Ben Quad – Wisher | Album Review

Pure Noise Records

Ben Quad are back. Not only are they back, but they’re fucking huge. Or at least that's what it feels like for those of us in the emo world, anyway.

I first discovered Ben Quad because I was endeared by the idea of a new band using so many interesting tricks and flips from the same dust I grew up in. They’re one of several Oklahoma acts from the past several years to break out of their local scene to more renowned heights, alongside acts like CLIFFDIVER, Chat Pile, and Red Sun. What makes Oklahoma such an outpost for this style of music? I am not quite sure, but earlier this year, I was in Ben Quad’s home state for a couple of concerts. Both nights, I stood outside my hotel room, looking at the way the sky never ends there. If I grew up under that sky, I would try to absorb the world with my guitars, too. 

Wisher is technically Ben Quad’s sophomore album. But between 2022’s I'm Scared That’s All There Is and present day, the band has unleashed a steady flow of releases that tightened their sound and expanded their ambitions. First, they released “You’re Part of It,” a standalone screamo single that felt like an instant addition to the Emo Canon. Then there was Hand Signals, a tour split, and finally Ephemera, their 2024 post-hardcore EP where they cited groups like Underoath and Norma Jean as inspiration. Wisher elaborates on the Ben Quad that Ephemera left behind, offering something not quite as genre-hopping but upholding that harsher sonic twist with even more experimentation. 

Ben Quad have described their new album as “post-emo,” a kind of theoretical subgenre that I’ve heard described as “emo but better” or “not real” depending on who you ask. Whatever it is, it marks a departure from the rules of the original emo sound and a step further into the depths of rock.

Wisher is an album that spans the parking lots of Warped Tour metalcore, the terrain of midwest emo, and the highs of country lilts, all with dizzying guitar tapping, frenzied screaming, and a desperate demand for something better than this. The record is full of “what-ifs,” both sonically and lyrically. What if we dialed this amp to eleven? What if we added tooth-grinding bass here? What if I told them I’m sorry? What if they told me they’re sorry? Say you’re sorry, you’ve been so hard on me. You. You. You.

The album begins with a banjo’s twang on “What Fer,” floating over the atmosphere that Ben Quad are desperately trying to find the limits of. The instrument bends with the breeze before ripping into the sky with electric guitars playing so ferociously you worry they might summon a lightning strike. The energy they build here shocks everything directly into “Painless” where Sam Wegrzynski begs some faceless other to “please just tell me how you’re doing” while Edgar Viveros’ guitar arcs around the song.

It’s at this point that I realized this album is so big that I had to talk to them about it.

Swim Into The Sound: This album sounds massive. As a long-time Ben Quad listener, I have always appreciated how flexible y’all are in your sound, but this is the biggest the band has sounded yet. I know you spoke a bit about the expansive studio access inspiring some of the sound, but what about the scale? 

Edgar Viveros: A lot of that has to do with Jon Markson’s magic. We really wanted to go with someone who could have a major impact on the production of the record. We walked into that studio with the intention of writing bigger choruses, and he knew exactly how to make them sound massive. We had so many new direct influences on the record, too — country, electronic, pop-rock. We knew early on that we wanted to have songs that got as big as a Third Eye Blind, Goo Goo Dolls, or Killers track.

No matter whether the band was tapping out Midwest Emo, post-hardcore, or playing along to an Always Sunny clip, Viveros’ guitar playing has always been a beloved aspect of Ben Quad. His style is very distinct in this era of post-emo: irrevocably fast, intricate, and loud. During live shows, Viveros stands center stage, radiant, as the crowd screams at him to play forever. On Wisher, he does seem to play forever, each song demanding something new and exciting, like the ethereal reverberations of “Classic Case of Guy on the Ground” or the world-absorbing work on the closer, “I Hate Cursive and I Hate All of You.” 

SWIM: I personally hear a lot of the stuff I grew up with — third and fourth wave emo, 2010s metalcore. What music were you inspired by while recording this album? What was it like working with Jon Markson?

VIVEROS: This record was influenced by so many things that I know I’ll probably forget something. The 3rd and 4th wave influence is definitely there. We’re all big fans of stuff like Taking Back Sunday, The All-American Rejects, and Motion City Soundtrack, and I don’t think there’ll ever be a Ben Quad record where my guitar playing won’t be inspired by Algernon Cadwallader and CSTVT. Stuff like Brakence and Porter Robinson heavily inspired the glitched-up guitar samples that are all over the record. There’s a good amount of banjo and slide guitar that draws inspiration from country and folk music. Personally, the recent wave of alt-country, like MJ Lenderman, really inspired me to dive into that style of playing. Beyond that, there’s huge Third Eye Blind and late 90s/early 2000s pop-rock influence. 

When it comes down to it, a lot of this record was us channeling the sounds we loved growing up to make something new. Jon Markson helped out so much with making that vision come together. His perspective was such a valuable resource when we were finalizing songs, and I don’t think I’ve ever worked with anyone who has pushed me to be a better musician as much as he did. It was such a cool experience to wake up and record music all day with him for three weeks. That guy rules. I look forward to being isolated on a farm with him many, many more times.

Photo by Kamdyn Coker

There’s a chance that this album might launch a dozen tweets about Ben Quad not being emo anymore from whatever the remnants of DIY Twitter are posting these days, but know that there’s nothing people can say that Ben Quad doesn’t already know. They make this abundantly clear on “Did You Decide to Skip Arts and Crafts?” with Sam Canty from Treaty Oak Revival.

SWIM: I’ve always heard that Oklahoma sound in your music, but never as much as I hear it in “Did You Decide to Skip Arts and Crafts.” What inspired y’all to bring a country twang to such a loud emo song? Do you see a connection between country and emo?

VIVEROS: I demoed out the instrumentals for that song in the summer of 2024 and really didn’t know where to take it. I kind of just wrote the song structure to be a mixture of big, anthemic Wonder Years choruses and some of the twangier moments in the Beths’ catalogue. It really came together when we invited our friend Sam Canty to hop on the track. That’s when I think we decided to really lean on the arena country-rock sound. I specifically love how Rocklahoma-coded the bridge sounds. Sam Canty’s feature fits so perfectly. I think the link between the two is a lot closer than people think. Sonically, both genres incorporate sparkly single coil guitars, and they both get pretty sad. Country is just farm emo.

I agree with all of the above: the connection between country and emo is storied, they’re both wrought, misunderstood genres that come from the middle of our nation. The aforementioned track starts with a phone call from Canty, playing a detractor of Ben Quad’s ever-evolving sound, telling them that they “ain’t the same anymore.” The song kicks in, and eventually Ben Quad gets him to change his mind and his sound too. Isaac Young clears a space in his drumming for Canty to return to the song to yell too, his Texas accent curving around an exasperated, “I guess it never made a fuckin’ difference to you.”

It’s impossible to discuss this album without acknowledging just how many people are on it; in addition to the Treaty Oak Revival frontman’s appearance, Zayna Youssef from Sweet Pill joins Wegrzynski and Henry Shields to kick your teeth in on “You Wanted Us, You Got Us.” Later on, “West of West” features Nate Hardy of Microwave, who contributes what might be the heaviest moment on the entire LP. It all starts to feel like a totally deserved victory lap, a testament to how big emo (or post-emo) has grown over the past few years, and a reminder of how much Ben Quad has grown since they met each other on a Craigslist post over their love of Microwave and Modern Baseball. 

SWIM: Y’all have called this album a kind of evolution for Ben Quad. How would you describe Ben Quad’s evolution since I’m Scared That’s All There Is, sonically? Since that album, y’all have also toured pretty nonstop (I think I’ve seen you guys three or four times on different tours over the past few years) – How would you describe Ben Quad’s evolution since your debut beyond the sound? Any ideas on what’s next after Wisher?

VIVEROS: I’m Scared That’s All There Is was cool because it was basically us doing emo revival worship with a little bit of a modern twist. Since then, we’ve just been throwing more and more influences into the kettle. I love that you can trace through our discography and see us gradually adding influences of screamo and post-hardcore. This new stuff has country, electronic, pop, and so much more thrown into the mix, and I’m just excited to keep growing that sound moving forward. 

