Interview With Sextile

Caught up with Mel and Brady of LA-based band, Sextile. The two founding members talk about their go-to gear, inspirations–from the Velvet Underground to The Prodigy–what their own Oblique Strategies card would look like and more.

Their album, yes, please, is out now via Sacred Bones. It's really good and I think you should give it a whirl.

Photos by Ambar Navarro for Synth History.

Sextile by Ambar Navarro.

Synth History: Can you tell me about the inception of Sextile?

Mel: Brady and I met in New York where we started messing around with music together but we didn’t take it seriously or really pursue music till we got to LA and got sober. We met Eddie Wuebben and one other in Narcotics Anonymous and from there we started Sextile.

Synth History: I read that a ‘Sextile’ is: “an angle of 60°, which is 1⁄6 of the 360°ecliptic or 1⁄2 a trine (120°)Depending on the involved planets, an orb of 4-5° is allowed. The symbol is the radii of a hexagon.” Can you tell me about the name and its meaning!?

Mel: We had our first show booked at the Echo for Part time punks and we didn’t have a good name. We knew we needed something good and every band name we all were coming up with was terrible. Eddie was super into astrology, the kind of guy who wouldn’t remember anyones name but always their star sign. He said this word a lot when speaking to people about their sign, which he did every conversation with anyone new. So we decided to use the world Sextile as it sounded punk. But its meaning is harmonious or opportunity. Which we were trying to manifest at the time.

Synth History: What have been some of your go-to or favorite pieces of gear over the years?

Brady: In the beginning, we used to haul a Polysix and a DX7 to our shows here in LA. We are fans of Chris Haas and Beat Bartel and always wanted a Korg MS-20 but we couldn't afford it at the time. So we bought a second hand Korg MS-10, from a guy in an office, who said he was only using it for filter sweeps. Crazy. After a few years, we finally snagged an MS-20 and both synths were integral to the sound of our previous two releases. For yes, please we wanted to make it a point to use contemporary gear. we felt that it's important to celebrate the instrument makers of today. So we used a lot of Make Noise, Xaoc Devices, Instruo, and LA-based Noise Engineering on this record. On the non-synth side, we have always used fender guitars, mostly strats on the records and then class Deluxe Memory Man - on both instruments and our vocals.

Synth History: Do you prefer recording / working in the studio or performing live?

Mel: I personally love both, but for two different reasons. I get high from performing live. but during the recording of this last record, I was really vibing by the end and I didn’t want it to be over as we had caught a groove and the reason it had to end was because of tour coming up!

Brady: I agree with Melissa. For me there’s a magic in finding and making the sounds. But there’s a magic of watching people's reactions to the songs. And hearing the tracks on big sound systems. But if I had to choose one, id chose to just record.

Synth History: Can you tell me what some of your biggest musical inspirations are?

Mel: For Sextile, in the beginning, it was Coil, the Fall, Messethetics compilations, Chrome, Chris & Cosey - which are all phenomenal bands but these days it’s shifted quite a bit. I think for Sextile now it’s from Underworld to Locked Club. We listen to a lot of more modern music these days. Which I believe it comes from being in a modern band, you are naturally submersed in what’s actively happening in the subculture of music and it influences what we are doing because it inspires us. We are always looking towards the future now. But the Velvet Underground will always be the blueprint from the beginning of Sextile to where we currently are at.

Brady: Yeah, like Scaduto said, Velvet Underground is the blue print. My biggest inspirations change every month I feel but I'd say The Prodigy and Brian Eno have been the longest standing. It's about being a 'non-musician', well at least for me, I've never been a virtuoso at piano, guitar or playing instruments in general, and these artists were able to take tape loops or samples and collage them together to create this new and amazing music, using the studio or new gear to create it.

Synth History: Biggest non-musical inspirations?

Brady: Just living life.

Mel: Life does inspire, from our cats to the city of LA.

Synth History: Brian Eno has a card-based method for promoting creativity called Oblique Strategies. If you could write your own Oblique Strategies card, what would it say?

Brady: Only use the first take.

Mel: Especially the vocals

Brady: It's probably already an Oblique Strategy.

Synth History: What’s one album you think everyone should listen to at least once in their lifetime?

Mel: Renegade Soundwave - Soundclash from 1989. Super underrated band in general. It's like if the Happy Mondays were more electronic. They were on Mute but I don’t think they ever got their respect. Obviously the Velvet Underground - White Light / White Heat is one of the nastiest records of all time and it always make me want to make music because it makes me feel like I can do something tough with two chords.

Brady: This was really hard because I feel like I have five and they kind of all cater to a different mood or purpose. But, if were talking albums, in my opinion, Pink Floyd - The Wall is the blue print for an album as an art piece. its entire emotional journey and so well thought out.

But if that's not your bag, The Prodigy - Fat of the Land.

Synth History: What’s one movie you think everyone should watch at least once in their lifetime?

Mel: Over the Edge, it’s a movie about what happens when new housing developments started to bloom and the creation of the suburbs and what that does to bored teenagers. It has as an epic line, “A kid who tells on another kid is a dead kid".

Brady: Apocalypse Now. I've never felt so many emotions while watching a movie. Watching the insanity unfold in the jungle. I feel like this movie changed me. You feel like you are there diving deep into a dark psychological analysis, analyzing the insanity of war, existence, and the lack of meaning or purpose to life other than to survive.

Synth History: What’s one tip you have for overcoming writer's block?

Mel: Just do it. Force yourself. You’ll get past this once you catch the flow again. No matter what, I had forced myself once to make an EP through tears and I couldn’t see anything changing at the time for my life but in retrospect everything was changing by doing this and I just couldn’t see it yet.

Brady: Create little completable tasks for yourself for a few days. Half the day you work on just creating as many melodies as you can, just little one bar melodies. Aim small and complete a lot. Second half of the day, make kick sounds with your synth, make snare sounds, make a percussion loop. By end the of the week you'll have enough little bits and pieces to collage together to hopefully make something you like.

Synth History Exclusive.

Photos by Ambar Navarro.

Interview by Danz.