CONELRAD are not only a killer two piece grind machine, but they hail from the Steel Town Pittsburgh,Pa. If you're ever in the burgh, make sure to catch these guys. CONELRAD are both Original and Brutal. A Conelrad full length will hopefully be available soon. So here it is the CONELRAD interview
December Featured Band: CONELRAD. Enjoy!
Interview with Jeff & Adam
Interview by DJ BUSHMADO
BUSHMADO: How long has Conelrad been around? Have you always been a two piece?
Jeff - We formed in February of 2001. We had discussed doing this for a few months prior to that and actually got our asses in gear to do a band with Dan Weyendt and Scott Mellinger from ZAO. They were busy touring and doing the ZAO thing so, we just started writing some stuff. I don't remember if it was for that... or just to do SOMETHING. There was never talk of adding a bass player, my logic was always, on most metal records you never hear the bass anyway, so why bother trying to get a third person to show up at practice and fight with over musical decisions.There was a brief period where we thought of getting a third person to do noise and electronics and shit like that. After a while, we had a bunch of songs and after doing some equipment overhauls to fill out the sound, we played our first show at The Mr. Roboto Project with Commit Suicide and Landed (from Providence) that June.
Adam - Here's a shocker: the ORIGINAL idea for Conelrad (as I had concieved it while contemplating quitting Creation Is Crucifixion outright midway through our European tour!) was Jeff on drums, myself on guitar, Pete from Fate of Icarus on noise/electronics, and Joe Horvath (Circle of Dead Children) on vokills. Obviously, this would have been a logistical nightmare and I eventually got over my stupid fat-boy sulking and toughed it out through tour until Nathan and the boys left me in Pittsburgh for greener pastures out west...
BUSHMADO: Who came up with the band name Conelrad, is there a meaning behind it?
Adam - Conelrad is an acronym for CONtrol of ELectronic RADiation--which was in a sense, the predecessor to the Emergency Broadcast System. It was a U.S. Civil Defense program that was launched back in the wonderful red-scare 1950s as a defense against Russkie bombers. In the event of a nuclear attack, all radio stations in the United States were to fall silent, presumably clicked off by some master switch in some underground bunker in D.C. or something. At that point, all of the emergency information (shelter locations, what to do if the bomb fell in YOUR town, survival tactics, etc...) would be broadcast on two government stations, located at 640 and 1240 on your AM dial, respectively. From my understanding, the thinking back then was that if all of the stations in the major cities were shut down, the Soviets could not get a bead on them based upon the presence of a broadcast signal. So, given the fact that Jeff and I were obsessed from an early age with the idea of nuclear annihilation at the hands of political forces beyond our control, it seemed to be the perfect moniker for a band that lyrically, would center around a lot of paranoia, dread and general distrust.
BUSHMADO: I recently saw you at the ADD fest here in Pittsburgh, though you were playing all covers of a certain band, which i now forget. Who was this band, and do you always play covers at the ADD fest?
Adam - This year, we decided to turn the whole "Conelrad thing" on its head for ADD Fest just because we thought that everyone would be expecting a noisy, fast, crazy set from us. We like to keep y'all guessin' when we can, see? So, I came up with the idea to play a set of covers by the great 70s L.A. art-punk band The Urinals instead of the typical knock-down-drag-out slop-grind, both as a tribute and as a testament to our own sense of, well, just not taking ourselves TOO seriously. I think we got the desired reaction this year. It was the most fun I had in under 6 minutes, unless you count that session with the Thai hooker in Amsterdam.
Jeff - We've played 2 A.D.D. fests and it's fun because you only have 10 minutes and so it comes down to, do we just play 10 minutes of our songs or take advantage of doing something different? Since it's only 10 minutes you can sort of throw caution to the wind and come up with a "theme". The Roboto Project is where we learned how to play this stuff and get it to the point that we were confident with it. So, it's sort of like us giving something special to them for their birthday. We did the Urinals covers this last time... the first time we did it we did a combined band with the Microwaves (2 drummers, 2 guitars and their bass player) and we played with them on one of their songs and did a cover of Pulp by Godflesh.
