Nearing a decade as a four-piece band, deathcrash sounds more united than ever Somersaults. The third album sees members Tiernan Banks (vocals/guitar), Noah Bennett (drums), Patrick Fitzgerald (bass), and Matthew Weinberger (guitar) at their most vulnerable while they continue to reflect on how the band fits into their adult lives. That reflection alone elicits some of their most confident songwriting yet. Self-questioning yet self-assuring lyricism is a bold signifier of the bond between bandmates–a lineup that has remained the same since their inception. Somersalts highlights a newfound sense of optimism and purpose for deathcrash in the face of underlying anxiety and the disillusionment of adulthood.
The band is no exception to the greatness that emerges from the South London-Windmill scene. deathcrash’s trajectory over the course of three albums has been quiet, yet distinct and admirable. Listening to their debut Return and sophomore album Less showcases the development of deathcrash’s unique, artistic voice on Somersaults, where their personal experiences and group dynamic is more fundamental than any other influence. Vocalist Tiernan Banks shares further introspection behind the unsuspecting positivity on deathcrash’s freshly-released third album.
There’s always been a lot of attention on bands from the UK, but especially right now. When you think of that or hear that statement and the history behind it, what comes to mind immediately? Is it inspiring or motivating, or does it feel intimidating in any way?
That’s a good question. It can definitely feel intimidating. For us, we’ve not always known exactly where we fit into that camp. Obviously, The Windmill has had a massive reputation. Kind of weirdly, you realize it has got a bit of a global reach. It’s not clear to what extent we’re a Windmill band. We have played shows with a lot of those bands and we have played at The Windmill, but I don’t think it’s a massive part of our identity. But it’s a really encouraging space because there’s loads of great bands. We came up with Jerskin Fendrix, Famous, Black Country, New Road, and Sorry. That was our generation. All really lovely people and great bands. It was an exciting time because you go to these shows and they’re actually good.
People rise in their own different ways and you might start thinking “Should we be doing more of what they’re doing?” It’s hard not to feel a bit out of your depth at times. Our nature to it has probably always been peripheral to that London scene. I feel very pleased to know some of those people and I’ve enjoyed a lot of the experiences, but I don’t think the deathcrash story is necessarily built into all of that. When you’re from the UK or London, or even a lot of The Windmill scene, there’s a big post-punk thing. We looked much more towards American bands when we were becoming a band. We always looked up to songwriting, or things that are slightly-more slowcore or emo-leaning. There’s never historically been that big a British sound. Interestingly, I do think London is becoming less post-punk over time, or something to that effect seems to be happening. It doesn’t seem to be quite as trendy as it used to be.
I was super intrigued by a quote your bandmate Matt shared in a Line Of Best Fit interview about feeling influenced by yourselves when creating Less. When you think of how almost every piece of media feels referential nowadays, what helps you position yourselves to create from a place that reflects your own sense of individuality rather than what’s been done before? Furthermore, what does it look like to gel together your individual identities to create this incredibly cohesive sound that reflects each of your capabilities and taste?
I really like that Matt said that. I think that that was something that we really felt at the time. I agree with you, firstly, that whether it’s the internet or whatever–everyone’s steeped in influences all the time. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, it’s really special actually. I think it can be a bad thing when it feels like things are being repeated aimlessly. I find it a really boring criticism. For example, because we were just talking about Cameron Winter, I hear a lot of people going, well, ‘Geese aren’t that interesting. They’re just like bands from the 70s.” I’ve heard people say that in a miserable way, but I think that’s slightly missing the point. What they’re doing is distinctive, it’s bringing something new and original. There’s such a crazy expectation on one side of the camp that culture should be constantly revolutionizing itself. I don’t think that’s true. In a weird way, the 20th century had an unsustainable rate of cultural change. Certain ideas are being gone over again, but in slightly new ways. Incremental change is not a bad thing.
All of that is to say that our first album was very consciously steeped in references and influences. That was the reason that we became a band. That sort of influence was really beautiful because we had these shared interests. We weren’t really worried about making something that original, we wanted to make something that sat within a context and also then brought our own originality as individuals. We wanted to tell our own stories with the lyrics and bridge things together to make a specific emotional style. The influence was really necessary to capture that style.
When we did Less, because we became so obsessive about references on the first album, it got in the way of certain things. We’d be wondering “How did they create that sound? How could we do a similar thing?” and on Less, we purposefully didn’t talk about any of that. Instead we created some very strict rules for ourselves: do the whole thing live, not using any guitar pedals, not using any overdubs. It has to be super bare. We had a few other rules, but that was our way of overcoming some of the issues with doing the first album.
