music: Destiny's Child, ABBA, Backstreet Boys, Nelly Furtado. Total 90's kid.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I really wish there were more resources and platforms accessible for financial grants for AAPI artists. A lot of us came from lower class households, and music is an extremely expensive pursuit when you're doing it independently.

It's very difficult to get ahead. We work insanely hard to create our art from start to finish, and then getting it out into the world is an entirely different game. I think reaching out to people/investors who would want to help would be a start in creating those types of resources for struggling AAPI artists. @xelli__island

YAØ (he/him) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

For me personally, It feels like there’s an unspoken responsibility to carry as an Asian artist. Because of tradition and all the stereotypes that are put on us, it feels as though it is my responsibility as an artist to show that we as Asians are not all the same and cannot be put in a box.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

To a certain degree, I do agree that heritage does influence my music.

However, I think it is really what we choose to absorb in the end that shapes us. I grew up listening to a lot of Anime soundtracks and J-pop.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I genuinely feel that the music industry has been getting better at inclusivity.

However, I really do wish to see more opportunities given to artists in smaller Southeast Asian countries like Singapore, and not necessarily to those who are already known but to those who deserve a shot at it. To properly represent the diverse members in the Asian community I think will definitely take a lot of time. However, with more and more Asian artists putting out good music/content, I believe that it's only a matter of time when we will see more representation that we can be proud of.

@yaogotwav

6 • kinda cool.

JAGUAR JONZE (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

I'm in the Australian music industry, and to be honest, it can be tough. I felt like I had to wait for the environment to be ready for my artistry and culture, and now that it is more open to colour, I still feel like it isn't ready for discussion - deep discussion about what needs to change. There is still a huge element of racism, fetishism, and tokenism that goes on in my industry.

For me, though, I am so proud to be an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community. There is so much culture and story to be shared, and coming from a melting pot of different Asian heritages allows me to play and draw from so much richness.

and of course, anime soundtracks.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Yes, I was born in Japan and raised by a Taiwanese mother, so I listened to a lot of Japanese and Mandarin music growing up. I just remember my mum belting these gorgeous lullabies of Teresa Teng at karaoke, and so I cover a Teresa Teng song in my live set. Everything was always timeless and classic in my household, but my teenagehood allowed me to discover J-Pop, K-Pop

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

Commit to quota change when programming festivals and radio shows. Commit to creating space for diverse artists to come to the front. Allow for an environment of listening and discussion. And don't just tick boxes.

@jaguarjonze

Dorothy (she/her) and Jisu (he/him) SUNDIAL What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

It's really cool to be part of such a supportive community. Being able to share our stories authentically is really important to us. Although we like to see ourselves as artists first, we're inherently going to be inspired by our heritage. If others resonate with our songs, we've done our job.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Dorothy: I grew up in Hong Kong, and my parents listened to a lot of Cantonese pop. So I was constantly surrounded by that. I think a lot of my influence for melodies came from that.

Jisu: Growing up in America, I never had a lot of opportunities to listen to Korean songs. Instead, bands, such as All American Rejects, Linkin Park, or even post-hardcore ones, such as Sleeping With Sirens, were constantly in rotation.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

Currently, we feel as if the industry is already taking the right steps to be inclusive. Because music has never been easier to share globally (thanks to the Internet), reaching a new audience is just a couple of clicks away. In America, the AAPI community is still relatively small. But as long as artists continue to produce songs that others want to listen to, there will be space in the industry.

@officialsundial

kindacoolmagazine.com • 7

BROOKE ALEXX (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

I'm glad to help pave the way for more AAPI representation in music.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

My next single will be called "I'm Sorry, Tokyo." It's an apology to my Asian heritage for dismissing it while growing up in an effort to fit in. Taylor Swift is my biggest influence.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

I'd love to see an Asian Top 40s pop star who is not a K-pop artist. Maybe I can be that.

@brookealexx

TRACE (she/her) What does being an artist within the Asian and Pacific Islander community mean to you?

It means everything to me. I didn't truly understand my role within the community until semi-recently. It sounds silly, but it's honest. In the beginning of my career, I was trying to be someone I thought I was supposed to, but I think, under the circumstances of our world alongside getting to meet my fans at shows or even online in the last few years, I'm seeing myself a bit clearer and the power of music in a way I want to hold onto for forever.

It means that I'm aware of the reality that most people don't look like me doing what I do and that because I get to be a part of something, I have to do it with my whole heart and for myself, yes, but for the good of others. It means I get to bend and expand what "people" think of Asian Americans in the music industry. There's room for surprise, education, inspiration, and lots of challenges, but I am up for it all.

Does your heritage influence any of your music? What kinds of music did you grow up listening to?

Growing up with a singer mom, I was surrounded by Vietnamese music so I was instantly immersed in it. My mother would have the usual Vietnamese ballads and pop and dance songs blasting and also anything disco—Donna Summers on repeat, for instance. I personally went the folk/emo/angsty route and listened to anything from Simon and Garfunkel/Joni Mitchell to Alanis Morissette to Dashboard Confessional.

How do you think the music industry can be more inclusive? What steps do we need to take in order to properly represent or include all of the wonderfully diverse members of this community?

This is a good and tough-ish question. I think there has been some decent effort, and I'd hate for things to feel forced and for the industry to just slap an AAPI face on a cover of something just for the sake of it, but when it comes to the chart toppers, what WOULD it look like to thin the chasm between the top spots and AAPI artists? It just makes me wonder if it is an "issue" of lack of talent or an exposure problem. It's definitely not the former.

Another thought perhaps would be a more collaborative energy from non-POC artists would be quite influential and could shift things. I see a lot of AAPI artists collaborating with one another, and it's beautiful. I'd love to see some heavy-hitter, pop-charting folks bringing up some artists of diverse influence. It sounds like I'm saying Billie or Bieber should have me on a song, and you know what, maybe I am.

But I think to properly represent or include, the industry has to seek, work hard at finding talent to highlight and cultivate and perhaps even pour some serious money into said talent. If you're not K-pop, it seems like there's a lack of a support system or "machine" to help bolster an AAPI artist.

@trace

8 • kinda cool.

@listentotrace

UNDISCOVERED

the playlist

In addition to telling us about their backgrounds and experiences, each artist has also shared some music by other artists within the Asian and Pacific Islander community. Take a listen to the playlist here - you just may find your newest obsession! angels (emily)

cehryl

amphetamine

boylife

Lonely Trust3000 (feat. Dijon) Meet Me in Amsterdam Scandal

daze No Rome RINI CA Christian Alexander

semilucent 2 EP

PARADISE RISING

Get Back

Chong the Nomad

Crush - Unfinished IN PINK (feat. Mndsgn) PROVE HONEST

Jai Paul CHAI Xelli Island

Tenderness

Jay Som

High Worry

Bantug

I Can’t Sleep

YAØ

how r u sleeping

Shye

WHO DIED AND MADE YOU KING? Quiet damn Right

Jaguar Jonze MILCK AUDREY NUNA

24

sundial

mm+i

serin oh

Oldest TNT

Brooke Alexx NAYANA IZ

Manic Pixie Dream Girl

EASHA

Dancing With The Devil

NIKI

Sucker Punch Keeper Lonesome Love

TRACE Hana Vu Mitski

listen here: https://spoti.fi/3qsUyJN kindacoolmagazine.com • 9

going deeper with

NOAH KAHAN Noah Kahan is no stranger to vulnerability. In fact, it’s one of the things his fans have come to know and love so much about his music. His ability to be so candid and bear his soul in every song he writes allows people to see their struggles reflected in his and reminds them they aren’t alone. It’s bigger than just writing catchy songs—it’s about making people feel seen and creating music that brightens the darkness. In the midst of his North American tour for his latest album I Was / I Am, we had the pleasure of talking with this Vermont native about his latest album, tour, and the growth and acceptance he’s gone through since his release of Busyhead.

Interview and photography by Stephanie Nardi It's been so long since you've been able to be out on the road touring, how has it been so far?

It's been really good so far! I think it's been successful getting back after two years of not playing shows and kind of slipping back into it. The band, from a music perspective, we've really kind of picked up where we left off and actually improved, which is really special because my biggest concern was being a little bit rusty. I think, if anything, the rust becomes existent from the lack of travel the past two years and kind of jumping into this crazy travel schedule, moving around a lot, figuring out laundry, and working out, so little things have

been an adjustment, but musically, we're really, really feeling good. And I mean, I'm just so happy to be back up there. It's been a really, really peaceful experience for me.

I know you’ve talked about how you wrote this album to be played live. How has it been to finally be able to play it how you intended and have the crowd there?

I think when you're at a show, you're always excited to be there, but I feel like there’s been an elevation of the love and respect for the songs that I've made, which has been so incredible. This last album, I put it out, and it just kind of lived on the internet because I wasn't able to play it. People seemed to like it, but you never really know. It's pretty easy to

kindacoolmagazine.com • 11

say you like it, but going to these shows, being in the crowd, singing every single word, and really, really passionately singing these songs has been just unbelievably cool. It's really made me believe in the music I'm making. It's been a really good confirmation that people like the album.

Your music makes people feel seen and like they aren’t alone in their struggles. Does it do the same for you when you have people singing the words back to you at shows and reaching out telling you how much you’ve helped them?

It really does. I feel like a lot of the stuff I go through, even if I write a song about it, I still feel like I'm going through it alone, especially the past couple of years of the pandemic. Releasing music on social media and watching people like it on social media doesn't really fulfill me at all. So going to the shows and seeing people actually singing the words back and feeling like they relate to it reminds me I'm not going through this by myself. People really are feeling these things, and people really are sharing these experiences with me. It definitely makes me feel more connected to myself and to my issues.

Your songs are so deeply personal and that’s why people love them so much, but do you ever find it challenging to bear your soul like that to the world and be so vulnerable?

I think it's less about me so much, at a certain point, than it is about having an opportunity to make other people feel heard. My favorite thing about music is when I hear an artist say something I thought no one else in the world thought besides me, and it makes you feel seen. Having felt that myself, and knowing that there's a chance for my music to do that for someone else, it kind of gets rid of any insecurity or any fear of being vulnerable I might have. It really overrides that fear and makes me feel like I'm doing something important.

Anyone can release music, but releasing music that is hard to say or hard to talk about is really challenging but incredibly rewarding, and I think it's a real purpose of mine to do that.

You've noted that this album takes stock of who you were and who you are now. Talk to me a little bit about that, where that came from, and how it came to be.

I started out in the music industry when I was

17, and I kind of put my head down and said, "I'm not going to fail, I'm not going to fail, I'm not going to fail. I have to just keep going one song at a time, one thing at a time, one show at a time, and not think about the rest.” I did that for a long time, and it worked to a degree, but I feel like I was shelving a lot of important growth and development in a lot of tricky, unfortunate parts of myself that I wasn't really looking at because I didn't have the time. I got the time during the pandemic, and I had to look back and think about who I actually was, and I kind of wanted to make an album about figuring that out.

In the past, you've talked about how you didn't want to lose the person you were when you were growing up and figured out how to bridge the gap between your old life and the new changes that came with this career. Why was it so important for you to hold on to that person that you grew up as?

That's a great question. I think I found it really important because a lot of what I feel are my most pure, creative feelings were from when I was younger. I felt like I was very uninhibited by stress and the pressure of adult life, and I

was writing music that felt really real to me at the time. I know it's just because I was young, and everything felt real and cool and super deep, but I just wanted to hold on to that. I just wanted to hold on to that innocence of being a kid. I wanted to feel like I wasn't burdened by the issues of the world and the issues of being an adult, and I could just feel free. It's idealistic and romanticizing childhood is never very good, but something I definitely suffer from is severe nostalgia. I find it very important to hold onto those things because I really like the way that nostalgia plays into my music and the music that I love. Looking back will always be at the heart of what I do.

How have those feelings of holding on to who you used to be evolved since then, especially with the realizations that came through with this new album?

I think it takes a little bit of acceptance, realizing that you're never going to stay the same. You're going to grow, it's important to grow, and it's good to grow. It's about hanging on to values you had when you were younger and that you believed in, and also adjusting those values to who you are now. I think it's about realizing

kindacoolmagazine.com • 13

that no one is black or white. I live with a lot of gray in myself and understand there are parts of me when I was younger that I love and parts of me when I was younger that I need to grow out of. There are parts of me now that I love and parts of me now that I still need to change and fix and get better with. Understanding myself a little bit more is kind of where the album fits in: taking an objective look at myself and not kind of living in the dreariness of hating it, but understanding that I'm a work in progress.

When structuring the album, did you have a strategy for the order of the songs that you wanted them to be in to tell a larger story?

There are a couple of spots in the album where I felt like the song placement could aid in the storytelling and the narrative of the concept we were working with. For example, “Bury Me” is at the end of the album and, to me, has a lot of finalities. It's about a funeral, and it feels like a kind of a celebration and a memorialization of the person I used to be. At the very end, felt like it was a nice place to put that. A lot of it was sonic, too. A lot of the sonic elements of the songs decided where they would be. “Part of Me” opens up with a really cool guitar riff that turns into a big folk-pop song and felt like a great way to start the album. So a lot of it is about

14 • kinda cool.

making sure it flows together sonically. I think, at the end of the day, I actually did tell kind of a cool story when you listen through almost incidentally, but I think the approach is mostly sonic.

You didn’t just release a new album recently though. You also released your EP Cape Elizabeth. Were you working on that at the same time, or was it prior to I Was / I Am? Yeah, I was working on Cape Elizabeth at the same time. I kind of write all the time, so as soon as my first album came out, I was writing the second one. Some of the songs from Cape Elizabeth were in that period, some of them were later, some of them were during the pandemic, but all the songs were written over the period of two or three years. I finished a lot of the Cape Elizabeth songs during the pandemic, right when it started, but they were all written over the course of two years.

There seemed to be less pressure with writing Cape Elizabeth, and it came about very organically in a ‘Let's throw this together’ kind of way. Is that a pretty fair statement?

Yeah, that's pretty much it. Basically, there were a bunch of songs I liked that didn't really fit the poppier stuff I was doing. The Cape Elizabeth tracks felt like they were just cool songs I was playing on Instagram Live, and there was really no pressure. Then I finished them and I was like "What am I going to do with all these cool songs?'' Eventually, my manager was like, "Why don't you just make an EP?" I didn't put a lot of constraints on myself. I gave myself a week and a half to finish it. You could spend months dissecting one track and end up having it sound shitty still, so let's give it a week and a half. There was no pressure, and that lack of pressure really helps the music shine and helps make it feel relaxed and peaceful and kind of made it what it was.

It sounds like what you were talking about earlier when you were just starting out and writing music because you loved it and nothing else. Did that EP bring you back to

your roots a little bit, especially since you were at home because of the pandemic?

It was a pretty perfect experience in terms of making me feel like I was just a kid writing songs at home again. The whole world had stopped, and I was just writing folk songs in my kitchen like I did when I was 15 or 16 years old.

It was really special to have that again. I feel like a real part of what I believed in as a young kid about being a songwriter came out in making those songs. It definitely brought me back to my roots, especially with the folkiness of the music. I used to make music that felt much more folk-focused, and it was cool to do that again. It reminded me of why I love music and reminded me I need to start doing that more, and my next project is going to be sonically in that space. It definitely reignited that flame.

Were you able to take some of that freedom and uninhibited mindset into writing this new album?

I think what's nice about a second album is that you can't play any tricks; people already know who you are. I've just gotten more comfortable with being myself and just being like, "This is the music I make and this is where I'm at" and not trying to chase trends or be the coolest person in the world. This is who I am, and you know that. You heard my first record, and the next record is going to be a continuation of that. If you've bought into what I'm doing, you're gonna love this album, and you're going to think it's special. I think this second record is really just me allowing myself to ask people to jump on board with what I'm doing. If they like it, they're gonna love the music I'm putting out, and if it's not for you, I'm not gonna change.

Noah Kahan’s I Was / I Am album is out everywhere, and if you haven’t snagged a ticket to see him and hear it live, we highly recommend doing so; you won’t regret it! And if you don’t already, be sure to follow him on Instagram (@noahkahanmusic) and Twitter (@ NoahKahan), or sign up for his newsletter on his website to never miss a thing from this talented artist.

kindacoolmagazine.com • 15

a night with

JU LIE N BAKE R Words by Gianna Cicchetti Photography by Sonya Alfano

There was a special kind of energy floating around within the walls of the Beacon Theatre on September 14th. Fans clad with indie singer/songwriter merchandise and pride-related pins on their denim jackets filled their assigned seats for one of Julien Baker’s biggest, most formal headline shows ever in New York City. It had been about 7 months since Little Oblivions, Baker’s third album, had been released, and it was finally being played to a live, in-person audience. We all knew we were stepping into an emotionally intense night, guaranteed to bring out some tears.

Both openers were fun and effective at getting us ready for the night’s main event.

Mini Trees, a Los Angeles-based bedroom pop act, started off the night with some laidback beats and poignant lyrics. Sole member Lexi Vega and her accompanying friend Gracie Gray were visibly enjoying themselves on such a massive stage, playing highlights from the new album, Always In Motion, along with some older tracks. The audience was starting to slowly pile in at this point, and I was excited to see how early people had come to catch a band that I was excited to have on my radar since the spring. Second up was Thao, formerly of Thao and the Get Down Stay Down. Thao and her band’s stage presence was absolutely electric, leaving the crowd in awe. It felt so good to be asked to sing along out loud by an artist after months of not being able to do so. After Thao’s badass energy and infectious songs sent a shock over the crowd, all were ready to finally see Julien Baker.

For years, Baker had performed live completely alone, with the exception of

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an occasional violinist. To match the new sonic territory she had expanded into on Little Oblivions, she was backed by a band of close friends while on tour. This changed the dynamic of her live shows but definitely not in a bad way. Some of her older songs had been reworked to suit the full band; “Shadowboxing” and “Tokyo” were two reimagined songs that particularly hit hard.

From the urgent introduction of “Hardline,” the first song on the setlist, the audience was hooked on every instrumental sound and every word that came from the stage. We were mesmerized, not sure whether to stand up in excitement or stay seated to capture it all.

Someone eventually did ask if we could stand, and Baker responded, “Why are you asking me?” and encouraged us all to get up and sing our hearts out.

Getting to see the new tracks live was worth the wait. One of the standout moments that took me by surprise was “Highlight Reel,” an overlooked track on the tail end of the album. There was a full band breakdown at the very end, headbanging included. If you were close enough, you could tell how excited and full of energy Baker was that night, especially during this song. It could not be a Julien Baker show without some slower moments as well.

The crowd was audibly ready to hear some of the stripped-back tracks from Baker’s debut album, Sprained Ankle, “Something” and the title track. The following song, Turn Out The Lights’ "Televangelist" left me in tears, as the complete focus was on Baker and her piano.

I somehow managed to move from the back of the orchestra to the very second row of the theatre halfway through her set, and it felt as if the power of what was happening on stage lured me forward into any empty

seat ahead of me that I could find. The show ended on what is perhaps Baker’s most wellknown song outside of her work in Boygenius, “Appointments.” It was cathartic to hear the entire crowd singing, “Maybe it’s all gonna turn out alright/I know that it’s not but I have to believe that it is,”since I referred to those particular lyrics many times during the past 18 months. During the entire show, and especially during this moment, I was reminded how powerful music is. Much of Baker’s music is rooted in trauma and struggle, and all of us

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were bonded by the strength of her lyrics in whichever way they relate to our own lives.

This show had been highly anticipated since April when it was announced, and it was a beautiful experience finally being able to see such an important artist in my life perform live.

