Life During Wartime interviews: Replica
Hey, we’re back after a little hiatus with our Life During Wartime interviews, where our friends’s at the Life During Wartime radio show in Portland, OR, talk to bands who perform live in the studio… This time Colin interviews Oakland’s amazing REPLICA!
Check out their on-air performance HERE or here:
Life During Wartime (Colin): Name and instrument?
Juliana: My name is Juliana, and I play the guitar.
Alicia: Alicia, I play bass.
B: My name is B, I play drums
Dharma: My name is Dharma Moony, I play the glockenspiel.
LDW: I don’t believe you.
Dharma: I sing in this band, though.
LDW: I believe that. Tell me, how did this band form? Who had the idea, Let’s start a band?
Alicia: It all started in Oakland, California.
LDW: Go on…
Alicia: It was in West Oakland.
LDW: So we got the place…
B: It was Juliana’s idea. We were at a show for our friends’ band, Alaric.
Alicia: Right before the general strike in Oakland, which was November 2nd, maybe a bit before, of 2011.
B: So we just got together, wrote five songs in about a month, and played our first show and recorded a demo.
LDW: That’s pretty quick. And how did you decide on your name Replica?
B: It was a very rare band name brainstorming result.
Juliana: Wwe liked it because it was in Portuguese and English it’s the same word. So, it’s pretty easy for me to say “Heplica” so that’s what we call the band.
LDW: Let’s talk about that, Juliana, why do you speak Portuguese?
Juliana: Because I’m from Brazil.
LDW: And how did you come to live in Oakland?
Juliana: Oakland is awesome, that’s why I moved there. Now I cheer for the Raiders. If you could see me, I’m wearing an Oakland Raiders T-shirt… (laughs)
LDW: Fact. I can see her, so I can totally vouch. So you recorded — what happened with that recording you were talking about earlier?
B: We made a cassette tape, and then some friends of ours in San Fransisco have a label called Radical Punks Never Die. They are doing a series of flexis — they’re putting out flexis of the demos of some local Bay Area bands. We’re the third one in that series. There’s also one by Effluxus, and one by Permanent Ruin.
LDW: What other recordings do you have in the pipeline?
Alicia: The first recording was by Craigums in Oakland, in December, and we just recorded four songs in May with Ear Hammer, which is also in Oakland. We’re submitting one of them for a Bay Area bands comp that Brian Stern is putting out. Two of them we submitted to the Maximum Rocknroll comp. We’re still waiting to hear about that. Future plans are to record in the fall. We still have to figure out when and with whom. We want to put out a record, and we’re writing more songs!
Juliana: Right now we have a tape and a flexi, with five songs each. That’s it.
LDW: Dharma, is it safe to assume that you’re doing the lyric writing?
Dharma: Yes.
LDW: And what are the topics of these songs?
Dharma: Some of them are pretty philosophical, life struggles in general. Others have to do with funny social occurrences that you might find in most social circles…
LDW: Like what, for example?
Dharma: Well, there’s this song “Sycophant,” which is not necessarily about a particular person, but how some people might try to exploit punk or hardcore, the underground social circle, for means of climbing the social ladder and being recognized for not particular reason but to be seen, which can sometimes hurt other people in the end. “You Can’t Stop the Weather” is more of a life struggle song. It’s about going through tough times — you can’t change change what happens, you just gotta role with the storm I guess. And then “Sandy Bottoms” is about having sex on the beach… (laughs) You got your range of topics….
LDW: Right on. So you are doing a tour?
(all): Yes
LDW: How is that going so far?
Juliana: Pretty cool, we’ve played Sacramento, Eureka and Oakland. It’s been pretty cool so far.
LDW: How much longer do you have ahead of you?
Alicia: The rest of the week.
B: Three or four shows. We’re going back to Oakland on Monday, so tomorrow we’re playing in Tacoma, Friday we’re back in Portland playing at Slabtown, Saturday we’re playing in Seattle, Sunday we’re playing in Olympia, and Monday we’re driving home.
LDW: Do you have future tour plans?
B: We’re going to try to make it down to the southern part of California, and hopefully go farther away at some time too. Everything’s nebulous. And we’re going to do a 7″ in December, we hope. We think our friends at Prank Records are going to help put it out, and this guy Flo, what’s his record label?
LDW: Flo from Germany?
B: Yeah. That’s the next big hope, plan
LDW: Do you all live in Oakland, California?
(all): Yes
B: Within about ten blocks of each other.
LDW: Do you feel like you’re members of the entire Bay Area scene, or do you feel very specific to Oakland?
B: Both
Dharma: I was born in Oakland and I’ve never left, so I don’t know. I feel not only part of it but stuck to it. I haven’t really cut the umbilical chord on that one yet.
Juliana: I think our sister bands are Permanent Ruin, who have members from San Francisco and San Jose. Effluxus has members from San Francisco and Oakland, Hunting Party the same, so it’s this new breed of Bay Area bands that have members in common with Oakland, San Francisco, Bay Area… it’s kind of a new scene.
B: There’s generally more going on in Oakland. We’re all united to bands from the greater Bay Area.
Juliana: But the thing is, in San Francisco, most shows are in bars, which sucks. And in Oakland it’s usually punk houses, which is way better, I think.
Dharma: Not as many outdoor shows anymore, which I wish would happen again.
LDW: Awesome. Anything else you want to say to the listeners at large?
Juliana: Hope you can come to the show in Portland on Friday cause Walls is really good.
Alicia: Thanks for letting us play here. This was awesome. I’ve never done anything like this.
Juliana: I got nervous but it was cool.
(Everyone adds their cute self deprecation moments)
LDW: You’re very welcome… and if people want to find your music, how do they contact you?
B: We have r-e-p-l-i-c-a.bandcamp.com, and an email replicacore@gmail.com
Alicia: And you can find our flexi on the Radical Punks Never Die website, and we’re on Facebook at facebook.com/replicareplica.
LDW: Thank you!
Life During Wartime can be heard on Portland, OR’s KBOO 90.7 FM Wednesday nights from 11 p.m. — 1 a.m. They can be reached at lifeduringwartimepdx@gmail.com, and you can send them records at PO Box 1113, Portland OR 97207-1113. Get their podcast here.
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