Such Gold (09/10/2012)
The 59th Sound chats with Such Gold, ahead of their appearances on the 2013 Soundwave Festival.
Hey, mate, how are you?
Pretty good, man. How you doing?
I'm good. For those that don't know, how did Such Gold start out?
It was January of 2009 and Nate (Derby, guitar) was working on 2 early songs that Such Gold went on to release. (Devan) Bentley (drums) was also helping him. It was a slightly different lineup to what we have now but basically we started playing shows from around then.
What can we expect from a Such Gold show?
Let me see....we play fast and very loud and we are usually very awkward between songs (laughs) but we like to have fun on and off the stage. I dunno what to say, we're a punk band.
Will Soundwave be your first visit to Australia?
It will be my first visit, but Devan, Ben (Kotin, vocals) and Nate have all been there. They did a tour with No Trigger in early 2011 so it'll all be new for me.
So you must be pretty excited then?
Very, very excited. I've heard so much so I'm stoked.
How did you react to the news of being put on the Soundwave lineup?
At first I was like “oh, that's awesome” because we were going to Australia so I was stoked but I hadn't heard much about Soundwave so I looked at the lineup we are on and the last few years and was just like damn! I don't think we've ever played a festival that big before so it's pretty cool.
Which band are you most looking forward to seeing live?
We're on tour at the moment but we've been watching videos of that band Ghost, they are like melodic doom from Sweden and they do this kind of satanic, religious act. The singer looks like a satanic priest, he wears a mask and it just looks fucken awesome. We've been listening to them on the bus, we've been on this real doom metal kick. Nate and I are looking forward to watching them a lot.
Who are your biggest musical influences?
Jeez, how many do you want? (laughs)
(laughs) As many as you want.
Ok, well it's hard to say. 108 is a big one. Growing up I was an enormous Lawrence Arms fans and when I got to see them in Boston it was awesome. I'm really into The Cure and Sparklehorse too.
Who writes your music and lyrics?
The only recording that I've played on is (the new album) Misadventures but before that it was Ben and the old guitar player Tim who did most of the lyrics. I dunno who did the music before I joined but now for the music Ben or Nate would write a guitar part and they'd put it together with Devan and I actually wrote a lot of the lyrics for Misadventures and Ben wrote the rest. I kind of stayed away from writing the music because Ben and Nate and Devan had it under control.
What influences your lyrics?
I try not to say “this is something I wanna write about” I just always have a notebook with me and just whatever I am thinking about that day may somehow move me to write a song I can just write it down. I can't control how often that happens so I always have a notebook with me which usually means I have quite a bit of stuff written, but most of it is never recorded.
What was the recording process like for the new album?
We did it in L.A. and did 4 days of pre-production where we went over the songs which was pretty sweet, we wrote a song in that time called Higher Places. After that we hammered out the drums in about 4 days, then guitars, bass, vocals. It was all finished in about 2 weeks which was really quick. The producer was great, it was cool.
Which country would you say has the best fans?
I really do like them all but I guess the craziest, well Europe was pretty insane, but we went to Costa Rica last July and I'd just joined the band and it was just insane. I'd never been that far south so that was cool. The guy we stayed with was amazing. I honestly didn't meet an unkind person that entire trip. We did this one show which was kind of behind this housing development in a gazebo, basically in the jungle with these crappy little amps but we didn't care it was just awesome and fun. It was just like a party in the jungle. We played with Strung Out that day, that's where we met them actually and we're on tour with them now so that was really cool. It was all new to me and it was just totally cool to do that so early one.
Which is your favourite song to play live?
I really like playing You Are Your Greatest Threat, I dunno why. It's just a lot of fun.
What would you say is the best and worst thing about being in a band?
The best is the people you meet and the travelling you do for sure. Maybe if we were a different sort of band I wouldn't say that but we are a heavily touring sort of band so we are always having great experiences which makes you wanna keep doing it. If we were a studio band I think the answer would be different though. The worst thing, I guess, well it's based on the fact we tour so much, is not being able to commit to a lot of other things but I guess that's something you have to learn how to do. Right now all I basically do is play in this band but I have a lot of other things I wanna do but then again I know other people that can play in a band and do other stuff as well so I should be able to. Also homesickness. I love where I am from. I miss home a lot.
Because you are on the road so much what do you do with your time off?
I'm from Rochester (New York) and I moved away from there when I was 18 but I live there again now and a lot of my friends are there so I just like to hang out with them when I get a few days off. If it's a longer break I try and catch up on exercise and just recording other songs that isn't fast punk music and screaming (laughs). We live out in the country so I love being outside and hanging out with my buddies.
We'll wrap it up there, thanks very much for your time and I look forward to seeing you at Soundwave.
