Thanks largely to the Internet, we are living in an age when anyone can pick up a few instruments, put their music out there, and drum up a decent amount of attention. A consequence of this phenomenon is a seemingly infinite supply of bands to listen to, most of which are disappointingly mediocre. On the other hand, this increase in accessibility has also compelled some musicians to really get out there and experiment with sounds that set them apart from the masses, resulting in some truly phenomenal music. Among the ranks of the latter, a band called Pilotdrift was born. Although they've only been playing for a year and a half, their vibrant, eclectic euphony has been turning a lot of heads lately, and has won them an opening slot on the bills of such notable acts as Polyphonic Spree, Mike Doughty, and Jon Brion. In a few short weeks, they will be undertaking their first national tour, opening for Eisley; one can't help but feel that they are on the brink of a whole new level of discovery. Last night they came through Austin to open for the Angels Of Light. It was the perfect time to sit down with lead vocalist Kelly Carr and drummer Ben Rice and get to know these bold young adventurers.

Hybrid Magazine: Ok, the first thing is, I had a hard time just finding basic information about you guys. For instance, how did you get involved with music? How did you guys meet each other? You know, the whole boring getting-to-know-you crap…

Kelly Carr: Um…wow…so, 'How did we meet?' That's your first question?

HM: No, no. The first question is how did you get into playing music?

KC: Ok, well, this answer is going to be personal, obviously. I can't answer for the other guys. But my mom is a piano teacher and a choir teacher. So I grew up around music and instruments through her. And I always messed around on the piano, and drums. I was a drummer in elementary and middle school. I just always messed around with the piano, but really, in middle school, I wanted to be hip so I wanted to start listening to music. So I just turned on the TV, and the "High and Dry" music video was on, from The Bends (Radiohead). That was my first introduction to [rock] music. It was just lucky chance. If it had been Alice In Chains everything might be different. So, I got into music, and off the bat, that was the kind of music I listened to. I just kind of jumped into it. Then, Micah and I and some of our other friends were just bored one summer, I think it was our sophomore year of high school. So we decided just for fun, just to be stupid, to start a three-piece band. We went pawn shopping for instruments and we just messed around to pass the time. But then some friends were saying that they really kinda liked it, so it grew from there. Just, the idea of creating something and using your imagination…it's a healthy thing that everybody wants to do in some sort of way.

Ben Rice: Me? How I got started in music? I don't know. I was trying to think of a landmark time when I started, but I don't know. I've been around music because my parents are very involved with their church choir, but nothing that was very cool or modern. But I remember one time I went to this church when I was in seventh grade-it wasn't a charismatic church, it was just, I guess more of a gospel thing-and they had live musicians, and there was a drummer playing with them. I had never seen drums or people playing before, and I was like, 'Wow.' So I wanted to play the drums. There was this drum set in the back of the church, so I would just go there after school, and I taught myself to play.

HM: Wow. How old were you?

BR: 12 or 13.

KC: Thinking back on it, probably the reason I wanted to start the band was because, I think the experience in middle school of being in band and playing just the snare drum was pretty amazing. To be able to be connected to a whole group of people and making this one sound, or piece of art at the same time. It's a unique thing.

HM: Yeah, that's cool. So how did all of you meet each other?

KC: Well, I knew Micah from school. I knew everybody else from church. Ben, I met at college, in the Music Hall. And the rest of the band met him through me.

HM: When was this?

BR: First year of college. About this time two years ago.

HM: Wow. It seems like you guys have been a cohesive unit for much longer than that.

BR: It does feel that way.

KC: It does.

HM: Actually, Kelly, you started to answer my next question earlier on. Your instrumentation is pretty elaborate. Most bands don't have…

KC: As much crap?

HM: [laughs] As much crap! Well that's not a very nice way to put it. They don't have as much going on as you guys do. So, I was curious whether you started off with this band with the goal of having a lot going on, or did it start out on a more simple level and you just kind of kept adding elements, like, "Well, what if we used this…?" Did it evolve into what it has become?