I am also forever grateful for the security guard who handed me a setlist that was backed by a picture of Baker’s dog, Beans, as it was a perfect souvenir! Julien Baker will be touring the States a little more in November, so be sure to check out a show if she is in your area.

Jeremy Zucker

by Anna Xu

creating a voice and a story with

OLIVER BAXXTER Oliver Baxxter is a name and a voice that you shouldn’t forget. The frontman of alternative band Broadside and author of several anthologies, the blunt rawness in his craft distinguishes him from the convoluted wordsmiths that mask their emotions with elaborate vocabulary and halfhearted stories. Conversely, Baxxter pulls his heartwrenching words from his own life, telling tales of his difficult childhood, challenges with love and loss, and fears of changing and growing. It’s easy to lose yourself in his work, as he shares his art to go beyond the circumstances life has granted him. Broadside’s most recent record, Into the Raging Sea, was released in late July 2020, and its songs intertwine with Baxxter’s poetry, connecting themes and metaphors in various mediums. His latest book, Is There Anything Left for Us?, recently came out at the start of October. Accompanied by his adorable miniature dachshund, Leo, Oliver sat down with me over Zoom to discuss his creative process, inspirations behind some of his poems, and his new book:

Interview by Mary Perez Was there ever a moment in particular that you knew you wanted to write or even that you had to write? When did you find your voice?

Growing up, I grew up in a less than poor community so I was raised to use my imagination for a lot of stuff, whether that was creating my own toys or making my friends laugh. I found that voice, that part of me as an artist, early on in my life because you can either wallow in it or make something of it. Trying to make

my parents laugh or my friends happier came to me early on. When it came time to create my own thing in my teenage years, time to create what is “my voice,” I also found myself leaning into the same type of attitude towards that entertainment aspect of my life. It was pulling from sadness and utilizing it to say “I have this, but I don’t want to be this, and I want to elevate beyond this.” Once my depression started and my trauma collided, that’s when I found my voice.

I’ve always been a needy bastard, as far as attention goes.

Do you have a different process in writing lyrics versus poetry, or are the processes rather similar?

These days, [Broadside] are just trying to explore the new sounds of where we are as musicians, which sounds so corny and cringey. Realistically, I like to let them do their thing, and I just show up like a rapper, “Let me hear the beat.” They show me what they’re writing or we write together, and then I show up lastminute and find melody first. These days, I try to focus on melody because if I enjoy singing it, then the lyrics are easy to me, and I think it’s because I’m a crazy person. I’m like, “Oh, I can just write a story right now.” That probably comes from overthinking, maybe ADHD or something, some self-diagnosed thing. I like to step in after the song is written, find the melody, and write the lyrics. I think that’s the easiest setup for me, and I find that it keeps me fresh because I don’t try to reflect on it. I find that, when you spend too much time trying to create something, you end up changing the shape, dynamic, and original intent of it, and you overthink it. At least with me, I’ll edit the shit out of everything. It’s better for me to just go in and go “That sounds good, right?” I find that’s where I am these days with my process with writing music, whereas, with me and poetry and short stories, I like

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to really get into it. I like to sit down, really slow down, get my mind into that stage, light a candle, get a La Croix, maybe take a third shower of the day, cry… I’m just kidding. I like to ease into the process, whereas, with music, I have too much to say. It’s going to spill out inevitably somehow.

Are there any other writers that have been able to capture certain feelings or situations into words that you really admire? Has there been anyone that has described something in a way that you wish you could have thought of?

I find that authors of children’s books are really interesting because they’re full-grown adults that are able to speak the language of a child, and I feel like that’s really beautiful and is saying, “I’ve gained knowledge by living, but I’m going to sacrifice that, not dumb it down, and put it into a lesson, a valuable lesson that a child might pick up and learn from.” I think that’s really powerful, and also dangerous in the wrong hands, but in the right hands, I think that any dedicated children’s author, or even Young Adult, that’s where it’s at. There’s a million books by a million different people, a million different white guys, and we have the same perspective—boring, stretched so thin. When you’re able to think into the mind of somebody else to benefit them, I find that those are the authors where I’m like, “How are you able to not be so vague?” How are they able to be like, “Let’s teach little Johnny how to tie his shoes or the right way to treat somebody who doesn’t like you.” I think that incorporating values and an overarching theme that seems so blatantly simple, it’s impressive. It’s like "Minecraft," the video game. I’m looking at it, and it looks dumb as hell, but you know there’s brainpower and creative and beneficial elements that have come out of that game alone. I think anything that looks silly on the surface but has a depth to it (chef’s kiss), those are the real people out there.

One of the most prominent references to your most recent album comes in You, Me, and The Moon as the poem, “There Is A Raging Sea Inside of Me.” When did you realize that there was this raging sea within you? What fuels this storm?

When I moved to LA when the band first started doing really well, I realized there were parts of me that I was changing in order to be absorbed by my surroundings. That’s essentially what the raging sea was: the opportunity to stand against what everything was trying to do, everything that was trying to consume me. It was an opportunity to walk amongst all that and be a standout guy. That’s what I wanted to be; I wanted to be a good guy, a successful millionaire. Neither of those things happened. Ultimately, I started to think of myself differently, like “Okay, I need to navigate this differently. I want things above what my peers want.” I started to feel very isolated and lonely. I think that’s the idea of The Wanderer as a whole: this demon that’s just walking the Earth, constantly forced to look down at the sea and see his own reflection of great shame and isolation. That’s how I felt for many years of my life, like drowning. No matter what I’d do, one step forward was like 30 steps backward because everything I had to do physically would take a toll on me emotionally for a while. That’s because we were on a different label, and they weren’t very fair to us, and some of my friends were leaving the band, all this other stuff. It was just heavy on me. All of this inside of me collapsed on me. Sometimes it feels like that.

Water is a recurring symbol that appears in both your poetry and discography quite often. Is there any reason that you use it so frequently?

I just think that it’s so terrifying. We love water sports and activities; we dream about it. It’s in movies, books, poems, great images of great people

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through history looking over vast amounts of water. We’re obsessed with water. The idea of humanity as a whole and the whole reason there are cities is because we were able to set up next to bodies of water. Without water, we’re nothing. That type of hippie mentality has always stuck with me my whole life because kinda crazy that, in the daytime, the ocean seems alright, but at nighttime, it’s like, “... What the hell.” It’s kind of a mystery. I think the one thing that humans haven’t exploited in this place, that’s what my obsession is. You never know! Maybe there is something we don’t know about down there.

Do you have any poems that come after you’ve written a song with a similar thread, such as “Morning Routine” giving reference to “Coffee Talk?” Conversely, were there any Broadside songs that originated after writing a poem?

There was definitely a time where I was on tour, and we were writing music so they were overlapping. I did find that I like to approach writing differently than how I approach melody and lyrics these days because I want them to be separate things. One is certainly more therapeutic than the other, and I would hate for either of them to become a noose tied around my own throat. I try to keep them separate, but every now and then, I can’t help it.

They’re just spilling into one another where I’m like, “Oh, there’s my other hat. I must have forgotten to take that.”

In “Always Running,” you ask whether we’ll ever reach paradise.

When do you think you’ll ever reach paradise, and what does it look like to you?

I think my idea of paradise these days has dramatically shifted from when I wrote that. My idea of paradise is within these days. I think it’s the ability to evaluate yourself in the mirror, or a simple human task like that, without feeling the need to be somewhere else momentarily. I find that these days, and maybe even the past few years, I feel like a stranger. Even if I accomplish everything on my list, it still feels vastly empty. I feel like paradise, for me, would be a prominent place of self-worth. I feel like it’s really difficult, despite all of the ways I’m trying to approach that. It feels further and further away with all the sad shit that happens. I feel like that’s what paradise would be: a nice moment to say, “I’m proud of you, Ollie” or “I feel good being in my skin today” within myself. I think the frustration is that I’m happy, I’m fine and healthy, in a good place. I bully myself all the time. I don’t even know what it is, but I think complacency within would be my idea of paradise.

You constantly talk about loving and being loved in return, and “A Note Left on the Dresser” connects to “Seasons” and not being the same person a lover fell in love with. However, in your poem, you explain that it’s a result of loving others before loving yourself. How do you make sure that you’re giving yourself the love that you need?

These days, I take an hour to myself where I allow myself to play video games or go get a Slurpee, something I would do as a child. [It’s] just stepping out of being an adult or what it means to be doing things right or wrong to just do something that’s for me, solely for me. A lot of people think that going to the gym and all this other stuff is for you, and it’s not. It is, but it’s not. The fire, it’s coming from a different place, which is fine, and how we get shit done. That’s how societies work—we judge one another while judging ourselves. You gotta connect to your soul, and your soul is just a fleeting voice that empties and goes away as you grow older and loses all the “Oh, imagine if we could grow wings and jump off the 3rd floor.” You just lose that sense of being. Loving yourself is allowing

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yourself to make mistakes, to fuck up, to love and be loved. I feel like you have to do a mere check-in thing, “Am I on track? Am I doing something that’s going to benefit me, the people I love? But ultimately, am I doing something toward leaving a positive impact on the little window that I have on this planet?” If it levels out with making me happy, that’s self-love right there. Sometimes my self-love is just doing the dishes.

“The Ballad of A Dying Flame” connects with “Foolish Believer” in that theme of not wanting your voice and legacy to die out after you’re gone. What messages do you want people to take away from your writing, both with your lyrics and poetry?

I’ve always been a bit of a funny guy, alright. I want to have a little bit of satire under everything I do because life itself is hilarious. Even the worst parts are so funny sometimes, like getting caught in the rain sucks, but it’s kinda hilarious. That’s not funny, but it is. I really want people to know that I tried, and I don’t know why I’m obsessed with letting people know that I tried, to be better than who I think I am. That was important to me in the first years of Broadside, letting people know that I don’t think I’m better than I am, but I want to be better than myself. As I grew, I think what I want people to know about me now is that I am a creator, a speaker, and a doer.

That was my place in society: I just created stuff. I might’ve made you think a certain way about a certain thing. I never want people to look at me and go “How unfortunate.” That’s my biggest fear. I feel like that’d be such a letdown for the little boy that I’m afraid of whenever I see myself.

In “Selling Sadness,” we hear you express fears that listeners are beginning to let go lately. “The Raging Sea” uses that same phrase, and do you feel like people are holding onto that notion that you’ll always just be ‘selling sadness?’

Whenever I post about being in a relationship or shit like that, I lose hundreds and hundreds of followers. It’s bizarre. I think I set myself up by having a stupid haircut in the beginning, but I might’ve brought on the wrong crowd. In reality, I’m a nice guy; sometimes it’s a flirty guy thing, and I’ve been very forward with who I am. That doesn’t mean we’re going to fall in love with one another. I think maybe, somewhere along the lines, people get upset that I’m more than just a normal guy. Whenever I post “Oh, I’m not feeling this today” or try to express the same emotions that I put on the record, it’s taken weirdly. It’s weird because I’ve tried a lot in the last two years to branch out, but I feel like a lot of people are like, “Oh, this isn’t pop punk? I’m out of here!” That’s fine—it’s anyone’s choice, but it is heartbreaking to think, the same sadness that you wanted, you don’t want the man who created it. You want the songs that you can sing along to. That shit is empty. It racks my brain because when you can’t tour, then what are you? I’m a memory? That sucks. Now I feel like there are so many cool pop punk bands—how are we going to compete? So many hot bands on TikTok, I feel like my life is falling apart, and I don’t have the legs to run in the race. That’s what it feels like with “selling sadness.” I told you about my childhood, and y’all connected to it when y’all were 14, 15. As the years go on, they go away and grow up, and people got their own lives. Unless you wanna be kinda gimmicky and do something that’s not true to you as an artist, that’s not me. That’s where I feel like I messed up because I “sold” my sadness. I didn’t sell something else. They like that I keep it real, which is awesome because I love keeping it real, but I’m like “Oh man, those are real feelings. I do have to process them...eventually.”

Given that your songs touch on some tougher subjects, have you ever written something that was too personal to put out? Do you find any

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advantages in being so open about challenges that you face?

Since it seems to be dying low, I should revert to trying the vague approach.

There are certainly songs that we’ve put out that I wish we never did, and we’ve never played them live. “A Place to Lay Your Head” from our first album, we’ve never played live, and “A Better Way,” which is a song about my best friend, I put that out about two years after he passed away. That shit wrecked me. I didn’t expect that to happen. That moment and what it means to me is now out in the world, collecting Spotify numbers. I can’t even say the man’s name without it breaking my heart. His mom was super upset, too. She heard the song and was like, “I can’t believe you’re exploiting it.”

It’s her right to think like that. It’s heartbreaking because that’s real-life stuff, and I just put it in my art. You can definitely be too personal if it’s too personal. You gotta heal that hurt.

During the process of writing your new book, when did you know that it was complete? What was the finishing touch?

So many terrible things have happened in the last year, and I thought the book would never be done. I kept abandoning it, picking it up, and putting it down, when I would travel and do all this stuff. I was going away to random places to finish writing it and be alone. I just left it on my shelf for three months, and then I read this quote that was like, “Art’s never done; you just abandon it.” I was like, “Holy shit,” and the book was done. Then I packaged it up and edited it down, and I sent it to a few editors and all that stuff. Then it started to look like a book, but at the time, it was just like a hundred poems. I just needed to hear something that was like, “Hey man, art is subjective. People are either gonna like it or they’re not.” If I put it out and they don’t like it, fine, move on to the next. If they like it, you got a winner. Maybe an agent will hit you up and be like “You wanna be a famous poet?”

What advice would you give to somebody struggling to find their voice?

A lot of people are trying to find what they have in common with other people, and they’re not spending enough time trying to find what they don’t have in common with other people. Somewhere between those two flashing points, you’re going to find an opportunity that’s really going to keep you complacent with your emotions for the rest of your life, where you’ll be able to satisfy both of those. We all need to be loved, but we all need to express ourselves, right? Sometimes people don’t express themselves because they’re afraid it’ll deter love from them or companionship or even family. It’ll deter someone’s loyalty to you because they’ll think that you’re strange or don’t like charcuterie boards, even though all of your friends like them. I feel like it’s important to find a balance between a reason to do something and a passion to do something, and I feel like that’s where the voice is. They call it like “See a need, fill a need,” blah blah blah blah. That’s in the business world. In the art world, we look at it like if you have something to say and feel like you should, it’s dying inside of you where you’re like, “If I don’t get this out, I’m going to explode,” then you gotta get that shit out because you’re going to explode. That’s how you find your voice: you just say “No one’s going to listen to me unless I speak.”

Is There Anything Left for Us? is available now at oliverbaxxter.com.

Additionally, Oliver’s fianceé, Sara, was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, and you can support her journey by checking out their new merch line and donating on elioco.com. Oliver has always been such a wonderful artist and someone whose challenges only fuel his storytelling, and following his artistic and personal journey is a gift in itself.

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VISUALIZING VALLEY: mood boards and looking through the sunroof of a Volkswagen Jetta Ashton Kutcher, Jim Carrey, and headline tours are all on the mind for Canadian alternative band Valley. With a newly released EP titled Last Birthday, we get down to the nitty-gritty of what the process looks like and the visualizations of their work. Images are everything to the four members, and they tell us all about it. With the interview having been set less than 24 hours before the EP’s release, you can feel the excitement they have for their new project. We talk about the title track that is not yet released that gave the EP its namesake, as well as the band receiving what shall be dubbed the “timeline trophy” from this point forward.

Interview by McKenzie Moore Photography courtesy of Becca Hamel Starting off, can everyone introduce themselves and include something that they are obsessed with right now?

Karah James: I'm Karah. I played drums and sing in the band, and I love to paint.

Rob Laska: I'm Rob. I sing and play guitar.

Something I'm obsessed with right now, huh?

To be honest, it's kind of a boring answer, but I just binge-watched one of my favorite shows, a British show called “Sex Education.” It's incredible.

Mickey Brandolino: I'm watching the third season right now; it’s so good.

RL: Yeah, so like my whole day is just binging.

MB: I’m Mickey. I play guitar and keys on stage, and I love skateboarding.

Alex DiMauro: I am Alex and I play bass. I am paying a lot of attention right now to the [Toronto] Blue Jays because they're very close to making the playoffs. Might go to a game this week. But I’m also binging “Brooklyn 99” because it’s the last season, and I’m very sad since I’m obsessed with that show.

Let's talk a little bit about the EP. Starting

off, can we talk a little bit about the cover art? Looking at it, I can't decide if I think it looks more like an old television box and you're all jumping out of it, or maybe it looks like when you're in a really old car and they have that little window to the trunk. Where does inspiration come from on that?

RL: Oh man, I love that you said that because we went through a lot of—I wouldn't say trouble, but there was a lot of back and forth on what the cover should have been—and the real answer is that we picked the cover because of what you just said. I think out of everyone that we sent it to, they were like, “What is going on here?” For us, a visual is always about explanation and kind of getting the picture, but also kind of being a little like, “How is that happening?” It's me slammed against this camera lens, but it causes you to kind of be like, “What? What are they on? Are they in the sky or are they flying?” And with this cover, I think it complements that really well. Are they in a laundry machine or a dryer? There are just so many different options of what it could be. I think the best art and the best shit that affects us is stuff that causes us to use our imagination and think. I don't think we're about visuals that are too explained, and I think, with our songwriting, we're the same way. It's how you want to have that room for people to imagine.

How it was really done is our photographer, Rebecca, just got on top of my mom's old beat-up Jetta, and we opened the sunroof kindacoolmagazine.com • 27

and it was us just sitting in that. But we're very down for people to imagine whatever else it could be. We have had some funny answers.

Our photographer did a poll on Instagram that said “What do you think it is?” and we got laundry machine, microwave, and so many good answers. It was also the daytime/nighttime thing. I think it was cool that sucks to see you doing better was very bright with the sky and colorful. For Last Birthday, you get kind of this evening in a car and a sort of cinematic vibe so that they contrast each other very nicely.

I like that answer a lot better than the ones I was coming up with. I didn't see the sunroof and now I am definitely going to see it.

MB: Yeah, you cannot see Becker’s shoes, too, on the edge of the car. There's like little things.

But yeah, on initial look, it causes people to scratch their heads a bit, which is cool. It's like a magic trick, you know? You see it, and that causes you to zoom in and be like, “What is going on here,” which I love. I think that's going to be so cool on vinyl when we do vinyl.

AD: Yeah, it's going to look great on vinyl.

I also think it helps that, if people are having to think about it, they're putting your name in their heads when they're taking that time to try to figure out what the hell is going on.

RL: Exactly, for sure.

Moving on to my next question for you all, where did the title “Last Birthday” start out?

How did it define itself?

KJ: There's a song coming out called “Last Birthday,” except I don't know if I'm allowed to say that. It l is such a special song to us, and we just felt like, “How do we highlight this song?” It's not necessarily the most trendy song or whatever. It's kind of like a Fleetwood Macsounding song, and we wanted to highlight it.

We wanted to put this life around it, and what better way to do that than call the body of work “Last Birthday” and have it encompass the era and be the poster child of that? Thematically, it also ties into the other songs in terms of the narrative because Last Birthday is the notion of “I'll be with you in your life in whatever sense that means until your last birthday,” and that's 28 • kinda cool.

what a lot of the songs are contextually about.

Do you guys imagine that when you guys have the option to print it, let's say on vinyl, you'll add that song to your seven songs that are on the tracklist now?

RL: There's a whole plan.

