New Orleans is not a city known for it’s Punk Rock, in fact during the successive waves of Punk – N’awlins has not even produced a single nationally recognised Punk act.. let alone internationally recognised.
All that has changed in the last couple of years with the emergence of hardcore band PEARS.
I spoke to guitarist Brian Pretus as PEARS prepare for their first ever Australian show with label mates Strung Out, next Wednesday night at The Jack in Cairns.
Brian! how are you? You’ll have to excuse my voice, I’m a little hungover this morning.. speaking of which do you have any hangover cures?
“Great man how are you doing? Oh don’t worry I feel ya… Hangover cures, well first of all its all about drinking water.. Then you gotta get a big breakfast into ya, you’re gonna need a steak and some hash browns.. oh and weed – weed helps as well!”
Amazingly PEARS first ever show was with Off With Their Heads, how did that come about?
“That happened I guess because someone in town found out we were forming a band at the time and like the next day they called us and were like “are you guys ready to play shows?”.. We were like uhh not really man, not yet. Then he says “well, we’ve got Off With Their Heads coming to town can you be ready for that?” – we were just like fuck yeah dude we’ll be ready in time for the show, we’ll make it happen. So anyway we went off and pretty much wrote a whole album in two weeks. Ryan from OWTH liked it so much he put it on vinyl for us through his record label.”
You guys are from New Orleans, which is a city synonymous with music and live performance in general. What is it like to play an unpopular style of music, in a city full of musicians?
“Um.. It’s tough you know, I mean New Orleans has it’s subcultures and whatever but it’s mostly a tourist town. Most people come to town to see like Jazz bands and big brass bands, being in a Punk band.. nobody really cares… it’s tough but people seem to be stoked now that we are getting out and playing other places, they are definitely more excited than usual about what we are doing.”
Cairns and New Orleans sound like they have some things in common! (laughs, bitterly). You guys have worked pretty fast and already played with some really legendary bands, how excited were you when you found out that you were coming downunder with Strung Out? What’s on your to do list while you are here?
“Well we are just stoked to be doing this tour, Australia has been like a main goal for us to get to like the whole time we’ve been a band… but yeah man it’s pretty awesome.. we couldn’t ask for a better situation really. Well, when we get there we wanna meet Frenzal Rhomb – coz they are like one of the best Punk bands in the world!… uh I wanna play with kangaroos, I wanna go scuba diving, I wanna meet a mermaid, I wanna meet a merman, I wanna throw some shrimps on the barbie.. if that’s still a thing… and I wanna meet all these awesome people I keep hearing about!”
Now I’m sure you’ve been asked this before, but is the PEARS logo an homage to the FEAR logo at all?
“Oh yeah, I mean it basically IS the FEAR logo (laughs)… See what happened there was when we were first starting out and doing flyers and stuff.. well we kinda needed like a logo. Well I ended up finding the FEAR logo and I was like “Man all I have to do is add the ’S’ in there and it’s done!”. I’m not sure how legal that is but yeah, it’d probably do their reputation more harm than good if they wanted to sue us anyway.”
Signing for Fat Wreck Chords must have been a dream come true for you guys, has it been a good fit for you?
“When we were in our old band we’d sit around and be like “Man how good would it be?” and now it’s happened for real, so yeah it really is a dream come true to be on this label with like all my favourite bands from when I was growing up. I guess the main thing that is different is when people find out you’re signed to FAT, they’ll give you a second listen or whatever because of their reputation. It’s been exciting to watch things grow faster and faster everyday – and the support we have received from them has been amazing, we couldn’t ask for a better home.”
Your first album “Go To Prison” is absolutely blistering, coming in at around 22 minutes! For the new record, are you gonna be ripping like 5 minute solos and shit or are you gonna be keeping it nice and tight again?
“(laughs) Well I’ll clue you in… there will be THREE whole solos on the new record.. they won’t be big… um not that i’m not very good at them, but we try to lay off them. The new record is pretty different from the other ones… don’t get me wrong it’s still Punk as fuck.. It’s fast sometimes, like incredibly fast playing… uh it’s also slower sometimes.. there’s a lot more harmony vocals on it then the last one.. but yeah we are just taking aspects of the last record and expanding on those pretty much… if you liked the first one, you’re definitely gonna like this one ten times more!”
Do you even like pears, the fruit?
Where did the name come from?
“Uh no not really, they taste kinda sandy.. especially the older ones (laughs).. I’d much rather eat an old apple than a pear. The name comes from something that happened to our singer while he was on mushrooms for like a week and half. He’s not a big drug kinda guy but whatever he does, he does one hundred percent.. thats just the kinda guy he is.”
(Unfortunately at the pivotal moment of the ‘shroom story, the phone connection dropped in quality.. but hey, it’ll give you something to ask them if you’re lucky enough to meet them – Dozer)
There would be very few Aussies that would’ve seen you perform live, so what can we expect? Is there anything you’d like to say to the people of North QLD?
“You can expect us to…. do our best! we’ll give a hundred percent and if you don’t like us we don’t care very much.. but it’s gonna be pretty fucking insane. If you don’t come, you’re really gonna regret it… and all your friends are gonna be like “awwww man you missed it!” and it will be one of those times where you REALLY have missed it, so yeah. We can’t wait to bring you the good stuff.”
Brian, its been a pleasure mate – I’ll see you at the show!
“Right on, mate! see you there!”
Dozer
Strung Out – Live at The Jack! W/ PEARS + local supports. Wednesday March 2nd, 7PM. Tickets available from www.thejack.com and also Travel Beats, Shop 27 Shields St.
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