Interview by Corban Goble
Photography by Milan Zrnic

Chalk the Drums’ music up as another argument for the dissipating notion of a regional sound: When 20-somethings who grew up in west New York and central Florida get together to form a rock band leaning heavily on the California-born surf rock of the ’50s and the pop sensibilities of the ’60s (with some new wave dashed in also), any attempt to logically tie the Drums’ sound together falls apart at formation. But what’s so fun about the Drums’ music is that it’s so sharp, straightforward and instinctive that it precludes thought. Their live show is a swift punch to the belly, a frenzied band caught up in the spirit of their sound and empowered by it in performance—a band that’s trying hard on purpose.
A project that started as a fictional band tossed around in the minds of Jacob and Jonathan in their tiny Kissimmee, FL apartment became a reality when they picked up friends Adam Kessler (guitar) and Connor Hanwick (drums) and settled in Brooklyn.
The Drums deliver the no-frills rock music pumping out timeless trend-bucking songs that dwell deeply in the technical vernacular of punk rock. But, even in that well-tread musical language, the Drums remain singular, a group distinct from the rest in the best possible way.

Does it feel weird doing press without a record out?
Jonathan: It’s really weird. It’s just moving really fast, you know? Like, we don’t have a product out but we just found out today that BBC Radio 1 called us the hottest record of the week.
Adam: Without having a record.
Jonathan: We have a Myspace page. You can’t even
download the songs. It’s been really hard. We just brought
on some management so that we aren’t doing it all ourselves. We really just feel lucky to be where we are right now and also a little bit scared, I think. You know, not really knowing what the future holds, if it holds anything at all. All we can do is lay low and work hard, play some shows. That’s what we were going to do anyways.

How did you develop the Drums’ sound? There’s a lot of elements and obvious influences, but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it presented this way.
Jacob: We only have one song that talks about surfing. It’s not a surf record. And it just happens to be our first single. It’s actually about the political climate in America.
Jonathan: It’s about the political climate and being carefree. We’re not surfers. We barely know anything about surf culture. But we do know what we did like was the simple but strong, timeless songs and melodies of groups like the Shangri-Las and the Zombies. We recently just kind of fell in love with it and it has infused itself into the recording process. We just kind of ran with it, just let it be what it was and not fight against it.
Jacob: The actual sound, when we started recording songs, we literally said to ourselves, ‘Let’s just start a band and be completely selfish and not think about anyone but ourselves, just do something that really pleases us.’ What would we want to hear in music and what do we think isn’t really happening?
Jonathan: The whole time we were in like, Kissimmee, FL. That’s where we were living, in a tiny little apartment. We didn’t have a car so we couldn’t even drive to Orlando to go to a cool party or something.
Jacob: There were no outside elements at all.
Jonathan: We kind of forgot to care about being cool or what people thought. We started listening to all these old records. People are just saying the outcome is sort of like Factory Records around 30 years before us. That’s just how it turned out, this accident.

It wasn’t deliberate?
Jonathan: It wasn’t deliberate. We had these ideas and the way it all fell together was very organic. I know that Jacob and I are, or were, big synthesizer groupies. Jacob built modular systems and stuff like that, so we try to geek out on that. There’s a song called “Make You Mine” and a song “Down By the Water” where we literally set out to write a straight up 1950s song, but I think because we were such synth geeks and we couldn’t pull away. That’s where it magically turned into this Factory Records thing because it still had that sort of new wave thing to it that we are fighting so hard against that we can’t get away from.
Jacob: The Factory Records thing isn’t intentional, but the ’50s thing is intentional.
Jonathan: The only reason that the synth is on it is because we couldn’t afford a bass guitar. There’s synth on it filling in those bass notes. That kind of brings it all together.
Jacob: We’re very happy with it.

