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100 Musicians Answer the Same 10 Questions

Part Eighty: New Radiant Storm King

instigated by dave heaton

New Radiant Storm King's been around since 1989, did you know that? You probably didn't, but you should. They've been flying under the radar with their style of philosophical rock n' roll landscapes for so long that they've built up quite a story, and quite a body of music. Their latest album, The Steady Hand, was released by Darla earlier this year, and blew away all your friends. You should hear it. Check out their website. Matt Hunter and Peyton Pinkerton answered the questions below -- they're the band's two singers/guitarists, and founding members.

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What aspect of making music excites you the most right now?

Matt: Most aspects of making music still excite and interest me, but I'm particularly jazzed about recording our next album. And learning standup bass.

Peyton: I’m a recording nut and always have been. I love to play live but I guess I live my life itching for the next chance to get back into the studio. I even love making demos at home on my little 8-track recorder. When I’m involved in making a record it’s all I can focus on (to a fault I’m sure). I can go 18 hours in the studio and I’ll still have trouble sleeping at night because I can’t wait to return the next morning. I’m definitely like a child on Christmas Eve.

What aspect of making music gets you the most discouraged?

Matt: The slow pace of progress. I'm sure it's a common complaint.

Peyton: The growing consensus that the “album” -as a complete and deliberately sequenced body of work, is on the endangered species list.

What are you up to right now, music-wise? (Current or upcoming recordings, tours, extravaganzas, experiments, top-secret projects, etc).

Matt: Various "side"-projects are certainly underway, as always, but we started writing the next NRSK album last month. We also have music in a couple of upcoming indie and studio films.

Peyton: Touring with the Silver Jews, preparing for a Pernice Brothers tour and getting the new NRSK album into the recording phase.

What's the most unusual place you've ever played a show or made a recording? How did the qualities of that place affect the show/recording?

Matt: We recorded early demos one instrument at a time on a cassette four-track in a classroom with really echo-y acoustics. Oddly, or maybe not so oddly, it sounded bigger and tougher than the 24-track two-inch album we recorded the next year.

Peyton: New Radiant Storm King's 1996 album Hurricane Necklace was recorded in Hartford, CT at the old Colt firearms factory. At the time it was a mostly vacant monster of a building with 1/4 mile long hallways and 30 foot tall ceilings. All reverb heard on the record was created by running a discrete vocal, guitar, drum track etc. through a speaker placed in a room, stairwell or hallway (depending on the desired depth of the effect). It was pretty time consuming and not always rewarding but it did define the sound of that album.

In what ways does the place where you live (or places where you have lived), affect the music you create, or your taste in music?

Matt: I like to think that October in New England affects (still) my music as much as any music I’ve heard (despite the fact that I’ve live in New York for close to ten years), though explaining why is hard. It’s something to do with mood, maybe.

Peyton: Being a New Englander for the last 17 years has definitely made an impact on my musical endeavors. I can’t pinpoint a specific way that it has directed the course of the music I make but this area (Western Massachusetts) is steeped in nostalgia and one cannot avoid it. I think too that the dramatic seasonal changes (explosive springs, intense summers, glorious autumns and deadly winters) play a part in my creative drive or lack of it, and the subsequent mood swings that can follow.

When was the last time you wrote a song? What can you tell us about it?

Matt: I’m always working on half-a-dozen songs or so at a time. I shouldn’t talk till they’re finished.

Peyton: Two days ago. I wrote in about five minutes purely by accident. I was working on another song, trying to come up with a bridge and ended up writing something that did not work for that particular song but was great all on its own.

As you create more music, do you find yourself getting more or less interested in seeking out and listening to new music made by other people...and why do you think that is?

Matt: The more I write/play music, the more I become interested in how other musicians approach musical problems. Plus I don’t find my appetite for new music to be diminishing at all.

Peyton: I have to admit that I do not buy new music by current bands as much as I used to but I am constantly buying records from other eras or replacing records that I used to own. Of course there are great new bands out there and sure, I own some of their records but I’m definitely not one to instantly seek out the new “buzz bands”. I am however constantly listening to music of some variety and I am always finding new interests; just not necessarily records made by current artists.

Lately what musical periods or styles do you find yourself most drawn to as a listener? (Old or new music? Music like yours or different from yours?)

Matt: I'm not drawn to styles or genres so much as I'm drawn to singers, tone, general spirit, stuff like that. That said, I especially love Richard Lloyd's guitar playing and Willie Nelson's singing these days.

Peyton: I’ve been listening to a lot of 1960’s folk music, particularly stuff from the U.K. lately. I actually haven’t been listening to anything from the genre that I guess my music would be lumped in with.

Name a musician or band, past or present, who you flat-out LOVE and think more people should be listening to. What's one of your all-time favorite recordings by this musician/band?

Matt: There's great band from Brooklyn called Hula that ought to be more widely heard. They’ve only one record so far.

Peyton: For years I thought I was the only one who had ever heard The Pretty Things album S.F. Sorrow. As it turns out I guess there is some cult worship surrounding that record now but it’s not enough! I first heard it in 1987 or so and it blew me away. I was listening to a lot of stuff like Sonic Youth and the Butthole Surfers and this record really came out of left field. I’m a huge Beatles fan but I think S.F. Sorrow is by far the best psychedelic concept record ever made (sorry Sgt. Pepper). The thing is, I’m not remotely as wild about any of their post or prior recordings although there is some decent British R&B stuff before S.F. Sorrow.

What's the saddest song you've ever heard?

Matt: This week the doomed-fatalism-with-still-beating-heart in the Mountain Goats' "Tallahassee” rings pretty true.

Peyton: If I am to be honest I have to say right off the top of my head that Judy Garland’s take on “Somewhere over the Rainbow” still breaks my heart every time I hear it. It always has, for as long as I can remember. The runner up might be “Whispering Pines” by The Band.

To check out the rest of the Q&As, click here.


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