Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 873 - Ethan McCarthy (Primitive Man) Talks New Album Observance- Out Now on Relapse

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 873 - Ethan McCarthy (Primitive Man) Talks New Album Observance- Out Now on Relapse · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

• 0:00
  We're a live band 1st and so things will definitely change
• 0:06
  when we're up there depending on the vibe and the, the feeling
• 0:09
  and the environment. I, I, we've always kind of been
• 0:12
  that way, like free to mess around in the live environment
• 0:17
  and give people like a a different experience and they
• 0:19
  may not necessarily get on the record.
• 0:21
  I know a lot of people want everything to sound exactly like
• 0:23
  the record, but that's not rock'n'roll.
• 0:24
  Like you're at a show. Like there should be like a a
• 0:27
  certain level of unpredictability there and
• 0:32
  exploration. I think for the audience and the
• 0:34
  musician, that makes it more more interesting, you know?
• 0:44
  This is Tom for Ghost Cults, and I'm delighted to be joined by
• 0:48
  Ethan Lee McCarthy of Primitive Man, who are releasing their
• 0:52
  latest record observance on October the 31st on Relapse
• 0:57
  Records. Ethan, thank you so much for
• 0:59
  joining us. Thank you for having me.
• 1:01
  So I'm going to say something right off the bat, and maybe you
• 1:03
  don't get people saying this so much about primitive man because
• 1:06
  it's very easy to use terms like brutal and crushing.
• 1:09
  But I think that there is beauty in the music of primitive man
• 1:12
  and I think there's beauty in the latest record.
• 1:14
  Is that something that you can identify with?
• 1:16
  I I think for this most recent record for sure, definitely for
• 1:20
  the most recent one, I would say yeah.
• 1:24
  It, it was interesting because I, I, I found myself thinking
• 1:26
  this first of all, actually from the, the video of, of natural
• 1:31
  law. And I was thinking, you know,
• 1:32
  there are aspects to this which are very elegant, very
• 1:34
  beautifully shot. And then it made me think, but
• 1:37
  you know, it's not just about the visuals.
• 1:39
  There is actually something in the music as well.
• 1:40
  There's a kind of, umm, yeah, there's a certain elegance in
• 1:44
  point. So you say that you think that
• 1:45
  that's definitely something in the latest record, but so maybe
• 1:48
  inferring it wasn't necessarily there before.
• 1:50
  So how did that come to be an aspect of the music?
• 1:53
  Yeah, For the most recent release, I think that they're
• 1:56
  sonically wanting to try some stuff out.
• 1:58
  I think is like a little bit, I don't want to say lighter, but
• 2:02
  the atmospheric elements I think kind of like added to the beauty
• 2:06
  aspect. And then spiritually, like
• 2:10
  lyrically and stuff, I'm singing about dark shit still, but
• 2:14
  there's like a hope of getting out of those things.
• 2:17
  Whereas in the past there was just none of that.
• 2:19
  So I think that's what makes this, you know, this really.
• 2:21
  Unique in that, yeah. And then from that point of view
• 2:24
  of the lyrics, I saw an interview with you from maybe
• 2:26
  two or three years ago where you were saying that at that point
• 2:30
  in your songwriting process, you were doing the lyrics at the end
• 2:34
  of the songwriting process. So is that, is that still the
• 2:36
  case for you? And if so, like how do you sort
• 2:39
  of, to what extent do you sort of thematically picture the
• 2:42
  music before there are actually lyrics attached to it?
• 2:45
  Well, so for this record it was a little bit of a mix because we
• 2:51
  were trying some of the songs out on tour before all this was
• 2:55
  done and like writing them because we did a lot of touring
• 2:58
  the last three years. So you know, in order to write
• 3:00
  music, like sometimes we would have to do it while we were out
• 3:03
  and try this shit out. So I had lyrics for like I think
• 3:07
  2 out of the six songs and then the other four were done in the
• 3:12
  studio. So kind of the way that a
• 3:14
  primitive man record comes together is that we'll start
• 3:17
  writing the music, we'll make all the changes in whatever we
• 3:20
  want to do the music all the way up until sometimes when we're
• 3:22
  going into the studio, especially with this release,
• 3:25
  I'll be writing the whole time, but it won't be for any specific
• 3:30
  song. It'll just be just me writing
• 3:32
  stuff. I will then when it's like time
• 3:35
  for me to put vocals down, you know, sometimes I'll try like
• 3:39
  lyrics and they just won't like stuff that I think is going to
• 3:41
  fit for a specific song and I'll try it and it just like does not
• 3:44
  work. There's like something about it
• 3:46
  that doesn't work. And so sometimes I'll switch to
• 3:48
  another pair of lyrics and it will lock in perfectly.
• 3:50
  So it's kind of a weird, almost like collage process in which
• 3:55
  this is kind of made, you know what I mean?
• 3:58
  But I think that the lyrics not to sound like too esoteric or
• 4:01
  whatever, but I think that the the lyrics find the song that
• 4:05
  they're supposed to go to. Yeah, I mean it like it makes
• 4:08
  sense because I suppose like, you know, if if you, if you're
• 4:11
  anyone else is making instrumental music, there's
• 4:13
  going to be personal emotional elements that come into that.
• 4:17
  So you don't necessarily have to consciously be thinking about
• 4:21
  the meaning of the songs for them to sort of have some kind
• 4:23
  of identity that you're not necessarily consciously thinking
• 4:25
  about. Yeah, because I mean, I'm all of
• 4:28
  the things I'm writing about, I am thinking about while we're
• 4:31
  like, I'm living it, you know what I mean?