BUSHMADO: So what is new with Conelrad? I heard your working on the full length, how is that coming? Where are your Recording?
Jeff - The full length is done. We spent an entire fucking year on it. 370 days to be exact... well not straight... there were months on end where we didn't touch it. We're really proud of it, but we don't just want to throw it out there without having someone that either a) knows what they're doing or b) cares about it enough to give it proper exposure. So, we're being VERY patient and sitting on it until we find a proper home for it. It was recorded at +/- studio here in Pittsburgh by Jason Jouver (from Creta Bourzia/Don Caballero). It was plauged with problems from the beginning. Between fighting over when to get IN the studio, getting money together to pay for it since we were doing it ourselves, and having the studio go out of business in the middle of the process, it was a nightmare. We ended up mixing the thing in Jason's bedroom. We STILL owe him money!
BUSHMADO: How would you describe the sound of Conelrad?
Jeff - Too weird for the metal crowd, to metal for the indie rockers. Music your girlfriend will hate. Paranoia and "low-brow self battery" set to music.
Adam - My failures set to blast beats.
BUSHMADO: Are both members of Conelrad ex members of Creation is Crucifixion?, and wasn't Adam in Fate of Icarus for a bit?
Adam - I was in Creation Is Crucifixion for one year, and in that time I did two U.S. tours (one full, one east coast only) and a month stint in Europe. It was an overwhlemingly positive experience for me, which reaffirmed my own desire to continue making crazy music until I am killed. When C.I.C. split for San Francisco back in late summer, 2000, I found myself broke and unwilling to tear myself away from the folks that I had been forging ties with out here (even though it meant better weather and a larger pool of women who probably shared my taste for insanity), so Ryan Unks from Fate Of Icarus replaced me in CIC and I replaced him in FOI. So, in essence, we kind of traded bands. I played with FOI for a handful of gigs and wrote maybe two songs with those guys, but the band split up after our singer and bass player began to lose interest in playing metal. I split amicably with Pete Cassin, our drummer, in early 2001 to rejoin my old chum Jeff, who I had been playing with in various situations since late 1991, and the rest, well, is history...
BUSHMADO: Play any cool shows lately? Do you usually play just Pittsburgh, are do you play out of state? If so, what are the crowd differences?
Jeff - Playing at the Lava Lounge here in Pittsburgh for the Monday Night Talk Talk that airs on PCTV was pretty neat. It's a total low budget David Letterman-type show. Allegheny County Councilman William Peduto was a guest. God knows what the Councilman thought of us. I think he knocked back his martini and took off before the first song was over. Playing at Lit Lounge in Manhattan recently with Dysrhythmia was pretty amazing. Also, the Conelrad Vs. Pay Toilets show was violent and chaotic in all of the best ways. A battle to the death with both bands playing their sets across the room from each other simultaneously. One of those things that you're nervous about doing because you don't know if it's going to work and then when you're done with it your playing it off like, "Yeah, what a brilliant idea we had."
Adam - We've only really played out of town twice now, both times in NYC. Both times, the crowd response was subdued, but positive all the same. For some reason, the whack-jobs in the audience always seem to corner me after our show with promises of great future gigs in Brooklyn and cheap drugs. Hopefully, when we get a van and the gumption to take the show on the road, we'll have similar positive and bizarre experiences...
BUSHMADO: What bands do you usually jam and play shows with?
Jeff - It changes around. Luckily we get asked, in Pittsburgh at least, to play a lot of really odd shows that we normally wouldn't expect to get asked to do. Rock shows, punk shows, metal shows. We are 9 times out of 10 the band that sticks out like a sore thumb on the bill, and LOVING it by the way.
Adam - We are in a weird and kinda cool position in that a lot of the "indie" type rock bands dig us (i.e. Modey Lemon, the former Microwaves) and ask us to play shows, as well as do the thrash/punk show promoters. This makes for a pretty entertaining mix of gigs for us, and it's great to be playing with friends of ours who are doing all manner of things within the "rock" idiom. But in all cases we usually wind up alienating all but the few weirdos in the crowd who can slamdance to free improv.
BUSHMADO: Any split releases in the works?
