KYLE: Doing pretty good; tired after the set
I: Yeah you had a great set, you played before New Gods and then Lost Cause; I thought you were gonna play like, in between those bands. Do you prefer to play first?
K: No, I think somebody in Lost Cause had work and couldn't be here til later so they had me open, which I don't mind. As long as I'm able to do my thing it doesn't matter when I play. It's all good.
I: So, I gotta say, I'm not that versed in the kind of art that you do...With the kind of music you make, I hesitate to even call it 'music.' How do you feel about that?
K: No that's fair. I mean, I go out of my way to take all the musical aspects out of it. I mean, there are notes hidden, hidden somewhere, but one of the things that I like about the noise genre - I guess you could call it that - is that there's no rules. There's no music theory, there's no 'these notes sound wrong next to these other notes,' it's all free sound. It gives me an appreciation to use anything I find as an instrument.
I: Yeah, I've seen, even tonight, you used a chain or something
K: Mmmhmmm
I: As an artist myself, I'm very lo-fi, I only use an acoustic guitar. I don't really understand all the effects. Do you have any songs that you feel you could play without a bunch of effects, or is that kind-of part of the [instrinsic] part of the way you make your art?
K: That's hard to say; have you listened to the recordings at all?
I: I did, and I'm unsure as to what's instrumental and what's not.
K: Some of the recordings that I've put out and plan to in the future, it kind-of spans everything non-music. There's some dark ambient, there's some harsh noise, some very wall-of-sound soundtrack.
I: Word. What I mean is like, would you ever be able to play like, an acoustic set? Do you play music without machines or is that a [fundamental] part of your art?
K: Yeah, I would definitely say it's a part. I like everything to be as abrasive as possible, you know? To everything, add distortion and reverb. Everything is clashing and dissonant; it's all about trying to get the emotions I feel in my head out of my head. That's why I named it Misery Ritual. It's more of a purge of what's in my mind instead of me writing songs.
I: That's something I noticed while you were playing, the way you perform is obviously very, very passionate, even though you're performing [in a way] that most people won't even understand what you're doing. If you had to explain yourself to like, your grandparents or your family who have never been exposed to this kind of stuff before, what would you say you do?
K: Um...you know, cuz noise is such a foriegn concept to a lot of people, I usually start off saying 'noise' and then elaborate that. There are certain sounds that people like, you know, and [on the opposite end] I feel like a lot of people will a have a [natural] aversion to the sound of glass breaking, or metal-on-metal scraping or something like that. But the thing is, it's all just sound, and everything has importance and beauty, in a way. Even in the aversion to it, it's important to me, that metal-on-metal scraping. To me, it's pleasing to the ear, but to anybody else it might make them cringe. It speaks to each person as an individual. I do waht I like regardless of how it could be interpreted by other people. Like I said, this is [all] to purge my brain of negative emotion.
I: That's what's up. [Now] I'm gonna go backwards in time: You used to have a band called Skinslip; what happened with that?
K: Uh, so basically I did guitar and the majority of the vocals, and that was a major depression/aggression outlet for me, but it go to the point where my own negative feelings came between me and the rest of the band. To them, it was better that they do their own thing with me not in the picture.
I: Are they doing anything right now?
K: Not to my understanding. Actually, no. It was more, with me being as emotional as I am you know, I have ups and downs. During that point it was mainly just downs. I was not the easiest person to be around. So I'll put some of that on myself. There are other circumstances also, you know, that played into it, but that's not my place to talk about. But yeah, of course I'm just glad [it happened]. It's freed me to do things on my own. As far as that had been going, I had been dedicating a lot of my free time to playing quote-unquote "real music," but without that, you throw out music theory, you throw out drum beats, and you get the rawest form of sound and passion. That's what I'm doing now. I feel like I'm better off, even though I do miss playing those with guitar and singing.
I: But you're doing what you are into right now
K: Exactly. This is exactly what I set out to do and, you know, based on how I feel afterwards, and the reactions I've been getting, I feel like I'm doing alright.
I: When I was watching you [I thought], if I were to die an untimely death soon, I would like you to play my funeral because it would explain to my parents and my family something about me that they don't understand. Just in the darkness and the unpredictability of your music, it's something that I want my family to understand. They way you've done it is so dark but so obviously filled with emotion; I see that and I really appreciate that.
K: That's like the most meaningful thing, the best feedback I think I've received so far.
I: So if I die soon, you're playing my funeral [LAUGHTER]. I'm gonna end out this intervuiew; the last thing that I always ask anybody, my favorite question because it shows what people really value: What's your favorite breakfast food?
K: Breakfast food? Hmmm...Of my god, that's....You know what, there's a spot in Corona called Goodfellas and they have a pastrami & swiss omelette and I am all about that
I: That does sound good
K: Pretty bomb
I: Alright well I'm gonna end this out then, do you have anything else that you'd like to say?
K: Well, I'll be here Saturday playing at Insect Worship Fest; [Insect Worship] is like, an online collective that I'm a part of and basically what we do is create noise tracks, upload them, and then each person can download and edit it however they want. We end up putting out CDs that are pretty much compilation CDs, we'll throw 5 people working on a track over time, and it's gonna be a bunch of us playing together at this fest on Saturday the 16th, so it'll be fun.
I: Word. Well, Kyle, thanks again for talking with me!
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