Statuette is a five-piece post-hardcore band from Austin. Although the group has been around for less than a year, it just released its second EP, Residual & Timeless, Thursday and was recently signed to Never Lost Records. The band will be playing its new material at Beale Street Tavern underneath The Parish on Saturday. The Daily Texan spoke with Landon Lewis (guitar) and Blake Given (bass) about post-hardcore and the band’s future.
Daily Texan: What do you think post-hardcore means?
Lewis: I think it’s more of a way for people to say they’re a hardcore band but they’re not like tough-guy hardcore. It’s more emotional hardcore than anything, which I guess defines our band a lot better than post-hardcore.
DT: How’s your recent signing to Never Lost Records from Portland been going?
Given: The big thing with Eric, the guy from Never Lost — it’s not like he’s throwing money at us to print CDs; he’s mostly getting us in contact with people for tours and places to stay.
Lewis: To me it’s more about the peace of mind in knowing that somebody cares enough about you to invest some money and some interest in you. That’s just really motivating.
DT: Any plans for the future?
Lewis: We’re touring up the West Coast in December — Texas, Arizona, Nevada, California, Washington and Oregon, with Restless from San Antonio. We’re going to be gone [Dec.] 27 through the 10th.
Given: I think there’s 13 dates total with one off day.
DT: What sound are you going for with the newer release? Has your style changed at all from your first EP, Losing Roots?
Given: Well with Losing Roots, we released that in April and we were a band from January, so we pumped out eight songs. There wasn’t that much of a revision time, but with the last three songs we’ve been playing them for months and months and months.
Lewis: I wouldn’t say our style’s changed; it’s definitely just more solidified. Like we said, last time we just pumped out eight songs in three months to get music out, but with this we had more of a chance to sit down with them and structure them over six months.
DT: I noticed a lot of frantic parts and then ambient parts. What do you think the combination of the two does for a listener?
Lewis: It creates excitement for sure. The chaotic parts are very break beat and distorted, it gets you hyped, and then it kind of brings you back down. I don’t know, that’s just how I write.
Given: It’s fun to play simple fast stuff and then take a second to just break it down and play something pretty.
DT: What’s Residual and Timeless? What are you talking about?
Lewis: Dude, that title just sounded cool. I was just sitting on my couch — I don’t know, I’m big on wordplay and how words sound and how they roll off your tongue and ‘residual’ was just like, man that’s sexy.
DT: If you had a choice, who would you make a statuette of?
Lewis: I’d make a statuette out of Charlie Sheen just because he’s always winning and he symbolizes winning and you have to always be winning in life if you want to get ahead.
Given: I’d make a statue of Rocko [a dog].
Printed on Wednesday, November 28, 2012 as: Statuette solidifies sound
