Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Divine Intervention With KAT MOSS From SCOWL
Transcript
- 0:18Speaker 1: I'm Kat. Moll's from Skal and I sing in the band.
- 0:22Speaker 1: I sing scream, spit whatever, and Scal's this weird combination
- 0:33Speaker 1: of hardcore punk and alternative rock.
- 0:35Speaker 2: I guess from.
- 0:36Speaker 1: Barry, California, but we do one guitars, just from Philadelphia,
- 0:41Speaker 1: which is on the other side of America, on the
- 0:43Speaker 1: East coast. Yeah, there's five of us and we've been
- 0:49Speaker 1: doing this since twenty nineteen, I want to say.
- 0:54Speaker 2: And it's been a ball. It's been such a blast.
- 0:56Speaker 1: We started as just a DIY hardcore band and we
- 0:59Speaker 1: just wanted to shows with their friends.
- 1:01Speaker 2: And somehow we have fallen into playing.
- 1:05Speaker 1: Shows all over the world and it's been a dream
- 1:08Speaker 1: come true.
- 1:09Speaker 3: Betasic Kat, thanks for joining us today.
- 1:13Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you for having me.
- 1:16Speaker 4: You say somehow, very very modestly though, because I'm saying
- 1:20Speaker 4: it's been a lot of hard work and effort from
- 1:22Speaker 4: you guys to put yourselves there. So it's not just
- 1:24Speaker 4: as if you've you've landed in the middle of all
- 1:26Speaker 4: these bands.
- 1:29Speaker 1: It feels like it sometimes, but you're right that it
- 1:32Speaker 1: has been a lot of hard work and a lot
- 1:35Speaker 1: of grinding, a lot of sleeple snakes on the Classic
- 1:39Speaker 1: Blood sweat and tears for sure.
- 1:42Speaker 3: Now we're here to talk about your new album, Are.
- 1:44Speaker 4: We All Angels, which comes out on April the fourth,
- 1:47Speaker 4: So how do you feel about it?
- 1:51Speaker 2: So excited? I love this record and I I'm definitely
- 1:58Speaker 2: excited to get it out.
- 2:00Speaker 1: I know, I've heard all the songs for about a
- 2:02Speaker 1: year now, and I'm just ready for the rest of
- 2:05Speaker 1: the world to consume it.
- 2:07Speaker 4: Can you tell us me more about it from a
- 2:09Speaker 4: musical point of view and what you're actually going for
- 2:11Speaker 4: with it.
- 2:12Speaker 1: Yeah, there is a lot of things that were unexpected
- 2:16Speaker 1: that happen in the you know, the final product of
- 2:19Speaker 1: the record. When when we went into to write, I
- 2:24Speaker 1: knew I wanted to incorporate a lot more melody and
- 2:29Speaker 1: and showcase my you know, my ear for harmonies and
- 2:33Speaker 1: and just vocal production as a whole, and and you know,
- 2:38Speaker 1: I think everybody in the band wanted to include more
- 2:41Speaker 1: of their personal influences and it kind of created this
- 2:45Speaker 1: really beautiful collage.
- 2:47Speaker 2: Musically that's it's hard.
- 2:49Speaker 1: To put your finger on, like really what it is.
- 2:51Speaker 1: And it's because we weren't focused on applying ourselves to
- 2:54Speaker 1: any one genre, just more so applied ourselves to write
- 3:00Speaker 1: songs that felt good and conveyed the emotions we wanted
- 3:02Speaker 1: to convey. The record is, you know, it's it's very
- 3:09Speaker 1: sparkly sounding in my opinion, it's it's got this like
- 3:14Speaker 1: double gum almost like nineties alternative thing going, and it's
- 3:19Speaker 1: really fun.
- 3:19Speaker 2: But on the poetic.
- 3:21Speaker 1: Side, the lyrics and the story I wanted to kind
- 3:24Speaker 1: of do that just the position of having these like fun,
- 3:28Speaker 1: fealing songs and then talking about some personal stuff that
- 3:36Speaker 1: isn't quite so fun and happy. You know.
