I had the pleasure of interviewing Daniel Carriere of Royal Tusk last week via phone. We caught up on what’s happened since their last show here in Vancouver (which ROCKED by the way), the upcoming tour about to swing out west again and his thoughts on a variety of things…
Scotty Evil: How are you guys doing?
Daniel: Not bad! Just gearing up for tour…we started with the cruise and that was a lot of fun and then across Canada…hopefully the weather holds up!.
SE: That’ll be a dice roll! So we haven’t seen you guys for over a year now (opening for Pop Evil at Venue)…you had just dropped your latest album…
DC: (laughing) yeah, we’re better at it now…97 shows in seventeen countries. And we write new songs during sound check etcetera so we have a new album written, so we’ll probably be playing a few new songs. That is if the crowd wants it…or we’ll do old ones! It’s kind of a blessing and a curse; we have such an array of styles through our EP and our first 2 albums…sometimes we get odd requests for what people want to hear. We try to keep a big library available to play if needed.
SE: What do you get asked for the most do you find?
DC: Usually just the ones like ‘Aftermath’, or ‘Fever’…that’s a very popular one or ‘Curse the Weather’…the classics.
SE: I just checked out the new video you guys just dropped. The visual style was fantastic I thought! (see below)
DC: Oh, for “Die Knowing”. It’s pretty cool because often people see videos of that style, with the silhouettes but what’s different with this one is generally you shoot those on a green-screen and it’s just a matter of taking out the background, but in this case, it wasn’t done on a green-screen; it was shot at 12 frames a second and then each frame was animated so that’s why, if you’re watching it looks like more of an animation. Keenan the director, he took liberties with that and while drawing the frames, made the hair go crazier and made it look a little more dramatic… so it was a lot of fun!
SE: Was that your concept, his, or a collaboration?
DC: Completely his idea. Initially we were going to draw each frame, in water-colour but we didn’t have the money or the time to get that done; he ended up drawing each frame on his tablet. He wanted to do a gallery showing with it but we just ran out of time and resources to get it done that way. It still looks great how he did it!
SE: And the song is great! Love it, has a really great riff.
DC: Thank you! Yeah, it’s a banger, and really fun to play. It goes over great live, so that’s why we decided to launch it as a single. It has a good tempo for head-banging…we just saw that the crowd really reacted to it.
SE: I had a good chat with Sandy (the bass player) after your show last time…I can’t remember specifically what the topic was but I’m sure it was about Rush, because I’m a big fan, and I was commenting on your red on white Rush font “TUSK” shirt which I proudly display in my collection.
DC: Oh right on! That’s an homage to Rush for sure and also a litmus test for talking to people when they know that it is in fact a Rush image…a lot of people don’t know! Which is kind of interesting…
SE: Of course you guy must have been pretty bummed about the news…that Neil Peart passed last week.
DC: When Rush has been around and in your life for as long as they have, you don’t really question their mortality. It’s just a thing that exists, so for this to happen, you realize just how connected to it you are. It was very sad, they are such creative guys and a huge inspiration to us. And they carried the torch for Canada…I think everyone was really upset about it. And Neil Peart is such an enigmatic guy; his stoicism and perfectionism and creativity is something that is very intriguing. He’s definitely an icon, you know…in his playing and also literary-wise his lyrics deal with really cool stuff; philosophies, objectivism…all sorts of interesting ideas. He will be missed. But the great thing about an artist is they share so much of who they are in their art and we can always enjoy that.
SE: How do you look at your own…well, you and Sandy have been together for quite some time, and the other guys since 2013…what do you see the arc has been like for you, since the first song you played to what you’re doing now?
DC: It’s been positive all in all…we’ve had hills and valleys. I’ll admit we had a period of time where we’ve been chasing a sound that we wanted…it’s been whittling away to a point to what we like to play and what we’re best at. We’ve touched some different genres as our career has progressed…it’s been a lot of fun and a learning experience as we get to know WHO Royal Tusk is.
SE: Where’d the band name come from?
DC: The Royal Alberta Museum. Their logo is a huge woolly mammoth. Sandy and I, when we were kids, on Friday nights there wasn’t much to do…we’d get someone to buy us beer and we’d go hang out at the museum. We wrote the name without thinking of anything…there was some kind of osmosis there where we spent so many evenings just talking and drinking outside…that sign really stuck with us. It’s powerful…the mammoth is a solitary, powerful thing. Also being up here in the north, we’ve spent our lives touring in cold-ass weather. It’s very fitting.
SE: What’s something you don’t get asked often in interviews like this?
DC: I’m always surprised at what people want to know, it’s always different. What we do playing in the band is really natural to us…but no one usually asks us politcal things, or
philosophy stuff. But those are the kind of questions you don’t ask at the dinner table either.
SE: Philosophy wise, what’s an album you would stick on if you were having a rough day?
DC: I do have one album that’s an absolute treasure to me…”Ghosts of the Great Highway” by Sun Kil Moon, who is a guy named Mark Kozelek. Way back in the 90s he had a band called Red House Painters that was quite popular. It’s the kind of album I don’t listen to too much because it’s precious. It’s a full rock album but it’s the real deal. I try to share things that are really true and without pretention, that’s what I really value in music. Sometimes you hear an album and it just feels honest. Sometimes hiding behind irony and cynicism can be easier than just being earnest and honest about how you may feel.
SE: The last thing that inspired you to write a song?
DC: Oh god…I have a half brother that I don’t see so often. I found it odd we didn’t spend much time together growing up yet how alike we are…makes me think about nature and nurture and how your blood is something and it connects you to people. But I haven’t written that song…sometimes things strike me and I have to write about it. We wrote a song on the last record called “Control”…I had watched a documentary on Netflix called “The Keepers” which was about abuse in the catholic church. Sometimes things are so enraging that as a musician that’s how you deal with feelings. Tusk has been going down the road of a heavier sound…songs focused about things that made me upset. Tusk II was loves songs, so you can track how I’m feeling (laughs).
SE: It’s amazing how many people can be on the same emotional wavelength at the same time…
DC: I feel it most strongly when I write it, then I don’t get to feel it like that again. Sometimes when I’m singing it live I get the feeling but there’s nothing like the first time you write it. But as a listener you didn’t write it, so everything about it is a surprise and you get the full value of the sound and the message the first time.
SE: Like giving birth to a child.
DC: Exactly!
Catch ROYAL TUSK live at the Fox Cabaret with special guests BRKN LOVE, Sights and Sounds and locals Redwoods
February 17th
Doors 7pm
Find Royal Tusk
Twitter
Facebook
Tour dates
©nightMair Creative.com
all rights reserved
written by Scotty Evil