Then this album that we’ve just done, I think we’ve now established, which is connected to the second-half of your question, a long-term relationship as a four. We have such a shared language now. We’ve been playing together for eight years and we don’t really talk about other people’s music very often. We barely see each other , so when we rehearse it’s pretty to the point. I don’t think we’ve found the need the longer that we’ve been together as a band. We know what we want to achieve and how we want to do it, and I think we find it much more fruitful to talk within our own room. Obviously, sometimes you have to point towards things and comparisons can bring light to other stuff–but you almost realize that after the fact, not before. I used to realize it a lot more before the fact.
On our new album, we didn’t want to have any of the rules of the second one. We were just totally free and creative. The one mantra we want to have is just writing more direct, more concise songwriting. It still hasn’t come from a place of influence. It’s just whatever feels worthwhile to write for us. In terms of bringing in all four of our influences or ways of writing, that’s just the best part of being in a band, really. Matt is the guitarist, he’s always writing little ideas for guitar parts, and then he’ll bring that to us. Songwriting tends to start from there and then that makes me want to sing a certain thing over it. We kind of build it that way, and then Pat and Noah jokingly start providing the bedrock for these in the rhythm section and we all edit together. It ends up going on a linear journey through the four of us–that’s really special.
We all have different things that we’re interested in and that we want to bring, so we don’t really end up fighting for power too much. We’re really lucky that our four sensibilities work together in that sort of way. I like doing the words, that’s what draws me to music. Matt loves coming up with a huge amount of ideas and being creative, that’s what draws him to it. Patrick likes seeing himself as more of an editor within music. All of our interests come together quite nicely. For eight years, we’ve had the same lineup. That’s rare particularly in bands that don’t do this professionally. It shows that we work together as a four.
As long-time friends and bandmates, what allows you to feel revitalized and motivated to keep coming back to each other to make music?
It’s a pertinent question because I think this album comes from this premise of getting older and it’s difficult to keep this thing going. It’s more of a logistical and life-oriented concern of ‘How can one be in a band when pressed up against all of the difficulties of real life?’ It’s hard. It’s really hard to find the time, money, energy, and enthusiasm. People like what we do, and we like what we do, but we’re never going to make a living from that. You go through different stages of finding that really disheartening and then finding it liberating, which is probably more where we’re at now. That’s the logistical answer to your question.
In terms of where we find the motivation or drive to make the music, that’s so much harder to answer in words. It just is one of those things that’s an urge. Matt sits down with his guitar all the time, for whatever reason that he’ll never be able to answer, and just has these ideas. When I hear them, it makes me want to respond to them. When we first started the band, me and Matt were talking about how it felt like we were writing each other letters, sending these ideas back and forth. There’s romance and excitement to it. It’s really beautiful to be involved with others creating something. There is just something that propels you towards it. You can question that, as I often do but you can’t really stop it from happening. I’ll find myself walking somewhere, or I’ll be in the shower, or whatever and I’ll have this idea for a song. Once the idea is set root, it’s really hard not to want to see that through. It is all emotional. There’s something that strives for expression, and music is a cheat code to doing that and provides immediate depth.
While Return saw you using your influences to navigate and express your feelings and Less became a reflection and continuation of that. In a number of ways, Somersaults feels confident and full of purpose and enjoyment. How would you describe Somersaults thematically in this timeline you’re building over the course of your work?
We feel less trapped by our music now. In a way, it’s connected to what I was saying about feeling more liberated in what we’re doing. That is potentially because we have shared certain expectations around this whole project, conversely, I think that’s meant we’re more ambitious with it and we enjoy it more. That’s the sort of feeling from which Somersaults was getting made. We’re becoming more confident as songwriters and we’re not as interested in slowcore as we used to be. It was useful for getting across the feeling of depression on Return and Less, but we’re not in that place anymore.
There’s different concerns. There may be more anxieties, or more concerns about what life is going to be–but the question of ‘Should one live at all?’ has been answered to some degree.
I have wanted to hold off from saying this is an album about growing up, because I wonder if it’s that interesting an idea, but I do think that this is an album about the disillusioning process of growing up. It is a process of dreams not being fulfilled, but that is a good and necessary thing, because it’s the only way to sustain yourself. It’s more direct, vibrant, and enjoyable, because it’s not living in this fantasy land.
