NKD Mag - Issue #36 (June 2014)

COVER STORY 38 Neon Trees: the red-headed stepchildren of popular music

MUSI C 4 Real Friends are taking over pop-punk 8 Punk veterans Bayside talk new album 16 Nina Nesbitt crosses the pond 18 Degrassi star Cassie Steele commits to music 24 Rockers Magic Man on growing into a band 26 Chromeo on standing out 32 From London to New York, Bombay Bicycle Club are cooler across the pond 58 Rapper Asher Roth is back in the game 61 From the internet to the stage, Timeflies are taking over

FI LM 50 Luke Bilyk talks graduating Degrassi 54 Chasing Life’s Haley Ramm shares about ABC Family’s newest drama

EDITORIAL 22 Live Photos: Sweetlife Festival 36 Live Photos: Skate & Surf 48 Live Photos: Boston Calling 56 Artist Write-In: Festivals vs. Summer Touring 57 New Music in June

TEAM NKD Editors: Jordan Melendrez Catherine Powell Jenna Ross

Photographer: Catherine Powell Designer: Catherine Powell

Writers: Jackie Bui Susan Cheng Tara DeVincenzo

Alex Lane Stacy Magallon Christine O’Dea Shina Patel

Stephanie Petit Catherine Powell Tanya Traner

Words by TARA DEVINCENZO Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

REAL FRIENDS

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When Real Friends started hitting their stride, they were like the new kids on the block. They didn’t feel like they related musically to hometown peers Fall Out Boy, but sounded more like East Coast bands Taking Back Sunday and Brand New. And they like it that way.

The band, made up of Brian Blake, Dan Lambton, Dave Knox, Eric Haines and Kyle Fasel have grown from being part of the local Chicago music scene to being part of the global community of pop-punk. When they first formed in 2011, they didn’t set their sights too far from home. Bowling alleys and local venue halls were their main stages.

“We all grew up going to shows, at VFW halls and all that,” Kyle says, “that’s where I felt the most at home.”

But Kyle noticed a trend in Chicago. He had played in bands that garnered audiences of more than 600 kids, but over a three or four-year timespan, that shrunk to close to 100.

“People grow out of music,” he says.

Although he thought the local scene was maturing away from poppunk, he and the band stayed true to their mission as musicians. Their dream didn’t focus on money and fame; they wanted an audience that could genuinely relate to the music.

“Kids need guidance in life from music,” Kyle says. “Music is a huge part of growing up.”

While the Chicago fan base dwindled, Real Friends found a way to revamp their fan base. With bands like Brand New and Taking Back Sunday connecting to the audiences that wanted to hear them, Real Friends found a way to get the buzz they’d been lacking by moving to the East Coast. “When we were exposed to [the East Coast], they kind to latched on more than the Midwest because of being exposed to more pop-punk over the past decade.”

Real Friends immediately found their niche in the pop-punk community. The band found that these pop-punk musicians all shared the same core principle of writing music NKDMAG.COM

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that they felt were proud of because it was real. “All these bands that are in this huge community are very honest,” Kyle says. “It’s not about getting on the radio or MTV, it’s just doing what we want to do.”

Being in this community where everyone knows one another made it easy for the band to start to spread the word about their music. “It’s really cool. It’s one of those small-world things,” Kyle says. While the band was still unsigned, they found other ways to promote themselves from within their newfound community. Tweeting to other band members got fans interested, and everyone was willing to help each other do that without ever making it competitive. “I think it’s definitely a more teamwork-type thing,” Kyle says.

They released their third self-released EP Put Yourself Back Together in June 2013, right before jumping into Vans Warped Tour. The EP proved that the band, no matter how much success they had, could remain true to their “sleepy eyes and bony knees.”

This recurring lyric in their music became such an integral part of them, that after this EP, Kyle had to publicly explain himself for always writing it into their songs. Kyle revealed the the sleepy eyes were a reference to the times in his life he was stressed and sleep deprived, and the bony knees refer to a time he was depressed and as a result, lost weight. Kyle’s defense of these lyrics that were starting to generate questions was to further prove that everything the band sang was truthful and came from their hearts.

In an effort to keep their relationship with the fans completely transparent, the band continuously denied label offers and relied solely on the teamwork of the community to keep their music out there. “We were all satisfied with doing it on our own,” Kyle explains. With only a manager, they were able to get themselves from Chicago to the East Coast and on tour, so when Fearless Records invited them 6

to sit down, they went with no idea of actually signing. “We went into Fearless on a random off day, and it really opened my eyes to what a record label is,” Kyle says.

Even though they had created their success from scratch, Kyle felt that Fearless would just be another helping hand for what they wanted to do. He was dealing with making the CDs, album art, business and merchandise of the band when he realized, ‘I have to be an artist, too.’

When the band finally decided that Fearless would help them to continue to do what they wanted, they signed on. “I think that’s part of growing as a band. You have to trust other people to do things for you sometimes,” Kyle says. “Fearless seemed like they were the most open about everything. ” Moving the band into the label brought some backlash from fans, but Kyle says that never made a difference to them. He felt that the fans who were upset with the record label were exactly the fans he didn’t want: those that were close-minded.

“I think that roots back to being honest, give your fans what they want and what you want, too,” he says.

The band was promised that though the Fearless name would now be on their albums, they would still have full creative control. “Me personally, and everyone in the band, are still heavily involved in what we do,” Kyle says. He still leaves time to work on album art, but he wants to funnel his energy to the music itself. “You need to have your hands on it, but you don’t always need to pick it up,” Kyle says, referring to the business details of their work.

Now, with their new album, Maybe This Place Is The Same and We’re Just Changing, the band is allowing themselves to improve and grow with the help from but not the influence of the label. They recorded the entire album themselves before sending it to Fearless so they could avoid anything that wasn’t 100 percent theirs. Fearless

is home to a lot of successful bands, but Real Friends knows they can be successful solely with their creativity.

“If we sign to a label that had a whole bunch of bands that sound like us then what’s the diversity of that?”

They have their fingers right on the trigger of their own music, but they know they are gradually molding themselves into something different. “I know that we won’t sound the same in two albums, but it’s not a switch. It’s a progression,” Kyle says.

Kyle had a particular interest in emo music, and the rest of the band shared different tastes that they decided to try to combine to create their current sound. All of their songs are either high or low in energy, and they wanted to experiment in between these areas on their new album.

By experimenting, Kyle feels the band can tap into their best music and have the best reception. “I think it has a lot more of a timeless sound to it, that was one of my main goals,” he says. “There are bands that I consider timeless that I love, and it would be so cool to be that for somebody.”

The band is looking forward to the reaction to Maybe This Place Is The Same and We Are Just Changing, but they are happy with where they are now. The pop-punk community has helped them gain recognition and fans, and even bring the culture back to their hometown. “Now it’s getting a lot better in the Chicago area, which is cool to see,” Kyle says. “I feel like we’ve kind of really helped that.”

Keeping the fans first was always Real Friends’ priority. They’re excited to see what happens when the album drops July 22, but they are even more excited to see what happens in the years to come. Likening themselves to bands bands that inspire them, like Jimmy Eat World, they feel they have the ability to release a record that kids will always go back to and feel a connection.

“It’s pretty cool to be able to make an impact like that,” Kyle says. NKD

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BAYSIDE Words by JACKIE BUI Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

It’s been 14 years since punk band Bayside stepped into the music scene, and while music has seen drastic changes over the course of time, lead vocalist Anthony Raneri, prides himself and the band on never losing sight of who they are, on staying together without any temporary break ups over the years, and on knowing what the fans want. While they say the world of punk music has altered and shifted throughout the years, with different bands coming and going, Raneri says Bayside has always focused on themselves as a band, and never on other bands in the industry.

In addition to Anthony, the four man band comprises lead guitarist Anthony Raneri, lead guitarist Jack O’Shea, bassist Nick Ghanbarian, and drummer Chris Guglielmo. The band originates from New York City, and the culture of the city, as well as the opportunities they were given because of their location played a huge role in their success. But not everyone around them felt the same way. Raneri says many people have told him to leave the city and go to the country 8

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to write music, but he stands firm in his belief that the chaos of the city has always been a huge part of his life and has always played a role in his music.

“Life is inspiring and life happens in major cities for me,” Anthony says.

“Walking down the street just people watching, the struggles, watching the class system work. That’s life. That’s inspiring.”

Being in New York City afforded the band many opportunities that perhaps they would not have been given if they were elsewhere. “We’re very lucky to be a place with such a music scene, it’s such a cultural mecca,” Anthony explains. “For us, it seemed possible. Being from New York and having so many clubs to play at and so many shows to go to and play on. All the labels and managers and agents are here. To make a living out of it seemed possible.”

Bayside’s sixth album, Cult, was released in February of this year, with Hopeless Records. “Hopeless is fine for us, they let us do what we want, and at this stage in our career, that’s just what we want. We want to make music that we want,” Anthony says.

“We want to satisfy the fans we have, and if new people jump on, that’s cool, too. We’re certainly not going to do anything that we’re not comfortable doing or that we don’t have fun doing to get huge overnight. It’s not who we’ve ever been, and it’s not who we’ll ever be.”

The process of writing and producing this album was a little different for the band, as they focused on making an album that focuses on the legacy they wanted to leave behind. Anthony says the band looks back on their career fondly, but the band is now at a point where they realize they’ve grown up. Being at this stage in their adult lives, where they’re in relationships, starting families, and seeing the impact they have on others, they wanted to make this album indicative of that shift in their lives through their music. “For me, I just thought about my legacy. Not just as a musician, but as a man. I think about my grandfather’s generation and I think about the current generation and the younger generation and I just want to

make sure I am remembered the way that older generation is. I want to be remembered as the guy who stormed the beaches, and not the guy who wrote nasty comments on YouTube.

