SPEAK
Interview by Jenn Stookey
I had heard of the Austin, TX “art rock” band SPEAK just a few weeks ago, and in perfect time for the release of their new EP, Pedals. Their music is simple but not too simple. It’s complicated with multiple sounds tearing apart your ears trying to nail down where it’s coming from, but surprisingly it’s not too complicated. Their music is moving in a direction I see the world of pop traveling in over the next five years. After being lead to their music, I had the wonderful opportunity to chat with lead vocalist, Troupe Gammage, about the band, his takes on originality, what “art rock” really means, and so much more. Take a look below, and check out their brand new EP on Spotify here.
Jenn Stookey: Tell me a little about yourself.
Troupe Gammage: My name is Troupe Gammage and I was born and raised in Austin, TX as was the rest of the band. We all went to school together. Elementary school, middle school, high school, college. At this point we have been playing officialy as SPEAK for about 6 years and and we just put out our second album a few days ago, and we’re stoked that it’s finally out there in the world!
JS: Why is music important to you?
TG: I have an easy answer because both of my parents were musicians. It wasn’t hard for me to follow music as a career and it’s something I grew up around. None of the other guys in the band have musican parents actually so I’m always really inspired by the fact that they take it so seriously and found that on their own. The thing is, everybody’s parents are in to music to some extent and I think it just kind of rubs off on certain people and it becomes apart of some creative existence.
JS: The band is from Austin, did you all grow up there? How did you come together?
TG: I went to the same elementary school as Joey, and Jr. high as Jake. Me, Jake and Nick all went to the same high school, and then Joey, Nick and Jake all went to the same college. We all were basically going through the school system at the same time. We basically grew up in various ways knowing each other since we were kids.
JS: Did any of you do any musical endeavors in college? Did you study anything different or was it completely about music?
TG: Nick and I met at a rock n roll camp between Jr. high and high school so we were definitely serious about music by Jr. high. Jake and I played drums in jazz band in high school. Nick and Joey actually met studying classical guitar at Austin University of Texas. Me, Nick and Jake were playing together at the time and I went off to USC in LA to study music composition so we were taking it seriously. I came back and that’s when Nick brought Joey on board as our bass player and Joey had never played any bass but he was a great guitarist so he figured he could do the job and he did. So we brought him in.
JS: Austin’s music scene is growing so rapidly and you no longer have to be in NYC or LA. But Austin is also no longer just Texas country which is great for your style of music, which you refer to it as “art rock”. Describe what that means to you.
TG: That was just a tag I picked on SoundCloud and then it ended up being something that blogs and websites started describing us as and I ended up really liking it. I feel that it encompasses a wide range of sounds and we are ultimately making pop music, like, we’re writing songs and we’re not trying to write compositions or movements or anything like that. But we are pretty experimental when it comes to the sounds and the textures. I think art rock is a nice blending of traditional and experimental.
JS: SPEAK. You’re name. Why the name? I feel like that’s a very weighted word.
TG: Band names are really hard and that was one of those things where we tried different permutations but we wanted something that was simple but as we progressed as a band then it could kind of take on those different meanings. You know, if we were called “Murder By Death” that has a certain image and we just didn’t want to force ourselves into anything. It’s kind of a generic name but it also gives us a lot of freedom and that was the most important thing for us.
JS: Your new album PEDALS released a few days ago and it isn’t your first release. Was there anything different on this one you did that you hadn’t before? Working with someone new, taking a new approach to writing or recording, etc?
TG: It was incredibly different. We actually didn’t work with anyone, that was the big shift. We had a producer on our first record who was great and we learned a lot but we just weren’t really sure what we wanted to do on this album and we didn’t really feel comfortable having someone else tell us what to do. So we took a bunch of time, a couple years, and just explored and it was difficult but we’re super happy with the results and I don’t think we could have done it any other way. We made the record at my house/studio and mixed it and mastered it and did all of the artwork and design and everything. We shot our own video and all that. Basically we just took this one into our own hands and it’s a lot of work and pretty exhausting but we’ve really been happy with it.
JS: Recording and getting your ideas out from your head can be strenuous. How do you cope with the long process? Does it ever get tiring or is the beginning just as exciting as the middle and the end?
TG: Wow, that’s a good question. I think every moment can be incredibly mind numbing or incredibly exciting. The beginnings of a song are always pretty exciting, just the initial spark of inspiration. But the process, there were so many triumphs and so many defeats that I remember these specific moments of when we got a synth tone that we had been working on for a couple years. We had been trying to figure out just one single sound, and then when we finally nailed it, it was amazing. Or I remember going back to the drawing board on things that I thought we were going in a good direction. It can be pretty demoralizing at times but you know the end goal is going to be something you’re really proud of permanently and not something that’s just good enough for the moment, and that definitely made it worth while enough for us.
