Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Falling From The Stars With SAM KISZKA From GRETA VAN FLEET

Transcript

Falling From The Stars With SAM KISZKA From GRETA VAN FLEET · HEAVY Music Interviews

• 0:00
  Hello, this is Sam Kisko from Gretavan Fleet and we just announced our Australian
• 0:06
  tour and we'll be there soon. See you there, beautiful mint. That
• 0:10
  was so beautiful. Bite. I reckon, I'm gonna go to the show
• 0:13
  anyway, just because of that. Okay, I'm convinced at least you kri
• 0:21
  So Credivan Fleet have announced your visitors tryer as part of this Stockcatcher worldwide tour,
• 0:26
  starting in Brisbane on August twenty first and gone through Sydney and Melbourne and
• 0:30
  finishing in Auckland on August at thirtieth. Mate. So it sounds like a
• 0:34
  party already. Oh yeah, this is gonna be over the top. It's
• 0:39
  been way too long since we've been there. And of course, like everybody
• 0:43
  else, I'm gonna say, we had a tour planned but then for some
• 0:50
  reason everything got canceled and I don't know exactly why. But now finally we're
• 0:56
  gonna be there, and I'm so excited because we love Austraia. You know,
• 1:00
  not the amount of times I've heard people say that they are excited about
• 1:03
  coming and you can just see in their face they're going through the motions,
• 1:06
  but you actually sold that so well, Mane, you do look like they're
• 1:08
  looking forward to coming. Oh no, I know itself. It's like and
• 1:12
  every show you can say, oh, yes, Sydney, you're my favorite
• 1:17
  city in the world. But no, like actually, like we fucking love
• 1:22
  Australia, going to the beaches and going out and seeing the wildlife. Just
• 1:26
  you can get outside of the city so quick. It's and that's what we
• 1:30
  like because we spend a lot of time in the cities, like to see
• 1:34
  some of the some of the trees out there and what nature exactly exactly.
• 1:41
  It feels so good to just be out of town. Is in the middle
• 1:45
  of nowhere, and it feels good to kind of get outside of the cities.
• 1:51
  That's sort of reflected a bit in your in your tour schedule, mate,
• 1:53
  Like I noticed that every show's got a few days off in between,
• 1:56
  So like, did you have plans to explore the country or are you just
• 2:00
  gonna spend ours is we don't have any exact plans, but yes, definitely
• 2:07
  getting outside of the cities and exploring a little bit. Because back in Geeze,
• 2:15
  when was this twenty eighteen, when we were last in Australia, we
• 2:20
  were touring so hard at the time. We went from a huge United States
• 2:25
  tour to a European tour to you know, New York City to do Saturday
• 2:31
  Night Live, and then we went to Japan and then we went to Australia
• 2:35
  and we were so burnt out. We just kind of stayed in our hotel
• 2:38
  rooms the whole time. Everything was going really quick and we were getting we
• 2:42
  were getting sick. But you know, at this point in our lives and
• 2:46
  our touring career, we had to really figure it out. You know,
• 2:49
  I know what I like. I like to I like to even show day
• 2:54
  sometimes kind of go out, get some sunlight on my skin and go to
• 3:00
  a forest or something. It feels really good. So yes, we're going
• 3:04
  to be exploring. You mentioned before that that it's been a while since you've
• 3:07
  been out of it. So the last Australian tour was in twenty nineteen,
• 3:09
  So what's changed with the band in that time? I guess a couple of
• 3:15
  albums, So maybe we got two albums out since then, and oh gosh,
• 3:23
  Yeah, the show is a completely different experience and I'm really happy to
• 3:30
  finally be coming to you know, share the show because it's just We've always
• 3:37
  wanted to curate everything right down to tea right, everything from the color of
• 3:43
  the stage to the to the light show, to the pyro that we're using,
• 3:47
  the flames and the fire and the music and in the jamming, and
• 3:53
  we're just you know, how much should we jam? And how long should
• 3:57
  Everything has changed since then, so there there are so many more songs that
• 4:04
  the show is so so different, and you know, there's so many great
• 4:10
  moments in the show. So gosh, I'm so excited. It has been
• 4:14
  a long time. Think back to gosh, what was it five years ago?