I feel that if you want to be remembered as a great man, you have to do something about it, and I think that’s what the record is about. But this transformation doesn’t steer too far from who they’ve been over the last 14 years. So far, the reception from the fans has been positive. “When you’ve been a band for as long as we have, it starts getting a little nerveracking to try to please your existing fans. So far, it’s been great. We’re really lucky,” Anthony says.

In an effort to keep themselves on the same page, Anthony says they are fans of their own band. “We have to always keep ourselves grounded and be fans of our own band. We listen to the old records and we still love them,” he explains. “We still love to play the old songs, we still love the way our band sounds. So we make the record that we want to listen to.”

In the process of making music they want to listen to, the band always keeps their families in the back of their minds, as they are all extensions of themselves. Anthony says he lives his life pretending his mom and wife are always watching. “I try to do things to make myself proud.”

As far as the major changes in the music industry, Anthony says the biggest change has been the decrease in record sales. “The concert industry is doing great, merchandise is doing great. You just have to think on your toes as far as how to stay afloat. A lot of old school people who relied on record sales to survive, those days are over,” Anthony explains. “Music now is an advertisement for other stuff.”

While the music industry has changed, what’s remained the same for the band are their fans. Their career has been what Anthony refers to as a snowball. “Little by little, more people keep jumping on. We never did a big song or a TV show, or the next day had a bigger number of fans.

It was very gradual.” He says that for the most part, most of their fans have been around for a long time,

and seeing the same faces at shows is a reminder that they’re doing something right. “We could’ve done a lot of things to try to get bigger faster, but said that’s just not the road to take.

We want to be around a long time, we want to have a legacy. To see the same faces all these years, to see the same kids going out 10 years later, 14 years later, I know we made the right choices. And if they stick around for the first ten years, we’re confident they’ll stick around for the next 10.”

Bayside wanted to be more than just a trendy band for a year; they wanted to create a career and leave a legacy. “We’ve always really avoided trends. We’ve watched other bands for, be the flavor of the moment, and be enormous, and then not be enormous anymore, and then break up and not exist anymore,” Anthony says.

“We’ve watched that happen over and over. For us, it’s always been gradual.

Anthony talked about how some of the bands they started out with aren’t together anymore. In an industry where many of those bands followed trends and tried to focus heavily on the genre of music or the rising trend in pop-punk, Bayside has steered clear from that. “Bayside is much more about an idea, we never jumped on any bandwagon musically, stylistically, lyrically. We didn’t do the morbidly depressed the ‘my girlfriend broke up with me stuff,’ back when all of our fans were in high school, so that when you grow out of that, then you grow out of the bands who did it for you. We’ve always been more about shit happens, but you got to be strong through that. I think that message resonates throughout your high school.”

In terms of genre, the band is often looked to as a pop-punk band, but Anthony doesn’t agree. “Personally I don’t think we are a pop-punk band.

I can see that, but as far as the stuff that’s popular now, we certainly don’t sound like any of those bands. And I don’t think those younger kids that are listening to that are listening to us,” says Anthony. “At least I don’t see it at shows. Bayside has always lived on an island. We always had a foot in whatever was happening at the time, NKDMAG.COM

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but was never part of the identity.”

Anthony says he just considers the band to be a punk band. “We’ve always associated more with bands like Bouncing Souls, NOFX, Dropkick Murphys, Bad Religion. If there’s anything we’ve ever aligned ourselves with, it’s that sound. But that’s not necessary the fans that we have. It doesn’t matter what we think and the sooner that bands learn that, the better off they are.”

Fourteen years later, the band is more confident about their music, and more confident about their sound.

“We were never as sure about it as we are now. Our sixth record was our best selling record; our tour in our 14th year is our best selling tour. Now we can say that all that shit we talked about all the time was right. All those crazy ideas we had as 18 year old kids and self-important ideologies, we were fucking right. Now we can comfortably say that.” Anthony says he and his bandmates are incredibly proud of the road they’ve taken thus far and all of the milestones they’ve reached, so he cannot pinpoint a specific goal he still has for the band.

“Our goal at one point was to go on tour, our goal at another point was to make a record and our goal was to get signed,” Anthony says. “At this point, we’re so far past that; our last goal was to make a living so that we could do this forever. It’s not about being rich and famous, but it’s about wanting to do music and not having to do anything else. I can’t think of anything else that we need right now.” The realization that they could decline a side job for extra money and make a living doing what they love to do is surreal for Anthony. “It’s the most accomplished I’ve ever felt.

“As far as success goes, we’re bigger than we ever thought we could be. I’m very happy that we are able to stop and look around and be like, ‘wow, we are buying houses, we’re supporting families.’ We’re playing places we’ve never dreamed we would play. We’re bigger than we ever thought possible. We make a living doing it, and we have fun doing it,” Anthony says.

“And as long as that’s the case, we’ll keep doing it.” NKD 12

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nina nesbitt Words by TANYA TRANER Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

Scottish singer-songwriter, Nina Nesbitt is ready to cross the pond. The Edinburgh native, who has already made a name for herself in the United Kingdom, is now making her way to the United States to show us what she’s got.

Nina says she loved writing poems as soon as she learned how to write, and this is where her songs originated.

She received an old keyboard at age 10 and began putting the poems she wrote to music. When she was 15, she 16

picked up her first guitar and began to write even more songs. That same year, she started posting videos to YouTube, which she largely credits to her success.

She didn’t instantly become YouTube famous — the climb was very gradual. She posted videos for about two years without any real attention.

But things changed when she started working with a classmate who wanted to be a filmmaker. “He would film me in a forest playing a cover of a song,”

she says. “Or like on a boat, you know weird places, and then people started to view them more and more because it was just an unusual setting, or an unusual song to cover.”

Nina went to college to study music, but she only stayed for two months. She says it wasn’t very beneficial for her because she really just wanted to get out there and do it. “I went down to London and got spotted by other artists and they took me on tour,” she says. “And it just eventually

turned into a career.” Her hard work turned into a record deal with Island Records and she has been working diligently ever since.

While she has released five EPs in the United Kingdom, this year she finally released music in the United States — a self-titled EP. It’s a compilation of her six favorite songs from her previously released EPs to give the United States a taste of what she has to offer.

Back in the United Kingdom, she recently released her first full-length album Peroxide, which is slated to release in the United States later this year. “It’s kind of a musical diary of everything I’ve experienced from about the age of 15 to now.” She means this

literally. She started writing the songs when she was 15 and began recording at 17. The recording process took a little over two years with touring and signing her record deal. She was annoyed with how long it took and was ready to just get her music out there.

“It would have been better just to go away and make the album.”

She finds it a little weird playing the older songs, because they are new and pertinent to her fans but not necessarily relatable to her any longer. “Anything you listen to is probably a year behind the artist. You just kind of have to accept that,” she says. “It’s not that the songs don’t mean a lot to me, it’s just that they aren’t as relevant to me as they were maybe two years ago.”

Nina already has a large following in the United Kingdom because of her hard work and the quality of the songs she has released, and she plans to do pretty much the same things here in the United States to build up her momentum. “I’m just out here on my own playing guitar.” She says her acoustic style worked well for her in the UK, and she hopes to support well-known names on tour in order to grow her fan base.

Her success in the United Kingdom is also based on remaining true to who she is and what she wants, and she plans to bring that here. “People always say that you need to be different, and you need to do something different from everyone else to stand out,” she says. “But I think that’s quite a dangerous thing to start doing. You can start to lose yourself a little bit and start trying to be someone you’re not.”

Once things started to pick up for her, she had to evaluate the kind of artist she wanted to be. She says the industry pressures her, and she sees that acoustic music in the United Kingdom isn’t quite as big anymore, so sometimes she questions whether or not she should do something else.

“But if I did anything else, it wouldn’t really be right,” she says. She came to the conclusion that she makes the

songs she makes and she is who she is.

“It might not be the most original, but at least it’s honest,” she explains. “I just do what I like doing.”

And Nina certainly likes to do a lot with her music. “I don’t really know what sound I want to make next. I’m always changing because I get bored very easily.” She says each EP has a different sound. It started out with just herself and her guitar, and she then transformed to a “quirky acoustic pop” sound. “It’s been folkier, it’s been rockier and it’s been poppier. I like to just have the freedom to do what I want,” Nina says.

The buzz around Nina is already going around the United States starting with a sold out show at The Studio at Webster Hall in New York City last year. “It’s just weird thinking 400 people bought tickets, and I’ve never been here before.” She was also surprised in Texas. “I tweeted saying ‘Come to this place at this time — I’m going to play a little acoustic show,’ just thinking there’d be about five people. And it was about 60 girls who showed up and knew the words and had been following me for ages. It was surreal that people would know it here,” she says.

While a fan base is beginning to grow, she recognizes that she has work to do. In the United Kingdom she plays for thousands, whereas in the United States the shows are much smaller. “It kind of feels like starting again.”

She plans to tour the United States soon, while still posting covers on YouTube from time to time. “I just think it’s nice to do what you did in the beginning and keep people interested,” Nina explains.

As Nina starts over in the United States, you can be sure she’s going to present herself honestly and openly and do whatever it takes to be the biggest star she can be. “I think a lot of people’s success is down to timing,” she says. “I don’t really know if it’s the right time, but I guess I’ll soon find out.” NKD NKDMAG.COM

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CASSIE STEELE Words by ALEX LANE Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

When talking to Cassie Steele, you begin to understand that, even though they aren’t the same person, she and her Degrassi: The Next Generation character Manny Santos are strikingly similar.