• 4:33
  So I'm like, still thinking about this stuff when we're
• 4:35
  writing the music, if that makes sense.
• 4:37
  Yeah, for sure. It's kind of like it's you're
• 4:40
  inhabiting that experience. Yeah, absolutely.
• 4:43
  And then I'm just kind of narrating it when it gets time,
• 4:46
  yeah. I wanted to highlight what is I
• 4:48
  think my favorite song on the record because I think it's
• 4:51
  really illustrative of of what makes the album great is the
• 4:55
  second track, Devotion, because I think it it goes all these
• 4:58
  great. Like just, I just say like
• 5:00
  around about a minute in when the drums come in, I was like,
• 5:03
  oh, that's just exquisite the way it comes in and I, I love
• 5:07
  the different transitions through it.
• 5:09
  Like there's this part I'd say about 6 minutes in where there's
• 5:12
  kind of like this floating distortion that gives me kind of
• 5:15
  God flesh vibes. And then you've got this sort of
• 5:18
  shrill guitar that comes in around 10 minutes.
• 5:21
  And then I think as well, I'm not 100% sure, but are those
• 5:23
  bells at the very end of the track?
• 5:25
  Yeah, those are bells at the very end of the track and those
• 5:28
  are recorded somewhere in Europe.
• 5:30
  And I'll have to ask John, our bass player, because he captured
• 5:34
  those bells on his phone when we were over there touring
• 5:38
  somewhere. So I'll have to ask him where
• 5:40
  those are from. But yeah, yeah, those are like a
• 5:42
  a live, like a field recording that he gave.
• 5:46
  So just like taking that as an example, like I don't know how
• 5:48
  illustrative that is of the way that you construct a song in
• 5:51
  general or through the rest of the album.
• 5:53
  But like in terms of, let's say, kind of like the songwriting
• 5:56
  process and the recording process.
• 5:57
  How did you put that track together?
• 6:00
  That song was definitely put together through jamming.
• 6:04
  You know, we knew that we wanted to start a song with like the
• 6:07
  bass and the drums and stuff like that.
• 6:10
  That's like the, you know, in terms of like a boring
• 6:13
  mechanical thing we knew we wanted to do.
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  But it really kind of like went from there and John and Joe kind
• 6:19
  of had their thing and then I came in there and we just kind
• 6:22
  of started jamming it together and then it kind of evolved into
• 6:24
  what it is now. Like, even the meteor heavy
• 6:27
  riffs come from that jam. So that song I think flows in
• 6:32
  that way because it it was just like just jammed the whole way
• 6:36
  through and then kind of piece together in a way that makes
• 6:39
  sense, you know? Yeah, but there's versions of
• 6:42
  that song that are like 25 minutes on recordings, you know,
• 6:45
  from messing around with it and stuff like that.
• 6:48
  So this is like the most distilled version of of what it
• 6:52
  originally was. And from that point of view, in
• 6:54
  terms of the way the primitive man songs might evolve in the
• 6:58
  writing process, what does that then imply when you play these
• 7:02
  songs live? Like, do you kind of have scope
• 7:04
  for things to change and evolve on stage as well?
• 7:07
  Yeah, definitely. I think we're a live band 1st
• 7:12
  and so things will definitely change when we're up there
• 7:16
  depending on the vibe and the, the feeling and the environment.
• 7:19
  I, I, we've always kind of been that way, like free to mess
• 7:25
  around in the live environment and give people like a, a
• 7:27
  different experience and they may not necessarily get on the
• 7:29
  record. I know a lot of people want
• 7:31
  everything to sound exactly like the record, but that's not
• 7:33
  rock'n'roll. Like you're at a show, like
• 7:36
  there should be like a, a certain level of
• 7:38
  unpredictability there and exploration.
• 7:42
  I think for the audience and the musician, that makes it more
• 7:45
  more interesting, you know? Yeah, yeah.
• 7:47
  I mean, in a way, I mean, I guess there, there definitely
• 7:49
  are examples of bands where they can choose to represent things
• 7:53
  very true to the records and it can work.
• 7:55
  But I do think in general, I kind of prefer that feeling that
• 7:58
  there's a sort of an organic process and also like an
• 8:00
  exchange between the people on stage and the audience.
• 8:02
  Yeah, definitely. And there are groups that I've
• 8:05
  seen that do really complicated compositions where they're
• 8:09
  playing everything exactly the same.
• 8:11
  And then I've seen groups who will like expand their songs or
• 8:15
  do like a medley of their stuff and I think it's just as cool.
• 8:17
  So I I think it really depends on probably the execution of the
• 8:21
  group or what you're looking for, but I don't know.
• 8:24
  Thinking about the history of the band, so something that I, I
• 8:27
  feel like listening to your different records is you have a
• 8:30
  very well formed, imposing, intense, you know, sometimes
• 8:36
  sonically overwhelming sound. I wonder how quickly did you, I
• 8:42
  mean a figure out what you wanted to sound like and B
• 8:45
  managed to actually get that sound.
• 8:46
  So this entire time that we've been a band, I feel like we've
• 8:49
  been trying to find our sound. I, I think that like through
• 8:55
  various stages of, of our career, like if you listen to
• 8:59
  Scorn and then you listen to this most recent release, you
• 9:02
  can kind of see how we piece this sound together.
• 9:06
  And whatever I think primitive man is it like the peak of what
• 9:08
  the project was supposed to be right now with this most recent
• 9:11
  release, I think that we broke through to what we were supposed
• 9:15
  to become with caustic and immersion.
