Whether you think of Touche Amore as post-hardcore, emo, screamo, or just plain punk rock, there can be no doubt as to their intensity, which shines through in their recordings as much as their live performances. Having previously played in Richmond with Title Fight and The Menzingers in a totally packed warehouse, they return to RVA this weekend with a performance tomorrow night at The Broadberry, this time in the company of Pennsylvania melodic punk band Tigers Jaw and NJ emo-punk duo Dads.
Whether you think of Touche Amore as post-hardcore, emo, screamo, or just plain punk rock, there can be no doubt as to their intensity, which shines through in their recordings as much as their live performances. Having previously played in Richmond with Title Fight and The Menzingers in a totally packed warehouse, they return to RVA this weekend with a performance tomorrow night at The Broadberry, this time in the company of Pennsylvania melodic punk band Tigers Jaw and NJ emo-punk duo Dads.
In advance of their return to the river city, we spoke to Touche Amore vocalist Jeremy Bolm about the pros and cons of playing bigger venues, writing deeply personal lyrics, and what ever happened to that whole “The Wave” thing.
When I was 16, I met you because I came out to see you guys play at the warehouse on School St. I hadn’t ever seen you guys before. I came up and bought a shirt from you, complimented your Pretty Hate Machine shirt, and we talked about NIN for a few minutes. I put the shirt I bought on, and you held the shirt I came in wearing behind the merch table until after the show. Then a few minutes later you were on stage and my best friend and I were both amazed. We’d had no idea who you were before. Your set was sparse and incredibly heavy. I remember when you screamed out mic-less during “Cadence,” it was so monumentally haunting.
Do you guys ever miss playing smaller spaces like that, or do you find larger venues to be a different sort of intimate?
It’s all situational. This tour has had a mix of both. There’s a few 500+-capacity venues and a couple 200-capacity venues. There’s upsides and downsides to both environments. I always will prefer a no barrier/very intimate situation, but with that, you deal with equipment issues (things getting knocked around), the heat (makes it sometimes hard to get through), limited space (disappointed people who can’t get in or see the show at all), etc. With big venues, you deal with things like a barrier, shitty security, etc. But what you may get in that situation is good sound, air conditioning, a space where everyone can get in and have a good view of the stage. If you’d asked me this years ago, I would just say “DIY venues for life,” but I’ve changed my tune a bit.
I saw you a few months back in DC with MeWithoutYOU and your set had to have been at least twice as long as when I saw you all those years back. You still play almost entirely without pauses. It’s punishing, heavy, and pure, but it’s obviously a barrage of something different than before. Is touring more tiring than you all found it before, considering how your sets and body of material have shifted over the past few years?
It’s a very tiring and very hard thing to do, but we enjoy the punishment of it. [laughs] We did it to ourselves, writing so many short songs that we have to fill an hour with 24+ songs. You don’t want to stop and tune after a 90 second song; you’d look amateur as hell. I like the idea of sculpting set lists in a way that transitions flow and leave the show-goer guessing. The hardest part is trying to satisfy the audience with older material while still trying to play newer songs that maybe haven’t connected with the “fan” as much.
As far as the shift of content, do you find that the ruminations on lineage and legacy that we heard on Is Survived By have made a large impact on what you now leave behind as a band? Do you feel as though the questions raised in the lyrical content of the record have been resolved in the making and release of the record?
The lyrical content with those themes are purely based on what I’d been thinking about. I wasn’t set to achieve anything with the record besides getting it out there in hopes others would understand. If our band has a legacy at all, I think it’s still to be determined. Too early to tell.
I’m wondering how letting in your audience in so personally with your lyrics leaves you feeling after a record as revealing as Is Survived By. Do you feel closer to your fans now that they know you so much better than they did when you were writing songs like “Hipsterectomy” and “Scene Is To Be Seen”?
There’s a feeling of nakedness sometimes. You talk to a stranger after a show and they have this presumption about your life that may not be true at all. Sometimes just a healthy conversation can clear things up in those situations. It’s hard to say I feel closer to anyone after letting that stuff out. If anything I feel more distant. It’s as if I shed a layer of skin in front of a class on the first day of school as my show & tell project, and I’m waiting to be judged.
With maturity are there things that you said in some of your older tracks that you now feel entirely differently about?
Absolutely. When singing certain songs live that I may have grown away from, it can take something as simple as the look on someone’s face that’s singing the words back at me to bring me back to where I was when I wrote it. I see how it has impacted someone, and it pushes me back to that place. I try not to write songs specifically about individuals though, as most things involving others can change overnight. I don’t wanna be left singing regretful songs.
From an instrumental standpoint, the average song by Touche Amore is maybe a minute longer than when you guys began, and yet they feel much fuller and longer than they actually are. Was creating a more spacious and full sound an intention with the last record, and is it something you guys intend to continue to explore with coming releases?
It just happened naturally. Same with the older material. We never set out to be the band that wrote short songs, it just happened. I’ve always blamed short attention spans. I think with understanding each other’s songwriting abilities more and more now, we have naturally written longer and stronger parts.
Taxonomy and genre classification shit aside, if there were a lineage of bands that you think your band most appropriately could be aligned with or could be considered to be pushing forward, what do you feel it would be?
Everything comes in cycles. I look at what’s happening now with us and our peers, and can compare it to the early 2000’s rise of bands like Thursday, Glassjaw, Thrice, etc. I think it’s very similar to that. Only instead of our bands getting swooped by major labels like they all did, bands now are getting swooped by major indies. Which are in fact the new major labels in 2014. I don’t put TA in a special category. I’d like for people to always think of us as a punk band that did what we wanted to do.
Another large difference in press with how your band has grown is that there seems to be little talk these days of The Wave and your relation to the other bands that were included in that whole deal (La Dispute, Pianos Become The Teeth, Make Do and Mend). Obviously you’ve done splits with all three bands and you all appear to be friends, but is the idea of The Wave still important to you guys as bands?
“The Wave” was never a thing. It was a joke name for a group of friends that shared the same ideals. Bands listed, as well as all the other peer bands we tour with and have released splits with, believe in the same things. That’s what’s important.
Any RVA bands you guys particularly big fans of?
Tons: Majority Rule, City of Caterpillar, Pg. 99, Strike Anywhere, Pygmy Lush…
Are there any particular spots and things to do you guys try to hit up when you come through Richmond?
I will immediately head to Vinyl Conflict. One of the best shops in the country. We also make stops to get tattooed if possible by Josh Stephens or Max Kuhn.
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Touche Amore will perform Saturday, July 12 at The Broadberry, located at 2729 W. Broad St. Doors open at 7 PM. Tickets are $15, and can be purchased HERE.