They are straight shooters, tenacious, sarcastic, inspired, caring and a little dark. They even share similar interests and a tendency toward creativity and performance.

Cassie was born in Toronto, Ontario to a Filipino mother and British father. As a child, she recalls being quirky and a little unpredictable. “I think I was just a little, weird kid. I just really weirded people out,” Cassie says. “I was really outgoing and loud, and said a lot of inappropriate things.”

Her knack for grabbing attention caused her parents to suggest creative outlets. “My dad thought it was good that I go to improv, or theater, and meet other weird kids,” she says. “And I did it, and it was awesome, and I did meet other weird kids.”

By the time she was 9 years old,

Cassie had an agent and had started working on commercials. She learned pretty quickly that commercials were not for her. “I was like ‘Fuck commercials,’” Cassie says. “I didn’t really like that I only got to work one or two days. I wanted to just do it all the time and never be in school.” It was after that realization that she landed a role on a short-lived, Canadian television series called Relic Hunter, as the younger version of the lead character.

Not long after, at the age of 11, Cassie was cast as Manny on Degrassi, a role she would play for nine years.

As Manny, Cassie was shot to stardom, and she grew up in front of the camera. Her character explored the tensions of friendships and families, as well as societal stigmas associated with homophobia, abortion and promiscuity. And while she did not attend a formal high school, the education that she got from Degrassi was invaluable. “I wouldn’t change it for anything,” she says. “I made some really great friends. I’m still really good NKDMAG.COM

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friends with a few people, and they are just friendships that I know will last no matter what. The experience was great.”

After a few years on Degrassi, Cassie felt like she needed to do more.

“I had been working on [Degrassi] since I was 11, so I had been making some money, and I wrote poetry when I was younger,” says Cassie. “And I wanted to try out songs, so I was like ‘Fuck it, why don’t I just make an album.’”

Her albums consist of work that is from a span of years, and sometimes, she says, she will scrap something that seems outdated for where she is at in life. For Cassie, the song-writing process doesn’t happen all at once.

“You come back to things that you’ve written, and you know, being young, you just don’t relate with them, or you don’t want to,” she says. “Or you wrote new stuff that you’re really stoked about, and you really want to do that.”

Her debut album How Much For Happy was released in early 2005, when Cassie was just 16. It reached gold certification in Canada, and Cassie went on two Canadian tours in support of the album. Following her tours, Cassie returned to acting.

Then in 2008, Cassie made the big move from her family home in Toronto to Los Angeles. “When I moved to L.A., I was 17 [to] 18, which is pretty young, not only to be moving away from home, but also to a different country,” Cassie remembers. “And for the first time ever, not having a job, and not having anything to keep me together. It was a huge learning experience being on my own, and making a ton of mistakes and really fucking up. Getting over things, making friends and choosing the right friends.”

Cassie says a lot of those experiences inspired some of the songs on her second album, Destructo Doll (2009), and the sound reflects the emotions she was feeling at the time.

“It was a good, awesome, compul20

sive, dark time for me, and it was so important to be who I am right now,” she says. “I feel like I would have been a shittier person if it didn’t happen. It was really just a humbling experience.

You think you are invincible, especially when you’re young.”

In 2010, she left Degrassi for other endeavors. The following year she was cast as Abby Vargas on the Canadian drama The L.A. Complex. That transition, Cassie says, was challenging but perfect timing for where she was in her own life. “I guess [Abby] was really like me. I really related with her. She was just a ball of anxiety and drive,” Cassie says. “I just really loved the writing because it showed exactly what its like to struggle and choose this profession.”

Trying to balance both acting and singing has amplified that struggle for Cassie. But acting has always come first. “It feels like music has been on the back burner because obviously you have to make a living,” Cassie says.

But now, she says, it is time for the music. “It’s just been too long of not putting my all into it,” she says. “I don’t like doing that, you know? I like to do everything right.”

So this year, she is doing both.

She just wrapped a movie called The Dorm, a psychological horror movie that focuses on a haunted dorm room.

The film is being produced by MTV and is expected to be out later this summer. She also just released “Mad” in early April, which is the first single off of her upcoming EP. The single is a nod to, and evolution of, her earlier music. Like most of her past releases, the new track definitely hints to the music Cassie grew up with. A fan of grunge and alternative-rock like The Pixies, Sonic Youth, and The Jesus and Mary Chain, as well as ’90s pop like Britney Spears and the Spice Girls; Cassie has created a cool and unique sound. “I love spooky blues,” she says. “I also listened to a ton of pop growing up…

I like crazy power pop, and I love that garage, dirty sound, with a wicked bass.”

Lyrically, Cassie uses her experiences as inspiration for her songs.

Now, at 24 years old, she is still working to find herself and her balance between passions. The new single shows where she has come from and where she feels like she is at in her own mind Somehow, Cassie has been able to showcase her outspoken independence, sarcasm and edginess in her major career roles, and music has been no different. “Mad” shows Cassie’s musical capabilities and what she has already overcome and experienced to get to where she is now.

The rest of this year for Cassie is packed. Between the release of The Dorm and the summer release of her EP, she is going to be touring. “After I drop the EP, I will probably hit the road. Or however I’m going to get places. By boat, maybe,” she says jokingly. “Hit the boat. Maybe I’ll just go around the Great Lakes.”

As for the future of her career, she is hopeful about her music and acting. She is excited about the EP. She says she really enjoyed making it and hopes listeners enjoy it just as much.

And with acting, this year is Cassie’s movie year, and she says that that is where she plans to focus her energy.

It seems like Cassie’s life has been full of big transitions. From child to actress, from commercials to Degrassi, from acting to music, and back, Cassie has had to learn how to roll with the changes. And while it certainly hasn’t been easy for the young actress, the 24-year-old says she now realizes that each transition served its purpose. For Cassie, growing up hasn’t been what it is for most people.

She has had to realize her mortality, with an audience.

“People would recognize me, and you think you’re the shit,” Cassie says.

“But eventually all that goes away, and you have to get another job. That’s when you really find out who you are.” NKD

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SWEETLIFE FESTIVAL (MAY 10 - COLUMBIA, MD)

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magic m Words by SHINA PATEL Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

man

When Alex Caplow met Sam Vanderhoop Lee in pre-school, he had made a friend for life. A friend to take guitar lessons with in the fifth grade, a friend who would share his passion for music and a friend to start an indie rock band with. Alex (vocals) and Sam (guitar) have been making music together since grade school. Through the years they played together in various garage rock bands. Although they went on to different colleges, it wasn’t long before they got back to making music together.

After their freshman year of college, Alex and Sam began creating under the alias Magic Man while working on a farm in Europe for the summer. What started as a duo has now grown into a full-fledged five piece band. Today, Magic Man consists of Alex, Sam, Justine Bowe (keyboards), Daniel Radin (bass), and Joey Sulkowski (drums).

At the onset, Magic Man was just Sam and Alex making music together.

As a duo, Sam and Alex released an album entitled Real Life Color in January of 2010. But the making of this album was all very low-key ¬— Alex and Sam wrote the songs together and then recorded them on Sam’s laptop. They played a handful of shows but were not satisfied as a duo. “When we started to play those songs live it really didn’t sound as full as we hoped,” Sam says.

They decided a full band was necessary and they recruited Justine, Daniel and Joey. Now, Magic Man sounds the way Alex and Sam had initially hoped they would.

Since the formation of the band, Alex and Sam have finished college and as a band released one EP, titled You Are Here in 2013. This July they plan to release their full-length album, Before The Wave, via Columbia Records. The album was produced by Alex Aldi, who has worked with bands such as Passion Pit and Holy Ghost! The album, which became available for pre-order at the end of May, has already hit the Top 20 on the iTunes Alternative chart. The first single off the album, “Paris”, has been ranking high on Sirius XM’s Alt Nation’s chart, spending two weeks at the #1 spot on their Alt-18 Countdown of most requested songs.

When making music, the band prefers to look at an album as a whole

rather than focusing on a single. In a world where singles take over the charts and albums are becoming less relevant, this thinking is a bit radical. “I’m an album guy myself, it’s a piece of art,” Alex says. Alex does acknowledge that many musicians don’t think the way he does but in his mind, each song is part of a puzzle that fits the greater picture.

“It’s rewarding to see the way it comes together,” he says. When writing music it all comes from a single idea from someone in the band and they’ll build from there. They’ll write a melody or a chord progression and go back and forth with ideas on vocals and lyrics to make sure they get the feel of the song right. Despite the fact that there are five creative minds coming together at once and making new music can sometimes be stressful, there is absolutely no tension between them when writing. They note that they all are in sync with what they want to do with a piece of music and have the same end goal in mind.

A common problem that many artists have today, due to the rise of technology and social media, is that kids don’t want to come out to shows because they could easily just look at a video on their computer in the comfort of their own home. The main goal for Magic Man is to get as many people out to the shows as possible. Not because they want to sell more tickets to gain a bigger profit, but because they want their fans to get the experience of their live show. The band feels they have a lot more to offer on stage besides the music. When they walk on stage, they get to show off their true passion for music and create a different and unique experience for every person in the audience. Crowds feed off their high energy and they have been able to balance the art of performing their music precisely while having a good time. They leave it all on the stage.

