PipemanRadio Interviews Puma Blue at Shaky Knees 2023

0:04 Hey, you love them too. On Wow You Wake Up America, It's time for the Adventures of Pipe Man on W FOURCY dot com. West Poon Beach is number one internet radio station. Here's your host, the pike Man. I'm myself roub my lashness. The count never looks so good. O stay with me. This is the pipe Man here on the Adventures Pipeman W four C Why Radio. And I'm here with Jacobs from Huma Blue Ice and uh here you are at Shaking Knees. Hey, lovely to meet you and even more lovely to have you here playing at Shaky Knees. I'll be in your neck in the woods in June for download no way. Yeah, so he's playing this year. I can't even begin the name. There's so many of them. I think I never made it to down at festival. I think bring me to rise in his playing, which I'm really excited about that because I like them, but I like to fact them going to see them in their home country, right, Yeah, I think it's a little different,

1:34 yeah type of it's away games, you know, Yeah, exactly so. Uh, but it's a cool festival. I'm surprised you never made there, being from there. Yeah, I could just I don't know. I was a nervous, shy music fan when I was young. I didn't I didn't have the bravery to go to festivals until I was older. So what is it that made you become an artist with that shyness um and need to express myself? I guess and I love for music. Yeah, I grew up on music. You know. My parents were avid listeners and both music teachers as well, and they got me a drum lesson for my seventh birthday and I just became obsessed with music then and really into music and bands.

2:20 And then I think around the time I was twelve or thirteen, started messing with composition and guitar and singing and realized that was really what inspired me, was like songs and pieces of music, not so much just being the rhythm section. So yeah, I just had to be an artist. You know, I've never really pictured myself as like the guys front, but here we are, and here we are yea and man from all that, you're a killer artist because, like I can tell the difference between somebody that you know got into music, but somebody that's a musician cool. There's a big difference in you're the musician. I just love it. It's it's an honor to be a vehicle for it, you know, absolutely, So tell our listeners a little bit about you as an artist, and you know, not necessarily a genre, because I hate genres because they box you in as an artist.

3:23 Okay, And it's like you can only do this because this is your genre. You know, How do you describe yourself as an artist? I honestly try not to because it's such a difficult question. Or yeah, you know, you end up scrambling for like you said, so like descriptive words or genres, and so I try to let the music speak for itself. But um I love like beautiful harmony. I listened to a lot of soul music and jazz music, and I mean, you know, all music inspires me, really, but um I love things that are pretty but with like dissonance and juxtaposition, things that make you feel a little tense, like tension and release is very important to me in music, Like things that feel haunting and angelic and ethereal, something that just feels a little otherworldly, I suppose.

4:24 But we have our roots and you know, we're essentially we play like a band. You know, like I do a lot of the post production stuff at home to make it feel like a strange alien planet, but the real stuff happens kind of between us as a band. It's a lot of just like improv and connecting on a groove. So I love it. Yeah, I think it's important that you have that connection between the band because I've seen bands that you can tell there's no connection and it's there's something different about the music there. It doesn't flow. It's more shoppy, is what I best way I could describe it. Because everybody's doing their own thing, but and that's cool if you're doing your own thing together. Yeah. Yeah, I think the guys in the band have such unique voices on their instruments, which is so cool to like be around. But we try and listen more than play and connect with each other on an emotional level before like any flashiness.

5:30 You know, I love it, and you know I love how you put it there, the voices of their instruments, because it's so true, you know, like your instrument is how you express yourself and is your voice. No matter what that instrument is, it doesn't have to be just vocals. Absolutely, Yeah, and these guys have really carved out there personality on their instruments over the years too, So like the longer I know them, the more I feel like I am familiar with their voices, you know. Yeah, And that's important too, right, you know, you have to have that connection with your bandmates to kind of know them. It's no different then, you know, the engineer of my radio show has to know me to engineer my show properly, and then like I don't even have to I wouldn't even have to say anything. It's like they know when to do this, when to do that because they know me, right, And I think it's the same for you. I mean, yeah, being the one in the band with the sort of the direction and like the vision for what it should be. I used to give the guys like notes and ideas and give them thoughts and feedback. And I just don't even do that anymore. You know that they're so inside of my head. And I also, in tourn of like grown to just love what they do naturally, like more and more over the years that these days, yeah, like you just said, I

7:03 don't need to sort of ask, They just kind of do the best. I love hearing that too, because there's a lot of bands had they've been around for a while that it's not like that, you know, and it's you know, you're welcoming what they bring to the table, opposed to the ego of not you know. And there's so many bands where it's like the band members don't have a say or you know. I give a perfect example of something that's been pretty much news all along. It's like the band Metallica when they Jason Newstedge formed the band, nobody ever, and they admit it, nobody ever really let him become a real band member, so he had no say. He had that and that's what caused him to leave the band.