KC: No, it started out that way. A lot of the songs were written before we formed the band. Actually, all of them were.

BR: Yeah, that's bringing it back to what I almost got to earlier.

KC: Oh. I guess, whenever I wrote the songs, it was just for fun. I didn't ever think about what it would take to perform it live. It was just something I was doing for fun. When we came to the point of putting a band together, the challenge was how to communicate this live. That's just the way I wrote it. I write as I record. It wasn't a band situation first, and then, "Let's record. Let's make it big." I guess that's kind of backwards from the way most bands do it. So it started off that way, like, "How are we going to pull this off?" But, I mean, it worked out, because the challenge of it was having to switch around instruments and stuff, and playing different instruments at the same time. That's what turned out to be the fun part.

HM: So you wrote all the songs?

KC: Well, the ones that Micah sings, he wrote. I sing the ones I wrote…with a little bit of collaboration with the drum section on some songs.

HM: (to Ben) What were you going to say about it earlier?

BR: Oh, I was just saying as a side-note to how we got started, when we were talking about what he wanted to do and what I wanted to do, he gave me a CD with a label on it. I still have it in my CD book-that's kind of funny. He even made a little insert in a slim case, and it had like trees on it. He took the time to do it. That's just how he would do it, you know? And it said, "Kelly and Micah - or - Micah and Kelly. Please join this band," with like five exclamation points next to it. [laughs] And I was like, yeah, we want to do the same thing musically in theory, but I'd never heard their music and obviously I'd like to hear it. And they'd never heard me play, either, so we were just talking. And it was just funny because they gave me that CD and then…I don't know.

KC: You didn't really sound that excited about it at first.

BR: Yeah…

KC: You were just trying to play the mature card. [laughs]

BR: No, it wasn't that! [laughs] We talked about this before. I didn't know what role I was going to play, because a lot of that stuff at first didn't even have any drums.

KC: That's true. Here's an interesting piece of information: a lot of the songs, like "So Long", all that drum stuff was non-existent.

HM: Are you serious? "So Long" started off with no percussion?

KC: Yeah!

HM: [laughs]

BR: Yeah! Exactly! So when I heard it, it wasn't that I wasn't excited, it was just like, "That's great, so what do I do?"

HM: You know what's funny about that is that when I first heard the CD, and when my friends listen to it and we talk about it, that song is always referred to as "that song with all the percussion." Drums totally run that song now.

KC: We started doing that because I knew it would be a nice effect live. I didn't want people to be bored, so we did stuff to try to build it more.

HM: So Micah sings, what, four songs on the album?

BR: No, more than that.

KC: Actually, out of thirteen songs, I sing five.

HM: What? Wait…so do you sing more of the songs live than he does?

KC: Yeah.

HM: Wow, ok forget that question.

KC: [laughs] Why?

HM: Well, because, I for some reason thought that he didn't sing all that many songs on the album. I guess that's because he doesn't sing as many of them live? So I was going to ask if he was planning on writing more. So do you only sing what you write? Or do you trade off?

KC: Well, I think part of the deal is that, for a thirty minute set, which is what we have at this stage of our career, we try to pick the ones that are immediately…

BR: A power-packed set. Not songs that require a lot of attention or patience for your first impression.

KC: Yeah, it's not an issue of them being better songs or anything like that, it's just that his songs tend to be a little mellower.

HM: But you sing some of his songs live, though.

KC: Well, I'm singing "Picturesque" now.

HM: Why? What was the reason for that?

KC: Well, the new version of "Picturesque" is going to be on the new album, and I'm singing it on the new album. The lyrics are getting changed a little bit.

HM: The lyrics you sang tonight, right?

KC: Yeah. It's kind of about the awkwardness of singing your friend's song.

BR: The first time [Micah] heard [the new lyrics] was last night in practice, which is kind of funny.

KC: The first time I sang it was last night. It was kinda weird, though.

HM: You've changed the lyrics of a few songs, though, right?