This summer fans can see Magic Man on their own headlining tour and opening up for Panic! At the Disco and Walk The Moon on the This Is Gospel Tour. As for the future in a more longterm sense, the band just wants to play as many shows as possible and reach a wider audience every day. “We love doing this. We want to do it for as long as possible,” Alex says. NKD NKDMAG.COM

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CHROMEO Words by STEPHANIE PETIT Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

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When the high school buddies Dave 1 (David Macklovitch) and P-Thugg (Patrick Gemayel) began discovering and playing music together, they had no idea their hobby would turn into something much greater. Music wasn’t their career until everything was already happening. “It’s always been something we loved to do and that we loved doing together whether it was a band in high school or hip hop projects in between or the creation of Chromeo,” says P-Thugg. “We did not necessarily have a career in mind.”

Ten years after their first album She’s in Control (2004) debuted, the Montreal natives are busier than ever. They just released their fourth album, White Women (2014), and recently played the main stage at Coachella to rave reviews, making lists like The Hollywood Reporter’s Top 10 Best Performances at the festival.

The duo themselves can hardly believe the hype their electrofunk band that started by chance is receiving. About twelve years ago while working on music in Montreal, electronic DJ Tiga offered Dave 1 a deal on his small record label. Dave 1 asked if he could get longtime friend P-Thugg involved and Chromeo was born.

“We didn’t really know what we were doing,” Dave 1 says. “We just knew we had to have that 80’s vibe and a new take on it.”

Though their song “Needy Girl” gained attention from club DJs all over the world, their first album wasn’t the game changer for Chromeo. At the time, Dave 1 and P-Thugg didn’t even live in the same city.

They would send each other song ideas and beats over email and get together to record when they felt they had enough ready.

The guys claim they were lucky to have the chance to make a second album. Three years later when Fancy Footwork (2007) was released, the whole music industry was changing.

“When our first record came out, YouTube didn’t exist yet,” Dave 1 says. “DJs spread our music around the old school way. On the second album, it was blogs that were just emerging and they basically took us on. It was prime MySpace time. We were riding that wave.”

The Internet also spread the music on their third album, Business Casual (2010), with the song “Night by Night” fostering over 4 million views on YouTube. However, the duo still considered music as a “serious hobby” at this point. For White Women, P-Thugg moved to New York and Dave 1 put aside his efforts for a Ph.D. in French NKDMAG.COM

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Literature to make music their focus.

“We really went on 12 hours a day, seven days a week of studio time,” P-Thugg says.

“We had double the amount of songs that we even needed for this album.” Because of this, they were able to pick and choose, add songs at the last minute, and rework them.

Since it is Chromeo’s fourth full-length album, they actively made an attempt to change up their sound and explore avenues they haven’t in the past. “Same set of influences, just different references,” P-Thugg says.

Being a band that has been around for so long without mainstream success puts them in a unique position. Besides producing great music, Chromeo recognizes that they had to create buzz surrounding White Women for it to be successful. To do that, they made the album an event that people will want to be part of.

“The idea was to do this super long, extended setup so that people talk about the record all the time, so they’d always have something to say,” Dave 1 explains, “Everybody has our music, but they don’t necessarily buy an album. You’ve got to make it into a thing where people aren’t even buying the album, they just want to buy into the story and the fun that goes into it.”

Beginning over six months ago, Chromeo started a campaign leading up to White Women’s release. They put out free singles, appeared on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in October, held a free art exhibit in New York in conjunction with Tumblr and made tons of videos.

Chromeo doesn’t have the marketing budget that more popular bands have; a lot of money for these came out of their own pockets. All the money they make is going back into their music. To keep fans interested in what they’re doing, Dave 1 says they have to be generous with their music and make sacrifices like using their own money.

Planning the marketing strategy takes as much work as actually making the music, but for Chromeo, being hands-on makes their work fun and gratifying.

“People can tell we care,” Dave 1 says.

“If you look at our album artwork and the packaging and the photo spread, they’re like, who the fuck does that anymore?”

For the new album, they tried something new—bringing in producers for help creating and choosing the songs. Because they have been in the music business for so long and have a fan base, they weren’t try30

ing to change what they do. The idea was to take what they had and optimize it. Dave 1 and P-Thugg found it really stimulating on a creative level to hear feedback from others.

“You’re never going to have an objective perception of your own music,” Dave 1 says. “We’ve always said the only thing we can control is the amount of work we put in so we just worked more.”

So far it seems like their work is been paying off. The album is getting positives reviews and has more preorders than their previous album during the first week of release.

The biggest indicator of their success is their single “Jealous (I Ain’t With It)” making its way onto Top 40 radio. “I think it’s definitely our most pop-sounding song, but at the same time it retains all the typical Chromeo elements so in a way, it’s our best song because it’s the most accessible but it’s a digest of all the things we’ve done in the past,” Dave 1 says.

Chromeo credits part of the single’s success to other artists’ work such as Daft Punk, Bruno Mars and Justin Timberlake having a similar 80’s disco-funk vibe that opened mainstream music up to their kind of sound.

“We came at the right time,” Dave says, before P-Thugg corrects him, saying, “Well, the right time came to us because we were there.”

As Coachella proved, live shows are an important aspect for the band and where they excel. They have been known how to get the audience dancing since the beginning before they had these grand marketing plans. It was the way to get their music and message out to the world while earning some money to do it all again.

Chromeo will be touring throughout the summer and doing a North American tour in the fall. They also plan to release more singles from White Women and carry the momentum they’ve been building around the album.

Though putting the work into their music careers (as oppose to hobby) keeps them busy, Dave 1 and P-Thugg are more than happy to keep pushing their work for the payoff.

“Is [our music] getting the unanimous, absolute praise that I wish for? Nope, but with us that’s going to take a lot of time,” Dave 1 says. “We have to do the leg work and that’s okay. I’ll take that over being a first album success and then falling off.

We’ll take that any day.” NKD

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With their fourth and latest studio album, Bombay Bicycle Club continues their musical evolution with So Long, See You Tomorrow.

The quartet, with Jack Steadman on vocals, guitar and piano, Suren de Saram on drums, Ed Nash on bass, and Jamie MacColl on guitar, have been together for almost a decade.

Each album has been different in style and sound, particularly the latest, after Jack spent some time traveling and became influenced by Bollywood music. Now, the band have three top priorities: writing music, connecting with fans and putting on the best live show possible.

How did Bombay Bicycle Club come together?

Jamie: We stared in school when we were 15 – about ten years ago.

Jack and I immediately bonded over music as people do at that age, and Suren and Jack were quite accomplished musicians in their own right at school. Jack had already made three solo albums; he was always in his bedroom making music. We got asked to play at a school assembly and it kind of went from there. It was slow at first because we were still kids and we came from very middle class backgrounds and people don’t just leave school at 16 to go and start a rock band. But we needed that time to develop. It was about five years after when we first formed that we released our first album and then it’s kind of been an album every year since then apart from this last one.

Words by CHRISTINE O’DEA Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

There was a much longer gap between So Long, See You Tomorrow and A Different Kind of Fix than there was between past records. Why is that?

Jamie: I think the last album was the first one that we had really toured on properly and internationally, so it was us getting used to the realities of what touring an album means.

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albums, we had just run out of things to write about and ran out of steam.

Those three albums were so different and we were able to release them because we weren’t trying to recycle the same ideas - it was something brand new each time. For this one, although it does sound different from the other ones, there are definitely more lines of continuity from the last album. We need to actually think about the kind of album we need to make.

Suren: There was a lot of material written for this latest album that didn’t end up getting used because the bar was set high and we wanted to maintain a standard throughout.

Jamie: I think to an extent, Jack felt like he sort of ran out of things to write about particularly because when you’ve been on tour for 18 months it becomes a cliché to talk about it. You can’t just keep writing about being on tour because no one’s really interested in that. I think you need to look towards more universal themes. I think he felt like he exhausted all his ideas musically and lyrically in London, so he decided to go traveling. He didn’t want it to be perceived as “finding yourself ” - it was more like breaking the routine of being on tour. He was in India for quite a long time, especially Mumbai, and I think that was really a conscious decision to go somewhere where there is a real drive to succeed.

There is a real energy and excitement there and at the same time India is one of those places where you’re constantly surrounded by music; music is very important to everyone there. Most significantly Bollywood surrounds you, and I think he just became really enamored in that and that just slowly seeped its way into the songs because he ended up sampling some of [Bollywood’s] songs.

When Jack came to you with these new ideas, what was your reaction?

Jamie: There was one song in particular, “Feel.” The start of the song is like a 45 second Bollywood song and the first time I heard it I was like, “He’s lost his mind.” That song sample is one of the most famous songs that there is in Bollywood. It’s a folk song in the sense that it has been reused constantly for the last 60 years so there are still pop songs that come out with that same melody. So when people in India hear it now, it’s like kind of using The Beatles or something for 45 seconds in a song which I think is kind of strange.

How do you keep your old fans involved while still building your audience?

Jamie: It’s a constant battle, really, but at the same time I think those bands that try and recreate a first album that is popular with fans inevitably don’t last very long. You could never recreate those songs. I think it’s easier for us in America because our first two albums weren’t released here. People don’t come to the band with the same preconceptions. In the UK our first album was a very straightforward indie rock album that had very simple lyrical ideas, and yet found a pretty powerful connection with young people.

There weren’t many other 18 year olds that were in relatively successful bands that spoke to people in that way, so in the UK it’s harder to move past that first impression.

But the fact that we released an acoustic album as a second album basically meant that there were no expectations of what we were going to sound like. I think we are one of those bands that need to keep doing something new just to keep going because we get bored. I don’t know if we will settle into something more defined as we get older, because a lot of it comes down to being young.