Jeff - Not quite yet. We've had some people ask. We had talked for awhile about recording the Microwaves/Conelrad combined band but they sort of are breaking up. We might do a cover of "3 a.m. Eternal" by the KLF with Ludus Lovestyle (from Chicago).
Adam - The closest I've come so far was splitting on a couple cases of Iron City with the dudes from Kalibas.
BUSHMADO: What do you consider your best show? How bout the worst Conelrad show? I'm not really talking about band performance, just the actual show.
Jeff- The time we played with Modey Lemon for their CD release show was probably the biggest show and the most fun. Also the time we played at this place in Latrobe, PA. It was called the Rally Ally and was the suburbs answer to Roboto. It was this all day "Metal" fest. It was snowing and miserable. We showed up and the place was locked. Turns out the cops had shut the place down and kicked the kid who ran the place out. So, all the bands are standing around and someone gets ahold of the guy that runs the place and he tells us to go ahead and have the show. So, a few people crawl through an unlocked window and open the place up. We start the show and halfway through our second song the cops show up and start threatening to arrest everyone. We ditch our gear in the snow, pack it up in the freezing cold and head back to the sanctuary of the city. We drove back to pittsburgh and played another show the same day. That was fun. It was a perfect example of small town cops with nothing to do on a Saturday afternoon throwing their weight around. I calmly walked up to one of them after we were told we had 5 minutes to leave the premises and said, "Look we got a couple grand worth of equiptment laying in the snow, can we please just pack it up without being hauled off?" He said no. So we just went about our business and they left us alone to my disappointment. I thought it would have been a riot to have the promoter from the show we were playing back in Pittsburgh that same night tell the crowd that Conelrad wasn't their because they were in jail.
Adam - I agree with Jeff on both counts, although our last time in NYC playing with Disrhythmia was a blast! The only thing I have to add to the Rally Ally story is that I had my first king-hell, tunnel-vision panic attack running like a pussy from the Latrobe cops (most of whom I knew, having written for the Latrobe newspaper a few years back). Getting thrown in the holding cell would have been a typical career move for me.
BUSHMADO: What are your thoughts on Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Scene?
Jeff - Pittsburgh is a great place to live and a great place to start a band. The logistics of doing what we're doing in a place like NYC or L.A. would just be a headache and a half. We don't make ANY money. It's a constant investment with no return and that's fine. BUT, the only reason it's working is because we live in a cheap city. If we lived in NYC we'd
have to sound like the Yeah Yeah Yeah's to survive. And who wants that?
Adam - Pittsburgh is a great town with a wealth of talent lurking around its basement parties, gallery shows, and saturday nights at Gooski's. I would agree with Jeff 100 percent on the economical aspect of working our shit in a town like this. It's a place that's big enough to get some modicum of recognition from folks from out of town, but small enough that we don't have to blow someone to play a fucking gig once a month. At this point in time, I can honestly say that the scene around here--and not just the "heavy" music scene--is probably as strong and original as it ever has been. At the same time, it continues to be a shame that this place is known for ersatz, whitebread, pseudo-funky 'Burgh rock a la what you are likely to hear any given night at Nick's Fat City.
BUSHMADO: Best live band(s) in your opinion?
Jeff - Arab On Radar (R.I.P.), Grand Buffet, The Melvins, Neil Hamburger
Adam - The Chinese Stars (onstage analingus and fellatio scores big in my book), the Pay Toilets, Iron Maiden, Mr. Quintron!!!!
BUSHMADO: Top 10 All Time favorite bands?
Jeff - The Who, The Beatles, The Minutemen, The Beach Boys, Khanate, Miles
Davis, Slayer, Faith No More, Duran Duran, Steely Dan
Adam - You're killing me, dude! Voivod, Minutemen, Zappa, Melvins, Swans, Husker Du, Faith No More, the Love Unlimited Orchestra, Sonny Sharrock, tie: Black Flag/Flipper
BUSHMADO: Top 10 All Time favorite albums?
