A Conversation With: HOLLERADO

by Sakina Shakil | 19th April 2010

Hollerado may be the nicest band ever. I had the opportunity to chat with the boys before their April 9^th show at Sneaky Dee’s with Sandman Viper Command and Titus Andronicus (check out my review here). The day before, they had performed at MuchMusic and partied late into the night at the Horseshoe Tavern. Then, before speaking with me, they had another interview at Ryerson University.

Needless to say, they were exhausted. And extremely hungry: I watched them devour two of Sneaky Dee’s famous King’s Crown Nachos in about half an hour. Still, Menno Versteeg, Jake Boyd, Dean Baxter, and Nick (Nixon) Boyd – guitar, drums, bass, guitar, respectively – were gracious as ever. In between mouthfuls of nachos and preparing for their upcoming set, we managed to cover a spectrum of topics, ranging from their concerts, their music, their disdain for suburbanization, and their unabashed hatred for Chad Kroeger.

You’re back in Toronto! How many times have you played here before?

Menno: I think we’ve played 41 shows in Toronto. About 41… 42… 45…

Jake: At least 35, for sure.

What are you expecting tonight?

Dean: I don’t know. Just to have fun, like always. That’s all we’re ever looking to get out of it. That’s always the theme. We don’t expect much, so that way we leave pretty happy.

Menno: It’s going to be busy, and fun. Sandman Viper Command is amazing, and Titus Andronicus is great. It’s going to be nuts.

You’re playing a show in Montreal tomorrow night. How do the fans in Montreal compare to Toronto?

Menno: Montreal is younger. A little bit wilder. Montreal you can play a bill with totally different types of bands. You can have three bands or four bands that sound nothing the same and people will still dig it. Here, it’s like you need a bill.

Jake: Montreal doesn’t really have nachos.

They have poutine.

Jake: Yeah… Definitely doesn’t make up for this though.

Playing Montreal the day after Toronto is what you did last year, right?

Jake: Yeah. Going from Toronto to Montreal is a natural progression for us.

Last year’s tour, your “Residency Tour”, is pretty legendary. Would you do it again?

Jake: That tour? Yeah. But I would do it in May though. Wait, I take that back. Doing a tour like that in February is kind of nice. You’re busy, and you get February done. And then, in May, when it’s really nice out, you can do a little bit of a vacation or something, you know. That’s what we did last year and it was really nice.

I read an article from 2008 in Chart Attack where you guys had said that basically all the people who came out to your shows were your friends.

Dean: Yeah. I think that’s pretty common for most bands starting out.

But how do you think that’s progressed?

Dean: There are more people. We’re fortunate enough to have people interview us. Some radio stations will have us in to play, so it’s always broadening the people who get to hear us. We don’t know everybody who comes to see us now. Which is a good thing.

Out of all the cities you will be playing, which one are you looking most forward to?

Dean: For some reason I want to say Saskatoon. Because we always have fun there, and this time it should be really fun. So that’s all.

What can you tell me about Record in a Bag?

Jake: It was a lot of fun to make. We hope lots more people hear it and enjoy it. I hope somebody doesn’t break up with the love of their life because they heard a song on it. Yeah. I’m gonna go with that.

Do you have a favourite song on the album?

Jake: I don’t really listen to it other than to practice the drum stuff. But to play it, I really like playing the song “Got to lose.” And “Juliette” is really fun to play because people are starting to know it a bit. So that’s fun, because they’ve heard it before. If there’s one song that people that are going to our shows have heard before, it’s that one.

When are you planning to get back in the studio, and record another album?

Dean: As soon as we can but it’s not looking like at least July. We have a bunch of stuff that we’re just waiting to let loose I guess. Not let loose. It’s not even ready yet. But we have stuff. We’re anxious to get back.

Dean, you okay there? [Dean is holding his head in one hand and examining his blackberry with the other.]

Dean: Yeah, sorry. I was just trying to find out how to make my e-mails two lines in my blackberry. I was busy. I’m new to it, so I’m curious.

Jake: (laughs) No we’ve just had a really crazy day.

What did you guys do today?

Nick: Well we went to a really cool show last night. With a band called the Smith Westerns. They were playing at the Horseshoe. We kind of partied too hard last night based on the schedule we had today.

And the schedule you have tomorrow, right?

Nick: And tomorrow, yes. And the day after that we’re going to Fredericton. And then today we went to an interview at Ryerson. What else did we do? We met up with some friends of ours that own a company called Eastwood guitars, and they gave us a mandolin. So we’re going to try and use the mandolin at the show tonight. We actually already had one of their mandolins: an electric mandolin. Now we have two. So we’re going to do a mandolin trial. It’s going to be fun.