Most 23 or 24 year olds don’t know what they want to do with their lives and I think that kind of translates to

our music making processes because we keep getting into something new every 6 months.

How does your fan base in America compare to yours in the UK? Jamie: On the last album it obviously had one stand out single that did really well on radio and connected with people everywhere. It’s kind of different here this time. “Luna” was a big single in the UK, but I thought here every night “Feel” has been one of the biggest songs of the night.

“Home By Now” has a really big reaction here as well. Our audience in America is different because we’re a little bit cooler here than we are at home. The audiences in general are very different here; I find at the gigs that people are watching you more and are more self-conscious. At home I’ve seen circle pits in the most inexplicable moments - like quiet little breakdowns. They’re just hurling themselves at each other and I don’t really get it. You always hear about people writing songs with American radio in mind but I think the harder you try and write a hit the less likely you are to. I think people can always hear something that’s forced and it will end up not representing the band well I think. Like “Shuffle,” our biggest radio hit to date, it started off as a really weird song and no one thought it would crossover in any sort of way, but it did quite well in the end. I don’t understand why.

When this Arctic Monkeys album came out no one said it would be the one to break them in America - it just happened. I don’t think you can really explain why these things happen. But I hope we aren’t writing with anything in mind really I think first and foremost you need to make something that you’re all proud of and that you love otherwise what’s the point really? If you have to go and play these songs for two years, you have to care about them. NKD NKDMAG.COM

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SKATE & SURF FESTIVAL (MAY 16 + 17 - ASBURY PARK, NJ)

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NEON TREES Words and Photos by CATHERINE POWELL Make-Up by HEIDI SIGLER

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On the eve of their album release day, I sit with Neon Trees in the outdoor lounge at the Hudson Hotel. The band — Tyler Glenn (vocals), Chris Allen (guitar), Branden Campbell (bass) and Elaine Bradley (drums) — are all dressed in bright colors and have glowing smiles on their faces, despite the fact that they’ve been awake since 4 a.m. They stand out among the various businessmen in suits, talking on their smartphones and filling the lobby of the popular hotel. But they’re used to that. Since Neon Trees formed in 2005 they’ve always been a little hard to place, but their new record, Pop Psychology, proves they’ve earned their spot on Top 40 radio.

Tyler and Chris began playing music together as teenagers before Chris moved to Utah in 2005. Tyler soon followed with low expectations for the state’s music scene, but was pleasantly surprised. They grabbed Elaine and Branden from other bands in the area and began their trek as a four-piece.

The decision to pursue pop music was a conscious one simply because that’s what they all enjoyed. “We all have an appreciation for songs that speak to you,” Elaine explains.

They didn’t want people to get bored. They approached songwriting with a “pop formula,” but sound-wise they were still a garage rock band.

Over the years they’ve learned how to produce the pop sound, but they still consider themselves an alternative band despite the pop influence and overall sound. “Alternative these days is so vast,” Tyler says. “And it’s so mainstream,” Branden adds. As they’ve grown in success, their main goal has been to prove to the world that they are not a “one-trick pony.”

Writing catchy songs has always been a huge element for the band, but when they sat down to write their first album Habits (2010), they learned how to develop their sound in a way that they never had before — they finally had a place for the songs they were writing. “I specifically remember having conversations about if it bothered us that people were saying we weren’t alternative enough, and all of us were on the same page about just writing what we want to write,” Elaine recalls.

These conversations happened very early on in the band’s career, and the sound they were creating was much different than the punk music that dominated much of the 2000s. To build a fan base, they performed live and let their talent speak for itself. The music scene in Provo, Utah was also crucial to Neon Trees’ early recognition. The city is heavily concentrated on music because of the universities in the area as well as the no-alcohol policy in local clubs. The sober crowds forced Neon Trees to focus on their live show and keeping people entertained.

The build-up outside of Utah was slow. It wasn’t until mid-2010, when “Animal” caught on, that Neon Trees began gaining momentum. Along the way they had little victories, like opening for big bands or selling out shows in places other than their hometown.

But when radio got involved, it completely changed the game. “We finally accepted the path that was right in front of us, as opposed to following one we thought we had to,” Branden explains.

When it came time to sign a record deal, the band had no preferences as far as indie or major labels — they just wanted help. They never took direction in terms of their sound or their image, and eventually they signed with Mercury Records, which simply instructed them to write more songs. The radio success of “Animal” didn’t come overnight, but it still felt rather sudden because the band were only expecting their debut record to take them on the road — nothing more. While “Animal” took them to a new level as a band, there are still millions of people who don’t know who they are. But they’re okay with that. “We just want to do what makes us happy,” Tyler says.

Going into Pop Psychology, there was not a single weight on the band’s shoulders. They did everything on their own terms and spread out the writing and recording processes significantly. Their label wasn’t completely in the loop about what was going on, which helped them focus on their own creative vision. After recording two full-lengths already, the band was able to apply their likes and dislikes of the recording process to Pop Psychology.

In addition to keeping the label out of the loop, Neon Trees hid their time in the studio from fans. “We live in a day and age where people get bored very quickly, so it’s nice to shorten the album launch in a way. They released the first single off the record, “Sleeping With A Friend,” and were able to say the full record would be out in less than three months. They had to constantly remind each other to not tweet or Instagram anything relating to the studio — but it was still a challenge.

They shot their photos and videos early on so everything was ready when it came time to announce the record.

Fans had no idea the band was in the studio because they were still playing shows and touring to keep fans involved.

The writing process for Pop Psychology started very early on. Tyler would write on breaks from tour and by the time they were ready to record, they had extremely detailed demos — some of which had existed for nine months already. By allowing the songs to sit for a while they were able to make alterations and focus on letting them be the best they can be, instead of rushing through them like they had in the past. “We could have just decided that [these songs] were not what we wanted to put out, and since no one knew we were in the studio it wouldn’t have mattered,” Tyler says.

While some people at Mercury Records were in the loop about the recording process, the band was lucky in the sense that no one was putting their two cents in while they were in the middle of the creative process. “I was not very well, mentally, and I was emotionally drained, and I needed time,” Tyler admits. He believes that putting everything out there really bought the band time when it came to putting together this record.

A few months ago, Tyler came out to the world in an in-depth interview.

While he was struggling to address his sexuality publically, he was still writing upbeat songs. He had written a lot of darker songs, but the record became more of a celebratory record as a weight lifted off his shoulders. While Tyler has always known he was gay, as his 30th birthday approached he began NKDMAG.COM

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contemplating how to address the cliché milestone year. “I don’t have a license, so I thought about getting one … and then I came out instead,” he laughs. He never felt the need to publically talk about his sexuality, using the band as a bit of a cover. “But that’s no way to live,” Tyler says. As he started to find a new level of happiness within himself, he felt confidence in the fact that this happy man was also a gay man. “But I also believe in God, and try to eat healthy and like certain kinds of music, and sometimes I’m angry,” Tyler says. “[Being gay] was just part of the whole sphere and I didn’t want to hide that part of it anymore.”

The reaction to Tyler’s coming out was extremely positive. “I appreciate the people who were like ‘He wasn’t fooling anyone,’ but at the same time I wasn’t trying to fool anyone. I don’t think it’s appropriate to assume anyone’s sexuality,” he says. But he didn’t come out for those people. He came out for the people that needed to hear it from him. “But mostly you came out for you,” Elaine adds, stating that she thinks Tyler is happier since coming out. “Just because you dance or dress a certain way doesn’t mean you’re gay,” Branden adds.

The response from the Mormon community is especially important to Tyler because he was raised Mormon and is still a member of their church.

He says there was an overwhelming amount of messages from kids who still believe in the Mormon Church regardless of their acceptance of homosexuality, and found Tyler’s situation inspiring. “I’ve gotten a lot of letters from Mormon leaders saying what I’m doing is awesome, and that was a shock,” Tyler admits.

While the last few weeks have been extremely positive and uplifting for Tyler, he doesn’t feel like he’s ready to be a role model just yet. In fact, everyone in the band is in a different place when it comes to accepting the role model position. “I’m acutely aware of it,” Elaine explains. “I would hope no one is using me as an example for doing something dumb, but on the other side I do acknowledge that people look up to me.” Elaine states that she finds the honesty Tyler has been expressing NKDMAG.COM

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lately inspiring, because it gives people on either side of the fence no reason to be negative. She has never seen Tyler’s sexuality as a “big deal,” explaining that the only “big deal” that comes along with it is that he is healthy and happy right now.

Chris takes his position as a role model very seriously, because he feels like it comes naturally to him.

“I obeyed my parents. I was a Boy Scout. I just feel like I’m the right place,” Chris says. He thinks the best way to be a good role model is to just be a good example and make good choices. “It gives us a unique opportunity to leave an impression on thousands of people,” Branden adds, “Even if it’s something as simple as being open-minded about music.” Over time they’ve realized what things they shouldn’t say out loud or put on the Internet, but regardless of the minor censoring, they don’t feel like they’re being anyone but themselves. “You can’t fully joke with the public like you can joke with your friends,” Elaine explains.

While their lives have changed drastically since the spotlight has been cast on them, the members of Neon Trees feel grounded. They still value their roots and make a point to focus their songwriting on universal topics.

