{"id":660811,"date":"2016-08-17T13:34:23","date_gmt":"2016-08-17T17:34:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/?p=660811"},"modified":"2016-08-17T13:34:23","modified_gmt":"2016-08-17T17:34:23","slug":"a-qa-with-joseph-and-the-beasts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/2016\/08\/17\/a-qa-with-joseph-and-the-beasts\/","title":{"rendered":"A Q&amp;A With Joseph And The Beasts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1170\" height=\"658\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/HFBPZGzP4oc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong>Friday. What you got goin&#8217; on? How about heading down to Cafe Nola to check out Joseph And The Beasts? They&#8217;re playing with Fellow Creatures and the great Andrew Bromhal from Silent Old Mtns. We recently caught up with the band&#8217;s namesake, Joseph Mulhollen, to talk about how the band came together, what inspired them to do what they do, and what we can expect from their set this weekend at Cafe Nola. You won&#8217;t want to miss it. This much, we know.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">Let\u2019s start with some history of the band. How did you get together? How did the band form and how long have you been at it?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The band started around 2012, when I (Joseph) released a solo record,\u00a0&#8220;Problematical Animals.&#8221; I enlisted the help of Patrick and Alex to help flesh out the recordings for the release show, and it just kind of kept on going. The band has since changed its name (from Joseph Mulhollen &amp; the Problematical Animals to Joseph &amp; The Beasts), and gone through a little line up change with the addition of Greg in 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">Did you guys have any goals when dreaming up the band &#8211; perhaps stylistically or otherwise?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">I&#8217;ve always had this kind of creepy acoustic chamber pop circus\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"s1\">aesthetic, which is really prevalent in my earlier work, but somewhere along the way, as the band became more of a group\u00a0effort in terms of writing, a little of that aesthetic has been shed and replaced with a rather bombastic, dynamic, shifty sound. There&#8217;s more of a moodiness that wasn&#8217;t there\u00a0before. I don&#8217;t think any of this was the goal or the intention; it&#8217;s just\u00a0what ended up happening as a result of the four\u00a0of us making music, and that&#8217;s almost more magical to me because the weight of expectation was absent and we were just able to create.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What are some of your favorite memories as a band? Conversely, can you talk a little about some of the hardships you guys have experienced through the years and what advice you\u2019d give to someone looking to start a band for the first time?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">In general, I think we all really enjoy performing for people. No matter what&#8217;s\u00a0going on, when we get on stage and perform, those tend to be among my favorite memories. I think we also really enjoy playing in new cities and venues. Touring can be really fun as well (especially if we see a Waffle House). However, touring can also be really difficult. We haven&#8217;t gone on a long tour in a while because the last one really wiped us out. As far as advice, I don&#8217;t feel like I&#8217;m qualified to give any out. Even though we&#8217;ve been together for four\u00a0years, in a lot of ways, we are still a very new band, and it&#8217;s\u00a0been very\u00a0difficult to balance our personal lives and obligations while also having\u00a0the\u00a0time to grow a band. You get out what you put in, and it&#8217;s all about balancing all of that so you don&#8217;t burn yourself out.\u00a0Wait, did I just give advice?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What\u2019s your perception of the local music scene in and around the DMV area, as well as Maryland as a whole?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">It&#8217;s a very exciting time for music in this region. I think that during times of political\/socio-cultural turmoil and\u00a0unrest, musicians and artists create some of their most thought-provoking work. Artists really reach to the corners of their artistic abilities as a reflection of (or in response to) the shifting of the collective consciousness around them. I see that in Baltimore. Many of the musicians and artists here express themselves\u00a0with an unapologetic honesty that I find to be really refreshing and much needed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">Who are some of your major influences and why?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">I can\u00a0only speak for myself because I think my bandmates and I have very different influences, but I&#8217;ve always been a fan of the strange and spooky (PJ Harvey,\u00a0Diamanda Galas, Brian Eno), of the ramshackle and escapist (Neutral Milk Hotel, Olivia Tremor Control, Chad VanGaalen), of the sonically thoughtful (Radiohead, Bjork, CAN, Fiery Furnaces), and of the great storytellers and conceptualizers (Tom Waits, David Bowie, Kate Bush).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">Can you give us names of some artists we need to check out that we maybe haven\u2019t seen yet? Who are you listening to the most these days?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">Aside from artists listed above, there are tons of local artists that are really\u00a0adding something special to the musical atmosphere. Blacksage, Fellow Creatures, Super City, Natural Velvet, Frenemies, Amy Reid\/Chiffon, Raindeer, Pellars, Sweepstakes, Ami Dang, Abdu Ali. I&#8217;m blanking on so many, but these are the ones that come to mind right now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">Where are some of your favorite places to play and why?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">I like playing DIY spaces the most. There&#8217;s an informal\u00a0hospitality to intentional safe spaces that can be really comforting and welcoming. We also\u00a0really enjoy any venue that has impeccable sound,\u00a0because it just makes the whole show so much more enjoyable for us if we can hear ourselves! My personal favorite place to play is Nietzsche&#8217;s in Buffalo, which is where I&#8217;m from. That city has some colorful characters in it. The last time we played there, a burlesque dancer named Cat McCarthy (who is also a close friend), got up on stage and did an impromptu striptease\u00a0during one of our songs. It&#8217;s just a super unrestrained place.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What does the rest of 2016 look like for Joseph &amp; The Beasts from here on out? New music? Shows?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">Oh boy. We have been working on an\u00a0album for a looooooong time and it is finally getting to the point where we are seeing the light at\u00a0the end of the tunnel. We also have a lot of shows coming up in September and October. We are working on videos, unique merchandise, and lots of amazing people have come out to help us design album art, t-shirts, poster designs, etc. It&#8217;s been really nice to feel supported.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What do you think is the most perfect song ever written and why?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">I don&#8217;t think there is one\u00a0specific song that fits the description of perfect, so I won&#8217;t even begin to make such a claim. What I will say is that the song &#8220;Mercy Seat&#8221; by Nick Cave &amp; The Bad Seeds does this thing to me (and has done it since the first time I heard it at the age of 15). From the instant the song starts, I&#8217;m transported to a very specific scene and I have extreme feelings of pain, sacrifice and redemption in a way that no other song has ever made me feel. It&#8217;s a powerful piece of music. It is not, however, the most perfect song ever written, and I don&#8217;t know what song that would be.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">And finally, what can we expect from your set at Cafe Nola this weekend?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">Like I said, we are a fairly\u00a0bombastic and energetic band, so we will be bringing a lot of that. And lots of facial and chest hair.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Friday. What you got goin&#8217; on? How about heading down to Cafe Nola to check out Joseph And The Beasts? They&#8217;re playing with Fellow Creatures and the great Andrew Bromhal&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[31],"class_list":["post-660811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-qa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=660811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660811\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=660811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=660811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnpsites.net\/playlist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=660811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}