Hell yeah! I'm looking forward to it as well.
Matt Barton
Hey, mate, how are you?
Pretty good, man. How you doing?
I'm good. For those that don't know, how did Such Gold start out?
It was January of 2009 and Nate (Derby, guitar) was working on 2 early songs that Such Gold went on to release. (Devan) Bentley (drums) was also helping him. It was a slightly different lineup to what we have now but basically we started playing shows from around then.
What can we expect from a Such Gold show?
Let me see....we play fast and very loud and we are usually very awkward between songs (laughs) but we like to have fun on and off the stage. I dunno what to say, we're a punk band.
Will Soundwave be your first visit to Australia?
It will be my first visit, but Devan, Ben (Kotin, vocals) and Nate have all been there. They did a tour with No Trigger in early 2011 so it'll all be new for me.
So you must be pretty excited then?
Very, very excited. I've heard so much so I'm stoked.
How did you react to the news of being put on the Soundwave lineup?
At first I was like “oh, that's awesome” because we were going to Australia so I was stoked but I hadn't heard much about Soundwave so I looked at the lineup we are on and the last few years and was just like damn! I don't think we've ever played a festival that big before so it's pretty cool.
Which band are you most looking forward to seeing live?
We're on tour at the moment but we've been watching videos of that band Ghost, they are like melodic doom from Sweden and they do this kind of satanic, religious act. The singer looks like a satanic priest, he wears a mask and it just looks fucken awesome. We've been listening to them on the bus, we've been on this real doom metal kick. Nate and I are looking forward to watching them a lot.
Who are your biggest musical influences?
Jeez, how many do you want? (laughs)
(laughs) As many as you want.
Ok, well it's hard to say. 108 is a big one. Growing up I was an enormous Lawrence Arms fans and when I got to see them in Boston it was awesome. I'm really into The Cure and Sparklehorse too.
Who writes your music and lyrics?
The only recording that I've played on is (the new album) Misadventures but before that it was Ben and the old guitar player Tim who did most of the lyrics. I dunno who did the music before I joined but now for the music Ben or Nate would write a guitar part and they'd put it together with Devan and I actually wrote a lot of the lyrics for Misadventures and Ben wrote the rest. I kind of stayed away from writing the music because Ben and Nate and Devan had it under control.
What influences your lyrics?
I try not to say “this is something I wanna write about” I just always have a notebook with me and just whatever I am thinking about that day may somehow move me to write a song I can just write it down. I can't control how often that happens so I always have a notebook with me which usually means I have quite a bit of stuff written, but most of it is never recorded.
What was the recording process like for the new album?
We did it in L.A. and did 4 days of pre-production where we went over the songs which was pretty sweet, we wrote a song in that time called Higher Places. After that we hammered out the drums in about 4 days, then guitars, bass, vocals. It was all finished in about 2 weeks which was really quick. The producer was great, it was cool.
Which country would you say has the best fans?
I really do like them all but I guess the craziest, well Europe was pretty insane, but we went to Costa Rica last July and I'd just joined the band and it was just insane. I'd never been that far south so that was cool. The guy we stayed with was amazing. I honestly didn't meet an unkind person that entire trip. We did this one show which was kind of behind this housing development in a gazebo, basically in the jungle with these crappy little amps but we didn't care it was just awesome and fun. It was just like a party in the jungle. We played with Strung Out that day, that's where we met them actually and we're on tour with them now so that was really cool. It was all new to me and it was just totally cool to do that so early one.
Which is your favourite song to play live?
I really like playing You Are Your Greatest Threat, I dunno why. It's just a lot of fun.
What would you say is the best and worst thing about being in a band?
The best is the people you meet and the travelling you do for sure. Maybe if we were a different sort of band I wouldn't say that but we are a heavily touring sort of band so we are always having great experiences which makes you wanna keep doing it. If we were a studio band I think the answer would be different though. The worst thing, I guess, well it's based on the fact we tour so much, is not being able to commit to a lot of other things but I guess that's something you have to learn how to do. Right now all I basically do is play in this band but I have a lot of other things I wanna do but then again I know other people that can play in a band and do other stuff as well so I should be able to. Also homesickness. I love where I am from. I miss home a lot.
Because you are on the road so much what do you do with your time off?
I'm from Rochester (New York) and I moved away from there when I was 18 but I live there again now and a lot of my friends are there so I just like to hang out with them when I get a few days off. If it's a longer break I try and catch up on exercise and just recording other songs that isn't fast punk music and screaming (laughs). We live out in the country so I love being outside and hanging out with my buddies.
We'll wrap it up there, thanks very much for your time and I look forward to seeing you at Soundwave.
Hell yeah! I'm looking forward to it as well.
Matt Barton