“I wrote a lot about identity and loneliness, but even though I wrote about loneliness from the road it’s still relatable,” Tyler explains. “You don’t want to write a record from the road that sounds like you wrote a record from the road,” Elaine adds. Their goal with Pop Psychology was to write relatable songs and share their stories through them. Considering the record debuted at No. 6 on the Billboard charts among pop divas and rock bands, it’s safe to say they’re succeeding with their intentions. Tyler admits that at times they feel like the “red-headed step child” of popular music, but they’ve stopped comparing themselves to their peers, mostly because they are not directly competing with acts like Beyoncé or One Direction — even if their singles are sitting next to each other on the charts. “We’ve carved our own sound,” Tyler says, “And now we just want to keep growing at the steady pace we have been.” NKD NKDMAG.COM

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BOSTON CALLING (MAY 23, 24 + 25 - BOSTON, MA)

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LUKE BILYK Words by STACY MAGALLON Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

Canadian actor Luke Bilyk didn’t want to play hockey — he wanted to act. And he knew that by the time he was seven years old.

Mainly known for his role on Degrassi: The Next Generation, much like his character in high school, Luke is ready to move forward.

Luke was born in Scarborough, Canada. The youngest of four children, his three older sisters and his mom worked in the modeling and acting industry. When he was eight years old, he landed his first commercial. “I didn’t want to play hockey or go to school,” Luke says. “And what’s awesome about acting is, I don’t have to go to school.” At 14, Luke auditioned for Degrassi. Unfortunately, he wasn’t cast but Luke refused to take “no” for an answer.

“It can come down to the color of

your hair, which is kind of prejudice, but what can you do?” Luke says.

“There’s usually nothing wrong with you, especially in the acting agency.”

Luke auditioned for the show again a year later. While he was at school one day, he received a message from his cousin congratulating on landing the role. He was befuddled.

Only after the family calls kept pouring in did he notice something on his kitchen counter: a printed email from the casting agency that had been sent to his agent. Since then, he has spent five years on the set — the transitional stage between teenage and adult actor.

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been 12 years old, and my mom told me I couldn’t watch that show,” Luke says. “And now I’m acting in it.”

Degrassi focuses on the real issues of teenagers in the 21st century: sexual abuse, pregnancy, drug abuse, child abuse, peer pressure and self-image, among many others. The show has since won over 50 awards such as The Teen Choice Awards, International Emmy Awards and Gemini Awards.

Luke plays Drew Torres, a stereotypical popular, attractive athlete at Degrassi. He plays basketball, football and is skilled in mixed martial arts. While working on a dramatic television series, Luke’s character was placed in a plethora of situations.

He says some of the scenes, like his on-screen brother’s death, require preparation accurately depict the emotions. “As an actor, you need to place yourself in that position,” he explains. “You need to feel what your character feels.” Death is a difficult concept to grasp and direct reactions are challenging to portray. For Luke, he believes these scenes are easier to film when working with extremely talented co-stars. He lists season 11 as his favorite. “I got beat up, joined a fight club, broke up with my girlfriend and went through two and a half weeks of intensive martial arts training,” he says.

In the five years Luke has spent on the Degrassi set, Drew’s character has transformed. As his character has grown, the show’s writers have also grown to understand Luke’s abilities as an actor and have written to his strengths. “I’ve played with guns, done ‘shrooms, joined a fight club, my brother died,” Luke says, listing a few of his experiences on the set of Degrassi. “I’ve done many physical scenes that actors crave for, which is extremely lucky for me.”

A handful of television shows cast older actors to play teenagers, but that isn’t the case with Degrassi. “We do cast age-appropriate characters,

and I think that’s what makes us so different from everyone else,” Luke says. In his shoes, heading to work isn’t even work. He shows up, reads his lines and hangs out with his best friends.

When Luke entered the show at age 15, the directors and cameramen treated him like a professional actor because of his skills and not his age. “I never got the perspective of how great it was until I worked with older actors, and I was treated like a kid rather than an adult,” Luke says, laughing. Now, he wants to leave the Degrassi set as exactly that, an adult.

When thinking about his eventual departure, Luke reflects on the advice he’d give to the actors of “the next generation.” “My character has evolved so much,” he says. “It helps to know where you’re going, especially when you know where the show has been.” Degrassi is known to lack boundaries and continually pushes the envelope season after season.

“I hope Drew starts to become a man, which is hard for a teenage boy to do,” Luke says. Drew is constantly struggling to prove himself, but he screws up over and over again “He shouldn’t be taking the easy way out, which is something he’s always done in the past,” Luke says about his hopes for Drew, who will no longer be a Degrassi character at the end of the 14th season. Luke has watched 20 cast members graduate, and now it’s his turn. He’ll be simultaneously filming another show in Toronto while wrapping up his final season.

He’s set to star in The CW’s Lost Girl, where he’s hoping to work for the next year.

Luke is moving forward with his acting career, and his experience on Degrassi has made him selective about his future in the business. He references Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Cruise and Johnny Depp — all of whom took their acting career by the reins during their late teenage years.

Luke, now 20, hopes to do the same.

“It’s all about picking the right roles, getting in front of the right people and having the right people to push you,” he says.

Luke is picky about other projects. Although he doesn’t have a say in his entire career, he chooses his auditions wisely. He has turned down various projects because he was conscious of the path he’d be going down. “Some roles weren’t steps backwards for me, but steps to the side,” Luke says. “And if you don’t land something right after your time on Degrassi, the chances of you landing something else are quite slim.”

Luke, who has been prominently recognized as one character, repeatedly asks himself, ‘Can I be seen as someone other than Drew?’ He briefly mentions a movie deal he has been offered, but doesn’t go into detail.

“This new character is so risqué,” Luke says. “I come from a traditional, Christian background, so it may not seem proper for me to step out like that.” Regardless of his next role, he just wants to find work.

After his time on Degrassi, Luke will venture out of Canada and begin seeking work elsewhere. He has lived with his parents since he was born and now, the youngest of the Bilyk clan is preparing for life on his own.

“My mom has to comprehend that her baby boy is growing up,” Luke says, laughing. “It’s nice to go out to L.A. and be a fresh face that doesn’t know anyone.” Luke hasn’t been a “fresh face” in years. He doesn’t view this as a downfall, but rather, an exercise. Building a new name is critical in an actor’s transition into adulthood. Luke is nervous, but he says, “Nervous is good.”

It’s been an exciting five years in Luke’s life. He’s played a major character on a major Canadian television show with some of the country’s best actors. But now, he’s ready for the next stage of his acting career.

“Sometimes I look back,” he says.

“There’s nothing I would change.” NKD NKDMAG.COM

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HALEY RAMM Words by STEPHANIE PETIT Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

ABC Family has been known to produce series with strong fan followings.

Just look at the effect of shows like Pretty Little Liars — you can’t go on Twitter on a Tuesday night without seeing half of your friends tweeting live play-by-play action.

With just over a month before the new ABC Family show Chasing Life is set to debut, most actors would be nervous about how critics and audiences will receive it, but Haley Ramm isn’t worried. “I haven’t really let myself think about it because I don’t want to have any expectations,” she says. “I’d rather not prepare and just enjoy it.”

Haley, 22, has barely had time to consider how her life might change when the show premieres. The crew will finish shooting the first season — 20 episodes — just before Chasing Life premieres on June 10. Haley says the timing is actually a good thing because they aren’t constantly worrying about reviews. “I think it’s kind of a blessing that we don’t have that criticism on our minds,” Haley says. “We’re able to just go to work and not care about what anyone is thinking because no one has seen it. I think it’s more creatively freeing.”

Even when reviews do come out, Haley won’t lose any sleep obsessing over what they say. She admits she doesn’t Google herself and isn’t really big on social media.

She says she doesn’t care what other people think because everyone has their own opinions. “You just can’t stress too much about it because then you can’t enjoy it,” Haley says. “There are so many other stressful parts about this business that I don’t want to see what other people are saying.” Having been in the entertainment business since she was only 6 years old, she has learned how to deal with critics and rejection.

Haley has always known she wanted to

act. After begging her parents to put her in acting classes, she started auditioning for commercials, short films and student films near her home in Texas — pretty much whatever job she could get, no matter how strange. “I remember I got this really weird short film where I had to drown,” she says.

“I had to go to the bottom of the pool and just lay there and float to the top. This other movie where I was playing an orphan, I had all these June bugs in my hair, real bugs in my hair. It was disgusting. They even put a Madagascar hissing cockroach on me.”

At age 11, Haley and her mother moved to Los Angeles. Her parents gave her three months to make something happen, which she says felt like a long time to her younger self. She worked enough to stay in L.A. and has been living there for the past 10 years.

In that time, Haley has appeared in episodes of many television shows such as iCarly, Grey’s Anatomy, and CSI: Miami.

She also worked in movies with stars like Jason Bateman and Alexander Skarsgård in Disconnect (2012). “I was so interested in getting this role from the moment I got the audition, and that’s really rare,” she says. “It’s scary to get attached to those roles because most of the time you lose them. I know that the director definitely fought for me.

It was nice to be the underdog and work with all these really powerful and extremely talented people.”

Despite a variety of guest appearances in well-known films and television shows, Chasing Life is her first consistent role.

The show is about a 20-something woman named April who finds out she has cancer.

Haley plays Brenna, April’s rebellious younger sister who is dealing with depression after losing their father.

When Haley filmed the pilot episode, she had no idea what would happen to her character. Although Brenna is not the nic-

est person and tends to fall into the wrong crowd in the beginning of the show, Haley says her character is really like any 16-yearold. Brenna changes into a more caring and selfless person once she discovers her sister has a terminal illness, which has been fun for Haley to portray over the first season.

“We’ve all had that time where we don’t really know who we are or what life is going to give us or necessarily the type of person we want to be,” Haley says, “Brenna is kind of trying on all of these paths.”

