slice of lime

Read The Full Interview Here…

“It’s like if Simple Plan went to a Grateful Dead show and then loved Nirvana”

I pride myself on my ability to find amazing small bands, and I do believe Rat Von Rat is my new diamond. I asked them what they thought made them stand out and they seemed pretty set that there wasn’t anything too different from what was occurring around them in Fort Collins, but if I had to title it it would be their focus and versatility.
They range from alt-rock to garage rock gone trippy. I hear some emo and metal influence tucked behind their muscle memory and own personal tastes, and the longer I listen to Rat Von Rat the more I find something new to catch my attention. They have a million sparkly moments in their songs, without ranging into over-stimulating noise rock. The members invited me into one of their practice nights where we talked about their experiences as a newer band in Fort Collins and the growth we should expect to see from them from here on out. They gave me a personal performance of some of their favorite and newer songs. I was impressed with their ability to settle into place with each other in the practice environment, there was a quiet focus to their playing while staying light and joking around with each other.

“This has become less of my solo project and more of a project where we all bring ideas to the table and we all work together to make a unique sound.”

One of the first songs I heard from them is ‘Sweet Summer Days’ which is a fruity Weezer-esque song filled with great bass riffs. It played to their strengths in the more floaty, fuzzy garage rock elements. My personal favorite was ‘Evil Big Machine’ in all its bouncy, beckoning glory. The cherry red drum set in their studio felt like a picturesque album cover to show the rough-edged emotion packed alongside a catchy melody. It highlighted the members nicely and built upon itself naturally. Their songs all explore sound in different ways, even ranging in dynamics and feel throughout a single song. The versatility through sound makes them a band I am keen to watch grow, as they explore more into the crunchy garage rock sound exemplified in their debut single ‘Aurora Ave (demo) [The Seattle Song]. They seem to be at a peak moment in their growth as well, recording an EP and working on new songs. The promise of their hypnotic guitar melodies and pleasantly raspy vocals captured my attention and hopefully everyone else’s.

Interview

Q: Let’s start with names, roles, and anything fun you want to tell me about yourselves.

Zach: Yeah, I’m Zach aka Big Man. They call me a bunch of things actually that I don’t particularly agree with but I do rule with an iron fist. I make sure they stay in line. Interesting fact about time, I’m really good at Smash Bros. Like scary good, like better than the music I write. I’m the frontman, I play rhythm guitar and I sing.
Shawn: I’m Shawn. I play lead guitar and I follow the guy with the iron fist. Interesting fact about me I will leave up to these guys. I will hand off to these guys.
Zach: Nothing really interesting to say there.
Caleb: Honestly, the most boring person I know.
Zach: Pretty bland.
Destin: I’m Destin. I play bass and I’m the certified in-house meme lord/comedian. Yeah, and other than that I just do what he says, because he scares me sometimes.
* Zach makes a whip sound *
Caleb: I’m Caleb and I do be drumming. I record our stuff a lot of the time, and I just do whatever these guys do. Honestly, like, you know there’s a pecking order here and I’m all the way down there.
Shawn: We make him do our dishes.
Zach: We invite him over to our house for band practice, but we just make him do dishes all night.
Caleb: Yeah, I’m like “Maybe this time we’ll practice. Guys, this time? We’ll get it next time.” I don’t get it, you guys have a dishwasher.
Zach: Yeah, his name is Caleb.

Q: How did you guys all meet? How did this come together?

