A Lot Like Birds Vocalist Kurt Travis Uses His Brief Downtime to Record Solo Album

The life of a touring musician can be grueling. You write and write and write some more, then you record an album and get it mixed, mastered and pressed. After all that, if you have any money left, you release said album and if all goes well and all your ducks are in a row, the next logical step is to leave normal life behind and hop in the van (or if you’re lucky, a bus or motorhome) and tour the shit out of the album. It’s a process that’s not cheap and not easy.

Kurt Travis, co-vocalist of Sacramento-based post-hardcore outfit A Lot Like Birds (and former co-vocalist of fellow Sacramento-based band Dance Gavin Dance) knows the drill all too well. “A Lot Like Birds doesn’t give me a lot of downtime, but when they do, I’m kind of thankful for it because then I can go forward with some solo stuff,” Travis recently told Submerge during an interview in his new downtown Sacramento loft. “ALLB was going to do this European tour and it ended up falling through. Immediately I was like, OK, I have this amount of time, lets bang out a record and lets go out on tour and sell it.”

Travis enlisted the help of longtime friend and former bandmate Zachary Garren (they played in DGD together years ago). Garren, who now plays in the instrumental band Strawberry Girls and lives in Salinas, Calif., would come up to Sacramento for a few days at a time and the two would write songs and work on the album’s pre-production. They were also sending song ideas back and forth even when not in the same town. Before they knew it, they were sitting on a full-length’s worth of solid material, had a label ready to release it (Blue Swan Records, a new label that is run by Dance Gavin Dance’s Will Swan) and a full-on tour booked to support the record, which will be titled Everything Is Beautiful and will be released sometime later in May.

As of press time, Travis and Garren had only released one song off of Everything Is Beautiful, a pop-y, upbeat ditty called “Brain Lord.” At last check, it had 16,031 views on YouTube after only being uploaded a week prior. With no plans to release any other material from the album before its full release, Submerge was lucky enough to get a private listening party where Garren and Travis allowed us to hear rough, unmixed, unmastered versions of seven of the 12 songs that will appear on the album. What we heard was not some half-assed solo effort from a lead singer who just wants to put something out for the fuck of it. What we heard was a focused, mature, surprisingly pop-friendly album that touches on surf-rock with lo-fi garage vibes, glittering and noodly lead guitar lines, lush layers of vocal harmonies with sprinkles of synth-y goodness. It’s light and accessible (we only heard one part with aggressive vocals, and it was more of a shout than a scream) without being overly cheesy. It’s an artsy pop album, if you will, and it’ll more than likely have you moving and grooving.

Check out an excerpt of our conversation and mark your calendars for Kurt Travis’ tour kick-off show at Luigi’s on Wednesday, May 14, 2014.

EDITOR’S UPDATE: As of May 13, 2014, Kurt Travis’ Everything Is Beautiful was available for streaming here.

Tell me a little bit about the album title, Everything Is Beautiful. What’s the reasoning or motivation behind calling it that?
Kurt Travis: With every release I kind of have a theme, because it’s fun. It’s fun to have a certain message. My first [album theme] being this little girl I knew, she was just learning how to speak, and I related to her because it was kind of like my first solo effort and the songs were very primitive. So it just kind of had this theme, that’s why I called it Wha Happen. She kept asking me that. For this [album theme], I’ve been under this impression lately. I’m very happy. I’m very creative. I’m doing really, really good. I’m having an amazing time with A Lot Like Birds and I’m having an amazing time writing my own stuff with Zach. The theme is Everything Is Beautiful because, well, it is. Just appreciating things that aren’t necessarily beautiful, but you watch them, and they change and your perspective on them becomes different. Kind of that sort of thing like, what is beauty, or what is art? I could get really crazy on you. We could talk about what is beauty and what isn’t beauty, but it would be wrong. Everything is beauty.

Would you say this is the most pop friendly thing you’ve ever done?
Zachary Garren: It’s definitely the poppiest.
KT: It’s the poppiest freaking thing I’ve ever done in my whole life, and you know what’s really weird is I was really trying not to. With this record I was trying to go for that like new wave sound…and it came out super pop-y and funky and groovy.

How does your approach to writing lyrics for your solo material differ from when you’re writing with A Lot Like Birds?
KT: They’re very, very different. Nowadays I’ve been writing very conceptually, not as song-to-song-to-song. But kind of an atmosphere or a story within that song, and kind of vicariously really, which is weird, because that’s something that I really don’t do. I usually write from life and sorrow and just, you know, therapeutically healing myself. I don’t really do that anymore. I guess I don’t really have the need to. I don’t have to be extremely worried about what’s going to happen next. That’s totally kept me up at night in younger years when it comes to music.

