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Post-Rock As A Second Language

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Colin Phils formed in South Korea and released an album while living in China, but over the past four years, they’ve made Richmond their home. Now they’re releasing Trust/Fall, their first full album as an RVA band.

Richmond rockers Colin Phils, who will release their new album, Trust/Fall, later this month, have been performing and releasing music in Richmond for the past four years. But, their origins actually reach back a long time ago, to a country far, far away.

The band had its humble beginnings in 2013, when all three members of the band were working in South Korea, teaching English as a second language. While the group was initially formed by guitarist and vocalist Ben Tiner and two others, over time Tiner replaced them with the band’s current lineup: married couple Ben and Karyn Mauch (on drums and synth/vocals, respectively). Oddly enough, while all three worked teaching English, Karyn was the only one who majored in the language during college.

“All you really need to teach English in a foreign country is you need to get a certificate. We all got that in the first month,” said Tiner. “It’s easy money, they pay for housing. It’s kind of an ideal job to get after college.”

The band stayed in Korea until 2015. During that time, they made their first album Right at Home. However, they all quickly found that Korea offered no room for personal or professional growth. At that point, they moved to China, where they crafted their second album, e,r,som,sa. Eventually, in 2016, they moved to Richmond, and have been making music in the river city ever since.

Since they’ve been here, they’ve had firsthand experience with the differences between making music in Asia and in America.

“The biggest difference [between East and West] is that far less people come to our shows in America,” said Tiner.

“Yeah, but in America there are so many more bands and musicians, and the China scene is still young,” Karyn added. “When we play here, even though there’s fewer people, we’ll be playing with four bands every night who are all REALLY good… Whereas in China, it’ll be just two bands a night. And you may enjoy it, you may not.”

The band’s sounds have progressed over the years, moving from an early sound that they described as being much closer to folk, with a much more devil-may-care approach to writing and recording. 

“The first album was recorded in one weekend,” said Tiner. “We got in a studio…and just recorded the whole thing at once. Which would be a crazy thing to do now.”

Since then, the band has moved towards a post-rock sound, utilizing loops and odd time signatures to construct their songs. They take no breaks from touring to write new music, instead sprinkling new tracks into their sets over time, until they’ve come up with enough to fashion into an album. Their recording style has also evolved; now their approach is much more traditional, recording and rerecording specific parts over a long period of time until they’ve refined the whole song as much as they can.

“I don’t think we’re very rigid,” said Karyn. “I think if we feel like something needs to be changed, we’ll change it. We’ll add something, we’ll take away something.”

This process has been helped along for their newest album by Mitch Clem, an Engineer at Go West Recording Studio.

“We’ve definitely altered stuff in the studio based off of his recommendations,” said Tiner. “And that’s the benefit of having somebody you trust in the studio to offer advice.”

Though the band has released a split LP, Star Charts, with fellow Richmond band Houdan The Mystic, Trust/Fall will be their first full album since they arrived in RVA. The album will be released on March 20 by Post.Recordings, and the band will celebrate its release with a performance at Gallery 5 on Saturday, March 21. The event begins at 7 PM and will also feature performances by Night Idea, Dumb Waiter, and Calvin Presents. Tickets can be purchased through Eventbrite for $7 in advance — or, for $12, you can get both a ticket and a copy of Trust/Fall on CD. For more info, click here.

Coronavirus: What It Is And How To Avoid It

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Fortunately, the case at George Mason turned out to be a false alarm. Nonetheless, it’s a good idea to be careful and protect your health.

After the U.S. had its first person-to-person transmission of coronavirus, the World Health Organization has declared the current state of the disease a “global health emergency.”

There have been six confirmed cases within the U.S., while more than 300 have already died due to the virus in China. On Wednesday, 195 passengers on board a flight returning from Wuhan, China were ordered into a 14-day quarantine at March Air Reserve Base by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  

Residents of Virginia raised concerns when a student at George Mason University was being tested for coronavirus symptoms (test results for the student were declared negative on Friday). For those anxious about the spread of the disease, here’s what you need to know and what precautions to take. 

By CDC/Alissa Eckert, MS; Dan Higgins, MAM – This media comes from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Public Health Image Library (PHIL), Public Domain, via Wikimedia

What It Is

Coronaviruses are a group of viruses typically found in animals, which resemble the common cold because of their similar symptoms. However, coronaviruses are much more severe and have longer durations. Other examples of coronaviruses include Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).

The new coronavirus (nCoV) that originated in Wuhan, which has now reached the U.S. and Europe, is a respiratory illness that has never been seen before in humans. 

“It’s believed it was initially transmitted from animals to human beings probably from food markets or animal markets in Wuhan, China,” said Gonzalo M. Bearman, M.D., M.P.H., in a video released by VCU Health. 

Coronaviruses can be transmitted between animals and people with numerous versions found in animals that haven’t affected humans. There have been other cases of the virus transmitting from animals to people, including SARS-CoV from civet cats to humans, and MERS-CoV from dromedary camels to humans. 

Symptoms

Signs that one might have the virus are similar to signs of the flu; they include shortness of breath, respiratory symptoms, fever, cough, and difficulties with breathing. The new coronavirus also includes more severe symptoms, such as pneumonia, worsening cough, sore muscles, and joint pain.