Brenna is also bisexual, but Haley says that element is not presented as a taboo trait. Although her character is struggling with her sexual identity and how to define herself, she is proud of whom she is.

“Brenna just sees love as love,” Haley says.

“She can love anyone whether it’s a guy or a girl, and she’s totally comfortable with that.

She doesn’t feel like she needs to explain herself.”

Haley relates to her character because she has also had many close family members who have battled cancer. She understands what it is like to be the person who is helping out and being there for emotional support. Even though the story revolves around April finding out she is ill, Haley says cancer is just one of the important subjects the show explores.

While Haley says she would like to be on the other side of the camera and produce someday, she’s ready to see where Chasing Life takes her acting career. Since the show has been in the works for a while — they shot the pilot a year and a half ago and waited for the show to get picked up by a network — it’s hard for Haley to believe that audiences will finally be seeing it. “It’s like we’re going to work every day filming this fake show,” she says. “But I’ve had this feeling since we started the pilot that it’s all just going to hit at once.” NKD NKDMAG.COM

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ASK THE ARTIST ARE FESTIVALS BEGINNING TO OVERSHADOW TRADITIONAL TOURING IN THE SUMMER?

MAX COLLINS (EVE 6)

VAVA VOOM

Yes, I’m sure they are. But I’d take a club show over a festival any day. I always feel like Woody Allen when this subject comes up, neurotically bemoaning the masses who are better at parties than I am. For me, proximity to the band is the appeal of seeing one live. I’m interested in the people making the music that moves me. Not so much the sweaty mob.

Coming from Switzerland, festivals have been a pretty big deal there for a while. Here in the U.S., festivals are growing, but I wouldn’t say overshadowing summer touring considering there are so many cities to tour. You see more and more of these festivals pop up every year, but because some of them are held in these specified locations or because of scheduling, not every artist or band can make it on the bill and not every fan can attend. So at this point, there is definitely still a large demand for artists to continue to go out and tour other venues. Also, your big fans will want to see you more than that one festival performance anyway! An artists’ specific show still counts for a lot.

PAUL OTTEN (BIG LITTLE LIONS) Yes, I definitely think festivals have been replacing traditional touring for the past few years, except for a handful of marquee artists like the Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, etc. And I believe it’s because of the declining concert attendance as a result of the economy, so promoters package bands together to offer more value to fans and more potential filled seats for venues. I like the idea of festival style concerts, it makes it more of an event to look forward to. Especially if it’s going to be at a larger venue. Although I do still enjoy traditional concerts in small, intimate venues.

TIFFANY HOUGHTON I think festivals are great because they provide the opportunity for fans to see artists they love while also exposing them to new music. In fact, I’ve stumbled upon some of my now favorite bands at festivals including Paramore, Imagine Dragons, and The 1975 to name a few! Sometimes I get so caught up a in being a fan and paying attention to the acts that I love that other great music slips through the cracks. When you’re walking past a stage and a great live performance captures your attention, there’s just no denying it.

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LILY CLAIRE (LILY & THE PARLOUR TRICKS) I don’t think festivals overshadow summer touring - their prevalence has just changed the game. The fact that the term “Festival Season” exists is very telling: at the end of the day, there’s a demand for festivals - people want to go to them, and musicians want to play where the people are.

We’re lucky and so psyched to be playing two big festivals this summer in two very different parts of the country, and it’s pretty convenient to be able to have those important stops as structure for the rest of our time on the road. So to that extent, festivals can actually be helpful for summer touring. It is funny when the same artists are headlining a lot of festivals in a row, though - makes it seem like they’re all touring together.

MUSIC OUT THIS JUNE

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ASHER ROTH Words by SUSAN CHENG Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

Half a decade has gone by since Asher Roth released the ode to campus partying heard around the world. The “I Love College” rapper launched into instant fame and landed a spot in XXL magazine’s illustrious 2009 Freshman Class. But even with his initial success, he faced a slew of setbacks while trying to release his sophomore album. It wasn’t until this past April that he finally dropped the much-anticipated RetroHash.

After leaving Def Jam Records in 2012, he relocated to Los Angeles, signed with an indie record label and transitioned to a sound that differs from his debut album.

Despite Asher’s new direction, fans have embraced the 28-year-old artist’s decision to take on a different sound. Even after a near five-year absence, Asher has remained the same spirited, humble and authentic rapper from Morrisville, Penn.

It seems inevitable that Asher, who was born and reared in a town just 40 minutes north of Philadelphia, would eventually stumble upon hip-hop. But it was a discovery that would take him a few years — growing up as he did with parents who preferred Bruce Springsteen to Black Star.

Even Asher himself started out listening to Dave Matthews Band, whose Crash album was the first CD he had ever bought.

“Being a white kid from Morrisville, I don’t know how surprising that is,” Asher jokes. But it was through Dave Matthews Band that he grew to appreciate live music. “That was what kind of put me onto the concert experience,” he explains. His family also taught him to value a variety of genres. He would go to punk shows with one of his two older sisters; his father presented him with Paul Simon’s Graceland; his other sister exposed him to R&B artists.

Eventually, Asher discovered rappers

such as Jay-Z and Eminem, whom he considers his greatest influences today.

“In seventh grade, when you’re an impressionable kid, you’re just kind of doing what everyone else is doing,” Asher says.

“Hip-hop was huge in the ’90s. I mean, as a kid in the suburbs, there was no way to escape it.”

In high school, Asher’s love for artists like The Roots, Mos Def, Black Star and Wu-Tang Clan inspired him to make his own music on ACID Pro software and $90 microphones. While Asher pursued music, many of his classmates dabbled in drugs because there wasn’t much else to do in Morrisville. One of the songs on RetroHash, “Fast Life,” recounts the death of one of his friends who overdosed on heroin. “That happened more often than I would like to think ’cause there’s just not much to do,” he says. “Kids were fuckin’ bored. It’s either getting the drugs … and try[ing] to be cool or spend your time playing or making music,” he explains.

“And for me, I definitely don’t think I have the personality to be like ‘Let me be a drug addict.’ But I definitely think music got me in the right direction.”

During his senior year of high school, he experienced his first professional recording session at Larry Gold’s The Studio. Although it didn’t lead to a breakthrough production, the opportunity allowed the young rapper to become better acquainted with a major studio — an opportunity he has his sister to thank.

“My sister was friends with a dude named Matt McGurk, who really is the one who gave me my first opportunity to get into the studio, record a demo and just have those experiences,” he explains. “So when more major labels got involved, I wasn’t too freaked out. I was like, ‘Okay, I can do this. I’ve done this before.”

Asher’s big break came a few years later when he was a student at West Chester University. After recording a song about coming from a good family, Asher uploaded the track onto MySpace.

“That topic of conversation doesn’t really happen in rap music,” Asher says. “It’s not like, ‘Hey I come from a great family.’

It’s usually like, ‘I come from a broken home.’” The song, with its unusual theme, caught the attention of Scooter Braun, who Asher had requested as a friend.

After Braun heard the song, the Atlantabased talent agent reached out to Asher and his friends. “[He] called my buddy Tom Boyd and was like, ‘Hey, tell us everything you know about Asher Roth.’” Asher and his friend Boyd, who had just thrown a massive party the night before, immediately hung up presuming Braun to be a cop.

Fortunately for Asher, Braun called back, and his exact words were “‘Yo, this is the most important call of your boy’s life.’”

After chatting with his would-be manager on the phone for two hours, Asher didn’t hear from Braun for weeks. This was around this same time Borat hit theaters.

“I hadn’t heard from Scooter at all and just something about Borat, like this not caring about consequences, whatever happens, happens, just kinda doing it [attitude], something about that was pretty inspiring, so I texted Scooter: … ‘Trust your gut. Let’s make some moves,’” Asher recalls his bold text message to Braun.

“He hit back like, ‘If you can get down here I can get you in front of important people, and we’ll go from there.’”

Needless to say, Asher booked a flight, with help from his father who paid for his seat. Once united with Braun, Asher met Chaka Zulu and Jeff Dixon, who co-founded Disturbing tha Peace with NKDMAG.COM

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Ludacris. He also met Steve Rifkind, who helped launch the careers of Wu-Tang Clan, Mobb Deep, Three 6 Mafia and others.

He eventually signed a joint deal with Braun’s Schoolboy and Rifkind’s SRC Records. But locking down a contract didn’t mean immediate acceptance from the hip-hop community. Despite a favorable reception from some white audience members, many listeners couldn’t relate to Asher’s carefree rhymes. “The push back from hip-hop culture in general was ‘Fuck this kid,’” Asher says, stating some of his skeptics’ sentiments. “‘What does he know? How is this 21-year-old kid gonna come in here, talk about loving college?’”

“I understand that initially I was kind of hard to root for, so to speak,” he says, referencing his instantaneous success and appearance as some characteristics that made him hard to like. Eventually, his naysayers changed their minds, his fan base expanded and the hip-hop world as a whole began to appreciate Asher for his authenticity. “If you’ve cultivated a core fan base ... it’s hard to hate on that,” he explains. “It’s like, ‘Yo, this guy has kind of earned it.’”

With the hit of “I Love College” also came the risk of having his music typecast as “white boy rap” or “frat rap,” a threat Asher thoroughly understands.

“It’s tough, especially when people expect that from you, especially businesses.

They’re like, ‘Yo, play off that,’” he says.

“For me, it’s just kind of [about] trusting myself and listening to myself instead of getting caught up in ‘Oh, this will make a lot of money … Ultimately, I don’t know if it will be more rewarding monetarily and I don’t know from a popularity standpoint, [but] I don’t lose any sleep at night, worrying about what other people think.”

