xNOMADx - Sound In The Signals Interview
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| 📸 @shanussy217 |
First, thanks for the interview.
Thank you for having us!
Your EP ‘On Skylines of Embers’ comes out October 30th. What can you tell me about the writing and recording process for the EP?
We (or more specifically Grady) started writing for the EP pretty much as soon as the demo was out, if not before. By July we already had all these songs more or less written and studio time booked. I’m pretty proud of the speed and efficiency we pumped out these tracks.
Did you try anything new with your writing process this time around?
I will say that while Grady does the vast majority of the writing still it was generally more collaborative overall. Our other guitarist Bradley wrote a couple riffs and Grady and I had multiple very long phone calls about songwriting stuff throughout the summer so I can take credit for a couple ideas here and there myself despite being a rough guitarist at best, haha. The demo was really just Grady’s passion project that he cobbled a few people together to execute, so he wrote everything, but with this we’re a full dedicated band now so it’s just more full and cohesive and representative of what everyone in the band is into.
Do you have a song that you’re most excited for people to hear and why?
Hard to say cuz I’m excited for all of them, but track 4, Acéphale, is going to be a really decisive track for people I think… there’s some stylistic choices at the end of it that will make people who like early 2000s shit very happy and make people who don’t roll their eyes, haha. If I had to hazard a guess I’d say that track 3, The Punishment, is gonna be the hit and gonna be a somewhat defining song for us too.
You released your demo earlier this year. How is this new EP similar or different sonically?
I feel as though you can definitely still tell the EP is us, but there’s some major stylistic changes. For one, I think we leaned out of the heavy hc Bury Your Dead type stuff a little. I think the perception of us was that we are a mosh band, which I’m not unhappy with at all (it’s almost funny how much I enjoy hard dancing), but it is definitely limiting to a degree, and I think we struck a good balance of every song having a pit part while not being just straight up dumb. In turn, we also went heavier on screamo influence — I know throughout the writing Grady and I were listening to tons of I Have Dreams and Ostraca, and it shows in many parts. Also, I learned how to actually do vocals now, hah.
The EP title is really interesting. What is the meaning behind it?
It actually was inspired by an Agalloch song, “As Embers Dress the Sky”. I was walking around rural Oregon one day this summer listening to that and it just kind of hit me I could sort of rearrange the words to make something that was meaningful to the EP and to my vision of the band. I wrote this EP a lot different lyrically than the demo — I was kind of unhappy with the demo lyrics as I pride myself on my writing and I feel as though the demo lyrics were entirely not up to par and super generic for the style — so I intended for this EP to be a more poetic, linear timeline telling the story of climate collapse. It ended up a bit looser than that, but “On Skylines of Embers” was sort of my prose-y, metalcore jargon title for the initial state of collapse, and I think it’s a dope title.
Can we expect any physical releases such as CDs, cassettes, or vinyl for the EP?
I *think* we’ll have a super limited run of tapes done by Alex Casey from Streets of Hate for our upcoming northeast run, and I *think* we’ll have a limited (out of 30) cover CD for the release show on November 1. Besides that, no immediate plans, but I’m sure all of the above will happen.
The way the band and Ephyra have presented your imagery has created a really interesting aesthetic to promote the band. What are some of your main influences aesthetically for how you present the band whether it be promotional material, artwork, merch, etc…?
I do most of the designs for this band. I’ve done almost all of the merch designs, the demo cover, the promo posters, a lot of the fliers, etc. I’m not a great graphic designer or anything by a long shot but I do have a clear artistic vision for how I want to present the band so I don’t mind taking on the brunt of that work (also, it saves us money). Senti from Balmora designed the cover for the EP and he killed it, really continued in the vein that we wanted. As for inspiration, I’m mostly into ’90s hc aesthetics (Unbroken, Day of Suffering, etc.) so I take a lot from that. Undying is another big inspo. I also take a ton from ’90s screamo aesthetics and from anarchist zines/shit in that vein. I also just love vintage nature photography, haha.
Thanks for taking the time to answer the questions. Do you have anything else that you would like to add?
If you’re a kid and you wanna start a band, don’t sound like us. Sound like Poison Idea, 86 Mentality, or Altercation. Love and peace, Free Palestine.
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