Today San Francisco Cold Beat released their first EP via Crime on the Moon: a good example of how punk’n’roll and surf-rock should melt together going hand in hand.
Worms, first track on the record, is a clear reference to certain garage vibrations, with some typical reverberated Bigsby-like effects and a wall of airy vocal lines.
Sustained by a dynamic drum pattern, the song easily flows for almost two minutes: the verse-chorus interchange works out superbly. The beat of the track certainly reveals some post-punk influences, even though the acid sounds and the fuzzy guitar licks are deeply soaked into old-fashioned garage tones.
Worms/Year 5772 EP offers a remix for each song on the B-side, confirming the wide range of sonorities the project is open to. At the end of the day, this 12″ seems to be a good introduction to future releases.
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We had a little chat with Hannah Lew, ex-Grass Widow and core of this project, about the origin of the band, the upcoming events and the current music scene in San Francisco.
On your facebook and tumblr it’s hard to find a proper biography of the band. How did you end up with the idea of founding COLD BEAT? How did you find the right people to play with?
Hannah: I had been working on a lot of the songs during the time Grass Widow was writing Internal Logic and I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with them. For a while I didn’t see the point in releasing anything on my own because most of my song writing energy was going towards Grass Widow. After a while I started feeling like I should do something with the songs. Lily from Grass Widow was initially playing drums and her boyfriend Cody played guitar as a way to help me actually see the project through. But it was really when I started playing with Kyle King that the project started taking form. Kyle and I work out a lot of the arrangements together and he has been a steady element in the band. While Lily and Cody moved on to work on their own projects, I enlisted my friends Bianca Sparta and Greer McGettrick to play drums and guitar.
It’s always difficult to understand the process of music composing. Sometimes it’s totally random and hard to explain, sometimes restrictions and deadlines are a huge source of motivation. Which way do you start arranging a song? What does inspire you at most?
Hannah: It’s nice to have a new project and my own label because I have no one else’s restrictions or deadlines. When I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with the songs I thought putting stuff out with a label would be good because it would be nice to have another entity pushing the record and instilling confidence in me. But then I decided to start Crime On The Moon and just go for it and do everything on my own terms. The inertia of the project is based on what the band needs as opposed to any label interests. Music writing is very necessary to my well being. It’s a way for me to process my feelings. It’s sort of a survival thing. I suffer from very bad insomnia and sometimes I just work my way through a thought all night and demo a song at 6 or 7 am. So I guess my motivation is built into the way I write songs out of necessity. I usually start with a concept and I write a bass part and sing sounds over it until the sounds turn into words. Then I layer a bunch of harmonies and share it with Kyle and we decipher which parts are guitar parts and which parts are vocal parts. I always feel like songs exist somewhere out in the ether and I am just channeling them.
Your sound clearly reminds of 60s garage atmospheres as well as the rock’n’roll revival we’re experiencing in the last years. San Francisco looks like a focal point for all the bands involved in this specific music scenario. Why do you think there is so much enthusiasm for this kind of sound in California?
Hannah: A lot of people think there is a cohesive scene here, but the truth is that all the bands here are always on tour and there isn’t much downtime when we’re all here. So in a lot of ways I feel that the scene is not very site specific. That being said-there are so many great bands that have come from SF. Lately the tech boom has made it almost impossible to live here because the inflation has made it prohibitively expensive. There’s been a mass exodus of sorts to LA and Portland and anywhere affordable. Things are changing here a lot right now. It’s become more of a city catering to the lifestyle desires of young tech people. Way too site specific restaurants and $7 cups of coffee shops everywhere and less musicians and artists.
Which band from this area do you think is probably way too underrated? and which one would you suggest as a typical incarnation of that scene?
Hannah: Rank Xerox isn’t really and anymore, but they are my favorite bay area band.
Your first 12″ as COLD BEAT is out (today) and you’re touring the west coast in the next weeks. Which are your plans for the future? When do you think a full-length could be released?
Hannah: We’ll have an LP out this spring on Crime On The Moon, so we’ll be touring a bit. Also in the nearer future I will be releasing a Bridge Collapse 7″, which is me on bass and vocals, Raven Mahon on guitar and vocals and Jon Shade on drums. That will be my 2nd release on Crime On The Moon-so that’s exciting!