Jake: We did the worst interview and the best interview ever today. We, and the opening band Sandman Viper Command, did an interview together, and it was just everybody saying whatever they wanted. It was just basically a bunch of dudes having a stupid, teenager style conversation, and recording it. It was at Ryerson University, and I think on 102.1 the Edge. I mean, they were really nice people at Ryerson University but you know… you know what I mean. Well, it wasn’t bad. It was just really silly. It just wasn’t serious at all.

Nick: It was really obnoxious and immature, actually. We were obnoxious and immature, I mean. We just started talking about Chad Kroeger, and that opened up a can of worms. Everybody just started making fun of him. Just like, basically slandering the guy’s name for the whole interview. Which is nice. Bands like us who are working really hard to make music different and interesting have a real bone to pick with Chad Kroeger, who’s making it, uh, uninteresting and not very inventive. His lyrics are total crap, and we just always have a bone to pick with him I guess. It was fun for us, but I’m sure the interviewers weren’t very impressed.

You guys are from Manotick, yeah?

Jake: Yeah.

In 2009 it became part of the city of Ottawa. How do you feel about that?

Jake: Small towns should stay small towns. Because it really was a true small town. And I feel like now when we go back there it’s just becoming some more of that suburbanized sprawl. The city of Ottawa, as it is, is just sort of imposing its own vibe on the town. There’s, like, developers that are coming in and making all these houses on outskirts of the town that are exactly the same.

Have you heard of Minto Developments?

Jake: Exactly. Those people are assholes. They’re fucking our town up. They’re raping the heart and soul of our town. But, at the same time, people have to have a place to eat. And the people who work for that business have to have money to eat, you know. Everybody’s got to work. I’m not blaming anybody but it does suck.

Sorry, I’m talking politics here.

Jake: I don’t have the time or brain cells to pay attention to that.

After the long day?

Jake: No, I just mean in general. For me, in my downtime, I just like to buy vinyls; buy and collect vinyls. I don’t even have the time to actually listen to those vinyls even. And you know, hang out with my friends. And smoke stuff. Not crack though.

I want to go back to Manotick, for a minute. Are the rumours true, that all four of you grew up on the same street?

Jake: Yeah, in Manotick. I was probably 9 or 10, or 11. Menno took Nick and I to our first rock concert. He’s a little older than us and he had a car. It was Foo Fighters and Green Day, back when both were still awesome. Neither of those bands are the worst things out there though.

Well, now Dave Grohl is in –

Jake: Them Crooked Vultures. For me, it was just like seeing the dude who played drums in Nirvana. I think Dave Grohl is probably my favorite drummer ever. That was really cool. It was something. And like, smelling pot smoke for the first time. It’s like smelling the future man.

How often do you visit Manotick?

Dean: Jake and Nick’s parents moved from that place. Menno still lives there, though not so much. Just to Menno’s house. We always go back for the big festival though. It’ll be fun.

Menno: We live really anywhere now. Right now, we don’t have a home. We’re living in a van.

So, nomadic?

Menno: Yeah, nomadic. Exactly.

Do you have a television in your van?

Dean: Well we can only play VHS. So we watch Star Wars… We have a very nice collection of VHS movies.

Who’s your favourite character from Star Wars?

Dean: Yoda. He’s so wise.

How is the van contest going?

Jake: Well a lot of people are interested in e-mailing us a ten word e-mail. ‘Hey guys, yeah my name is Matt, and I play in the band Natural Blonde,’ or whatever. People have the time and energy to do that, but not a lot of people have the time and energy to enter the contest properly, which they have to create a video of them doing something awesome for somebody. So that’s kind of discouraging. People basically are too lazy to do something nice for someone and film it and put it on the Internet. But we’re hoping that some people, at least one or two people, will start to do that. The deadline is April 23^rd.

How many proper entries have you gotten so far?

Jake: There’s one. Basically one. And they’re a really good band from Ottawa called hotshotcasino, so if they win by default then that’s good enough for me.

All right, one final question. If you could be sitting here, eating a plate of Nachos with any person – dead or alive – who would it be?

Jake: You three!

Nick: Sitting with you guys is pretty sweet, but…

Jake: I’d say King Tut would have to be one. Because he’s in Toronto.

Nick: So we could make it a reality.

Jake: He is though, actually. At the AGO.

Nick: For me, John Lennon. And Genghis Khan is in there for sure.

Jake: Noah, from Noah’s Ark.

Nick: I’ll take Noah’s wife. She’d be very polite.

Jake: What’s the first Prime Minister’s name? John A. Macdonald. He was probably a raging drunk too.

Dean: Bruce Willis and Michael Jordan. I’m fine with those two.

Menno: Hank Williams, Napoleon, and a caveman.