- 3:40Speaker 4: It's an interesting point there because all the press that
- 3:44Speaker 4: you read about the album calls it a hardcore album,
- 3:46Speaker 4: but it said Saladier is a little bit shortened in
- 3:49Speaker 4: that respect, I think because there's so much more going on.
- 3:51Speaker 4: You've got some punkin there, there's some alternative rock, there's
- 3:54Speaker 4: some hard rock. There's it's it's not just a hardcore record,
- 3:58Speaker 4: is it.
- 4:00Speaker 2: No, it's it's definitely not.
- 4:02Speaker 1: I wouldn't self claim that even it's it's it's a
- 4:06Speaker 1: not a hardcore record from a band that is a
- 4:09Speaker 1: hardcore bandy you know, that has hardcore or perhaps hardcore
- 4:14Speaker 1: people in the band, and and that kind of creates
- 4:17Speaker 1: this really beautiful thing in my opinion, where you know,
- 4:23Speaker 1: we're just kind of feeling it out as we go
- 4:25Speaker 1: in the dark, and that is the reality of songwriting
- 4:29Speaker 1: as a whole. All doesn't really matter if it's hardcore
- 4:33Speaker 1: for indie music or whatever. But it was very freeing,
- 4:39Speaker 1: very free to enter that space with the music and
- 4:43Speaker 1: and just make what felt right.
- 4:46Speaker 4: Right now, today, you've released the single not Hell, Not Heaven,
- 4:51Speaker 4: and it's a It's a great song. But again, it'd
- 4:55Speaker 4: be hard to change singles to represent the album sonically
- 4:58Speaker 4: because there is such a diversity there.
- 4:59Speaker 3: But does this one guy close.
- 5:04Speaker 4: Close as in as in representing the album musically, so
- 5:07Speaker 4: like sonically, oh.
- 5:10Speaker 2: Hard to answer. I feel like.
- 5:13Speaker 1: Not Hell, not Have It is a bit of an
- 5:15Speaker 1: outlier in some regards. But I also do feel like
- 5:19Speaker 1: every song while some in my pacing structuring, it understand
- 5:27Speaker 1: on its own, and it's really hard to place. It's
- 5:29Speaker 1: hard to pick. I can't pick my favorite song, and
- 5:33Speaker 1: right now my favorite song is not a single song.
- 5:39Speaker 1: I can't really give you. I can't give you a
- 5:41Speaker 1: very straight answer there.
- 5:45Speaker 4: The album opens with the track Special, which is like
- 5:48Speaker 4: it's a hot, rocking, kicking the fight stright up light
- 5:51Speaker 4: what's that particular song to set things off?
- 5:57Speaker 1: I think we knew it would be a good song
- 6:00Speaker 1: to showcase post Psychic Danswer Team, which is our prettiest ep,
- 6:07Speaker 1: and like prior to really announcing this record and giving it,
- 6:10Speaker 1: like giving everyone kind of a full view without the
- 6:14Speaker 1: music verse.
- 6:16Speaker 2: I think that it was in a way a great
- 6:20Speaker 2: you know, bridge between the two.
- 6:25Speaker 4: Not Yea also noted for the album title to you
- 6:29Speaker 4: and the companies off good anyway, there's no question mark
- 6:31Speaker 4: after are we old Angels?
- 6:33Speaker 3: So is it a statement or is it a question?
- 6:37Speaker 2: Off to interpretation, which I know is the worst answer
- 6:40Speaker 2: coming from.
- 6:41Speaker 1: It's something we talked about and we were intentional with
- 6:47Speaker 1: and you know, it was it was a complicated conversation
- 6:51Speaker 1: because to some degree it was like, well, you know,
- 6:54Speaker 1: like let's figure this out. Let's let's make a decision
- 6:58Speaker 1: on question or period or whatever, you know, put the
- 7:01Speaker 1: punctuation in, make it something, and we.
- 7:05Speaker 2: Kind of like no, and in South fashion, we're like, actually.