MB: A whole plan. Might not just be even one.

There are lots planned for the last part.

Awesome, I'll let you keep some of your secrets hidden and move on to our next question. I know you guys have mentioned in past interviews you've done that the songwriting process is chaotic and changes as it goes. Was there anything specific for the songwriting process on this EP that was a little bit strange or out of the box that stuck with you?

MB: Lots of Zoom sessions gave us this different perspective of songwriting because we're so used to taking our time in the room with the people we write with. Now when we were over the pandemic and we were not able to meet up with people, we had to access a different part of our brain and a different type of energy to write songs. I think there were a lot of silver linings with it because typically if you're going to write with people in Nashville, you're usually going to wait until you go to Nashville to write with them. Now it's normal to write with people anywhere in the world because of Zoom.

That’s the silver lining of working with whoever and you don't really have to do the traveling.

I think we got a lot of different palettes and a lot of different flavors in this process, which is another one of the silver linings. That's how we came out with “Like 1999,” a couple of friends from Nashville. That's how we came up with “Oh shit… are we in love?” That was definitely a different thing this time around.

So since we mentioned “Like 1999,” I’d love to bring up some timeline questions.

“Like 1999” mentions this year, and in my head, that begs the question: when did the writing begin and end? Was Last Birthday a pandemic baby?

RL: The timeline of this EP is all over the place, which I think makes it this chaotic body of work

that somehow makes sense. There are a few songs that were written in 2019, and then there are some written in early 2020 as the pandemic was starting. And then there's a few buzzerbeaters that were written. There's one that was written like two weeks before everything was submitted.

seen - on an EP, especially.

KJ: There was one that was written seven years ago.

MB: It's different for everyone. I think the collective favorite is the title track that will be released at a later date. But beneath that, we all have our own love for different tracks on the record for different reasons.

AD: It probably is the most like wide timescale of any body of work we put out, for sure.

RL: The timeline is crazy. I'm starting to think about it more and more. “Ain’t my girl” is the song that's seven years old, over seven years old. It’s one of the first songs we wrote. It's very full circle in that way. In 2019, we went to L.A., and there's a song called “SOCIETY,” which we wrote while we were writing for sucks. We just ended up keeping the song back and working on it more. The timeline is very much like 2014, but also 2019 and 2020 and 2021.

That is the longest time span I think I've

MB: Well. We won something. We won the timeline trophy.

Of the seven tracks on the EP, is there a favorite? Is everyone’s different?

RL: I would say mine is “Can We Make It (Jim Carrey)?” There's three main reasons. Firstly, Jim Carrey grew up in my hometown. He went to high school down the street from me, and for some reason, just having his name in that song, it's just really important to me. I think he's one of the only icons from my hometown that made it out and became this character and this human that changes people's lives with humor. Just that attachment of him being down the street from me when he was little and trying to have a dream is just so cool to me. Secondly, the

about it.

RL: Whenever I think of that song, I think of that chapter of our lives closing.

MB: Well, now I’m sad.

RL: It's pretty sad. I really want people to hear it and know. The lyrics of it, too, are very much about self-help and meeting people halfway. I think that song is really powerful, and I’m excited for it and cannot stop talking about it.

production of the song is just wild. It's very live.

There's crazy drums, a bass groove, and this gospel chorus that we love. And then thirdly, it's one of the only songs on the EP that we wrote as the four of us. We wrote with a lot of different artists and collaborators on the other tracks.

But for this one, we wrote it just the four of us, just in Mickey’s parents' house. And that was the last song we wrote as a band in Mickey’s basement where we started the band. We're never going to probably write a song down there again.

MB: It’s crazy to think about. I never thought 30 • kinda cool.

MB: My favorite song, in terms of longevity, like the one that I keep going back to, is “ain't my girl.” It might be because it was so easy and just happened, so I haven't spent as much time with it as the other songs that I replayed a hundred thousand times on a laptop. We also got to collaborate with really cool people who I've always wanted to work with, and I think it's just the easiest song to listen to. It just goes by, and it's just a vibe.

KJ: Mine is probably “Cure.”

RL: That one has a funny story. I didn't want that song to be on the EP. This is for people to know. For me, it just wasn’t hitting for some reason, and then Karah was the champion of that song. She said that you have to just trust me and believe in it—this song is a banger.

Then there was a moment where I was walking and listening to it in the city, and I was like, “Oh, shit, I get it.” I think I just needed it to click. It's the focus track, and I am really happy with it, but it took a minute.

AD: Oh wait, am I the only one who didn't say my favorite? It's actually so tough because Last Birthday is probably one of my favorites.

It honestly rotates; I think this is my favorite EP that we've ever put out because every song is so equally one of my favorite songs. I love “Jim Carrey.” I love “ain’t my girl.” I love “Cure.”

RL: Let’s put it this way: if you were to meet one of your heroes, like if you were to meet Steve Jobs, which song would you show him off of this EP? AD: I think I'd show him “Jim Carrey.”

RL: There you go.

For me, “ain’t my girl” is my favorite.

RL: Everyone's been saying that; it makes me so happy.

The only reason I am so in love with it is that the vibe of it feels like dancing in the headlights at midnight in the arms of the person you love, just smiling as you sing the words, with cornfields on both sides. I don't know why I have such a very specific vision of it, but that really brings me back to that vision.

RL: Yes, definitely. Cornside.

KJ: Yes. Specifically.

We're in the Midwest here, so it has to be.

But that brings me to visualizations. I saw you guys had put out that mood board visualization on

YouTube. Do you ever use mood boards to figure out the vibes for things, or was that just a cool idea to throw on YouTube?

RL: No, we've done that before. I mean, mood boards are so important to the way we work, and especially with photos. Any world we're trying to build is based on consuming other people's worlds and taking one thing here, one thing there. So that was very new for us in terms of a song mood board. But yeah, we love that kind of stuff. I think that's something we'll do in the future. And it's so fun to do that kind of stuff. I'm glad you noticed that. No one's ever

asked us about the mood board online.

I am very observant.

MB: I love it.

RL: That's so cool. Thanks for noticing that.

One more question on visualization-type stuff: three of the seven songs on this EP already have music videos out in the world.

Are you working towards more music videos?

RL: Oh, of course, just you wait.

MB: We have a video dropping for “Cure” and it's going to be wild. I'm so happy with it. It's very funny. I hope people look at it and get it.

This is just where I don't want to give away anything. To be honest, it does involve an ambulance. And I know that sounds dark, but it's silly. I'm really happy with the way it turned out. Hopefully, we can film more for the other songs. We have some other ideas for some other songs, depending on if it happens or not, with the state of the world. We love doing music videos since they are so important to our brand, and we love filming them.

Awesome. You guys do have some tour dates coming up soon. I know you have had some festival shows over the summer.

For me, getting back to live music and shows felt a little strange. So, how does it feel getting back into live music post shutdowns?

MB: Honestly, for me, I felt like… do you ever have like a really, really hard workday? And then the next morning, you wake up, and once it's over, you feel like it didn't even happen?

When we got back to touring, it's almost like we never stopped. For me, it just felt like we did our festivals, and it was back into the groove of things. It feels very natural just jumping back on stage. It's one of those things; it's literally like riding a bike.

AD: It felt like time kind of just paused.

RL: Yeah, exactly.

Last question I have for you guys. You guys 32 • kinda cool.

are going on a tour with COIN this fall. What are the chances of some headlining stuff coming soon?

RL: Honestly we've joked with the idea of calling our headlining tour the “finally we're headlining tour” or something because it's been very much requested for a few years now. But yes, it is in the works.

KJ: There will be dates. We can’t confirm where, but there will be dates.

I was thinking when I was writing the interview up, that I have seen you guys open twice and taken photos of you guys as openers twice. And it hit me that I have not seen a Valley headline show, so I went and looked back through your tours and couldn’t find one.

MB: We're definitely trying to avoid just being an opening band and being in that graveyard. We've done it for a long time, and we're so fortunate that so many artists want to bring us out. There's nothing like playing your own show and people coming in there for you. The issue is that we have a high standard for what our headliner is going to be. It's been built up in our head for so long so we're making sure that we are going to do it and that we can do it. So we're taking our time with planning it and making sure it's the right time and that it can be the best it can be. We have postponed our headlining plans a couple of times. I mean, obviously, the pandemic is the main wrench that got thrown in in the mix. But soon you will be able to see us live in a headlining set.

Thank you guys so much for talking with me today. Is there anything you’d like to leave our readers on?

RL: There's a clip that I saw today of Ashton Kutcher accepting an award, and he goes on saying “We wake up and process the world and these rules, and all this shit that people have deemed as ‘This is the way the world is.’ The biggest perspective that we have to remember is that this thing we know as the world was invented and created by people no smarter than you.” I think that's something so important to remember. So if anyone's reading this, just know that everyone that deems to tell you that this is the way shit is, it was created by no people smarter than you. So you can do it just as much. So instead of living a life, build a life.

I saw that this morning, and it made me smile because it's true.

VALLEY can be seen this fall on the COIN Rainbow Dreamland Tour across the US. They will also be headlining The Opera House in Toronto on December 16th, and that gives hope to more headline dates coming in the near future, as hinted to above. If after hearing about it, you’re interested in seeing the “Cure” music video, ambulances and all, it is now available for viewing on the band’s YouTube channel.

Last Birthday is also available on all streaming platforms now.

new single

out now on all streaming platforms @modernracket_

modernracket.com

@themodernracket

breaks away from their roots on eponymous debut Words by Caitlyn McGonigal

T

wo and a half years following their signing to Elektra, Nashville-based trio The Band CAMINO released their eponymous debut record in early September. The highly-anticipated album comes after a handful of EPs, with the most recent prior to their debut being the band’s first Elektra release, tryhard.

With a few years between releases under the group’s belt, The Band CAMINO’s debut showcases the experimentation both lyrically and instrumentally that the band undertook in preparation for their first album. While the experimentation is generally successful, The Band CAMINO leaves much to be desired for longtime fans of the band.

Intro track “EVERYBODYDIES” starts slow and cautious.

Sonically, it’s reminiscent of waking up at a party without knowing quite how you got there, what exactly you were doing, or why you spent the night. It’s trying to find your footing as you stumble out of the house and try to make sense of what comes next. As a listener, I expected “EVERYBODYDIES” to throw me into the deep end halfway through, right when I’m looking to jump head-first into what comes next.

Unfortunately, the song’s slow start remains consistent throughout the three-and-a-half-minute runtime, leaving me fighting the urge to skip it.

A perfect intro is hard to nail, especially on a debut, so I remained hopeful as I listened to the rest of the record. Songs like “I Think I Like You” (which is sure to be a fan-favorite) and “Know It All” pick up the pace and keep the first half of the album moving along nicely. However, the record falls victim to what comes across as filler in tracks like “Who Do You Think You Are” and “Sorry Mom,” which fail to

kindacoolmagazine.com • 35

provide the album with the intriguing lyricism and dynamic instrumentals that The Band CAMINO is known for.

The first half of the album is reminiscent of the pop-rock sound that was born out of artists like The Vamps and 5 Seconds of Summer in 2014, a far cry from anything The Band CAMINO has released up until this point.

The second half of the record is where the album truly shines. “Just A Phase” takes the unique blend of guitars and pop elements that The Band CAMINO is known for, and rearranges it into something brand new (and honestly spectacular) from the inside out. It’s familiar, but new and exciting—a clear level-up from their past sound and a logical follow-up to tryhard in regards to their musical style and lyricism.

Additions to the tracklist like “1 Last Cigarette” and “Song About You” continue to show The Band CAMINO making a logical growth in their sound while still experimenting with what makes a song memorable. “1 Last Cigarette” is destined to be an encore; it’s clear that every decision that went into creating the song was made knowing that it needs to be played live in order to reach its full potential. On the other hand, tracks like “Help Me Get Over You” and “Get In Your Way” fall short simply due to their placement on the record.

Truthfully, The Band CAMINO comes across as two EPs with similar, but ultimately too different, sounds being released as one installment in their discography, rather than a cohesive album.

The first six tracks fell short of the

36 • kinda cool.

few expectations I had going into this record.

The songwriting was far more shallow than I expected from the band, and the songs themselves struggle to hold their own against each other, eventually blending together into twenty or so minutes of the pop-rock sound that was popular nearly eight years ago.

The second half of the record finds the trio gaining solid footing seemingly instantly, which was a complete 180-degree turn from what the record had been providing by this point. The Band CAMINO left their best songs from their debut for last, but to do so guarantees that these songs may remain hidden to anyone who isn’t playing the album on shuffle.

Like any good group, The Band CAMINO is experimenting with their sound in their debut to see what sticks and which parts of their former sounds can be brought over and expanded upon.

And while the refusal to play it safe and stick to what they know is admirable, the experimentation simply isn’t as cohesive as it needs to be for the record to feel complete. Shifting around a few of the track placements could help break up the points where songs begin to feel the same, but at the end of the day, The Band CAMINO falls short of the anticipation tryhard set up.

The songs from this debut that are good, even phenomenal, but the ones that are forgettable are just that. It’s clear that The Band CAMINO has entered a transitional era in their sound, but this debut leaves listeners with more uncertainty than excitement for this period of experimentation.

MUNA

by Mary Perez

on learning to reflect, growth, and being a

Interview and words by Lexi Matuson Photography courtesy of Karina Barberis

Last year, Orla Gartland set a goal for herself – she aimed to finally put out her debut album. Having been an artist in the public sphere for roughly ten years, Gartland released four EPs and went on numerous tours but had yet to release a full body of work. “I had opportunities to make bigger bodies of work,” says Gartland, “but there were so many pieces of the puzzle that needed to fall into place.” For the first few EPs Orla released, she had brought on a producer to help her create her vision.

It was like “those pictures of people in the studio, where they take a picture of the back of some dude’s head and the guy is doing the music,” where Orla felt like she was “speaking a different language.” When Gartland was finally able to execute these ideas herself, “it was so satisfying. So when that kinda clicked into place, I was like, ‘Time for a bigger thing,’” thus leading to the creation of Woman On The Internet.

When Orla set out to write this record, she had no idea just how much time she would have to do so. In a time where we were all confined to our homes, Orla found it essential to have a way to escape. Having decided to write the record outside of her room, she “started renting a studio down the road […] A really small room, but the first time [she] had ever made music outside of [her] room, and it was the most exciting thing in the world.” On songwriting, Gartland doesn’t want to force what isn’t there. She says that “rather than just write a song in a day and do all the bits, it works better for [her] to just make a 20-second idea and move on to the next thing.” This is how the opener, “Things That I’ve Learned,” 38 • kinda cool.

came about. The song began with “a little drum loop that [she] made and you come back to it a couple days later, and it’s like ‘Oh okay, this still stands up.’” The song goes through lessons that Gartland has had to learn the hard way, paired with an experimental instrumental of drums in 5/4. In a video shared to her Twitter, we see the musician drumming on what appears to be a fire extinguisher and to really bring power to the beat, at the end a large wooden box is dropped. This unusual mix of sounds is able to capture the listener, bringing them into the album.

Reflecting on your own work objectively is a difficult thing to do, and Orla Gartland echoed this sentiment. “How can you ever have perspective on your own thing?” Garland asks. “Like I don’t ever have perspective on these songs even now. Like, I turned them in

in January, and maybe I’ll never learn to listen to them objectively because it’s me and I’m too close to it, but the only way that you’re gonna see the world through the trees is taking a break and seeing how something makes you feel a couple days later.” With songs, it’s important to give them room to breathe according to the singer. You don’t want to force what isn’t there. “It’s having that time to sit with things and see how they age with you was so good rather than committing to finishing everything the first day that you dream it up.”

One of the most striking aspects of this album was its visuals. All of the singles and the album cover itself had a similar artistic style and setting with Gartland even going so far as to sending out a sticker sheet so fans could customize their own covers. The musician had always resented visuals prior to this project. For her, the main focus had always been the songs themselves. However, Orla had an ace up her sleeve by the name of Greta Isaac. Gartland says she “could not have done this without her,” saying that, for this album, the visuals felt more important. Orla reached out to her friend to help art direct the visuals for the album.

Isaac completely changed Gartland’s outlook on visuals, taking them from “being something

40 • kinda cool.

[she] resented to being something [she] found so much joy in” and “putting as much of [her] self into them as the music.” During a time where live shows were nonexistent, it was the perfect release for the musician.

One of the biggest changes from Orla Gartland’s first EP to her first full length record is her songwriting style. Gartland notes that in the time between then and now, she grew up. “I think you have more things to say when you grow up,” begins the singer. “I think when I used to write songs, I used to really struggle with what I was talking about. In my very early songs, I would get to the end of an entire song and just not know what it was about. Now I’m always trying to write with a bit more intention, and I think, with language in particular, trying to be more literal is a big change. I used to hide behind so many metaphors because I was afraid of saying what I actually wanted to say.

Now I try to check myself when I write. I’ll come up with a super poetic line and I’ll check myself like ‘What do I really wanna say? What would I say if I were just having a conversation with someone?’ And I’ll usually try and go for that option.” This type of songwriting is something Gartland also found in indie musician Phoebe Bridgers’s debut album, Stranger in the Alps.

“That, to me, is the perfect style,” Gartland gushes. “Where she has one core metaphor in the song: ‘I have emotional motion sickness/ Somebody roll the windows down.’ That is incredible! That, to me, is like the best ever.

But that’s the only metaphor you need. And then the verses are so literal. They’re also really specifically about her story which is not my experience. I used to think that you had to be really general with your language so it was really universal and accessible, and if you were too specific, people wouldn’t get it. Now I think totally the opposite. In that Phoebe Bridgers song, she’s singing about in that verse about ‘You gave me fifteen-hundred to see your hypnotherapist.’ Like, that is so specific. That did not have to be, yet as a listener and as a fan, I’m no worse off for having that experience.

With this album, I was very keen to have my version of that. I think a really good example of that is this one song called ‘More Like You,’ which I wrote about my best friend’s other best friend, so this girl that I didn’t really know. I was just rolling my eyes all the time and was like her.

I wrote a song about that, but when it came out, I got these messages like ‘This reminds me of my ex,’ ‘This reminds me of my mom,’ ‘This reminds me of my sister.’ That’s so sick because that’s not what I wrote it about, but that’s your thing that you took from it.”

Imagery is always a core aspect of Orla’s lyrics, using her words to paint a universal feeling based in her own truths. When asked about her favorite lyrics, Gartland had a lot to share. “I like the houseplant one,” she begins, speaking about the song “Madison.”

“I just think it’s so sad as well to me. The idea of being like I wanna be in your life so much I’d literally be an object on your windowsill, it’s both sweet and a bit sad.” Another moment that always makes the artist smile is when the name of the album comes up, like in the chorus of “More Like You”. Gartland then moves onto sadder lyrics, like in “Left Behind” when she says “An elephant is in the room/Don’t look, and don't try to feed it.”

From “Lonely People” to “Woman On The Internet,” Orla Gartland has always focused on mental health within her music. Within the record itself, she made it a point that she didn’t want to write a lockdown album because she “didn’t want [her] debut album to be about this thing” instead of herself. Having to sit down and face the things that she had been running from

42 • kinda cool.

made the album what it was. “Pre-COVID, I was such a busybody,” Gartland recollects. “I was such a ‘fill-up-my-own-diary, go-and-meeteveryone-for-coffee, go-meet-person, go-tothis-show, let’s-do-loads-of-sessions,’ and I would look at my diary and be so overwhelmed.

