Thrice Interview with Eddie Breckenridge

I love this band.  Not only to they put on one of the best live shows I've ever seen, but after getting a chance to sit and chat with Eddie, I quickly realized that these are genuine people.  There's no rockstar attitudes here, not in the least.  It's nice to know that there are still people doing it for the art rather than just saying so.  Here's my short and sweet interview with Thrice's Eddie Breckenridge, whom I'd like to thank for being so honest, and well...awesome.

HOW'S THE TOUR BEEN SO FAR?
It's been awesome. It's been more busy than we've ever been on any tour cuz we're doing a lot, since the label's involved, both us and Thursday are doing a lot of meet & greets, press and stuff that we've never really had to do before. But it's cool cuz we're meeting a lot of new people and having fun at the same time. Coheed's some of our best friends we were on tour with them the same time last year, it's like a reunion.

HOW DO YOU LIKE HAVING SWITCHED TO A MAJOR LABEL, DOING MORE PRESS AND GAINING MORE EXPOSURE?
I like it, I think its awesome to get your music out to more people. it's one of the main reasons we switch. SubCity's an awesome label, but there's only so much they could do for us without neglecting other bands on the label as far as funding, and stuff like that. Basically, we moved somewhere very similar to SubCity and they continue on the charity stuff we've done in the past. Everyone's really close with the people at the label. It's awesome to be involved with people that seem like friends.

IN THE RECENT ARTICLE IN ALTERNATIVE PRESS, YOU WERE QUOTED AS SAYING, " I DON'T IN ANY WAY AT ALL, WANT TO BE FAMOUS." WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY "FAMOUS"?
It has nothing to do with money. I don't want to be known for my art, I want my art to be known. I would way rather be like a shadowy figure that plays on stage, although there's certain things our label wants us to be. Like recognizable. That's not something that I'm that into. I think some people like that kind of attention, but I want my music to be the thing people pay attention to. We've had that happen in a way. I can walk through crowds at our shows and people won't know who I am, which is awesome. Plus, I'm the bass player, so it doesn't really matter. It's cool being able to share my music and not have to be some public figure. I don't have any want to be noticed in public or anything like that. I don't feel any different from anyone else in the crowd. I don't feel I know anything more about music or anything, I just want to be able to create music and not have it effect my personal life I guess.


A LOT OF BANDS ARE EASY TO LUMP TOGETHER BY THEIR SOUND, BUT YOU GUYS HAVE A DISTINCTIVE SOUND. WHAT ARE YOUR INFLUENCES TO WRITE MOST AS A BAND?
A lot of it is subconscious. I don't really know how to describe where our sound comes from. We all listen to a ton of different styles of music. We definitely don't write our songs thinking, 'okay this song is going to have this sound'. All of us write, which is a big reason why our sound is the way it is. We have pushing and pulling between ideas of what a song should be like. The sound that we are is random. I think it's always going to be changing. It is what it is. Whatever comes out of us, comes out and as long as we think it sounds cool and we all have a common agreement what works, that's what its going to sound like. I don't know why we're different from other people's music.


WHAT'S IT LIKE BEING IN A BAND WITH YOUR BROTHER?
It's awesome. When my brother went to college, I kinda lost touch with him, and I realized how much I missed him. He ended up coming back to school in Southern California. I really wasn't hanging out with him that much then either. Then me, Teppei and Dustin decided to start the band and I asked him to practice with us. Since then we've been super close and it's awesome all around. We never get into fights or anything, we've never been like that.

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS AFTER THIS TOUR?
Right after this tour we hop on a tour with us, Thursday and the Deftones, that ends on the 10th I think. Directly after that, we play the KRock Acoustic Christmas in LA and then after that, we have a benefit show for the Syrentha Savio Endowment too, I think its going to be with Moments of Grace, a band from Florida. They're really cool. It's like weird, melodic, way different than anything I've heard. I think us, Minus the Bear, and Moments of Grace are playing it. It'll be really cool, it's at the House of Blues in LA. We're going to Europe with Coheed in February and doing a headlining tour in the spring but I don't know much about that.

- Laurie