- 7:09Speaker 1: You don't get to We're not going to make it obvious,
- 7:12Speaker 1: like you get to figure it out for yourself. And
- 7:14Speaker 1: there isn't really any right or wrong answer there because
- 7:17Speaker 1: it's supposed supposed to be introspective.
- 7:20Speaker 4: You know, I know with media answers. No, if it's
- 7:23Speaker 4: a question that I know, you guys don't write these
- 7:30Speaker 4: press releases. But it says in there that the album
- 7:33Speaker 4: finds a band funneling their aggression through a more expansive
- 7:36Speaker 4: version of themselves, which is quite poetic.
- 7:39Speaker 3: Can can you explain what they mean by that?
- 7:43Speaker 1: I think they just mean that we're not just expressing
- 7:45Speaker 1: ourselves through breakdowns and screams and two steps anymore.
- 7:49Speaker 2: It's it's further than that.
- 7:51Speaker 3: Yeah, and then how did you How did you go
- 7:53Speaker 3: about making that happen?
- 7:59Speaker 2: I just the same war and we.
- 8:03Speaker 1: Became we be We challenged ourselves by you know where
- 8:06Speaker 1: maybe in the past we would be writing a.
- 8:08Speaker 2: Song, coming up with riffs that.
- 8:09Speaker 1: Were, you know, would lead into a hardcore part or
- 8:14Speaker 1: something that was more metal inspired. We chose other other
- 8:19Speaker 1: avenues and then at times we we did the hardcore thing,
- 8:22Speaker 1: we did the heavier thing. Also, I feel like musically
- 8:27Speaker 1: the record isn't that shocking. I think it's just some
- 8:33Speaker 1: of the choices I decided to make vocally, we're not
- 8:37Speaker 1: are not expected. Perhaps I didn't I didn't expect them.
- 8:42Speaker 1: I just knew I was going to do it, but
- 8:43Speaker 1: I didn't know what it was going to really like
- 8:45Speaker 1: blush out to be, you know.
- 8:47Speaker 3: Yeah, And was that a difficult process?
- 8:51Speaker 2: No, it was so fun. It was really freeing.
- 8:54Speaker 1: I think it was really freaking because I feel like
- 8:57Speaker 1: I've had these ideas for a long time, so it
- 9:01Speaker 1: was it was finally like coming out of me and
- 9:03Speaker 1: I finally had the the platform in the moment to
- 9:08Speaker 1: just express it, finally after years of being in a
- 9:11Speaker 1: touring environment and not really being able to write besides poetry.
- 9:20Speaker 4: You've also to say previously that the songwriting was more
- 9:23Speaker 4: collaborative on our we Old Angels the House I compared
- 9:27Speaker 4: to about albums.
- 9:30Speaker 1: And in previous Cell history when it comes to, you know, writing, we.
- 9:36Speaker 2: Oftentimes Malachi are guitarists.
- 9:39Speaker 1: One of our guitarists and I would just kind of
- 9:41Speaker 1: take the reins on it and everyone would follow suit.
- 9:45Speaker 1: Whereas this time around, everybody kind of had a moment
- 9:49Speaker 1: where they came up with the core of a song
- 9:51Speaker 1: where it was like, oh, hey, I have this riff idea,
- 9:53Speaker 1: or I have this phil or I would you know,
- 9:57Speaker 1: Mikey and I are other guitarists there was a few
- 10:00Speaker 1: songs where I would he would do a little noodle
- 10:02Speaker 1: and guitar, and or I would sing a little line
- 10:05Speaker 1: and then we'd be like, oh wait, that kind of
- 10:07Speaker 1: works together and do the musician thing. But this is
- 10:10Speaker 1: just the first time it came together in such a
- 10:12Speaker 1: more collaborative effort, and I think it was one. Oh
- 10:18Speaker 1: the door was more opened for that because we wanted
- 10:21Speaker 1: to give this like maturation to the music. And we
- 10:26Speaker 1: also just didn't want to write.
- 10:27Speaker 2: The same stuff over and over.