I’ll have done it to myself every single time [...] then I’ll be like, ‘I wonder why I have no time to feel or process anything. Oh, wait! I’m doing this to myself deliberately.’” Once the pandemic hit, the artist didn’t have a choice but to face the things that she’d been ignoring.

“Still now, I’m unpacking a lot of what I learned about myself in the past year, and I think I’ve grown up so much. It feels like teen years or something, you know? You know when you’re 16 and 17, and it’s such a big jump. Then when you get to your early twenties, it slows down, and you’re not really a different person between 23 and 24, you’re just a little bit older. But something about the last year and a half, it feels like five years to me. I grew up, but I also feel frozen in time. I think that is such a weird thing, and I think we’re really going to process it for a long time. We won’t have any perspective on it for a long time.”

The final track on the album is quite the

emotional rollercoaster. “Bloodline / Difficult Things” is “a song that’s deliberately dynamic.”

When Orla identifies a song as one that she likes, “it’s almost a bad thing because [she] get[s] quite precious about it.” The musician shares that, when she cares about a song in that sense, nothing is right, adding “I rewrote the second verse like eighteen times because I really liked the first verse. It was a song about my family and about how I was thinking a lot about how I am. It’s about growing up and identity and coming of age, adulthood, all this stuff. But naturally, I wanted to have one song that was pre-that and was about growing up and about why am I the way that I am? Oh, because I’ve inherited this trait from my mum, this trait from my dad. My sense of humor I get from my dad. All this stuff - I was thinking about the longevity of that. This trait that I get from my mom, she might’ve got it from her mom who got it from her mom. So I was kinda thinking a lot about that passing on of traits and behaviors and patterns. It sounds a bit Doctor Phil, but I was finding it quite fascinating. And then I was specifically thinking about how you don’t have to give into that at the same time.” This thought causes Gartland to recall her childhood kindacoolmagazine.com • 43

and how this has always been a constant for her. “I was always so obsessed with people’s parents when I was young,” Orla reflects.

“We used to have parent-teacher meetings, and I would always volunteer to help with the parentteacher meetings because I was completely obsessed with meeting people’s parents and seeing ‘Oh yeah, that’s that girl’s parents, and they look like her. She’s got these mannerisms she gets from her dad.’ I was always fascinated by it. The song was about those traits that you inherit and where they come from but also knowing that you can go against them. Knowing that you’re not just a combination of your parents, but you’re your own person with your own choices.

You can undo all of that as well. It was a bit of a wrestle to get that writing finished because I could tell, after I wrote the first verse, that I cared about it so much, and that ended up just working against me.

It was like ‘Damn, I’m treating this with too much care.’ It’s very easy to lose the quick thinking train of thought type writing when you’ve overcooked something.”

Coming out of the darkness of the pandemic, shows are finally coming back like a light at the end of the tunnel.

Fantasizing about her dream lineup of a tour, Orla gushed about an artist she’d want to open for her and one that she’d want to open for. “There’s a band that I love right now called Wet Leg,” she answered almost immediately.

“They’re a British band. They’re really cool and they literally have one song that I’ve listened to called ‘Chaise Longue.’ They’re super punky, two girls, crazy music video.” And for the closer, Gartland chooses Caroline Polacheck. “Love her,” she gushes. “I mean, none of 44 • kinda cool.

us are worthy. Just a visionary, a true artist.”

When Orla Gartland realized the album was done, the only word she could describe the feeling was weird. “It kept me so sane last year to have this thing to focus on. I feel so grateful that I had decided pre-COVID to make an album because it gave me this really obvious tunnel vision thing to think about all year. I handed it in in January because it takes so long to get it mixed.”

When February hit, Gartland didn’t know what to quite do with herself.

Thankfully, she had music videos to focus on, but her main priority was gone. So she chose to look forward.

As a music lover, Orla Gartland hopes that people can see their own experiences within these songs, even in the moments that are so personal

to her. “If they could just see themselves or project themselves on it or get something back from it, that is it,” the artist shares honestly. “That is all I want. I don’t care what it streams. I don’t care what it sells. I don’t care what size venues I’m doing. Just connection is all that it’s about, really. It’s the only thing that brings me wholesome fuzzy feelings and really reminds me why I do it in the first place.

I just want people to live with it and have it and have a big body of work from me finally.” That sort of passion is what makes Gartland a true artist and what makes the album Woman On The Internet a true pleasure to listen to. As an audience, the listener can tell that Orla loves what she’s doing and that she put her heart into the record. At the end of the day, we’re all just people on the internet.

kindacoolmagazine.com • 45

I NS I D E

TH E

WI LD

WO R LD

OF

WATERPARKS Even from their earliest records, Waterparks, the pop-rock trio from Houston, has always been a force to be reckoned with. The band—comprised of frontman Awsten Knight, guitarist Geoff Wigington, and drummer Otto Wood—recently released their latest record, Greatest Hits, earlier this year. The album is experimental and bold, as the band never fails to push the boundaries of their sound, mashing creative influences with candid lyricism to formulate a Waterparks record that is both fun and refreshing. Their ever-passionate fanbase can easily be identified, donning brightly-colored hair (or matching wigs, one of the band’s most unusual merch items), holding their armfuls of art to share with the band, and gleaming with excitement for their favorite guys to take the stage. In preparation for their US tour, I had the pleasure of speaking with frontman Awsten Knight about their album, live performances, and favorite memories with fans:

Interview and live photography by Mary Perez Photography courtesy of Jawn Rocha Greatest Hits has received amazing reviews with fans loving the creative twists you’ve taken with Waterparks’ sound. How do fans’ responses stack up against your initial expectations?

I think it’s good. It’s also really hard to get because I can look at numbers all day and be like, “Oh, we have more than double the number of fans” or whatever, but until you can do stuff in the real world, it’s really hard to personally accept how well something’s being received. Someone can show me a chart and be like, “Hey, look at Spotify,” but until I can see how many people are at shows and how loud they are, it’s kinda hard for me to judge.

You’ve been known to hide references within songs and connect your discography with hidden threads. Have there been any references that fans haven’t found yet?

I don’t think everything has been uncovered, but throughout this cycle, I was trying to be less online, but sometimes I go through and see people’s annotations on Genius or whatever.

Some of those are really good, and I’ve considered going on and adding them myself. I feel like if people can see more layers regarding themes or metaphors or double meanings or whatever, they might appreciate it more. I’ll probably do that at some point. I can’t think of a specific example off the top of my head, but I would imagine there are some uncovered layers.

46 • kinda cool.

You were saying that you’d see what fans perceive certain lyrics to be about on Genius, and has there ever been a time where you had a completely different interpretation of what they said?

Yes. Sometimes I can’t tell how serious people are. There are some that are like, “This song’s about phone sex,” and I’m like, “No, it’s not!”

They thought one of the songs, they had this whole theory typed out and everything, and they thought one of them was about me falling for a girl who’s a lesbian. I was like, “That’s not what this is, but I guess it’s an interesting take.”

It’s interesting how fans decipher what you say and give their own meaning to it!

I don’t have a better way to say it, but I’m kinda selfish with the writing. I’m like, “It’s just for me.

What do I feel right now?” It’s very specific to me, so when people can either relate or find their own meanings, it’s kinda cool.

Do these connections come naturally within the songwriting process, or do you have to purposefully remember to place them within certain songs?

They come pretty naturally. Honestly, most of the lyrics do, like there’s not a lot of times that I’m like, “I don’t know what I want to say,” which is great. When I’m at the point where I’m making a song about something, I already feel very strongly about it, so most things kinda just flow out. If they relate in some way and have a reference, awesome. I don’t really force any of them or try to be like “Where do I fit this piece?” It kinda just works pretty well. I think when you’re coming up with a tracklist is when you can choose how the story or concepts will go. A ton of songs get written, and sometimes they have overlapping themes or topics, and that’s usually where the references come into play. Someone like Otto might be like, “Hey, I think this song should go after this one because this one, you say this, and this one afterward, you say this, and it’s like future tense.”

Many of your fans are rather creative and love to make art related to your music - are there any fan projects related to Greatest Hits that have stood out to you in particular?

48 • kinda cool.

That’d be so hard to pick just one! There are so many good artists that we’re lucky enough to have around. I have some at my house in L.A, but my mom has so many of the bigger pieces of me. I’ll come home, and there’s just a shitload of me around my room.

A shrine to Awsten!

Straight up, if anyone came into my room, they’d be like, “He’s a narcissist.”

Would you consider doing another painting video similar to the one you did for Fandom?

Absolutely, yes! Even my mom asked me if I was gonna do that. With this cycle and COVID and everything going on right now, there’s not much press or face-to-face stuff. I would imagine something like that would come up because I love doing it, and it seems like people enjoy looking into that side of it.

I’ve noticed that fighting is a common situation in your music videos, from “I’m A Natural Blue” to even “Lowkey as Hell.” Any reason for that?

Well, at that time and through the first album, we were kinda just like, “Okay, what do we want to spend a day doing? What would be fun for us?” It’d be funny to make our friend be a bird lady, and then we fight him. Or for “Crave,” like we want to hang out with dogs all day. When we got to Entertainment, things were still fun but more story-driven and had more of a narrative. I think with “Lowkey [as Hell],” I wanted to take pieces of older things to pair with the new stuff and put elements of old videos and put them in that way but newer, updated, and in my opinion, better versions.

One thing that I was really into for this album was giving visuals of how the songs look and feel to me and creating more of a mood piece than trying to fit an entire story into three kindacoolmagazine.com • 49

minutes. It’s hard to be like, “I want to tell this story, and I’ve got like 180 seconds to do it.”

It can kinda make things feel a little bit sloppy.

This time around, especially with “Numb” or “Secret Life [of Me]” or “Snow Globe,” I didn’t want to distract from the songs as much by trying to fit this full story in there, so it was very “How does this look? How does this feel?

How do we make the song pop?” Instead of the song being a soundtrack to the video, I want the video to be helping the song, as opposed to the other way around.

What should fans expect from your return back to live performances? Any surprising additions to the setlist or show’s visual aspects?

Yes, definitely on the setlist part. There were a couple where, when I suggested them, Otto and Geoff were like, “That one? Really?” We got to do a few smaller shows in the UK like two months ago where we played the full album, and we kinda got to see which songs really go off. We got to do a test. It’s not even about whether or not I like them because, of course, I do. I love every song on the album.

Some of them still translated well in an auditory sense, but there were definitely things where I was like, “Man, they’re not really going off to this one.” I definitely made sure that this set is a lot of Greatest Hits but also looking at the past and which ones made everyone jump.

Which ones made everybody crowdsurf? Put that one in there. It’s going to be a really hype set.

What song translates better live than you expected? Which song do fans have a particularly great reaction to?

There’s a lot of overlap to those answers. One that I feel translates really well live, which I learned from the last cycle, is “[Reboot].” That one goes so hard live, and I’m not saying that the album one isn’t amazing because I love it, it’s so cool. “See You in the Future” was good, “Turbulent was good.” I’m trying to think of the ones that made people go off the most for, like “Watch What Happens Next.” “Numb” is really good. “Violet!” went really hard live. Same with “[You’d Be] Paranoid [Too (If Everyone Was Out to Get You)]” - that was one of the ones they were loudest for.

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What’s your favorite question that you’ve been asked at a show Q&A? Ooh, that’s hard! The first one that came to mind was if we could all be anybody in any movie, like if we could live that life, and what we’d do. That was a good question. Otto kept picking people that die. Truthfully, I’d probably just want to be like a background character like a pet, like a dog that’s always around, but he’s not too involved in the plot. I don’t want to be someone that has to overcome too much; I’m just very tired. I wouldn’t want to be in A Bug’s Life or something because then I’d have to fight these grasshoppers that are like five times my size, and it’s just not something on my to-do list. I also mostly watch horror movies, and I don’t want to be involved in any of that either. I wish I had a better answer for you… you know what?

I’ll be Stuart Little. He overcomes, but he’s still chilling, and he has the nice car.

Have you seen those memes about being a child in that orphanage and watching as a mouse gets chosen over you?

No, I haven’t seen that, but that’s such a good point! It makes sense—it’s like lower maintenance. Kids are so expensive now. Have you ever looked up how much it costs to have a kid? It’s like hundreds of thousands of dollars by the time someone’s 18 or whatever. I feel like a rat just doesn’t cost that.

They’re like, “How much does it cost to take care of someone? 300k? How

much will it cost to take care of this rat? Oh, like $50?” It’s not great, but I’m just trying to think of their logic.

I know your tour merch has had some unconventional items in the past, so what would be something that you’d love to offer as merch in the future?

Oof, let me think. See, most of the things that interest me just aren’t really feasible. I think it’d be so fun to give people car tires, like a big

rubber tire that has our name on it, but I don’t know where they’d put it or what they’d do with it. I tried to have us make condoms once, but they looked horrible when we got them. We just didn’t give them out because I was like, “No, there’s gonna be so many kids.” They weren’t even in good packaging—they were folded over in like paper that was only secured by a staple. It was so sketchy. There were Cluster, Entertainment, and Double Dare ones, but they were just so sketchy, and I was just like, “None of us can use these, and we cannot give

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52 • kinda cool.

them to anybody. We need to get rid of these now.” That wasn’t a bad idea but just terrible execution.

What’s something you’d request on a dream tour rider?

Shockingly, we’re pretty low-maintenance.

What we normally have is blue Gatorade because, after every show, I’m just like, “Dude, all I want is a cold blue Gatorade. That’s all I want.” I can just sit there quietly to cool down. We also have a dog [on the rider], but usually the dog leaves by the time the show is happening because it’s loud. I think we get a dog like half the time? But it’s on the rider. It’s nice because he comes on the bus, and we’re like, “Baby!” You know who’s inspired me to extend our rider to be a little more bougie is blackbear. I was talking to him the other day, and we were talking about riders, and his is so insane. It has like everything. I’m like, “What do you do with all of this?” His is like four or five pages long. I don’t think ours would get to that point for a second because we’re lowmaintenance, but I want to be more bougie.

He’s smart; he’s got socks and underwear on his, which is really smart.

So nothing special for you guys?

Are you kidding me? The dog is real special.

That’s the most special thing you could ever ask for. Ours is like blue Gatorade, some fruit… oh, we also get one Green Apple Gatorade so Otto and I can fight over it. It’s not even about the Gatorade; it’s about the process of winning.

And the dog.

Fill in the blanks: __+__+__ = Waterparks’ sound.

If we had to do something with what’s sonically going on, I’d go Kesha, Donald Glover, Beach Boys. Get the cool electronic stuff in there, dance sometimes, be like hard sometimes, great harmonies always, you know what I mean?

What’s your favorite conspiracy theory you’ve heard about your band?

Honestly, I like hearing that we’re industry plants. I haven’t heard it in a while, but I used to hear it all the time. I really liked it because it’s really flattering because we were doing everything ourselves, and for people to say we’re an industry plant, I’m like, “Holy shit, we look professional.” They’re like, “This is too good to not have help,” like that’s such a compliment. They’re trying to be haters, but it’s not working. In fact, it’s helping me.

If we had to change our national anthem to a Waterparks song, what would the new anthem be?

Something for the people… my instinct is to say “Made in America” because it’s obvious.

I don’t want anything sad. I’m going to say “Take Her to the Moon” because I think we should go back to the moon more… and because we lied about going the first time.

Some people believe that because we were in some shit with Russia. I’m pretty sure we faked it the first time, and we needed that morale boost, but we’ve been back since.

Any last remarks for your fans?

Hi. Go outside. Touch nature, drink water. Try to spend less than five hours a day on your phone; I know it’s hard, but you should try.

Wear deodorant, wash your hands. Be nice.

Pick and choose the things you care about. Be good.

I’ve followed Waterparks since their Cluster days, and they continue to refine and define that signature Waterparks sound. The liveliness and vibrancy of their music are enhanced by their live performances, which are always sure to include a few surprises, whether that be through spontaneous covers of “The StarSpangled Banner'' or guest appearances from friends. If this interview is any indication of what you can expect for the band’s future, it’s those elements of mystery and unpredictability that keep fans waiting for every next move.

Waterparks are currently on tour through the United States, but they most definitely will not be stopping their world (and universe) takeover as “God’s Favorite Boy Band.”

kindacoolmagazine.com • 53

LIL NAS X

sings about fame and sexuality in

MONTERO

Words by Faith Logue

T

he world was graced with his presence with the 2019 release of his viral hit song, “Old Town Road,” and now Lil Nas X is turning heads again with his new album MONTERO. This album defines Lil Nas X as not just a one genre artist that people may think he is but a dynamic genre-blurring musician who takes you on all twists and turns through this album. MONTERO is hauntingly beautiful, with exceptional lyrics and a full mix of songs that will have your head spinning, transitioning seamlessly from rock to rap to pop, all at once. Lil Nas poured his heart and soul into MONTERO, and each song shows this dedication to his craft.

The opener to the album, “MONTERO (CALL ME BY YOUR NAME),” is a song that almost all of us have been bumping since its release. A viral sensation, this song was the hit of the summer. I love this song, and I am entrapped by the catchy lyrics and beats that make “CALL ME BY YOUR NAME” what it is. The chorus is by far the best part of the song for me as Nas’s vocals sing, “Call me when you want/call me when you need/Call me in the morning, I'll be on the way.” This song has amazing harmonies at the end of it, which starts the journey of this album off.

The second track is very unexpected from Nas, titled “DEAD RIGHT NOW.” This reminds me of his past single, “SUN GOES DOWN,” due to the personal touch Nas adds to it. The song is a slow ballad about his rise to fame and how no one cared about him until he became famous. The chorus is very well done, and the lyrics themselves stand out as much as the instrumentals, “I'll treat you like you’re dead right now/I'm on your head right now/ You wanna fuck with me so bad right now/Well, now you can't right now, oh.” Another set of lyrics that are found in verse two are “If I didn't blow, I woulda died tryna be here/If it didn't go, suicide, wouldn't be here/Now they all come around like they been here.”

Personal and saddening, Nas thought suicide was the only answer before fame, and it is disgusting that now people in his life care only because he is famous.

The third track is “INDUSTRY BABY” with rapper Jack Harlow, and this song has probably been heard by everyone as this one also went viral on TikTok. The song has very catchy beats, with loud trumpets in the background. The pre-chorus

54 • kinda cool.

speaks again about fame and how people told him he could never make it—of course, they were wrong, “And this one is for the champions/I ain't lost since I began, yeah/Funny how you said it was the end, yeah/Then I went did it again, yeah.” Jack Harlow’s verse is also infectious, and both Nas and Harlow are great rappers and made a great song.

The next track is electrifying, “THAT’S WHAT I WANT,” is a very different song produced by Nas. The song has many bubblegum pop elements in it and talks about wanting to find a lover, and in this case, a man for Nas, who came out as gay in 2019.

The chorus of the song can speak most to single people as Nas sings, “I want someone who loves me/I need someone who needs me/'Cause it don't feel right when it's late at night/And it's just me in my dreams.” The song has groovy guitars, synthesizers, and really lovely harmonies. This song is also going viral on TikTok, which seems to be how Lil Nas X is going to continue down this path of fame. After this track, there is a very short interlude called, “THE ART OF REALIZATION,” which is just Nas talking, and it seems to be a break between the rap from the first few tracks to the rest of the album.

After that comes the next track, “SCOOP” featuring Doja Cat who, like Nas, blurs the lines between genres. The song has really fun beats, and the chorus is something I could see a lot of people vibing to as it goes, “Scoop, skrt.” I could envision a future Nas tour with the whole crowd singing that and going wild. I think Nas might have used Doja Cat for a bit more exposure, but she works so well in the song that it paid off. I like the lyric “But you thought you'd have a chance after you wanna disrespect me?” because it gives me major “girl boss” vibes.