• 4:21
  You said, yeah, five years half a de guide even as everything
• 4:28
  has changed, so you can you can expect us to you know, get
• 4:32
  a little a little pyro going. You can expect some some dud songs and
• 4:38
  and everything, and just a lot of energy. I find that whenever we're
• 4:41
  playing in front of a live audience, we just we just start going off
• 4:46
  and it's it's hard to stop. But it's exciting that the tour has already
• 4:51
  taken you throughout the US, Europe and the UK with nice of we're shows
• 4:56
  at legendary venues such as Madisonsquay, Goden, the Forum and VA Arena in
• 5:00
  Wembley Mine, So what's what's that actually like? Playing massive best well,
• 5:04
  massive venues while that was so much history, it must be a buzz well.
• 5:11
  You know, my favorite part is we go into these venues and they
• 5:15
  have all of these plaques and like photos on the malls of like Elton John
• 5:23
  and bb King, and then you have Aretha Franklin, and then you have
• 5:27
  like led Zeppelin, and it's like, oh my god, do we have
• 5:32
  to compete with this? It's just so cool. It's like, oh my
• 5:38
  gosh, funking Dellic played here, and like all these like the bands that
• 5:43
  we look up so much too, and and bands that we grew up listening
• 5:46
  to. It's it's really powerful to be walking through those halls and they make
• 5:54
  sure to remind you of of what happened in that building. So it's super
• 5:58
  cool. It's a huge honor. It's a privilege to be able to come
• 6:01
  somewhere, especially so far from home, and people buy the tickets and people
• 6:10
  people show up and do that. So it's it's humbling, it's beautiful,
• 6:13
  and the real purpose of the show is to hopefully inspire people and have this
• 6:21
  positive feedback where we're playing and we're having a great time on stage, but
• 6:29
  then the audience starts having a great time, and then we even we have
• 6:32
  it even better, and it's just this. It just shoots back and forth
• 6:35
  until you know, we all kind of ascend. It's just a fantastic time
• 6:40
  and I really live for this kind of thing. So yeah, now for
• 6:46
  this next rest of that, you can already give us a standard expected answer,
• 6:48
  or you could be a bit more honest, so we'll see what sort
• 6:51
  of person you are bring it out, bringing the fuck on. So I
• 6:57
  thought the play the place is like Wembley and the form of medicine Square Godens.
• 7:01
  That's such iconic venues. Is it? Is it difficult in a way
• 7:04
  to sort of go back to your normal standard venues and not have that around
• 7:09
  you, Like, does it sort of you have to get your mindset around
• 7:13
  not being in the pinnacle? I guess no. I mean, if I'm
• 7:16
  being completely honest, I think that all of those, all of the arenas
• 7:21
  are very similar. All you know, all these all these venues are very
• 7:30
  similar. What makes a big difference is the audience. It's like, what
• 7:34
  quality of audience are we looking at here? We love an audience that is,
• 7:40
  you know, we're so picky attentive at the right time, but also
• 7:44
  likes to wrap the fuck out, so it's difficult to find the right uh
• 7:51
  great medium. But I love an audience that's very attentive and they're like,
• 7:56
  you know, Jake's doing a long guitar solo. I love to see them
• 7:59
  looking at them and they go what they're thinking and they're Wow, they're trying
• 8:03
  to figure out what he's saying of that. But I also like it when
• 8:07
  we you know, break in the Highway too, and everybody loses their fucking
• 8:11
  minds. So I guess that's the answer to that, because the question was
• 8:16
  essentially, what's the difference or does it is it not as fun going to
• 8:24
  lesser known venues. Basically you answered that very well mate, well done.
• 8:30
  Yeah, that's that's exactly how I feel about it. It's all about the
• 8:33
  people who are in there. I actually particularly love you steimend Bite when you
• 8:37
  describe in the crowd watching the guitar solo and you said that they're trying to
• 8:39
  figure out what he's saying, Like you're actually referring that the guitar is actually
• 8:43
  saying something. It's beautiful. Yes, because as just as much as Josh
• 8:50
  is singing words, Jake is pretty much doing the same thing, but just
• 8:54
  in a different language, so you can. And also the people front always
• 9:00
  are really involved in different ways sometimes, but they're always watching no matter what.
• 9:05
  If they're rocking out, they're always attentive at the same time, and
• 9:11
  maybe the music asks for that, or hopefully it's because we were put in
• 9:15
  so much work into the music and the performance that it kind of asks you
• 9:20
  to pay attention. But no matter what, the people up there are always
• 9:24
  really along for the ride, and it's very inspiring for us to look out
• 9:28
  there and see these people who are so excited and so attentive. Okay,
• 9:35
  now, as the name of the choice suggests you, what'soring on the back
• 9:37
  of last year's album stock at you? So, how's that being received by
• 9:41
  Fansbody? Did they all get into it as much as you thought they would?
