The Art of Rock: The Moth & the Flame

"When we first moved here I was really in love with the donut shops that are on every corner. I thought that was pretty amazing." That’s what the Moth & the Flame keyboardist, Mark Garbett had to say. The musical road from their native Provo, UT to Los Angeles, CA measures approximately 645 miles and at the end of the travel rainbow apparently there awaits a pot of donuts. "They all taste really good." he added. Welcome to LA, gentlemen.

If you’re an LA resident, Mark’s observation makes perfect sense. No seriously; it’s so on point that it may even instill some local flavor pride. Brandon Robbins (vox/guitar) is on a similar train: "For me, I'd have to say it's all about the food. A million different restaurants that are all amazing and you can go whenever you want. Just awesome. And the weather is perfect all the time."

That leaves us with drummer Andrew Tolman’s opinion to judge. "There's a lot that I love about the city, but I'm kind of a sucker for the beach.” he admits. “Anytime I have spare time, my wife and I will drive down and I really enjoy it. I think it's a bit therapeutic for me."

For seven months now the Moth & the Flame (TMTF) have called Los Angeles ‘home.’ They’ve been busy: they secured a month long Monday night residency at the Silverlake Lounge. They’ve been productive: they’ve recorded an EP (plus enough material for an upcoming full album) and they’ve a musical vision that’s currently under construction. Brandon and Mark had Norther; a band which Mark calls "the earliest version" of TMTF. Andrew (founding member and former drummer of Imagine Dragons, a band partially from Provo) rounded out TMTF to where that vision can fully flesh itself out which it began to do with the 2011 release of their eponymous full-length debut. Somewhere among the blurred lines of art, indie and alternative rock (as opposed to the Robin Thicke-kind of blurred lines) with perhaps a dash of math thrown in, genre-fication gets a little cloudy (yes, I just made that word up). You can hear shades of what makes Radiohead so vibrant, fascinating, hypnotic and occasionally confusing (the song "Winsome" is nothing if not Exhibit A). At the end of the day, it’s irrelevant as long as the music stands up but the ability to identify can be helpful.

“I like to say art rock fairly often.” Mark offers. “I'd also say our music is kind of an introspective mood, like a mood rock. We like to really focus on the feeling of the song when it’s first written and just kind of really dig into feeling to enhance it, if we can. That's always one of our main goals in writing.”

That particular focus on the sensory nature of their sound is key and prompts Brandon’s response: “It's hard to say. We’re looking for another term I guess it's just like Indie alternative rock, more like moody rock or introspective rock. I don’t know. Intelligent rock.”

Now along with the donut-thing this, too, makes sense because of the distinctly cerebral nature of the music. There’s nothing linear about the song structures: the layers of melody, the rich sound, the shifting and alt rhythms, the build-ups into languid releases. Perhaps there is a goal of capturing a particular aesthetic, harnessing a specific chaos to morph along with a personal artistic view. Not everyone’s going to get it, but those who do will do so because it taps into a place that perhaps straighter edged rock or fluffier, self-centered pop does not.

For Andrew, a link to feeling is paramount. “At least for me when I listen to music, the music that I connect to the most is when I can feel that [emotion] transmitting through; the emotion that the musician or the band is portraying seems real to me.” he added. “We just try and take that song we’re recording and perform it the way that it was meant to be performed and the way we envision it when it was being written. One of the key elements is just portraying the right emotion, tacking them to the song and whatever the song is about. And the emotion that it's portraying, we try to enhance it.”

That being the case, when it came time to record their next EP, Brandon, Mark and Andrew went into the studio with the fairly like-minded ears of Joey Waronker (Atoms For Peace and Beck drummer). Mark explained how that association came to be.

“We hooked up with Joey through our manager who was friends with him. He sent him some of the first album. He listened to it, really liked it and he was kind of the middle of producing a couple different projects and he had some free time in between his tours with Atoms For Peace and with all the things that he’s been doing with Beck.

We met with him in LA and he was really cool. We decided to do one track with him to kind of feel it out and see if it was something that we wanted to keep doing. The first track we did with Joey was “Sorry”, it's the lead off track for this EP. It went really well. At the time we were moving to LA so when we moved here we did four other tracks with him.”

