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Psychostick Interview With Rob Kersey!


Pyschostick TG: So assuming that you have one, which would be crazy if you didn't, but who's in charge of the piss jar while you're on the road?

Rob: Honestly, we don't have a piss jar, and that's a lame answer, so I'm going to say, Alex, because he probably is the one who would be the least likely actually to be in charge of it. So it would be awkward for him.

TG: Right on. When you guys play live shows, when everybody leaves, what do you want them to remember after leaving your show?

Rob: Mostly make sure they had a good time, laugh a lot. Like we want them to come away thinking that it was one of the funniest, entertaining "in your face" experiences ever. Really. Like it's just the community is what gives us our, I guess, uniqueness. So we put a lot of energy into that to make sure that they're laughing and you know, headbanging and all that stuff, you know?

TG: Yeah. And as you mentioned, you're meant to be funny, and it's supposed to be humorous. And you guys have been described as humor core, so what do you guys think draws so many people to it?

Rob: I think part of it is that it's, a lot of the stuff you write about is grounded in reality. Like a lot of our songs that we write come from your life experiences. Like something that you know is, it is frustrating. Or like Josh wrote "Two Ton Paperweight" because his car kept breaking down and he was trying to like find a job and pay for the car, and he couldn't find a job to pay for the car, but he had to have a car to go get a job and that sort of thing. You write songs based on a lot of real-life experiences and frustrations, and I think that's why it's relatable because everybody has to deal with something along those lines at some point.

TG: Yeah, just adding like a bit of humor to it makes the whole situation a lot lighter.

Rob: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a way to vent and cope, and you know, at the end of the day, you laugh it off as a bond, you know?

TG: Absolutely. So as you were mentioning, you know, writing songs, I assume that it's a little bit different from, kind of quote-unquote regular songwriters since you guys do kind of strive for more of a humorous spaced songwriting. So how does that go about?

Rob: We try to do our best to make sure that there's no real set of rules that go behind it because when you start introducing rules, know that we have to, we have to have it make us laugh. Outside of that is just really no, there's no like template that we follow. So sometimes, a concept will come up, and then we'll write the music and then the lyrics to the music, and sometimes we'll write the music and then attach a concept to it and then take it from there. So it's just all over the place. But it's natural for musicians, especially ones to understand the songwriting complexity. They can get a lot of, it's just very intuitive and just listening to your gut.

TG: What song would you say is quintessential for new listeners as an introduction to your band?

Rob: I would say a good one to get started would be one like "Obey The Beard" and then, "You Can Maybe Do it" those are good to get people to understand what we're about, that'd be a good entry point for people, and it's like, okay, this is aggressive and weird. Like the messages are something else.

TG: Okay. So you guys have been playing for a long time, so ever since you guys first started playing to now, would you say that the dynamic of your sound has changed ever since playing live shows?

Rob: Yeah. I think if you're in a band for this long, I think anybody's sounds will change. We didn't start fooling around with different tunings until "Revenge As An Engine" when we had it heavy on there. We decided to do that ridiculously, metalcore down tuning, and then we played around with more tuning. So we're more into like, just experimenting with what makes sense to the song. I mean, we typically want to continue to push our abilities not too far, but far enough to where we're challenged and we make, and we learn and grow from it.

TG: So when you guys play live, and you guys are coming back from it, and you're like, wow, that was good, or that was bad, what do you guys take in that help you to establish a good show from a bad show?

Rob: I think a bad show would probably be if we just had a bad day, and then it kind of bleeds on the stage. Like if we had a flat tire or, we had an engine problem or something like that and it just kind kills our morale that day. But then, you know, for the show itself, like usually a bad show is if you know, we have really bad sound or, we can't hear each other on stage or Josh and his guitar decide to stop working for no reason. We get grumpy. Like those are, those are the bad shows.

TG: So as technology moves forward and people, more people are using things like synthesizers and you know, all these different things, where do you think the future of music is headed?

Rob: There is a lot of pop music, and a lot of the stuff that's huge right now is, at least in my opinion, it feels very manufactured. And I think the more "genuine" music will start to become a thing again since trends kind of cycle in and out. Like right now, the 80's synth wave is kind of in right now. So I feel like genuine, real recordings and real lyrics and that sort of thing is gonna start taking a bit of a lead. Because getting out of sync sometimes in a recording, and digging back up has a unique feel to it. You know, like something that sounds real will probably be the future in my opinion. It's not there yet in a lot of ways. I think the more genuine the music is, the better it'll do; cause people are starting to kind of get sick of the verse, chorus verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, chorus, formula.

TG: Yeah. Well, I love that, and I hope so as well!

Rob: I mean the best-written songs follow a formula, but you don't notice it because it's such a good, well-composed song. But that's a challenge to do. That's where that genuine part comes in.

TG: Any last words?

Rob: Support your favorite artists, buy their merch, buy their music, or stream them. If you have a streaming service, listen to them. Because it just supports them more than you think. Streaming artists from Spotify or Apple music or one of those services do support the band more than you realize. So. Yeah, that's a big one.

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Tags:  InterviewRob KerseyPyschostick  

    February 04, 2020

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