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Brandtson
has been an up and coming star on the indie rock horizon
for several years. With each release the band is tighter
and the music is stronger. With the release of "Send Us
A Signal", the band's first release for the Militia
Group, Brandtson is back with some of their best rock to
date. I had opportunity to speak with guitarist Matt
Traxler while the band was en route to Saint Louis,
touring with Further Seems Forever. I found that the
band is as fun and diverse as the music they create.
By: Jim Mcdonald
1340mag
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Jim McDonald: What's new with Brandtson?
Matt Traxler: Right now we're on the road with
Further Seems Forever and the Kicks and Moments in Grace.
The tour's about six weeks long and we're about halfway
through it right now. After that we're home for about ten
days then we're out on the road again for another month
with Beautiful Mistake and our friends from New York
called Fire When Ready, and then ten days with a band
called Bayside on Victory Records.
JM: So where are you at geographically?
MT: Right now we're heading to Saint Louis. We're
playing there tonight. We're probably about an hour
outside the city.
JM: Tell me a little bit about the bands name. Where
did it come from?
MT: The name is from the name of a street that Mike
grew up on. The whole band kind of started out as a
project. It was supposed to be just an EP and we put
together some songs and the name just kind of stuck after
we had formed the band.
JM: That's interesting. You guys have been a really
hard working indie band for quite a while, what keeps you
going?
MT: I think that all of us just kind of have a
passion for this and just love doing it. I think if it
ever got to the point where we weren't enjoying ourselves
doing this anymore that we couln't keep doing it. There's
very little reward as far as financially and otherwise.
We have been doing it for a while, so I think just that
fact that we all love doing it. I mean, there's a lot to
it. Writing, recording, touring... Every aspect of it
there's some enjoyment. There's a good payoff in it in
just that you're barely scraping by, but your still doing
something that you really enjoy and that I have a passion
for. I think that's the thing that keeps us going. I
think that if that was gone for me personally there'd be
no way I could keep doing this.
JM: You guys have built up quite a buzz since you
started, what's changed over the past few years?
MT: We recently switched record labels. We're working
with the Militia Group now. In the past we worked with
Deep Elm, and the Militia Group has just done so much for
us. They've just been real helpful and proactive with us.
I think for us it was a real important move and a real
important step. I feel like now we have a label behind us
that is willing to work as hard as we've worked over the
past seven years or so.
JM: Is there any chance we'll see Brandtson on a major
label any time in the near future?
MT: I couldn't answer that. I have no idea. I mean,
we've invested so much time and work in this band that I
think all of us would be really hesitant to jump ship and
go with a major label. I think there's just a lot of fear
in the fact that you just get lost in the shuffle very
easily, and for every band that a major label signs that
makes it big there's a hundred other bands they've signed
that get a good chunk of money up front and that's all
they ever see. I think one of the things we're excited to
work with the Militia Group on is that we've known those
guys personally for a while. We know them, we trust them
and we've seen first hand what they can do with their
bands, and what they have done and what they're willing
to do. So, I think for us to work with a major label it
would have to be the right time. Personally, right now I
don't think it's the right time. I think that there's
still a lot of building as far as us and our fan base and
all that kind of stuff needs to happen before something
like that makes sense.
JM: So you think the Militia Group is a really good
fit for you right now?
MT: Yeah, for right now definitely. I'm sure we'll
stick out our contract with them and we'll just kind of
see where stuff goes from there. Right now it just seems
like the best possible home. Once we were out of our
contract with Deep Elm we had our handful of offers and
this one just seemed to make the most sense. We're just
really happy with everything up to this point, and like
I've said they've done so much for us I can't imagine a
situation that could be much improved.
JM: I was checking out your website and I saw
something about taco eating constests?
MT: (Laughter) Yeah, that was several tours ago. I
don't recall if we ever really did that or if we just
kept talking about it. I think we were all kind of
arguing between ourselves about who could eat the most
tacos. We decided we were going to bet some money on it.
I honestly don't remember if we ever went through with
it. I don't think that we did but the offer might still
be on the table, so it might still come up again some
time.
JM: Who do you think would win?
MT: I'm not sure. for a while I thought I might have
a good chance but I don't eat meat so every time I get
tacos like from Taco Bell or somewhere I get them with
beans instead, so I'm kind of at a disadvantage because
of the fact that the beans are so much heavier. So, I
don't think I'd win. Unless the rules were leveled, then
I might have a better chance, like if everybody had beans
I might do alright. But, I don't know. I'm thinking John
or Jared might win. Jared might win out of sheer
determination. That guy can go to some great lengths just
so that he might prove himself.
JM: I see you guys have an interest in Art Bell Coast
to Coast.
MT: Yeah, absolutely.
JM: Who is your favorite guest?
MT: Oh, man, it's been a while since we've actually
caught it. It's one of those things that when we're
driving late at night we're always trying to find Art
Bell. About half the time we get it in and the other half
we just end up finding static. I don't know about
favorite guests. (Voices in the background begin chiming
in) Mike says his favorite guest is the antichrist.
JM: Really?
MT: Oh yeah, he was talking about once that they
interviewed the antichrist. He said that he had some
interaction with this man that claimed to be the
antichrist. So, I don't know. That show's awesome. It's
definitely good late night entertainment.
