This is an interview I did with Ty
Borhnstedt from The Vliets for It’s Psychedelic Baby:
Forget about thunderous drum beats.
Forget about heavy distorted guitar/bass riffs. At least for now.
The Vliets, currently working on their full length debut, drink from nowadays electronic scene as much as they do from 60s psychedelia, trapped between avant-gardism and nostalgia, meandering between Austin and Chicago. Their first release, The Vliets EP, dates back from 2011 and was followed by last year’s God’s Drug EP, having both of them revealed a very mature sound as well as a band that knows how to spice up things without overdoing it.
The Vliets, currently working on their full length debut, drink from nowadays electronic scene as much as they do from 60s psychedelia, trapped between avant-gardism and nostalgia, meandering between Austin and Chicago. Their first release, The Vliets EP, dates back from 2011 and was followed by last year’s God’s Drug EP, having both of them revealed a very mature sound as well as a band that knows how to spice up things without overdoing it.
We wanted to know more about this
promising band and so we had this little chat with Ty Bohrnstedt, The Vliets’
front man and guitarist. We talked about those commonplaces like their
influences and stuff but we also had some time to discuss UFOs and God’s drug.
The Vliets started out as a duo but,
as far as I know, it now includes two more members. Would you like to briefly
tell us your story as a band?
Right now it's myself, Daniel
Gonzalez, Max Anderson and Preston Smith. Everyone has been involved
since the beginning, or before this band, just at different times. I've
been playing music with Max since we were like 14 years old, he's always been
the drummer. Preston recently became more involved in our live show
production but will be contributing to the music as well, as he has some in the
past. We had some distance issues the last few years, which is why we
didn't play many shows. I live in Heath, TX, Max lives in Austin, Daniel
lives in Chicago and Preston lives in Dallas so it was extremely difficult to
all get together. We've made it work though. Daniel and I wrote and
recorded our last EP over the phone and email. We also incorporated the
lap top into our live sets so we don't have to actually rehearse together
before shows, everyone just rehearses on their own.
When did you first come in contact
with music? What were your first instruments?
One of my very first memories was
hearing The Beatles for the first time. Not sure how old I was, maybe 2
or 3, but I was pretty much obsessed after that. Guitar was my first
instrument, my buddy sold me his for 50 dollars when I was 12 and I played it
for about 7 or 8 hours a day until I figured it out.
Was there any major figure in your
childhood who introduced you to great records like your parents or some older
friend? And if you have any interesting episode that influenced you as
musicians at an early age please be my guest.
Yeah my parents always made sure I
was listening to quality music and not radio shit. My grandfather was
also a composer and a doctor of music, so I was exposed to a lot of classical
music as well.
In what other musical projects were
you involved before the existence of The Vliets? Were you always interested in
psychedelic rock?
Our first band was called Dubious
Rothchild which was essentially just The Vliets. Max and I started it and
then Daniel joined. We just didn't actually record any music. We
changed the name to The Vliets because I had moved from Austin and I didn't
think Max was going to play with us anymore, otherwise we'd still be Dubious
Rothchild. I was always interested in 60's rock. It's all I
listened to as a child. I think it pretty much goes without saying, the
1960's can't be topped, in the psychedelic genre.
I came across with your music at a
time when I was starting to pay more attention to electronic music and it was a
little bit strange because all of a sudden you were wrapping this laid back
psychedelic rock with a hint of electronic music and it made complete sense.
How did you guys come up with this sound of yours?
Well we've all always loved
electronic music, we just don't really know how to make it. I think it
came about because we were just so ignorant when it came to recording
techniques and music software. All of the music on our first two EP's was
recorded through a mic and physically making the sounds, for the most part.
I think it was only natural though because it's a good mix of all the
music we listen to (Grandaddy, Beck, Radiohead, John Frusciante, Neil Young,
Captain Beefheart, múm, The Kinks). I've recently started
experimenting more with the lap top, I think our next album will be a little
more electronic than our previous releases.
By now you have only released two
self-produced EPs and yet you managed to get some media attention, with, for
example, Deli Magazine considering your band as one of the most promising bands
around. How does it reflect on the attendance of your shows? Do you notice any
difference? Is there more public or is it too soon to notice the effect of that
exposure?
