Diese Woche stellen wir euch SOM vor, sie sind bereits mit Katatonia auf großer Europatour gewesen und absolut sehenswert. Sie haben sich unseren neugierigen Fragen gestellt.
Who is behind SOM?
Will Benoit: We wanted to choose something that sets a mood but that isn’t a clearly defined word or term. It means different things in different languages as well, so it’s been cool to tour around the world and have people tell us what the band name means to them.
Forget about genres for a second – SOM’s music sounds like ..?
Mike Repasch-Nieves: Beautiful, ethereal, heavy (in both sound and emotion). Some folks have called our music “doom pop” or “dream sludge” — both of those descriptions seem fitting.
Which sort of mood produces the best songs?
Will: Honest introspection, and an openness and curiosity about where a song can take you.
Mike: A mood where egos are put aside in favor of doing what’s best for the music.
Which person, artist or incident inspired you when you first started making music?
Will: Early on Nine Inch Nails was a big inspiration. Without really knowing what was happening in terms of production and songwriting, I was very aware that they were doing something really special that set them apart from other bands. The Downward Spiral is still one of the catchiest, heaviest, strangest albums I’ve ever heard.
I started recording with a 4 track tape machine around the time that album came out and I spent a ton of time running drum machines through different effects and yelling through distortion pedals and trying to figure out how all those Wax Trax and TVT artists got their sounds.
Mike: My first two concerts as a teenager were Ozzy Osbourne and Bad Religion. The dark arena metal of Ozzy and the raw integrity of Bad Religion’s punk rock ethos both made a huge impact in different ways. I also can remember exactly where I was when I listened to albums like The Cure’s Disintegration and Type O Negative’s Bloody Kisses for the first time, which also totally changed the way I approached music.
The Fairy-Godmother pops up in front of you and grants you a wish. What do you wish for?
Will: That no one ever has to worry about money another day in their lives.
Mike: Amen to that.
No alcohol is no solution either. What booze combination will definitely dissolve all your troubles and issues?
Will: Tequila works every time.
Mike: Club Mate and Jägermeister (or any German Kräuterlikör really) is my go-to combination on tour — it might not dissolve my troubles, but it gets me in just the right headspace before going on stage.
Who was the hero of your childhood?
Will: I don’t think I ever had a ‘hero’, but if we’re talking comic books it was Spider Man. I really looked up to George Carlin when I was way too young to really understand him, and I actually got to see him live a couple of times. Musically I guess I’d have to say Trent Reznor again. Even when I was pretty young I looked very aspirationally at his career.
Mike: I guess I was a Batman kid growing up, but the older I get, the more the idea of heroes and villains seems silly. Seeing things in binary terms of good and evil has created a lot of pain and conflict in our world.
What is the most embarrassing/surprising record in your CD-shelf?
Will: Hmm unfortunately the CD shelves disappeared a long time ago, but the vinyl collection has lots of 80s synth stuff, including pretty much every Phil Collins record, albums from The Eagles, Christopher Cross, Steely Dan, weird trance and house records from the late 90’s and dub records from artists like King Tubby and Augustus Pablo.
Mike: My record shelves contain way too much bossa nova, latin jazz, and hawaiian music. Though, there’s something magical and melancholic about a lot of those old recordings and I think that stuff has found its way into my guitar playing more and more over the years.
What’s next? Tour? Studio? Vacation? Something completely different?
Will: Right now we’re working on our next full length record — it’s a little more than halfway tracked and we’re incredibly excited about the songs and the direction. We’re also heading out on tour with Rosetta and playing at POST Festival next month. Vacation sounds nice but those seem to be few and far between these days.
(639)