Beyond sound though, I think we’ve grown in a lot of ways since the ISTATI days. We’re way more road-worn. When we released ISTATI, we hadn’t actually done a proper tour. Now, we’re releasing this new record on like our sixth full US tour. That alone has given us so much perspective on the world and many chances to meet a lot of talented and insightful people. I’d say our biggest area of progression has been in the confidence of our songwriting abilities. We’ve put out a handful of releases at this point, so sitting down and writing songs just feels so natural now. We’ve learned to just go with our gut when it comes to making music. I think any writing roadblock we encountered during the recording process was sheerly because we were afraid of sounding too honest or vulnerable. 

At the end of the day, if we think it sounds good, then that’s all that matters. As far as what’s next after Wisher, I have no idea. Maybe we’ll make a real butt-rock record. Some real Breaking Benjamin type shit.

Anything is possible when it comes to Ben Quad. At its heart, that’s what Wisher is about: testing how far post-emo can stretch, showing off the possibilities of the sounds they can craft, and clearing a path for what’s next. On Wisher, Ben Quad ain’t the fucking same anymore, but who would want them to be?

Around this time, three years ago, Ben Quad released “You’re Part of It,” where they chanted endlessly and heart-wrenchingly about how they were just waiting for all of this to fall apart. Unfortunately, with Wisher, they’re just going to have to keep waiting, because this album is universe-engulfing and none of this is falling apart.

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Caro Alt (she/her) is from New Orleans, Louisiana, and if she could be anyone in The Simpsons, she would be Milhouse.

The Timeline-Altering Shoegaze of Total Wife

Photo by Sean Booz

Shopping for vintage clothes is a hobby that I treat more like a sport. Whenever I find myself researching the best places to find garments of the past, I feel like a star quarterback studying game tape. It’s both about the thrill of the hunt and that feeling of discovering a diamond in the rough that’s been repeatedly passed over by onlookers who didn’t realize what they were missing.

Today, shoegaze bands are a lot like going vintage shopping. There are so many different iterations and variations of homogeneous items from the past, but by being patient and dedicated, you will come across that timeless piece if you know exactly where to look. Insert the band Total Wife.

The Nashville experimental shoegaze duo is centered around the creative partnership between Luna Kupper and Ash Richter, though when they play live, their ranks expand to include a bassist, a second guitarist, and a drummer. The group is signed to Julia’s War Recordings, the Philadelphia-based record label founded by Doug Dulgarian of They Are Gutting a Body of Water, which is pushing the genre forward with some of the most exciting music in the underground from Her New Knife, Joyer, Bedridden, and now Total Wife. What makes Total Wife an unmistakable hit is their fearlessness. Both Kupper and Richter create art that feels like it could only have come from them and them alone. Their new record, come back down, has a DIY aesthetic both musically and visually that feels fresh, exciting, and unique to everything else that’s out there today.

Total Wife craft songs that would not only fit in on the radio in 1991, but also feel future-proofed for 3001.  Let’s start at that first extreme with tracks like “peaches” and “second spring,” which are good enough to make any My Bloody Valentine devotee blush with excitement. It’s a wet dream for any fans of that style of music; both Kupper and Richter are true students of the game, as evidenced by the way they’re able to slather on countless waves of distorted guitar tones that mend and mold depending on the mood of each song. There’s a sharpness and respect to their craft in how they are able to achieve such a specific sound while also molding their guitar tones into their own entity. It’s an impressive feat considering a shit ton (for the record, I consider a “shit ton” to be the unofficial highest measure of the metric system) of bands that are currently trying to achieve the same sound.

Elsewhere on the same record, we get a taste of what I imagine music will sound like eighty years from now. Songs like “ofersi3” and “internetsupermagazine” are sharp left turns into a combination of breakbeats, hyperpop, and hard techno that inspire Jersey Shore-levels of fist pumping where the speed gets turned up to infinity. The decision to veer into this type of rapid-fire sub-genre expedition feels so fresh, vital, and needed in today’s shoegaze landscape. The result is something I imagine people might listen to while flying to work on their jetpack.

I love it when bands try to test the limits of what musical lengths they can achieve. Total Wife’s reverence for the past while creating music that feels so future-forward makes them one of the most exciting projects I have heard all year. The most exciting part is that the music on come back down has constructed an endless number of doors, each offering different possibilities of where the band could take their sonic excursions next.

I got to chat with Total Wife over Zoom, where we talked about Halloween costumes, first-ever concert experiences, and a sado-masochistic moment on stage in Pittsburgh that potentially left a fan lost in another dimension.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length

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SWIM: You just finished touring for your latest record. How did it go? 

LUNA: Yeah, it was really fun! All the shows were fun, we love our friends, and there were some really late drives this time, but we made it out. We were doing a lot of late-night driving. 

SWIM: Do you have any fun playlists to keep you going when you’re driving at night?

ASH: It’s up to the driver. Whoever’s driving gets to choose.

LUNA: It gets a little manic at times. I feel like it’ll get into nightcore remixes and shit to keep us wired. 

SWIM: I read a lot of Stephen King, so whenever I hear the word “manic,” I’m instantly brought back to his work for whatever reason, which leads me to my next question: Are you all excited for Halloween this year?

LUNA: Yeah! We usually have some kind of Halloween show plans, but we don’t this time. There’s one like a couple of days after, but yeah, we have to figure it out. We were The Matrix last year, and that was great. 

SWIM: Was anyone Neo or Trinity? 

LUNA: We were more vague characters within the Matrix universe. Our own Matrix characters. 

SWIM: Do you guys remember your first Halloween costume? 

ASH: The first one that I remember was when I did The Wizard of Oz with my family. I was the Scarecrow.

LUNA: I was a pile of leaves. That’s like my first memory. Being a pile of leaves, just a suit with a bunch of leaves attached to me. [laughs]

SWIM: What was your first-ever concert memory?

ASH: I saw Van Halen in 2007 with my dad for my birthday. 

LUNA: My first show was in 2012, and I saw Connor Oberst at Carnegie Hall, which is a crazy first.

SWIM: Both of you have crazy fun first shows. Do you remember the first show you guys saw together? 

ASH: That’s a good question. I feel like it was the Flaming Lips. We’ve known each other for a really long time. But yeah, they were on tour with Tame Impala in 2013, I think, and The Flaming Lips were opening, so that was cool. 

Photo by Sean Booz

SWIM: I really love the guitar textures on come back down, they sound so lush and beautiful. Is that a style you guys developed over time, or is there a particular era of music that you were influenced by to achieve that type of sound? 

LUNA: We’ve always made dense, layered stuff, usually with guitars and synths. The guitar just became more natural and sounded more organic. Just adding more and more guitar layer textures until it was only that. I think it comes from listening to a lot of nineties music and early 2000s stuff over time. 

SWIM: I get a little My Bloody Valentine type of vibes, Loveless, which is my type of stuff. It was done so expertly, in my opinion.

I was watching an interview with Pete Davidson, and he was talking about how Adam Sandler is seven years ahead of everyone in fashion, and I thought it was really funny yet accurate. So, to bring it back to you both, I was listening to “ofersi3,” which sounds like it’s a hundred years ahead of where everyone else is right now. When I imagine what people in the year 3000 will be listening to, it’s exactly that. How did you come up with that song? 

LUNA: [Laughs] Thank you. The whole first half is just a couple classic breaks that I distorted to create different notes. It’s not any crazy processing other than chopping audio files super tiny to make them tonal. Over time in the song, each beat gets fragmented further and further until they’re tonal and then end up creating different sounds. Those sounds then get chopped up for the second half and mixed in with some of the vocal samples taken from an old Elliot Smith cover that we never finished.

SWIM: Was this a time-consuming process to create, or did it come fairly quickly to you? 

LUNA: It was pretty fast. It kind of had to happen all at once because of this one unfolding thought, and I felt like I had to see where it went in that moment or else it wouldn’t be true to itself.

SWIM: Both of your styles are so unique. Did that develop over time? Were you always outgoing and willing to express yourself, or did it mature over time?

ASH: I think it was always pretty unique. When we were younger, we were just trying really hard to be weird at the cost of something listenable.

I think being daring and bold has kind of always been in our repertoire of songwriting. 

LUNA: Yeah, but it feels like recently, with this album, and maybe for a couple of years, it felt like enough time had passed that we’ve been doing this, so as long as we stay true to ourselves, whatever we do would sound different. Also, not trying to sound like anyone else. For a while, you’re just inspired by other musicians and trying to learn how to sound like your favorite bands until you have your own mix of whatever you’re trying to do.