I think there has been some effect.
We were on a short tour in California a couple weeks ago and some people
came up to me who were fans prior to seeing us and knew all about the music,
that was pretty insane because we're virtually unknown in Texas, only our
friends show up for the most part. It becomes very political in our
hometowns though, it's hard to even book a show and I'm pretty sure it's like
that for all bands you know? Unless you actively participate in the scene
and be everyones friend, you kind of get left out. We're just not that
kind of band, I'm a pretty shy person anyway, networking is not my thing.
Writing and recording is what we really love to do.
These EPs artwork feature your
friend’s Edgar Cardoze paintings which complement quite well your music. How
did you meet him and when did you decide that his paintings should be on your
EPs covers?
Edgar is a master. He was one
of my good buddies roommate. I was invited to their house for a party a
few years ago and Edgar's paintings were hanging on their walls. I
immediately was in love with his work and I already knew I wanted real
paintings to be the covers of any music we released. When I was writing
the lyrics to 'Velvet Sea' I was staring at one of Edgar's paintings.
When I finished the song, I sent it to him and asked if I could use the
painting as the cover. That's pretty much how it started, and hopefully
he'll continue to let us use his masterpieces.
God’s Drug EP was your first work
to see a physical release just a couple weeks ago. How can people get it? Do
you intend to make other physical releases of this or other works?
It's available to order on our bandcamp page vliets.bandcamp.com.
Not ourselves, but someone did press vinyl of both of our EP's onto a
single album. It's only available through their website. It's sort
of a new model for record labels, I'm not even sure if I'm supposed to say
anything actually, they don't disclose the names of the bands and it's
subscription based.
You were telling that your debut
album will probably be more electronic than your previous releases. What else
can you tell us about it? In what stage is it?
Yeah I think it will be a bit more electronic but I can't be certain,
things just sort of happen as they will. It's still in it's infancy
though. The songs are written, and by that I mean there are melodies and
chord progressions and beats. I add in everything else as I record so
there's still quite a bit to do. I'm thinking it will be done this fall
sometime.
What about The Vliets lyrics, what
inspires them?
Love. Life. Experiences in general. I usually
only feel like writing when I'm in a heightened emotional state. A lot of
times it doesn't make sense to me until way later and I'm 'ohhh that's what
that means'.
To some of the greatest bands ever (Pink Floyd, The
Beatles, even Brian Wilson) the studio became an instrument in itself. Since
you do all your recording at home do you think it influenced your sound? Does
it push you to experiment more?
Oh yeah for sure. A majority of the writing
happens during the recording process so experimenting and trying different
things is a huge part of our process. I try not to think if it will
translate to a live show or not because I don't want to limit our music that
way. To me the really enjoyable part of music is the actual creating and
shaping of the songs. I couldn't rent time at a studio and go in and try
to record songs in a day, I'd need months in there to try different things and
to really translate what the dimensions or spirits or whatever is trying to get
across.
Some people claim they have seen
UFOs materializing during your gigs. Do you confirm that?
Yeah! There
is a UFO that flies over the crowd during our shows.
How important is it to The Vliets
to put on something more than just a concert? What other tricks do you use to
enhance your audience’s live experience?
Pretty important. It's just more fun for me as a performer to have
more going on, and hopefully more enjoyable for the audience. Preston
Smith is in charge of our live production. He built the UFO, flies it
during the shows, and does live VJing through a projector. He also setup
an HD camera in the center of the UFO, where the light beam is, that sends the
live video to his computer and then it's projected on stage. So it
records and projects everything the UFO sees.
Besides recording do you have any plans you would like
to share with us?
We just got back from a short tour in California but
we're planning on a northern tour this winter including New York, Chicago,
Toronto, Montreal and possibly Philly or Nashville. It's still in the planning
stages though.
Time for some mystical stuff. What do you think is
God’s drug?
God's Drug refers to morphine. Whenever I
recorded that song it was just an instrumental and it felt really warm like the
sensation of morphine. To me it's a combination of things though like
love, dmt, the mind of 'God', suffering, happiness, life and death. The
song is about all those things, it's not just about morphine, well really it's
not about morphine at all, it just gave me that feeling.
Interview made by Hugo Pereira/2013
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