The result was the October 29th release & (ampersand): the symbol, itself, turned upside down for artistic and disarming affect, the music an exercise in stylized substance. Its apologetic lead off single, “Sorry,” which boasts the stinging bridge, “How is it we were always running out of love but never walked away?” is an easy read: Something or someone fucked up.

“Yeah, that one’s an interesting one.” said Brandon. “It came together very quickly and very emotionally. It's about betrayal and relationships and just all these very, very strong emotions.” As singer and songwriter of the band, Brandon bears the weight of being not only the author of the messages but also the messenger. “I have a very unorthodox way of writing lyrics and I try and let my subconscious do most of the writing. I’ll guide it a little bit with certain things that I want to get across but, for the most part, I just kind of let it come to me. I think that's the best way to let your feelings write the lyrics.” Now we have 1 ½ albums worth of messages to dig into for reference. As for what he sees as the difference between their 2011 offering and &, Brandon says, “We've had two years since the full-length album to kind of figure ourselves out and I think it shows in the music. I think it's just a more mature The Moth & The Flame. “ And as for his songwriting that, too, has matured.

“I think it's been a transition for me. As I get more comfortable and find myself as a lyricist I'm growing a little bit more towards literal, but still even then I'm much more abstract. I think the first album was very abstract and kind of hidden and I think I've grown a little more towards a little less abstract for the EP.”

From the 2011 album to the & EP there is carryover: the dramatic and ultimately tempestuous “How We Woke Up” which was inspired by the first album’s artwork (the image of a pilot in a state of uneasy suspension) and serves as a complementary bonus piece to & and a fair place to compare and contrast the lyrical then and now.

“The artwork depicts this pilot in this precarious situation in the desert and that image is just so powerful. There you wake up, not necessarily literally, but you wake up in a situation that is precarious or that you didn’t want and you are having this realization of where you are in life: what you decide to do from that point is what “How We Woke Up” is about.”

Personally, I give him cool points for creative thinking on that one.

Speaking of waking up in a precarious or “decide what to do from this point on” moment, one day the three woke up living in Los Angeles having left things known, friendly and successful behind in Provo, UT. Not a lightly made decision. Mark explains:

“It's something we all talked about. We had been playing in Utah and felt like the music scene in Provo is really amazing and we love it and we love everyone there. We felt like we'd reached the point where it makes sense to move to L.A. We felt like there’d be more opportunities for us out here and not just because of the success we were having in Utah. Our manager talked to us about it and thought it would be a really good idea and so we did it. We moved out and I'm really glad we did.”

As a city less than 45 square miles, lets play the odds and assume that Provo’s music community is modest but concentrated with artists comfortable, familiar with and fairly supportive of one another which might make the decision to leave difficult. “Yes and no.” Brandon explained. “We’d been in the Provo music scene for quite some time with The Moth & the Flame, but also with other bands. I think it was difficult because we had made such good friends and acquaintances that it was just hard to leave. But at the same time I think we had been there long enough and we were all kind of itching for something new and we knew that it was the best thing for the band.

For that reason we were all very excited to move to LA and we definitely make decisions based on feelings and vibes. All three of us felt like LA was pulling us to it. It felt very natural and so it was a really easy decision for us, strangely enough.”

You know what’s not strange? TMTF as tour mates and opening band on the Fall leg of Imagine Dragons’ European tour. For approximately 7 weeks Andrew, Mark and Brandon road tripped with one of 2013’s biggest breakout bands. Yes, that happened. How the hell did that happen?

As Andrew explained, “They reached out to us and offered some show opportunities: one in Utah, where we have a lot of home fans, and one in Idaho. Those shows, they went really well and the crowd reacted well. So they wanted us to stay in touch about having us do some shows later with them.” Some shows. Paris, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Vienna, Belgium, Berlin, London, Luxembourg: some random shows. Impressive places to begin supporting an EP, touring its new music and testing it on unfamiliar ears. In its recorded form, the songs are bold and textured, stormy and sometimes bleak but they are packaged to be affecting. So believe me when I say that live is truly where TMTF’s music lives: in heady translation. “Ultimately the live experience is what we work for,” Andrew added. “Hopefully we can win over as many fans as possible through our recordings. We want to be able to do that and more with the live experience.”