SWIM: Did it take a while for you to find your own voice, or was it a quick process?

ASH: I think we always were doing something that was our own voice, but our influences were just so solidly there. I felt like we had to learn how to write songs first before we could sound like ourselves. We’ve been focusing more on the songwriting and structure, then adding all the personality to something that’s already true to classic songwriting. 

SWIM: When you’re on stage, do you feel you’re able to get your personality across to the fans while performing? Do you feel you’re able to be your true, unfiltered self up there, or does it help to get in the mindset of a different character, similar to an actor?

LUNA: I’m curious to see what your response is going to be. [laughing while talking to Ash]

ASH: I try to lock into the songs themselves in my performance and really think about what I’m saying, ‘cause the majority of what I do on stage is just singing. Then I have like a few samples I play as well, which are leads.

So, to give my best performance, I usually focus really hard on how I felt when I wrote the words to the songs and try to embody the truest version of that me. 

LUNA: I had to learn how to be fully comfortable and myself on stage, ‘cause at first, I was pretty nervous about that stuff. We’ve been recording in a studio for so long, so I had to be the calmest version of myself, which at first was impossible, but I figured it out. So yeah, I feel comfortable with it.

SWIM: I have to ask about a recent show in Pittsburgh where you played an over twenty-minute extended noise jam at the end of the song “make it last.” I read an article Eli Enis wrote, which, I have to quote him here, saying that this instance “felt like a sado-masochistic ritual” and potentially left a 19-year-old man named Carl in another dimension after what he had just witnessed. Can you please describe whether this usually happens during your shows, or was this a one-off kind of thing?

LUNA: Yeah, we always do that. [laughs]

ASH: It’s not necessarily supposed to be sado-masochistic. [laughs]

LUNA: It’s funny to see everyone’s different reaction to that. It’s a thing that happens, and the audience gets to experience it however they want. 

ASH: The truth is that we’ve done it in so many different ways, and everybody has a completely different reaction to it. We’ve done it differently in different places, and sometimes it feels like that, I guess.

LUNA: It’s interesting ‘cause people will, I find it either very aggressive or very soothing, which, I think, we’re trying to go for soothing. It’s something I want to exist only in the time it exists, so it’s hard to talk about, but, yeah, it’s definitely supposed to create a oneness with everyone there. I hope it is meditative for some people, you know? 

SWIM: Do you have a favorite part of touring? 

ASH: Honestly, getting to perform every night is my favorite part. Whenever we have a night off, I’m relieved in part, but also a little bummed. I really enjoy the experience where we’re basically just playing all these local bills with people who are active in their own scene. That is really cool to see how other scenes function because we’re so used to Nashville at this point. Yeah, it’s cool to be inspired by the different ways every scene uplifts itself and try to bring that home. 

SWIM: Do you guys like to explore the cities you visit on off days? 

ASH: Yeah. Sean, who plays drums in Total Wife, he’ll usually look up something on Atlas Obscura on an off day, and we’ll go to a cool cemetery or something.

LUNA: It’ll just show you oddities in whatever city you’re in. Just like weird, strange things that you can usually find for free, stuff that you wouldn’t find on Google or Apple Maps if you typed in ‘local attractions.’ 

I obviously love the music part of tour, but didn’t realize that touring so much meant that you’re just traveling all the time, which is really good for my brain in a way that I didn’t expect. The way it removes you from the cycle of your everyday life puts you outside of your head for a second, and then you can come back into it. It really does something crazy to my brain that I need. The road can definitely be soothing for different people, like just to travel and whatnot.

SWIM: You both have created a really distinct visual aesthetic —from the album cover art to the music videos —is that a collaborative effort between you two? 

ASH: I feel like we just have been making a lot of stuff for many years. For example, need-based flyers for shows. Art for promotion and stuff like that. When I was younger, I kind of overthought making art, and I thought if I’m not some classically trained artist, then what’s the point of making anything? But basically, I started using collage when I couldn’t draw what I wanted. I just had all these conceptual ideas and collages that really lend themselves well—combining concepts and just mashing up imagery together. 

A lot of the art is collaborative; we kind of just pass it back and forth. 

LUNA: Yeah. It’s a lot of passing back and forth with that stuff, or just making art alongside each other. Just snap reactions to this will be cool; that’ll be cool for that. Also, kind of accumulating different ideas and collages over the years, like Ash said. This project has always been both musical and visual. I think all of our output is just put into Total Wife. 

SWIM: How fulfilling is it to tag-team visual mediums, stuff other than music, together? 

ASH: Oh, yeah. It feels impossible to imagine not working together. Just because of how long it’s been, it’s such a long, growing process where we’ve worked through a lot of artistic disputes and refined the art we make, using each other as a sounding board. 

SWIM: Do you feel you operate creatively differently now than when you first met? 

LUNA: Totally. We were just trying to work out how we wanted to make stuff and had no end goal. We still kind of don’t, but it’s much easier to finish things now. 

ASH: I feel like we’re much more sure when we’re giving our opinions. We used to know what we didn’t want versus what we did. That helped because it helped us refine ourselves, but it took a while to sort out what exactly felt like us.

Neither of us started with any music theory knowledge or any real background in songwriting. I was in and out of bands, but I never learned to play guitar until last year. 

SWIM: Has your songwriting become easier for you now than it was 12 years ago? 

ASH: Definitely, yeah. It really started with recording just to have recordings, make songs, and have sounds. And then we were slowly making songs, which was kind of the reverse. 

Photo by Sean Booz

SWIM: What do you all have planned for the rest of the year? 

LUNA: We just have one more show planned. We’re doing so much touring and the album rollout. We’re both really excited to get back in the studio.

ASH: Yeah, so we’re just taking a little break from shows. 

LUNA: We have a bunch of songs written, and the next album has about like ten Pro Tools projects for new songs. That’s been in the sitting stage for so long because this was the first time we decided to do anything with the release other than just upload it the second we had the masters. 

SWIM: Is there gonna be a tonal shift with your next project?

LUNA: Honestly, not really. I would like to hear what people think, because in my mind, a lot of these songs could have been on this most recent album. 

Starting an album while the other one is being finished means each new record half sounds like the last one. So I think that’ll probably be the case with this one. It’ll be like half of the ideas I wanted to finish up on the last thing, half new stuff, and further trying to mesh everything and sound less disjointed.

SWIM: Is there anything else you all wanna talk about or bring up before we sign off?

LUNA: Nashville is awesome. There are a lot of cool bands here, and I'm just always trying to rep that. There are a lot of weird and fun bands out here, a lot of cool music that you wouldn’t expect.

SWIM: Who are some bands people should know about from Nashville? 

LUNA: The members of our band all have their own projects. Celltower and Make Yourself at Home. I play in another band called Melaina Kol. There’s just all these great bands. Sour Tooth, they’re amazing. 

SWIM: With you both living in Nashville, have either of you seen Haley Williams walking around?

LUNA: Yeah. She comes to the bagel shop I work at. 

SWIM: Oh, no way. 

ASH: I wanna meet her so bad. 

LUNA: She’s sweet, actually, which is nice to know. She’s a sweetheart. Thank goodness. 

SWIM: Thank you again for taking the time. I really appreciate it, and I hope you both have a wonderful day.

Luna and Ash in unison: Thank you! You too! 

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David is a content mercenary based in Chicago. He’s also a freelance writer specializing in music, movies, and culture. His hidden talents are his mid-range jump shot and the ability to always be able to tell when someone is uncomfortable at a party. You can find him scrolling away on Instagram @davidmwill89, Twitter @Cobretti24, or Medium @davidmwms.

Embracing The Chaos: An Interview With Laveda

Photo by Mars Alba

New York City is known as “The City of Dreams” for the hundreds of thousands that relocate there every year with grand aspirations in an even grander city. New York itself has enough main character energy for a whole coastline, making it the ideal setting for an artist. From the hustle and bustle of the people on the streets to the blinding glow of a subway car and the peeled-off paint of a tenement building, inspiration is abundant at all hours of the day. Falling in love with NYC is as easy as acquiring a late-night slice at Joe’s Pizza.

