Sister Hymns Interview
Q: Sister Hymns is a band that formed in 2016. Can you talk a little bit about the formation?
A: I spent a lot of 2016 writing songs that I didn’t quite know what to do with at the time. At some point I knew I wanted to get these songs recorded, so I called up Joey Mancaruso our drummer and said “why don’t we try to make something out of this?” Joey and I had played in many bands in the past so it was natural for us to get back in a room together and start thrashing around at full volume until something came to fruition. After about a month of what seemed like endless musical chaos, we finally had songs we were both comfortable with showing to the public. Joey and I have always felt like a cohesive unit and Sister Hymns has been a very natural extension of our musical history together.
Q: Can you talk about the songwriting process regarding the four songs on your recent self-titled EP?
My songwriting process has always been kind of haphazard. Sometimes I have a riff idea that I can bring to the table to build from, and other times I have lyrics completed that I need to create a musical idea around. For this record it was a little bit of both. I had been writing a lot of stripped down acoustic stuff that I really liked, but I wanted to match that with the heavier music that Joey and I love playing together. The concept we both wanted was something memorable and simple. On top of that, having something to say has always been just as important to me as musical prowess, and I think that is an aspect that gets lost a lot in guitar oriented music. The sex, drugs and rock n’roll cliché has always kind of bored me, so I wanted to stay as far from that as possible. In the end, the goal was to blend the songwriters that inspire me with some of the music that make me turn a song up on the radio.
Q: The songs feel stripped back. Old school No frills rock to my ears. What was the recording process like?
A: We like to keep things REALLY simple. I don’t even own a pedal board, so it’s pretty much just my Gibson ES-335, an overdrive pedal, a big muff and a tube amp. I tracked two guitar parts for the record, one with my overdrive, and one with my overdrive on top of a fuzz pedal. The idea was to have one track come out muddy, and the other clearer and more dynamic. Joey plays drums louder than anyone I have ever heard in my life, so he asked for as few drum microphones as possible to achieve a very natural sound. I recorded the bass parts with the same BOSS overdrive pedal I used for my guitar set up, as we wanted to give it a Lemmy meets Geezer Butler tone. Erol our friend and owner of Bright Lights Studios in Santa Ana, CA, understood that we weren’t looking for anything polished. He did a great job of just capturing the live tracks and not adding the glossy mastering job that a lot of producers try to push these days. All in all it’s just us playing the same way we do live. No studio magic.
Q: This EP has a cohesive sound. Do you have any current favorites of the four songs?
A: I tend to listen to finished material manically for like a month after it is recorded, obsessing over things like song order and minor musical errors. In anything I have ever written and recorded the song that I liked the most ends up being my least favorite recording, while the one I hoped we could bury ends up being the crowning achievement. This recording process was no different. The first song on the record “American Nightmare” ended up really blowing me away after hearing it back in its entirety. Lyrically “Pretty Vultures” is probably my favorite, as it is very personal and a bit darker than the rest of the record.
Q: As I was listening to your brand of rock it seemed to span over a couple of generations. I was reminded of bands ranging from Sabbath to Queens of the Stone Age. What are some of the music acts that the band grew up on and were they an influence on the writing process?
Joey and I both grew up huge Black Sabbath fans, but it was very important to us that this record didn’t just fall under the same “Sabbath worship” that most stoner rock bands are happy to attach themselves to these days. Queens of the Stone Age did have a large impact on this record as well, although more so for their ability to write sonically complex songs than for their heavier aspects. My biggest songwriting influences coming into Sister Hymns were a bit more subtle. I was very influenced by old Nine Inch Nails as well as the first three Marilyn Manson records (don’t discredit them, they’re actually really great). Heavy industrial music from the ’90s has always given me quite a bit of inspiration. I am also heavily influenced by Americana songwriters like Ben Nichols from Lucero and Jason Isbell. Successfully telling a story through music is the greatest thing any artist can do in my opinion. I tried my best to blend all of these aspects.
Q: The band is still in the embryonic stage of development. What are your plans for 2017?
A: We are very excited to continue writing and recording in the new year, as well as playing as many shows as possible. Both Joey and I are looking forward to what the year has to offer!