Considering that live experience is exactly how we became acquainted, mission accomplished.
Signed,
@dharma69 aka Diary of a Concert Whore

South By Southwest-Watch: Track-By-Track With Irontom

The number of times that I’ve mentioned Irontom via Tweet, Facebook, email or face-to-face conversation probably cannot be counted but you should know that it is for cause: I happen to believe in this band. A five-piece out of Los Angeles, Harry Hayes (vox), Zach Irons (guitar), Dane Sandborg (bass), Daniel Saslow (keys) and Dyl Williams (drums) are, by my ear, a little too dynamic, too talented and too non-ordinary of a band to be ignored. It’s classic rock high on youth, fresh blood and swagger: unabashedly loud, dense and eclectic.

Two seminal events have and are about to happen: Irontom has released a 4-song EP (Loose) and they’re making their first trip to South By Southwest (SXSW) this week. This simply means that they now have recorded music to be judged by and that they’ll be before more eyes and ears than ever before. As Harry put it: “This is our first EP. We put it out basically to announce the existence of the band.”

Announcement, made. Each of those four songs has an individual killer rhythm, upheaval and instinct about it and apparently- with a full-length album on the way- it’s only the tip of the iceberg. Here’s introducing you to those four songs by way of Harry, himself.

1. “Mind My Halo”
This was one of the first songs we wrote as a band. Over the course of a week At Zach's grandma's house we wrote and recorded four songs. One of them was “Halo.” Dan came in with most of the chords on the Rhodes and then one night we sat in a circle and figured out all the rest. We all knew that we had something pretty decent with this one. The lyrics are about a guy turning towards religion as an answer to his lonely and empty feelings. The dude basically finds out that even though his new creed might've distracted him from his deep fears, it's all still there as plain as ever.

2. “My Brothers”
The song is about my two drug addict brothers. They've caused a ton of grief for my family over the past couple years. It's a pretty personal song and that's why it's sick.

 

3. “Goin’ Slow”
This is a song Zach and I wrote some time before the band. It was really easy to bring into the group and it's great live because Dan and Z get to solo and fly with the seagulls. It's a song about being too content with whatever's going on. And then getting into the habit of being stuck there. The day we recorded this one, Z had been drinking quite a bit more 4loko then he normally does. When we told him to slow down, he just said 'never tell me what to do'.

 

4. “Lady Got Me”
Another song Zach and I had written that we brought into the band. Z is playing drums on this recording as well. Zach and I wrote this with him jamming on drums and me on guitar. We wrote this song the year the band basically came together and I remember it exciting Dane and Dan to start working seriously with Zach and I. It seemed like a good one to include on the EP. Lyrically it's a song about trying to forget about a crazy old girlfriend.

Their current SXSW schedule looks like this but don't be surprised if more shows get added:

SXSW
Mar 12th @ The Jr (603 Red River St)
Mar 14th @ The Old School (401 E. 6th St)

Track-By-Track w/ Arc & Stones And Their Debut EP

“Hey Trina,

So I'm gonna do my best to try and paint a nice picture about each of these songs. Each one is a pretty cool journey and I'd like to take you on them.”

Dan Pellarin, Arc & Stones

This is one aspect of music that excites me because every song is a telling of a story, of a  moment, of an emotion. And one of my most favored interactions with musicians is pulling back the curtain on a song to flesh out the lines and what lies between them. 

From Brooklyn, NY comes Arc & Stones, a rock outfit with a full-bodied sound made by Dan Pellarin, Ben Cramer, Joe Doino and Eddy Bayes. What they deliver is aggressive yet accessible, even radio-ready songs waiting to be jammed out for your approval in a club or arena near you. The music is progressive in that it’s a complete package: the instrumentation boasts nimble melodies constructing anthemic and soulful rock offerings served up handsomely by the emotional vehicle of Pellarin’s powerful and flexible voice. Girls will dig it, guys will reap the benefits: a win-win for all.

