They were just confirmed for Falls Festival, their debut album is in stores now – and you can get a taste of San Diego’s finest with three shows in Australia next month. In advance of the tour, we chatted to drummer Brian Hill about playing SXSW, David Letterman, living in LA and growing up in San Diego.
Larry: So you’re at home in LA? I wasn’t sure if you were still on the road or not!
Brian: Yeah we have a little bit of time off now, we got off tour about a month ago now.
Oh nice. How did the tour go?
It was three months long, so it was a little long, but it was great. We got to go to some cities that we hadn’t been to yet in the US, so that’s always nice. We wound up with our last show in Coachella, so it’s been pretty exciting!
Being a band from California, you really don’t get much more iconic than that!
Yeah it’s a huge thing. It was a lot of fun.
I managed to catch you guys at SXSW – what was that experience like for you? Was it your first time?
No that was the third time in a row we’d done it. It was great! It’s fun, I like how there are all the official things on one side, and then there’s all the unnofficial parties that are really fun to go to on the other side of town. That’s really fun. When we get to play both, it’s a lot fun.
So you’re based in LA nowadays – what brought on the move from San Diego?
Well initially Matt, our singer, he graduated from college and he had a film degree, so he moved up here for work. He was possibly going to do editing or something. He wanted to get into that. Then the band kind of started to occupy more and more of our time. We were all living in San Diego, then Matt and the other two guys pretty much moved up here at the same time, and I was still down in San Diego for several months. And it just became more practical to live in the same city and see if we could do this full time. Luckily it worked out. For now at least.
Are you enjoying living in LA?
Yeah, Los Angeles has really grown on me. It’s not too far of a cry from San Diego, two hours north – it’s within reach, we can still go back and visit every once in a while. Yeah, it’s good. There’s definitely a lot more going on here. San Diego has really limited options if you want to go out and see bands. It seems that LA has a lot more going on – you don’t have to go and see the same things all the time. It’s definitely good for nightlife.
Is it a very “college” sort of scene in San Diego?
Not really. But it is very small. There’s one club that is on the campus of a college, that is kind of a legendary place, in San Diego at least, called Jay Café. A lot of bands come through there, it’s really small and volunteer run. There’s a really cool art space, it’s got a cool vibe to it and some amazing history. But other than that, San Diego has this strange seperation between all ages scene and everything else. There seems to be way more music to see when you’re over 21, the drinking age in the US. So San Diego doesn’t seem to be do many shows that all ages can go to see, except maybe when a big band comes through and they play a big club and it costs a lot of money. There really aren’t enough spaces for anyone who’s not old enough to get into a bar. It’s kind of one of the strange things about the city, the scene there. There’s definitely better music if you’re 21.
That must be so frustrating, to not only be able to drink, but not be able to see any good music either!!
Yeah and when you do manage to sneak in to those bars to see live music, you get kicked out pretty much every time. Well at least I did.
Going back a few months, can you talk a bit about getting to perform on David Letterman? I know for me at least, this was the first time I was exposed to your music.
That was definitely an incredible experience. We all grew up watching David Letterman. It was amazing to be there on the set – it’s such an iconic thing for Americans. It was surreal to see it in the flesh, and to shake his hand – I can barely remember it, in real life actually happening. He was just this really tall, looming shadowy guy coming over. I don’t even think I looked him in the face, it was such a blur and over so quickly. Major highlight for the band.
Is the studio as cold as everyone makes it out to be?
You know, we were wearing sweaters when we did it, because it was winter in New York and it was really really cold – it snowed the next day. So we were pretty bundled up. It may have been, but I don’t know. Because when I got there in the morning to load in it was pretty cold, but it was February in New York City – which is maybe the coldest month there?
David also alluded to the album cover being shot in Malibu – to which you all didn’t seem to know how to reply – but it looks more like Venice to me?
Yeah we shot it at Venice Beach. I don’t remember the banter! It was a little jarring – David Letterman’s talking to you, you have to answer! You know, what are you going to say? I think Matt said San Diego – I don’t think he heard what Dave said, I think he thought he was asking where we were from. Yeah that was funny.
How did the photo shoot at Venice come about for the album cover?
Matt’s cousin, he lives down there near Venice, and he just wanted to take some photos of us, and he ended up taking tonnes of photos. We just walked around one morning, and we went to a café, and we went to the beach and a bunch of shops. There are so many shots that we haven’t done anything with. But that shot (the album cover) really stood out for us as a cool shot. It captured us just hanging out. We weren’t planning on it as a cover, but we were having a lot of trouble coming up with a cover, so I think Matt suggested we use that. But yeah, it’s a really nice shot!
It was your first full length recording, can you talk about the process of putting the album together?
It was a lot of fun, but it really was hard work. Especially getting the drum tracks. They were the first things I had to lay down, and then everyone else could do their parts. So we really had to do good takes, as there wasn’t really an option for me to go back and redo it. But it was good, we learnt a lot, working with Eli, the guy who produced it, he was really great. He had this really good balance between production and knowing what our influences were. He was in a band called Girls Against Boys, so he was from the Punk Rock Washington D.C. world, and I love that stuff. I was aware of him as a producer and a musician before this. So It was a thrill to work with him too.
I imagine it was quite different to recording your earlier EPs?
A lot of our older stuff, that was recorded at Matty’s old house, in his bedroom, so it was a big difference, getting into a studio. There’s a lot of pressure when you’re paying a lot more money to make it work, and get somethingn really good. But if you’re just in a bedroom, you can just go and do something over. It was a lot more of a formal process, but we learnt a lot. We became better at our instruments from having to do take after take and be under the scutiny of Eli. He wasn’t too much of a stickler, but he wanted to make sure he got the best possible performances out of the band. All in all, it was a great experience.
And the result is of course taking you around the world – you’re heading to Australia in early July. Are you looking forward to getting down here?
Oh yeah, absolutely. It’s a great place – I’ve been there once before, and hopefully I’ll get to see more than I did before. A few years ago I was in another band (The Plot to Blow Up the Eiffel Tower) and we did a tour of New Zealand and then we went over to Australia. We only did four shows, and I think we did two in Sydney, one in Melbourne and one in Brisbane. That was it. I think we are going to get to see one or two other cities this time, so really looking forward to that. It’s a great place! I’d been wanting to go since I was a kid, and didn’t get to see enough. So hopefully this time.
And finally, the question I end all my interviews with drummers with: what’s your favourite percussion instrument?
I’d say right now, it’s definitely the maraca. Really liking that lately. I have one and I use it on one of the older Muslims songs (The Muslims were what The Soft Pack were initially known as), I use it on “On My Time”. But I’ve been using it a lot more lately. We’re working on some new stuff and I’m trying to sneak it as much as possible so I can justify packing it into my suitcase. I think I’m getting a lot more control over it. It’s kind of hard to play a lot of those percussion instruments.
Thanks so much for your time! See you next month!
Looking forward to it! See you in July.
Find out more about the July tour! Check out the dates here:
https://www.theaureview.com/guide/tours/the-soft-pack-debut-australian-tour-july-2010
