I met with Ten Pole Drunk at Le Voyeur about a week ago in hopes of getting some insight into their new album and their upcoming tour. It was a fitting location. We've both played their before, more than once. Probably together. It kind of just seemed like meeting some great friends for lunch. That's actually exactly what it was.
Despite the time stamp being 1 PM, I was still really groggy when I showed up. I was kind of surprised to see everyone there. Damien, the vocalist. Raquel, the drummer. James, the guitarist. Ricky, the bassist. Even Joi, the band's "babysitter." All of them bright eyed, full of smiles, and ready to tell their story. At least, to tell some jokes, thinly veiled by their story. It was comforting to see that they were already eating fries and drinking beer. They certainly didn't waste any time making themselves at home. That's what I've always loved about Ten Pole, they're at home wherever they are.
It's kind of hard coming up with questions for your friends. People you've played with a lot, shared beers with, and probably punched in the face before, generally have already told you what you need to know. It was tempting to just have a beer with them and catch up, to forget about my obligation to this blog or my commitments to them, and to just hang out. The good news was, once we got to talking, it was easy to stay on topic, even though we honestly were just kickin' it.
I started where you would expect: Asking about the origins. I asked how long they'd been playing. Raquel informed me, "It's been about a year and half since we started playing shows."
Damien sat there with a smug look, slowly nodding and added, "Dead Baby Bikes, two years ago."
"Our first show was at Dead Baby Downhill. So, that's like our band anniversary," James tried to clarify.
I was as confused as you are. Apparently Seattle is home to a bicycle club known as Dead Baby Bikes. Once a year, they do the Dead Baby Downhill. Ten Pole played their first show the same night at Studio Seven. This all sounded pretty great. I had to ask. "There's a bicycle club in Seattle called Dead Baby Bikes. They do a downhill race every year that turns into this major event afterwards. There's a couple thousand people in the streets. They do bike jousting on tall bikes, and they build stages in the street. They take over downtown. There's no cops." James is apparently an expert.
Thanks to the fact that I was pretty stoned, this conversation led to some confusion. I thought these guys were called "Dead Baby Box" when they first played that show. I was wrong. However, TPD seemed pretty impressed with that name, "Maybe we should have been Dead Baby Box." I guess it's a weekly thing for them to "try to change the band name," I was glad to contribute to the tradition.
Their real name, Ten Pole Drunk, is a reference to an old public intoxication test, where the suspect would have to walk the length of ten telephone poles without falling over. James admits he stole it. Saying, "To be really honest I stole it from someone else, Tyler, from American Dischord (AMDX). He used to be a member of [unintelligible band name] out here and that was a contender that they didn't use, and I wasn't going to let that go to waste!"
With the name out of the way, that left the question of how these guys started working together. Damien volunteered to spill the beans, "I moved up here after living in Portland for about a year. I meet this ass-hole [James] a year into school. We started jamming at our buddy's house. He had a bunch of drums and guitars. So, we just get drunk. He allowed us to get drunk and stoned and shit, but it kept us in a safe area. So, we ended up meeting her [Raquel] and were Dead Peasants. Ricky gave us our first show. We decided to kill Dead Peasants and started this band."
James added, "Our bass player left us and Ricky kind of stepped in to get us back on our feet, it just turned into this. I think it was a good move for us, because before we were just playing a really generic, straight forward form of punk rock. This changed our sound for the better."
Hearing that got me gushing about how great their style is. It's like good old-school hardcore: Still punk. Not metallic. Devoid of machismo. I asked them if that was working for or against them. A lot of the punk going on around here either has a really melodic sound, or heavy elements of metal and thrash crossing over. It didn't surprise me to hear that it did work out for them, and James was more than stoked to tell me all about it. "We used to be on this circuit, where we played the 2 Bit a lot, and there'd always be these old guys drinking beer. It made my day every time it would happen; they'd all just migrate into the pit and go out of their way afterward to say, 'I haven't seen punk rock or hardcore like this since I was a kid,' and we get that reaction all the time. People that were there in the 80's for that kind of hardcore. We played with Fang at the Chuck [Charleston] and their singer went out his way to super compliment us. Like, 'You guys remind me of when we were starting out.' It's really worked in our favor."