On February 12th Arc & Stones will release their debut, self-titled five-song EP which is a fairly diverse yet solid representation of what they’re capable of: a sneak peak at the potential. So in advance of the event, here’s learning the heart of those songs from the voice that sings them, track by track.

1. Silence
This song is about the period of blind faith in a certain someone after they have left without letting you know if they cared for you or not, while you have quickly and undoubtedly fallen for them. "Silence" expresses that feeling that you would go to any length to see that someone, talk to that someone, love that someone again...if only for a while.

The period of time when you have given all you can and in return have only received silence, is quite possibly the most painful part of any confusion and eventual realization that this certain someone just doesn't feel the same way...

"Silence" also expresses...that even though you begin to realize the only stronger force than fear is hope...and with that hope you simply don't care and want to keep trying, fighting for as long as your heart can take. It's a fire that burns for however long we let it, for whomever we ignite it for.

As we experience the passion, the confusion, the insanity, we also feel the anger in it all, and "if you can see love, then why can't you see mine?" is a line that expresses that anger we all know too well. This song was chosen because for us, it is a perfect representation of the paradox that is love, and the painful bliss we keep chasing after.

I showed Ben a very altered version of this minus the chorus which we didn't change one bit, and decided we loved where it was going and re-worked the verses and bridge. It turned into something magnificent, a real journey, and we couldn't be more proud of this song.

2. Say Goodbye
"Say Goodbye" expands on the feeling of "Silence." No matter what happens, the love that you shared with that someone will never fade, and in an essence there is no way you could ever say goodbye to it, and them. As we search "far from the light," and save "a cut from the stone shaped like a heart," we can look far beyond the familiar and take what has become seemingly nothing and turn it into something, someday, somewhere. The line "Someday when I can stop chasing someday, can I call you home..." builds upon a thought that maybe when everything is through, and we have done all we can, we can maybe one day call that special someone our own.

Taking the fire symbolized in "Silence," and building upon the rock that is "Say Goodbye," a clear picture of emotion is formed. Through it all, we'll still chase and hope, even if it takes forever.

3. Let Me Down
This one is mainly stating that, "Hey, you can save me all of this trouble, pain, confusion and anger if you just let me know how it is right here, right now. Either you feel something for me or you don't." I can't take being led on and I can't take questioning everything I do before I do it. "Don't let me down so easy," because I'll still find reason to hope and hurt, and "don't let me down so slow," because I can't bear with all of this just to eventually be kicked to the curb. Why? Because if you lead me on, it'll turn me into a different person and, possibly, one that neither myself nor anyone else enjoys.

"By breaking me down, you're building a broken home."

I hated this one, but still showed it to Ben, and he gave me this look like...are you kidding me? So we re-worked the first verse a bit, recorded it live, and placed it right smack in the middle of the EP. I now love this song because of Ben and [producer] Jeremy Griffith's help turning this into a beauty. Thank you, dudes.

4. She's Mine
A boisterous, loud and flat out fun rock song that combines the ideas of a woman, a self-realization that this person doesn't like what they have become of late, a kick ass party gone wrong, and well some different...things that maybe cause the party to go wrong. The lyrics talk of the extreme highs, "running through my blood, come and take me for a ride," extreme lows, "but why does every story come crashing down like this," and the eventual rally cry, "no you won't take me alive..." of this hard-hitting tornado of a rock and roll party song. Screaming, shouting, and dancing your ass off are encouraged on this one.

Ben and I wanted to a write a seriously hard and fun rock and roll song. I think we broke the most furniture in our small box of an apartment during the time we were writing this one, but it was fitting and necessary.

5. Rise
"Rise" for us is an anthem that really hits home. It's simply about the idea that nothing is impossible, no one can tell you anything is impossible and there is not a single person, idea or obstacle that can restrict you from that thought. It hits home because a lot of people said we couldn't do what we are doing now and it feels damn good to sing about it. 

The chorus states that "We are faces in the water here to wash the pain. Sons and daughters of tomorrow, begging for a name." This is us and everyone else with this belief saying that the battle is not fought alone. The battle to strive for what you love and believe in is one being fought today in strong company, and there is nothing and no one that can bring this determined belief down. We will claw and fight to be heard, and to be known. Cue the national anthem.

