Ra Ra Riot

0:00Well no, we'll start with South by because you guys are there now aren't you? So what's the excitement for this year? I mean besides playing your own shows and the hecticness that comes with South by Southwest. You guys are veterans now, what are you excited for? Are you guys big video game band?

1:21You guys have a bus now I think I read somewhere. So do you bring video games on the bus now that you're not in a van anymore and you have the capability of doing so? Yeah, there's a lot of stuff. But yeah, what am I like? So what do you keep busy with that if you're not playing video games do you read a lot?

2:14Like how do you pass the time during the drives? Yeah, I do. Well now you've won me over. Okay, that's amazing. So what position are you? Where do you sit in the band? There you go. Who's your fan? Yeah, we have the whole band. Oh good.

2:59Well there's plenty of place to play in Texas there. I'm thinking all the side streets like in the alleys behind all the venues and you got a lot of Canadian bands that maybe you should start challenging. Go to the Canadian blast events. I'm sure they've got some stuff going on. Yeah, who's your fantasy goaltender? Who's in net for you right now then? Nice.

3:57I think so. I think so. I think so. I think so. I think so. I think so. I think it's a pretty good team. I don't want to spend the whole time talking about hockey. So I'm going to move on here. Although I could. Yeah, usually. So but maybe for maybe just one more question. What is your team being a Syracuse band? Are you Rangers? Devils? Actually, well no. Oh, well then we are not going to get along because I'm from Montreal. Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. We were just about, you're touring with the banding and I came to the end of the guys in the banding and just felt free.

4:55That's great. Now a little, a little stare downs on stage. That's fantastic. Sure. Well, talking about earlier before we got into the hockey, we were saying about bringing books on tour. And I hear I'm a big Kurzweel fan as well. I'm currently, I read like 10 books at once and I kind of go back and forth. But I got spiritual machines on the go right now. But I hear that's not the one that influenced the record. It's a different one. And I want to, I'd love to hear you talk about what got you into that book. Why you chose it and why I guess it was you that brought it to the band and said, Hey, let's, let's go in this direction for lyrics.

7:31And then how does that, how do you bring that to the band and say, Let's write songs about this as opposed to, I guess, what you normally write about. Because that's, it's a step in a different direction. It was like, do those lyrical themes then transform the way you thought about writing music for this record?

9:43I mean, every, every review I'm reading says, you know, it's a lot more synthy or less strings and everything like that, which I hear as well. But, you know, that's a decision that you guys make, I don't know, while recording, it just happens organically or it's a choice because these songs are more robotic kind of, you choose more to use synthetic instruments. And so I'm wondering, like, where did that decision come from? I don't even know. I don't know if it's a phrase that way. What's the organic and we never? Did it end up being a conceptual?

11:13Do you think it's, is it a conceptual album now that it's finished? I think the one thing that...

12:24No, me neither. You say that in there, being a part of the creative process and everything, and I just, sorry to heart back on something you said earlier, but I read that, like, that you guys kind of went into the studio for the first time on this record and developed the songs in the studio. Like, there was no, you didn't have the songs finished going in, like, road tested and rehearsed and everything.

13:10Is that the case? Because it doesn't sound that the way you're talking. Yeah. So how long did it take to make the record with everything being... I am. That's how I got it. Well, I was going to say, like, I feel like it would take longer to make the record. It wouldn't be, like, a quick, like, two-week process. It would be, I don't know, two, three months kind of thing, if you're writing in the studio kind of. But well worth it in the way it sounds.

14:26Let me tell you. Oh, thank you. Well, I do. Well, it's only half an hour, so I've listened to it like six times today, but it's amazing. Besides, yeah, this is very short. It's not a bad thing, though. It's good for radio. Yeah. Are you jamming them out longer than live? Like, are you trying to... Um, no, actually, I think we play everything pretty true to the album form. Okay. I don't want to take up too much of your time, but I do want to talk about Arts and Crafts for a bit, because the next time you're going to be here in Toronto is the Field Trip Festival,

15:11the Big Arts and Crafts, 10-Year Anniversary Show. So as a label from Canada being an American band, why Arts and Crafts and what have they done for you that you guys love. Oh, yeah.

17:07Yeah, they do. Yeah. Well, yeah. Cool. Before I let you go, we always do something called Five Questions, Five Quick Questions, One Word Answers. Road or Studio? Oh, it's one. I know. Leonard or McCartney. When you hear a song what usually hits you first, lyrics, melody, or rhythm.

17:55Song you've written you're most proud of. Well, but you write your bass parts, right? Like you write what you play. That counts. Okay. All right. Cool.

18:48And in One Word, in One Word, Rob, Rob, Riot.