q and also a :: BED.
Alex and Sierra of BED. sent us these answers to our questions in this next installment of the q and also a.
q: What is the last song you (really) heard?
alex: We keep returning to Alphaville’s “Forever Young” lately. I sense a cover of this song in our future.
q: What is the first album you remember purchasing?
a: My first cassette was Winger’s self-titled debut and my first CD was The Simpsons Sing the Blues. But the first album I remember purchasing with my own money was Public Enemy’s “Fear of a Black Planet”. Altogether a pretty well-rounded upbringing, I guess.
q: Is there an album you wished you knew about when you were younger?
sierra: As a big fan of Jets to Brazil, I wish I’d known about Jawbreaker when I was younger. Actually, I’m not even sure how I missed the boat on Jawbreaker in the first place. There are obviously great Jawbreaker records, but I feel like I’ve gotten a little too old to relate to the melodrama of Blake Schwarzenbach. For some reason, I still love his records that I discovered when I was in middle school, but it’s hard not to listen to ones I’m less familiar with without groaning and rolling my eyes. “Seems I couldn’t save you from me”…. gimme a break.
q: What is the last album you purchased?
s: We love a Minneapolis band called We Are The Willows. They have this incredible album called Picture/Portrait that tells the story of the singer’s grandparents’ courtship during WWII. The songs are based on actual love letters the two sent back and forth while the singer’s grandfather was stationed overseas, so most of the album is in the first person, which make it twice as heartbreaking. The band recently released the album on vinyl with an additional batch of new complementary songs and recordings of the album’s subjects, still together and in love in their old age, and finally, a recording of the singer’s grandmother reading aloud a letter she wrote to her husband after he had died. I feel like I’m doing a terrible job explaining it. Just buy the record.
q: What is your favorite memory of experiencing music in a live setting?
s: When I turned 13, my parents started letting me go to an all-ages venue in Oakland called iMusicast that also broadcasted their shows online. It was probably a pretty typical all-ages venue. Punk and emo and screamo and hardcore teen bands played. I loved the pop-punk bands because they were the most fun to dance to. I’d go home from each show bruised up from what was probably very light moshing, with ringing ears and a backpack full of demo CD’s. As a kid, I had a pretty stressful home life and school often felt like something I was barely surviving. iMusicast shows gave me and lots of other kids, many of whom I still know, an opportunity to experiment socially and have fun with other kids who felt out of place in their normal lives. It also exposed me to the world of independent music, a world which has since given me a husband (and soon a baby!), a career, countless fun creative projects, and almost every one of my friends.
q: What is your favorite artist/band to listen to recorded (i.e. not live)?
a: I love diving into each new of Montreal record that comes out and I’ve been doing it every couple years or so since I initially found Cherry Peel in a record store bargain bin in Florida when I was about 12. Kevin Barnes is a mad genius and it’s always exciting to see what kind of insane and intricate pop gems he’s come up with. I always tell myself I’ll go see them when they come to town, but I really can’t be bothered with being around that many people most of the time.
q: What piece(s) of culture are you really really excited about right now?
a: Does watching “Parenthood” on Netflix count as a piece of culture?
q: Anything we should know about your latest project (whatever that might be)?
a: We just released a 12″ EP of all the songs we’ve digitally released up to this point, plus one new one. We also recorded our debut full-length this past December with producer Larry Crane and that one will maybe be out next spring.
Listen to Billy Joel…
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