• 9:18
  And so now I really think we're in this space where we're trying
• 9:21
  to like refine it and make it more interesting and then move
• 9:24
  forward with it. So we knew we wanted to be
• 9:26
  doomed. We knew we wanted to be harsh.
• 9:28
  We knew we wanted to be heavy. We knew we wanted to incorporate
• 9:30
  noise elements. We knew we had all these
• 9:32
  influences. God flushed like you mentioned
• 9:33
  and like all this other stuff. But it really has been been a
• 9:38
  lot of exploration because we knew that we didn't want to
• 9:41
  sound just like our influences. You know what I mean?
• 9:44
  Yeah. So trying to find like a unique
• 9:46
  voice amongst the, the noise of the stuff that you listen to
• 9:50
  has, has been the the biggest challenge, you know?
• 9:53
  Yeah. But I, I think that we're there
• 9:55
  now, you know? Like.
• 9:57
  Sworn sounds like like if if I were to put that on, I could be
• 10:00
  like, that sounds like Sabbath. That sounds like an earthly
• 10:02
  trance. That sounds like burning witch.
• 10:04
  That sounds like like, I could tell you, you know, all of this
• 10:08
  shit. Whereas I think that after that
• 10:10
  we kind of grew into our own, you know?
• 10:12
  Yeah, yeah. So until you get to the point
• 10:15
  you're like, ah, this sounds like primitive man.
• 10:17
  Yeah. Now it's like easier to write as
• 10:19
  primitive man. And I guess like that sound ISM
• 10:22
  is embedded into us so much so that it is not as difficult to
• 10:26
  find our own sound. We know what we sound like.
• 10:28
  And so I would say that everything on observances has
• 10:32
  been was very intentional like because I think we're the most
• 10:35
  comfortable and being primitive man than we've.
• 10:38
  Ever been another another track and in fact, also video that I
• 10:41
  wanted to highlight is Social contract.
• 10:45
  And it's a kind of like a contrast to to natural law,
• 10:48
  which does have this elegance to it.
• 10:49
  Social Contract. It's kind of difficult for me to
• 10:51
  say because I think I the first time that I heard it was
• 10:54
  actually when I watched the video.
• 10:55
  So it's kind of like the video and the song are sort of
• 10:57
  inexorably linked together for me, but it is such a disturbing
• 11:00
  video video. Like, I don't know how involved
• 11:03
  you were with the actual visual side of it, but I think there's
• 11:05
  a lot of interesting components to that.
• 11:08
  We contacted Craig, the Craig Murray who did the video killer
• 11:12
  job on the video shouts out to Craig and we sent in the album
• 11:17
  the lyrics. I told him a little bit about my
• 11:21
  perspective and mind frame and where I'm coming from with this
• 11:24
  topic and like of of social contract of the specific song,
• 11:28
  where I was coming from, what I'm thinking about.
• 11:29
  And he took this huge paragraph that I sent him and he distilled
• 11:33
  all that into this video and covered absolutely everything.
• 11:37
  And if that answers your question.
• 11:39
  So though we weren't hands on making it our ideas and input
• 11:44
  that went to Craig, he he then created this as a result of it.
• 11:47
  Does that kind of help? Absolutely.
• 11:48
  Oh, that's really interesting. That's a very interesting
• 11:50
  insight because one of the things that I was curious about
• 11:52
  was a couple of different things.
• 11:54
  I was thinking there's sort of a body horror aspect to this that
• 11:58
  also like specifically makes me think of Videodrome, the David
• 12:02
  Cronenberg movie. And then there was also as well,
• 12:04
  like you've got these juxtapositions.
• 12:05
  Like there were little bits of sort of like, you know, smiling
• 12:08
  families in the video offset against torture and against war.
• 12:11
  And I thought this kind of reminds me on the one hand,
• 12:14
  something that full of hell, I think play around with visually
• 12:18
  and also which I think kind of maybe goes back to sort of like
• 12:20
  grind core covers, you know, where they do these sort of
• 12:23
  colleges that have got atrocities going on.
• 12:26
  But then you have the sort of like, you know, 1950s white
• 12:29
  picket fence images and that kind of like the the intensity
• 12:32
  of that kind of contrast. So I was sort of curious from
• 12:35
  that sort of visual side, how much you were interested in that
• 12:38
  kind of concept, that sort of pairing of those two opposites?
• 12:42
  So before Primitive Man, we were all in grind Corbans and yeah.
• 12:47
  And so this is always kind of been a thing.
• 12:49
  I actually met Full of Hell when I was in a grind core band when
• 12:52
  they were like 13 years old. So it's funny that you bring
• 12:57
  them up. I yeah, we've always messed
• 12:59
  around with these themes and I think that we are a doom metal
• 13:03
  band that comes from punk and grind and this sort of stuff.
• 13:07
  So though we may have changed direction musically as
• 13:11
  individuals, a lot of those ideas and and stuff has stayed
• 13:15
  the same. So I think that that's why that
• 13:17
  that sort of imagery has continued throughout primitive
• 13:20
  man's kind of career and stuff like that.
• 13:23
  Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Another thing I was wondering
• 13:25
  about sort of going back into the history of the band, it
• 13:27
  seems from the outside, like. So if you did, you originally
• 13:31
  formed in 2012, is that right? Yeah.
• 13:34
  So it seems like you got onto Relapse Records pretty quickly
• 13:38
  in terms of the life of the band.
• 13:39
  How did that come about and did it feel quick from your point of
• 13:42
  view? So we put out Scorn with Board
• 13:45
  Grim and Throat Runner records before Relapse.