7:59 But that's also cause them to maybe not make some of their best music because it wasn't a you know, collective effort. Yeah. I think, you know, geniuses exist. Maybe I don't know, but really you have to let music do its thing. Yeah, you have to like get out of the way of of music. And I think true geniuses too, are smart enough to realize that everybody can play a role and everybody can add to it, and somebody doesn't have to be smarter than you to add to the equation. Yeah, totally. Yeah, I think those geniuses are just really good at being like antenna or like vessels for letting the music speak through them.

8:52 And they yeah, they often know how and when to like like people get involved in collaborating like add to special source. Like you know, a person that's coming to mind is like Kendrick Lamar, you know, yeah, super collaborative and has all these amazing people around him to contribute to the music. But it's still like his still his identity at the end of the day. He's still have style, still a sound, but he's still he's being collective with people that are on the same wavelength. Yeah, you know, and they do things that he can't do, like that's videostic pianists and stuff, you know, like dramas and uh yeah, it's cool that he he's like so open to that. I think that is a big key. Like even in like my radio studio, I want my engineer to know more than me. Yeah, like because everybody has to bring something at table, and you can't be great at everything and you have to realize that. So yeah, I may be able well do the engineer's job, but not as good as the engineer. If I have the right one, it's it's definitely a ego death lesson. Yeah, you have to kind of realize, Okay, you know it's cool to do everything, but let's just leave doing everything to Stevie Wanda. You really somehow can do everything other than him. I don't.

10:22 I don't know if there's anybody. There's not many, that's for sure. Well, and you know Henry Ford who invented the automobile. He only had a third grade education. And when they asked him how he knew all the answers or knew that, he goes, I don't have the all the answers. I hire the people that do. Yeah, And so to me, that's a genius. A genius knows what they're good at and what other people are good at and collaborates in that realm. Cool, And that's what you're talking about in your band, really defining what a genius is right now, that's it. I love that and I love it too. So what do you got going on after Shaky Knees? I'm gonna sleep because that's a novel idea. Right, I've had like three hours sleep in the last two days. Maybe it's been a lot of driving. We've been on tour um so I'm gonna get horizontal and close my eyes hopefully for a while. Um.

11:22 Then we've got New Orleans and three Texas states. Really excited to go out there. We never played New Orleans before. And then I've got a little break over the summer and then two tours in like September and November and putting the album out nice. Yeah, went to the album dropping first of September. Yeah, so tell us a little bit about the new album. So it's called Holy Waters, and it's funny enough. Like as I've been saying so much about them already, it's it's like more of a band focused record were the process before has been a lot more me alone and a laptop and you know, maybe getting the odd part from them here and there in the studio. But this time I just really wanted to let them loose and collaborate more. So. Yeah, we made a more band centric album.

12:22 Even wrote some of the songs together for the first time, which is super cool. Nice not just be like bringing stuff to them, Like lots of songs came out of jams. And Yeah, I'm super excited for people to hear it. It's it's like my proudest piece of work I've I've managed to do, and I just really love it. It's very dear to my heart, some of the lyrics and stuff. I love it. So I guess you've found out that maybe you've taken things a whole nother level now to do that band collaborative thing, and like, you're probably even more impressed with your art now that you included others. Oh, honestly, yes, because it's less like looking in a mirror and more like looking at a family photograph.

13:13 You know, you know, I like the way you cringe it. Oh, I don't like the face I'm pulling that, but you're still like, oh, I like this photograph of all of us together. Whereas before I think the music was such a reflection of just me. You get kind of insecure about it, or you get really proud for a second, and then your taste changes, and this time I just love how much of them there is. So yeah, I feel like the art is better because I love hearing that. And there's a big reason I love hearing that, because there's so many bands out there that they have one person that really is the person, right, and I think a that's not long lasting. Yeah, Number one. Number two, I think like your experience. It can be very tunnel vision at that point because you don't have any other thing going in the funnel. Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah, So if you pour soda in a funnel, SODA's going to come in. But if you pour this soda an ice cream in the funnel, you have an ice cream soda. It's true.

