Contents Under Pressure Issue 1: San Diego DIY

It’s one of those coastal fog
days most people who hear
about Southern California’s
coast would never dream of
happening. Just a few hours
before meeting the boys
at Terra Mar Point in North
County’s Carlsbad, a wall of
clouds rolled in over the cliff by
the seaside, obscuring the sun and
giving the air that wet, salty smell
one can only experience and not
properly describe.
The band has obviously spent a
lot of time along the cliffs here,
hardly stumbling as they trek
along the steep cliffs and rock
ledges as we make our way down
to the beach, their photoshoot
location of choice. After the tides
get too high (Mikey’s shoe being
soaked along the way), we head
back up to the side of the coastal
highway to talk about their next
album and what it means to be in
a DIY scene.
Luke describes their experience
recording the album as
“turbulent.” Having worked on
the album for two years, and
having recorded it twice after
scrapping a bad first take,
they’re finally ready to release
their work. “It’s got songs that
are almost two years old now,”
Marc tells me, “and the new ones,
we just finished the writing
process a couple of months
before we recorded it.” It seems
that there’s an entire catalogue of
their work from the band’s career
there.
Why record it twice, though?
Luke says they just needed more
practice. “We weren’t getting
tight enough to record in one
take.” Mikey agrees: “That was a
priority, to be able to play the
songs well enough to just do it.
We recorded it once, and then
we scrapped that, and then did it
again. And we did it all to a tape
machine, so it was analogue.” “In
my garage,” Marc laughs.
The entire thing, outside of
paying a friend to help mix,
was DIY as well. Nate tells me
they did buy a digital interface
to record, but it didn’t
go so well. “We bought our
digital interface before that,
trying to record just straight
onto the computer, and ended up
stumbling.”
Despite it being a long and messy
experience, though, Mikey sees
it as a learning one. “It was just
a lot about making mistakes and
fucking up and doing shit wrong.
Because that’s the thing, [you
have to] expect to fuck up a lot.
Over and over again.” Marc
sees the benefit of DIY in having
every say in what happens
to your work: “If you want what
you want, you’re gonna fuck up.
Someone else might do a good
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