• 9:46
  Yeah, it's been so great. Every time we kind of roll out
• 9:48
  a new album, we think, Okay, which songs do we put on
• 9:54
  the set list? Because of course we want to play the new ones that
• 9:56
  are kind of more exciting to us, but of course we have to play
• 9:58
  the far A song and highway tune. Oh, we don't have to,
• 10:01
  but there is you know, yeah, yeah, there'll be a riot now.
• 10:09
  But what I mean is there are so many movements to songs on like
• 10:15
  Starcatcher, like Falling Sky into Goo Streak. They change tempos, they changed
• 10:20
  parts, sometimes they change keys, and there are different attitudes throughout the song.
• 10:26
  But if you play highway tune, it's just like, yes, like
• 10:31
  everybody's racking out for a while and we embellish it and we jam on it
• 10:35
  and we kind of do that stuff. So I'm not gonna say like,
• 10:39
  oh, it's no fun playing highway too. It's so simple and it's attitude.
• 10:46
  It's about and that's at the end of the day, rock and roll
• 10:50
  really is about the attitude. We're not trying to be pretentious with the music.
• 10:56
  We're not trying to you know, do time signs, nature changes and
• 11:01
  this and that. We wanted to feel natural, we wanted to feel like
• 11:05
  obviously authentic. I think that's really the brand of Gretavan Fleet is authenticity and
• 11:11
  attitude as far as the music goes. So, yes, I'm really good
• 11:16
  at forgetting the question, but well, you're right, So the ones someone's
• 11:20
  got to ask anyway. Really well, oh, perfect person really says with
• 11:31
  the star cuts, Yeah, the band is definitely managed to capture their live
• 11:35
  energy in the recording studio. Would you agree with that statement? Well,
• 11:39
  yes, that was kind of the whole point of the album is because we
• 11:43
  did our very you know, big cinematic Starkepper. We did our big cinematic
• 11:52
  gosh, what was the name that the Battle gardens Gate that one, and
• 11:56
  we we did it, and that was the album in my head that I
• 11:58
  was when we were kind of starting off. So from there it was kind
• 12:03
  of a curiosity to figure out what we would do next. And in my
• 12:09
  head, I thought, gosh, it would be nice to go backwards and
• 12:18
  look at some of that attitude because I actually think that I'd bring us into
• 12:22
  the future of Greta van Fleet, And it certainly did. Maybe not exactly
• 12:28
  what we were doing back in the garage in Michigan, but the ethos of
• 12:35
  that, the idea of sitting down in a garage and just bringing ideas to
• 12:41
  the table and just playing and having that energy rather than you know, get
• 12:50
  the adrenaline rolling. All right, let's have let's let's do a take all
• 12:52
  right, take two, let's go again. Now, it was about having
• 12:56
  us sitting really naturally in the and not focusing down too hard, kind of
• 13:05
  like feeling relaxed and just being a band. And that's kind of what star
• 13:11
  Catcher is about. And we capture that energy and it's so loose and it's
• 13:16
  so it's so gretavand Fleet. It wasn't about saying, hey, let me
• 13:22
  take another take of this guitar solo after ninety takes. Now it's about just
• 13:28
  doing it the first time and having that energy purveyed the message of the song,
• 13:33
  because after a while it gets convoluted and it starts to not represent the
• 13:37
  song, it gets too rigid. And yes, I feel that Starcatcher is
• 13:43
  a very emotionally wide open album for us as players. And of course Josh
• 13:48
  is a singer and also a writer. Now I've totally lost track of Tommy
• 13:56
  and myself. I got talked for a few more questions or I've a stud
• 13:58
  ba No, throw a couple more at me. Ezy but so great.
• 14:05
  Vail Greta van Fleet burst on the scene with your Grammy Award winning twenty seventeen
• 14:09
  ep from the Fire. So how was that period for you? My life
• 14:13
  was? It was it a bit overwhelming. Getting such recognition on running your
• 14:16
  first relations that period of time was absolutely insane because that was in the same
• 14:24
  period of time where we were touring Australia for the first time, we toured
• 14:30
  Japan for the first time, and we were supposed to go to Los Angeles,
• 14:33
  and then we were supposed to do Saturday Night Live in New York and
• 14:37
  we were off in the British Vision Islands for you know, some family vacation
• 14:43
  because we didn't see our family for a year, and it was just absolutely
• 14:46
  nuts and it was so much fun. But we kind of figured out,
• 14:50
  hey, this speed of life isn't gonna work. We won't be able to
• 14:56
  we won't be able to keep doing this, So yeah, we kind of
• 15:00
  we kind of figured out where that lies. But yeah, as far as
• 15:03
  the Grammys go, it was very flattering in the sense that, wow,
• 15:07
  we did something impactful enough to be recognized by the Academy of Recording Arts.
