Interview: Reptar
Reptar is a four-piece band from Athens, Georgia who has a lot to be excited about. The group just released their debut album Body Faucet on Vagrant Records to critical acclaim and this weekend the band will be performing at the Firefly Music Festival in Delaware. Check out our interview with the band about their debut, Athens, and touring with Rubblebucket.
You guys put out your debut album about two months ago could you talk about the recording process and working with Ben Allen?
Working with Ben was enlightening and creatively fun experience. He has become a friend of ours now that weve been working with him for a while and we can really jive together well. We spent most of December 2011 and a couple weeks of January 2012 recording and mixing the record and that was a totally new experience to us, litteraly our total focus and job was going into the studio all day and working on music. It was insanely fun needless to say and it was also a real learning experience crafting all of the songs to fit with each other and experimenting with the tools of the studio to create new sonic textures.
Athens’ has a pretty deep musical history it is home to bands from Azure Ray to Drive By Truckers and of course Reptar. How has Athens’ affected the band in terms of sound?
Athens is a wonderful place full of amazingly talented and hardworking musicians. Ive been living there for about 4 years now and have been deeply influenced by the musicians I have met and seen play there. Everyone is very open, free and sincere here (and every musician always plays in at least 2 or 3 bands!) Bands like Quiet Hooves, Bubbly Mommy Gun, Grass Giraffes, Bit Birgade, Manray, Japancakes, Powers, Birdnames, Supercluster, The Squalls, etcc (just to name a few) have really been role models to us. I love how all the bands here are so different too, they could be poppy 9 piece bands or they could be a insanely practiced precisely perfect 4 piece math rock band, We look up to these bands and what they are doing and how they are doing and think “hey, I’ve never seen a band like these guys before” and I think that originality and diversity of sound is something that we strive for in our own music.
Are you looking forward to touring with Rubblebucket? And how did that tour come to fruition?
OHHH BABEYY are we ever looking forward to touring with those guys! Man every since we saw they play in Cleveland, OH totally randomly we have been obsessed with their music. Its got this dancey groovey energy that is soo infectious and ecstatic we just couldnt help but be mesmerized. And they are all such amazing musicians, its such a joy to watch them play. We just kinda kept in touch after that show and they came and saw us in New York and at SXSW and liked us a lot too so we were like, “heyyyy budddies! you like us, we like you-ah, why dont we…ya know make a lil’ magic happen and book a lil’ tour around this great country. have some fun and get some other people to have some fun!”
What bands are you looking most forward to seeing at the Firefly festival?
Turf War (! Atlanta represent!), Modest Mouse, Mariachi El Bronx, Charles Bradley, Mayer Hawthorne, Cults, Grouplove (our tour BUDDIES!), Fitz and the Tantrums, Ra Ra Riot, Flaming Lips. like everyone duhh!!