The risk of someone in the commonwealth receiving the virus is currently low, so someone who is showing these signs may simply have the flu. For doctors to be concerned, someone would have had to recently visited an area with epidemic activity or have been in contact with someone else with a confirmed case of the virus within the past 14 days. 

Officials from the Virginia Department of Health have been informing citizens that they should be more concerned about the flu. Roanoke’s Carilion Clinic has reported three patients dying from influenza, while no one in Virginia has a confirmed case of coronavirus. 

Map of the 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak as of 4 February 2020. Region of origin (mainland China) in brown. Confirmed cases reported in red. Suspected cases reported in blue. By Pharexia. Map derived from BlankMap-World-Microstates.svg. Data derived from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. New York Times, CNBC, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia

Precautions

Health officials are advising people to take routine steps to prevent further spread of the disease and to protect themselves from it. 

Recommended precautions include:

  • wash hands with soap and water regularly
  • cover mouth and nose when coughing or sneezing
  • don’t share drinks or food
  • use alcohol-based hand sanitizer
  • don’t make contact with people showing symptoms of the infection.

If someone is experiencing symptoms of the infection, has been in contact with someone known to have the infection (or currently being tested for it), or has recently traveled to Wuhan, China, they are advised to seek medical attention immediately. Those in the Richmond area can visit the VCU Health emergency room at 1213 E. Clay St.

“VCU Health is aggressively monitoring the situation, so that we’re aware of all the latest updates and recommendations coming from the CDC to have the appropriate teams to respond to changes in the situation,” said Bearman. 

More information about the new coronavirus can be found at the World Health Organization or VCU Health webpages.

Top Photo by Macau Photo Agency on Unsplash

How To Race Your Dragon: Celebrating Chinese Culture in Richmond

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Despite its corporate influences, Richmond’s Dragon Boat Festival was an entertaining spectacle of Chinese culture by the James.

A little piece of China came to Richmond earlier this month, when the Richmond International Dragon Boat Festival hit Rocketts Landing on August 3. The festival, which has run annually for the past 11 years, featured 41 teams competing on the James alongside a variety of Chinese cultural performances. 

Dragon boat festivals originated in China, and are usually held as a cultural festival around the summer solstice. The tradition of racing dragon boats dates back to the 5th or 6th century, and today the International Dragon Boat Federation (IDBF) helps to organize rowing teams and races throughout the world. Every other year, the IDBF hosts a world championship in different cities around the globe. 

The journey to my first-ever dragon boat festival began on the GRTC Pulse. With the final eastbound stop being Rocketts Landing, the Pulse was the obvious choice for anyone seeking a quick way to the festival without hopping in a car or sweating on a bike. But for some unexplained reason, my bus stopped at the Shockoe Bottom station; passengers were informed that the bus would not be traveling any further. This was unexpected, but turned out to be a blessing in disguise as the Virginia Capital Trail was just two blocks away. The 10 minute walk to the festival along the river came complete with cool breezes and nice views of Richmond’s skyline. 

Photo by Jimmy O’Keefe

The trail took me right to the middle of the festival, which was in full swing when I arrived. A voice over the PA system narrated a race in real time as teams cheered on from tents along the river. Meandering lines of attendees led to a handful of food trucks, which provided festival-goers with all of the essentials, from funnel cakes to beer. 

Farther down the trail, crowds gathered to watch Chinese traditional dances. Conveniently, the performances largely took place between dragon boat races, so there was no need to pick between one or the other. An announcer — who couldn’t have been over the age of 10 — expertly described what was happening in each dance, and what it meant within the context of Chinese culture. Elegant and informative, the Chinese cultural performances were a definite highlight of the festival. 

Photo by Jimmy O’Keefe

In the river, long canoe-like boats containing 22 rowers plus a drummer sped through the water. While it was a little difficult to get a great view of the boats because of our distance from shore, it was clear where each of the boats stood in the race. The speed at which the boats traveled was truly impressive; none of the races I witnessed lasted much more than a minute and a half. 

Seeing nearly two dozen people working together to propel a massive boat forward is quite a spectacle. This, in combination with the cultural performances, made the festival well worth attending. But throughout my time at the festival, I couldn’t help but get the feeling that things were a little off — in the most corporate way possible. It seems as though many of the teams participating in the races were representatives from big businesses, participating in the festival for team-building exercises. Perhaps I’m being cynical, but in many ways, the Dragon Boat Festival resembled an employee playground for major corporations, who drank beer and took cool photos while superficially signaling support for the community at hand. 

Photo by Jimmy O’Keefe

Perhaps the festival would have felt less corporate if the teams had come up with names a bit more creative than “Team CarMax” or “Altria East/Spring.” I will admit, though, that “Bankers Aweigh” perfectly captured the corporate/boating feeling of the festival while making me smile. 

All in all, the Dragon Boat Festival was a fun way to spend a Saturday. While there are definitely ways the festival could feature better, more in-depth discussions of Chinese culture in the future, watching almost unbelievably long boats race down the James was definitely worth the trip to Rocketts Landing.

Top Photo by Jimmy O’Keefe