December 20, 2007
6 Things You Should Know About Brown Recluse Sings
Landphil was at Penn’s Pi Lam, breathing in the stale smell of beer and cigarettes and enjoying the sights and sounds the show had to offer. The night started off with Ravens and Vultures, then Brown Recluse Sings, and then DJ RMT (the SuperTodd Brothers of Brown Recluse) and the Broadzilla Dj’s topped us off for an infinite night of dancing.
1. The band started as a collaboration between Tim Meskers and his good friend Mark Saddlemire. [Tim Meskers] “It was originally intended to be mostly a studio only project and we invited some friends to play on the songs, but then we found that the chemistry and the repore was so good that we might want to start playing live shows. We had a legendarily shambolic first show at the Kensington South forum, and it just kind went on from there.” Mark left the band around the end of the summer of 2007, [Alexander Tyson] “He went on tour with us, and it was a really nice farewell. I think it was an amicable sort of separation because he just wanted to focus more time on his studio efforts.”
2. The 6 guys in Brown Recluse all met at school, Tim and Alex have played together since Middle/high School and they met Herbie and the Todd brothers (Ryan, Jesse, and Patrick) at Temple University. The Todd Brothers have obviously known one another all of their lives, but Patrick, the youngest Todd brother at the age of 21, just joined the band as Mark decided to leave. It was a smooth transition, as they expected Mark to leave and Patrick to move from Connecticut (hometown of the Todd brothers) to Philadelphia. The brothers report that they’ve always gotten along well, and aren’t like normal brothers that usually struggle with sibling rivalries.
3. Brown Recluse Sings has a clean track record. They’ve never really fought amongst themselves, except Herbie has always been somewhat of a troublemaker. He was once moved to yelling and breaking furniture, something very out of character for him, but according to Tim, it was “something about needing more delay, he needed more delay. There was a bunch of blood everywhere, and he broke Alex’s chair”. The band actually almost broke up once because they couldn’t cross the Canadian border together, because of Herbie’s criminal record. They had to leave Herbie there for some time until things blew over, and when I dug deeper, he and Alex quickly changed the subject. Herbie seems to be the rebel of the group, but it’s a subject they like to keep quiet.
4. The band shares a wide spectrum of music, ranging from psychedelic late 60’s/early 70’s to black metal to early electronic. These all have their own preferences that they’re constantly sharing with one another on tour. However, they do share a love for Brazilian psych, and apparently Alex does for Brazilian women, as they shared that his girlfriend is Brazilian (He blushingly changed the subject back to music). [Herbie] “We had a song listening event on tour, where we all picked our favorite songs and we would all play them for each other. And we voted on how much we liked them, and we narrowed it down to the best songs.”
5. The band not only shares a wide variety of music, they also have some pretty diverse jobs. Jesse Todd (the middle Todd brother) is actually a Spanish teacher at Philadelphia public high school, and he also coaches a mock trial team at the school at which he helps encourage students that are interested in becoming lawyers. He has no interest in practicing law himself, but he works with attorneys and has some experience studying law. The band itself has become a full-time occupation for all of the guys, as Herbie explains, “We try to remain a self-sufficient group, as far as recording goes, as far as artwork goes, promotions, show booking, etc… We like to think that we’re a diverse enough group that we can sort of in-house like handle anything that comes at us.” It’s quite a task/feat for any band to maintain a DIY mentality, but Recluse Sings attempts to keep their original intentions in sight.
6. All of the members of BRS are already DJing, Ryan and Jesse (DJ RMT, supertodd brothers), Herbie (HTShell), and Tim is soon to begin spinning a bit of his own. When asked how their spinning could come to influence the band’s music, Herbie responded, “Well, even with what we DJ, there’s a wide variety. From like hip-hop to indie music, to like what Ryan’s playing now (Ryan wasn’t in during the interview, he was spinning just outside the door), Krautrock and pretty drawn out simple stuff. I can definitely see us incorporating that into our music, we’ve definitely fooled around with it before. We don’t really have anything definitely worked on. So in short, probably? Ha. ”
The band was supposed to release an EP “The Soft Skin” under Tequila Sunrise Records, last month in November, but due to various circumstances it’s been delayed. They’re playing this Friday, December 21, at Johnny Brenda’s. I’m really excited for this show, because it’s giving a lot of local artists a chance to get som well-deserved recognition.
DJ Kyle Intensified
November 30, 2007
Brown Recluse Sings FREE SHOW at UPenn’s Pi Lam
Brown Recluse Sings
http://www.myspace.com/brownreclusesings
Ravens and Vultures
http://www.ravensandvultures.org/
LandPhil 