Your work with your other bands no doubt keeps you guys busy: Constant touring, writing, recording, doing press, etc. Why not just use your down time to relax? What is it that drives you to want to create music even during your little bit of time off?
KT: I think Zach and I will totally say the same thing. It almost feels the opposite, you know what I mean? If you’re constantly creating and you’re doing different genres and such, I feel like sometimes the more opposite the genre, the more I’m just secretly influenced by it because it’s completely different.
ZG: I just like to create a lot. Some days I’ll do way more than other days…
KT: When I tell him to write a song, he’s got like six the next day. By the time I’m done listening to those, he’s got two more. And then when we get to the studio he’s like, oh man, I got to relearn these. It’s like that show Heroes where the guy blacks out and just does some amazing shit.
ZG: Being a musician is different than working a 9-to-5 sort of job. It’s not easy, but it’s different. It’s still fun to a degree.
KT: Even if I didn’t write a record this last month and immediately go back out on tour, I probably would have worked an odd job for a month and did it that way. But instead, I made a record, and I invested money in the T-shirts I’m going to sell on tour, stuff like that.

So in a way, it’s kind of like an “in between job” that just happened to be creating a record?
KT: Exactly. When Joe [Arrington, drummer for ALLB and who also plays on Everything Is Beautiful] is home, he plays with like four different cover bands and makes way more money… I guess there is this mentality of like, work your fucking ass off, because we are privileged enough to be able to play music.
ZG: Creating music in a way is also kind of downtime. If you’re a musician, what do you do in your downtime from your job? You’re probably doing music. We’re just kind of having extra fun. We do it because we like it and want to try to keep getting better and hopefully making better stuff than we have in the past.
KT: The more you make music and go out on tour, the more you’re going to gain fans. At this point, I’ve been doing it for almost 10 years, I might as well just keep on. Kids still appreciate it and still buy the previous stuff and the new stuff. They’re still buying it, so…
ZG: It’s cool to switch it up, too, because this new album isn’t like anything we’ve done in a long time. It’s the most accessible kind of thing. There’s no screaming so it’s a more mature version of some of our past stuff.

With this album being so much more pop friendly than most of your guys’ past stuff, is it crazy to think that this could very well become the most popular shit you’ve ever done?
KT: It very well could be, although you never know.
ZG: It has the potential, but there are so many little things.
KT: I mean, my manager is Eric Rushing and he’s pretty freaking connected. I did my best. A lot of the times I’ve shown him stuff, and he’s like, “Dude this is fucking incredible, what am I supposed to do with this? This is the best song I could never do anything about.” So this record will definitely be like, “Here you go man, this is probably the most accessible thing you can get out of me, what can we do with it now?” And I think Eric can do a lot.
ZG: And it’s still creative music too, which is cool. This is going to be like our parents’ favorite record.

On the same day that you dropped the first single off your album, Jonny Craig and Tilian Pearson, two other vocalists with past or present DGD ties, also dropped new songs from their new projects. Was that just a big coincidence, or was that meticulously planned out by your management or something like that?
ZG: Not planned at all.
KT: Swear to god. Not planned. We wanted to put it out a couple days earlier, but it didn’t work out. That’s what happens.

Don’t you think in a weird way it might have worked to everyone’s advantage?
KT: Oh we loved it! We milked the shit out of it. It was crazy awesome cross promotion. I talked to Tilian, too. He was totally super happy about it, just like, “Oh my gosh this is going to boost everything!”

One question that I feel a lot of people are curious about is what your relationship is like with all those guys? Jonny, Tilian, all the other DGD guys… I feel like people think there is all this drama. Is there?
KT: No, no. Jonny was at the recent DGD show at Assembly, and I was at that show with Zach. I see Jonny at Ace or Assembly or whatever. I talked to Tilian after the show, shit like that, we were all talking and hanging out after the show. Everybody is just doing their thing. There’s a lot of shit you can check out from all of us, there’s just a big resume from all of us, and that’s really cool.

See Kurt Travis, Zachary Garren and their newly formed backing band play songs off of Everything Is Beautiful at one of the few remaining shows at Luigi’s on Wednesday, May 14, 2014. Also performing will be Hotel Books and So Much Light. Show starts at 7 p.m. and all ages are welcome.

The Speed of Sound in Seawater is Ready to Take the Next Step

Words by Andrew Scoggins • Photo by Phill Mamula

Sacramento produces some odd bands. From the barbaric yawps of industrial-rap duo Death Grips to the hedonistic dance-rock in short shorts of !!!, Sacramento has never had a concrete “scene” in the usual sense. Sure, there were a few smatterings of crust punk and that unfortunate period in the mid-‘00s where it seemed you couldn’t go to a venue without hearing Christian hardcore, but no one genre has ever truly dominated the scene. So it makes sense that math-rock band The Speed of Sound in Seawater would spring through the cracks in the concrete and onto the national stage. The Speed of Sound in Seawater is alternately geeky and totally badass, and it’s this awkward dichotomy that makes them so interesting and, well, completely endearing.