The outro is probably my favorite set of lyrics from the song, as it goes, “Shit, I been workin' on my body, yeah (I been workin' on my body)/Workin' overtime to make sure I'll be the scoop/They gon' know me, scoop/Well, baby.”

The preceding track, “ONE OF ME,” features Elton John on piano, doing an incredible job, as always. This song starts the next few tracks in that they are all slower songs. I like the chorus of this song as it goes, “I like this, I don't like that/Do this here, don't you do that/Say you one of me, say you one of me, yeah, yeah.” He doesn’t like people in the industry telling him what to do, and when people told him he will be nothing after “Old Town Road,” he proved them wrong. This song, like almost every

song thus far on MONTERO, is very catchy, and its slowness proves Nas can truly do everything.

“LOST IN THE CITADEL,” like the last track, is slow, but it adds an element that Nas hasn’t utilized in his songs before. The song revolves around an electronic-pop track mixing with a pop-rock track.

The pre-chorus has some amazing lyrics, which say, ”I need time to get up and get off the floor/I need time to realize that I can't be yours/I need time to give up just like before.” One thing I find interesting on this album is the use of religious entities within the tracks— in “CALL ME BY YOUR NAME,” Nas refers to the biblical people Adam and Eve—and in this song, “My guardian angel/I only seen you in your halo.” I wonder if he is saying religion saved him or simply using it as an aesthetic for his album.

The next track is very much the rap Nas produces that all of us are used to. “DOLLA SIGN SLIME” features powerhouse rapper Megan the Stallion. Nas is flexing his money in this song, and the average population could not relate to being rich, but he can go off about being able to buy luxury items and not even blink. I like the line in Megan the Stallion’s verse that goes like, “Ooh, I'm just such an obsession/Tea about me, your IG suggestions” because it sounds very different and her voice sounds so different in a good way. While this one is not my favorite off of the album lyrically, productionwise the beats were amazing, and Megan being featured was another great surprise, as this is the second female rapper on this album.

Slowing things down, the next track, “TALE OF DOMINICA” is the best song on MONTERO and is going to be the sad song for these cold winter months. The opening lyrics, “Woke up on the floor/Oh, this plastic bed don't blow up no more” reminds me of “LOST IN THE CITADEL” because Nas also references needing to get off the floor in that song. I think the pre-chorus is very chilling as Nas’s vocals mellow out as he sings, “Oh, sometimes you're angry/Sometimes you're hurting/Sometimes you're all alone/Sometimes I'm anxious/ Sometimes it makes me/ Feel like there's only now.”

I feel sad when I listen to these lyrics, but it speaks to me because I sometimes feel those negative emotions.

The next song is sad too which is called “SUN GOES DOWN” with

“VOID” following. “SUN GOES DOWN” has been out for quite a while, and it gets better after each listen.

This song makes me want to go back in time to give young Nas a hug and tell him it will all work out.

While I cannot relate to coming out, I feel the pain and emotion Nas conveys through this simple yet beautiful song. “VOID” is also about Nas coming to grips with his sexuality. When he sings the lyrics, “Oh, Blue/I wrote for you/To say I'm gonna run away from home/Oh, Blue/I love you too/But today I'm gonna run away from home,” he is talking about the film Love, Simon. The film did great things for the LGTBQ+ community, and Nas is going to do great things for the community as well, so it is really amazing that he references it in this song.

The next song Nas sings about the treacherous mountains of being famous. In “DONT WANT IT,” he speaks about how he doesn’t like the fame in the aspect that every little thing he does is put under a microscope and his past actions haunt him. This song is different from the past tracks in that he is back in his rap roots, and he really goes off in the lyrics, “I wanted fame and I wanted riches/ Wanted happiness, wanted forgiveness/Started focusin' on all these riches/Crazy how this shit come to fruition.” It is truly crazy how quickly your life can change, especially in Nas’s case.

The next song may be the most versatile song Nas has ever put out. “LIFE AFTER SALEM,” which I suspect is the sequel to “LOST IN CITADEL,” is a pop-rock ballad, which is so unusual to hear coming from a Lil Nas X song, but here it is. I hope that Nas continues to make rock ballads, especially songs similar to this one. I really like the lyrics, “You're changing/You're changing everyday/And you're taking/You're taking everything” because Nas lets out his heart and soul in those lines.

The last track is called “AM I DREAMING” featuring the impeccable Miley Cyrus, which surprised me so much that I had to reread the title multiple times. Nas, yet again, proves he is a very versatile musician, not confining himself to one genre. This song is another slow song, and the vocals impressed me. The best part of the song is in the final verse, when Cyrus and Nas combine vocals as they sing, “Oh, never forget me/And everything I've done/Oh, never forget me/Like I'm your favorite song/I'm fading.” Lil Nas, we will never forget you.

kindacoolmagazine.com • 55

SUPER

AMERICAN talk new album SUP and their complicated aesthetic

Pop-punk band Super American from Buffalo, NY are rising artists in the scene as they are getting ready to release their sophomore album SUP, a rock-driven record filled that reminds you of Midwestern emo and good old classic pop-punk.

Sup comes out October 22, and I had the great pleasure of being able to talk with them about the record, their upcoming tour with Hot Mulligan, and just how complicated their aesthetic is.

Interview by Faith Logue Photography courtesy of Sam Tilkins

like Turnstile, and obviously, you mention Hot Mulligan.

First off, how was it opening for iDKHOW for two dates? How did this all happen?

PF: We are big blink-182 fans and that would be awesome. Whatever Mark, Travis, or Tom are doing, we really like that.

Patrick Feeley: We basically got an email saying that they were looking for an opener on very short notice and if we were interested. It was kind of from a friend of a friend situation so it was just a nice serendipitous opportunity that came about where he thought of us because we are friends and we were available so it was great.

I had the pleasure of seeing you guys open for them, and I loved your stage presence and how you interacted with the crowd—are there certain things you guys do before going onstage to hype yourselves up?

PF: That’s a great question. Matt, what do you think?

MC: Whoever is down to have us.

PF: Yeah, really. We like The Story So Far a lot. That’s such a tough question, I guess the bucket list would be like Blink.

Before I talk about the new album, I want to go over your aesthetic. I am amazed by it and was wondering if you could tell me a bit about it?

PF: It’s like a music fan, a sports fan aesthetic.

I always think of like as high school sports or something. Whatever that one music video is, is

Matt Cox: I don’t do much, especially since we haven’t played in so long. It was just exciting to just play more than anything, as vanilla of an answer that is. Just being there is exciting in itself.

PF: Yeah I think the crowds at those shows made it easy because they got us fired up. We weren’t sure what to expect, and you can play for a lot of people and have them be in a weird mood and not riled up to go, but everybody was in such a great excitable mood, so it was great honestly.

I was at the Syracuse show and I saw how excited the crowd was and how much they were digging your vibes.

PF: I don’t know what that was all about, but we loved it.

Speaking of being openers, are there any bucket list bands you would love to open for?

PF: Certainly, what’s on your list, Matt?

MC: It’s tough because there’s so much good stuff going on right now. There’s a handful of bands that are doing really awesome, bands kindacoolmagazine.com • 57

what it is.

MC: Yeah that Nada Surf song.

PF: I gotta Google it.

MC: I just had to Google aesthetic.

PF: Oh! “Popular.” If you look up the music video to “Popular” by Nada Surf, that is what is in the back of our minds at all times. Like Lancaster high school, like the suburbs. Did you mean musically though?

The music is giving me Midwestern emo and indie rock vibes. Could you explain what exactly the cover of your album is depicting? I see the Virgin Mary wearing a Super American shirt and a bunch of other random things - are these things random?

Or are they symbols of something else?

MC: They are random visually like you said.

Fundamentally, now that I think about it, our visual aesthetic on social media, merch, and past album covers stems from the fact that neither of us is good at Photoshop or any of that stuff. We just have to make it by hand, for better or for worse. All we have is a scanner and some markers.

PF: To Matt’s point, I feel like when we first started, we made stuff

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by hand; we would take disposable photos and cut them up, and Matt would draw stuff and we would make our own flyers for shows. Now that we have more resources, like someone else making the flyer for us, they still try to make it in that vein almost, and they think that is our thing. I think that is where the aesthetic comes from, starting originally by hand. That is a good question.

MC: It is so hard to describe to somebody what you want, and it is really tough. You also don’t want to bother anyone because everyone we would ask has their stuff going on. It is just fun.

I think it comes together really well; for example, the album cover of Virgin Mary wearing the Super American shirt, I thought was hilarious.

MC: Call it beginner’s luck.

PF: In our defense to though, Matt, that was thought out, like all the icons meant something to us, whether it was subconsciously or very obvious. Aside from the icons we did for each song, everything does have a certain meaning, I think the fact that Matt and his buddy manually traced it, then I recolored it in Photoshop, makes a good mix of by hand and digital.

I like the lyric in “fuck it!!!!!” that says, “This little life of mine, I’m going to let it burn.”

Could you explain a bit of what that song is about and why it goes through many different tempos and melody changes?

Was that on purpose to reflect moods?

PF: Well, as far as the lyric goes, it was just a play on that “This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine thing,” they sang at church back in the day, which is very obvious. I thought it was a good visual about destroying whatever is holy. Honestly, the song is the same chords, the whole time, and the only thing to make it exciting is by slowing it down at certain bits. It isn’t about moods necessarily, but just trying to make it exciting for two and a half minutes so somebody would listen to it. "relax and float downstream" is very short, and I was hoping it would keep going on. Is there a certain reason that you made it on the shorter side?

MC: There’s a lot of words there in that short time, and any longer would have been a short story. That’s not necessarily bad, but I am not sure if that was intentional; it might just poke out that way in the tracklisting compared to other songs. It really is just like a chaotic moment.

PF: I would agree. I think, just because it is chaotic and aggressive almost, and I am

conscious of what others would listen to, I don’t think anyone would want to be yelled at for more than a minute and a half. I feel like what Matt said about the volume of words and aggression, if it went on too much longer, it would be a little much.

Speaking of that song, could you explain the video a little bit because it is very interesting, like the angel costumes?

PF: It was a really good idea by Matt, I would say.

MC: I think it was a good idea by everyone; we operate pretty well. We tend to just panic and wait until the last minute, which works for us, I guess. When you come up with an idea towards the end and there’s not a lot of time to second guess it, you just go for it. Our friend Shauna, who also did our “RIP JEFF” video, did a great job with her crew. We were really fortunate because, as you may be able to tell by this interview, we are not the most black-and-white communicators, as far as creatives go. She was very patient and took our minor ideas, and she elaborated on them. It would not be possible without her.

PF: Yeah, I felt like the idea was what would be provocative and cool-looking and not having much of a storyline really because it kindacoolmagazine.com • 59

is a short song. I think it looks cool, and it is the first time we were able to come up with an idea on our own and be able to execute it with friends, as opposed to outsourcing making a video and kind of just letting the videographer do it all. I am proud of it from that aspect. We had the idea from before that day so it was premeditated.

MC: Yeah, our friend has a donut shop that he works overnights in and has access to. It was an idea he has had floating around, so we decided to shoot it because Shauna has a nice camera, and we got a nice location. To your point before, it is only a 1:43 [song], so you could only fill so much space, so a timeline is not as essential as the visuals are.

In the song, "greetings" you speak of heaven—do religious meanings, like the angels in your "relax and float downstream" video and the Mother Mary on the cover, have a lot of importance to you as people?

PF: I grew up in a family that went to church every Sunday in a Roman Catholic type situation, and I felt a lot of guilt when I grew up because I felt a lot of it was bullshit so I think it comes from that. I just have a lot of experience in those environments and rejecting it so they are kind of an acceptance of where I’ve been and where I am now. I am not a religious person.

MC: I guess I come from a similar situation as Pat. I went to a religious college for a while, and I had to match my credit hours with religion courses. Also, from age 20-23 is such a bizarre time, in which you trust everyone and then realize that some of that stuff is bullshit, and you question the world around you. I have this terrible fear that if it is all real, I don’t know if I am getting in. It is almost like a brownie point.

PF: I think that there is a motherly aspect to the Virgin Mary image that is comforting to us because the concept of having a mother figure, in general, is comforting to all humans. It is like a comfort thing with a lot of other shit mixed in.

I can relate to that because I started questioning everything and floated away from Roman Catholicism.

PF: Yeah, sounds familiar.

MC: I’m pretty spiritual, I classify myself as a spiritual person. I just don’t think I classify it as putting on a suit and tossing a $5 bill in a basket at church; I just don’t think that is very holy in itself. I just think the Bible is a great book, and the modern practice is frustrating and hypocritical to me.

PF: On that aspect of spirituality, I think that is why there are so many of those icons visually because I think that everyone has their version of spirituality that they grow into if they are so inclined. Those are the only icons from what we’ve seen growing up that help us visualize.

A lot of the songs on the album are very energetic, except for “together” and arguably “greetings,” so is there a certain reason for this?

MC: That’s an interesting question.

I guess I have never thought about it that way.

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PF: Yeah, it is kind of cool to think about. As much as I like to say it is deliberate, when we are demoing songs, we sit and think about which songs we want on there, and we deliberately did want songs that were upbeat and fun to listen to vibes. As we were demoing songs and writing them, we just thought those are the ones we want on the album. What do you think, Matt?

MC: Yeah, that’s how I look at it too. We have a handful of songs, and then basically, we just kind of show them love, and then we start to look at them collectively. On this album, we couldn’t pick the tracklist, like we had our friend do it with our input. You can get it so far, but sometimes you need a bigger picture.

To answer your question, we look at them subjectively, and simultaneously, we look at each song in the context of another, how does it work on its own and how does it work with the context of its siblings. It is a really fun process. We probably made like 16 or 17 songs for the album, and the final is ten. They kind of just take care of themselves, we let it be and what is there six months later is what will be.

PF: Whatever sticks is what we run with over the course of the months. It is the fun part.

62 • kinda cool.

You write a song and may think it is great or it is shit, and months later, it might make sense in the context of the other songs and it will fit on the album. There are so many moving parts. It is partly deliberate and partly luck the way it worked out. “how big is your brain?” has racked up one million streams on Spotify, which is amazing. Are you happy that that particular song blew up, or do you wish it was a different one?

PF: You can’t pick what works and what doesn’t. There’s a lot of luck involved in that many people hear your song, and where we are at, we haven’t toured a lot and don’t have strongholds across the country with a bunch of Super American fans. It worked out great for us; I wouldn’t change it necessarily, I hope we get that far again. We are appreciative of it.

MC: “Brain” is an important song because it is a big step for our band, and a great example is it was a single and is now a parental figure on our album. It is a song that sustained energy, and I think it just was a big step for Super American.

One thing I notice is the seamless transitions between the two of you singing - how did you

guys develop this sort of technique?

MC: That is a good question. I try to look at it this way in that it is like an evolution in the context of our previous work and how it seems like a place of finality, but I think that, even now, we are still beginning to scratch the surface of what we can do dynamically and in this particular moment, that is what works on the album. I think it is a continued elaboration, from beginning to end, and I think it is what makes our band unique. It seems final, but I am not sure if that will be true in the future.

PF: I’m glad Matt answered that question first because it is more insightful. It is good for us to remember that what works and feels right at the moment is the way to go. We enjoy doing that and might keep doing that. The concept of that style being final or not is interesting.

You have an album release show happening in Buffalo, your hometown. How excited are you guys to finally place these songs live?

PF: It’s exciting. We haven’t done anything like this ever—this is the first time we have had a show extremely organized months in advance at an actual venue with real sound. It is especially exciting on the heels of ten more songs being out.

Lastly, the new album is out October 22, what are four words you could use to describe this album to someone that doesn’t know your band?

MC: You go, Pat. I answered this question last week so I have a safe answer; it is a very good question though.

PF: Matt, can you say them so I can play off of them?

MC: I think I said dense, studious, deliberate, and sexy.

PF: That’s pretty good. I like those. Dense and studious because it’s wordy, and I feel like a lot of reading and effort was put into it.

Deliberate because we were very decisive in attacking the album and getting the album done, [which] I think comes through in the overall product. I guess sexy because that’s like very primal energy that you can’t always put into words, but you can channel it for creative purposes. It is fun energy to channel when used properly.

SUP will be available to listen on October 22 and can be streamed on any streaming service. Super American is also touring with Hot Mulligan starting in November.

dreaming of the past and future of

GLASS ANIMALS

Throughout quarantine, we watched UK band Glass Animals rise, determined to make the best of a bad situation. They have been nominated for countless music awards, went double platinum in the US for their song “Heat Waves” this year, and stayed engaged in as many ways as one could possibly think of. In our interview, singer and songwriter Dave Bayley let us in on how he stayed creative and how social media gave him wings during a time of physical isolation.

Interview by Tanya Wright Photography by Rebekah Witt Hi! How have you been doing recently, now that shows are back and you’re playing live again?

That’s a really nice question. Yeah, I think I’ve been doing good, been really busy. All really, really exciting!

Good, that’s great!

It feels amazing to be doing shows again, actually. It feels really, really good after all this time being locked in my bedroom. They’ve let me out, and it’s nice to see people reacting to the music… not on the internet.

It was definitely a different time, but it’s so nice having it back. I’ve been to a few shows since things have started to open up again. It’s so cool to see people doing what they love again, whether that be you guys performing or just people going and enjoying live music again.

Yeah, it’s back! It’s back, it’s amazing.

I wanted to touch a little bit on songwriting because I know you do all of the songwriting for the band.

Yeah, I love doing it. I’m obsessed, I’m obsessed with songwriting!

Like a real job? Not talking about, like, grilled cheese and macaroni? I guess maybe 10 years ago… in college basically. Actually, a couple of years before college. So yeah, when I was like, 16.

That’s so cool! And where do you think you take inspiration from?

Hmm… everywhere, I don’t know. Initially, when we were starting out, I was quite shy and didn’t want to talk about personal stuff, so I was kind of writing about all sorts of stuff, mainly other people and stories other people had told me and things like that! The first two albums are sort of based on that kind of thing: trying to tell other people’s stories, like where I related to them. The latest album is a lot more personal! It’s more… it’s just my growing up and how it was growing up for me. Feels a bit selfish sometimes, but I enjoyed it and it’s not COMPLETELY about me.

It’s also about other people I grew up next to and were really close to me. It’s everything.

Well, that’s the whole point, hearing other people’s stories, whether you’re telling someone else’s story or someone else is listening to you tell yours. What is your favorite song that you’ve ever written?

That’s so mean! I can’t…

Lyrically, I guess.

Jesus, I don’t know. I mean, everyone writes songs when they’re like three years old…

Oh, lyrically? It’s really hard… I hate them all!

No, no! What have I been liking a lot lately?

There’s a song called “Helium” on the album that I like, but it’s really sad. Quite a sad song, quite a sentimental song. I think that would be my favorite.

When did you really start pursuing it?

Usually, with sad songs, you just feel it more,

How long have you been writing for?

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and a lot of the time, those mean the most to people, especially if it’s your own writing, your own story, that kind of thing.

Yeah, I love a sad song.

Me too!

I love happy songs too, but mainly sad.

It’s a different kind of love for a happy song and a sad song, definitely.

Yeah.

Okay, so during COVID, you guys were super active on social media. You were everywhere and blew up because of it.

I’m curious: how did it feel to see people reacting to your music all over the internet before you started performing again?