Zach: That’s a long story. About three years ago, just after the pandemic was coming to a close, I decided I was going to live out of my car and pursue my musical career. I ended up bouncing around from place to place, and my car actually ended up breaking down in Fort Collins, in the CSU parking lot. So, I basically lived out of CSU for a week as I tried to fix my oil pan. I did a lot of street performing and busking and one day I met this guy who was like “Yo, come to this open jam. It’s going to be a lot of fun.” I said “Yah okay, my car just got fixed. Why not? Why not have a night on the town?” After the open jam, he was like “Yo, I’ve got some friends from New Jersey that are in town, they just moved here. Let’s go to the bar and drink with them.” So, we’re all at this bar, we’re all hanging out, and one thing leads to another and I ended up crashing at these people from Jersey’s house. I wake up the next morning and the only other person in the house was this guy, Shawn here. I was like “Yo, do you play music?” and he was like “Yeah, I play music”. Then we had a little jam and exchanged phone numbers. Came back the next year, still living out of my car, and still being homeless. He just like popped the question one day. He got down on one knee and said “I need new roommates. Will you move in with me?” I said, “You know what, Shawn, yes. I do.”
Shawn: That was before the Illegal Pete’s gig.
Zach: Yeah, before that we had one gig that had like a week of preparation before.
Shawn: Not even, it was like two practices for an hour or two. It was when he was coming back out anyway and I was just like, hey here. But I think you set the show up.
Zach: Yeah, I set the show up.
Shawn: Then he was like, I need people to play. We – me and another guy, Jason, and at the time, Kyle, we’re all like “Yeah we like your stuff”. If you want a full band to get behind it, we were all decent enough to throw it together in a decent way with that kind of time frame, like two days or so. So, I mean we did it. It was definitely rough. The songs are a lot different sounding today than what they sounded like at that point because, I mean, we’ve had time to sit with them. After that, we just vibed. I needed to kick my roommate out and ask him if he wanted to stay and get a room in my house because he was talking about moving here.
Destin:  I got a quick phone call from this little son-of-a-bitch. He was like “Dammit Destin, I need a roommate. This other guy, Zach, he’s quite a songwriter.”
Shawn: Yeah, these two had never met each other till then.
Destin: Now we’re roommates.
Zach: Then, I met Caleb, his other band was playing, Sonic Dispatch whoo! We needed a drummer, so I ended up getting his contact information, and then we tried a couple of times.
Shawn: I didn’t think it was a good idea at first.
Caleb: Me and this guy met one time. We had like one jam with a couple of other dudes. I don’t think we said one word to each other the whole entire time.
Shawn: Yeah, I don’t think so. Like you were just saying, in the pecking order of things we were trying to step behind someone else’s acoustic songs and build them up. So, we’re just like, “So tell us what to do.” Which is kind of unusual for me, I’m usually spearheading things. We just kind of sat there and didn’t say anything to each other, and played music for an hour or two.
Caleb: Didn’t remember your name.
Shawn: I think we may have followed each other on Instagram. When he was moving in, he needed a drummer. Our previous drummer was problematic, to say the least. I was like, “Well, I do know this guy. I don’t know if it’s really going to be the right fit”. Not that I was saying he’s a bad drummer or anything like that. We practiced once as we were walking out in front of the house here. I was just about to be like “Yeah man, I don’t know.” When he was like “Yeah man! That was fucking great I can’t wait to do it again!”

Q: Have you guys seen things change over time as you added in more people and more voices and inspirations?

Zach: Absolutely, like this has become less of my solo project and more of a project where we all bring ideas to the table and we all work together to make a unique sound. At least, I think so.

Q: Do you guys have a goal in mind when making a song, like I want it to sound like this or more of a go-with-the-flow type of process?

Zach: It’s more of an organic process where we’re like, ah that didn’t sound good let’s try this instead. Or we’ll combine ideas.
Caleb: I mean, honestly, too, when we started playing like we had no clue it was gonna sound the way it sounds like we probably all had our own ideas of how it was gonna sound. Then it just sounded the way it sounded and it sounded pretty badass. So, we were like you know what let’s keep going.
Shawn: The dynamic has definitely changed a bit because I think we all kinda, or at least myself, all went into it asking Zach like, there are your songs so what do you want me to do? What do you want it to sound like? You know, playing music for the past decade, I’ve been able to basically do whatever I want instead of asking someone else what do you need from me. So, it was different and we kind of just tried that for a little bit then I think it just wasn’t working. We started throwing our own kind of influences into it and you know, keeping the big picture in mind. I think all these songs sound a lot different than he ever thought they would, and we had no idea what to expect.
Caleb: It makes it fun.

Q: You said that two of you had a background in music, how about the other two do you as well?

Shawn: Yeah. I played for years, actually since high school with this guy back on the East Coast. It was mostly psychedelic rock/reggae. Definitely playing in Rat Von Rat and the sound we’re making is different than anything I’ve ever played before, but I love it.

Q: You said you’re not originally from Fort Collins, and you’ve traveled quite a bit. How do you find Fort Collins to be for you musically?

Destin: Oh amazing. The music scene here is so tight. So many great bands of all different genres too. My music taste is very vast, so seeing a good local punk band or seeing a good local jam band and seeing how good they are really inspires.
Shawn: You’ve got a lot of stuff over here. Bluegrass, jazz, just about anything.
Zach: The fusion funk guys. Yeah, everything.
Shawn: Where we grew up everything was basically cover bands, then your kind of New Jersey hippie jam bands.
Destin: Or Country or Christian Rock.
Shawn: Even those were kind of few and far between. There’s a big punk DIY kind of scene, but that’s about it. Over here there’s a lot of different stuff going on and everybody seems to have decent momentum.

