Math The Band Interview!!

Woot! So, since the Christmas Island interview worked out alright I thought I'd try my luck with another band I've been listeneing to aot recently, Math The Band. I was hoping to catch them at South By Southwest, but their shows were always clashing with something else and it just never happened. Anyway, what can be said about them? They play some sort of messy-but-fun-and-mega-fast-electro-bleep-boom-chip-core-pop...yup, that's pretty much it. They're also very productive and have a lot of stuff out there for you to hunt down or buy from their webshop.

Both the below songs are from the record available to buy there, Math The Band Banned The Math.

Were Wolf Fever (Mediafire link, mp3)

Everyone Is Embarrasing (Mediafire link, mp3)

OK, on to the interview....again same rules from me. Anything I could think of without thinking about it too much. All the questions stay, even if they don't want to answer them. Nothing has been edited, apart from the occasional spelling mistake. Again, I can think of loads of other things I should have asked. Maybe next time.

Kevin is answering the questions...

What's the line-up? What software do you use for programming your drums/beats?
Right now, the live setup is I play guitar and sing, and Justine plays keyboard, a floor tom and a crash. We have had a drummer at a fair amount of shows, and are actually looking for a new drummer now.

On the albums, I do all of the work, from writing to recording to mixing and producing. I program/produce the music using the following things:
-a pc running acid, fruity loops, and max msp
-a mac running ableton live
-arp axxe
-yamaha cs15
-moog mg1
-nintendo entertainment system
-gameboy pocket
-commodore 64
-shitty guitars
-shittier drums
-even shittier homemade microphones

How did you come up with your band name? Are/Were you good at maths?
Neither of us were ever good at math at all. The band was named after pin on my backpack actually. I started the band when i was 15 years old, and had a pin on my backpack that just said "math", and had some numbers on it. I named the band after the pin, because that way my band had a pin.

Tell us a bit about your discography. First/best/current releases? Who does the art/videos and stuff?
The number of albums we have is a little bit fuzzy for a few reasons. I started the band when i was a young dude, and when the band was new i would write just about a song a day, put them on a cd when i had 80 minutes worth, and call it an album. At the time i thought it was great, but looking back on it now, ide rather call those demos, and dont really want anyone to have to be exposed to them. All together, I had 2 instrumental albums like this, totaling something around 70 tracks. Then I had 3 full albums with vocals. These 5 albums totaled something like 150 tracks, and were all made within a span of 2 years. After that, I actually made a couple albums that used electronics and acoustic guitars and banjos and things like that. I made 2 full length albums and one EP that got put out in mexico of that kind of music, but sometimes wish i had put it under a different band name, because it sounds dramatically different, and sometimes people get confused. After that point we recorded our first album to be actually pressed, math the band banned the math. for that album we basically took the songs from the old albums that we thought were worth revisiting, added some new songs, and ended up with a greatest hits of sorts. Almost exactly at the time this album came out, we changed the entire concept and lineup of the band. Until 2008, I had been the only member of the band, but after releasing math the band banned the math, we got a drummer and keyboard played, and i started playing guitar, and we started adding these sounds to the songs. If you listen to our last two releases, tour de freinds EP and Dont Worry, you'll notice a pretty big change between them and banned the math. this is mostly because the time span of writing one album to another there is 4 or 5 years. I would say we're most happy with our most current release, "dont worry".

Our artist right now is nick shively - http://nickshively.blogspot.com/
and we have done videos with a few people, check them out here - http://www.paperfortressfilms.com/ and here:



You're playing an insane amount of shows in May. Do you like touring? How do you kill time in between shows? How do you manage to avoid killing each other when you spend so much time together? What's on the Math The Band touring playlist/mix CD? What kind of venues/shows do you prefer playing?
We like touring a lot. We generally tour 100-150 days a year, but might be doing more than that this year. we've done 30-40 shows in 2010 so far, and are going to be on tour from may 1st til the 4th of july also. There isnt really time to kill between shows. any time not spent sleeping or playing a show is spent driving or maybe eating if there is time to eat. we dont really have trouble getting along on tour. its usually just justine and I, and we have been dating for 4 years now and have fun on the road. We have a giant ipod that we just leave of shuffle with the rule that nobody can ever skip a song. we have something like 3 weeks of music on it. We like plying shows in peoples kitchens because stage diving off a refrigerator is cool.

What's "the scene" like where you live. What local bands should I check out?
there is mostly a noise scene where we are from. we have a hard time finding bands we fit in with where we live

Favorite bands in general?
jingle cats

What was the first gig you went to?
mustard plug and big d and the kids table

First record you bought?
mighty mighty bosstones - lets face it

Last record you bought?
"why?" - almost live from elis live room

What was the last gig you went to? (As a fan. Not as a friend or as part of the bill?)
"why?"

Favorite ice cream flavour?
lemon jalapeno

I was hoping to see you at South by South-West and walked all the way to some weird backyard show behind a vintage clothes shop…it was that day when it was absolutely freezing cold….only to find out that you had cancelled. What happened? Did you play any SxSW shows? Was I just unlucky?
that show had a lot of technical difficulties, and the schedule was pushed an hour or two behind. we were playing another show across town that we were going to need to rush to right after our set, so we had to pick one show or the other, and played the other show. Sorry about the mixup! we had to choose one show or the other

What are your thoughts on people "illegally" downloading your music? I confess, I have downloaded a lot of your music and haven't paid for any of it. I do tend to download a lot to find out about new bands and then I try to buy stuff directly from the bands at gigs etc. For example, I actually just bought a t-shirt from your online shop. Who made the artwork? It was a tough choice, but I went for the red one with the little characters on the globe one, rather than the diver. It looks awesome!
I am all for people downloading music. That is how we have gotten any small amount of success. if we didnt put all our music up free to download for a long time, we would most likely not be doing this band anymore. i actually used to pay 100 bucks every christmas to host downloads of all of our albums for a couple weeks.

Have you ever been outside the US? Any plans to?
we have played mexico and canada, and really hope to play europe and asia soon. I have spent time in europe, but never to play music.

Future plans. What can we look forward to from Math The Band?
after our summer touring with mc chris, we will be finishing a new album as fast as we can!

What question(s) do you wish interviewers would ask? Please also provide an answer. Also, what question(s) do you wish they wouldn't ask?

And if you would like to add anything, feel free to. Thanks.


But he didn't, so I assume it must have all been alright. Thanks, Kevin! Woot. Have a listen and if you like what you hear, support the band by at least paying for some stuff. Personally, I just bought a t-shirt.

Math The Band myspace


Hmmmm....who will be the next interview victim?