• 13:48
  There's a pressing of it that was done and then about a year
• 13:51
  went by or like a year and a half and then Relapse re
• 13:57
  released it after that. So a year and a half, like a
• 14:01
  year and a half of us being a band and then being signed to
• 14:04
  Relapse is very quick based on like all of our previous
• 14:07
  experiences and other bands that were around for like a decade or
• 14:10
  around a decade that didn't get anything cool like that.
• 14:15
  So I think that the having relapses support has been
• 14:20
  helpful for primitive man for sure, because in the past with
• 14:24
  other man's we were in, it's like nobody had any money to
• 14:27
  invest into this kind of thing. You needed people to help you.
• 14:32
  You needed to find like 6 different people to pitch in on
• 14:34
  a, on a release because everyone is broke.
• 14:37
  There's not going to be any PR behind it.
• 14:39
  And it's just kind of like, all right, well, we're all doing
• 14:41
  this together and best of luck. And I, and not that like being
• 14:44
  signed to Relapse is like the final key for a band to like get
• 14:50
  their name out there or anything.
• 14:51
  You still have to do like a ton of work.
• 14:53
  Like they may release your records, but then if you just
• 14:55
  like sit at home and don't do anything with those records they
• 14:58
  released, it's the same effect as if you were doing what we
• 15:01
  were doing before, you know what I mean?
• 15:02
  So I think that like having them support us, help us with our
• 15:07
  records, give us advice and we've asked for it has been
• 15:10
  extremely helpful. And I and I especially going
• 15:12
  like a DIY background before that they entered into my life.
• 15:15
  I can see the differences, very much so.
• 15:19
  And from that perspective, that DIY background and having, as
• 15:23
  you mentioned, I think like about a decade's worth of
• 15:25
  experience being in other bands before Primitive Man, how much
• 15:27
  do you think all of that experience prepared you or sort
• 15:30
  of was valuable in terms of, you know, navigating the music
• 15:34
  business with Primitive Man? Umm, the landscape has just
• 15:37
  changed a lot since Primitive Man has been a band and it's
• 15:40
  changed significantly since when I was in these other bands.
• 15:43
  I think, umm, it has helped me in terms of being resilient and
• 15:48
  knowing that I have to reach out for things myself and do things
• 15:51
  myself. And that's like what it is.
• 15:53
  If you're going to play this extreme kind of shit, I, I, I
• 15:56
  picked the wrong kind of music to not have to work really hard
• 16:00
  for it to get noticed, you know, So I think it helped with a lot
• 16:04
  of that and with the, you know, being able to book tours and do
• 16:08
  all of the things that a underground band needs to do.
• 16:12
  But it could not have prepared me for shit like Spotify.
• 16:16
  It could not have prepared me for this wave of underground DIY
• 16:22
  musicians Chase seeing fame and fortune while playing music that
• 16:25
  has death metal growls in it and then being confused why they're
• 16:28
  not making hundreds of thousands of dollars off of their art.
• 16:33
  That's a new thing. I think people have lost
• 16:36
  perspective on what this like really truly underground shit
• 16:39
  is. So nothing could have prepared
• 16:40
  me for that. Like you bring up relapse.
• 16:42
  When primitive Man signed a relapse, I had a whole section
• 16:45
  of people that like my music say that I'm a sell out and then
• 16:48
  they wouldn't listen to anything that I do anymore because we
• 16:51
  signed to relapse. Whereas now that's not even a
• 16:55
  conversation that would happen. I think that the the the most
• 16:59
  valuable things I got from that experience was really just that
• 17:03
  you have to work hard. No ones going to do it for you.
• 17:05
  You need to be able to be self reliant and, and resilient.
• 17:10
  And that's the biggest lesson I took from that.
• 17:13
  But so much has changed since Primitive Man had been a band.
• 17:16
  Like it's just not a, it's like a hostile place for musicians
• 17:19
  now, you know, it's like not as friendly and shit as it used to
• 17:23
  be. Even the underground DIY scene
• 17:25
  is like being swallowed up by like a lot of underground venues
• 17:29
  and stuff been swallowed up by corporate venues and things like
• 17:32
  that. So it's just, it's just, it's
• 17:34
  just much different than it used to be, man.
• 17:36
  I, I, I, I, I don't want to be traumatic, but it's like, I
• 17:39
  would hate to be 20 years old trying to start this now in this
• 17:45
  landscape. It is set up for for smaller
• 17:49
  acts to fail. It's like not set up for
• 17:52
  underground acts to get any sort of traction.
• 17:54
  And if you don't have like the connections or anything with
• 17:57
  people, your asses can can be grass.
• 17:59
  And how much do you think that that's a matter of technology I.
• 18:02
  Think it's a big part of it. I think that the technology at
• 18:05
  first was helpful and then tech oligarchs, all of this shit and
• 18:09
  now it's not as helpful. So it's like anything, it starts
• 18:12
  out great for people and then the wrong people get a hold of
• 18:15
  it and put money into it and then they own it and then we
• 18:17
  don't own shit. Yep.
• 18:18
  So I think that that's a long and the short of it, it's a it's
• 18:22
  a hostile world out here for underground musicians.
• 18:25
  And you know, I don't want someone to listen to this and be
• 18:27
  like, oh man, like why would I even like a younger person or
• 18:30
  something listen to this and be like, Oh, you know, why?
• 18:33
  Why would I even want to get into this?
• 18:35
  This sounds terrible or whatever.
• 18:37
  It's like because because there are people who are aware of it
• 18:39
  and they're looking into it and still want to help, and there's
• 18:41
  still plenty of people out there who who want to help and be a
• 18:44
  part of it. I think it's just a little bit
• 18:46
  more difficult and corrupted than it used to be.