I mean, it was really the only way we had a chance to see people’s reactions to the album. Without social media, we would have released the album, and it would have been out and we would have had nothing back, seen nothing back, so I’m actually quite glad social media existed over the last year and a half. Yeah, it was amazing, but mainly, the main thing was seeing people’s creative reactions to it.

I think everyone was in a similar situation in the pandemic in the way that everyone was trying to make themselves feel more comfortable with the situation… it was a really dark situation, a scary situation.

When the future is a bit unknown, it’s quite daunting! I think people were trying to find comfort in creating things and making things. We made a website where we just put all of the Photoshop files, the sounds, and all the bits used to make the artwork, and everything is on our website basically for free and people were using it to make stuff. That’s what kinda meant the most, having people make things from something you made. It’s the most beautiful thing you can ask for.

Yeah, it was really cool just me seeing you guys everywhere, and the sheer joy of people reacting to your music was awesome.

Yeah, it was amazing. It made me cry a

couple of times.

Aww! I definitely think, for over a year, it was really unknown for a lot of people, especially for people who that was a lot of what they did, even just going to shows. If that’s what they were passionate about, and then it was just gone one day. I was supposed to see you guys the week everything shut down in California!

Really? Where were you going to see us?

It was in San Francisco somewhere.

That was the day! That was the day it all closed down. Wow… yeah, that was it.

We flew from San Francisco back home.

We thought we were gonna be back. We actually left our stuff in San Francisco for a bit because we thought we’d just fly back and finish the tour… I was so wrong!

Just a little bit, you were just a little bit off. Sometimes we’re all a little bit off. I don’t think any of us saw that coming.

I was really, REALLY wrong.

As far as the lockdown goes, did you, at any point, hit a creative wall? I know a lot of people felt like they were unsure of what they were doing before or how to keep doing what they loved when it was quite physically taken from them.

Yeah, yeah, it was difficult for a bit. I think the thing I found tricky was I would put out so much creative energy into creating the album and creating the artwork and the set design and stuff, and I kind of twisted every ounce of creative juices out of my brain into this album, and then it was ready to go. Then that was it, it was going to come out in April, and then BOOM, pandemic, and then I had nothing left at that point. It was like a steam train just plowed over all of this hard work. For a couple of weeks, I found it really, really hard to basically do anything at all.

I was just pretty bummed and was like, “This album is never gonna get to see the light of day, and if it does, will anyone listen to it?” I don’t know. And after about two weeks, I was like, “C’mon, Dave.”

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68 • kinda cool.

Gotta keep moving forward.

I know.

Yeah, like there is a creative solution to this. That’s when we did the website and started using social media a bit more properly, and yeah, we just started realizing that maybe there’s a lot of fun stuff we could do with just the internet. It made sense, too, because the album was about my growing up, and the internet was a huge part of me growing up. I am a child of the internet.

Okay, so as far as *rooster crows* oh, that’s my rooster!

For everyone, it was kind of hard in the beginning once they realized it wasn’t immediately going away, and it kind of hit everyone at the same time like “What am I gonna do now?” A lot of people lost their jobs, a lot of people lost their creative outlets, and it was really hard.

Oh, it was so difficult, it was so hard. But I’m lucky I can go and sit at a guitar or piano… it’s so therapeutic. I think that’s probably why a lot of people were making and returning to a lot of hobbies. I know a lot of people who played guitar as a kid like, “Ah I’m gonna pick that up”… and people started making sourdough.

I was definitely making sourdough.

You have a rooster?

I have 11 chickens.

Whoa! Wow! I can hear him, that’s amazing! So you must get a lot of eggs.

A lot of eggs!

Whoa. Where are you?

Well, I’m in the Bay Area.

WHAT?!

I know, I tell people that and they’re like, “Hmm, something doesn’t add up there,” but I do. A lot of people in my neighborhood have backyard chickens. We’re just in our own little world over here.

That’s amazing!

Did it work?

He’s so loud right now!

Yeah, it did!

He hates me.

Well done!

My mom is out of town, and he misses her so he’s been screaming a lot.

I was on a kick for a couple of weeks where that was all I did, and then I was like, “I better calm down, this might be a bit much.”

Whoa… that is a lot of bread. It’s delicious and it’s comforting, but quite a bit of work.

Aww, can’t you just put up a picture of her?

I FaceTime her and she talks to him, but then he gets an attitude and doesn’t want to talk to her because he’s mad at her.

I’d never made bread before, but it turned out fine.

I’m just impatient and wanted it to be done right now, so I got in this cycle of making bread because it was taking all my time!

Yeah, my dog does that as well.

I’m glad you got it right though, now you know. I didn’t learn anything about how to do it.

He’s great. He’s the same. I FaceTime him, tell him a bedtime story, but he’s like, “I don’t want to hear it”. And then when I come home, he goes absolutely crazy and jumps on me and jumps on me, and then he’s like, “Wait, I’m pissed”.

Yeah, it’s a good thing to know. Eventually, I might use it again, butIn the next pandemic.

Don’t say that!

Oh, it’s too early, too early.

Definitely too soon. It’s still a fresh wound.

I was going to ask you about your dog. How is he? Besides adorable.

Right! Can’t get enough of you until he remembers that you left him and then he’s mad again.

Yep, yeah. He was LIVID when I went on tour.

Aww. When are you going to be home with him again?

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I get to see him, not tomorrow, but the day after.

pressure on yourself. I know maybe that seems backward…

Oh well, that’s exciting! Something to look forward to. It’s so hard to leave your pets. I have three dogs and all my chickens, and they’re all my babies.

No, I think that’s a good one because I think a lot of people put too much pressure on themselves, and then it doesn’t become fun anymore. A lot of people find their self-worth tied to their productivity or work, and I think that’s definitely a good one.

Wow. Do they get along?

Yeah. The chickens used to be afraid of the dogs, but now we can let them all in the backyard together and they’re fine.

Aww! That’s really sweet! That’s good.

I had a question before we started talking about chickens.

Oh, that’s okay, I’m very happy to talk about chickens! I like it, actually.

They’re amazing. This was our first time having chickens, and it was a learning experience, definitely.

This was your first time having chickens, and you just went in and got ten?

We ended up with 11 and thankfully only one rooster because he is so loud.

Have you not trained him to just “Shh?” No, he starts crowing in the morning, so we put a little Velcro collar on him so that soothes him and he usually goes back to bed, but when he’s up, he’s up. But when he gets hungry, he screams, when he wants attention, he screams. Just like a kid or dog.

Or me!

Or like you! If that’s how you roll, then yeah, exactly like you. I know what I was going to ask you. We were talking about how hard it was creatively during the pandemic.

What is your advice to creatives trying to get back to what they’re doing right now?

Oh, I say trust your gut instinct, and I would say try to have fun while you’re doing your thing, whatever it may be. What else would I say? Don’t put

And you can ease into it! A really good way to start getting back into your thing is to try and recreate someone else’s work. That’s really good, that’s really fun. Sometimes I’ll do it. If I haven’t been in the studio, I'll listen to someone’s song and be like, “I’m just going to remake it,” and I’ll remake it, or remake it until I get bored. Another good way is to start really small, and just like, it’s the first thing you do when you wake up. Soon as your brain starts to light up in the morning, you do a little bit of your creative thing.

For me, sometimes I try to wake up, and just for 10 minutes, just do it: pick up a guitar for just 10 minutes, write something for 10 minutes, or draw something for 10 minutes, whatever you wanna do. That’s really nice because, in the morning, your brain is in this weird floaty place before you leave your bedroom. It’s worth trying!

Absolutely! I think that’s really good. Especially in the morning, those morning hours when your head is still clear, when the reality of all the things you have to get done today hasn’t set in yet. I think that’s definitely a good one.

Definitely.

What are you listening to right now?

I was listening to something the other day called Gabriels. Do you know them?

No, I don’t.

I thought it was really cool. I think it’s a pretty new release. I really loved it.

Awesome, I’ll definitely have to check it out.

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Yes, check it out, and let me know what you think.

I think everyone is a little bit.

I definitely will. That’s actually how I came across you guys. I was working a job in 2016, and my friend came over to me at my desk and gave me a list of songs. I think it was something from How To Be A Human Being, and I loved it and have been listening to you guys since! I never would have come across you guys otherwise.

Yeah, it happens to me too. I get really obsessed with something…

Wow! Well, I’m glad we have stuck with you for that long! Please thank your friend for me.

I think everyone’s interests are ever-changing.

Are you saying you’re fickle?

Just a little bit!

Just a little? That’s okay, I am, too.

Yep. I’m obsessed with something until I wear it down in my mind. I think you guys have continued to change, and still, you’re so close to who you were in the beginning, and that’s what I personally love so much. You’ve continued to grow and change in the best way, and people who have continued to listen to you for years and people who just found you all love you the same.

Aww, everyone’s so nice. I feel very lucky. Very, very lucky. That’s crazy. I think, at the end of this year, I’m going to sit down and think about the whole journey, the last like eight years or however long it’s been. It’s just crazy!

Yeah, I think you don’t realize how fast time is going by until something like this hits, and then a year and a half is gone.

us to see you back doing what you love while we’re happy doing what we love. It’s everyone together in that, so I think that’s super cool!

I know, I know.

Oh, that makes me feel good! I was worried I was being selfish.

Last question, what can we be expecting from Glass Animals in the new year?

Ooh, good question. There’s more touring, we’re coming back to America, which will be really fun.

There’s some… I can’t say too much, I can’t say too much! But, we will be back in America and I hope, I hope there will be some new music ready by then.

I think I speak for all of us when I say we’re really excited. It’s been great to see your side and just how passionate you are and how excited you are to be back, and also just for everyone else to see you back. It’s that same warm, fuzzy feeling for

No, if anything, you’re giving to these people who have loved you and watched you grow and grown with you. So, not selfish, I promise.

It’s like a giant family. It was really nice speaking to you! I hope your rooster is okay!

We find hope in the passion we see in this group as they slowly return to their normal. We’re reminded of the community we belong to, the light we will always find in hard times, and the joy and promise of the future. Be sure to catch Glass Animals on tour in 2022!

growing dandelions with

THE GREETING COMMITTEE Very few times does a sophomore album feel as cathartic and revolutionary as The Greeting Committee’s Dandelion. Grief, love, and uncertainty are woven into the album’s unfeigned lyricism.

Melodies joyful enough to drag heavy feet into dance and tender enough to soothe aching hearts linger in the background. They dutifully fill up the empty silence of young adulthood, and like a bittersweet soundtrack, they provide the comfort of knowing that— despite the turbulence—life has much beauty left to offer. I recently had the pleasure of speaking with the Kansas City-based quartet’s Pierce Turcotte. Below are a few of the moments and feelings that led up to this inspiring sophomore release.

Interview by Natalie Melendez Photography courtesy of Elizabeth Miranda How has your day been?

Not too bad. Not too bad at all. I’ve just been in the same room all day, just writing music on my own. It's been good.

Just to start things off, it’s almost been two weeks since the release of Dandelion. How are you feeling?

Feels good. Yeah, it's always weird. Album release is always weird because you are expected to put all this energy into this one thing when, most of the time, it's pretty much everything else, every other part of the year, 74 • kinda cool.

that kind of matters the most. It's kind of continuing to keep that sort of momentum going, I guess. But it's been good. It just feels like a small little success with the band. But I mean, with every release, it's like always two years, one year in the making, so it doesn't feel like that big of a moment. But it's good to have it out.

What have fan reactions been like?

They've been good. I mean, everything is just whatever we can see on Twitter, or we have this thing called Community where we can keep up with fan engagement. Everything has been really positive so far. All of us in the band have been really interested in what people's favorite songs were. It's been interesting to

see how scattered people's favorite songs are, which has been cool.

What has been your favorite song?

Oh, good question. I think it changed throughout the writing and recording and release process. I was really proud of “Can I Leave Me Too?” because that was kind of like my baby for a little. I mean, it is my baby. That was one of the first songs we wrote as a single for this. I just put a lot of energy into it. I don't think it's my favorite right now just because I feel like I've kind of learned to love each song individually. But I think right now, “Bird Hall” is my favorite and sort of like, not necessarily a fan favorite. But the people who like that song really like that song.

“Can I Leave Me Too?” is a bit different from things you guys have released in the past. Why did you decide to make that the first single?

I mean, it wasn't intentional. It was just the first time that we could write at the time. We sort of started writing back in March, April 2020, so like, right as quarantine started to hit. It just kind of happened to be when we were ready to start writing. We were doing a lot of writing individually and kind of separate from each other. We’d share the demos via Dropbox just to get everyone's reactions and collaborate.

But “Can I Leave Me Too?” was one of the first ones that I had kind of put together. It feels like a different release from anything else we put out before, but at the time, it was just me messing around with the saxophone and some guitar parts. The saxophone didn't actually end up making it, but the initial demos still kind of felt within The Greeting Committee's sphere. I think it's when it got to the recording process where things really started to shift and feel a bit more dancey or poppy than what we're used to doing.

Did you guys feel any pressure coming into the new album? Were there any expectations that you felt like you had to meet?

I don't know. Second album is always a hard one because, I mean, just all the previous music. I think I reflected on that a

lot afterward, just like feeling a lot of nerves going into the release. Because I know we just had this sort of big moment with the movie To All the Boys where a lot of people got introduced to all the songs on This Is It and were introduced to that feature we were doing “Beginning Middle End”—the cover we played for the movie. I was afraid that people are going to be really attached to this kind of style of our music and aren't going to perceive this new stuff as well. But when we started writing it, I think we felt a lot of freedom, especially since we didn't have to tour or play any shows. We could just stay at home and work on music. There's some intentionality to stay within: not intentionality, but just selfawareness, I guess, to what our old music is and that we're typically a guitar-based band.

We didn't want to make this crazy shift into playing all these new instruments, but I think we were just excited to have all the freedom to sort of make whatever music felt natural to us.

You mentioned you guys made a special appearance in the latest To All the Boys movie. What was that like? How did it come about?

Yeah! I mean, it kind of went by really fast. I think it all kind of came up at the beginning of 2019. We had just finished our headlining tour, and we got this email that we might be in this movie. It's hard to have any sort of expectations even if we were going to get it because we sort of had to go through this audition process of sending versions of us playing the feature track. But we ended up getting the spot and it was really kind of surreal. We flew out to New York for like two days, got to check out the set. We were on set filming from 7 PM to whenever we stopped when the sun came up. So that was kind of like filming in the middle of the night; I'm sure actors do it all the time. But it was just fun to be on this rooftop in New York City and to be part of this movie, then hear nothing about it for a year and a half and be like, “Oh, here's the final version of it and you are in it.”

Because anything can happen in between that time where they decided to cut the music. So there were fun little adventures, but when it finally came out we got to take it in and it was fun. Cool to see us all on the big screen on Netflix. Yeah, it was fun. kindacoolmagazine.com • 75

Did you get to meet any of the actors?

Yes, kind of. Madeleine Arthur, I think, is her name. She is sort of the main character’s best friend. She was super sweet. I do not remember any of their names, I'm sorry. But the head actress, we're obviously in the scene with her, but we didn't really get the chance to talk to her. We ended up talking to a lot of the extras for a few hours because we were all in the same room together. I just remember everyone was super nice. The director was really sweet to us and just made the point to check in with us.

I know he said a really nice comment after the fact. A great crew to work with in general.

In what ways do you feel like you've grown

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from your last album? What do you think are the main differences?

I feel like we've grown in a lot of different ways.

I mean, how can you not really grow from starting out as 16, 17, 18-year-olds who just signed to a record label to kind of where we're at now when we're sort of dealing with the repercussions of that—kind of being thrown into music at a relatively young age for us. So I think, emotionally, there's been a lot of maturity.

Of course, the musicality that evolves over time and the decisions we make, how we go about recording an album, the way we recorded our first album was a lot different than how we did this album. And a lot is because of things that we have learned about, “We don't like recording like this,” or “We do like recording like this” and things that just kind of didn't really work

for us. We just kind of figured out how to make ourselves happy during that process. Yeah, plenty of change. But for the better, I think.

Do you guys have a process for making a song? Do the lyrics come first, does the melody?

It sort of changed every album. But, more or less, it's all the band members in the room, and we just try to create this sonic atmosphere first, then Addie writes lyrics on top of that. She usually keeps notes for all the songs, so she's kind of prepared. She usually has an overall theme in mind. Like, right when we first started writing for Dandelion, grief was a big theme that Addie really wanted to write about. As far as writing and creating the sonic atmosphere for it all, it's almost like you're throwing darts at a dartboard trying to figure out what sort of music or song works well for whatever Addie wants to write about. That's why I think there's a lot of variety on the album. “Can I Leave Me Too?” is the more sad and sort of dance [song]; we kind of hit that target. Then Brandon came

in with the song “Make Out,” which is totally different jangly guitar, just a goofy song. But, yeah, more or less, it's just always us in the room together. Maybe someone comes in with an idea, but we'll kind of try to produce and work on it all together, even if all three of us guys aren’t vocalists whatsoever.

Do you all collaborate on the lyrics? Are they a reflection of everyone's experiences, or is it mostly Addie’s?

Oh, it's just Addie’s. I think that's just something we've kind of figured out that works for us. It's always Addie’s narrative that we're trying to tell. Anything outside of that doesn't feel as genuine. And I think that works well with other bands, but I think listeners usually expect to hear Addie’s narrative or whatever narrative Addie is trying to tell. And then we'll give feedback about whether a verse is too long or she's getting a little wordy. And she can take those comments and leave it or whatever. Yeah, it's primarily just Addie creating that story to tell. kindacoolmagazine.com • 77

What was it like recording during COVID? Were there any major differences that you made in the studio?

Oh my gosh, it was a nightmare! So the writing part, we did a lot of demoing going into the actual writing or recording process. We tried to produce on the front end as much as we could.

Every time we're writing a song, we try to get all the weird effects and really try to throw out all the ideas that we can. So that was fine. We shifted around places. We were in my parents’ house for a bit, then switched to an actual proper rehearsal space. But then when we went to LA to record, we had these protocols in order to make sure everyone was safe, not getting COVID. So we're driving from Kansas City to Las Vegas or drove from Kansas City to Colorado, spent the night, then Colorado to LA. We stopped in Las Vegas to all get tested, and one of us had a positive COVID test going into a three-week recording session. It was just all this huge debacle. Brandon, who tested positive, ended up having a false positive. It was just chaos at first, trying to record and be safe in the time of COVID. We only lost a couple of days, and it was fine. But yeah, kind of getting into that headspace was difficult because we're trying to get past all these hurdles first. And it ended up working out just fine, kind of just like a normal recording experience—except the COVID part.

What was the impact of COVID and quarantine on the creative process? Did you find it more difficult, or did you feel like you had more time?

Yeah, I think it was beneficial. I think we get distracted a lot with touring or traveling pretty easily. Like the first record, I know that was a big hurdle we ran into where we got these long tours and just couldn't find enough time to write. We were struggling to kind of throw all the music together last second. I think it's definitely a point of privilege to even say that, but I think we all had a relatively easy time during COVID because we just got to hang out at our parents’ houses and work on music and really have that be the only thing we focus on. We all have jobs outside of the band too, more or less. Those jobs came to a halt, too. It was really just, everything kind of went away.

We could just focus on music, and I think that 78 • kinda cool.

was the best thing that probably could have happened to us, in a way.

Do you have any funny stories that happened while you were trying to record?

We had a pretty regimented writing schedule.

We would meet together four days a week, like Monday through Thursday, noon to five pretty regularly. There was definitely some burnout.