KC: Yeah, I'm messing around with "Caught In My Trap" at the end.

HM: I noticed that.

KC: I think I said something like, "Shattered windows/broken leg bones," or something like that. I'm not quite sure I'm going to keep it. The thing is, I wrote that song before Hail To The Thief came out, and "We Suck Young Blood". The whole cannibalistic referencing thing…I don't want people to draw comparisons any more than they already have.

HM: Do what you want with it, but I don't think a lot of people are going to draw that comparison. Because, first of all, anyone who tries to compare you directly to Radiohead are pulling the lazy journalistic I-compare-everything-to-Radiohead card, and should not be taken seriously. Ok? So they don't count. And secondly, Radiohead isn't the first band to write a song about violence or cannibalism in humans, so comparing you to them just because one of your songs shares a common theme is absurd.

BR: Well I think he's just saying that a lot of people say we sound like them anyway, because they are the only band people can think to compare us to. So it's like more fuel for that attitude.

HM: I would never ever ever draw a comparison between Pilotdrift and Radiohead. I mean, even if you feel that you've been influenced by Radiohead, your sound is not theirs at all. The only reason I could possibly think that people would say Radiohead is because, when they first came out, they were so difficult to classify, simply because they were just doing their own thing. And people get that same feeling when listening to you guys. I mean, you asked me about the Neutral Milk Hotel comparison, which is really funny because I didn't particularly think of Neutral Milk Hotel specifically, but the very first time I heard your music, I thought of the Decemberists, and everybody compares the Decemberists to Neutral Milk Hotel. So something along those lines makes more sense.

KC: I don't see that at all.

HM: Well, you probably don't see it because they have much more of a twangy alt-country sound, which you guys don't have. But…actually, this is a great tie-in to my next question. So, Neutral Milk Hotel and the Decemberists both have this wonderfully intelligent and deliciously archaic sense of narrative, and a lot of your songs are very narrative and less confessional. Even the ones that are written in the first person feel more like a story than you spilling your guts. So I think that's why you get those comparisons. That's why I drew those comparisons. Which brings me to the question: is that a conscious decision? Did you sit down and say, "Ok, I'm going to write songs, but I don't want to play the emo boy card?" Do you just write like that, or is it a clear choice?

KC: Well, actually, I think my personal life is within the story in some form or fashion. Some songs are just for fun. But in some songs there is a certain meaning that isn't obvious to others, but is for myself. It really depends on each song. "So Long", actually, would be the only one that would be really confessional. I wrote that for my graduating class. I went to a small school; there were only twelve of us, and we were all really good friends. So I wrote that and played it to my class. I just had to do it to say goodbye. "Elephant Island" is obviously just telling a story that was true. "Rings of Symbols" has to do with my frustration with the culture of MTV, etc., how it seems like there's not encouragement of marriage and family. So "Rings of Symbols" has to do with the idea of commitment, and the idea of celebrating true love with someone that you really love, not just something frivolous with someone that you met in a bar and want to hook up with. I mean, I'm not trying to be preachy, but the song's about sex-about your first time having sex, and how it's like taking a trip to a completely unfamiliar, foreign land; it's a completely intimate connection with this person. It's all those different emotions and feelings and meanings-it's a powerful thing. I was just trying to celebrate that. But you know, the other songs are just stories, that have a more cinematic feel. Like with "Caught In My Trap", I was very influenced by the soundtrack to The Usual Suspects. Some of the stuff on the new album are just more stories. I'm fascinated by the future, and the idea of technology, so they are about the possibilities that lie there. So some songs are more personal, but some are not. "Elephant Island" is just an amazing story, to me.

HM: It is, and I love the way you chose to present it musically. Anyway, I know you guys are really pushing to get this album done and out, but are you even thinking about a third album right now? Is that even on the radar?

BR: Only in the sense that some other songs that [Kelly] has written are being saved for another time, because they might not fit the best with the rest of the songs on this album.