- 10:28Speaker 1: And I think it's very important to be collaborative so
- 10:32Speaker 1: you can come up with new things and new ideas.
- 10:36Speaker 2: I think you're doing yourself with a service.
- 10:38Speaker 1: By not working with new people, are working with people
- 10:41Speaker 1: in a different way, and I don't want to write
- 10:43Speaker 1: the same record over Yeah.
- 10:45Speaker 3: No, So the fans of the band, how does are
- 10:49Speaker 3: We All Angels? Deficit? Last one? Psychic dance routine?
- 10:54Speaker 1: I think that psychic dance routine is a bit of
- 10:56Speaker 1: a good cracked door.
- 10:58Speaker 2: Where are We All Angels?
- 10:59Speaker 1: Is a full step through the doorway of what we
- 11:04Speaker 1: are trying to achieve sonically, and what that is is,
- 11:09Speaker 1: I guess more melody and more influence showing showcasing more
- 11:13Speaker 1: influence from just from outside hardcore, you know, not just
- 11:17Speaker 1: hardcore punk, or at least doing in a wet.
- 11:21Speaker 2: Doing it.
- 11:26Speaker 1: Unique and maybe something ever done before, and perhaps trying
- 11:29Speaker 1: to do something that people can't pipe put their fingers on.
- 11:32Speaker 2: You know.
- 11:35Speaker 4: This is also Scale's first album with Bad Oceans, So
- 11:39Speaker 4: what does that mean for the band?
- 11:40Speaker 3: Change the labels at this stage of your career.
- 11:43Speaker 2: I mean, it's exciting.
- 11:44Speaker 1: I'm a huge fan of Democeans and the artists they have,
- 11:48Speaker 1: and we take pride in being outliers if we can,
- 11:52Speaker 1: you know, and so it's really exciting to think of
- 11:56Speaker 1: being on this label that has primarily like you know,
- 11:59Speaker 1: indeed alternative of.
- 12:01Speaker 2: Soft, softer sounding musicians and being this like kind of wrong.
- 12:05Speaker 1: Like sandpapery sounding band, and it's to me, it's very juicy.
- 12:10Speaker 2: I love it, and it doesn't.
- 12:12Speaker 1: I'm not insecure about it, Like I find a lot
- 12:15Speaker 1: of comfort and doing something a little bit backwards and different.
- 12:21Speaker 5: You know.
- 12:21Speaker 2: It's it's it's cool.
- 12:23Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, let's see something unexpected. But at the
- 12:28Speaker 1: same time, it's also it's it's it's terrifying because you know,
- 12:34Speaker 1: we're the smallest band slash artist on on the label
- 12:38Speaker 1: and and it's just it's it's new territory.
- 12:43Speaker 2: But I have a lot.
- 12:44Speaker 1: Of faith in the band and like my my best
- 12:48Speaker 1: friends who put in all the work with me, and
- 12:51Speaker 1: that we can just make something fun out of it
- 12:54Speaker 1: no matter what.
- 12:57Speaker 3: You mentioned before A scout fall back in two thousand
- 12:59Speaker 3: and change.
- 13:00Speaker 4: So what was a musical climate like the guy birth
- 13:03Speaker 4: of the band and where do you go spitting?
- 13:05Speaker 3: Initially, I mean, we.
- 13:08Speaker 1: Just were a local hardcore band. We started, like I said,
- 13:13Speaker 1: with the intentions of just playing shows with our friends.
- 13:15Speaker 2: And to me, it was like I love hardcore. I
- 13:19Speaker 2: loved hardcore. It was like everything.
- 13:23Speaker 1: I just wanted to participate in any way I could.
- 13:27Speaker 1: And I always wanted to sing in a band. I've
- 13:29Speaker 1: never done it before, so I'm really scared and I
- 13:34Speaker 1: didn't want to stand in my own way anymore. It
- 13:35Speaker 1: was kind of like a leap I wanted to take.
- 13:37Speaker 1: And there was no intention beyond just.
- 13:42Speaker 2: Doing the band and writing a demo and playing some shows,
- 13:45Speaker 2: like some local shows and the dream like.