​Enter Laveda, a noisy rock band fronted by Ali Genevich (guitar, bass, synths, vocals) and Jacob Brooks (guitar, bass, synths, vocals). What started out as a project between the two of them in the winter of 2018 evolved into something bigger as they realized the momentum was building. In 2022, with hopes to solidify their sound, Laveda enlisted Dan Carr (bass, guitar) and Joe Taurone (drums) for assistance on their sophomore effort. The resulting album, A Place You Grew Up In, was full of lush, warm soundscapes which felt like an ode to their upstate New York, Albany roots.

The following year, Genevich and Brooks made the jump to migrate a couple of hours south to New York City. The ceaseless energy of their new home inspired their third studio record, Love, Darla. The two were influenced to create new music by the things they would hear on the streets: the clattering of subway cars, screeching of metal on construction sites, and distant sirens. There was never a dull moment in their world or their music.

The songs on Love, Darla have a scrappy chaos within them. The introductory “Care” starts with just a minute of guitar reverb that sounds like grinding metal, then morphs into a dissonant, energetic banger. “Cellphone” has a gentle, melodic, head-bobbing slacker rock appeal with rebellious kiss-off lyrics. The songs come with a real bite to them, but also have a melodic flow that makes them rewarding to revisit, just like Sonic Youth and countless New York bands of yore. Laveda is now about constant movement. Gone is the quiet, suburban life of northeast New York; in its place is the eruptive energy of the city that never sleeps.

I sat down with Ali Genevich and Jacob Brooks via Zoom to talk about moving to the city, getting inspired by live music, and Tim Burton. 

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Photo by Mars Alba

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

SWIM: I read that you moved from Albany to New York City in 2023. What inspired that move?

ALI: We had wanted to move to New York for a while, the timing just wasn’t right for us with COVID. Once things were opening back up again, we started doing a lot of gigging and touring. I feel like we were busy in the local scene, just trying to build up our presence as a band upstate. Eventually, I think we reached a point where it felt like we had sort of outgrown the scene there and wanted to surround ourselves with more like-minded musicians and a new community. The scene sort of died out with COVID and my college shutting down. Unfortunately, it took a big hit. Not to say we wanted to abandon it, but we also had always wanted to come to New York, so the timing just felt right when we made the move in 2023.

SWIM: Were you able to adapt quickly to New York City, or did it take some time to settle in?

ALI: I think it was a little of both. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of people we already knew when we first got here, so in some ways, it was easier for us to move here than a different city. If we were to move to somewhere that we’ve never been, like Texas, we just don’t know people in those cities, but we had a lot of friends who already lived in New York City, so it was really nice. It was just cool to have people to hang out with, bring you out to things, and show you the cool venues and bars and all that jazz.

SWIM: Is there a difference between creating music in Albany as opposed to New York? Can you feel a difference?

ALI: Yeah, definitely. I’m very inspired by my environment, and New York is a lot different than Albany or Troy, just much more industrial, and there’s so much more noise and energy, and people are surprising you every day. There’s always an interaction that you don’t expect you’re going to have, and it’s really awesome. I think Albany and Upstate are just so much slower-paced, and sometimes you can go about your day without really even talking to anyone at all. That’s interesting to me. I think a lot of the griminess of New York City has found its way into our music for sure, into this new record. It definitely contributed a lot to a sonic shift that was already happening in our sound – New York kind of drove the nail further into the coffin, I guess.

SWIM: I hear that griminess in “I Wish” and “Care,” and it reminds me of mid-to-late ‘80s Sonic Youth. Were they like an inspiration for you? What’s your relationship with them?

ALI: Yeah, I’ve always loved Sonic Youth, but I think I found a new appreciation for their music when we moved here because I just read Kim Gordon’s book, Girl in a Band. I picked it up at Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon, and I started reading it on tour. It was super relatable, and I was like, ‘Well this would be a good time to dive deeper into Sonic Youth’s music after we moved here,’ because I had just finished the book at that time. 

It took me, like, two years to read it because I put books down constantly and pick them back up again. But yeah, then I started listening to their first record, second record, third record, all that, just from the beginning, because Kim had referenced so many different eras in her life, you know? I wanted to have a better idea of what she was talking about, so I just got really into it and eventually was like, wait, these records are some of the best records. I’d only heard some of their more popular stuff, and now some of the random deeper cuts are some of my favorite tracks. They’re an incredible band.

SWIM: Do you have a favorite album from Sonic Youth? 

ALI: I think Sister is probably my favorite.

SWIM: Sister, that’s a good one. I love that album cover.

ALI: Yeah, it’s just, it’s got such a mood, and I’m a sucker for just feeling nostalgic all the time. It really does evoke that emotion in me. But they have a lot of great records. I mean, honestly, what am I forgetting? Goo, that’s it! I feel like that’s a more popular record, but also pretty undeniably awesome. 

SWIM: I read that you guys workshoped “Strawberry” and “Heaven” during live shows. I think that’s really cool. It reminds me of a comedian going to a club just to see what jokes work, trying to add them into their set. How did you decide to workshop these songs together at live shows?

JACOB: At the time, those were our only two new ones, really. I think we had started “Heaven” first. We also had “Tim Burton’s Tower” in our back pocket and “Cellphone” as well, but we weren’t really ready to flesh those out yet.

ALI: Yeah, I think we knew that those songs were too challenging. We just didn’t know what they were gonna sound like yet. We felt “Strawberry” and “Heaven” were just strong. They had really solid foundations, so it made sense to take those out, play them, and just sort of see how they evolved. 

I don’t think the songs fundamentally changed a lot, but it was more the energy that we had when we played them and the little nuances. Things like figuring out what pedals sound good for a certain section of the song and what buzz tone I wanted. For Joe, I feel like the drum part really solidified itself over the course of a month. He would try some new fills here and there just to experiment because we had the time to. I sang the song completely differently in the demo than I ended up singing it on the record. The end result is completely different. If you heard the demo, you’d be like, ‘Oh, wow, this is a very different voice and character.’ I think that also inspired a lot of the other songs and the singing on the rest of the record. Finding the right style of singing wasn’t challenging, but it definitely took some time to figure out.

SWIM: Did you notice a crowd reaction to a certain part of the song, like ‘oh, they seemed to be drawn to this, so maybe we should add this into the song’ or something like that?

ALI: Well, yeah, I feel “Strawberry” was really the Catalyst because people just liked the song in general, but they would always say ‘Oh, I really like when you scream’ and enough people said it to where I was like, ‘maybe I should just do that more.’ And because I like when I scream, I was like, great, you like it, I like it, sounds good, let’s just put it all over the place.

SWIM: You guys mentioned the song “Tim Burton’s Tower” earlier. I love his movies – is he an inspiration? Did you draw anything from him for the song title?

JACOB: I think it’s more of a Troy, New York thing.

ALI: Yeah, the lyrics of the song are loosely about someone who just wants to be a movie star, but the song was inspired by this old church that we could see from our apartment in Troy. It had this scary-looking tower, and we would always just call it the Tim Burton Tower. Troy has a lot of really old Gothic architecture and historical buildings from the 1800s, which is really cool. But yeah, and it’s the oldest song on the record, or at least the oldest idea. We were still living upstate when I wrote that, and I think it just stuck. I thought, 'Oh, since it’s a song called Tim Burton’s Tower, I’ll just make it about the movies.'

SWIM: Do you have any favorite Tim Burton movies? 

ALI: Well, we definitely love The Nightmare Before Christmas. I think Edward Scissorhands specifically was what I was picturing while we were writing that song. We actually had a VHS of Edward Scissorhands on in the background in LA while we were recording the song. That scene where he’s cutting the shrubs with his hand, it’s just, like, so crazy.

SWIM: Have you ever seen the movie Sleepy Hollow? Was that in Upstate New York, or am I imagining that? 

JACOB: No, you’re not imagining, there is. I saw it once. It’s good. It’s a crazy movie.

Photo by Julia Tarantino

SWIM: Was there a live band you all saw that was so good that it sparked a competitive fire for you to want to go practice harder and get better as musicians?

ALI: Oh, that’s a really cool question. Yes, I mean, I feel like I have two answers for this. 

I think maybe not in a competitive way, but more just in an inspirational way. We were on our way to record A Place You Grew Up In, out in California, so the whole band was driving across the country with our gear, and my aunt and uncle live just outside of Denver, so we crashed a couple of nights with them on our way to LA. It just so happened that Wilco was playing at Red Rocks, so we went to that. I was like, okay, we have to go to this, and the tickets were like 50 bucks a pop, so no brainer, let’s go. We just had the most amazing time, and we had never gone to a show just the four of us together, so that was really special. Wilco is just an incredible band, and Dan, our bass player, has always been a really big Wilco fan. After that show, I think we were all just like, 'Oh my God, wow, what a crazy, awesome experience.'