Everyone in the band looks like the quintessential laidback 20-something college student, which makes sense because two-thirds of the band is still going to school between tours. Damien Verrett just graduated from UC Davis with a degree in technicultural studies, bassist Luke Ulrici is currently studying microbiology and drummer Fernando Oliva is studying architectural design. These aren’t the easiest majors but it makes sense to have smart guys in a math-rock band.

On a recent visit to the band’s practice space (guitarist Damien Verrett’s parents’ house in deep Elk Grove suburbia), the living room is crowded with amps and instruments. The guys pick them up, and, after fiddling with a Mariah carey sample, Verrett looks over to Oliva, who counts off. And the band just goes.

The first thing you’re struck by is the technicality of the music and how seamless the transition is from their recorded songs. The beats are crisp, the melodies are spot-on and the band simply motors like it’s another day at the office. It’s like it’s not a big deal that Verrett is shredding with the frenetic energy of The Fall of Troy or that Oliva is beating every inch of his minimalistic kit to create the thundering, jittering rhythms that hold the intricate workings of the song together. But in between the complexities and musicality you find yourself humming along to the fat, glimmering pop hooks in songs like “Lots of Love for Logan,” and “The Oddest Sea.” Verrett’s crystal-clear voice brings comparisons to Circa Survive’s Anthony Green or even to some more pop-y indie acts like Freelance Whales or even Ben Gibbard. All these disparate elements blend and shift, and work in a way that doesn’t quite make sense, but is incredibly intriguing. And that’s The Speed of Sound in Seawater’s charm. The band is utterly without pretension, they’re simply really good friends who make really, really good music.

The Speed of Sound in Seawater is a band that readily rejects most, if not all of the typical rockstar clichés. There’s no band drama, the guys don’t party (“I’ll drink a little bit but then we have to get up and drive for 13 hours, so I can’t really drink that much,” Verrett said). They don’t have groupies (“It’s really just a lot of like really young girls and some old creepy guys, which is kind of disturbing,” Oliva said). They just come together and rock their balls off. And that is exactly what they did when they came together in August to record their first proper LP in Seattle, First Contact.

“In this one we just participated a lot more in the songwriting process together. Before it was just Damien who’d come and be like, ‘Hey check out this sweet riff bro,’ and then I’d be like, ‘Check out this lick bro,’ and then it’d be like, ‘You wanna put it together bro?’ and then we’d high five.” Oliva said with a laugh.

“I just wanted it to be really polished, really clean where you still have that verse-chorus structure but with some different elements thrown in to keep it interesting,” Verrett said.

This marks a departure from the band’s previous, admittedly brotastic, method of simply jamming out songs until they worked.

“Before, we would really just kind of feel out the songs and the time changes on the fly. It was super stressful,” Oliva said.

“It’s like one time it’ll be really good and the rest of the time it’s just going to be awful,” Ulrici said.

But this change to a more structured approach has not been without its detractors. The band has gotten a few calls from their “fans” to return to their older, more chaotic style that was present when they released their first two EP’s, Blue Version and Red Version, four years ago.

“It’s like you spend hard-earned money, you work for hours and hours writing and practicing, and then you go to a really nice studio to put out the best thing you possibly can. And then some stupid idiot on the Internet just goes, ‘well, it’s not as good as that one song you wrote in two hours and recorded in your fuckin’ bedroom.’ It’s just frustrating,” Oliva said.

But these small hiccups seem to just be growing pains for a band that is attempting to plan a national tour for the summer.

“I think every band goes through something similar,” Verrett said. “We’re just growing up I guess.”
“It’s just about writing good songs and good melodies. It’s about musicianship rather than just being like world’s best fucking drummer!” Oliva said.

The new approach seems to have paid off as First Contact is easily the band’s catchiest and most polished record to date. The technicality of the math-rock element of the band is still preserved in songs like “Soulmate 2.1” and “Anyanka,” but these sections are interspersed with hooky vocal melodies that give the tracks some breathing room. Instead of unhinged, frenetic jamming, the songs feel like songs. The dynamics build, ebb and flow. One of the highlights of the album, “The Macabray,” even takes a few interludes with violins, accordions and clarinets to build and layer the song brilliantly. It is in these instances where the technicality is honed to a heartbreaking point, that the band’s gift for writing simply beautiful music shines through.

This is not to say that The Speed of Sound in Seawater has given up the immediacy that made their early works so enduring in the eyes of their fans. The stomping payoff to “Apples to Apples, Dust to Dust” is as great a crescendo as the band has ever written. And if that isn’t enough, the band still uses their prog-y, rowdy shout-along “Hot and Bothered by Space” as a bombastic live finale.

Overall, The Speed of Sound in Seawater is simply a brilliantly talented band that somehow manages to stay humble even at the onset of their wider success.

