Fuck that, no intro, I am tired.

Take 1

BYT: Hi John! It’s Christina from BYT. I hope this is a good time to call you…
HEALTH: Hey Christina, its fine. I just woke up on the tour bus. We are on our way to Philly

BYT: Oh yeah? How long have you guys been on tour for?
HEALTH: Oh God, I don’t even know. Forty five days I think now…..ehh, this is weird, I hear my voice in delay and then robot voice.

BYT: Let me call you back

Take 2

BYT: Can you hear me better now?
HEALTH: Hey what’s up Christina? Yeah I don’t hear the robot voice or myself anymore.

BYT: You have been on tour for about a month and a half, so how much more is there?
HEALTH: Well, there is about two more weeks of the US. Then we have one day off and we will fly off to Europe for seven weeks.

BYT: Wow, that’s an intense schedule. Have you enjoyed it so far?
HEALTH: It has been the best tour of our lives. Really, really awesome. I think the length of time we are on tour, thinking back, we are like ” Aww jeeesus” but it’s certainly been awesome

BYT: What’s been your most memorable show on this tour so far?
HEALTH: Ummm shit, definitely most of the Crystal Castle shows. The one in Ontario was really awesome. Chicago as well and Philadelphia- where we are playing tonight.
Both Brooklyn shows we did were really incredible. SXSW this year was really memorable too. There are too many to talk about!

BYT: Are you guys playing any festivals in Europe?
HEALTH: Yeah we are doing a ton of festivals actually- Primavera, Electronique… and a bunch of other, whatever their names are.

BYT: That will be fantastic! I wish I could go to a bunch of festivals in Europe. Will this be your first time touring in Europe?
HEALTH: We have never done any of this before. It will be our first time in “Real” Europe. I mean, We did a tour of the UK last year for like two weeks but we have never been to mainland Europe. We are totally excited.

BYT: So, I am sure you get silly questions about your name. Do you?
HEALTH: Yeah, it’s not a very interesting story actually. But we do get that question a lot.

BYT: Yeah, I won’t ask you again then. But I thought I would just confirm that. Thanks.
So how did you guys form the band? How did you start off?
HEALTH: That’s also a really common question that unfortunately doesn’t have a very interesting answer ( laughs)…

BYT: That’s ok, it’s still nice to have a background.
HEALTH: Jake and Jupiter went to college together. Then post college, I met Jake working at Guitar center. And then we got BJ through Craigslist Casual Encounters.

BYT: Nice! Craigslist hooking it up. Anyway, Looking through some of your previous and future tour locations, I noticed a lot of art galleries or art spaces or things owned by art collectives. Is there a specific connection you have to art as a group or is it just a coincidence?
HEALTH: I guess it’s because we use places that are more DIY spaces or associated with cool scenes. In a lot of cities, especially smaller cities, we would rather play the art space or a more interesting space over a standard venue. Its a lot of time what the operator or what the tour company thinks that will be the better show or the crowd you should play for.

BYT: What would you describe your bands sound, if you even had to or do you try to avoid categories?
HEALTH: Its uh…..yeah LOUD. I don’t know really, we get asked that a lot and we don’t want to use the typical things you would say to describe a band like us normally. Like if you get a good band in your head and think “ Ou its this band I saw”. We struggle with that . Most of the things that we thought we would be labelled as or genre that we would be, people aren’t ok with that in terms of reviews or press or anything We don’t really know, we just don’t know.

BYT: Are there any other bands that have influenced the music that you make or your process?
HEALTH: We don’t really take direct influence from bands anymore. However, a big influence in earlier days was Animal Collective. We were really into their early albums.

BYT: Do you get influence from another source if it’s not specifically other bands?
HEALTH: We are still full swing when it comes to music. We still listen to a lot of music of course. What I am trying to say is, if I listen to a band, its not necessarily trying to do something along the line of what they are doing. We are just listening to music or whatever and getting ideas on how to improve our own music, filling our sound and figuring what we want to do with our own music . Is it influencing our own music, helping improve it or is it just something random sometimes, some song on the radio or something like that. There are always indirect influences.

BYT: Are there any specifically that you want to share with us?
HEALTH: We are really excited about a band from Baltimore called Video Hippos. We also really like Narwhalz from Richmond, VA….hmm let me think of something even newer. Oh! Picture Planes from Denver, CO are excellent. We are really big fans. The scene in Denver is not very well documented and it’s totally amazing. We just played there on this tour and previously as well. It was a really awesome show. We played at some really incredible DIY venues there. The shows can get really crazy. I mean, it’s not the most exciting place but the venue and the scene there are really exciting.

BYT: You also played and collaborated with Crystal Castles, how was that?
HEALTH: It was great! They are a group we admire so much and to get to play with them every night was wonderful. Not mention their shows are incredible on their own. They have just skyrocketed and now that their album has come out its been awesome to be part of their first headlining US tour.

BYT: So, what about the DC show?
HEALTH: Well, we have played with the APES a bunch. They are on the same booking agency. They played our showcase with us at SXSW. It’s the only band we know it DC.

BYT: Hey even one band aint too bad! So, your album came out in September 2007, how have things changes since then.
HEALTH: It’s been incredible, like night and day. It wasn’t immediate at all actually. It’s taken a little bit of time to catch on but now it really has. The biggest difference is just a lot more people knowing about us! But also the calibre of the shows and the stuff we are being asked to do is really big and completely different. Before we were just booking DIY basement tours with no effort at all. Now, it’s completely different.

BYT: What can we expect from HEALTH after all this touring?
HEALTH: After the crazy stretch of tour in Europe, we actually have even more touring. Immediately after, We are going to try to write and record our second album in between these extra tour dates that wont be as long. That will keep us busy right up until the end of the year. Then we want to do a lot of heavy touring to promote the second album beginning of next year. For sure this year is completely booked and we will have to see what 2009 looks like. We will be very busy.

BYT: Being busy is always better. Final question, what’s been your soundtrack to this year’s tour?
HEALTH: There actually has been just one album. R Kelly Double Up. We have listened to that every day.

BYT: Thanks so much! Look forward to your show tomorrow!

WANT MORE NOISE?
befriend HEALTH socially
check out Jason and Ryan’s Jazzy Live Review from two weeks a go in Baltimore (from which all the photos in here are from) here
and
catch them in DC tonight at Velvet Lounge (with Apes and True Womanhood) and at Wham City in Baltimore Saturday (with Ponytail, Ecstatic Sunshine and Video Hippos)

 Send to a Friend