Another sort of band that I feel like really ticks this box is Robber Robber from Burlington, Vermont. They’re an amazing band, really sweet people, and friends of ours. We’ve played a show or two with them, but they’re an incredible live band. I remember Joe, after he saw Zack (from Robber Robber) play the drums for the first time, he literally went home and was like, ‘I need to practice more.’ Joe is already such an incredible drummer, so when he says something like that, you know he’s gotta be mind-blown. It was really cool to see how inspired he was by Zack’s playing, and we all love that band. They’re awesome. They put on a sick live show, so you should check them out if you haven’t.

SWIM: For me, music is a lot about scenery and vibes. If you listen to the right album at the right time, it can enhance your experience. Is there an ideal setting you would love for people to listen to your new album so that it might enhance their listening experience?

JACOB: I think it’s a subway record.

ALI: Yeah, I definitely think listening on the subway is really cool because the subway is kind of chaotic sometimes, but especially the above-ground trains, where you can see outside and you can just see everything moving fast and all these random people in the train car that are just on their daily commute or whatever. I do enjoy listening to it then. I think we've both said it can be really noisy when you’re listening with earpods, and you can still hear the sounds of the train and people and whatever else is going on.. It’s almost like the music blends in because it’s grimy and noisy already; it sort of just incorporates those sounds, so it’s like it doesn’t really matter if you have bleed from the outside world. But yeah, I haven’t really found a place that’s beat that experience for me with this record yet. 

JACOB: I think our previous records were made more for the car because we were upstate. Now we never drive.

ALI: Yeah, I don’t know if this is a car album.

JACOB: I don’t think it is.

SWIM: The album is so chaotic and up-tempo and has so much energy. It feels like it’s built for body movement: either you’re walking, you’re running, or you’re on the subway. I think that’s perfect for your guys’ record.

ALI: Yeah, yeah, walking is nice. Walking in any city, I think, would also be pretty nice. Just point A to point B type stuff.

SWIM: Thanks so much for taking the time! See you on tour soon.

ALI: Thank you. Have a great rest of your day.

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David is a content mercenary based in Chicago. He’s also a freelance writer specializing in music, movies, and culture. His hidden talents are his mid-range jump shot and the ability to always be able to tell when someone is uncomfortable at a party. You can find him scrolling away on Instagram @davidmwill89, Twitter @Cobretti24, or Medium @davidmwms.

Inside Porcupine’s Altar of Vapor: An interview with Chicago’s masters of Dark Hardcore

Photo by K.B. Imaging

“We didn’t sacrifice anything that makes us Porcupine. We’re still heavy. This is our most collaborative project to date as a band. We don’t take ourselves too seriously, but we take the band and the music itself very seriously. People should be keeping their eyes peeled for anything that we do.” 

Porcupine vocalist and lyricist Dawson Kiser sounds extremely proud and confident when he says this to me, his excitement about his band’s newest material completely shining through the Google Meet call we arranged. I have been closely watching the evolution of the Chicagoland and Pittsburgh hardcore outfit since their first proper releases in 2018, though they had been germinating deep in the Midwest suburbs for a couple of years already at that point. Since then, I’ve heard the band put out record after record of intense, chaotic, blistering hardcore music, and seen them perform with the likes of Harvest, Ignite, and Portrayal Of Guilt. 2024 was a crucial year for the band, with their debut full-length album All Is Vapor being unleashed in June — sharing a release date with Charli xcx’s unavoidable brat, a fact they jokingly feel set them back. “Our album is a challenging listen; it’s long and ruthless for a modern hardcore album,” guitarist Joey Hernandez reflects. “And it came out the same day as brat, so we got beef with Charli now.”

Porcupine’s music has nothing in common with the 365 party girl herself, as you might imagine. Their ferocious and unrelenting approach to hardcore and metal is one of the most impressive that the underground has to offer, evident by songs like “Funeral Grief” from 2021’s The Sybil EP, or “Army Of Martyrs” from All Is Vapor. Now, just over a year later, the band is back with the six-track EP Under The Altar, released via Chicago label New Morality Zine, the band’s longtime home. The 25-minute collection serves as a direct companion to last year’s album, with its only physical release being a CD that compiles the two – a further extension of the themes and imagery that began with The Sybil. Dawson Kiser breaks it all down: “There is a strong connection between those three records. I was still exploring different ideas, starting with The Sybil, but there’s been this consistent philosophical idea of dualism – the idea of having a body and a spirit, being drawn to material life and immaterial life – and what that means in a world full of suffering and depravity. That’s been across the board through our releases, but I think it’s gotten more precise on Under The Altar.”

Hernandez adds, “Some of the ideas for these new songs have been around for a while. Dawson wanted to do a sequel to ‘Holy Cowards’ from All Is Vapor, which sort of inspired us to do this follow-up EP. I pulled a lot of things that have been sitting on the shelf and recreated them to sound like something that Porcupine would make in 2025. I was really influenced by mewithoutYou, who put out a lot of sequels to other things across their discography. The next one we worked on redoing was ‘Close The Doors,’ since the album version is just acoustic. We wanted to work out a full band version for our live set, and Dawson added new lyrics to it. I think the sequel totally works as a tone setter for the EP before ‘Dull Blade’ comes in.”

Under The Altar’s title track is the band’s longest to date, clocking in at just under nine minutes. The group is no stranger to epic, sprawling songs on their releases, like “The Kingdom Of Heaven” from The Sibyl and “I Am Bound” from All Is Vapor. But this track’s inception also predates the other songs on the EP by quite some time, as the band explains. “It was originally called ‘I Wish You Peace,’ and it came out on the benefit compilation Artists For Black Lives Matter Vol. 1 back in 2020,” Kiser recalls about his original acoustic performance of the track. Hernandez follows, “I always had the idea to make that a Porcupine song because I thought the melody and riff were so sick. When I translated it to the band, I wanted it to be super calm in the beginning, because what Dawson is saying lyrically on the song is just so haunting and desperate, but I knew the second half would be a lot more intense.”

Kiser admits, “It’s a very exhausting song for me. My vocal approach was totally different; I’ve never sung that way on a Porcupine song before. I start really subdued, and then it goes into this painful scream where I’m trying to hold the note of the song. I was listening to a lot of Battle Of Mice and their vocalist, Julie Christmas, while writing the song. Her vocals really inspire me because they’re so terrifying and emotional all at once.”

Photo by @w0rms5

Hernandez and Kiser are the band’s co-founders and only consistent members, although Under The Altar was mixed by returning bassist Jordan Hermes, an element of the record they’re both excited about. “We love him being back, he’s been instrumental in making these songs sound like more than just demos. It feels so natural, and we’re so locked in whenever we practice. He’s been a huge part of us becoming a better band,” Hernandez says.

Between the thematic consistency of their 2020s catalog and the return of early band members, the conversation with the band led me to suggest the idea of the “Porcupine Cinematic Universe,” and it turns out I wasn’t far off. “Jordan said the same thing,” Hernandez says. “We all like to do different stuff that may not be directly related to Porcupine, but it’s all kind of connected. Dawson’s solo record that came out recently is like that.”

Released in May under his middle name, Micaiah Kaiser, Treachery Utterly Murders Our Respect, or TUMOR, is a deeply personal record about betrayal, heartbreak, and suffering. “It was still a collaboration with Joey,” Kiser notes. “We’ve been working on it for a long time, like five years…”

“That’s because I was procrastinating,” Hernandez admits.

“… that’s also true, but I wasn’t going to throw you under the bus,” Kiser laughs. He continues, “There are some sonic similarities to the band because it’s these same two guys working on it, but nothing sounds like a Porcupine song. It’s not remotely hardcore. I don’t really know what to call it. Joey is better at identifying genres than I am.”

Hernandez qualifies, “It’s like Giles Corey-core. Definitely something for fans of that or other artists on The Flenser record label. Bedroom recordings with some spacey and ambient beats.”

“Nick Cave is probably my most listened-to artist of all time,” Kiser says when asked about other musical artists that inform his writing. “I’m always listening to his stuff and am really influenced by the way he approaches dark themes with a sort of folklore style.”