I remember we were just not communicating with each other well. I sometimes try to be the entertainer of the group when people aren't feeling very excited to write music. I just went into the fridge and then cracked a White Claw open for everyone just to kind of get everyone back into the writing mood. We're pretty boring, I think, I'll just leave it at that.

Did you have any influences going into this new record? Were you really influenced by other artists you guys listen to or anything else?

Yeah, I think being in a band, you have endless influences. Like someone might be really into this at the time or someone into this. When I was writing “Can I Leave Me Too?,” I really wanted to write something that felt sort of Lorde-esque, slightly Bon-Iver-esque. And then once I did that, I didn't really want to do that again. But overall, for me, a lot of my influence came from movies and just storytelling in general rather than, like, I'm really into like punk rock music right now. Like, I would listen to that but I think what felt more important to me is I watched so many movies at the start of quarantine. I feel like I would take those feelings I got from those movies and try to put them into some sort of music form. Like I remember, I don't know if you've seen the movie Perks of Being a Wallflower. It’s a classic. I rewatched that during quarantine and there are, like, certain feelings I got from that that I wonder if I can put into a song. So I ended up making a song that is what ended up becoming the song “Ten” on the record. But outside of that, I think the band as a whole was really interested in putting out more, almost like dance music, like house dance music. Not like EDM or big dubstep sort of music, but we have a song on the record called “How Long,” and there's a lot of LCD Soundsystem influence for that.

And there's a lot of dance influence on “Can I

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Leave Me Too?” so I think that was the general direction or pursuit that we wanted to do. But we're never really stuck to a certain sort of genre, ever.

You have your first show back as a band in about a month. How are you feeling about that?

Good! We actually just did a show in Memphis, which was like a college show; college shows are a little different. But we've been rehearsing a lot lately and trying to get these trying to translate these recorded songs into a live setting, which we've never run, like backing tracks or used the computer to sort of play the music for us. We always have to translate whatever song it is on the record into a fivepiece band, basically, which can be very difficult at times. We've been wrapping a lot of the new songs in rehearsals, but we got to play some of the songs on the record at this last show in Memphis. The show was great, but once we have our fifth band member

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back in, I think people will really receive these songs in a really fun and exciting way. I don't think the songs on our first album necessarily translated as well to a live setting. Or they just translated a lot differently because I think those songs are a lot quieter, and when we play them live, they're a lot bigger. And there's a lot more instrumentation on this new album that we couldn't do with just five people. I think that will result in a more intimate feeling. Like, rather than all of us are playing synthesizers or something, you had to translate that to guitar.

So it kind of feels more band-like in a way, which I'm excited for people to hear.

Are there any concerns regarding COVID? Are you nervous about that at all?

Yeah. We had to cancel the show last week because I had COVID. Oh, no! Do you still have it?

No, I'm good. We were able to play our show this past weekend.

But like two weeks before that, we had to cancel the show.

We're sort of learning how that's gonna affect us in the future.

Like we had another show before we released Dandelion back in August, I think, and our drummer got COVID after that.

It's almost inevitable that people are gonna start getting sick, even though we're

all vaccinated.

We're friends with a band called Jukebox the Ghost, and they're on tour right now.

Their drummer got sick with COVID, so he missed the first week of shows. Then their guitar player got sick with COVID the following week. We're just trying to figure out how we're going to manage that because it seems inevitable in a way that things like this are going to happen, and how we're going to recover if we're on a two-month tour, so we don't have to cancel that. We're looking at ways to prevent that, but it's not an exciting time to be a touring band right now.

Are you planning any upcoming shows or full tours sometime soon?

Yeah, we are figuring out a sort of US tour, just like across the states—a month-long tour top of next year sometime. We're still figuring out all the dates and everything. But we're planning for that and we're planning on another big Kansas City show springtime of next year that I think just got booked. So yeah, we're planning a lot of tours, and we even just had a call today just thinking of who would be a really fun band to go like on that co-headlining tour with or who to bring out for support. Next year is definitely going to be a big year for us, as far as traveling and touringwise, hopefully. And we're trying to announce it this month, hopefully.

Yeah, it's exciting. It's exciting to see music come back after it being stopped for so long.

Yeah. I'm still kind of hesitant about going to shows. It definitely doesn't feel the same, but it feels good.

Are there any last words that you want to leave our readers with?

No because I'm probably going to botch it.

No pressure!

What do people usually tell the fans? I’m trying to think of something interesting. I got nothing.

Tell the fans that we’re boring people.

Keep up with The Greeting Committee on Twitter and Instagram @thegcband, and make sure to stream Dandelion on all your favorite platforms. kindacoolmagazine.com • 81

Twenty One Pilots

by Rebekah Witt

Olivia O'Brien

by Sophie Harris

brighter days are before us with

MEET ME @ THE ALTAR

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Meet the band that’s currently reshaping the pop punk scene and bringing back only the best aspects of the early 2000s with their own special brand of bouncy, nostalgic pop punk. Currently residing in a shared house in Orlando, Florida, Meet Me @ The Altar was formed back in 2015 by guitarist and bassists Téa Campbell and drummer Ada Juarez when they were just 14 and 16 years old respectively. They didn’t let that - or the fact that they lived in different states until 2020 - stop them. Singer Edith Johnson joined them two years later, following online auditions.

They also didn’t let the lack of representation they saw in pop punk or the difficulties they encountered in the scene themselves hinder their dreams. From the start, the band had a clear sense of identity, even avoiding cursing in their music to make it more accessible to younger kids, knowing that they would be role models. One major bucket-list item was fulfilled last year: getting signed by Fueled By Ramen, the label that houses some of their biggest musical idols.

And they’re not slowing down any time soon. Meet Me @ The Altar released their debut EP under Fueled by Ramen in August, just finished their first UK tour with All Time Low and The Maine, and is currently touring in the US with nothing.nowhere.. They’ve also announced a 2022 tour with State Champs and just released a music video for “Now or Never.”

I had the pleasure of talking to Téa Campbell over Zoom about the band’s aspirations, new EP, positions as role models in the scene, and much more.

Interview by Astrid Kutos

Photography courtesy of Jimmy Fontaine and Lindsey Byrnes Live photography by Mary Perez

You just finished your first-ever UK tour with All Time Low and The Maine a couple of days ago – what was that experience like?

It was crazy going over there for the first time. It was my first time just being in the UK in general, and it was our first time playing over there as a band, so it was really cool to experience. Everyone over there is super nice! Being able to play those stages with All Time Low and The Maine was insane because we all grew up listening to both of them. It was a really cool experience to be on the same stage as them.

How did your band come about in the first place?

In the summer of 2015, I was 14 years old and on YouTube, looking up drum covers of Twenty One Pilots songs. I came across one of Ada’s videos and was stoked because she was sixteen at the time, and I had never seen a girl around my age playing her instrument so well. So I hit up Ada online and she gave me her Kik, and we just started chatting. I was like, “We should collab,” but eventually we just decided to

start a band. The only caveat was that she lived in Jersey, and I lived in Florida.

But we didn’t really let that stop us… I think because we were naïve kids, but it’s good because we didn’t see that as an obstacle. We wanted to be in a band, and we were going to do it. It was us and another member for a while. We held auditions for a singer online, and that’s how Edith came across us. She saw our video and tried out, but we didn’t end up letting her in the band until a couple years later.

Are you currently pursuing music full-time, or are you still in college or working?

We’re doing the band full-time right now.

When we got signed at Fueled By Ramen, Edith and I were still in school. I was working at Chick-Fil-A. But things got so busy - we were doing so much and were bringing in money, very fortunately, throughout COVID, just because we were working so hard. So we’re actually able to do the band full-time, which is a blessing, because it’s literally our dream, and we’re doing it as a job.

For you guys, the Internet and social media played a huge part in how the band started so how do you think social media is affecting the music scene overall?

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Right now, social media is so important. I feel like not a lot of bands really knew how important it is, but since we started as an Internet band, that was always at the forefront. After COVID, bands started realising that, if you’re not playing shows and stuff, you have to stay relevant somehow. And if people can’t physically see you, social media is how you stay in touch with your support and keep building your band. And it’s really cool too; I feel like you can do a lot with social media, especially if you get creative with it. We lived in a house together for a year when we got signed, and we used that year to make a lot of video content so that people could see the personal side of our band and not just the music side. People like to feel like they actually know the members of their favourite band, and social media is the perfect way to show that side of yourself.

your life know that they’re not alone and that you’re there for them. We wrote that song pre-COVID, and when we released it, the whole world had shut down, everyone was isolated. It just felt like the perfect time for that message to be getting out. And that was when we really found our sound, I think.

What is a song of yours that best describes your sound or most encompasses your identity as a band?

You signed with Fueled By Ramen back in 2020 so what was that experience like?

I would say “Garden” just because “Garden” was that song that really catapulted us to where we are now. We released it before we signed with Fueled By Ramen, but we re-released it after. That’s the song that everyone got their ears on, and it’s really special and close to our hearts. I don’t know what inspired that song, actually; it just kind of came about. We wanted to write a song about letting the people in

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Generally, how would you characterise the kind of music you make?

I would say it’s nostalgic, bouncy pop-punk. It makes you miss being in middle-school and high school, the glory days. It has those elements of early 2000s pop punk, which isn’t really in pop punk right now. We like to bring those elements back, nostalgia is a big part of our sound. Bouncy, super energetic, classic pop punk.

It was crazy because Fueled By Ramen was always at the top of our bucket list. That was what we expected to work for our entire career, to eventually make it there. It just came really early and we didn’t expect it. When we officially started talking after we got backed by Alex Gaskarth and Dave Campbell from The Wonder Years, that’s when it really started to set in—this is huge, we’re actually doing this. We all grew up listening to

Paramore, Panic! At the Disco, All Time Low, Twenty One Pilots, all these bands that are on FBR. It was a huge full-circle moment for all of us, especially because I found Ada through a Twenty One Pilots song, Edith auditioned for a band with a Paramore song, it was really crazy, that whole experience. Now, being a year in, it’s still kind of hard to believe.

The band suddenly got much more exposure to a wider audience, and is that something you consider when writing or performing?

Since the band formed back in 2015, we always knew the potential of our band, and we’ve always had huge dreams. Most people only know us from a year ago, but we were grinding for four years prior to that. So everything that has come and this platform that we’ve been building, we’ve been working for this for six years now. It just feels right, it feels natural. It’s really great for us to be building the platform that we’ve been dreaming of having. Now when we write songs, we write them with our live shows in mind because that’s always at the forefront, and it’s super important for us. We want to be writing arena songs while we’re playing clubs because we know where we could go.

Are there any other particular goals you’d like to achieve?

Yeah, we have a lot of aspirations. Award shows are on our bucket list, Grammys one day. Fingers crossed! I mean, we’ve manifested everything so far—why not the Grammys? And bigger tours: this is just a random example, but we really want to get on P!nk’s radar because we know P!nk would love us and that would be such a fun tour. We’re playing a show with Twenty One Pilots, which is absolutely crazy, but being able to tour with them one day would be sick. We really hope to get a song on a soundtrack one day. And radio! Hopefully we’ll write some stuff that can end up on the radio; I feel like that when we’ll really feel like we made it.

Do you have anything in particular in mind?

I don’t know if you’ve heard Hit Like A Girl, but when we wrote that, I was like “We need to pitch this to ESPN! It would be perfect for women's sports and stuff!”. But we’re the type of people who would literally write a song super specifically for a movie, if we don’t already have one that would fit. Superhero movies would always be super cool. Or any coming-of-age movie, because you know that nostalgia in there, where we can make it sound like those early 2000s movies. Any soundtrack, really.

Now, about your new EP, Model Citizen - how did the name come about?

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So, the name came before the actual EP itself. I was in the shower one day, and those words just literally popped into my head. I texted it to the girls and they were like, “This sounds iconic, we have to use it.” We had already started writing songs about just kind of growing up—we entered adulthood during a pandemic, which was really weird, and not many people have to experience that. We lived with our parents before, and when we got signed, we moved in together during quarantine. It was a lot to process and a lot going on. And figuring out who you are in the midst of that, and your idea of who you could be, that ideal “model citizen” in your head - we just really wanted the songs to reflect that whole process. Front to back, the EP tells the story of just acknowledging that you’re not okay and not where you want to be, and the back and forth of progressing and growing, then falling back, and then progressing even more. Mental health really isn’t linear; it’s a lot of back and forth. We just really wanted to reflect that in our songs, and that it’s okay to not really know what you’re doing because most people don’t. Most people are just living life one day at a time, and that’s okay.

What was the writing process like?

Technically, we started right when the pandemic hit. “Never Gonna Change” was the first song that we wrote for this EP. We actually had an EP that was Model Citizen that we were working on from when we got signed to the end of March. A week before our demos were due, Edith and I were thinking, “We kind of want to rewrite the EP.” We had finished writing the EP before we got approached

by Facebook to write “Hit Like A Girl.” And when we had the concept of writing a song for Women’s History Month, we wanted it to hit really hard because we wanted to reclaim the title “Hit Like A Girl” because it’s always been a negative thing.

But that song was way more easycore-leaning and heavier than Model Citizen, and we didn’t want to go from heavier to more laidback – it just didn’t make sense to us.

So with a week left, we literally rewrote the EP. “Never Gonna Change” was still on it, but we redid some parts. “Feel A Thing” had been written when “Garden” was, but it got pushed after we signed to the label. So that ended up going on the EP,

but it made sense because that was more in the vein of “Hit Like A Girl.” The rest of the songs we literally wrote in our studio that entire week. I think because it came so quickly, it was some of our best work because we didn’t really have to think about it, it just flowed out of us. It’s funny because we literally didn’t tell our label or our management that we were rewriting it – because we didn’t want them to freak out!

Did it end up sounding the way you wanted it to sound?

Oh, for sure. We’re so happy with how it turned out, and we’re really glad that we decided to redo it.

The songs we wrote are some of our favourite songs to date, and we wouldn’t have written those if we had just put out the songs before.

Is the sound you’re doing now the direction you’re going to continue in?

Yeah, we’ve already started writing new songs and they’re definitely in that vein, but a little bit more mature and a little bit more radio-leaning without being pop. Like it’s still very much Meet Me @ The Altar, super pop punk, but we’re definitely really utilising Edith’s voice. It’s a pop voice, very Demi Lovato-ish, and that kind of sound is really what we’re leaning into. Like those 2008 rock hits, like P!nk for example, Kelly Clarkson, Avril Lavigne – that’s kind of the direction that we’re going, but still keeping it modern.

As I’m sure you know, many people see you as role models, and how do you feel about this? Is there anything in particular you’d like people to take away from your music or your performances?

When the band first formed, we always knew that there was nothing like us, so we knew from the start that being role models would come with that. When Edith joined the band, we actually made the decision to not put bad words in our songs anymore because we knew that little girls would look up to us, and we’d want their parents to support them listening to us. We feel like we’re the perfect people to be in this position, just because of our character. And we grew up not having representation - we didn’t let that stop us, but not everyone is like that. I feel like it’s cool for us to be super unapologetic and let women and POC know to claim your space in this scene! You

deserve to be here just as much as anyone else! I feel like that’s a great message to send out and for people to hear that and look up to us. Because we have experienced that ourselves and know exactly how the people who look up to us feel, we can connect to them on a really personal level. When we were on tour with Coheed & Cambria in Denver, there was this little girl who was on the side of the stage in the front, and she was having the time of her life. On the stage, mid-song, I got Edith’s attention and she saw the little girl. When the song ended she singled her out, she was like, “I see you over there, and you’re so strong and can literally do anything that you set your mind to.” That’s what we’re most thankful for, having this platform because that girl is probably going to remember that for the rest of her life. It’s so cool for us to be in the position to impact people like that. Because we know how much our idols impacted us, like Hayley Williams for example – we didn’t have Black women to look up to, but Hayley was like the woman in pop punk. She is literally the reason why I decided that I wanted to do this for the rest of my life. Having those role models is so important, knowing that you can do that too, it means a lot to us to be that for people.

Who are your personal role models, either music or career-wise?

Now we kind of look up to the OGs, like P!nk for

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example, Avril Lavigne. Any woman really, because the industry’s hard, and we know that they’ve had to go through so much shit to get to where they are, so it’s just amazing how long their careers have lasted. Hayley Williams too, that will never go away. But honestly, we just look up to each other. We’re constantly helping each other grow, and we’re the only ones who truly know how we feel. And honestly, I look up to the bands who are coming up now because I see ourselves in them and I know all that they can achieve.

Obviously, the music industry, and in particular, the pop punk scene still has a long way to go. What do you think needs to be done or needs to change so the scene can become less homogenous?

It definitely has to change from the higher-ups. Journalists, record labels, radio, booking agents, all that – they have to be the ones to bring up diverse bands because they’re the ones in power, they’re the ones giving out the opportunities. Most of them are just going to straight white guys. The change has to be at that higher level because the diverse bands can only do so much. We literally had to call our way to the top because no one would give us any opportunities until we got signed with Fueled By Ramen. No one would give us the opening slots for the bigger shows, no one would take us on tour. Every time we toured, we headlined, and I booked it myself. It definitely has to come from them. And those bigger bands, take smaller bands on tour and introduce your fans to them! You never know—it could literally change the course of that band’s career. The scene definitely has to be more inclusive and welcoming. And stop hiring the same three bands!

Is there anything else you wanna say to the readers of Kinda Cool Magazine?

I just want to say that, if there’s anything that you’ve been wanting to do, but you’ve been doubting yourself, just do it!

You never know, and the worst thing in life is to get by, and then have what-ifs and wonder what could have been. But you can do it now, you can do it today. We were literally naïve 14 and 16-year-olds, not knowing what we were doing, and we had to Google everything we know. If we can get to where we are, so can you.

You can listen to Meet Me @ The Altar’s new EP, Model Citizen, on all streaming platforms and watch their new music video for “Now or Never.” Tickets for their 2022 tour with State Champs are also on sale (I just got mine today)!

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a wonderfully good time with

I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME Words by Faith Logue Photography by Mary Perez

My excitement was at its peak when the doors opened for my first concert post-COVID. It had been almost two years since I last went to a concert, and to my surprise, I Don’t Know How But They Found Me announced a short tour with a few dates, and two of them were in Upstate NY, the area where I live. On September 25, the band played a sold-out show in Syracuse, NY, to a bunch of eager fans.

It was weird looking around and seeing all the masks in the pit, but I felt safe knowing that we were all doing our part to protect ourselves and those around us. IDKHBTFM graced the stage at 9 P.M., and since that moment, there was only one thing on my mind—it’s good to be back.

I am not the first to say that the pandemic has affected me; it has affected every single person differently. To my surprise, the absence of concerts in my life gave me a great deal of sadness because it felt like I had nothing to look forward to. When times were tough, I would always have a concert coming up to help me get through it, but once the pandemic shut everything down, I didn’t have that safety net. Luckily, I learned to cope because I realized there was nothing I could do to change the state of the world. I started seeing bands announcing tours and shows going back, and I knew that we could attend them safely. Of course, to my dismay, no bands were coming near me until IDKHBTFM decided to change that. I was ecstatic and bought tickets the minute they came out. They have not yet played some songs off of their new album, Razzmatazz, which came out right in the middle

of the pandemic. The album, in my opinion, is flawless, and as I waited in line for the show, I became more and more excited to hear these new songs live.