“Honestly I get more excited to meet the fans than they are to meet me,” said Oliva, “I still get stoked when we’re hanging out in a parking lot in Oklahoma or something and somebody comes up to me and goes, ‘I drove six hours to see you guys and you fucking killed it!’”

“It’s like someone will get a tattoo and I’ll be like ‘Let me take a picture so I can show my mom!’” Verett said with a laugh.

The Speed of Sound in Seawater is still a young, growing band but look to see these guys blow up in a big way. Sacramento is lucky to have them, for at least a little while longer.

Start the New Year off right with The Speed of Sound in Seawater when they play what is sure to be a must-see show at Luigi’s Fungarden in Sacramento on Jan. 2, 2014. It will be the first show of the band’s Unsinkable Tour, so be sure to send them off properly. Feed Me Jack and Paper Pistols will also perform.

What would Sacramento do without our beloved Danny Secretion (of local punk legends The Secretions)? I, for one, do not want to imagine what our music scene would be like without people like him that are so passionate and dedicated to promoting good punk rock bands, both local and touring. Every year for the past several years Danny has put together a big-ass weekend of shows to celebrate his birthday and to also raise money for The American Cancer Society. For Danny, these shows are personal.

“Cancer took my father from me a little more than five years ago,” he recently told Submerge. “Cancer has affected so many of my friends and their families. Doing these shows for the past several years has been so unbelievably therapeutic for me.”

This year the shows will go down on Friday, Nov. 16 and Saturday, Nov 17, 2012 at Luigi’s Fungarden, both start at 8 p.m. and are all-ages. And the final show on Sunday, Nov. 18 will be at Press Club (21-and-over) starting at 5 p.m. There is a cool twist to this year’s event: all of the bands will be performing tribute sets!

“I always love ‘themed shows’ like this,” Danny said. “Bands picked a band to cover and I think it will lead to a very special and fun night for the folks who come out to support. You’re going to see local bands covering everything from Black Flag to Billy Bragg.” Some notables: The Left Hand will do a Misfits set, Dead Dads will cover Alkaline Trio songs, The Community are doing Bad Religion tunes and Cold Heart Re-Press are playing Murder City Devil tracks. Can you say “awesome!” and “yes please?” All proceeds from the shows and from the limited edition T-shirts that Danny has made will go directly to The American Cancer Society, so come out and hear some local bands play familiar tunes all for a good cause. For details on when certain bands will be playing, visit Facebook.com/secretions/events.

The very first time I heard Sacramento band San Kazakgascar way back in 2008 at a small show at Javalounge, I was hooked. What wasn’t to love about their “Quasi-Middle Eastern/Indian psychedelia” sound? First off, they have a badass clarinet player (Mike Woo), which I’d like to see more of in live band settings, and secondly, they play a style of music that, at least to my knowledge, nobody else in town even comes close to. Imagine Sonic Youth jamming with a sitar player at an open-air market. Imagine that killer backing track you just couldn’t put your finger on in a VICE documentary. Imagine The Black Lips tinkering on weird instruments after smoking a “peace pipe.” Imagine tribal drumming and sweet weaving melodies from an electric violin with drone-y, chant-y vocals. Smash all that together played by a bunch of dudes here in the Sacramento area and you’re getting close to San Kazakgascar. Well, sort of. After releasing two full-lengths their newest EP, titled Drought Times, will be their first self-recorded release. The band recorded it at bassist Greg Hain’s “modest wood dwelling,” and it is also their first release with new violinist John Cypher. A clutch addition I must say. Guitarist and vocalist Jed Brewer, drummer Paul Takushi and the aforementioned Woo (on clarinet) round out the group. On songs “The Switchbacks Are Crumbling” and “Crispy Lords,” Brewer used a custom-made gourd guitar that the band says “creates a quasi-sitar like sustain.” They will be performing new songs at their show on Nov. 3 at Luigi’s Fungarden, where you can also snag their new EP. Knock Knock and Nacho Business will also perform. Show starts at 8 p.m., all ages are welcome, $5 cover. For more information on the band, visit http://latherrecords.com/sankaz/

Faith is a powerful thing. It drives people to do all kinds of things–both positive and negative. For Sacramento Christian hard rockers The Seeking, faith has been a nourishing force in the band members’ lives. The band stands to release its full-length debut, Yours Forever, on Nov. 6, 2012. Before that, they will launch on a mammoth cross-country excursion, touring in support of Woe, Is Me.

The tour begins in Atlanta on Nov. 2, 2012 and circumnavigates the United States before culminating in Greensboro, N.C. The trip will keep The Seeking busy, playing shows almost every day, and it’s so extensive that some of the band members (which include Taylor Green, vocals/screaming; Dylan Housewright, clean vocals/guitar; Grayson Smith, guitar; Shane Tiller, bass; and Ben Wood, drums) had quit their day jobs, taking a leap of faith in their music, so to speak.