The full band’s approach to what they call “dark hardcore” feels informed more at times by leftfield and experimental artists like Cave or King Woman than traditional hardcore bands, but Hernandez and Kiser haven’t lost any love for their anchoring genre, despite the sense that they’re navigating their way through it. “The thing about hardcore,” Hernandez confesses, “it’s kind of a sore subject for us. We’re totally doing our own thing, and it’s not the cool thing to do. I think that’s made us stand out, but it’s also made us go, ‘Oh, people don’t really understand what this is.’ We’re always thinking about that type of thing. I love bands like Candy and Vein because they’re so off-kilter and doing something interesting, but you can tell they’re all really talented dudes. Or a band like Code Orange, where you can tell they have hardcore roots, but they went in more of a rock and roll direction that was still really heavy.”

Kiser adds, “I still view us as a hardcore band, I don’t ever see us as not having an obvious hardcore influence. There are songs on Under The Altar that are just hardcore songs to me, and how I personally understand the genre. I still love listening to hardcore bands and going to shows and watching people going crazy, even if some of the more popular bands don’t generally line up with what Porcupine is doing. Even some of my favorite bands like All Else Failed, Converge, and Starkweather, that maybe lean more metal or something else entirely, they’re still hardcore bands to me.”

Photo by Max Glazer

Porcupine’s live performances are not to be missed — the quintet consistently delivers blistering and visceral shows at any venue they play, channeling the energy of some of extreme music’s tightest acts like Full Of Hell and Harm’s Way. They’ve just wrapped up a short touring run with close friends The Jackal – a new Ohio band featuring members of Griphook and Coop. On the tour, Hernandez says, “I’m excited to connect back up with them, just to hang out and get inspired. Every tour we do, we get inspired by the bands we play with. Like the band Prouns, who are just a three-piece, but they really know how to rock out. And the band Clot, they’re super professional and older than us, I almost felt like they were showing us up every night. And with The Jackal, this is the most impressed I’ve been with one of Zach Butcher’s bands.”

Porcupine continues their Summer tour dates next week with fellow Chicago-based band We Weren’t Invited, capped off by a hometown record release show on August 16th. Hernandez feels equally pumped for this run, giving his next tourmates accolades for being “so crazy, and they do whatever the fuck they want, it’s wild. I’m also excited to talk to people about the new record. We’ve been keeping it under wraps for a while, but I can’t wait to hear what people think of it. I love that our close friends love our music, and I don’t think their opinion doesn’t matter, but I really love listening to new people who are discovering Porcupine, even if they only like one song. It just makes me happy to know I did something cool like that.”

2026 will mark ten years since Porcupine formed, and Hernandez and Kiser have no plans to stop anytime soon. Reflecting on the milestone, Hernandez says, “I think we’re at a point now where we’re at our best, and we can make the best music we can with the best people.” Kiser agrees, “We’ve all grown up together, and the music is indicative of that. This current lineup is the best one that we’ve had. We all get along great.” I asked them exactly what “growing up” means to them as a band, not just the experience of doing so, but what they’re taking away from that experience.

Hernandez answers, “Even though I love a lot of what we did in the past, obviously I would do it a lot differently now. The first real thing I’m proud of is the Zomia record. I still listen back to that and go, ‘that’s crazy that I made that when I was 20.’ That was the first time I realized I could make something really interesting, and we got a nod from the Axe To Grind podcast, which I never thought could happen even back then. And then they premiered ‘Euphrosyne’ ahead of All Is Vapor coming out, which was so cool of them to do.

We just want to keep challenging ourselves with things that I don’t even know if they’re hardcore or not anymore, but then I’ll go write a 90-second straightforward hardcore song after that. I love how Smashing Pumpkins can mix together soft and heavy songs on the same album, like Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness, which was the first record that made me think, ‘I want to sonically emulate this.’ We’ve ventured through a lot of sonic experimentation, a lot of different types of hardcore. We’ve grown our networking skills since our first tour in 2018. We’re a lot more mature now. I’m really happy with this EP. I wouldn’t change a thing about it, and I didn’t compromise anything that makes us Porcupine, but every new record we do, I feel like we have to reintroduce ourselves. So I hope this is going to foreshadow whatever comes next, because it’s going to be even better.”

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Logan Archer Mounts once almost got kicked out of Warped Tour for doing the Disturbed scream during a band’s acoustic set. He currently lives in Rolling Meadows, IL, but tells everyone he lives in Palatine.

Different Parts of the Same Elephant: An Interview With Dustin Hayes of Walter Mitty and His Makeshift Orchestra

Photo by Lisa Johnson

People always say never to meet your heroes, but what if you get to meet your hero twice because you don’t understand how Google Meet works?

It might make you a little tired trying to keep up with everything that singer-songwriter Dustin Hayes is connected to. He cofounded the record label and art collective Making New Enemies, which has released an armful of records alongside a late-night-esque comedy show, a lo-fi surf film, and an annual community collaborative album called Group Picture, currently fourteen iterations deep. Hayes directed and edited a “mumblecore soap opera” short film called Library Card. He’s dabbled in podcasting, blogging, and photography. He’s even been a ping-pong referee.

At the center of this rich, creative universe lies beloved folk-punk band Walter Mitty and His Makeshift Orchestra, as well as its electric, more experimental sibling, Walter Etc., which Dustin founded after Walter Mitty took a hiatus way back in 2015. Since the band’s founding, virtually all of Dustin’s latest musical work has been under the Walter Etc. name, aside from a compilation of Walter Mitty B-sides and oddities in 2019. 

But that all changes with Yikes Almighty, Walter Mitty’s first new album in over ten years. Mixing the DIY acoustic colors characteristic of Walter Mitty with new sounds echoing the experimentation of his Walter Etc. offerings, Yikes Almighty is a soul-searching snapshot of where Dustin is currently in his life. Hayes’ honest songwriting takes on new shapes as his lyrics filter through the sieve of adulthood, yet never lose their poignancy or authenticity. 

After meeting once from the comfort of our own homes and failing to properly record our interview, Dustin was nice enough to meet again for a second interview to talk about the circumstances leading up to Yikes Almighty, the album’s eclectic rollout, spirituality in your early 30s, and what exactly the point of the whole Walter-verse is.

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This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

SWIM: Thank you for being so flexible. I’m so sorry that this entire thing happened. Apparently, I don’t know how to work technology, despite what I say on my resume.

DUSTIN: No worries. I would have done the exact same thing. 

SWIM: I was like, oh, yeah, I see a red recording dot! We’re good to go. Realize after the interview that it’s not a recording dot, it’s just letting me know I’m using my microphone. Oh. It’s probably going to be a little bit of a repeat of Monday for the most part. I’m bummed because we had a really good conversation on Monday, but... 

DUSTIN: It’s all good! 

SWIM: What can you do, man. Anyway, how are you doing? 

DUSTIN: Good. This was just reminding me of my ultimate Zoom mistake where I threw an online party for Group Picture. It was the first time I did a Zoom party, and I didn’t realize you can’t just throw the Zoom link out on social media without something happening, so I shared the link on Twitter and I was like, “We’re live now!” And then we got all these bots coming into the chat, and then there’s just porn on the screen. I was like, “Holy shit!” And then they appropriated one of our friends’ usernames, so it looked like our friend was talking in the chat and saying all these terrible things.

SWIM: Dude, that’s so funny. My girlfriend and I have a book club with our friends, and that happened to us too! We don’t even know how this person got in, but they did the same thing. My girlfriend’s sister’s name is Maria, and they joined under “Maria’s iPhone.” So everyone’s like, “Okay, cool, Maria’s here!” They join and they’re just streaming Pornhub, so everyone’s like “Oh my god, what is she doing?!” Then we realize that it’s not her because she actually tried to join after!

DUSTIN: This is the Wild West out here. 

SWIM: I know, honestly, if you’re in a public Zoom, it is the Wild West. So let’s just take it back to square one. Earlier this week, we talked about Yikes Almighty being the first Walter Mitty album in ten years. I want to ask you more about the recording process because before we even knew about this album, you were posting pictures of yourself in a room hitting this triangle-like instrument, showing off toy pianos and all these new sorts of sounds for a Walter Mitty record. How did that come about? What were you going through at the time? Where were you listening to? 

