Small Comforts - Sound In The Signals Interview
I recently had the opportunity to interview Small Comforts. We discussed an early interest in music, how they formed the band, writing and recording new EP, ‘Couch Songs’, artwork, and more. Check it out below.
First, thanks for the interview.
Of course! I'm happy to do it!
Can you tell me how you formed the band for those who may be unfamiliar with it? How did you initially become interested in music?
Sure can! The idea came after my old band Royce Park called it quits. I had a ton of free of time and I thought it'd be fun to put together an EP of songs I had just been sitting on. I called Pete (bassist) immediately who was also in Royce Park with me, we started jamming and that was really the beginning of it all.
At first it was intended to be a one off project, we brought in our friend Liam Joyce (drummer on the EP) who plays in several bands around the Marquette scene (The Thirties/Sift/Waxy Motion) to write/record the drums. Right around the time we were about to start recording, I ran into Nick at a show. We started talked about jamming and around a week or so later Nick was learning the songs! After we finished up recording the EP, we brought in Nick to be our full time drummer and Small Comforts became a band!
How I initially became interested in music was when I was a very little kid from the age of around 5 and forward, my grandparents ran a cab company out of their house and one of the cab drivers was always playing guitar and I would always think "Wow, that's so cool! I want to be able to do that!" And so I would pick up the guitar and strum nonsense on it every opportunity I got. When I really first got hooked on the idea of being in a band was when I was around 12-13. I was starting to get the hang of playing guitar and I was watching just a ton of bands live sets on YouTube relentlessly thinking it was just the coolest thing ever.
You recently released your new EP ‘Couch Songs’. Can you tell me about the writing and recording process? How long did you work on it?
So the writing process of this EP was a lot of me on my couch with an acoustic guitar putting together the ideas. I'd send them over to Pete and Liam and they transformed those ideas into songs! I'd say as a unit we worked on the songs for around two months before recording.
For the recording process, we did the tracking at our practice space with Dave Daignault from Charmer on all of his equipment. We did around 3-4 sessions of tracking and it was then given to Mike Maple from Liquid Mike for post production. It was all a very enjoyable process. We had a great time making this EP.
I really like “Running Gag”. Can you tell me about writing that song specifically? At what point in the writing process was it written?
Definitely! At it's core Running Gag is a song about struggling. I wrote it pretty much as a way to vent about my own personal struggles I was going through around that time. It was the third song written for the EP and it is also one my personal favorites to play!
Do you have a favorite musical or lyrical moment from the EP? Why?
I'd have to say my favorite moment is the instrumental ending of Changes. It's very chaotic instrumentally, everybody is absolutely shredding but it still sounds very calm and melodic.
The artwork is really interesting. Who came up with the concept for it and who designed it?
I came up with the concept for it. The idea for it was the most disastrous depression cave imaginable centered around a couch. The artwork was all done by our friend Skyler Mark and she did a spectacular job bringing the idea to life!
Is there any chance that we’ll see a physical release such as cassettes or vinyl for the EP?
We have no plans as of right now, but I would love to get some tapes made! So who knows, there could be some physical copies in the future!
Thanks for taking the time to answer the questions. Do you have anything else that you would like to add?
Thank you for having me! As of right now all I have to add is we've got a lot coming up in the next few months here so stay tuned!
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