What is Omega La La ?

Good question! Omega La La is a world that we all kind of made up together. One meaning that I translated is that ‘Omega’ is the ultimate and ‘La La’ is like a song. So it’s like the ultimate song. That’s a thing that’s hard to describe, so I made a word for it. It’s being full of attitude and containing lots of motion and change. It’s like a still frame of someone dancing wildly with confetti all around and a spark plug coming out of their nose, and one boob falling out by accident. That’s Omega La La.

*On this album, there is a strong French influence on some of the lyrics and song titles. What is your French background? *

I lived in France as an exchange student right after high school and I was there for 10 months. There’s nothing more than that—I don’t have any family background—but I really, really got into the language and read a lot and talked a lot and it affected me. It still does…I mean I dreamt in it for years after I left and had these recurring dreams of going back there. They were always really unsettling. I think there’s some part of me that developed when I was in France that was pretty subconscious and intense. Maybe I did spend a lot of time alone at the time, it was right in Paris and it was kind of hard to make friends. I spent a lot of time writing, journaling, drawing and for whatever reason it was, that stuck with me deeply.

Rubblebucket has developed a reputation for these high-energy live performances. How do you translate the songs from the studio into that setting?

Well, it’s kind of the other way around. We spend so much time on the road and, unfortunately, at least for me, so little time in the studio. I think that’s going to change with this next cycle that we do. Alex and I and all the other guys feel our music deserves a little more and we want to do something exciting and risky. It’s just because all of us are trained musicians, we really just have a habit of judging ourselves based on how we perform in the live setting. So, obviously, more energy goes into that. It’s one of our strengths, but it’s one of our weaknesses too.

Partly as a result of Rubblebucket’s powerful live performances and the complex musicianship, the band has been lumped into fringes of the jamband scene. What are your thoughts on that and were you fans of any jambands growing up? I mean you are from Vermont…

I think all of us appreciated Phish on a certain level. We just played with Dave Matthews at his Caravan and it really stirred up some awesome conversation. We’re all sort of passed that stage of really listening to Dave Matthews Band, but we can all totally appreciate the amazing musicianship and we were just like, “Wow, he’s such a high grossing tour.” I don’t know, it was just cool. I think it’s funny.

You’re right that our musicianship is sort of why we’re in the jamband world, but I don’t think that our music is really “jam music,” per se, especially because we hardly ever improvise. There’s never a point in our set where there’s a big open “hey, go play whatever you want.” That never happens. I think we’re happy with that. We like the tight arrangements and executing it right, and I think there’s so much room to sway within these arrangements to make them fresh from night to night. I would hopefully like to, one day, be appreciated by a broader audience.

Not to say that the jam people aren’t awesome—they really have some great ears. People really compartmentalize the hippie and the hipster thing, but I feel like I see so many parallels. I get to be on both sides where I’m living in Brooklyn going to these warehouse parties and then I’ll go up to these festivals and everyone is scantily clad, on drugs and having an amazing time. Then they all wake up the next morning and eat at Denny’s…there’s a lot of similarities.

I think one of the aspects of your show that attracts the jam crowd is the visual element which incorporates lots of bright colors, lights and imagery. I’ve noticed a common theme in your videos as well. Do you feel there is a visual element to your music that relates to bright colors and things of that sort?

Yeah, absolutely. That’s been a goal of mine since the very beginning and it’s still a work in progress—bringing in the visual elements to our whole package. I’ve sort of been the visual director all these years and that’s probably why there’s so many bright colors—because I can’t do anything but that. I would like to one day do a project where I don’t incorporate tons of bright colors, but I think it’s just a subconscious thing. I really give my synesthesia plenty of fodder and let it live as robustly as it wants to. The result is lots of crazy bright colors and shapes.

You guys recently hosted a flood relief benefit in Vermont. How did that turn out?

Oh man, it was one of my favorite shows in a long time. We’ve had some pretty awesome shows this summer, but it was just so…I think every time I’m in Vermont I just get so happy, unexplainably. The whole scene was like “We love Vermont, we love community support,” and we had so many friends and family in the house that it felt more relaxed than our other Higher Ground shows. It just felt like a big sharing, it was great.

Who are some of your personal favorite artists coming out of the Brooklyn scene these days?

We just made friends with this band called Friends and they kind of embody the really detached, but also hippie-ish, but also hipsterish Brooklyn feel…and their music is pretty interesting. I love Nomo, they are always a favorite. I can’t speak highly enough of them. They’re from the Midwest but we always see them around. They’re an Afrobeat band that Pitchfork writes about. They’re really cool…they haven’t been touring as much as of lately as the sax player and the trumpet player are playing with Iron & Wine. Superhuman Happiness also and Antibalas, of course.

And then we’ve got a few of close friends that have a little network of bands and we all go to each other’s shows. Those bands are Cuddle Magic, if you haven’t heard of them go hear them right away. They’re like orchestral brainy-pop and they all sing and play a million instruments. There’s also two other bands The Rex Complex and Railbird. We do shows together every once and a while.

How do you see the Rubblebucket sound developing on the next album?

I personally want to write more songs. There’s a few songs on Omega La La where I’m like, “I want to write another one of that.” I think it’s exciting for the first time to have a sound that we are excited to keep replicating and expanding upon, rather than always moving. So finally, we’re in our sound home.

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