DUSTIN: I don’t know if I really remember exactly what I was listening to, but I was definitely just kind of getting back to my roots in those sounds. The very first Walter Mitty record I had to make in a bedroom because I didn’t have access to anything. I just had an acoustic guitar and random stuff around me. So that’s kind of always been like the home base for me with recording. 

When I was making Yikes Almighty, I didn’t have a home and I went to our drummer Chris’s house out in Denver, so it was kind of just back to square one. I was going around his house looking through things to hit [for percussion]. That’s why I was hitting the pan lid! But then I took it a step further on this album – I went to a thrift store and I bought a bunch of kid’s toys and started messing with those. So I could have, you know, used more real instruments, but the circumstances kind of gave me a “back to the beginning, back to the basics.”

SWIM: Right. Almost like a full circle, in a sense. 

DUSTIN: Yeah, exactly. A little full circle as far as the production and where I was at in life. 

SWIM: I feel like... in some ways, this is kind of a full-circle Walter Mitty album. For example, the last track on Yikes Almighty is “101 S.” I think a lot of listeners, especially if they’ve been Walter Heads for a long time, they’re going to notice that title right away: “101 N” is one of your most popular songs. Are those two connected?

DUSTIN: There’s definitely a connection for me, like, in my head and life, but I think musically or lyrically… “101 S” is not a continuation of “101 N.” I guess the vibes behind them are kind of similar. “101 N” was about leaving home when I was a kid in Orange County and moving out for my first time when I was eighteen and being scared and excited and hitting the road and taking the 101 North Freeway into the Great Unknown. Then “101 S” is from my thirties when I left my life in Ventura and I moved south to LA, and it also felt like leaving it all behind, going into the Great Unknown. This was the unknown of Los Angeles and a life with no job and no home, no partner and no band or… anything. I was just living out of my truck in LA. “101 S” just made sense because it was the same exact feeling as “101 N” of going off into the great unknown in a new moment of life, but this was the reverse of the original. So yeah, they’re pretty spiritually connected. In my head, it’s like yin and yang, but to a random listener, it’s probably just another song. [Laughs]

SWIM: I love that. I want to circle back to the treasure hunt album rollout. It’s just such a badass idea! I remember you talking briefly about an author that was a huge source of inspiration for it?

DUSTIN: It was really a confluence of things, but there was this author named Forrest Fenn who had a treasure- I’ve never read Forrest Fenn or anything, I just know the lore- but he had a treasure with these Native American artifacts, Spanish gold, and very valuable things worth over a million dollars then buried it in the Rocky Mountains. He just left a poem that was the treasure map to find it, and it was a big deal… I think there’s a Netflix documentary about it? 

So my dad told me about that, and he would always joke that we should go find the treasure! [Laughs] I always thought it was super sick. So the idea was in my head, like, I want to do something like that one day! And then my friend Sarah was telling me about a sculptor she knows who buries their sculptures in the desert for people to dig up. And I was like, that’s the coolest, most romantic thing I’ve ever heard. So when I heard Sarah tell me that, it reminded me of the Fenn treasure and it all kind of just clicked in my head. I was like, “Oh, I have to bury an album one day!” And then I was like, “I’m just going to bury my next album because life is short,” you know? 

SWIM: I mean, there’s no better time than the present, right? 

DUSTIN: Exactly. 

SWIM: Does that whole idea have anything to do with the name Yikes Almighty? I feel like that sounds something like finding something or some sort of adventure, but maybe one where you don’t like what you find.

DUSTIN: I love that. I love that. They don’t have any literal connection, but energetically, it felt the same. I had the name Yikes Almighty before the treasure hunt really got underway, so they didn’t really have anything to do with each other. Yikes Almighty is just jumping off and taking a big risk and just going for something, even if it’s messy or doesn’t make sense right away, and just trusting your gut and going for it. So the essence of the treasure hunt is very much in line with that same philosophy. 

SWIM: I love it, dude, it’s such an interesting idea. I had never heard of anything like it, and you’re giving me all these references that have already been done. Last time we talked, we discussed writing and how you had wanted to write about your touring adventures and all that fun stuff, but one thing I wanted to check in on is watercolor painting! Are you still a painter? 

Dustin [Laughs] Definitely goes in phases, you know. It’ll go in phases where I’ll do a bunch at once and then stop for like months. I recently did this thing for the album [holds up a water color illustration themed around ‘Yikes Almighty’]. But besides that, I haven’t really been watercoloring too much. I’ll get back into it, though. I’d like to. 

SWIM: Yeah, I’d imagine you got a lot coming up, so I get if it’s not, you know, the primary goal right now to become a watercolor artist. I just wanted to know because I remember you posted this funny story on Patreon about how you came into contact with this watercolor artist. Was it Craigslist? Or am I getting it confused with something else? 

DUSTIN: It was! 

SWIM: [Laughs] That’s so random. That’s so cool, though. I miss Craigslist so much. Well, I mean, I guess it’s still there, but like when it was, you know… before Offer Up and all those apps and stuff. 

DUSTIN: Yeah, it’s not quite as active anymore. But you know how it is. I have a lot of things I wish I could pursue and get good at, but I don’t even try! I always get sidetracked and start making more music.

SWIM: I know, it’s hard to find time. I mean, speaking of busy schedules, I know you have the Taxpayers tour coming up, and I know we talked about the Apes of the State show happening in LA in October, and you just wrapped up your solo living room tour. How is the touring experience on your own compared to touring with a band?

DUSTIN: Oh, it’s so different. Some quick pros and cons: On the solo tour, it’s like, I have all day. It’s just my own schedule. You don’t have to show up as early when it’s just you on an acoustic guitar, you know? I was going to skate parks and surfing and posting up in a park and just playing guitar or reading and it was so chill. Then after the show, I’m just getting in the car. I don’t have a lot of money, so I was just sleeping in my car. In Santa Rosa, I was like, ‘I guess I’m just going to drive out to the coast tonight and sleep in Bedego Bay and wake up on the NorCal coast and look for waves.’ 

But after a show, good or bad, it’s just… everyone kind of leaves, and then I’m just like, “Oh, all right!’ There’s not really anyone to hang with at the end of the night, and I’m just alone in the car, just with my thoughts. It’s so lonely! I don’t have a bandmate to be like, “How was your night?” You’re truly alone. Pros and cons with a band… It’s fun to share the excitement and the adventure with your friends, but it’s a lot easier to travel and do logistical things as a solo person. 

SWIM: Yeah, I can imagine. There’s so much logistics, and especially considering how expensive it is now to tour… I can only imagine how much of a pain in the ass it is to just coordinate everything with everybody. 

DUSTIN: Yeah, that’s true, too. Money-wise, it’s actually feasible alone. It’s not as a band. And then you’re thinking about where we are going to stay? Are we getting a hotel? But hanging out with my old friends, the bandmates, is just invaluable. 

SWIM: It’s priceless.

DUSTIN: Right. I can’t put a dollar on it.

Photo by Ricardo Campos Molina

SWIM: I know we kind of talked about “101 S” earlier, but I really want to go back to the lyrics on this album because you’re such a great lyricist, and the first thing I want to talk about is that spiritual tinge that we touched on a little bit on Monday. I remember you saying that you’re not a born-again Christian or anything like that, but there is definitely a little bit of spirituality on this record. Going back to the older Walter Mitty records, there are lines like “Now it’s God that thinks that I don’t actually exist” and “This is why pseudo-intellectual tells us that we need our vices.” It felt like you were kind of turning away from that sort of idea, but in this record, you say, ‘I’m talking to, you know, girls that are smarter than me and I’m trying to convince them that there’s a higher purpose.’ There’s a very distinct shift into “maybe there is some truth to all this spiritual stuff?” and you’re trying to show others that. 

DUSTIN: Totally. I definitely haven’t become a Christian or joined any organized religion, but I think there’s more room for it in my life now. It’s funny because I feel like with younger kids now God is kind of cool, but when I was younger God was very uncool. If you were alternative and into punk music, you were against the church and organized religion and all of that dogma. 

SWIM: Yeah. They’d call you a poser if they found out you went to church!

DUSTIN: Exactly, yeah. And not that that’s right or wrong, but, yeah, that’s where I was coming from when I was younger, like 19 to 25 or whatever. It was pushing away any sort of spirituality or religion and not accepting it. And as I’ve grown older, there really is a place for this. It kind of turned from a philosophy of “everything’s meaningless” to “yes, everything’s meaningless, but we create our own reality- whatever meaning you put into that void is actually going to have meaning.” So it’s not meaningless! It’s just a customized spiritual, meaningful existence you create for yourself. 