Q: What have you found are your favorite people to work with, those who are genrely similar?

Shawn: We haven’t really had the ability to choose our lineups, but it’s kind of nice in that sense anyway because then sometimes you get thrown into the mix with other genres that might not be quite the same thing, but you might have some overlaps somewhere. Embellish the overall idea. So, maybe some people come for that band, and they’re not really into what we sound like. They’re at the show and like okay I see the similarities and that’s just kind of cool.
Destin: Also, we’ve gone along the way. We’re meeting them, meeting new musicians, more talent, and that’s how we’ve been getting more gigs from that too.
Caleb: Whether it’s a bar or brewery or garage party.
Zach: Our last gig was at a Vuncular Bobs, and we were playing with two groups. One was a cover band, and one was this soft indie rock band, and then we were smack dab in the middle. The person who gave us the gig was like, “I think you’re the perfect bridge between these two bands”. We started off at peaking and ended off at peaking. Just going crazy doing our more punk-ish kind of songs. I like playing with every kind of genre of band. In conclusion, Rat Von Rat works with everyone.
Caleb: Unless you’re a dick.
Zach: Yeah, be nice or get out.

Q: What do you find is a lot of the inspiration behind your stuff?

Zach: Oh, lots of stuff.
Destin: Lots of different Weezer albums.
Zach: Yeah, lots of different Weezer albums. Weezer is definitely one of them. CAKE is another huge inspiration. Nirvana. Just sort of like grungy alternative rock. Marcy Playground.
Destin: I think for me it’s this band out of Jersey called Disposable. Really good surf punk. Honestly, when I play music that’s what gives me the drive.
Shawn: You know, you should’ve had them on instead of us.
Zach: Absolutely.

Q: Do you find your own personal taste leaks into what you’re playing?

Destin: 100%
Shawn: Zach hated it at first too.
Zach: Yeah, when I went back to Washington, there’s this song called ‘Sweet Summer Days’ that we were trying to record and I get the files of the bass and guitar sent back to me and I put on my headphones, I click play, and I was just like “No, no, this is awful. This is garbage.” It was way too high volume in comparison, and I started mixing it a little bit and the sound was better. That was still at the point where they were asking me like, what exactly do you want me to play? It’s like I want you to be yourself.
Destin: He kept saying that but not a fuckin part of me believed that.
Zach: Now look at us!
Destin: We have, me and Shawn especially, a lot of improv jam influence or style that we bring to the table. I always think about the overall sound of a song, and Shawn does too. But you know, especially practicing I like to throw a wrench into the mix here and there and Zach absolutely loves it.
Zach: Every time.
Dustin: I just want to note too, we still use that part he’s talking about that we recorded.
Zach: We did still use it.
Caleb: It grew on us.
Zach: It’s different now though.
Destin: It’s kind of repositioned between both verses its in just one, and we put like the other double stop parts at the end there. How it works though is he comes up with a lot of the meat and potatoes and we’ll add this or that. None of the songs are the same when they start, compared to the year into it.

Q: What does the creative process look like for you guys, is it a lot of that jam inspiration?

Zach: Usually what happens is I get really depressed, lock myself into my room, spend like three- or four days watching anime. Specifically, Gundam. I’ll have my notebook out; I’ll write down lyrics about what’s making me sad and then I’ll come back and be like “Guys I got an idea!” We’ll jam on it and then they’ll add stuff to it and more parts and more lyrics and eventually have a song.
Caleb: Mostly jamming.
Shawn: A lot of times too. It frustrates everyone. They’ll come up with the meat and potatoes. We’ll put it into a format of some sort. Even on some of the songs we still play, I’m still playing things differently every time we go through because I’m still trying to figure out what I want.
Caleb: I love doing 12 bars for solo every practice, it’s super awesome.
Shawn: I’m not used to playing lead guitar, or I call it more like auxiliary guitar because that sounds less dickish. I’m not playing the chords and sometimes all I need to be is a little groove in the background. A couple of notes sometimes change the whole picture. Absolutely. So, it’s been different. I’ll be noodling for quite some time while I guess these guys just get the meat and potatoes tighter and tighter. It works itself out over time.

Q: We just entered the new year, look back on the past year what are some of your favorite moments as a band?