It would be a nerve-wracking experience for anyone, diving headlong into a career in music, but considering the members of The Seeking range just 18 to 21 in age, it may even be more so.

“We’re probably going to cry,” Taylor Green joked in the first of two phone conversations about the band spending such an extended time away from family.

Green started the band with Housewright in 2010, the two still in high school. Green wasn’t sure what his role would be in the band they wanted to get together. He considered bass and guitar, but didn’t want to buy the gear. He even thought about drumming, but the physical coordination proved difficult.

“I was going to try to do drums, but the only thing I really needed to try to get down was the feet,” he said. “It’s the hardest freaking thing. I don’t know how Ben does it.”

Green had done more traditional singing in his church’s youth group, however, and settled on becoming Housewright’s vocal counterpoint in The Seeking. Though Green also provides traditional clean vocals, his guttural screams shake up Housewright’s soaringly melodic voice.

“Screaming showed up out of nowhere,” Green said. “I figured I’d just try it. I just went for it.”

It would seem Green made the right decision. The band signed to a label (Razor and Tie) in September, and when Submerge talked to Green, he and the band were in Los Angeles, recording with well-known producer John Feldmann, who’s worked with a litany of well known artists (The Used and Papa Roach this year alone) and is also the frontman for pop-punk stalwarts Goldfinger.

Listening to The Seeking’s Yours Forever reveals a barrage of heavy rock sounds–crushing guitars, pummeling breakdowns and snarling vocals–but the album’s most striking feature is its melodicism. It’s the band’s pop tendencies that The Seeking is working to bring out under Feldmann’s keen, catchy songwriting sensibilities. Green reported that the band was re-recording “Alone,” perhaps the most hook-laden track on Yours Forever, reworking it to make it even more radio-friendly as well as working on a new as-yet untitled song the band co-wrote with the producer that should be released in 2013. In the following interview, Green described what it was like working with Feldmann, offered clues into the band’s first music video and discussed matters of faith.

How has it been working with John Feldmann? What have you done in the studio so far?
Oh, it’s amazing. It’s an awesome experience working with him. The bands he’s recorded are legendary bands, and he’s done some solo artists as well. So far, it’s been awesome. We’ve done a lot of demoing the past couple days, and today we started doing the final product and it turned out really good. We’re laying down some drums, we got the bass track laid down in there. It’s turning out really well.

You mentioned a couple days ago that you were going to be working on “Alone.” Is that the track you’re going with for the radio?
We’re actually working on two songs. We’re releasing “Alone” on the album, the original one, but this one is redone a little bit. It’s going to have some new parts to it. It’s going to be released separately for something for radio–hopefully it will get there. We’ve got another song that we started completely from scratch, and it’s all ready to go. It’s all demoed out. That one sounds amazing as well.

You said you were working on rewriting the chorus for “Alone” with John Feldmann. How was it writing with him?
His writing is pretty cool. His studio is separate from his house–he works on his property–but he’ll go play his piano in his house. Dylan met up with him at the house and they worked something out. It’s definitely hot, and it’s definitely catchy, and it’s definitely awesome. It’s going to fit so well.

Tell me about this new song you guys started from scratch. Was it based on any ideas you and the band had kicking around?
We had some ideas, but we came in and we didn’t really get a chance to show them. He [Feldmann] started off asking us some questions when we first got there and took off and started writing. We came together and figured everything out. It’s all from scratch. We started writing it when we got here. It’s turning out awesome.

What kind of stuff did John ask you guys to get you going?
He just wanted to get to know us a little bit, to see what kind of band we were. We covered the fact that we were a Christian band. He asked us about how we grew up and what type of music we started playing and how were we before we got signed, and how we’re evolving. He went off and started recording stuff. The chorus is definitely the catchiest part, but it’s a really pop-y side to us. We think people are going to dig it.

You guys seem to be exploring the pop-ier side of things. You were saying that you came from a heavier music background. Is it fun for you to do something outside of your comfort zone?
It’s really fun. We’ve been playing a style for so long, and we definitely see ourselves staying in that style for a while, but this is something that’s different from the album. It’s way pop-ier than the album, but it’s fun to go in there and throw down some singing–no screaming at all.

You’re going to be filming your first music video on Sunday. What song are you shooting the video for?
It’s going to be for the title track, “Yours Forever.” I’m not sure where it’s going to be yet, but it’s somewhere in SoCal. It’s going to be fun.

Did you have a hand in the concept of the video?
Yeah, we picked the concept a couple weeks ago. We had about three concepts to choose from, and this one fit the meaning of the lyrics more. The other two didn’t fit the lyrics too well, but this one definitely did.

Can you talk about the concept more?
I don’t think so [laughs]. I’m not too sure what I’m allowed to talk about. The lyrics are about God talking to us… I’ll get into a little bit. I believe it’s about a girl, and something happens where she could lose her life. Right at the last minute, or right after she dies, her life flashes before her eyes, and then the music video kicks in, like everything kicks in, to what she sees in her future. It flashes to her at the end, to her before her dying, and then the video changes from there, and there’s a twist to it. I’m really excited about it. It’s a cool concept.