I also liken it to a relationship during the honeymoon period. After a while, the honeymoon period dies and maybe you start to worry. “What the fuck’s going on? Is this good? Is this bad?” Maybe some of the excitement or that desire to rip each other’s clothes off all the time has gone. If you want to be committed for a really long time, sure it’s sad that that feeling’s gone, but it’s essential that it goes. That’s how I see it.
Totally, and that goes into my next point. Despite anxieties being riddled within this album, there’s a sense of joy and hope that shines through. What was occurring in each of your lives throughout this process that elicited that feeling? Where were you emotionally?
We were all going in slightly different directions emotionally and in our lives. I’ll speak for myself, but I was going through this process of really trying to understand what I wanted to do with my life. This album is about being in a band and grappling with how this band can still exist if I’m going to lead an adult life. I still don’t have an answer to that question. Songs like ‘NYC’ and ‘CMC’ get to the heart of that. This is a self-referential album. There’s the question of the whole project itself, but also if I’m going to be successful at anything else, or be able to make enough money to buy a house, get married, and have a baby. If so, I can put more time into other things. But if I’m putting more time into other things, will there be time for deathcrash? It’s been our priority for so many years, and it still remains so. We still love doing it, but it’s hard not to at least question it.
I think the anxiety of the album comes from having to sometimes doubt what you know or commit to. Similar to committing to a long term relationship. We’re kind of at that stage of our lives where we are thinking about marriage and wondering if in five years time, some of us might have children. These are very real things happening in our lives that we talk about, and that I think have found their way into the songs.
What were you able to uncover about yourselves through the process of creating Somersaults?
I don’t know where I stand on that sort of thing–whether or not I learn about myself through writing, or do we learn about ourselves and then write about that? It is a good thing to think about. It’s often both. Sometimes I will look back on a song and not realize I was feeling that. I’d say I never really go into a song being like, with the example of questioning whether or not I should be in a band, I want to write a song about that. It’s never like that. Or if I feel envious of all my friends who seem to have established themselves in their careers, but I’ve spent all my time in this band. That does come out in lines on Somersaults. I like latching onto ideas that feel slightly less specific. On ‘NYC’, for example, we ended up having this running joke about calling our album California Tonight.
It was an inside joke, but it was such a good idea–that has to be the linchpin of this album. That was what we’re trying to get out of this album. You can have these silly metaphors like California tonight that end up much easier to talk about. Maybe it’s these manic feelings before these big decisions–it’s much easier to latch onto a metaphor in that sense. I do learn about myself in that way. I don’t write very consciously, but I do write about things I am aware of and know about myself. I get to them via a slightly strange route.
Matt wrote the demo for Somersaults before there were ever words on it. I just thought it was really beautiful, and that word became a part of the song, then that became a metaphor for this feeling of becoming more confident as a band but maybe less confident about how that fitted into our lives. Sometimes you need this sort of image that’s slightly extraneous to what you’re talking about to get to the heart of what you’re trying to say.
Finally, when you think about your developing career and personal life in the grand scheme of things, what does being successful mean to you? There’s success that’s seen in an industry standard sort of way, or success that you feel personally–it could be something as simple as being at peace.
I agree with that. My answer is definitely a combination of an accolade or money-related aspect, but I also agree with you on the peace front and the more emotional side. The deathcrash idea of success has always been wanting to impact people with our music. We’ve often felt success with that and we used to joke about how we wanted to be a cult band, now we’ve kind of achieved that. There’s that level of success where people are touched by our music and there’s an authenticity to it that they enjoy, but there is also the aspect of success also looking like playing Primavera and doing a headline show at the Barbican. A dream of mine to headline the Barbican. That would feel like a success if we managed it. I don’t think you can do the second one without the first one.
For me personally, success is probably something along the same lines. I won’t feel successful until I feel like I can stand on my own two feet and be proud of something I’ve achieved career wise. That could come from music or elsewhere. I would have to like be earning a certain amount of money so that I could live in this fucking ridiculously expensive city. I don’t think it’d be stupid to shy away from that. It’s important to achieve those milestones, but I’m definitely not led by any of that in a greedy sense. It’s more for relational reasons. I want for me, my girlfriend, and whatever family we might end up having to be able to have a content life. A life that feels like it has a certain level of depth to it. Music is really good for that. Other things that I’m interested in are good for that. I wouldn’t just want success for success’s sake. I think I need to speak to your word, some kind of peace, but also some kind of depth–which probably has an artistic or philosophical aspect to it.
Izzy Petraglia is a publicist, writer and photographer based in Toronto. Within her work, she loves to tie in her passion for music, fashion, and pop culture. Follow her on Instagram.