The other side of that, as Damien pointed out, were the shows where everyone would go outside. "When we were first starting out, there were a couple shows where it was abysmal. We had people go outside. I had an extra long cable. So, I just went outside and started yelling at the kids. I guess they were all straight-edge or something. They just went out there and mad-dogged us. Except a few crazies, out there smoking cigarettes, that just started a circle pit outside. We were doing 'Crucified.' I was just out there yelling, 'crucified for your sins!' So I sound super crazy."
I was excited to hear about how their distinct sound and old-school style would shape the new album. I heard their old demo and it didn't do them justice. I got a teaser track before the interview, a rough mix of "Godzilla." It was fairly amazing. One of the lines in it was "keeping hardcore alive," which I honestly believe they're doing.
Upon bringing up their old demo tracks, everyone laughed and assured me this new album would "blow them out of the water." The new album will consist of nine tracks, recorded with Scott, at the Boiler Room. They're shooting for a release at the end of May. There's going to be release parties in Everett and Olympia, and they're taking copies on tour with them. I think that's a big selling point for this tour. Everyone who shows up can get the new album, and most recent run of merchandise before the die-hard fans at home. Unless, the die-hards want to get out and catch an out-of-town date.
Being their first real release, you can expect all of their old songs. Everything written since October is gonna have to wait for the next album. This release has classics like, "More Chicks in the Pit," "Godzilla," "Due Process," "Are You Having Fun Yet?" and "Tacoma Low Lives." They say it's pretty much an even split between political songs and party anthems.
Which lead us to talk of tour. They've planned an awesome journey through Oregon and California to promote the album. It will take place over the first ten days in May, with a bonus "homecoming" show in Olympia on the eleventh. This is their second tour, with the first being a trek through eastern Washington, on over to Idaho. Despite that trip being full of good performances, nice bands, and great crowd response, it was kind of miserable. "Our van overheated non-stop. I think it overheated eight to ten times. So, the whole trip, in eastern Washington, while it's over a hundred degrees, we're stuck in this van where we had to have the heat blaring the whole time," James lamented. "We're going to drive at night. That's what we learned."
A common practice with touring bands is to try to play places where they have friends, especially to ensure a place to sleep. When I brought that up, they had a laundry list of people they were stoked to see on the road, but it also sounded like the were going to wing it a bit. "We harass people," Damien assured me, "That usually works out."
The thing that excites me about this tour is the new merch. James gave me the run-down, saying "We've been busting our asses on merch. I'm so goddamn tired of screen printing. We did something a little off the beaten path with our CD's, as far as packaging goes. I don't want to give too much away, you'll have to wait for that... but, we've also got patches, stickers for the first time, a run of buttons, and shirts. We're just finishing up the last of the Godzilla shirts." I got some details about the packaging, but was sworn to secrecy. I also got a sheet of five patches and one of those fabled Godzilla shirts. I sport both regularly, now.
The CD's are 100% DIY! Once again, James acted as band spokesperson, and excitedly laid-it-out, "We're doing it all ourselves. We're putting the labels on the CD's. we're printing the packages. We have 200 sheets of cardboard at home right now. It's a two color screen print, so it takes about ten minutes for each one, just to get the color on it. Then we still have to glue them up and do all that. Plus, there's even more than that, because there's bonuses going into each one." Everyone loves bonuses, Joi assured me that they would be different. "If you buy two CD's, you'll probably get different prizes."
At this point we decided to take a smoke break. After we got back to it, I got a lot of awesome stories about the legend of naked Damien, more stories of hot vans, a little glimpse into bringing your rowdy friends into the studio and letting them drink while recording gang vocals, and a great story about an out-of-town gig that somehow ended in drunks shitting out of a third story window. The world of Ten Pole drunk is a magical place.
You're going to have to wait for the podcast to hear anymore about it, or you can just catch them next week. Either way, be sure to tell your friends about the tour and see the band as soon as possible. Their fun, antagonistic stage show will be everything you ever hoped punk could be... and you might get hit with Damien's dong.
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