A lot of your music deals with your faith. Is that the band’s first goal when it comes to making music? Are you concerned with expressing that?
Definitely. We want people to know that we express our faith through our music. We’re not like those preaching bands, like For Today, but when we play, we want to show people that we’re there to love on them, and God is there to love on them. We’re here for a reason, not just to play music, but we’re here to be a shoulder to cry on or a friend to them. We’re trying to show God’s love through the band to them. It’s just an opportunity to show people that they’re not alone in struggle, that if they want to try God out, we definitely encourage that. Just, not make them feel uncomfortable when they come to watch us, that we’re there to simply hang out with them and talk with them about anything. If they want to have faith in the Lord, then we’re there to encourage them. Faith is a huge thing with the band. It’s something we want people to recognize.

Was music one of the things that helped you discover your own faith?
Yeah. I became a Christian when I was young, but nothing really hit me until I started high school, and even then, I wasn’t in any bands or anything. I grew up in a Christian home. My parents didn’t, but when I was born, they became Christian and their faiths grew as well. They didn’t pressure me like a lot of parents would. It was more of a choice for myself. I was always a clean-cut kid. In high school, I thought for a long time I’ve been faking it, but let me see what it is to really put myself [into faith]. It was an awesome experience. I grew to love the Lord. Music is one thing I want to do with the band, because I knew it would get me out of my comfort zone of just staying in my hometown and going to church and being on the worship team. I wanted to step outside my comfort zone and see where God could take me. I trust Him to take me out on the road…and see what He could do with me. It’s an awesome opportunity, and it’s going to change my life.

The Sacramento area will get a few chances to see The Seeking live. First, they play with Jonny Craig for a two-night stint at Luigi’s Fungarden on Oct. 26 and 27, 2012. The band returns on Nov. 19, 2012 with Woe, Is Me at Ace of Spades. The Seeking has also set up a donation page to raise money for gas during their long arduous trek across America. Help keep the fuel tank full by going to http://www.indiegogo.com/theseeking. For more show info, go to http://www.facebook.com/theseeking.

(Photo above: Ken Doose w/ Lys Mayo of Dead Dads)

This has been a great summer for music festivals in and around Sacramento, if you read this column you already know that. Launch was a success, Punch and Pie Fest was rad, every Friday at Cesar Chavez Plaza felt like a mini-fest with Concerts in the Park, local band ZuhG threw its own fest, American River Music Festival is next weekend in Coloma, Calif., and in a couple weeks the highly anticipated mega-rock-show Aftershock Festival will no doubt shake Sacramento to its core. Here’s another one to add to that list: Bat Guano Fest. Trust us, it won’t be as shitty as it might sound.

“Bat Guano Fest is a two-day event at Luigi’s Fungarden that’s being held to celebrate my birthday and the release of my latest compilation Batshit Crazy,” said Ken Doose, the event’s organizer.

It’s also the unofficial 22nd anniversary for his record label, Bat Guano Productions. Taking place on Friday, Sept. 14 and Saturday, Sept. 15, 2012, Bat Guano Fest will feature 17 punk bands (five on Friday, 12 on Saturday) hand selected by Doose himself. Bands like The Left Hand, Bobby Joe Ebola and the Children MacNuggits, Dead Dads, The Walking Dead, Support the Rabid and many others are scheduled to play. The Batshit Crazy compilation will feature 31 bands, most hailing from Sacramento, and is being released as a free digital download available at http://batguanoproductions.blogspot.com/ on Sept. 19, Doose’s actual birthday. A limited amount of physical CDs will be available at the Luigi’s shows as well as at Phono Select.

“Batshit Crazy is Bat Guano’s latest effort to create an audio document/time capsule of the ever-changing Sacramento punk scene,” Doose said.

Friday’s show is only $5 and kicks off at 8 p.m., Saturday’s show starts a little earlier, 3 p.m., and is still only $7. Both shows are all-ages. Happy birthday Ken, and thanks for throwing shows and putting out comps, the local music community appreciates it!

If you attended last Saturday night’s show at Luigi’s in Davis as part of Davis Music Fest, you would have never known you were witnessing the final show the venue would host. The very next day, Luigi’s quietly closed its doors for good. “It just didn’t resonate and never got better,” owner Linda Brida told Submerge of the all-ages venue and pizza joint, going on to say that Davis “is an interesting animal.” They wanted to tough it out to the one-year mark (they opened on January 21 of this year), but it just didn’t make sense financially to keep it going any longer. As of press time there was no indication as to what business would fill the location.

The closing of Luigi’s in Davis leaves the small college town with very few legit (i.e.: not house shows) all-ages venues for both touring and local bands to play. One remaining example is the ever-popular, long standing Sophia’s Thai Kitchen, which hosts all-ages shows on their patio during fair weather months.

