BBBR INTERVIEW SERIES FEATURING THE OX KING

BLUE BLOOD BLEEDS RED INTERVIEW SERIES FEATURING THE OX KING - MARCH 23, 2013 –  INTERVIEW CONDUCTED AND TRANSCRIBED BY BRIAN JAMES

Just off the 290 Expressway in the East Garfield Park neighborhood stands a constructed dwelling that can only be described as foreboding. A fortress if you will, built solid from top to bottom with brick and mortar by laboring hands that have long since been retired. A 17,500-square-foot behemoth existing alongside lesser buildings in a once thriving neighborhood on Chicago’s West Side. A structure that if Chicago ever finds itself host to an A-bomb drop, would be one of the few structures left standing amongst the rubble. A building worthy of  Medieval torture and a fitting practice for the Juggernaut known only as The Ox King. This is the building that I met up with vocalists Dave Klingenberg and bassist Blake Dwindle before taking our travels Northward for tacos and conversation. The following words are the words that transpired and were recorded for an exclusive Blue Blood Bleeds Red interview.

BBBR: Chicago is the third largest city in the country - famous for its volatile weather conditions, its multi-ethnic communities, and its notoriety for corruption and crime. I’m hell-bent on the theory that art forms are effected by both nature and nurture. So before we tackle the standards, I’m curious how you feel about being based in Chicago and how you think these environments and atmospheres have influenced your sound - whether consciously or subconsciously?

Blake Dwindle: Yea, I think the environment that a band comes out of can affect the sound immensely. If you listen to a band like Napalm Death for example, talking about being from Birmingham, you can really feel it in the music - the harshness of the environment. Chicago’s a tough town and I think our music represents that. But also, Chicago is a working class town. You’ve got a lot of tough working-class people. I think on some level our music embodies that.

Dave Klingenberg: That’s kind of where the name “The Ox King” comes from. It’s a working class title. The Ox pulls the tractor ya know? And one thing I'd like to add about the landscape of the city that I think shines through with our band - and when you look at other bands from Chicago and the Midwest for that matter - is diversity.  There are so many different kinds of people with so many different ideas, growing up under different circumstances and in different environments. Even within the same genres of music. There’s so much diversity.

Blake: And it’s so segregated. You’ve got the North Side thing happening and you’ve got the South Side thing happening. It’s like two separate heads of the same monster. It’s bizarre.

BBBR: So with that question out of the way, talk about the origins of the band. The whos, the whats, the whens, wheres and whys. How do we get to where we’re at with this "machine" known as the Ox King?

Dave: Everything really started through bands like Dead to Fall and Carnivale. There was  a  specific core of  bands that we all hung out with and that’s how Kurt (Collins), Brian (Mulholland), and myself  got to know each other. Brian was a member of Carnivelle and after they broke up he got together with Kurt to form Alters. That project kind of fizzled out but Kurt never really stopped writing songs. When he got to the point where he had a few he was comfortable with, he started jammin with these two dudes from Wisconsin. Jake Smith and Jeff Geiser. Those two came as kind of a package deal. When they felt the time was right they brought Brian back into the mix and that kind of solidified the deal. They had a show lined up and they needed a singer. Since I was friends with these guys, they asked if I could fill in. I’d never sung before but I said I’d do it. It ended up working out pretty well and it’s been progressing like that ever since.

BBBR: So how do we get to the current lineup with Blake on bass and Ryan on drums. Jake and Jeff are no longer in the band right?

Dave: Well Jake and Jeff kind of already knew they’d be leaving the band. They had plans to move to California But they did so much to help establish our sound. Both those guys come from more of a punk and indie kind of background so the influences are so diverse and ecause of that our rhythm section comes from more of punk sound where Kurt and Brian bring a heavier, more metallic sound - just weird stuff all across the board. So (Jake and Jeff) moved to California and two or three months passed before Blake signed on to play bass. Once Blake was signed on he recommended we tryout his friend Ryan (Steigerwald) to play drums. And that brings us to where we’re at right now.

BBBR: What’s the creative process like when you guys are putting a song together? Does each member write his own part and then throw it into the mix? Or do the songs come together in more of a jam session style?

Dave: I think it’s kind of a mixture of both. There's some days where it’s just the three of us and we work on stuff and then we bring it with us when we all get together for practice. As far as my role as the lyricist and the singer, the music is already concrete by the time I sit down to write the words for it. For these guys, the music comes together as kind of an organic process I would say.

Blake Dwindle: Yea, I think organic is the right word to describe our process musically. Someone will come to the table with a complete song and by the end of the practice the whole thing will be turned upside down.  This is by far the most collaborative band I’ve ever been in. It’s really like a meeting of the minds.

BBBR: This question is specifically catered to Dave. I’m interested in what kind of subject matter you tackle lyrically in the songs? Do you have a certain theme you follow?

Dave: I dabble a little bit with socially conscious themes. Some things are personal but really it’s just an expression of a basic distaste for society. Having to go to work every day. Not being able to expand yourself as a human being because of your day to day routines. Coming to grips with relationships and friends that aren’t there anymore and learning to cope with that. Sometimes it’s easy. Sometimes it’s hard. It is what it is.

BBBR: Whenever I talk to bands from the Midwest regions there always seems to be issues with touring. That’s seems to be the biggest difficulty. What do you think the reason for that are and does the Ox King have any plans to hit the road anytime in the future?