Surf rock and the more angular sounding punk seem to be quite popular these days, and you guys have been compared to both. Do you ever worry about getting unfairly categorized and pre-judged?
Jacob: We didn’t know that was happening. Maybe it’s just one of those weird things in the universe where everybody has the same idea at the same time.
Jonathan: There’s certain acts right now like Chairlift or something, that are pop acts. And I like what they do and everything, but I think the difference—as far as the songwriting and sensibility—I think they’re a little more experimental than we’re willing to be. We’re all about that three minute strict verse-chorus-verse-chorus-end. That’s how I feel.
Jacob: Maybe that’s because we have such short attention spans. I think maybe a band like Chairlift or other bands like
Animal Collective, I think they have a couple really good pop songs, but they also have these three-minute intros.
I think we just decided to have that instant gratification and be super-dynamic within that short time.
Jacob: And I think that’s how we’ve written songs. Everything’s just a reaction because we all grew up listening to super experimental electronic albums from the ’60s and ’70s and it’s all 20-minute, weird, Tomita and Jean Michel Jarre and people like that. It’s kind of a backlash to that, I think.
Jonathan: I think the Drums is just one huge backlash made up of a lot of backlashes.
Jacob. Everything. From the live show to the aesthetic
of the band, the artwork, the music, everything.
Jonathan: We have had people literally say that they feel like the Drums have been scientifically engineered for this time. I kind of feel like we operate—and this is what people have said to me—like a nice stiff drink at the end of a hard day, with the recession and the acres of bullshit you just went through. I don’t go to live shows anymore because they bore the shit out of me. They always have. I’ve never enjoyed it, even my favorite artists. I’ve always been bored. When we’re setting up our live show, we’re just like, ‘What’s the last live show you’ve been glad you went to it, that you took a lot from it?’
Jacob: You can sort of pinpoint the exact dates because they’re that few and far between.
Jonathan: We just kind of took all the things that we wished to see on stage and just brought all of those elements together. You should come tomorrow night.

I’ll be there.
Jonathan: We have these two great friends of ours that sing backup vocals, two girls. It’s sort of a spectacle but at the same time it’s very minimal. It just relies more on us giving it our all. On stage we don’t need to mess with guitar pedals, we just plug into the amps. We don’t even use a chord. Which is sort of a testament to melody.
Jacob: We don’t play chords. All the guitar parts are leads.
Jonathan: We have 14 songs right now and not a single guitar chord.
Jacob: We just don’t know how to play guitars. Adam does. He’s holding back! But the shows are more about the energy and the spirit of the whole thing. That’s what we’re trying to convey, the spirit of it.

You’re really busy this fall. Are you nervous about that?
Adam: We’re ready to be busy. Even though we are already.
Jonathan: We’re busy in different ways.
Adam: We’ve kind of reached that point in New York City where we’ve played all the things we need to play and done all—well maybe not all the things—but we’re at this critical level where we need to move to a different place.
Jonathan: We’ve played like, 12 shows here and it’s all been in the last two months. And it’s all been in New York.
Jacob: And we’re so grateful that people still come!
Jonathan: We just feel like its time to move forward.
Adam: We have no idea how the buzz started across
the ocean.
Jonathan: I don’t know where it started.
Jacob: The Queen of England.
Jonathan: She loves us.
Connor: The Queen of England bought a Drums t-shirt from us.
Jacob: She never wears it.

Where’s the band name from?
Jonathan: That’s actually a good story.
Jacob: It just kind of came out of thin air.
Adam: It’s the coolest band name you could ever have.

It’s Google-proof.
Jacob: We thought that at first. But we’re on the first page on Google now! A lot of it is us.
Adam: I just can’t believe that no band has been named the Drums before. I just think that’s a sign that it’s amazing.
Jonathan: I think the reason why we love the Drums name is because, to us, the Drums sounds sort of iconic and we’re really drawn to iconic images, iconic songs. Anything we can sort of take a snapshot of; it’s timeless. The name the Drums was about stripping away everything and having a four piece, four boys, guitar, drums, vocals, super simple. And just have a band called the Drums.
Jacob: It’s very easy to understand, you know. It’s another backlash reaction thing. It’s like, your band is called something that nobody can ever remember, like the 17th Century Conquest of whatever. No one can ever remember that.
Connor: I don’t want to name names but there are bands that have been popular in the recent years that don’t even make sense grammatically. It’s like, I feel awkward even saying that. Like, ‘Is it Your Birthday? Say Yes or No’. Like what the fuck does that mean?

I like the direction this interview has taken. Usually all of my interviews end up talking about the Internet and how it affects everything.
Jacob: Like, how does it work?
Connor: Al Gore.
Jacob: Al Gore invented the Internet. Like, you have an Internet and I have an Internet, but they’re not the same? Where is it?
Connor: It’s like above space but below heaven. That’s where it is.
Jacob: It’s really flat.
Adam: If every computer was unplugged, would the Internet disappear?
Connor: Yes. It’s like a tree falling in space.END