“Unlike Sophia’s, Luigi’s didn’t have a clientele that treated the place like a local,” said musician Lauren Cole Norton, who plays in The Souterrain.

“If there was going to be anyone in the audience, they were going to be people you had invited out,” she said, as opposed to a built-in crowd that comes out no matter who is playing. Her band had played Luigi’s during the venue’s opening weekend and she remembers that the “place was hopping.” But, she added, “You could see already how it was going to be tricky to get people to pay to come down to the basement when they could hang out upstairs at the bar and listen for free.”

“We thought that was what Davis wanted,” Brida said. “It was not their cup of tea. It just didn’t take off.” She pointed out how hard it was to close the location knowing that their 15 employees would be out of work.

Luigi’s two Sacramento locations, 3800 Stockton Boulevard and 1050 20th Street in Midtown (which also holds all-ages shows) will both stay open. The Midtown location is scheduled to be remodeled later this year, something that Brida says they’ve been planning for a long time. It will include a kitchen expansion and a cleaning up of the “Fungarden,” the room adjacent to the eatery where countless touring and local bands have had the pleasure of performing.

“There’s lots of wear and tear, and there’s lots of things that we’re trying out,” Brida said of the Midtown location.

Wear and tear or not, there are some killer bands playing at the Fungarden throughout the month of July, so keep an eye out on our calendar section, pick a show, grab some friends and enjoy some live music for cheap (cover is typically around $5). And while you’re at it, grab a slice and a beer. You know how the saying goes, Sacramento, you never know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.

Psychedelic indie rock group Mr. Gnome is returning to Sacramento during their coast-to-coast spring tour. Recently named Rolling Stone’s “Band to Watch” for their third full-length album, Madness in Miniature, Mr. Gnome is ready to release their new 7-inch, Softly Mad. The duo, featuring Nicole Barille and Sam Meister, has been premiered on MTV, for their new track called “The Way.” Cleveland’s Mr. Gnome will be headlining Luigi’s Fungarden on March 28 along with Playboy School and Survival Guide. The show is all-ages and starts at 7:30 p.m. Entrance fee is just $7 at the door.

Bacon lovers unite! From Jan. 20—22 the inaugural Sacramento Bacon Fest will be sizzling in venues all over town. On Friday, Jan. 20, 2012 at 8 p.m. at Luigi’s Fungarden (1050 20th Street), check out the “Kevin Bacon Tribute Night” featuring musical artists like Jem and Scout, Aaron King, The Foxtails, John Conley, 50-Watt Heavy and others performing songs from Kevin Bacon films. Hilarious! Luigi’s menu will feature a special Bacon Supreme Pizza, and the all-ages show is $5. Bacon on pizza? Yes, please! Then on Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012 Magpie Market Cafe (1409 R Street) will host the “Bacon Fest Breakfast” from 7:30 a.m. until it’s all gone. Once you’ve snapped out of your food coma from breakfast, head to Pangea Two Brews Cafe (2743 Franklin Boulevard) at 4 p.m. to their “Bacon-in-Beers” event where a special bacon bar menu will be in place as well. Bacon in beer? Fill it up again! Bacon Fest wraps up on Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012 with two events: “Bacon Fest Brunch” starting at 10 a.m. at Golden Bear (2326 K Street) and then from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. the first ever “Bacon Fest Local Chefs Competition” at Mulvaney’s B&L’s Pig Next Door (L and 19th streets) which will feature celebrity judges, plus bacon small plates as well as beer and wine selections. Cover charge on that event is $20. For more information, visit
Facebook.com/sacramentobaconfest or follow Bacon Fest on Twitter @SacBaconFest.

Dog Party’s new album cause for extra exclamation points!

What do teens and preteens do these days? What are they into? One could guess: Twilight? The Kardashians? Justin Bieber?

Maybe. Or maybe that’s just brushing the surface.

Local sister duo Lucy and Gwendolyn Giles have been playing in their rock band Dog Party since they were only 9 and 11 years old, respectively. Now Gwendolyn is a sophomore in high school, and Lucy will have her first taste of high school starting next year. At 13 and 15 years old, they are preparing for release of their second album, P.A.R.T.Y!!!, which they spent a good half year recording.

The Giles’ mother drove the two to Shine café in downtown Sacramento for an interview with Submerge about their upcoming release. They look older than they do in the pictures. Bits of bright purple and pink flash from underneath Lucy’s brown bob. She is wearing a Ramones shirt beneath a black pleather jacket with skinny jeans and Chucks–a Joan Jett in the making. Gwendolyn appears a bit more subtle, dressed in a gray hoodie, jeans, Saucony tennies and a checker belt.

