Almost On the Making Of “Disarm”
What was the creative process like for this particular song?
Like most of the songs I’ve written for Almost, I’ll be up in the middle of the night recording demos and expanding on ideas from my notes app on my phone. In “Disarm,” I wanted to take something that would be like a cliche in one genre of music, and see if I can make it work in a different genre. So I was playing around with these jazz voicing of a 2-5-1 chord progression and thinking ‘how can I contextualize this into an indie rock sound?’
Were there any memorable or standout moments during the recording sessions for "Disarm?"
When Bram and I began recording the series of singles we’re going to be releasing soon, “Disarm” was the one that just felt ‘right’ like right away. We played it live in his living room studio and at the end of that first day, we had all the instruments tracked, looked at each other and had this like ‘yeah that was it’ moment.
Is there a particular message or theme you hope listeners take away from "Disarm?"
Don’t do drugs and stay in school.
Could you share some of your musical influences and how they have shaped your sound?
It’s funny ‘cause we all love music, but the specific genres each of us are passionate about or geek over are pretty different from each other. Syris is super into hardcore and emo but also makes these insane house beats. Bram always insists that he’s “an old man’ who listens to ‘old man music’ but he’s always bringing in this sort of disco flair on the drums. Tyler’s all about jangle pop and jizz jazz. Arik’s a garage rock head. I’ve been really into things like the C86 bands, UK 80s twee pop. Somehow all these influences make sense together when we play.
Where do you find inspiration for your songs or musical ideas?
“Disarm” was inspired by this Marina Abramovic piece called Rest Energy. I’m super inspired by her work, as well as other artists from other mediums beyond music. Books, theatre, graffiti on the sides of trains, I don’t know. Everything’s inspiring.