HM: So it's pretty far in the future? I mean, you're just planning on really touring this second album for a while, working your mojo…

BR: Well, in a sense, this is really Pilotdrift's first record, to the general public. We're going to be really touring it, whereas [Iter Facere] has been regional at best, excepting the small, little, brief tour we did with the Polyphonic Spree. We're still pretty much unknown, obviously, to the masses. So this will really be like the first record, and it's pretty hard to say when we're going to do a second one. I know that people who have known us for a while want to go ahead and hear something else, but the good thing about this upcoming release is that [the material] is half new songs, and the old songs are recorded much better. So it's good for the fans that already exist, but it's also good for those who are new and don't know any better. It's a great first record. Kelly was joking around and said, "We ought to call this album 'The Best Of'."

HM: [laughs] Yeah! You should!

KC: We'll call it "Greatest Hits".

BR: Can you imagine having your first CD on the shelf and it says "Greatest Hits"?

KC: It's been done. It has to have been done.

HM: Well someone…oh! It's Nellie McKay! Her debut album is a double CD. She's so ballsy! She's just like, "I'm just gonna put 'em all out!"

BR: "I'm gonna give 'em all I got!" [laughs]

HM: Oh yeah! Do any of you guys have any solo or side projects, or do you have any ideas for some you'd like to do?

BR: Other than the fact that I want to be able to collaborate and work and record with as many good musicians as we can, no, not really. I guess because my day job is working in a studio, there's a lot of crap that I have to do to make money. But there are a lot of people that I meet that are fun to write with, but it's not a side project; it's just that I want to get all the music I can possibly get, and not do just one thing. But yeah, [Pilotdrift] is definitely a priority for me.

KC: This takes up all the time I have.

HM: So who are some musicians that you want to collaborate with? Do you see yourselves putting out a split EP with someone in the near future?

KC: There she goes, talking about someone we've never heard of again.

HM: Who? Who did I say?

KC: Slippy P?

HM: No! [laughs] I said, "Do you want to do a split EP?"

KC: Oh! [laughs] I thought you were giving an example of an artist that we'd collaborate with! Like, "You should do something with Slippy P."

HM: Slippy P! [laughs]

KC: I can just imagine some rapper guy like, "Yo, I'm Slippy P." [laughs]

HM: [laughs] You should totally do a split EP with some hip-hop act!

KC: That's so suggestive, too. You know, Slippy P.

HM: And that's totally your bad, because I didn't say that at all, so that came out of your brain.

KC: Yeah. [laughs] But anyway, to answer your question: I'd like to work with Jon Brion, actually.

HM: Good boy!

KC: Because he's got so much knowledge that I would just like to have some of him rub off on me. It was such an experience just being around him.

HM: Yeah, when I found out that you guys were playing with him, I just thought, "What a perfect combination!" Jon Brion just fits with you guys. I mean, I don't know him personally, I just know his work as a composer…

BR: I'd love to work with Matt Chamberlain, if I could name-drop somebody. He's my favorite drummer. He's just someone I respect a lot.

KC: Who is that?

BR: He's called the most recorded drummer, just because he plays with everybody-Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, lots of different people. He's such an amazing instrumentalist.

HM: Producers: are there any you admire and would like to work with, or are you planning on avoiding working with producers altogether? You've done well on your own so far…

BR: I think the obvious producer that everyone wants to work with would be Nigel Godrich just because he…

KC: Who's the guy that produced Elbow?

BR: I don't remember. Whoever that is, that would be cool. (About three minutes of conversation is lost by an irritating scratching noise.) But I mean, I'm not sure what need there is for production help. I mean, Kelly knows what he wants the song to do and we work very well together. What we did see that was good about [Eric Drew Feldman (Sparklehorse, Polyphonic Spree) co-producing] was having a task manager. He did a lot of that, like, "Ok, what's next?" And he spoke on our behalf to an engineer that we'd never met before whom he had worked with on other albums. But now that we know that engineer so well…

KC: I guess, to answer your question, we've talked about this and have decided that, at least at this point, doing it ourselves is the way to go. That's not saying that we would never consider working with someone, but this is where we are right now. But I do have a few songs on the shelf that would be quite an undertaking, and if we wanted to get a real orchestra, I'd need some help with that.