• 15:16
  And I thought it was so great because rock and roll is not a big
• 15:20
  category. People don't care about rock and roll so much in the mainstream sense.
• 15:26
  Rock and roll is an underground movement. It's always been. There was
• 15:30
  a time obviously in the late sixties and early seventies where it was mainstream,
• 15:35
  like rock and roll is charting, but it's really not about pop music.
• 15:43
  Rock and roll is about being underground. It's about being kind of the one
• 15:50
  who does not follow the status quo. It's about being the person who takes
• 15:56
  the path less traveled, and I really think that's what it's about. But
• 16:00
  it was very cool to be recognized by the Recording Academy in that sense because
• 16:06
  rock and roll's so underground. It's because of the success of that a thing,
• 16:12
  right It was it tempting to replicate the same formula on your debut album
• 16:17
  and the Faithful Amy or did did you make a conscious effort? I guess
• 16:21
  the point to shake things up and got away from that. You got to
• 16:26
  shake it up. But I'm kind of halfway with that. I think that
• 16:30
  you always have to change it up a little bit. You can't release the
• 16:37
  same album over and over, not only because it's contrived, because it would
• 16:42
  be a disservice to the band. It would be a disservice to the group.
• 16:49
  Like Neil Young said, I could have made another Harvest, which was,
• 16:53
  you know, his biggest album, but it would have been dishonest to
• 16:57
  myself, is what he said. I remember the Beatles commenting on some American
• 17:02
  artists, I think especially in Motown, saying, you know what, we
• 17:07
  love these songs, but they're doing the same thing over and over again.
• 17:14
  And the Beatles are a perfect example. And that's kind of that's kind of
• 17:17
  what I really like to look at and think, Okay, they really changed
• 17:22
  album to album and for us regreta Van Fleet not only esthetically, like the
• 17:27
  visual world has to change, but the sonic world has to change. We
• 17:33
  have to get different influences for the next album, you know, we have
• 17:38
  to change the idea of the music. We have to change the feeling.
• 17:47
  It's always going to be great band and fleet no matter what, because if
• 17:49
  you put Josh, Jake, Daniel and I together in a room, it's
• 17:52
  always going to sound like that because of our styles and my musical influences and
• 17:57
  the whole collision of all those is. But you always have to you always
• 18:02
  have to push the envelope. You have to challenge yourself to do something differently
• 18:04
  because that's what makes it makes it interesting. A lot of bands do the
• 18:10
  same album over and over. It sounds like the same thing. But if
• 18:12
  you challenge yourself and you put yourself in an uncomfortable spot, you get something
• 18:18
  that's a lot more interesting. You get something that's a lot more authentic because
• 18:22
  it came from learning. I mean, it's all about learning. It's humans,
• 18:27
  right, yeah, now, And in the overall scheme of things,
• 18:30
  credit van Fleet is still still pretty young and fresh, bail like, it's
• 18:34
  still got your baby teeth. I'd say, so, how much means you
• 18:38
  call growth? I guess if you think the band's got left in you would
• 18:42
  you say how many years do we have? But I'm sorry, how much
• 18:45
  musical growth do you think you've got left in here? Because you're only just
• 18:48
  sort of starting your journey? Really gosh, it's yeah, it's really difficult
• 18:52
  to say. I would love to never become stale. I would love to
• 19:00
  never become this one thing as a band. I would I would really like
• 19:07
  to see our career keep growing as as as we grow as people and have
• 19:15
  different musical influences and keep challenging ourselves in different ways to create a new grid
• 19:21
  of an fleet. Because nothing is supposed to be stagnant, not not even
• 19:27
  a puddle of water, not a tree, not a career, not a
• 19:33
  not not not even being a person. We're supposed to grow when we're supposed
• 19:37
  to change, and so I don't have an answer to that, but very
• 19:44
  well, the way that things are going now, I would see greditvand Fleet
• 19:49
  evolving and evolving for as long as we're doing Fleet. There you go,
• 19:56
  all right, Sabell, thanks very much to be talking. I'd mean absolutely
• 19:59
  pleasures with the band will be in Australia from August the twenty first, starting
• 20:03
  in Brisbane, and I shall be at that show, so hopefully we catch
• 20:07
  up. I'm so excited. You're still excited. What a man. Yes,
• 20:14
  I'll see you there.