• 18:49
  And would you say like, in terms of thinking about what younger
• 18:53
  people can take, you might be thinking of starting a band or
• 18:56
  have just started a band is part of the what you would say the
• 18:59
  the kind of healthy approach is a matter of expectations.
• 19:02
  Like you were talking before about, you know, people making
• 19:05
  death metal music and expecting they're going to get rich off
• 19:07
  it. So is there is, is a big part of
• 19:09
  this about the perspective that you have when you're getting
• 19:11
  into making music at an underground DIY level?
• 19:13
  Yeah. I think that people do need to
• 19:15
  to retain their perspective and just because you know, a band
• 19:18
  somewhere, just because we just because you know, one band that
• 19:22
  it appears is making it work in this way, you don't know what
• 19:26
  it's really like over there. Appearances on the Internet
• 19:28
  these days mean nothing, and that's not you.
• 19:32
  It might be 1 out of 30 that shoot right to the top, but the
• 19:37
  other 29 of us are going to do it the traditional way.
• 19:40
  Yeah. I think that that tampering
• 19:42
  expectations is a big part of it.
• 19:44
  So I book bands for a living on as on the side and that informs
• 19:49
  a lot of my opinion on this stuff because I'm seeing what
• 19:52
  underground bands are going through.
• 19:53
  I'm supporting them on a daily basis.
• 19:56
  So yeah, I don't know. I think managing your
• 19:59
  expectations, doing it because you love it.
• 20:01
  I understand that people want to grow their.
• 20:05
  Band, everybody wants to do that, but in a world where you
• 20:08
  have to like degrade yourself on TikTok to get anywhere and shit,
• 20:13
  if you don't want to do this kind of like spiritually
• 20:16
  bankrupt pushing of your music, this is what I view it as.
• 20:20
  And this isn't to like shit on anyone that does it.
• 20:22
  It's because we're forced to do it.
• 20:24
  If you don't want to do that, just tamp your expectations, go
• 20:27
  on tour and work really hard and write really good songs.
• 20:29
  Well, funnily enough, having I think maybe just at the very
• 20:32
  beginning, but before I did the introductions, I brought up the
• 20:34
  fact that you've got this much about TOP and we've talked about
• 20:37
  Full of Hell. Another band and person that I
• 20:40
  was going to bring up for a couple of different reasons is
• 20:42
  Today's The Day. And Steve Austin, who I talked
• 20:45
  to recently, absolute hero of mine.
• 20:47
  And I was kind of asking him a similar question about, you
• 20:50
  know, sort of expectations for younger artists.
• 20:53
  And he essentially said something very similar.
• 20:55
  Like the primary thing to focus on is that you do the best
• 20:59
  whatever it is, like you focus on creating the best thing you
• 21:02
  can possibly create. Everything else is kind of
• 21:04
  secondary to that. But one of the the reasons why I
• 21:08
  wanted to bring him up was because getting back to to the
• 21:11
  musical side of things in terms of what you create, I wanted to
• 21:14
  talk about noise particularly. And I gather if I've got this
• 21:18
  right, you are also a big fan of Sadness Will Prevail, which is
• 21:21
  probably my favorite Today Is the Day record.
• 21:24
  And I was thinking, for me, this is a great example of using
• 21:27
  noise really effectively throughout about music in
• 21:30
  different ways. And I know that you've got your
• 21:33
  music that you put out under your own name where you lean
• 21:35
  quite heavily into noise aspects.
• 21:38
  So I'm kind of curious for you in general, because I'm sort of
• 21:41
  fascinated by noise aesthetically.
• 21:43
  What is noise as a kind of form of artistic expression for you?
• 21:46
  And how does that end up coming into what you do with primitive
• 21:49
  Man? To mean noise music is like the
• 21:52
  most it's like the final Sonic frontier.
• 21:56
  It is like when used properly, can be like unbelievably
• 22:00
  powerful. And I think that that's why I
• 22:02
  like to put it into metal music and, and the things that I do
• 22:06
  and why it's such a big part of my life.
• 22:08
  And that Sadness will Prevail Record, huge record for me and
• 22:12
  I, we definitely thought about Sadness Will Prevail when we
• 22:15
  were writing Observance. A lot of people turn their
• 22:18
  noise, their nose up at noise because it is noise.
• 22:22
  But all music and sound is just noise.
• 22:25
  And I think that, I don't know, I think that people are just now
• 22:29
  starting to get the hang of it. And there's people who have been
• 22:31
  pushing this shit for like 50 years.
• 22:33
  Like it's taking noise such a long time to even get where it
• 22:36
  is. And it's not even like in like a
• 22:37
  very prevalent place, you know what I mean?
• 22:39
  I, I think it's like an undiscovered wonderful tool of
• 22:43
  the musician and people should be more open to, to using noise
• 22:47
  in their compositions. I, I think you know, my, I look
• 22:51
  at music in like a real weird way.
• 22:53
  So like when I am incorporating noise and things happen, there's
• 22:58
  a randomness within it. The improv zone.
• 23:01
  I feel like it's like the thing that gives you inspiration and
• 23:04
  ideas, giving you a little freebie and and put in
• 23:07
  incorporating that into your shit.
• 23:08
  It's just a, it's a magical thing.
• 23:10
  It's a powerful thing to do. I don't know, sorry it's a
• 23:12
  little bit of a tangent, but. No, no, it's so good.
• 23:14
  I, you know, because I'm just kind of fascinated by the
• 23:17
  concept in general. So I'm curious to know what it
• 23:20
  is for you because I found myself sort of accidentally
• 23:23
  collaborating with people that use noise.