The band couldn't be more proud of everything that's been accomplished, and we are so pumped for the future. It's gonna be a fun road and we hope to make it count where it matters most- with you guys, the listeners.
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I imagine many ears appreciating what Arc & Stones have to give, not the least of which is that delicious guitar in "Say Goodbye." So now you that you know, seek out these gentlemen of heartfelt yet dynamic-in-the-making rock and roll (and disarming good looks) in the usual socially interactive places. And also in 2013 look for them to make themselves heard well outside of their NYC comfort zone.
Official Web
Facebook
Twitter

Cultures Colliding/New Music Discovery: terminal

Filter Magazine’s Culture Collide Festival came and went in the Echo Park section of Los Angeles and I can say that, without reservation, that it was a success. That’s because Culture Collide is an international music festival and very niche event with a very particular goal: to bring the various music flavors of other countries to meld and bleed into the already melting pot that is Los Angeles for discovery by hungry ears. This year 50 bands from 24 different countries participated in the 4-day, multi venue event that culminated on the fifth day with a big old block party.

Considering that I cannot imagine under what circumstances I would have discovered a little band from Denmark had it not been for Culture Collide- I say again- the damned thing was a success.

terminal. Thorsten Bæk (vox, guitar), Henrik Engstrøm (bass, synths, vox) and Rasmus Toft Ilsø Jensen(drums). What we have here are three gentlemen of Nordic descent (or Scandinavian as the two are interchangeable) who are possibly Calvin Klein or Abercrombie & Fitch models in this lifetime or the next (if they’re okay with pseudo soft porn). What we also have here is a Danish trio with the ability to craft deftly emotive songs (Danes are apparently very sensitive people) that have no fear of that thing called rock or an undercurrent of dance.

In the madness that was Culture Collide I was fortunate enough to catch two of their sets at the festival: One, which went smoothly; the other, not so much (technical difficulties are a bitch). But in the true spirit of rock and roll, they kept calm and carried on delivering an abbreviated and partially acoustic set that far from disappointed those who hung in for the duration. They (we) were rewarded with terminal kicking out a fairly gutsy “everything we have” set minus their backing track which- in case they hadn’t noticed- didn’t diminish the strength of their sound. Also, the power and dynamics of Thorsten’s vocals were clear and present with nothing to obscure them and that’s never a bad thing. Think an artful Gavin Rossdale and hold on to that.

With one full album (2009’s Bring Forth the Few) with the fantastically dense track "Chasing Light" and one EP (2010’s Ignite the World) under their collective belts, terminal’s sound has graduated to a more aggressive, formidable and infectiously grooveable level. They consciously weave a thread of electro/dance and- dare we say glam?- through the fabric of their alt rock and, from the listening, one can ascertain that a myriad of influences have found their way into their world. In the asking, Henrik waxed eloquent about what moves the band as well as himself:

"Even when we didn't know each other yet, were definitely defined by acts such as Queen, Michael Jackson, Dire Straits, Pearl Jam, and Marilyn Manson. I, personally, have accepted in my heart that I love music, which is simply good. It can be the simplest song, and if there's passion and drive and love, I'm on. We all listen to and love the Killers, Muse, Carpark North, Coldplay, Robyn, Jeff Buckley, and classical music but we're not limited to particular bands. We embrace music in all forms and have no "arrogance" in regards to genres or bands."

When all of the mechanical parts click onstage, terminal harnesses some serious energy; the kind that really good rock shows are made of. Yes they're easy to look at and that's always a plus, but what seals the deal is how they put out (musically) and encourage the listener to receive.

"I want others to feel what I feel, when I write music. I think about love, or the absence of love, between people, and the amazing thing that is the universe. Encapsulating what happens NOW and not worrying about the past or the future."

Live in the moment with terminal.

Keep and ear on these guys as they're prepping to conquer audiences well outside of Denmark in the very near future. In the meantime, feel free to catch up and get to know them on Facebook, Twitter and their official site.