JM: I check Art Bell out as often as I can. I've
really enjoyed his interviews with David Icke.
MT: Yeah, it's really good. He definitely has a way
of bringing out the most interesting facts of whatever's
going on. It's just a good time.
JM: So what do you think of George Noory?
MT: George Noory, he's no Art Bell, but I have
nothing against him. I think he still does a good job.
Definitely Art's the preference.
JM: I don't think he guides the conversation as well
as Art did.
MT: No, he didn't. That's the thing about Art. Art
could just steer it into the most insane area. The most
far out, imaginable thing on whatever the topic was. He
could just lead it right to that. He was just the master
at that.
JM: Did the U.S. ever land on the moon?
MT: Absolutely not. I mean, there were cameras there.
You can see a boom stand. No way did we land on the moon.
(Laughter)
JM: This is the most enjoyable interview I've done in
a while.
MT: Absolutely. Us too. Nobody ever asks about
landing on the moon or Art Bell and tacos. This is
awesome.
JM: "Send Us A Signal" is a really diverse album.
Where do you pull inspiration from?
MT: It's hard to say. I think that all of us
individually... It's hard to say what inspires us versus
what actually influences us. There's so much that
inspires me in that fact that it makes me want to keep
making music, it gets me excited about it again, but it's
not like our songs ever come out sounding like those
things. I think it's just more of a mental state that
whether it be a song or an artist or whatever it is that
just get's you in the mode of wow, that's really awesome
and it makes me want to do this or whatever. It's really
hard to say here's some bands that inspired this record.
There was a definite decided move to... Kind of... I
guess we all grew up in that era, we're older than most
bands in our genre, but we've been a fan of the whole
eighties kind of dancey sythpop. We all like New Order
and Depeche Mode and the Cure and stuff like that, so
there was a definite decided attempt to include some of
that. In the past we've messed around with some of it,
but it was always kind of off limits. It was like oh no,
we can't do that, that doesn't sound like us. There was a
definite decision to just kind of explore that stuff.
JM: That's really cool. My next question was actually
about the song "Mexico" because it reminds me of some of
my favorite eighties music.
MT: Nice. Very cool.
JM: I caught that vibe. "Mexico" is a really cool
song. It's got a great groove.
MT: Awesome. Awesome, thank you so much. That one was
kind of fun. Ed Rhoades, the guy that produced the
record, wanted to leave that song off the album. He ended
up not liking it. I think the reason he didn't like it is
cause he's a huge Psychodelic Furs fan and there's a song
by them referenced in that song, and he hated the song
that's referenced. He felt that if we're going to
reference one of their songs we should pick one of the
good ones.
JM: So he was biased.
MT: (Laughter) Yeah.
JM: Why did you choose to re-record "Blindspot"?
MT: It was something we'd talked about in the past,
and it just never really... We didn't talk about it that
much. We got to the studio and we had a whole month to do
this record and when we got there we had ten songs
demoed. We would work in the evenings. We had a couple
microphones and my computer set up upstairs from the
studio. There was an apartment and we were staying up
there. In the evenings we would work on... Ed kind of
gave us homework. He was like, OK this chorus sucks
rewrite this chorus or come up with a different guitar
company for this verse or we're cutting this out so
figure out how you want to do that. Just different ideas
that he had that he wanted us to work on. Another idea
was try to write a couple more songs and get them demoed
in the evenings and we'll see how they come out, and also
let's pick one of the songs from your first record and
kind of rework that and see how that comes out, just
cause we've got the time to do it. Since we had talked
about doing that song over in the past that was kind of
the one song that hung around from that record. So it was
just like well, let's just try this. So one day we had
just done a track and had mastered the other stuff, so we
had some time so we just started playing around with it.
We decided to keep it and put it on the record.
JM: You guys are from Cleveland?
MT: Yeah. Yeah, Cleveland Ohio.
JM: Cleveland seems to have a pretty thriving scene.
Who are some of your favorite hometown bands?
MT: Oh, man, there's a lot of good stuff going on in
Cleveland right now. One of our best friends and one of
the greatest bands out there right now I think is Furnace
Street. They actually did a remix of a vinyl version of
one of our songs. The vinyl version of "Trying to Figure
Each Other Out". They're just a two piece and they kind
of have a dancey, kind of synthpop type thing going on.
They're just a really, really amazing band. The
electronic stuff, the programming is just incredible.
It's kind of like a cross between Radiohead and Depeche
Mode. They're really good friends of ours, and they're
really a good band. There's a lot of bands going on.
There are a lot of bands that have really good things
going on in Cleveland. They're really close friends of
ours.
JM: So what's next for Brandtson?
MT: After we finish this tour we're home for ten days
and then we're out for about another month. After that,
that kind of goes up to right around Thanksgiving, we'll
probably take a little break. Then we're going out at the
beginning of December, too. Then after that we're
probably going to take some time off for Christmas and
then probably be back on the road shortly after the new
year. In between that we'll be home probably trying to
write some new songs and maybe record some new demos and
just get stuff ready. I'm not exactly sure of dates but
we're excited to record another record, but that's
somewhat in the future. We're looking at a little bit
down the line, but for now we're just touring and once
we're home we'll be working on writing and just getting
some new stuff going.
~1340mag
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