• 23:27
  And once I started doing that, I sort of found myself entering
• 23:30
  into this world, this realm. And I'm seeing different people
• 23:33
  making different, you know, noise arts.
• 23:36
  And I'm, I'm kind of more and more fascinated.
• 23:38
  But you know, it's like if I, if I sit and listen to a Mertzma
• 23:40
  record, I'm like, why is this so compelling?
• 23:43
  It's just kind of. Sorry, I'm didn't mean to cut
• 23:45
  you off. Go ahead.
• 23:46
  No, no, I just, yeah, I it just sort of leaves me questioning
• 23:49
  what it is about it. I just think it's just like the
• 23:51
  most free place that you can be. You can.
• 23:53
  It's like the most free place to inhabit as a, as a the player,
• 23:56
  you know. And I think that when you've
• 23:58
  played conventional music or like traditionally laid out
• 24:02
  rock'n'roll or like whatever, that when you start to dip into
• 24:06
  that world and you see the possibilities, the Sonic
• 24:08
  possibilities of music are so much greater than what are is
• 24:12
  shown to you as a kid. There's Pharaoh Sanders records
• 24:16
  that like jazz records that are noise as hell.
• 24:20
  You know what I mean? These jazz guys knew this.
• 24:23
  There's, there's plenty of examples of people who have
• 24:26
  known this. And I think that getting into
• 24:28
  that free space helps with writing regular music too.
• 24:31
  It's just, oh man, music is a spiritual thing.
• 24:34
  And I think that if you're able to get free enough to dip into
• 24:37
  those places and create things from those places, that it is a
• 24:40
  great thought exercise. And from that dimension, maybe a
• 24:44
  little bit tied to what you're saying with spirituality, I was
• 24:48
  wondering in terms of whatever project is you're working on,
• 24:53
  whether it's your own music or whether it's primitive man or
• 24:55
  other projects. I mean, I guess I was
• 24:56
  particularly thinking about this with a sort of the noise drone
• 24:59
  aspect. Do you find yourself in a kind
• 25:01
  of trance or would you describe that in some way when you're on
• 25:04
  stage? Because I was sort of like, not
• 25:06
  necessarily all the time, but I was thinking particularly with,
• 25:08
  you know, very drawn out music that's kind of droning and noisy
• 25:12
  and there's like a lot of space there.
• 25:14
  There's kind of the opportunity to sort of get lost in the
• 25:17
  experience to some degree. So I wonder how relatable that
• 25:20
  is, a kind of idea for you on stage.
• 25:22
  Yeah, yeah. And I definitely, I think that
• 25:23
  there are sometimes there's moments where like the most free
• 25:26
  I will ever feel is when we're playing and we're in the middle
• 25:28
  of these long passages and all of this stuff.
• 25:31
  Like I, it's that moment and that moment only.
• 25:34
  And I love that feeling. And I've been chasing that
• 25:36
  feeling since I was a child, you know?
• 25:39
  But then the thing that's interesting about what we're
• 25:41
  doing is that I'm also singing about like super traumatic shit.
• 25:45
  So I'll be in there in this zone, and then I will have to,
• 25:49
  like, jerk out of it to start to speak about things that are
• 25:52
  uncomfortable. And so that creates this really
• 25:55
  interesting whiplash of feelings when you're playing in primitive
• 26:01
  man, you know? Yeah.
• 26:02
  So. So there's like moments of free,
• 26:05
  but then there's moments where I am like drinking concrete.
• 26:08
  There's a, there's a quote from you that I wanted to mention
• 26:12
  because I thought was an amazing quote where you said, I want to
• 26:14
  sound simultaneously dead and very much alive and suffering
• 26:17
  because oftentimes that is how the human experience feels.
• 26:21
  And I thought that's such a great quote to sort of emphasize
• 26:25
  the like the empathy and the humanity in Primitive man, that
• 26:27
  it's not just about sort of Sonic barbarism, but there's
• 26:31
  actually, you know, it's a really, yeah, it's there is a
• 26:34
  lot of empathy in that, I think. Yeah, I'm in pain because we are
• 26:37
  in pain. It's not just like my like I
• 26:40
  have my own problems or whatever, but the human race is
• 26:42
  in pain, especially now, like we're, we're not a good place.
• 26:47
  From that perspective, is there, you know, aside from what you
• 26:50
  were saying about feeling free on stage or sometimes having
• 26:54
  that experience, is there catharsis for you in the in the
• 26:57
  music of primitive man? There's catharsis for sure.
• 27:00
  And I I feel really good when I feel great when we release
• 27:03
  record and when we write these songs and when I get these
• 27:05
  thoughts out and sometimes after we're done playing, I'll feel
• 27:09
  really good. I think where I'm at right now
• 27:12
  though is I'm experiencing this thing where like the problems
• 27:15
  that I've been talking about for like a few years now, some of
• 27:19
  them I've repeated and it's because those things are not
• 27:21
  disappearing. And so that is weird because you
• 27:26
  can experience catharsis, but like, I can sing about a
• 27:29
  personal problem and then in a few years that problem is gone.
• 27:31
  But if I'm singing about a world problem and that problem is
• 27:34
  still there a few years later, that's a different thing.
• 27:37
  That is less catharsis. And it makes me like angrier
• 27:40
  than shit. And I and I think that that is
• 27:43
  also like why the music continues to be the way that it
• 27:46
  is. Like there's no, you know, you'd
• 27:48
  think that we'd like start to lighten up after over a decade
• 27:50
  or whatever, but it's just like not, not what's going to happen.