Asher’s self-assurance and modesty has also made him a likeable guy throughout the years. Even now, five years after his first professional release, The Greenhouse Effect Vol. 1, the rapper still remembers his humble beginnings.

“I was delivering pizzas when The Greenhouse Effect came out.” The following year, “I Love College” dropped. Asher went on to perform at the mtvU Woodie Awards and was eventually inducted into XXL’s 2009 Freshman Class along with 60

the likes of Kid Cudi, Wale and B.o.B. “I remember I didn’t even have a wardrobe I just had on what I was wearing. And they were like, ‘So where’s your stylist?’” Asher recalls, chuckling. “I can’t really pretend to be something that I’m not. I can’t really fake the funk.”

Throughout his career, Asher has experienced his fair share of high and low points. As an artist once signed to a major label, he found himself adhering to a structure that ultimately became more confining than liberating. “I was trying to operate within the boundaries, so to speak,” Asher explains. After years of release date pushbacks, however, Asher decided to leave Def Jam Records in 2012. “It just got to a point where I was like, ‘I just wanna be able to do what I do.’ And I didn’t really hate on anybody on the way up, so they just kind of let me go,” Asher says.

Leaving Def Jam Records meant he needed to start from scratch, which is precisely what he did with RetroHash.

The process was easier after he signed with Federal Prism Records, an independent label that allowed him more creative freedom.

“It’s all kind of fresh stuff [from] after moving to Los Angeles and having this no-rules kind of vibe,” he says. Even the name of his long-awaited sophomore album stemmed from spontaneity. “I got sent over a list of anagrams of my name just as a joke,” he says, explaining that he had initially considered “Rather Hoes” as a possible album title. “But I saw ‘RetroHash’ and was like … ‘This is exactly what the music sounds like,’ so we ran with it. I knew this record was gonna be cool because it manifested itself pretty easily.” The newfound freedom and relocation allowed Asher to produce an album with a sound that is unlike his previous. “It definitely has a California, slower vibe to it,” he says.

With his sophomore album finally out, Asher is set to go back on tour. Only now, he’s ready to take his world tour to Australia and Asia, where he didn’t have a chance to go before. “I wanna go all over the world,” he says. “I definitely want to see the world, play live music. I just want to play outdoors while the sun’s setting, you know, that kind of stuff. If I could do that, I’ll definitely chalk it up as a win.” NKD

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TIMEFLIES Words by SHINA PATEL Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

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When Cal Shapiro agreed to sing in Rob “Rez” Resnick’s funk band, he had no idea it would change his life.

The duo, now known as Timeflies, met while attending Tufts University — more specifically a party at Tufts University. Cal was free styling at a frat party, and Rez approached him about singing in his six-piece band, The Ride. In 2009, The Ride won Tufts’ annual Battle of the Bands competition and opened for Ludacris, who was headlining that year’s competition. Although the band played funk and jazz, Cal and Rob wanted to explore different aspects of music, so they started making songs under their own alias — Timeflies.

When the first Timeflies song was released to the public, Cal and Rez were not expecting such as positive reception — they did not even know the song had been released.

Their current manager, Jared Glick, released the song “Fade” to various music blogs without Cal or Rez’s knowledge — in their minds it wasn’t even a finished song. “We were really pissed off, but then everyone loved it,” Cal says. Motivated by the positive reaction to “Fade,” Cal and Rez decided to record another song called “All Night,” which also garnered a positive response from listeners. Throughout this stage in recording, both boys were graduating from Tufts as music majors.

After graduation they decided it was time to make a full-length album. “We worked on a full length project just for fun, to see what would happen,” Cal says. “And we woke up and it was Number 8 on iTunes.” After the album, titled The Scotch Tape, was released in September of 2011, Cal and Rez moved to Brooklyn, N.Y. and set up their own little home studio in their apartment in Crown Heights. The Scotch Tape was able to rise to the top of the charts so quickly because of the 64

support of their fans. Since they started making music together and playing shows in college and the local area, Cal and Rez had been building a dedicated fan base. While at Tufts, they would also perform at other colleges in the area. They also attribute a great deal of their success to the music blogs that were playing their songs and supporting them from the beginning. Some of these blogs include Good Music All Day, CamelBack and Fresh New Tracks. “They all had our backs, and our manager Jared was hitting them up, bothering them with our music,” Cal says. Their manager knew which blogs to contact because before managing Timeflies he used to produce music with Rez, and they had researched blogs that featured the best music and had the widest audience. And although many artists struggle to catch the attention of blogs, Timeflies flourished. “I think all you really need is a wellwritten email and good music,” Rez says. They both agree that there is a certain advantage to featuring their music on blogs instead of going straight to radio. There are no expectations to new music on a blog — people don’t have to automatically like it, which differs from radio because it is meant to please the general audience. Blogs are also an excellent platform for communication between listener and artist.

Listeners are able to easily provide feedback on what they enjoyed and didn’t enjoy. Fans reacted positively to the Timeflies music and were rating them highly. Through this and their various different social media outlets, Timeflies had gained a loyal following.

After releasing their second song “Lose My Mind” in the December of their senior year at Tufts, Cal and Rob realized that making music wasn’t something they were doing for fun anymore — it could be their careers. “I remember going home for

winter break, and I went out to like a bar and there were kids that I didn’t know, I mean I knew in high school but was not friends with, saying, ‘Dude, ‘Lose My Mind’ is hot.’ And that’s when I was like, we should really take this more seriously,” Rez says.

From the onset, record labels chased Timeflies. But they felt the right place for them was Island Records. Island seemed like the perfect choice for the duo because it was the only label that was willing to bring specific terms to the table instead of throwing out generic deals. Island has always been interested in what is best for Timeflies and their fans.

And they didn’t sign until last year — more than two years after the release of their first album. They account this to their own independent mindset. They were set in their ways of doing things on their own, such as promoting their music on social media. But they realized that if they ever wanted to release their music on a bigger scale, they would need a label. “It just came time where we realized that it was tough to break into the radio game,” Cal says. “We knew that, looking at our fans, that’s who listens to radio, so we wanted to pump out all our stuff on a greater scheme.”

One thing that Cal and Rez would like to avoid is being carved into a specific sound, which comes with the expectation to deliver the same thing time and time again. They even admit that their first album was a little bit all over the place — slow, acoustic-like songs as well as dubstep and electronic. But they see this as a positive trait. Record labels were constantly trying to force them to select one genre. The label was looking for a specific music genre box to categorize Timeflies, and that wasn’t right for the duo. “We joked around on our website that we’re ‘electro-hip-pop-dub something,’ and that’s really stuck with us,” Rez

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says. They’re happy with the way their music turns out because it’s what fans like best. Their tracks will start on an acoustic guitar and turn into dubstep. “That’s what’s fun for us,” Cal says. “We don’t want to turn into that group who does ‘this’ and then just keep making that song.”

Timeflies’ debut in the music world was perfectly timed because they were on the cutting edge of technology. Twitter was becoming very popular, and Cal and Rez were able to forge a connection with their fans through their YouTube channel.

They always try to be engaging with their listeners — a very interactive relationship. A common struggle for any artist is encouraging their Twitter followers or even YouTube subscribers to come to live performances because most kids would rather watch it on their screen than go out to a show. Timeflies doesn’t really struggle with this problem because they’ve noticed that fans aren’t just coming out for the music.

They’re coming for the experience of a Timeflies concert. They want to hang out with Cal and Rez. This desire to hang out with the duo primarily stems from something the two coined as “Timeflies Tuesdays.”

Essentially, on Tuesdays, Cal and Rez release cover videos and mashups to entertain fans while the two are in the studio or on the road, so it doesn’t seem like they’ve completely disappeared. In an ideal world, Timeflies would be able to put out a new video every Tuesday. And they did for 68 weeks straight. But it gets harder to put out quality work when they’re trying to make a new album and living in a tour bus. “We decided that we’re going to do it as often as we can. Do one or two a month, really hype those up,” Cal says.

This past April, Timeflies released their second full-length album titled After Hours — their first album under a label. Because they were under a label, the two could write 66

and work with other artists, something Cal and Rez had never done before. They were a bit apprehensive at first, but they soon realized that different perspectives and opinions could help them grow as musicians.

“You shouldn’t write the song that someone else wants to write,” Cal says. “You need to write what you’re doing, take what info they give you, take what info you get from every session and just keep delivering your sound.” When working with other artists, many musicians must remain cautious about producing the same sound and not getting caught up in what the other artist might do. Cal and Rez made sure that they weren’t being forced to make music that was absolutely Timeflies. The duo lists Mike Posner, Martin Johnson, lead singer of pop rock band Boys Like Girls, and Ammo as producers and writers who truly understood what it meant for Cal and Rez to maintain their artistic freedom and expression. The duo have recently able to switch roles and have become collaborators for other artists. They enjoy being able to help artists make new music and offer their insight.

They recently finished working on a song with rapper Jake Miller for his new album. But regardless of collaborators, there are a few key elements to all of Timeflies’ music. Most notably, their melodies are very unique and identifiable. And when it comes to production, there is an electronic influence with hip-hop rhythms.

Timeflies have come a long way from their first song, a song that wasn’t even supposed to be released.

An album that was made for fun went straight to the top of the charts and helped launch a serious music career for Cal and Rez. In the future, the duo hopes to win a Grammy or even a Video Music Award. But other than that, all they really want is to make the best music they can and reach a wider audience with engaging music. NKD

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