Dave: Right now we’re kind of waiting to be in the right situation. It’s not like it’s off the table. I just think with us being older guys and being out of school and having full-time jobs - its weekend warrior kind of stuff. A promoter that I’m good friends with gave me some really good advise a few years back  and  said if you don’t have a more than one full-length out then just tour on the weekends cuz it’s not gonna be worth your time. Hopefully everything works out and everything keeps working out the way it has been and there will be fans to see us in other places. But as far us doing national tours or going out West or out on the East Coast… I think we’re just looking to pick our shot and make sure it’s the right situation for us before we make that commitment ya know? We’re older. We can’t just decide to drop everything and go. A lot of people are like that and they just want to drop everything. Unfortunately being older you have to think about things a little more thoroughly to make sure it’s gonna work out.

BBBR: The first thing that really caught my attention about the band was the cover art on the record. Who gets the credit for the design work and what’s the symbolism behind it?

Blake: Our guitar player Brian (Mulholland) put that together. He’s a wonderful artist. We just wanted something simple that looked bleak but also something that looked kind of mechanical. We chose that photo for a reason. The architecture and construction of that building in that photo really captures our sound I think. We have a mechanical element to our music. We could have gone for a more DIY look and used some black and white photocopy shit but that probably would have disappointed the listeners once they heard the record. I think the artwork definitely reflects our sound.

BBBR: What was the recording process like for you guys? Did you find it to be technical or was it a smooth, linier process. Did you guys just go in there and bang it out or was it more complicated than that?

Dave: We didn’t record the record live. Like we mentioned, there’s a technical aspect to our music that would be pretty hard to pull off in a live setting. The process was still pretty organic though. All the drums were recorded live and we recorded a click mainly so we could utilizes things like samples and add stuff in post production to make things more interesting and kind of fatten the sound up a little bit. Aside from that, the guitars, the bass, the vocals, were pretty straight forward. We just played our parts and then went over everything with a fine tooth comb to make sure everything sounded the way we wanted it to. It was a great experience. We recorded it at Bricktop Recording. Pete (Grossmann) and Andy (Nelson) in my opinion are probably the two best recording engineers in Chicago. Everything they do sounds great and sounds the way it’s supposed to sound. They did the Harms Way record. The last Killer 7 inch…Weekend Nachos recorded some stuff the. It’s a wonderful conglomerate of heaviness over there.

BBBR: There's so many different styles of Hardcore out there right now whether it be Beatdown, Scream-o, Metal-Core, Melodic Hardcore, New York Hardcore - I know Boston and New York have identifiable Hardcore scenes. They have a sound. They have an attitude. As far as what the Hardcore scene in Chicago has been in the last couple years, to where it is now, to where you think it’s headed, do you guys care to be identified with it or associate yourself with it?

Dave: I personally do. I might have to disclaim myself from the rest of my band mates when I say that but I mean, I grew up going to shows here and that’s the bottom line. It’s like that TV show Cheers. I can go to a hardcore show and I’ll run into people that I’ve known for a long time. As far as hardcore music in general – and I like to be outspoken about this because it gets lost in a lot of the uniforms so to speak– but we approach this band with no rules. And I think that’s the way hardcore should be. It’s ok to draw influences from things but really we just want to contribute to a community that we’ve been a part of for years and affect the audience in a positive way and do it on our own terms and do what we want without being distracted by a lot of the riffery that comes along with it and the politics of it. We don’t affiliate ourselves with crews or anything but at the end of the day I consider myself a part of the hardcore community of Chicago. If you wanna throw out names, you’ve got Weekend Nachos. You’ve got The Killer. You’ve got Harms Way...No Zodiac...No Regrets…

Blake: ...and you’ve got Warhound – who are a little controversial these days – I mean… I know Nico really well and I think they’re great guys, I think their music’s good. We played a show with those guys a few weeks ago and there were no problems.

Dave: Listen. Just play your music. It shouldn’t be about reppin on the internet and startin shit. Just do what you’ve been doin since you were a kid. Don’t let exposure or drama get in the way of what you want to accomplish, Hardcore music and music in general was the thing that kept me out of trouble and I know it’s the same for a lot of other guys I know. So don’t take that and corrupt it. Its bullshit. Those kids are gonna be my age one day and they’re gonna look back and they’re gonna feel like fucking idiots. That shit didn’t work out with Tupac or Biggie so how the hell is it gonna work out between hardcore bands. It’s not gonna work out for anybody. And it’s not good for hardcore because you’re gonna get violence that comes to the table. You’ve got people that are separated who should be friends. We’re all in this together when you really thing about it and if you wanna throw some kind of label on yourself and separate yourself from everybody…I mean  that’s the exact opposite of what hardcore supposed to be about. This should be the place were everybody’s welcome and I’d like to think that we embody that kind of sentiment in everything we do. It doesn’t matter who you’re friends with or what you dress like. If you come to one of our shows we want you to have some fun and give people some kind of escape from day to day life. Just party it up. Whatever.

For all those still untouched by the band’s audio assault, The Ox King are a five-piece ensemble who’ve played-out Chicago and other Midwest regions on a regular basis since their inception in 2011. The band released their debut 7-track debut in Decemeber of 2012 that can be previewed and purchased at their Bandcamp page right HERE. An exclusive Blue Blood Bleeds Red review of that self-titled release can be found HERE. Enjoy and support. 

Fun fact: When the bands not cutting throats onstage, half the members can be found protecting the liquor license at The Cobra Lounge while the other half can be found indulging in their spirits. Just sayin.