• 27:54
  Like for as long as things are the way that they are and for as
• 27:58
  long as I have to witness the human race doing itself in, in
• 28:03
  the way in which it is. I I think that will sound this
• 28:06
  way. And and there will be like
• 28:08
  catharsis, but limited, you know?
• 28:10
  It does make a lot of sense. Yeah, I guess that's the thing.
• 28:12
  It's like you, you identify a problem and then if the problem
• 28:14
  remains, it's like it's the added, sort of adding insult to
• 28:18
  injury of like I, I see what this is and it's still here and
• 28:21
  it feels worse knowing that. Yeah, definitely.
• 28:24
  And I would say that there's a song called Consumption at the
• 28:27
  end of immersion. And I would say that social
• 28:29
  contract is the second part of that idea because the problem is
• 28:33
  worse. So I've lost my train of
• 28:35
  thought. But yeah, the problem is still
• 28:37
  there. It's, yeah, looking to find
• 28:41
  light in the darkness. So I've, I've interviewed people
• 28:44
  before that make incredibly sonically intense music.
• 28:47
  And something that interests me is, you know, I, I presume that
• 28:52
  if you're going on tour, for example, and you're playing
• 28:54
  music like Primitive Man, there has to be kind of like some fun
• 28:58
  and frivolity in there between you and the rest of the band.
• 29:01
  So I'm, I'm like curious to know from your point of view and
• 29:03
  within Primitive Man, like where's the levity in the
• 29:06
  experience of, of doing what you do?
• 29:08
  I mean, it's jamming with my friends and like, making this
• 29:11
  shit together is like really fun, I think.
• 29:14
  And we are aware of what we are and like how heavy we are and
• 29:17
  stuff. Like we know what we're doing to
• 29:19
  people. It's by design.
• 29:20
  So like, that's fun. Like that is very funny.
• 29:23
  Like, it's funny to be so loud and so heavy and so punishing
• 29:29
  and aware that we are requiring not only attention but, like,
• 29:35
  Sonic tolerance from people, you know?
• 29:38
  I think that that is fun. I think, yeah, that's where the
• 29:42
  levity is. Traveling, meeting people,
• 29:45
  making friends and other bands who are into this shit.
• 29:48
  These are all the best parts of this stuff.
• 29:51
  Yeah. Like, there's a lot of good
• 29:52
  things that have come into my life from creating this, like
• 29:55
  sort of negative art, you know? Well, on that topic of live
• 30:00
  shows, so you've got a tour coming up and you've got some
• 30:03
  great bands that you're playing with, not least of which Today
• 30:06
  is the day. So we spoke a little bit about
• 30:09
  sadness of Prevail, but maybe tell me a bit from your point of
• 30:12
  view, like what's your story with Today is the Day and and
• 30:16
  are you? Well, it's not are you?
• 30:18
  But how exciting is that to be playing with him?
• 30:20
  I don't if you've ever played with them before.
• 30:22
  So I got so I've like met Steve a few times over the years and
• 30:26
  stuff and then I got to do a tour playing solo with where
• 30:32
  Today is a Day in Bunnell and Lydia launching some dates and I
• 30:36
  was on some dates so. Oh, you were on.
• 30:38
  You were on that tour. Oh, shit.
• 30:40
  I didn't realize that because. Yeah, because I spoke to Bunwell
• 30:42
  and yeah, around about the time of that tour.
• 30:45
  OK, so yeah, so I was spiritual poison on that tour as what I
• 30:49
  was playing under and so. OK.
• 30:52
  Yeah. So.
• 30:53
  So we got to do shows with Steve then or whatever and it was
• 30:55
  really cool. And he's known.
• 30:56
  I liked his music for a long time, like when I met him in
• 31:00
  Denver and stuff. I've told him and he's known
• 31:01
  about Primitive man. Like we've kind of been touch
• 31:03
  and go over the years. But then doing that long tour
• 31:06
  with them was when we really got acquainted, I think better than
• 31:09
  ever. And then asking him to do this
• 31:12
  as a dream and the fact that he accepted as a dream because
• 31:15
  today is the day. Me discovering that music is
• 31:19
  like a character divining moment.
• 31:21
  I'll never forget it. I was in a record store with a
• 31:24
  friend and I went and I bought Incantations.
• 31:27
  Diabolical Conquest, some other shit that I can't remember.
• 31:32
  And then I had a older friend with my with me.
• 31:35
  The kid that drove older kid was like, Hey, you should check out
• 31:39
  this record. This is like the most hateful
• 31:41
  shit I've ever heard. And it was a temple of the
• 31:44
  Morning Star. And I was like, well, this cover
• 31:47
  is crazy. This is crazy.
• 31:48
  And we went and we listened to Diabolical Conquest and we
• 31:53
  listened to in the eyes of or I mean temple, the morning star.
• 31:57
  And I remember feeling like this is so unhinged that I like feel
• 32:03
  I can't believe that I'm listening to this.
• 32:05
  Like I, I just remember like that today is the day.
• 32:07
  Open my eyes up to this world where like you could just be
• 32:10
  fucking mad and crazy. Like you didn't need to sing
• 32:14
  about the devil or like any of this shit, which is fine.
• 32:19
  I love plenty of shit that sings about the devil.
• 32:22
  It's that's fine. That's like cool, but see,
• 32:26
  extreme music played through like a different lens.
• 32:29
  And shit with today as a day was just so illuminating for me.
