Scene Point Blank: Hey, could you guys tell me whom we’re sitting down with.
Phil: My name is Phil. I sing and play guitar
Greg: I’m Greg. I play bass
Scene Point Blank: Firstly, How do you think your set went?
Phil: I thought it was awful.
[All laugh.]
Phil: Very subpar. Very disappointed in myself, but I’ll pass it.
Greg: I disagree 100%. No, it was cool. It’s our second night in Calgary, and we’re having a good time. It was awesome.
Phil: I felt like we performed better yesterday but I’d say as far as liking either or, last night, we partied super fucking hard.
Greg: Yeah, last night could be a contender. We don’t know yet.
Scene Point Blank: Your new album came out on Tuesday. How do you guys feel like you improved on or correlated with Siblings & Sevens?
Phil: In terms of the song structure, I feel like we kind of nailed it with songs, a nice structured song. Siblings had a lot of kind of long, jammy sort of parts to it and I think we really nailed it, getting our vibe across in three minute songs.
Greg: Siblings was like a collection of songs that we wrote at different periods of time, and as opposed to this [which] we wrote in one big bulk session so it feels like more of an album to me
Scene Point Blank: I know between Siblings and this album you did a split with Copyrights and Gray Area. How do you feel your song writing grew between each recording.
Greg: You can definitely tell the evolution. If anything, the two songs that were on the split were precursors to getting somewhere else, like a segue piece. We also wrote those songs by themselves, they were written and recorded at the same time so they were kind of like a stepping stone.
Scene Point Blank: I hear you guys are celebrating your two year anniversary as a band?
Phil: I forgot. I’m going to be a very stereotypical boyfriend or husband because I can’t remember our anniversary.
Scene Point Blank: I read somewhere that it was September or something like that.
Greg: I think November was the first show.
Phil: November 5th was the first show.
Greg: But the band was probably solidified in September 2010.
Scene Point Blank: So how does it feel to be around for two years?
[All laugh.]
Greg: Pretty good man!
Scene Point Blank: Some bands last six months.
Greg: And some bands last ten years without even touring, so to be around for a decent amount of time but still like have done as much stuff as we’ve done ‘cause we’ve just been working our asses off just touring nonstop.
Scene Point Blank: You’ve shared the stage with a lot of great bands obviously, especially in a fairly short period of time. Are there any bands you wish to share the stage with? Sort of a dream team?
Greg: Joyce Manor.
Scene Point Blank: Joyce Manor?
Greg: Joyce Manor. Totally. I would love to play with those guys. That’s on my very short list of bands I would like to do something with.
Scene Point Blank: Are there any bands or producers that you would like to work with?
Greg: Well we did Let’s Get You Somewhere Else with Pete from the Souls and that was the best experience, just getting to hang out for basically a month and hang out with our friends in the studio. It was the most laid back experience. Personally, I hate recording. I'm the touring guy in the band—a couple of the guys like to play shows here and there, and a couple guys are more into recording or writing—but he made the recording process as painless as possible. It was great so, to be honest, I would love to do another record with him.
Scene Point Blank: You've been with a number of record labels, with some pretty scattered releases. How did each label compare to the next one and how did those situations come to be?
Greg: Siblings & Sevens and the split were both on a record label from New Jersey called Black Numbers and, collectively, all of us in the band have known the dudes who run the label for…I’ve known Dave, one of the main guys, for maybe about six or seven years. When we were getting ready to release a record, I kind of shot him a text and was like, “Hey man, what do you think about doing something together?” And he had already heard us and liked us so he put out Siblings and the split. Then, just from playing shows with the Souls and becoming friends with them, Chunksaah came up to us and was like, “We want to put out your next record.” Unanimously, we were all ,”Yes!” One, the Souls being friends and two being tour mates but, I mean, we grew up listening to them so it’s really an honor being a part of this.
Scene Point Blank: On the state of your sound, you have a different style even compared to some of the other Chunksaah artists. What bands do you feel form the best comparisons to your sound or even influence you?
Phil: We all have very, very different musical tastes. There are very few things we can all sit down and listen too, but at the end of the day I think ‘90s rock, emo, like ‘90s stuff in general is what we agree on.
We can all agree on liking Jimmy Eat World and Get Up Kids are always a band that gets played a lot in the van. But then The Replacements, Husker Du, shit like that.
There’s some older stuff. Saves the Day, Hot Water Music, all those bands we grew up listening to. We figured we can all still agree on that so it was kind of second-hand to start playing stuff like that.
Scene Point Blank: How did this tour come into fruition?
Phil: Over the summer we did a U.S. tour with the Souls and the Menzingers and that was a ton of fun.
Greg: 56 days long
Phil: 56 days very spoiling, it was just the best. Through that, the idea was tossed around.
Greg: And they were like, “Hey, we’re also doing Canada. You want to come with us on that?”
Scene Point Blank: A keep it going kind of thing?
Greg: Yeah, sign us up!
Scene Point Blank: Well that’s all for questions. Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Greg: The album is called Let’s Get You Somewhere Else. Get it on chunksaah.com, iTunes, or straight from Luther.
Scene Point Blank: Along with that, are there any bands you guys want to shout out or anything coming up you’d like to mention?
Greg: Before this we were on tour with a band called Timeshares from New York. Best dudes ever. We’ve known them for a long time and never got to do anything with them. The two weeks before this and we hit Minneapolis and back…
[A voice from outside]
Brian: We’re shotgunning beers you guys!
Greg: We’re going to shotgun some beers! Do you want to shotgun some beers with us?
Scene Point Blank: Alright.
Greg: That's a wrap.
Scene Point Blank: Thanks for your time.
