Power of 2
By Andrew Flanagan
Listen to – MP3 – Salem Frogs by Power of 2
Power of 2 make rock and roll that happens to lack vocals.Their music is bright, sharp, and big. They’re very nice, and would love to meet you or play your show. Max hits the drums hard. There you have it.
Rift: How long has either of you played music?
PO2: We both started playing music roughly 9 years ago. Max started drumming in middle school band, while Joe just picked up a guitar one day and said “This looks pretty good.”
Rift: How long have you guys played together?
PO2: We started playing together about 4 years ago when we moved in together.
Rift: What were you listening to in the 10th grade?
PO2: Joe was a lot cooler than Max and listened to stuff like Refused, At The Drive-In and Hendrix. Max was definitely a loser and was just starting to listen to “good” music like Radiohead, but mostly he was that kid who had a different Weezer shirt for each day of the week and wore the same dirty Placebo knit-cap almost everyday, even in the summer.
Rift: Did you have a steel-ball necklace? I definitely rocked that.
PO2: I actually did, but only for a very short period of time and it was only because I found it on the ground.
Rift: Day jobs?
PO2: Joe works as a freelance boom operator in film, while Max works for a non-profit that helps media artists in Minnesota.
Rift: Does working in the arts, especially in a supporting capacity, affect how you process or create it? Kind of how a lot of service industry workers hate people more than most.
PO2: I suppose it might. If it does, it’s definitely not a conscious effort. But at the same time, I like to just think that we are “Minnesota Nice.”
Rift: Favorite superhero?
PO2: DUFFMAN!
Rift: What are your influences, excluding music?
PO2: We are both filmmakers and watch a lot of movies, we draw a lot from that, I guess. Also, living in Minnesota has had a bit of influence on our music. And beer.
Rift: I see this brought up a lot by artists either from here or have moved here, even after they’ve left. The contrasts between seasons, the winters. How has living here influenced your music?
PO2: I think that maybe because Minnesota isn’t exactly known as a hot bed of culture and art, even though we Minnesotans all know it is, we try to strive for something more than what is going on in the New York or L.A. or whatever. We take pride in being from a unique spot in the country and being able to muster more creativity than any east or west coaster ever could. Call it the cold, call it what you will, but Midwesterners have something in their blood that feels more original, and perhaps, more hard fought for.
Rift: Are there any overlooked local bands that you think deserve more attention?
PO2: Well, there was this band that we played with a lot called Brothers Quetico that was by far, one of the best Minneapolis bands out there . But unfortunately, like many great Minneapolis bands, their life span was too short and they broke up after releasing an incredible record. If you thought Fleet Fox’s record was the best of the year, I highly suggest you listen to “Bovine” by Brothers Quetico.
Rift: I saw on your MySpace page that you guys are super hard working and are very much available to help other like-minded bands or artists. Do you think there’s a glut of passion or ethic with artists today?
PO2: I think there are definitely a lot of really hard working artists out there right now, you kind of have to be one to survive. With everyone and their mother’s bands trying to get heard, you have to put a lot of work into being a band. I also think that there are a lot of bands out there that say they are about the DIY spirit, and say they work hard, but really, it’s just the next passing fad. Being indie, DIY and especially “artsy” is really cool right now, so it can be hard to weed through the crap to find honest, hard working bands out there.
Rift: I feel like people are getting better at sussing out the fly-by-nighters and supporting more fervently the artists they do care about – buying records, going to shows, telling friends – where before they would download the album and forget about it and it would end up lost in a wall of text in iTunes. It’s happened to me more than once. The freneticism of the early aughts, with the rise of “blog culture” causing attentions to be drawn in every which way, the constant availability of different media (making it all less and less culturally valuable)…all of this contributing to the dwindling hold of corporate “quality control.” People are their own critics now I would like to think.
PO2: That is very true. However, I don’t think that it has gotten much better since the early aughts. There is over saturation for sure in the art culture. It can become that wall of text, in any media really.I can see that some blog communities are trying to fix that, but I feel that they are doing it in the wrong way. They are getting more exclusive in what kind of content they post and review, and they all seem to post the same content. Like they are all getting talking points handed down from Pitchfork, just another oxymoronic “indie giant.”
Rift: Where do you place yourselves in the instrumental rock universe?
PO2: We are trying to stay away from Math Rock, and the stigma that comes with a lot of instrumental music. We try not to intellectualize our music. A lot of instrumental music can be alienating because it is made to be as complex as possible and it really only aims to impress. There seems to be a lack of passion with that. We’d rather play music that we enjoy, that is a challenge to us, and that you can hum the next day.
Rift: You guys keep it manically simple, it’s true. You can tell that you aren’t stretching yourselves thin, but really nuzzling up and going for it. The influence of film in your music makes more sense now – the songs aren’t narratives but they do narrate, sort of free-flowing even in their aggression. Would you agree with that?
PO2: Yeah, but again, it’s definitely in our subconscious when writing. Mainly, we want people to have a good time, and think of our music as fun, loud and catchy. If they find it complex and aggressive, then all the better.
Rift: When will you be putting a new album out?
PO2: We have been taking some time to write more lately and hope to have a real record done by this summer. Our previous releases have been EP’s that we recorded in a few hours and then hand-made cases for, but we hope to make this next one a little more polished.
Rift: I think you should definitely keep the hand-made thing going; people like a little extra love. A dab of glitter glue never hurts.
PO2: Oh for sure. (Wow, that’s Minnesotan, especially when I say it out loud). We will definitely keep with the hand made packaging. It’s fun and it makes each CD unique. We just need better, more current, recordings. We do have some new songs that we will be playing at our upcoming shows.
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