Monday 23 December 2013

X Suns Q&A

Name of band:
X SUNS (pronounced "TEN" Suns).

Where are you from? 
Seattle, Washington, USA.

Who is in your band? 
Trent McIntyre, Skippy King, Erick Hohnstein-Van Etten and Adam Tricoli.

How would you describe yourselves?
Erick: Atmospheric instrumental space-rock.

Skippy: Post-everything.

Trent: Space rock, post-whatever, stoner mathcore.

Who are your main influences musically?
Adam: Personally.. Hot Water Music, Fugazi, old hardcore, so many weird obscure bands to list, but I can always come back to HWM and Fugazi and it still never gets old to me.

Trent: Probably Don Caballero, Hum, and Zach Hill. 

Erick: Cave In, Isis, Bjork, Smashing Pumpkins.

Skippy: Joe Satriani and Yngwie Malmsteen.

What do you hope to achieve in music?
Skippy: Someone once said that our music made them levitate. That's what I want to do, make people levitate.

Erick: I've just always wanted to make music that is interesting to me; stuff I enjoy playing and would want to listen to myself.  I want to put on an interesting, engaging live show and connect with audiences.  Getting chills while you're playing live is always a good sign and something that I strive for at every show.  Being able to go on tours regularly without going broke would be amazing too. 

Trent: I hope to get famous enough to sleep with Olivia Wilde, or Megan Fox. And hopefully sell some records in the process.

Adam: Ideally, would like to be able to have the music we make fund the making of more music. So that we can keep doing it without having to pay for it ourselves. Will always be playing music though, even if it costs me financially, I can't imagine not playing music in some form.

What has been the highlight of your career so far, and why?
Skippy: Playing with And So I Watch You From Afar on a Sargent House showcase to a club FULL of people who appreciate instrumental music.

Adam: My favorite show for X Suns was opening for a Sargent House tour at the Crocodile. Got to play with And So I Watch You From Afar, This Town Needs Guns and Mylets.

Trent: Yeah, that show, and playing with Junius was pretty awesome. They're one of my favorite bands.

Erick: I was previously in a hardcore band from Tacoma called Erode and I had a blast when we went on a tour of Canada one summer. The hardcore community there is incredibly supportive and I was blown away by their enthusiasm and hospitality.  It's also unbelievably beautiful up in the Canadian mountains. I thought we had some impressive forests in the Washington State, but damn, that was something else. I haven't been with X Suns very long, but so far my favorite experience with them was opening for And So I Watch You From Afar at the Crocodile. It was my first time playing at that venue and I've always wanted to ever since I was a kid seeing photos of all my grunge heroes playing there. 

And what’s the moment you want to forget?
Trent: I don't really want to forget anything. It's all good experience.

Skippy: The time I got snuggle-raped.

Erick: Years ago, my band had a show booked that we were really excited about. There was some miscommunication between people involved in setting it up and there ended up being basically zero promotion for the show, so NOBODY came. The people who ran the venue were super pissed and chewed us out hard. Told us that we could "Play to the fucking wall or go home!". We went home. Also, one time I got too drunk and played an entire set in the wrong tuning. Pretty embarrassing!     

Adam: All of the shows where there were technical difficulties. A guitar is unplugged or an amp quit working. The first couple shows after Keith Furtado (previous guitar player) left the band, it was pretty rough as well.

If you had to pick just one of your songs to represent your music, what would it be and why? 
Adam: To the Bottom of the Sea (The Greys). The only song of ours that all previous and current members have played live and/or recorded on in some shape or form. I just think it's a really powerful song, full of emotion and feeling and best represents who we were and what we've become.

Trent: I'd say Jupitourist. It's our shortest song, and is probably the best representation of our music to a "new" listener. 

Where can we listen to it?




Where can we find out more about your music? 

Anything else you’d like to say about your band/music that I forgot to ask?
Adam: Our new EP "The Greys" was recently released on 10/31/13. It's available on bandcamp, itunes, amazon, & tons of different music streaming/downloading sites. We recorded it with Christiaan Morris and had it mixed by Matt Bayles (Mastodon, ISIS, Minus the Bear, etc.) at the Red Room in Seattle, WA. It was mastered by Ed Brooks at RFI. Go buy it, only $3 for about 18 minutes of awesomeness!

Trent: We really want to release it on vinyl & cd too. We're currently seeking label support to help with that. 

Erick: We're working on new material and excited to hear how it turns out with the new line-up.  

No comments:

Post a Comment