Matt (musicGeek.org): Okay, so, why “Three Month Sunset” for a name?
Gabe (Three Month Sunset): there’s not much of a story to tell about that… my friend was always coming up with names for bands and I kept that one in the back of my head. i liked the dreamy abstraction of it. and also the sound of the vowels together…
What sort of music was present during your formative years?
My early influences in the mid 80’s were bands like Joy Division, R.E.M., The Fall, Velvet Underground, and The Clash. From there I started listening to different genres of music from Soundtracks to 60s French Pop to Speed Metal. I like select cuts from almost every genre.
What have been your musical influences growing up?
As strange as it sounds I was heavily influenced by new school punk growing up. It’s definitely not apparent in our sound and isn’t what I listen to anymore but I think I’ve kept a lot of the ideals that punk introduces you to. The idea that independent music not only exists, but is actually better that what you hear on the radio or see on MTV. That music is being made that leans more towards art and less towards commerce. That it was possible to write and track your own records. All of these ideas were heavily influential to me at a fairly young age.
What type of music did you listen to growing up?
Rocky:I bought my first album when I was six, It was piece of mind by Iron Maiden. After that I liked Guns ‘n’ Roses for while. When I was eight i started listening to Nirvana, and then stuff like the Pixies and Radiohead and the Boo Radleys. I didn’t really get into keyboards or electronica until I was sixteen. I saw three bands, Mina, Salaryman and To Rococo Rot, I thought ‘I have to get a Moog’
What’s your biggest influence in writing music?
In general, The Beatles have had the biggest influence, but as far as this album goes… I just thought of this–there?s something that happened fairly recently that could?ve had an influence on it. About a year-and-a-half ago, my friends and I got to visit an old mechanical band organ museum in San Francisco. They?re the coin-operated kind that read rolls of paper, and have an entire little orchestra within this large wooden cabinet: pipe organ, triangle, piano, snare drum, xylophone, bass drum, tambourine, etc. They?re so magical. The arrangements are incredibly inventive. This trip was just before I started writing songs on the Omnichord for what would become Halos & Lassos. Yeah, the album is sort of similar I guess — you press the ‘on’ button, and it sort of begins with a sputter, and just goes. I bet that subconsciously, as I was trying-out this new instrument, I was also picking-up on memories of that band organ museum. I feel that maybe there’s something a little ‘organically mechanical’ about Halos & Lassos. I know that the Omnichord instrument itself influenced the way that everything was written and presented.
Who are your major musical influences?
Warren: Well, I have to say pavement. not because they had a defining impact on my musical taste but because SM is our ‘friend’ on myspace and without him the whole thing would collapse like a pack of cards. No, pavement have a lot to answer for in my book, along with Sebadoh, Silver Jews, Sonic Youth, and, of course, British bands like Black Sabbath and My Bloody Valentine. I?d even go to as far to say David Bowie and John Lennon although the prior is for his acting and the latter for his acting up. I?d like to be more provocational, I just don?t have it in me.
What approach do you take to writing music?
I don’t really have so much an approach, the music usually just writes itself. I listen to the music that I favor at the time and get inspired by what I hear, though I don’t usually just tell myself “oh, alright, I guess I will write this and put this here”. That’s one way of doing it, but I don’t really think about it much anymore really, it sort of just comes. I can’t usually remember how I come up with the songs, but when I do feel like I’m in a blue mood or something, before I know it, the music is just there.
From where do you draw your influences — and how do you manage to combine them in a way that remains true to your intentions?
this is exploding writes its music together as a group. Sometimes one person will bring in an idea and we’ll all build upon it, but more often then not the four of us will jam on something for a little while and then expand upon it slowly and steadily, demolish it, and then build it up again till it’s just right. This allows all four of us to put our different influences and thoughts into each song. I personally draw influence from anything that is done with passion and quality. I love the talking heads, the police, john lennon, and sting, and those were my main influences as a songwriter early on, but the further I get along the more I absorb everything that catches me, movies, music videos, books, country, grindcore, indie-alt-pop bands that no one has ever heard of, dance routines. So long as it is done well and with passion in mind there is something to be appreciated and absorbed from it. That all comes out in the music I make and the experiences I have and the words I write.