JS: You did something really cool with your song “Be Reasonable, Diane” which is you turned the music video into a video game. Originality in this age can be very hard to come by because copying is so easy. How did you come up with this idea? And what are your takes about being original in this industry?
TG: I got into music by doing music to games which is what I still do as a job and I got into that through my best friend Tristen Michael who I made the game with. I think it was his suggestion actually, he was like, “Yeah I’ll make a game for you,” and we had been wanting to collaborate for a while. It had been a little bit because he was out of town for a little while and then moved back and he said we should just do something. It was kind of dumb because we thought it would be this little project but it ended up taking a couple years of pretty consistant work to get it put altogether. But it was super fun because like you were saying, it hasn’t been done a lot, so we were really thrilled with the response and excited to actually make something that people could write articles about without even really knowing who we are because the idea itself is interesting. It is hard to come by those ideas. We’re always looking for it but people have done just about everything when it comes to promoting music. We were stoked we got to get on the ground floor. I’m sure there’s going to be a lot more music video games, it feels good to be early on in that trend.
JS: These next few questions are ones we like to ask to all of the artists we interview. The first two combined being: what has the biggest struggle for you been and how did you overcome it or how are you still overcoming it?
TG: I think maintaining a positive attitude is the biggest struggle for any artist. There’s quite a few uphill battles that have to be fought and it’s an incredibly demanding lifestyle and it’s easy to see failures and endpoints and take the easy way out and say, “okay never mind, it’s not worth it.” But for whatever reason we’ve just never considered failure as an option. So, here we are many years later after almost a decade of playing together and contiuing to move forward. It is hard to have the motivation to do that and every little bit, every little tweet, every little note you get from an artist you really respect saying they enjoy the album, all of those things help you through work. So yeah, we’re working on it. It’s not something you ever really master.
TG: I think maintaining a positive attitude is the biggest struggle for any artist. There’s quite a few uphill battles that have to be fought and it’s an incredibly demanding lifestyle and it’s easy to see failures and endpoints and take the easy way out and say, “okay never mind, it’s not worth it.” But for whatever reason we’ve just never considered failure as an option. So, here we are many years later after almost a decade of playing together and contiuing to move forward. It is hard to have the motivation to do that and every little bit, every little tweet, every little note you get from an artist you really respect saying they enjoy the album, all of those things help you through work. So yeah, we’re working on it. It’s not something you ever really master.
JS: On the opposite side of that, what has been the highlight of your career?
TG: We got played by Ellie Goulding when she did a takeover of Zane Lowe’s show on BBC radio and she played our song which is super amazing to hear. We all tuned in to the stream just to say she knows nothing about our band but really wants people to check us out and were really excited for people to hear our band. That’s the kind of random stuff that happens that will make you go from saying, “What are we doing?” to “Wow, well Ellie Goulding is playing us on the radio! We’re doing something right!”
TG: We got played by Ellie Goulding when she did a takeover of Zane Lowe’s show on BBC radio and she played our song which is super amazing to hear. We all tuned in to the stream just to say she knows nothing about our band but really wants people to check us out and were really excited for people to hear our band. That’s the kind of random stuff that happens that will make you go from saying, “What are we doing?” to “Wow, well Ellie Goulding is playing us on the radio! We’re doing something right!”
JS: If the moment has or hasn’t happened yet, when did you or will you be able to say that this is you living your dreams?
TG: It has not happened. It’s funny how it’s easy to desire more. We definitely have had a lot of really amazing achievements but it still costs us money to be in the band. I think when everybody can choose to do work outside of the band as a bonus and for fun and to explore and to not be required to do work outside of the band just to make ends meet, then we will be feeling real nice. And I hope that happens on this album. But we don’t feel satisfied, and even with that we wont feel satisfied. We always just want to try to make the best records we can and have the best shows and that’s pretty much a life long endeavor so we’re excited to spend our lives trying.
TG: It has not happened. It’s funny how it’s easy to desire more. We definitely have had a lot of really amazing achievements but it still costs us money to be in the band. I think when everybody can choose to do work outside of the band as a bonus and for fun and to explore and to not be required to do work outside of the band just to make ends meet, then we will be feeling real nice. And I hope that happens on this album. But we don’t feel satisfied, and even with that we wont feel satisfied. We always just want to try to make the best records we can and have the best shows and that’s pretty much a life long endeavor so we’re excited to spend our lives trying.