• 32:34
  And I think kind of like laid out the path that I wanted to
• 32:37
  follow for sure. And there's stuff that he does
• 32:39
  as a guitar player that I RIP off and like, all sorts of shit,
• 32:45
  you know what I mean? And Steve said something to me
• 32:49
  when we were on that tour, when I was on that tour with him
• 32:52
  where he was just like, you know, man, like which I, which I
• 32:54
  meant to bring up when we were talking about younger bands,
• 32:56
  just like why I'm bringing it up now.
• 32:58
  He's like, you know, man, people's careers, they have a
• 33:01
  highs and lows and I thought that that was just such a
• 33:04
  fucking Zen thing to hear from the guy who wrote you're going
• 33:08
  to hell, like I was just like put a fucking awesome thing, you
• 33:11
  know, to hear. So I don't know, man, today's a
• 33:13
  day is like is a huge fucking band for me, man, like huge to
• 33:18
  have them supporting primitive man is crazy.
• 33:21
  It's like I I can even barely believe it.
• 33:24
  Talking to you about it now. Oh, well, I'm, I'm so glad that
• 33:28
  we brought this up then because yeah, he's just an absolute
• 33:30
  inspiration to me. So to hear you talking about him
• 33:32
  in in such terms and to hear how you discovered the band as well
• 33:35
  is, yeah, that's very gratifying for me, too.
• 33:38
  I mean dude, the kid that showed it to me too was just like such
• 33:41
  a bad boy, like the scary upperclassman, like leather
• 33:44
  jacket ass with like a fucking pentagram on the back of shit
• 33:47
  like the bad boy. You know?
• 33:48
  Show me today is the day. Like I think.
• 33:53
  We probably wouldn't smoke pot afterwards and shit, you know,
• 33:55
  just like real, real funny youth story, you know?
• 33:59
  But but that moment went on to define a lot about who I am as a
• 34:03
  player and yeah and all stuff so.
• 34:06
  But I think also as well, like they're they're really a good
• 34:08
  illustration of what you were talking about with noise about
• 34:11
  this sort of being this last frontier.
• 34:12
  And it's a thing that doesn't get accepted by a lot of people.
• 34:15
  Like I feel today is the day really inhabit that space.
• 34:17
  It's like they're so creative and they're so free from my
• 34:21
  point of view that it's like, I think for a lot of people,
• 34:24
  they're just like, oh, this is like it's got like if you take
• 34:27
  sadness will prevail. It's like, I know that a lot of
• 34:29
  people aren't going to like the weird piano and the screeching,
• 34:33
  but to me this is like part of what makes the record so
• 34:35
  amazing. But it really does require you
• 34:37
  to accept a lot of different faces.
• 34:40
  Definitely. And I think the one thing about
• 34:42
  Steve is that each record sounds different, like there's a
• 34:45
  today's the day sound, but this fool is like trying something
• 34:48
  different on every record. And I think that that also is a
• 34:51
  is a unique thing that if you're not, if you don't understand
• 34:54
  them, it's going to repulse you. But I think that that's part of
• 34:57
  the genius is that it is sounds like Steve Austin, but every
• 35:02
  single fucking record is sonically takes a turn you
• 35:06
  didn't expect. You know what I mean?
• 35:08
  Like there's a sound there but it just takes turns you didn't
• 35:10
  expect. Like Kiss the Pig and I don't
• 35:13
  know, Supernova are not the same at all for sure.
• 35:17
  Oh well. I.
• 35:18
  Don't want to. I don't want to take up too many
• 35:20
  time talking about today's the day, but oh.
• 35:21
  No, I mean, that's cool and I'm all about it.
• 35:23
  Like, you know, like there's, there's plenty of people like I
• 35:25
  think that today's a day God flesh, like all these kinds of
• 35:29
  guys who have always put noise in there, metal or their music
• 35:34
  are the people that I've always looked up to as a player and as
• 35:37
  a song. I'm like struggling to to say
• 35:39
  more just because I feel like sort of on the spot.
• 35:41
  But I mean, like, obviously, like son and the shit that
• 35:44
  Stephen O'Malley has done and, and, and things like that have
• 35:47
  all been an influence in any, any artist like that who has
• 35:51
  pushed the boundaries with noise and taking it to to these Sonic
• 35:55
  places that not that their peers weren't doing.
• 35:57
  Because this is all the stuff I've been looking to my own life
• 36:00
  and and I love all the other shit, but this is the stuff that
• 36:04
  has really done it for me, you know?
• 36:05
  Yeah, that's a really cool insight to get.
• 36:07
  Ethan. Thank you so much for your time.
• 36:08
  It's been a pleasure to chat with you.
• 36:10
  And yeah, thank you for. Taking the time I hope I
• 36:12
  answered your, your questions fine enough.
• 36:16
  I like ran in here after walking my dogs and like had to make
• 36:20
  sure they didn't bite the neighbor.
• 36:22
  It was this whole thing. So so thank you for taking the
• 36:25
  time and being patient with me. It was, it was all great.
• 36:28
  It was all great. So yeah, I hope that the record
• 36:30
  gets a great reception when it comes out.
• 36:32
  I'm sure everybody that's a fan of Primitive Man is going to
• 36:34
  love it. And I think anybody that can
• 36:36
  appreciate, you know, really sonically intense music that
• 36:39
  does also have some kind of beautiful aspects to it, we'll
• 36:42
  get a lot from it as well. And yeah, I hope you have a
• 36:44
  great tour in in November. Thank you.
• 36:47
  I, I appreciate that very much. We're hoping to come over there
• 36:51
  the year neck of the woods next year.
• 36:53
  So hopefully if that happens and you feel like you're going to
• 36:57
  come to show, you should let us know. 100% I will definitely be
• 37:00
  on the lookout for that. Oh.
• 37:01
  Man, cheers.