Q: Sister Hymns is a band that formed in 2016. Can you talk a little bit about the formation?
A: I spent a lot of 2016 writing songs that I didn’t quite know what to do with at the time. At some point I knew I wanted to get these songs recorded, so I called up Joey Mancaruso our drummer and said “why don’t we try to make something out of this?” Joey and I had played in many bands in the past so it was natural for us to get back in a room together and start thrashing around at full volume until something came to fruition. After about a month of what seemed like endless musical chaos, we finally had songs we were both comfortable with showing to the public. Joey and I have always felt like a cohesive unit and Sister Hymns has been a very natural extension of our musical history together.
Q: Can you talk about the songwriting process regarding the four songs on your recent self-titled EP?
My songwriting process has always been kind of haphazard. Sometimes I have a riff idea that I can bring to the table to build from, and other times I have lyrics completed that I need to create a musical idea around. For this record it was a little bit of both. I had been writing a lot of stripped down acoustic stuff that I really liked, but I wanted to match that with the heavier music that Joey and I love playing together. The concept we both wanted was something memorable and simple. On top of that, having something to say has always been just as important to me as musical prowess, and I think that is an aspect that gets lost a lot in guitar oriented music. The sex, drugs and rock n’roll cliché has always kind of bored me, so I wanted to stay as far from that as possible. In the end, the goal was to blend the songwriters that inspire me with some of the music that make me turn a song up on the radio.
Q: The songs feel stripped back. Old school No frills rock to my ears. What was the recording process like?
A: We like to keep things REALLY simple. I don’t even own a pedal board, so it’s pretty much just my Gibson ES-335, an overdrive pedal, a big muff and a tube amp. I tracked two guitar parts for the record, one with my overdrive, and one with my overdrive on top of a fuzz pedal. The idea was to have one track come out muddy, and the other clearer and more dynamic. Joey plays drums louder than anyone I have ever heard in my life, so he asked for as few drum microphones as possible to achieve a very natural sound. I recorded the bass parts with the same BOSS overdrive pedal I used for my guitar set up, as we wanted to give it a Lemmy meets Geezer Butler tone. Erol our friend and owner of Bright Lights Studios in Santa Ana, CA, understood that we weren’t looking for anything polished. He did a great job of just capturing the live tracks and not adding the glossy mastering job that a lot of producers try to push these days. All in all it’s just us playing the same way we do live. No studio magic.
Q: This EP has a cohesive sound. Do you have any current favorites of the four songs?
A: I tend to listen to finished material manically for like a month after it is recorded, obsessing over things like song order and minor musical errors. In anything I have ever written and recorded the song that I liked the most ends up being my least favorite recording, while the one I hoped we could bury ends up being the crowning achievement. This recording process was no different. The first song on the record “American Nightmare” ended up really blowing me away after hearing it back in its entirety. Lyrically “Pretty Vultures” is probably my favorite, as it is very personal and a bit darker than the rest of the record.
Q: As I was listening to your brand of rock it seemed to span over a couple of generations. I was reminded of bands ranging from Sabbath to Queens of the Stone Age. What are some of the music acts that the band grew up on and were they an influence on the writing process?
Joey and I both grew up huge Black Sabbath fans, but it was very important to us that this record didn’t just fall under the same “Sabbath worship” that most stoner rock bands are happy to attach themselves to these days. Queens of the Stone Age did have a large impact on this record as well, although more so for their ability to write sonically complex songs than for their heavier aspects. My biggest songwriting influences coming into Sister Hymns were a bit more subtle. I was very influenced by old Nine Inch Nails as well as the first three Marilyn Manson records (don’t discredit them, they’re actually really great). Heavy industrial music from the ’90s has always given me quite a bit of inspiration. I am also heavily influenced by Americana songwriters like Ben Nichols from Lucero and Jason Isbell. Successfully telling a story through music is the greatest thing any artist can do in my opinion. I tried my best to blend all of these aspects.
Q: The band is still in the embryonic stage of development. What are your plans for 2017?
A: We are very excited to continue writing and recording in the new year, as well as playing as many shows as possible. Both Joey and I are looking forward to what the year has to offer!