14:22 I mean, you know, it's strange I feel now that there's more of us writing. I mean, we're sort of a four piece with a fifth member, a good friend of Oz that comes in and he was writing with us on this album, but he doesn't to with us, and it was it was really weird to feel like, oh, now we feel whole, which makes me imagine that on the last projects that I was releasing, like I was only kind of putting forward a fifth even though at the time I like one hundred percent of a person with all my influences and references.

15:05 Suddenly you're pouring four other people as one hundred percent in so it becomes this like five deal and suddenly it's just a much richer, more interesting soup, you know. Yeah, And I bet the band members probably perform even better in this environment because when they feel they are more part of the family, they're gonna go more out of their way, and it's they're gonna shine even more. Yeah, it's the freedom thing. Like, if everyone's comfortable and relaxed and feeling like they're allowed to just be expressive, then some of the craziest magic ends up coming out because you're allowing the space for it and everyone's like in that place where they're ready to just accidentally reveal something, to find something that wasn't there yesterday. And then yeah, think of how hollow music can be if it's not a form of expression. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you see that so much with TikTok and stuff that's purely being made for commercial reasons, right, rather than you know, there's songs that are real songs and then find an audience with TikTok. But I've heard of people making music specifically to go viral, right, And but there's no soul to that, you know, totally, and music should have soul. Yeah, otherwise what's the point? I mean, just yeah, just find another way

16:38 of making money. Yeah. I always say this. If you're in this business to make money, I don't think you should be an artist because there's two main negatives of the business if you're not doing it for the music, just go to a business and do that. Yeah exactly. I mean you know we have to eat of course. Yeah, but different story. Yeah, yeah exactly, that's what you should get the reward. That shouldn't be the purpose. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. So, tell everybody how they can connect on socials on the web by merch get the lue. Well, but my drops if they can pre save it all that good stuff.

17:21 So we just launched a website. It's just Puma Blue dot com. There's a lot of stuff on there, like tour dates and even this scrolling journal of all the photos from the last kind of you know, eight years or so. Nice. But my Instagram is Puma Blue. It's one word. It's not usually but um and yeah. You can pre order the vinyl of the album now, and I honestly can't wait to hold it as like a physical objet. So exciting vinyl. I'm so glad make it come back, because it's special to have some thing that feels so full, you know, it's like got the liner notes and you can really pour over it and be proud of owning it and to experience, you know, it's a journey.

18:08 I remember being a kid. You buy an album, I would put my headphones on and just sit there and consume and like look at all the pictures and the artwork and the lyrics and that, like you said, the liner notes and all that stuff. It was like a complete sensory experience, not just the music. It's like a whole universe and kind of fall into it. And yeah, it's like the full immersion. Yes, even CDs. I used to feel that way as a child, you know, which is the same. It's not quite as immersive as vinyl. You've got to like interact with the vinyl more. You've got to the way you put it on and change the sides, and even just how much bigger it is. Yeah, but if I had a CD, I mean the cool thing about that was like I would buy a few things at HMV, which is like our music store back home for a while, just whatever I could have for at least to have like a sort of three for two deal, and you'd bring it home and you'd really listen to it, because sometimes you wouldn't like it.

19:08 You couldn't test it right, so like sometimes you wouldn't like it, you'd listen seven eight times, just in case there was a song you missed and you know, there's no way of like getting a refund or it grows on you. Like perfect example, first time I heard a CDC, I didn't like them, and then I just kept listening to the album over and over again, and then somehow I ended up liking them. You know. It's like it's it's that's the difference today. Okay, So you bought an album back then or a CD you can stream it and see what it sounded like. You had to take your chances. And because you were buying it, yeah, the investment. You weren't just listen to track and say forget it and say decide you you know, I mean, I know I sound really like old right now, back in my day, but it's true, it is there's something really special about it. Yes, so that's really cool.

20:06 I can't wait for the new album to drop. Thank you so much. You rock and uh it was so good to have you here at Shaking Kneeds and thanks for being on the Adventures of Pipe Man's my absolute pleasure. Thanks for having me my pleasure. Thank you for listening to the Adventures of pipe Man. I'm w for CUI Radio.