One thing you should know about these girls is their musical upbringing. Their father, bless his soul, chose to introduce the two to “good” music at an incredibly young age–their musical tastes include The White Stripes, The Black Keys, the Beatles, the Ramones, the Beach Boys, Green Day, LCD Soundsystem and CSS.

Take a listen to P.A.R.T.Y!!! and you get the idea. From the screeching of Gwendolyn’s phaser pedal on the album’s first track, “That’s What You Said,” the sisters brandish their rock roots. But in the midst of the album’s power chords and cowbell taps, other songs expose a folksier side, like “Mixed Up Lovers,” or a gypsy punk flare, like “Red Ribbon.” Lucy was listening to a lot of Gogol Bordello at the time, she discloses.

Then there is “Memories,” which is by far the hardest song on the album, plunging into a metal sound. It’s about not being able to ski in the summer, Lucy says to me. Note that most of their songs are not so melancholy. They sing about the likes of a furry friend on “Chih-Iro,” for example, or their photographer acquaintance on “Andy Wu.”

Regardless of whatever sound they’re going for on a given day, they have always loved music, they say. Gwendolyn had picked up the guitar and was playing talent shows at school by fifth grade. Lucy wasn’t far behind. Looking to Meg White of The White Stripes for inspiration, Lucy wanted to play the drums as early as first grade, she remembers.

“I thought it was normal to be a girl drummer,” Lucy says.

Her dad bought her a Reuther drum set that year, but she would have to wait until third grade before she could take drum lessons.

Unlike many of their peers, they managed to escape the magnetism of Miley Cyrus or Kelly Clarkson. With a little push from family friend Zach Goodin, they formed Dog Party in 2007 instead.

The White Stripes and The Ramones are high on their influence list, the latter of which Lucy admits an obsession with. While the girls were in Southern California for a photo shoot with Tom Tom Magazine over the summer, she insisted that her family stop at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery to see Dee Dee and Johnny Ramones’ graves. An artist as well, she pulls out her phone to show pictures of stencils she made of each Ramone’s face.

Indeed, the girls are comfortably familiar with a lifestyle that their friends are strangers to. The last show Gwendolyn tried to drag her friends to was a Secretions show at Luigi’s. And apparently it freaked them out, in the same fashion that their friends are scared to come to Midtown in general, preferring the ‘burbs of Carmichael, Gwendolyn bluntly says.

“I don’t like being in the ‘burbs,” pipes Lucy.

This is not to say that the girls don’t have friends their age. Ski team and cross country help to keep the girls socially connected. In fact, ski racing in Squaw Valley was one reason why the album took so long to record, since often the girls only could record one to two days a week.

But when it comes to playing music with friends their age, the pickings are slim, they say. The kids at school are mostly “band people,” Lucy states dismissively. Rather, the two find musical support from Midtown musicians, namely adults. They’ve played a number of shows with Kepi Ghoulie, who just released an album himself. In fact, the Giles family had just spent their past Sunday at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco for Kepi’s show.

Goodin has been helpful schooling the girls on gear. They rattle off gear specifics with ease. Gwendolyn rotates between her sister’s Fender Squire Strat, a couple of Silvertones, and a Hofner paired with a Fender Pro Reverb amp and Marshall cabinet.

Goodin also released P.A.R.T.Y!!! on his label, Half of Nothing records.

The girls have grown accustomed to playing with musicians older than themselves. In addition to Dog Party, they are also half of Sacramento band Little Medusas with two older counterparts.

They also just completed a two-week tour through Arizona, New Mexico and Southern California over the summer with Ghoulie and Sacramento band Pets, playing half their shows in houses and the other half in bars. By far, their best show was at a house party in Flagstaff, Ariz., Lucy says, because people were actually moving instead of just standing around the way people tend to do at Sacramento shows.

Here in town, the girls are also accustomed to playing house shows. They have garnered enough local notoriety to play for the last three years at Concert in the Park at Cesar Chavez. Luigi’s is a favorite all-ages venue. Aside from that, there are only so many 21-and-up venues the girls can get into at ages 15 and 13. Old Ironsides is no longer one of them.

“We used to play Old Ironsides all the time. Now we can’t,” Lucy says.

As youngsters daydream about the 21-and-over venues where they one day hope to watch shows, the Giles sisters daydream about the venues they would want to play if they were of age. The Roxy Theatre or Whisky A Go-Go in Los Angeles, says Lucy unabashedly.

All in good time, we can hope. The girls make it clear that music is a crucial part of their life–not just a phase.

Gwendolyn acknowledges that she will likely go to college in the future. But her intentions remain the same.

“We will play forever,” she says.

Dog Party will celebrate the release of P.A.R.T.Y!!! at Luigi’s Fungarden on Dec. 30, 2011. Also playing will be Kepi Ghoulie and Nacho Business. P.A.R.T.Y!!! will be available on CD and pink vinyl! For more info, look up the band on Facebook, or go to Dogpartyrocks.tumblr.com.