Jeff - The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds, Todd Rundgren - Something/Anything, Slayer - Reign In Blood, Goreguts - Obscura, Captain Beefheart - Trout Mask Replica, The Minutemen - Double Nickels On The Dime, Faith No More - Angel Dust, Miles Davis - Bitches Brew, Anthrax - Among the Living, Steve Reich - Works (box set)
Adam - Swans - Children of God, Residents - Third Reich and Roll, Minutemen - Double Nickels on the Dime, Faith No More - Angel Dust, Husker Du - Warehouse: Songs and Stories, Carcass - Reek of Putrefaction, Godflesh - Streetcleaner, Frank Zappa - Absolutely Free!, Pharoah Sanders - Tauhid, Voivod - Dimension Hatross!
BUSHMADO: Top 4 Favorite Movies?
Jeff - Vertigo, Dawn Of The Dead, Pink Flamingos, Salo: 120 Days of Sodom
Adam - The Holy Mountain, Bad Lieutenant, Pink Flamingos, Sholay
BUSHMADO: Which do you think is cooler: Vinyl or CD?
Jeff - It depends. I love vinyl but I'm not an elitist about it. I like the hands on experience that vinyl gives you over cd's and the fact that it looks cooler and you can do stuff like weird colors and lock grooves and have better packaging. Sound quality wise... I still side with CD's. I don't care what anyone says about the "warmth" of vinyl. It's a bunch of crap. That's like saying you like the warmth of VHS over DVD. Although the cover art for Emerson Lake and Palmer's TARKUS just loses something on those little cd booklets.
Adam - I like CDs because of the convenience and "improved" sound quality and whatnot, but lemme tell you--it really sucks when you drop your Discman while running on the treadmill and your out-of-print copy of Nuclear Assault's "Handle With Care" CD goes skittering face-down across a filthy, gritty gym floor, rendering it unplayable. In that case, I'm all for vinyl despite all of its imperfections. At least if you scrape it a little the worst you'll have to deal with is an audible "pop". I am sure that Jeff will agree that we are big fans of spending the afternoon searching through the dusty stacks at Jerry's Used Vinyl, though.
BUSHMADO: What are your thoughts on the world in it's current state?
Adam- I don't even know where to begin here. A good friend of mine made the observation about a year ago, what with all of that rotten cunt Bush's saber-rattling against Iraq, the ongoing war of attrition/great battle for the gas pipeline right-of-way in Afghanistan, and that botched coup in Chile (or was it?), that this era we are living in is a great one, indeed, for political hardcore not seen since the early days of Reagan. I used to be really really concerned and, frankly, totally paranoid about what might happen to me, my city, my loved ones, western civilization as we know it, etc., if the shit were truly to hit the fan. At this point, if the balloon went up, I would just calmly shit my pants and chalk it all up to the resultant effects of a U.S. foreign policy that was always questionable, but is now indefensible. It's a shit game that few understand, but people like you and me are the ones who are going to pay for the transgressions of our "elected" leaders (and the ever-present influence of big business), ultimately. I guess I am really apathetic to the point of being a total nihilist at this point, unfortunately...fuck it, smoke pot.
Jeff - I'm terribly concerned. I'm afraid that Conelrad will soon be replaced by a Starbucks.
BUSHMADO: What can we expect for Conelrad in the near future?
Jeff - We're looking for a van right now, so by spring we should be on the road. We have a 4 song ep coming out on Hope/Hardtravlin' Records and 2(!!!) full length albums coming out. One that is the Conelrad you know and
loathe... the other one is a collaboration that was done with Steve Moore (from Zombi/Microwaves) on alto sax, it's instrumental and completely improvised. Still sounds like us, just with a sax shrieking instead of Adam and I. We recorded this stuff over a year ago and have been sitting on it. It will come out VERY shortly after the full length.
Adam - Worth noting that the Conelrad/Moore release will be known as "The Torus Shock Trio Session". I got a box full of 'em sitting behind me--we are just waiting for packaging to be designed before that drops. We are currently featured on the WRCT "Advanced Calculus" compilation, as well as the Multi-Tool's "West Coast of the East Coast" comp CD. Forthcoming is a benefit CD compilation for the Pittsburgh chapter of Anti-Racist Action to which we contributed one track, so keep an eye out for that one.
LINKS:
www.conelrad.net
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