1. If I knew absolutely nothing about Clock Hands Strangle,
how would you describe the group’s music to me?
-- We’re a band that’s as interested
in literature as we are in music, so the songs often center around the
lyrics and can take a bit of patience to warm up to. Our song structures
are untraditional--the music conforms to the lyrics, whatever shape those
may take--particularly with the newer material we’ve been writing,
so there’s
not as much to cling on to as there would be in your average pop song.
Our sound can range anywhere from folk to pop to rock n’ roll, and
it changes pretty significantly the more we write, so we have most of the
venues in Florida confused as to what exactly we’re doing. The goal
of our music lines up more closely with the goal of music in the ‘60s
and ‘70s than it does with anything today—to create something
that engages as well as entertains.
2. If I were to buy your new album Red Shift/Blue
Shift,
what songs should I pay particular attention to and why?
-- “Redshift/Blueshift,” though we’ve
never really thought of it as a concept album, is set up based on the
two terms from astronomy that it carries in its title. “Redshifted” objects—planets,
stars, galaxies—are moving away from the earth and “Blueshifted” objects
are moving toward the earth, and so the first half of the album deals
with expansion, and the second half with contraction. The point is,
the album functions as a whole, each track a shade different than the
other, and so it would be difficult to enumerate a few as demanding “particular
attention.” It wouldn’t hurt, however, to listen a bit
more carefully to the opening track and closing track, titled ‘Redshift’ and ‘Blueshift’ respectively,
which bookend the album and provide a sort-of guide for the listener.
3. When and where did the band form, and where didthe
name come from? -- We formed in 2004
in Melbourne, Florida. Originally there were four of us, but after playing
a few shows around town Cristian joined the band on trombone and keyboard.
Toward the end of 2006 we had a “changing of the drummers,” picking
up Adam from Jason Choi and the Sea, a local band and Team Grizzly label-mate.
The majority of us are now living in downtown Orlando, in a house that formerly
had a Russian flag up in the front yard—it was torn down by a few anonymous,
close-minded children of McCarthy, who also spray-painted black over our
touring van’s license plate.
4.
What was your worst on stage experience? What was your
best?
-- We did this “Battle of the Bands” in
a local high school auditorium, I think it was around 2005, that had
to be our worst show. “Battles” are always overcrowded and
so the set-up and tear-down alone are a pain, and I remember Brian broke
a string on bass early in the set and I broke a string on guitar later
on. I think we ended up just putting down our instruments and calling
it a day after a few songs. We’ve had a few bad “off-stage” experiences
as well, such as being denied entry into Canada at the Vermont border…
Our best “on-stage” experience is when Nick had a sexual
eruption on lead. The whole band was taking it slow, not rushing the
stroke, and one thing led to another
5. Do you think that the Internet (whether it be Internet
radio, legal downloading, MySpace, streaming audio, etc.) is a good tool
for musicians or is it a bad thing because it hinders profits?
-- Tough question. I’m not sure what you mean
by that last word “profits” however, because that would involve
us making more than we put in. For a band like us, who can only really afford
online distribution (on a wide scale, anyways), we’d be forced to say
that the internet is a good tool.
As for the big picture, it’s good and bad, though I think mostly good.
More people hear your music. It’s better for the consumers, which is
a good thing, and that seems to be happening less and less in capitalism.
Not every band is Radiohead however, and can’t count on releasing a
priceless album and still banking. I think the music industry is at the stage
where it’s trying to figure out how to handle the sale of music now
that it’s predominantly digital, so we’ll have to see what happens.
As the internet becomes a bigger monster music won’t be the only industry
having to refigure its sales techniques…it’s already happening
to the film industry. Look at the writer’s strike. The debate itself
is shape-shifting as the internet becomes a more efficient network, so it’s
impossible to even argue. Or maybe it’s a simpler, moral question about
property? Have I made this better or worse?
The real question is one of value. When you purchase an album from the record
store (Best Buy, Wal-Mart) you have something tangible, something that you’ve
paid for and have expectations about. Does music mean less when there’s
no album to hold and no price to pay? No one in our band, of course, has
downloaded music illegally…but…if one of us had…we’d
probably listen to it just like we would music we’d purchased. If anything,
we've become more critical. In a way, it pushes bands to improve their content—there’s
not as much room for flare and gimmicks without the advantage of cover art
and fancy packaging. A musician’s success is more and more at the mercy
of the listener, and, without record labels acting as necessary middle-men,
there’s a more direct connection between the artist and whomever’s
purchasing the art—that can’t be a bad thing.