The tour stop in Syracuse was the first to hear a few songs of the album live, such as “Door” and “Need You Here,” which are both excellent songs. I let one or two tears fall to “Need You Here” because it is such an emotionally driven song that one couldn’t help but cry. IDKHBTFM doesn’t need big production shows to make a concert good, and that is one thing I love about them. They have some cool lighting and robotic backtracks, something I have never seen a band do before, and those elements, combined with the infectious energy of the band and crowd, make for one hell of a show. My favorite part of every IDKHBTFM show is when they play the song, “Visitation of the Ghost.” Lead singer Dallon Weekes goes into the crowd, and in true Freddie Mercury style, sings notes and has the crowd sing them back. Another cool thing the band does during that song is having the drummer Ryan Seaman play bass guitar AND drum at the same time—what a cool party trick!

I have seen them live three times before this concert, so I knew that was coming, but it was still really exciting.

The setlist was fairly long, consisting of about 14 songs. My favorite songs that they played live were “Social Climb,” “Clusterhug,” “Sugar Pills,” and “Letter.” I had such a fun time at the concert; I saw one of my concert friends who I hadn’t seen in a long time, and that was so amazing to catch up with them. I camped out all day and ended up in the front row, which was what I was hoping for. It was an amazing show, and I hope to see them again soon.

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better days with

BETWEEN YOU & ME Australian band Between You & Me’s sophomore record Armageddon is set for release on November 19 via Hopeless Records. Their latest singles transcend beyond their pop-punk roots, blending modern rock with vibrant hints of pop for a unique sound that retains the sense of fun and energy that the band possesses. I had the opportunity to speak with frontman Jake Wilson about all things tour, the new album, the band’s recording process, and what is shaping up to be Between You & Me’s most defining release yet.

Interview by Adrienne Joelle Photography courtesy of Georgia Moloney Thank you so much for being here today.

Good morning from Australia! Sorry, I’m just now waking up. I got a message from my manager saying “Don’t forget.”

I have family in Melbourne actually!

Sick, I’m from Victoria, but I’m in Sydney at the moment. Is that Drew House you’re wearing?

I am, check it out. I paid too much for a t-shirt though.

They’re expensive! So expensive, oh my gosh. I bought this blue one for me because there was this shop in Sydney that sold it, and I have never paid so much money for just an item of clothing. That was like 180 bucks, and I’m like... it’s just a long sleeve, and I’m never gonna wear it. It’s just to hang it up!

So, I have a couple of questions to get us started. For people who don’t know you, introduce yourself and tell me a little about Between You & Me. I’m JT, I sing in the band. Between You And Me is pretty much the best new band out of Australia, I would say. That is going to be a fantastic quote.

We’re just guys that like to drink and play shows, pretty much.

How would you describe your sound, and who are some of your top influences or bands you find yourself listening to for inspiration?

We looked at one of the genres that Spotify gave us, and it was alt-pop for one of the new songs. I wouldn’t say we’re alt-pop, I would say rock, pop rock, or pop punk. My favorite band of all time is Hanson, which doesn’t correlate with pop punk

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at all. The twins [guitarist Chris Bowerman and drummer Jamey Bowerman] really love Papa Roach and Metallica. [Bassist James Karagiozis] Bassy’s into anything early 2000s, kind of more old-school pop punk. [Jai Gibson guitarist] Gibbo is a floater; he likes to listen to mega pop music and dive deep into pop punk stuff. I think that’s how we kind of get our sound, just by grabbing bits and pieces from everywhere. The singing definitely comes from Hanson for this new record, anyway for me.

Speaking of the record, your forthcoming second album Armageddon is due for release with Hopeless Records in November. What can listeners expect from the album?

What people can expect from this record is Between You & Me, but just sounding way, way, way better.

So much better. I’d say it sounds a little bit more mature. That way, when we play these more mature songs on stage, we can offset it by being completely immature personally.

What was the recording process like? I know you were able to get [producer] Sam Guaiana to fly out to work on the album during the heat of COVID. We were very lucky! The recording process was really fun. Obviously, we got Sam over, but we didn’t think that was going to be able to happen because we’ve been fucked around so many times.

We got to record it at our friend’s studio, Marshall Street Studios, and they had a ping pong table upstairs, so every time someone wasn’t recording their parts, it was just a ping pong tournament upstairs. I loved it. Just drinking every day, I probably shouldn’t be endorsing this, but it just felt like a big holiday! It was nice because we hadn’t got to tour in close to a year at that point, and this kind of just felt like a one-month tour. It was nice for everyone to get together and hang out and obviously make music in the process. I just like the hangs, to be honest.

Not the work part so much? I understand the whole process is a lot to manage but definitely rewarding once it all comes together.

I get really stressed sometimes when I’m working on the record, especially when Sam is from overseas.

There’s no “Oh, we’ll just do it next week” or “If I don’t get it now, I’ll just pop in and finish it,” so that part really stresses me out. We went into this record with a bunch of songs that had full lyrics and everything, [but] those didn’t get chosen and we chose songs that didn’t have any lyrics written to them. The workload bumped up for me way more than I thought it was gonna be. There were a few late nights of me writing last-minute, last-minute everything. “Butterflies” was pretty much written on the day, but yeah, it was fun. Aside from the stress, it was very fun.

Do you guys tend to write first or record the songs and write to that?

There are different ways that people in the band come up with songs. Chris will write the basic music and ask us what we think. If I vibe it, I’ll sing to it usually within a week, and then we’ll have a song there. Bassy does the same thing; he records music, and he’ll send over ideas. I only just recently started writing ideas while playing guitar, so that’s probably going to be more for album three. We had an album worth of songs done, but to make them all sound like a cohesive unit, we ended up with some songs being pulled.

You mentioned the new music has a mature sound. How does this record differ from previous releases?

I guess we’re all older now.

For the first record, I so clearly wanted to be The Story So Far and every other pop punk band there was. I was just a pretty young kid yelling with angst, I don’t know. Not that I don’t like those songs, but now that we’ve recorded the second record, it feels more like this is us. I wouldn’t say there was a lot of immaturity, but being more experienced as songwriters now, it’s easy to look back and see we just really wanted to be a pop punk band so bad. So bad! Off drum beats and riffy guitar

stuff, but I mean it definitely got us to be able to get to this point. I don’t think we would have been able to write this record with zero fanbase. I don’t think it would be received the same way. I think it’s working up to something! I hope.

I can definitely tell the difference between your earlier songs and these latest releases.

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I just sing way better on the new stuff. The other stuff is just me yelling, this time it’s like, “Come on. Let’s sing.”

At the very least, I say to people, if you don’t like the music, at least the singing is much better. I don’t care at this point. I don’t care if people think I’m a certain way—I think I just love my band more than anyone else.

I think your sound is very new and refreshing, so I am excited to see where you guys are headed.

I think that pop punk bands—heavy hitters like State Champs, The Story So Far, Knuckle Puck, Neck Deep, all of them—people only want them to sound like their biggest

records. They only want them to keep doing that. If newer bands who love these bands write music, at least me, I don’t have time or capacity in my brain for bands that sound exactly like the big ones.

If you feel like listening to pop punk, you’ll just listen to the ones, the good ones. If you’re a new band writing that sound of music, I don’t know how far you’ll get to be honest because people already have the memory cache of all their favorite bands up there. I’m not saying people need to write different styles of music, but I think that’s why we didn’t really care about changing sounds. If people want to listen to pop punk, they can listen to our old stuff or way better pop punk bands. If you want something new, then, I think it’s better to have a new sound rather than trying to sound like X, Y, and Z. Tell me about the latest single, “Butterflies,” which follows previous singles “Supervillain” and “Deadbeat” as the third song released from your second album.

We wrote this track in Canada, about to record with Sam over there and not knowing we were going to get sent home. We had half an album worth of stuff and were trying to get things done at the last minute. I had a couple of ideas for it, but I didn’t do much at the time. We got sent home, and that song sat in the file for months and months. Then we pulled it out for the record, and I kind of just wrote to it on the spot. I kept trying to record it in the studio, but one morning, I woke up, got up early, wrote the chorus or most of the chorus, and we kind of had that to work off of. So the chorus sounded good, and we worked out the verses and stuff. I knew what I wanted to say, and for this one, there was me, Gibbo, and Sam mostly in the room. I’m very anal or specific with phrasing, syllables, and lyrics, so they were throwing out ideas trying to help me get an idea for it. Some of the lyrics can be perceived as corny, but I feel like there’s a difference between corny lyrics and something that BYAM would sing with a little bit of sass and attitude, so I was trying to find the right things to say while keeping the BYAM vibe without it being too cringe. That was probably the challenge of this song, but I really do like the verses.

When I came up with the line Uber, I was like, “How the fuck am I gonna sing Uber in a song?” But it worked out! People have been jamming to it, which I love.

What is your favorite song on the album?

“Better Days,” track eight. I think that’s the best song we’ve ever written. We wrote this song after the first record, and it sat there for years. We brought it out for this record and reworked the chorus, and it was super hard to get right. Sometimes when you have a demo that’s got this melody there for years, you get stuck listening to that melody in your head, and it’s very hard to separate, but I think what we did with that song was awesome.

What does Between You And Me mean to you?

I didn’t know I wanted to travel until I was in this band, I had no intention really of seeing anything. Obviously, I thought it would be cool, but I’d have to save all my money and travel that way, and it’d take too long. Being able to write songs that people all over the world connect with is fucking awesome. That little half an hour every day on tour that you get to see someone singing

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your words that you’ve been writing in your room and yelling them back is awesome. That’s definitely the highlight. I always wanted to be in a band—I had nothing else planned for myself, I wasn’t really good at anything else. I just loved to be a musician.

Chris and Jamey found me online and it just clicked. I’m pretty lucky to be in my first band and get signed. I’m very lucky, it’s really cool. When we get back on tour and hear people sing those words, it’s very rewarding.

What goals do you have or are most excited about for this upcoming album, and what do you look forward to in 2022? When do you expect to return to the US? I want to play as many shows as we can. If we can get bigger tours, that’d be awesome. I feel that our band is at its best when we’re trying to win fans over at a live show. You either like it or you don’t when listening to a recording, but if you’re at a Between You & Me show, it’s hard not to like us because we bring the party on stage. I just want to get our new music out to as many people as possible, and then they can make an informed decision on whether they like us or not. But yeah, just tour, tour, tour really. I feel like we’re just

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starting to get into the swing of things after our first record and COVID. I just want to go everywhere we can go. Travel while I can milk the band for all it's got. We will be touring the US in March, I won’t say how or why, but we are going there then!

What do you want fans to take away from your music?

I just think if you’ve been a long-time listener of Between You & Me, you’ll be able to appreciate how far we’ve come with this new stuff. Everyone’s gonna feel like proud parents when they hear this record. I want everyone to enjoy these songs and like them enough that they come see us at shows and party with us for a day out of the year. Also, stream it so we become rich.

Between You & Me’s highly anticipated album is sure to not disappoint. They blur the lines of pop punk with their dynamic sound and do so unapologetically. Listeners can look forward to a more refined version of the Australian band, for Armageddon will stand the test of time in proving the band’s desire to take risks and evolve. The record will be available on all streaming platforms on November 19.

new EP

out now on all platforms

lexcolemusic.com

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MAISIE PETERS: heartbreak, happy birthdays, and John Hughes Fresh off of the release of her debut album, You Signed Up For This, British pop artist Maisie Peters somehow found the time in her busy schedule of interviews and TV performances to sit down with us at Kinda Cool Magazine. We talked about everything from writing songs for the future to kissing imaginary crushes in outdoor pools.

Interview by Lexi Matuson Photography courtesy of Lillie Eiger First of all, thank you so much for sitting down with Kinda Cool Magazine. We’re so excited about this! We are all girlbosses and love You Signed Up For This.

Thank you! I loved that the meeting password was girlboss. It was very iconic.

So let’s dive right into it! We have absolutely been loving the record. What was the hardest song to write on it?

The hardest song to write… There are different ways of seeing it; I guess, emotionally, the hardest, or sort of felt the hardest, maybe “Volcano,” just because I think it was very real to like where I was at the time. I often write with sort of hindsight, and with that song, there wasn't a lot of hindsight. I was actually in a weird way; I was with foresight because I was writing and discussing a situation— whether or not I should say “Happy birthday” to somebody—with my co-writers in the room, and I wrote the song thinking about that. What could happen from that conversation? It is hilarious that I actually wrote with foresight, but I just think that was sort of a very kind of raw situation, and I hadn't really sorted out how I felt about it, and so that was sort of hard to

write. In terms of more logistically, like what took the longest and felt the hardest, I feel like they all sort of came relatively easy, but maybe “Elvis Song.” We pieced it over time. There were definitely moments where we went in and redid the verses, or we redid a chorus or we redid the middle eight.

So you have a bunch of themes throughout the album, which I love because it really makes it feel very cohesive. You have the theme of ‘You said nothing’ strung along throughout the album.

Was that intentional?

together, and they were like, “What the fuck, Maisie? When did you kiss some boy in an outdoor pool?” And I was like, “No, guys, like that wasn't real.” The thing is no, I didn't kiss my crush in an outdoor pool, sadly. We wrote it sort of daydreaming about that, and the whole day, I just was obsessed with making it the most sort of British teenage culture thing. Like I just wanted as much of that in as possible:

No, like really, no, which I think is so cool. I noticed that ages after I did it.

You have it in “Psycho” and you have it in “Volcano.” I don't know where else it’s in, but no, it's not intentional. These things happen because if you're writing about things that did happen, then things repeat themselves often. Definitely similar characters in both of those songs, but I also kind of like that lyric for several reasons. I think that it's cool that it's in both, this theme of someone saying nothing. It's interesting because I'm saying everything in these songs. I'm both saying everything because it's my song and I'm writing it, and I also feel like I'm talking a lot in the song, [and] the person that I'm singing about often seemingly has nothing to say. Maybe that's vanity, and also maybe that's me power-playing and using the fact that I'm the one that is able to write the song.

I don't give them a voice; I think that it sort of just reflects maybe the real life dynamic.

“Outdoor Pool” is a song that's very vulnerable and very specific. What was the inspiration behind that song?

I'm going to be really honest and I might break your heart, but “Outdoor Pool” is not a real story. Um, I did not kiss my crush in an outdoor pool. What's so good is that I didn't even think about it, and then it came out, and I had my sister and two of my best friends from my hometown text me and be like, “Who is ‘Outdoor Pool’ about? Like, when did you do that?” Because obviously we all grew up

there's Skins, we talk about form, which is where you go in the morning for school. It's like HMV, driver's license — which also was before “drivers license” [by Olivia Rodrigo] may I just say, which is hilarious. There's a lot of references to driver's licenses before “drivers license,” the most iconic song. There's a supermarket and a French exchange. There kindacoolmagazine.com • 101

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are science lockers. There was so much of my real school and my real school life experience in that song that I do still feel like it was still personal to me in that way.

I think that's why it seems so real because there's so much of you in it. Moving on, you've really grown a lot as an artist since It’s Your Bed Babe, It’s Your Funeral. What do you think was the area that you've grown the most in since then?

I think I definitely have sort of experimented a lot more. I think It’s Your Bed Babe, It’s Your Funeral is kind of “experimental,” I say with quote marks, but I think it actually is for what it was. I think that I've just become more confident in my tone of voice, and it's funny because I'm writing for my next album now. I'm starting that process, which is quite daunting, and I definitely have come into it a little bit like, “Oh god, um, what am I doing?” I need to plan, like how do I want to make things that I like as much as my first album and the other, and I think a lot of that is sort of trying to have quiet confidence in that you've been doing it long enough and to know at least subconsciously what you're trying to do.

So you've also got the TikTok girls in their bag right now. How does it feel to kind of have such a grasp on this young audience through the social media app?

That's so fun. I mean, I try my best. Obviously, TikTok’s something that just came up out of the blue, and everyone was like, “Oh my god, okay, we gotta do this thing.” I actually love to TikTok. I spend so much time on it. I love music TikTok. I'm on funny TikTok as well, but I love music TikTok. I think there are so many super talented singer-songwriters on TikTok, and I'm just so inspired by them. And I think it's the coolest thing that I can just go on TikTok and hear five songs that I think are amazing, but they're like half-written and someone just sitting in their bedroom playing them. I think it's like the coolest thing ever. So I really love that world, and I love being a part of it. So I'm always leaking bits, which is funny. I write a lot anyway, so it's sort of fun for me to get to experiment and throw things out and see what people like and what they don't like, and what sticks and what doesn't. And then also it's just a fun time.

I don't know, like I really enjoy it.

It's really fun to have someone who is in your world, who just kind of gets us, as a member of the TikTok sphere. So now a few fun questions! What's your favorite John Hughes movie?

A great question. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is my favorite John Hughes movie. I think it's a really classic film. It's really funny, it's also really heartwarming, and I'm a big fan of, I'm going to forget his name, which is terrible, but the guy who plays Ferris Bueller’s best friend. That actor is now in “Succession,” my favorite TV show. I read this interview with him the other day, and he was talking about Ferris Bueller and about the sort of emotional arc of it. It just really reminded me of how much I love that film and how it's actually super sweet and sort of nostalgic and sad. I just love it, I love that.

Shows are coming back and you're going on tour soon, but I'm wondering if you could make your dream tour lineup with someone to open for you and someone to close for you, who would it be?

Oh, what a fun question! Okay, to open for me, I'm going to pick—she's far too successful and talented to open for me, and she could never open for me because she's so actually truly, so much better than me. It would be a terrible idea to have her on first, but I love Jensen McRae. She is an American singer-songwriter who lives in L.A., and she is truly the best songwriter, I think, of our generation. She is truly the best songwriter out there right now, and I really say that with my whole chest, I really mean it. I think Jensen is the best songwriter around, hence why she can’t open for me, because she would blow me out of the water. But Jensen and then myself and then to close... Well, maybe this isn't an opening and closing. This is just a triple headliner. We’re gonna do Jensen, myself, and then I have another really close friend called Gretta Ray, who is an Australian singer-songwriter who released this amazing pop album called Begin To Look Around, which I really recommend if you like my music. I think we would do it like a hot, hot, hot girl thing. I also love Sigrid, I think she's fucking insane, and Sigrid live is like a holy experience. One of the best live acts I've ever seen. So I'm gonna kindacoolmagazine.com • 103

say Sigrid, and I'm just gonna also add in like Phoebe Bridgers because she’s a fucking queen. Enough said.

Phoebe Bridgers? (points to Phoebe Bridgers shirt) I didn't even see that! I didn't even see that when I said it, I swear. Hand on heart. But yeah, don't even need to elaborate on why obviously.

Did you see her “Moon Song” performance?

I'm assuming you did.

Oh my god, her voice was so emotional I'm gonna cry. Are you kidding me? With Rob Moose?

Just insane. Yeah. Oh my god, it's so insane.

Her voice is like so clear. I can't believe this is real.

She's absolutely incredible. All right. I'm onto my last question, which breaks my heart because I could literally sit here talking forever.

Me too!

What do you want your fans to take away from this album?

Oh, whatever they want to take from it. I'm happy to take anything. I guess I want them to just really love it and have it with them, like wherever they go, and I want it to be the album that you have saved on your phone. You know what I want to be? You know how you never have enough storage on your phone? So you always have to delete albums and delete things that you've saved to make more room? I want You Signed Up For This to be the album that you don't delete and that you always have because it's always with you and you always need it. You might need it, no matter where you are.

The album You Signed Up For This is available to stream on all platforms. Check out Maisie Peters on her upcoming North American tour.

Tickets are selling fast so be sure to get yours soon!

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Bleachers

by Emilia Rangel

100 gecs

by Anna Xu

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