Interview with Sukpatch.
Brblife: We first heard you on Slabco Records. Why the change to Moshi Moshi Records?
A: Yes Slabco! That was our first home. We all met in college, we were kind of this collective of bands, or more accurately a bunch of kids with 4 tracks. It was a tape only label. It kind of evolved and Steven(Slabco) finally got the money to release cd's, after several 7" records he released Haulin' Grass and Smoking Ass, and Honky Tonk Operation. At that point I guess majors labels began sniffing around and somehow we wound up on Grand Royal. It seemed like all the Slabco bands (land of the loops...etc) were trying for bigger an better things, not that we didn't love Slabco and Steven and the whole gang, but it just seems to be what happened to everyone back in those days. Moshi came about in the midst of all of this, we did a 7" with them, which was the very first Moshi Moshi release, it has a song called "Hey Jolie" on the A side, and it is still one of the best songs we ever made! Anyway, this is a long story I know, Grand Royal had signed us right after, and we sort of toiled there, we released "Tie Down that Shiny Wave", and as the label began to crumble our full length release "Naturalisms" got lost in the shuffle, although it did come out in Japan. After grand royal closed we were pretty distraught and kind of went on a 5 year hiatus. During that time we recorded "23", I emailed the moshi guys the stuff we had been working on while hiding out, and they jumped on releasing it, we had always wanted to do a full length with them, so we went for it.
Brblife: The first Sukpatch song we heard was Au Pair, can you tell us about this song?
A: Yeah, I remember that one, that was the first song we made that really got people into us. It was a sample, which I cannot reveal, and some crazy beat I had made, there was almost nothing to it. I handed it to Steve and the next day he played me what he had sung. I think when I first heard it I didn't know what to think, it was a total departure from what we had been doing. We were just playing guitars and drums, we were all about the K records scene going on at the time. But after that song, we decided to sell off all of our guitars and amps and bought samplers and keyboards. A real turning point song.
Brblife: How has your music changed from 1997 album "haulin' grass and smokin' ass" onward?
Well, Haulin' grass was the first release where we were guitar-less. That became our thing I guess, and it was really working. I think Honky Tonk Operation was a continuation of that idea, it was an ep that followed up Haulin'. I don't know that the formula changed all that much until we signed to grand royal, and it became clear that they weren't all that comfortable with us using loops, basically they didn't want to pay for clearing them. So I think at that point we began playing more instruments again, but it still sounded like Sukpatch. I think "23" is a lot different, we played guitar all over that thing, we were kind of getting back to writing songs the way we did when we first started making music. I suppose it is much more of an indie-rock sounding thing, although we still have beats and all that.
Brblife: Why should we buy your newest album? What have you brought to the table this time?
A: You know... I don't know. Ha! It's pretty hot! Do people buy music anymore?
Brblife: We are really into the chilled melodies and the epic beats, what songs should we look for if we want to here this type of stuff?
A: " 7:30 Tomorrow" is like the archetypal Sukpatch sound! It's the mellow kind of stoner electro sounding thing that we do best. Sopenyo is pretty epic! Kinda has the choppy Haulin' Grass sound to it. I think that "Bottom of the Well" might be the strongest song on the record, and is kind of a news sound for us, just a beat a rhodes and an acoustic guitar. "Medium Self Employed" is rather nice, a real freakout.
Brblife: What was it like working with the likes of the Beastie Boys?
A: It was cool, it certainly opened a lot of doors for us. The demise of Grand Royal was a real bummer, a lot of us bands on the label were really hurt by how they went about it.
Brblife: Tell us about any interesting stories you may have from your encounters with people at Grand Royal, or about any other celebrity gossip.
A: I got stories! But you are going to have to get me drunk before I will say!!!
Brblife: How can we get a hold of any of your cds?
A: well that is a good question, I know that "23" is available on iTunes domestically, cd's were made for the UK /europe release, and there is a Japanese version out there too. But no cd's in the states, except imports. I guess our music is always going to be impossible to find! I think you can find our Slabco stuff here and there, actually last time I checked I think Steven was giving away all the early Sukpatch records for free (downloads) on Slabco.com, so that would be the best place to look. I have like 500 copies of tie down that shiny wave in my closet... you want em?!?!
Brblife: Finally, tell us about a cool product that you have seen or used recently that would fair well on our website.
A: Well I do like my iPhone quite a bit.
Sukpatch.com
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