Is there a common thread that connects everyone musically?

Let me think, I’ve never really thought about it. At different points in each of our lives we were exposed to religious music. There’s certain old religious songs that all of us know even though we all grew up in Texas, Detroit, etc. We all know these religious songs. So that’s a common thread. And also just being into older music, all the great music from the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. We all dig the same jams. I think everyone has that hunger to get better at what they’re doing and not to be just content. We can all challenge each other in that way too.

It seems like Nashville has been expanding more musically of late to cover a lot of new ground.

Yeah it’s changed. We’ve all been down there about ten years, well most of us. When I moved down there people thought it was predominantly country. But I’ve always been impressed and surprised with the rock musicians, even soul and funk too. It’s just a place where people can go and be with other musicians. Historically Nashville is about musicians hanging out with other musicians and they jam. We ended up coming there for education and other reasons other than that. We never moved to Nashville to make it and all started jamming together.

You recorded in a number of different environments (Bomb Shelter and “Lil’ Biv Town” in Nashville; Trimble’s bedroom; a garage in Celeste, Texas; Trinity College in Tehuacana, Texas). Why did you do it like that?

Each room has a different feel to it and different energy. When we’re going to all these different places we try to find places that we were responding to in some way and that we felt would add something to the music on some kind of conscious level which would come through to the listener and us. So we did this old abandoned college, like a failed institution. It had not a spooky vibe but it just had a different vibe to it.

And with doing a longer album the idea was going to different places would give the listener an opportunity to have different themes sonically so it wasn’t all one space. The three songs in the middle may be the college. Sonically they’re formed in different spaces.

When you were writing the album you were influenced partly by the 1973 Alejandro Jodorowsky film The Holy Mountain. Can you talk about that and why it resonated so much with you?

I found it on a YouTube journey. I was finishing around on YouTube for stuff and found the movie The Fantastic Planet which is a French film with a killer soundtrack. Then I found The Holy Mountain. I think I was laying in bed and I stood up and ever hair standing up and I couldn’t believe what…I was like “What was that?” It was so colorful. It feels rare that you find something on film like you’ve never seen and you can’t even place it in some kind of aesthetic place in what you know about film.

So early on – this was when were first making the record – we were throwing out the idea of it being a longer album. So I got the movie and started watching it and within five minutes I just turned the sound off and I could hear all these things. So it was sort of in my mind and coincided with “Oh, what making a longer record might be like.” I had a thought that we could make a longer album that could synch to that movie. And some of the subject and content in the movie was similar to what I was reading and everything. I think this record coincides with this movie based on what I was hearing and what I was seeing but I wasn’t married to it. I wasn’t like this is what it’s going to be.

I thought “Let’s keep letting this thing go and if it works out, it can synch up and it’ll be cool.” As we would keep doing that I would keep going back to the movie. And the movie would always have some sort of new inspiration for me or scene that takes on a whole new meaning. It was a well of inspiration for us while we were working on it. Once we got it done we put it together and we were like “Wow, it does synch with the movie!” After that I got into reading about Jodorowsky, his book and writing. He’s a esoteric spiritualist and calls himself the “sacred calm.” He has a whole philosophy called Psychomagic where you perform a series of events that are very theatrical. He’s a beautiful human being that has a lot of wisdom.

Why did you end up with title Quartz ?

Early on I knew the album would be called Quartz. And for a number of reasons. I had been reading about it because someone had given me a piece of quartz and I had heard it had some kind of shielding properties and could be a spiritual protecting tool. So I made a little necklace out of it and within six months I got into a really bad accident and the rock scratched my chest. It was an interesting interaction with the rock. And after reading it I read that it’s one of the most common minerals or materials on Earth but some people still attribute these spiritual properties to it. But it’s a very common rock. Like I might be walking on a bunch of quartz right now. It just worked with everything.

Did it have anything to do with all these musical styles coming together as one all encompassing sound?

Oh, yeah, that’s another way to look at it too. I like that.

The band has supported various other touring acts like Benjamin Booker, Hurray for the Riff Raff, and Alabama Shakes. It must be a nice learning experience. Could you talk about that?

It’s great. Anytime you can play for a room full of people it feels amazing and exciting. As an opener people don’t know much about you or who you are so you have this amazing opportunity to get up in front of a bunch of strangers and make a connection and have an experience with them. And hopefully them remember it and come back.

What’s the biggest thing you’ve learned through making this album?

It was cool to learn that the form something takes is produced by its function. LPs are roughly around 10 to 13 songs long. It’s for good reason as that’s what people can digest in 45 minutes on a break or in their home and you can fit everything in. We made a longer record and after that we thought it would be cool to be like “It would be fun to do a 12-song version next.” And there’s a reason most albums are 10-12 songs long. I’m not entirely sure the reason but just something about it works for people.

Also, like any other band, each record gives you an opportunity to learn about the guys or girls you’re playing with and how to work with people better. Once the album gets done it enters into the collective consciousness of people and yourself and you have the opportunity to let it do what it’s going to do for listeners and friends and all that and for yourself. After the record’s out I can hear it and learn something about myself. It’s like a painter. You can get a better sense of yourself and being alive.

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