Go Fever really shouldn't be this good already.
They haven't been a band for very long, is what we're saying. It's sort of an unspoken rule of being in a rock 'n roll band that you kinda have to put in some time, you know, sucking. Or at the very least being mediocre for a little while. Apparently, nobody told Go Fever about this much-suffered phenomenon, because their very first album smacks of a band who knows exactly what they want to achieve musically and who has every tool at their disposal to achieve that vision. Go figure.
Maybe you can chalk up this out-of-the-gate excellence to the fact that each member of Go Fever has an impressive musical pedigree playing in other Austin bands (among them Sweet Spirit, Star Parks, Burgess Meredith, Glass Grapes, and Tear Dungeon). Whatever the case, something really great happens when singer-songwriter Acey Monaro, Benjamin Burdick, Keith Lough, Sam Rives and Josh Merry get together to make music.
With a show coming up at Stubb's on April 28th, we spoke with each member of Go Fever about foul smelling trees, becoming friends with Lena Dunham, fish guts, and more.
Do512: What is the dumbest way that you've ever hurt yourself?
Acey: This is pretty standard for people our age, but after the Jackass movies came out, I tried to do a whole bunch of stuff. Like as soon as I came out of the movie (we were at a mall with a cinema) my friends and I got in shopping trolleys and pushed each other around and a car T-boned me and I really fucked up my knee, and it's an ongoing problem. We also started pushing each other over in Porta Potties... they could never get me over. But that's probably the stupidest thing.
Josh: I was running up a slide when it was raining when I was ten and I fell over and broke my two front teeth out. Half of my teeth are fake because I've broken half my teeth.
Sam: The only time I ever broke a bone was when I was like being an eleven-year-old fancy boy pretending to ice-skate on the ice with just my regular sneakers. And then my dad told me to stop doing it, and then I slipped and broke my wrist. So it's like, if I had just kept on being my sweet little self, I was having a lovely graceful time, and then he told me to be a real boy and then I and broke my arm. Sooo heteronormativity strikes again.
What is the best part of being a musician in Austin, Texas?
Acey: You can play two nights a week and people will still come out to your shows. There are gigs all the time. Comparing it to cities that we've lived in before where there's less of a scene, I mean even in Sydney.
Keith: The sound systems, all the clubs are pretty quality. We rarely play anywhere where the sound is bad, and I appreciate that.
Josh: I just think you can learn a lot, too. Like they said, there's like 13 shows a night, so you can go to shows and if you pay attention instead of being a turd, if you see a good band, you can learn how to be a good band. If you see a shitty band, you can learn not to do things that they do. It can also give you hope because you see shitty bands and you're like, "Oh, moms can do better than that."
Keith: I think the good thing is you get to play with a lot of different people, which is good for everybody involved to play more.
Josh: Oh I know another thing too, through just as many people and musicians I have added on facebook, I can go on there pretty much at any time and just be like "I need a poodle" and within two minutes it's just like, "I got a poodle, I got a poodle, I got a poodle."
Go Fever | Photo Credit Roger Ho
What is one thing you flat-out refuse to do, ever?
Josh: Vape.
Sam: Crack cocaine, not gonna do that. Not gonna fuckin' do it! It's whack! I learned that as a child.
Acey: Buy Josh a drum-kit.
Keith: I would say, starting now, no more train beats. I don't want to play a train beat on the drums. Like a snare drum.
Josh: Fuck, I'm never gonna be able to listen to Bob Dylan again without saying, "there's a train beat, there's another fuckin' train beat."
Excluding musical equipment, if I gave you $5,000 right now and you had to spend it within an hour, what would you spend it on?
Ben: Going to the airport and just getting a flight to whatever exotic place.
Josh: I'd probably just go pay my rent for forever.
Keith: Yeah, I'd pay half of my taxes from this year.
Acey: I would do something dumb like I'd hire a limousine to take us on all a bar crawl.
Sam: I'd probably just pay like for an IOU on studio time. So that you could record music. Because, all we care about is making more music, so I don't wanna buy just stuff!
What is something that you're paranoid about?
Acey: I don't want anyone to hear me farting and pissing. I'm really full on about it. Because I like, fart all the time and it doesn't bother me, but there's something extremely embarrassing about, like, farting in your sleep or while you're pissing, when you're not in control and it's not funny, cause you're like, not in control of the joke. It's terrifying! When I fell asleep in the back of a van on our way back from Dallas, we had eaten McDonald's and just a bunch of trash. And every ten minutes I would wake up and be like, "Did I just let one rip?" And then I'd fall back asleep.
Sam: I never post about whenever I'm out of town because I don't want people to break into my house or touch my wife.
Keith: Sam's also paranoid about our studio burning down.
Sam: Yeah, they had a candle burning in there yesterday and I was like, "You need to blow that out."
