Wes Mantooth - Sound In The Signals Interview

I recently had the chance to interview Wes Mantooth. Check out the full interview after the jump!

For those who haven't heard of your band can you tell me a little about how you guys got together and what got you interested in starting a band?


Travis Verbil: I have been playing music with Brian for as long as I can remember. A lot of the time we would be in Brian’s basement with his cousin Joe when we were twelve/thirteen years old covering Moby Dick and trying to play Protest the Hero. Despite playing together all of the time, our music tastes were pretty much the polar opposites–Brian was into hardcore while I was into stuff like Nirvana and The White Stripes. It took several years and failed bands with mutual friends, but we found a middle point. We decided to do everything ourselves. At that point it was just Brian and I. We had no idea what the fuck we were doing but it was fun as hell. I started singing because we couldn’t find anyone else to. We started messing around with synthesizers and everything.

Eventually I was introduced to Noah who joined us about a year ago. Recently, Brian’s cousin Joe joined the band. That’s when everything really came full circle for me. It felt like it was fate.

 It’s interesting to see how as time went by we grew from a collection of people writing music into a band. It was always less about writing music and more about producing something from start to finish—more about that certain sense of fulfillment that comes with creating something. That’s the dragon I’m constantly trying to chase.


You have a new EP coming out soon called Von Ghoul. What was the recording process like for the EP and how long did the songwriting process for the EP take?

Travis: The recording process itself was kind of strenuous. We were working at Harvestworks studio and The Boxcar studio with our fantastic producer Steven Kellner (Van Atta High, Born Cages), but we were under some heavy burdens of time constraints, which really caused us to not explore as much as we had hoped to in the studio. But in terms of conception to final product, Von Ghoul was­­­—at least I think—what we wanted it to be. I mean, Brian, Noah, and I have been working on those songs for a couple of months and they took a lot of shapes until we found a sound we really liked. That’s always the toughest part about writing a new collection of songs—figuring out the new direction. Once we get comfortable somewhere, we start moving forward.

Brian Mazeski: Like Travis said, the recording process was strenuous. But it was a good strenuous—the kind that walks the line, however masochistically, between stress and elation, and that, at the end of the day, makes you want to do it again, and again, and again, and again. At any rate, though, Travis and I always try to work the kinks of out our songs months before we even think about recording, so that no guitar parts clash or anything like that. And each time we record, we get better. With Von Ghoul, then, which is our third EP, we were relaxed and ready to kill it in the studio, and I think—hope, really—that that comes across on the recordings. As for songwriting, some songs on the EP were written in a week and some songs Travis and I’ve been writing for years. We know a finished song when we hear one, and until we do, we don’t stop re-writing.

The artwork for the EP is really neat. Can you tell me a little about who came up with the artwork and concept and why you felt like it fit the EP?


Travis: We commissioned Aleen Montchal (link) to do the artwork because I saw a lot of stuff she did at Brian Deodat from the band CUTTER’S apartment, and I thought her style was phenomenal. I came up with the concept because I feel like the album touches upon themes of isolation, and loneliness, and a true sense of misdirection. I always saw Von Ghoul as this really loose concept album, but I think the artwork really tied all of those themes together. When we got the artwork from Aleen I thought she somehow got a copy of the demos we had—it fit the songs like a glove.


You also have a limited edition cassette version of the EP coming out. Can you tell me a little about that (variants, amounts being made, etc...) and when it will be available?

Brian: Yes! Driftwood Records is releasing Von Ghoul on cassette—the bulk of them will be on orange cassettes, and some will be on some other cool colors like turquoise or red. We’re distributing our limited edition pink cassettes, however, as Taking Back Queens exclusives. We’re looking to get the cassettes out sometime in September.

Is there any chance you Von Ghoul will be out on vinyl?

Travis: I hope so! Sound quality aside, I’m infatuated with the idea of vinyl. I want music to have a tangible side again. Maybe I just sound like a fucking bitter old man, but having music only digitally takes away a layer of the experience.

What else do you guys have planned for 2013?


Travis: Shows. Shows. Shows. I want to get to know our songs as well as I possibly can before we put a pen to paper again. We’re in this period of almost a creative melting pot in the sense that we’re absorbing everything we want to do and letting it sit with us for a bit. Eventually, the songs will write themselves. I’ve always felt that writing music was always more of ‘what you shouldn’t do’ rather than ‘what you should do’. We’re all into so much music that the possibilities are endless. My favorite album of 2013 was Yeezus. Who knows what the fuck we’re going to do next- I’m excited.

Brian: I’m excited to write new songs. We really are, as Travis said, a melting pot of creative influences, and I’m excited to hear what kind of songs we put out in the future. I’m looking forward to seeing where we wind up playing shows, too.  We’ve played churches, basements, a rooftop— I hope the venues continue to get more and more interesting.

I guess that about wraps it up. Thanks for taking the time to answer the questions. Do you have anything else you'd like to add?

Travis: Keep it dirty, friends.