So that’s where I feel like this new album is coming from, philosophically. A little more of allowing myself to feel love and not just being cynical. Like “love’s just a trick we play on ourselves.” Now it’s more allowing myself to believe in that or allowing myself to think about a higher power and assign myself a higher purpose. So there definitely is a spiritual, philosophical evolution between Old Walter and New Walter. I think it’s just a little less angsty and young and a little more calm and confident in the chaos. 

SWIM: Right. And I think you said you’ve given yourself grace to accept that love for yourself and others, which I love for you, and I think it makes perfect sense. We’re almost the same age. I feel like I’ve also gone through more of an acceptance or more of an open mind to that stuff. We almost had the same exact character arc [Laughs]. I was also like “fuck religion! Church sucks!” I was probably very insufferable, but that’s part of growing up. 

DUSTIN: It’s part of growing up, yeah.

Walter Etc. backyard show in Long Beach, CA. Photo by Nickolas Sackett.

SWIM: Speaking of growing up, there’s one thing that really surprised me listening to this record: you make a lot of references to having children in this record.

DUSTIN: Damn. That’s probably true. [Laughs]

SWIM: Do you want children?

DUSTIN: Theoretically, yeah. 

SWIM: Have you become more open to that as you’ve gotten older?

DUSTIN: Well, I was never against having kids. I would love to have kids. I love kids. Yeah. I love kids. Always have. I haven’t had a lot of jobs throughout my life, but I have always been nannying and babysitting and teaching. But it’s more a matter of if I can have some more stability and money and stuff like that. You know what I mean? 

SWIM: Yeah, I know. I totally understand.

DUSTIN: And then there’s the whole, ‘is it ethical to bring a kid into a dying world?’ but that’s a whole other conversation. But kids are awesome. How about you? 

SWIM: It’s funny you ask that because, again, same character arc- I was not really for having kids because of the whole ethical dilemma, and also my childhood experience of not really knowing my dad. But I’ve gotten older. I’ve been working at the same school for about five years, and the fifth graders who were promoted to sixth grade this year were in first grade when I started. So it was very strange seeing these students for five years and watching them grow and become their own persons and go through shit and see their wins and their losses. It just made me see how important children are and how wonderful they are. As I’ve gotten older, I see the allure of having a family of your own and having that chance to create a little person who has their own thoughts and feelings in the world. For them to carry the torch, but not in some weird patriarchal way. They’re like an artwork, you know? 

DUSTIN: For sure. 

SWIM: I struggled with the same things: bringing a child into the dying world, stability, all that fun stuff. But definitely stuck out to me on the album because I don’t think I’ve ever heard you sing about children. I want to circle back to this Patreon post you made about people having this preconstructed idea of Dustin based on your songs. You shared that this is a source of discomfort when people act like they know who you are based on the songs you write, or they have this very clear idea of who you are before they even get a chance to actually talk to you. Does that still affect you?

DUSTIN: I don’t want to overplay it. It’s not like I’m famous or something [Laughs]. But in my direct life, with friends and family, for sure. The first few Walter albums, there was just literally no one listening to us, you know? Maybe some friends, but my parents weren’t really listening, and I could just kind of say whatever. There weren’t any consequences in my real life, so I developed this personal, artistic philosophy where I’m really writing about my life and being super honest and vulnerable and… sometimes very specific in these songs. 

There’s a divide between the world of Walter and the world of Dustin, but the songs are usually like 90% true to my life and like 10% poetic license. But as time has gone on and more friends and family have become fully aware of the band, they’ve accepted it as, ‘This is what Dustin does!’ I know they’re going to hear stuff when I release it, and it does create more of a block or an obstacle, so I have to just be a little bit reckless and kind of trick myself while I’m writing things and be like “okay, I never actually have to release this or show it to anybody just so I can write it as purely and honestly and true to what I want.” Then I decide later if I’m going to release it, and once I like it, I’m just like, ‘fuck it,’ and I release it. [Laughs] 

But then I deal with the consequences in my life, like people get mad at me or get confused about things, uncomfortable. And they assume because my songs are so literal and raw that they just assume everything is 100% true, so if there’s a little bit of fictionalizing or poetic license taken here and there in a song, it’s taken as 100% fact. It’s just a funny life I’ve chosen for myself, but ultimately, I still have that mission to be as pure, honest, raw, and prolific of an artist in my lifetime as I can be. It’s still my number one priority and value, so I’m just sticking to it, and everything else can come second.

SWIM: Take it to the chin, like we said last time!

DUSTIN: [Laughs] Yeah, that’s what we were saying. Yeah, take it to the chin. Be brave and keep it going. 

SWIM: Love it, dude. I think that’s a pretty noble goal to have in a creative life. 

DUSTIN: I don’t know if it is, though. Is it? I don’t know. I feel like it is. I don’t know what people’s goals are. 

SWIM: I guess that goes back to the meaning you crave for yourself, right? 

DUSTIN: It is! That’s true.

SWIM: All right, I just have the last question that I asked you last time. I brought up this whole concept that many artists have talked about in the past. I know James Baldwin is probably the most famous example of this quote; he says something along the lines that he’s essentially writing the same story over and over and over again, but he’s just adding a different perspective on it. I feel like you’ve also touched on that briefly in your music. In “Um” from Always Leaving, you say, “the same chord progressions, but my lyrics were better back then.” What is Walter’s story, and do you think you’re constantly writing it and rewriting it? 

DUSTIN: Yeah. It’s a really interesting thought. I used to think - I think I still think this, but I’ve kind of lost the thread on this theory. There was a time I felt really strongly that all art is about the same thing. Like everyone’s art is about the same thing. If you zoom out far enough, it’s all trying to say the same thing and kind of describing different parts of the same elephant. So speaking just for all Walter songs, that same zooming out and describing different parts of the same elephant is true. I can’t, or any other writer, can’t get out of themselves. Everything is their own experience. So whether you’re writing about yourself or writing about other people, you’re ultimately writing about your experience of the world. 

I feel all Walter’s songs are about this journey through life, and maybe the elephant is the timeline of life as we experience it, and each song is describing a little chunk of that Walter timeline. Ultimately, at least in Walter’s songs, the writing is about struggles with mental health and knowing yourself. And then knowing how to deal with yourself and relationships with other people and how to deal with people. And then the third conflict is usually with the world and society and how to stay sane and make your life in the crazy, chaotic, crumbling world. So yeah, I think all Walter’s songs are kind of just about life’s journey for me.

SWIM: I love that, dude. You’re very existential. Have you read existential philosophy before? 

DUSTIN: [Laughs] Not really.

SWIM: Really? That’s surprising. Because earlier you talked about creating your own meaning, and that’s the core tenet of existentialist philosophies. Existence precedes essence, which means you have to create; you’re not born with a meaning, you create your own meaning. And then you’re talking about this mingling of Self with the Other and all that.

DUSTIN: That’s funny. Well, I mean, I listen to some philosophy podcasts and I’ve read some books and stuff, but it’s not like I’m a philosopher or something, you know? 

SWIM: I mean, you kind of are, in some sense. Aren’t we all? 

Thank you guys so much. I can’t thank you guys enough for being so flexible. 

LIZZIE: Yeah, all good! 

DUSTIN: Lizzie, you’ve been here the whole time?!

LIZZIE: [Laughs] Yeah, I was. I’ve been, you know, answering emails at the same time.

DUSTIN: I hope you had us muted. I am embarrassed to know you’ve been listening.

[Everyone laughs] 

SWIM: Thank you so much. I hope you guys enjoy the rest of your week. Thank you, Dustin! It was great. It’s a dream come true to talk to you, twice even. 

DUSTIN: No, it was fun. I hope to talk to you again on a show or something!

SWIM: I’m definitely planning on seeing you guys with Apes of the State. So hopefully, I’ll be able to say what’s up.

DUSTIN: Perfect. You should reach out!

SWIM: All right! You guys take care. Thank you guys. 

EVERYONE: Bye-bye!

The recording has stopped

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Nickolas is an artist based in Southern California. Described by a beloved elementary teacher as an “absolute pleasure to have in class,” his work wrestles with the conflict between privacy and self-expression in the digital age. You can find him shitposting on Twitter @DjQuicknut and on Instagram @sopranos_on_dvd_.