Keith: I keep having a recurring dream that I get kicked out of the house that I'm renting. I've been there for 6 years, just around the corner. I think that's what I'm most paranoid about, like getting that call like, we're out of there, find a new house. They tried to sell it last year. It's just a good spot and it's a good price. I don't wanna start over.
Josh: I had fuckin' meat-mares last night after all that Torchy's. If I eat meat or cheese, within like an hour of going to sleep, its just insane dreams. Like stress dreams.
Go Fever | Photo Credit: Roger Ho
What smell reminds you of your childhood?
Acey: This is really weird... leather. Leather and fish guts. Because there was always dead fish on the banks of the river I used to live by. And my dad fished a lot and he just always smelled like fish guts. I had two dads, and one of them was a motorbike dude, and so whenever he came to visit he was always wearing bike leathers, so that must've been it.
Sam: Bike tires, because my dad used to work in a bike shop. So whenever I'm in a bike store I'm like, "mmmm."
Keith: Freshly mowed grass.
Josh: In our practice space right now, there's some kind of air freshener that they used that my friend had in his car all the time when I was like 13 or 14 and so our practice place smells like my friend's car. Everyone else is like, "this is fuckin' gross," but I love it. That, and dogwood trees. I fucking hate how dogwood trees smell.
Acey: Are those the ones that smell like cum?
Josh: Yeah! They totally do. When I was young I grew up in North Carolina and at the church my family went to, the whole parking lot was dogwood trees. And one day I was walking to the car with my family from church, and I was like... "it smells like cum!"
What is your least favorite song from your favorite album, and why?
Josh: "Baby I'm a Star" off of Purple Rain. Because it's the only song on that album that not like, "Jesus christ, that's such a good fuckin' song." I love that album, but that song is just like, bullshit. It just seems like Prince made it up, and was just like, "there's another song." Whereas every other song on that album is so good.
Sam: It's hard to even remember the songs that I don't like on the albums that I love because I've long since been reconciled to them. It's like, what did I not like about "Ram" by Linda and McCartney? Or "Abbey Road" or whatever. I like all the bad songs, it's cheesy, but it's part of what it is, you know? Because otherwise, why would you even love the record? There was some movie critic that said something that I always apply to records, which was like, "a great movie is one where there's three great scenes and no bad scenes," and I feel like a great record is the same way, where there's like three great songs and no bad songs. Sometimes there's songs that aren't as good, but they're all great if it's a record I love, I guess.
Acey: True, it's all relative. Like the bad songs that people don't like from a Beatles record, if you put them up against like, Sum 41 or something, it's pretty good.
Go Fever | Photo Credit Roger Ho
Is there a particular moment you've imagined or achievement you have to unlock to where you think, "We've made it as a band"?
Acey: I've always wanted to play Letterman. And I'm a kid from a country town in Australia. That was always my benchmark. And then I remember when Letterman was no more, and I was like "Oh well, guess I'll never play Letterman."
Keith: Yeah, I've always imagined him announcing the band.
Acey: I just wanted to chill with Letterman on the couch, I wasn't just gonna play... This is so so daggy, but I have a not so super fantasy about being friends with Lena Dunham. And like, being a part of her clique. I've had imaginary conversations with her.
Josh: If you become friends with her, I'm not fuckin' hanging out with you.
Keith: This is cliché as all hell, but before I started living in Austin it was ACL Live. That was it. I watched that as a kid and I was just like, "If I could play that... then I don't have to do anything else."
Acey: I remember playing a show at Lambert's and I got everyone around and was gonna buy everyone a shot with [the money we got] and I said, "Alright! A round of shots of your finest whiskeys!" and then we got the bill and I ended up having to fork out an extra 40 bucks or something out of my pocket 'cause they were really expensive!
Sam: The more I play music the more I actually feel it's a real part of my life the less I really believe in "making it." I don't care. I love what we're doing. I don't really care about that so much anymore.
Josh: I know exactly what it is, being able to quit your other job.
What song would y'all like to be playing as Go Fever goes riding triumphantly into battle?
Josh: "Hallowed Be Thy Name" by Iron Maiden.
Sam: "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," just so I could like slip away while they were distracted. 'Cause I'm not riding into any fuckin' battle.
Acey: Simon and Garfunkel, "The Sounds of Silence."
Keith: I'd go, "Achilles Last Stand."
Acey: Actually no, oh my god, of course I want, "Fanfare for the Common Man."
Sam: Actually one time when I was flying into Montreal in the clouds, I was listening to the first song on Scott Walker II and it was the most victorious, grand, "Fuck you Canada! I cannot wait to land on your fuckin' asshole."
Someone is going to sit down and start writing the Go Fever biography. What is this chapter called?
Sam: "Farts"
Acey: "Introduction"
Sam: "The Tale of Two Joshes"
Acey: Yeah, exactly! "The Tale of Two Joshes"