- 13:48Speaker 1: The biggest goal was to just play with like our
- 13:51Speaker 1: friend's band Drain, you know, Hands of God, Bulbs, just
- 13:56Speaker 1: just Bay area, like the big Bay Area bands, hardcore
- 14:00Speaker 1: Bay Area bands to me and to the rest of
- 14:02Speaker 1: the band, and not beautiful. Those beautiful things happened and
- 14:07Speaker 1: it was like it was gold.
- 14:10Speaker 2: It was an amazing experience.
- 14:12Speaker 1: And then it just kept going and it's been this
- 14:15Speaker 1: like unexpected like joy, you know.
- 14:22Speaker 2: But I had just as much.
- 14:24Speaker 1: Fun and just as much of a good time playing
- 14:26Speaker 1: those you know, tiny rooms with like a bunch of
- 14:31Speaker 1: hardcore kids as I do, you know, playing festivals or
- 14:36Speaker 1: having you know, quote unquote bigger opportunities.
- 14:39Speaker 2: It doesn't really matter to me. It's just it's just
- 14:42Speaker 2: really exciting to go play music.
- 14:45Speaker 3: Beautiful under refreshing.
- 14:46Speaker 5: Right.
- 14:47Speaker 4: We sort of mentioned the musical journey you've gone on,
- 14:50Speaker 4: like you've started hardcore and you've branched out through the
- 14:53Speaker 4: park and through the rock and the helt journey rocks
- 14:55Speaker 4: along those lines. How much musical growth do you think
- 14:58Speaker 4: Scale has left in yet?
- 15:02Speaker 2: I hope it never stocks. I think I don't. I
- 15:06Speaker 2: don't think that'll ever saw.
- 15:10Speaker 1: I don't want to write the same record over and over, so,
- 15:13Speaker 1: you know, whatever happens happens, I can't quite predict it.
- 15:16Speaker 2: I don't have a crystal ball but.
- 15:18Speaker 1: I don't foresee any sell anyone cell record sounding the same.
- 15:24Speaker 3: Beautiful cat Thanks very much for your time.
- 15:26Speaker 4: They an absolutely pleasure speaking with you and the album
- 15:29Speaker 4: music Cracker so hopefully brings you out of an astrayer
- 15:32Speaker 4: and we can catch up for a via.
- 15:34Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we'll be over there.
- 15:52Speaker 6: I want to protection. Should have learned how to shut
- 16:02Speaker 6: my mom then I can.
- 16:04Speaker 7: It's up my sister that tsis catty and I didn't
- 16:09Speaker 7: want to sense my question. It's not if I have one,
- 16:13Speaker 7: But she's like, listen, I'm gonna send to John your name.
- 16:19Speaker 7: Listend you that's sister.
- 16:23Speaker 6: Come do I get a swell you have but you
- 16:31Speaker 6: see and I'll get a little swell.
- 16:37Speaker 4: You have.
- 16:39Speaker 7: Pleas and my ls it shots in them INDs so
- 16:48Speaker 7: of time and your own your names, my dreams not
- 16:55Speaker 7: a button.
- 16:55Speaker 6: Now you'll see that there's no way out the street.
- 17:00Speaker 6: It was kind of fun down he says, a way,
- 17:04Speaker 6: just say thats you. Then that you fast my shoe.
- 17:10Speaker 7: S sorry, excited your fruit strydal.
- 17:16Speaker 6: She's like dressing. I'm that's that's a job.
- 17:19Speaker 7: NA send me like she got a sound, fam Do
- 17:26Speaker 7: I get you sworry.
- 17:27Speaker 1: You have.
- 17:31Speaker 6: So see and get sway you.
- 17:42Speaker 4: And my my words.
- 17:44Speaker 6: It's shaped it, but it the lives of Dill and
- 17:51Speaker 6: finds you all.
- 17:54Speaker 5: Your name, sy get Outside had.
- 18:27Speaker 6: Got so
- 18:33Speaker 4: Hi