HM: Is there anything that you're afraid of? I mean artistically, or for your career?

KC: I'm scared of comparisons. That freaks me out. It's always discouraging to me.

HM: Really?

KC: Well, not comparisons. I shouldn't say comparisons. I mean when someone says we ripped someone off. Being compared is fine.

HM: You're more afraid of being thought of as derivative.

KC: In a negative context, yeah. I mean, I don't think we've ever had that yet. Maybe there have been a couple of times where I've come across something like that. But it will happen. It always does. Everyone has different opinions.

HM: Ok, these are questions from fans now. The first one is: "You guys rock so hard. You're like my heroes. Do you have any weaknesses, like kryptonite?"

[everyone laughs]

KC: Weaknesses?

HM: Like kryptonite.

KC: Um…well…I can't answer that seriously. My weakness is funny answers to funny questions at 4:30 in the morning.

[everyone laughs]

HM: What's your favorite superpower?

KC: Do you have a list of superpowers?

HM: No! You have to tell me your favorite!

KC: Well, the ultimate is shapeshifting. You can't beat that.

HM: You can't, I agree.

BR: Yeah, you can't really argue with that.

KC: Actually we're shapeshifting right now. I'm Ben and he's Kelly. Just to mess with you. Gotcha! Let's switch back now.

BR: I'll do it later. I'm too tired.

[everyone laughs]

HM: Ok, um… [laughing] If you were Star Wars… [laughing harder]

KC: If I was Star Wars, like the whole concept of Star Wars? [laughing] That doesn't make any sense! The concept of Star Wars in human form!

HM: No! Wait! [still laughing] If you were Star Wars, what episode would you be?

KC: That really is the question! [laughs] I'm not that well versed in Star Wars.

BR: [laughs] Me neither.

KC: I'm more of a Star Trek guy. How nerdy is that?

BR: I'm more of an X-Files person.

HM: So what episode of Star Trek and X-Files would you be?

BR: What? That's impossible to answer! There are tons and tons of episodes.

KC: Ok, let me just say, to answer that question, Return Of The King.

[everyone laughs]

HM: Have you ever built your own robot, and if so, what did it do? And if so, that's hot.

BR: I tried to build a robot that would turn my light switch on and off.

HM: Did it work?

KC: How stupid is that?

BR: It was after watching McGee And Me when I was a little kid, and it was just a domino effect, I guess.

KC: It just stands there and looks at you like, "…Now?"

[everyone laughs]

BR: It wasn't really a robot; I guess it was just like an assembly line thing. So no, I've never built a robot.

HM: I guess that means you guys are officially not hot, then. I thought you might be hot, but you're definitely not now.

[everyone laughs]

HM: Ok, and here's a question by a fan who was trying to be more serious. Do you see yourself belonging to any scene? What scenes or groups do you consciously avoid?

KC: Are you serious?

BR: The scene of trying to make good music?

[everyone laughs]

HM: Good answer! What about scenes you're trying to avoid?

BR: That's like judging people…

KC: Well, we aren't really into the rap thing… [laughs]

HM: So that's it for the questions. At the end of every interview, I allow the band to turn the tables. It usually works better when I do the interview at the venue, because then the band can ask anybody anything. So I guess because your options are limited, you don't have to do this. But you have the opportunity to ask a question, if you'd like.

KC: If you went skydiving from an airplane and had to land in a cake, what kind of cake would you want it to be?

[everyone laughs]

KC: The whole skydiving thing is irrelevant, really. [laughs] I'm just trying to find out what kind of cake you like.

HM: Well, it is relevant, because if I were jumping out of a plane, I'd definitely want it to be a sponge cake. Hello!

KC: Ah, very good!

[everyone laughs]

HM: Well thanks for talking with us!

- Emily Strong