Zach: Drinking Windex on stage.
Shawn: The Birdhouse shows have been really good.
Zach: Yeah, they’ve been great. Best shows.
Destin: Unfortunately, they’re no longer having those shows at that house.
Zach: Mal is trying to bring that sort of brand, the Birdhouse brand, into being a talent buyer and booking shows at like bigger venues. I’m really excited for that to get up and running.
Caleb: That’d be sick.
Zach: Yeah, I think that’d be a lot of fun.
Destin: Yeah, last year we played probably more gigs than I thought we were gonna play.
Zach: Yeah, absolutely. We played that house show where the crowd was giving us no energy at all. It was a day when we had two shows, and the first one was awful.
Shawn: It was like playing in a Hospice ward.
Destin: It was early.
Shawn: There were like seven people there.
Zach: So, I started anger drinking and then we get to Birdhouse and then we just killed. It was probably my favorite show.
Caleb: People were warmed up.
Zach: We also played in New Jersey which was a lot of fun.
Caleb:  Jersey was dope.
Zach: That’s when we played the Greeks in New Jersey.
Destin: It’s our hometown staple venue. It’s a dive bar with the coolest people and friends. We’re friends with the owners and the regulars and whatnot. We had a huge crowd for Rat Von Rat for that out there.
Zach: Lots of fun.

Q: Looking forward to the new year, what are your dream goals? Anything you’re working on?

Shawn: I really want Zach to write us new songs.
Zach: I’ve got four or five new songs we’re working on. We’re currently in the process of recording an EP. We’ve got one demo out already, and we’re thinking about releasing another single before the EP. I think that is probably our first goal to get done this year.
Destin: Play more venues and the EP would help with that too.
Zach: So, we would have something to send people.
Caleb: A bit thing, I really wanna play focoMX, I don’t know about you.
Zach: I reapplied and now I’m praying to the focoMX deities out there to get back to me.
Dustin: Expand our audience and play more shows, release more music, and have fun.
Shawn: Kind of wild that it’s been almost a year at this point.
Zach: Yeah, we didn’t start practicing until March of last year.

Q: How have you seen things change in that year since starting?

Zach: We’re just kind of flying by the seat of our pants.
Caleb: I feel like your songs are a little different now that you have the full band.
Zach: Writing more has become more of what can I write that the boys will be able to jump on and make better.
Shawn: Anything.
Zach: Yeah, please something new.
Destin: No, you’re killing it. I have the worst writer’s block myself, have for years, and as much as I’m decent at writing. I can do a good bass part, but Zach here, his songs I was blown away like I’m fucking very happy to be playing in a band with this kid because he’s very talented.
Caleb: Yeah we got lucky there.
Zach: That’s a big compliment, man.
Caleb: Like we don’t kiss your ass all the time.
Shawn: Musically too, one big thing that goes into is not hating each other and the people you work with. So being with the three of us living together. Going back to the question of how. When they moved in, we weren’t just developing musically we were developing socially. So, we were all growing in other ways and it has definitely helped with our writing process be smoother.
Destin: I’ve lived with this guy before and I’ve known him for most of my life now at this point and I’m still not sick of him completely.
Zach:  We’re just waiting for Caleb to say “I want to move in.”
Destin: You’ve got dishes.
Caleb: This house is our home studio as well.
Destin: We’re moving in actually pretty soon.
Caleb: Yeah, well there’s only four bedrooms and one is the studio.
Zach: You’ve got two couches in this thing.

Q: If you guys had to describe what makes you different from other Fort Collins bands, what would you say it is?

Destin: Alcoholism.
Caleb: No, no. There are plenty of those around.
Zach: That’s how we sound alike.
Destin: I don’t know. I would say besides Caleb here, and I guess Shawn too, we’re fairly new to the scene.
Caleb: I’d say variety.
Zach: We do have some pretty high highs and low lows without music. Maybe that makes us different. I don’t know.
Shawn: It’s hard to be like, oh, we sound different without sounding like an asshole. I think maybe because it’s new territory to me. It’s like if Simple Plan went to a Grateful Dead show and then loved Nirvana. A lot of weird stuff is going on. We touch on a lot of different genres like we could play a Birdhouse show where all these other people have no idea who we are. There are a lot of punk bands going on a lot of times. A lot of the time, it’s just like punk. Like Caleb was saying, we do a lot of highs and lows. If you’re like why does it sound like Blind Melon x Nirvana? Now it’s Simple Plan. I don’t get it. What’s going on?
Zach: The guitarist just took a solo.
Shawn: Introducing all these kids to ten-minute guitar solos.
Destin: In those genre scenes, cause there definitely plenty of phenomenal local jam bands here.
Destin: It’s here, it’s in town, you know. It’s definitely not 10 minutes, I’m exaggerating. Not so much in the type of scene we are in though, like you don’t typically get a lot of extended guitar solos in punk or alt band.
Shawn: Really just improv in general.
Shawn: Sometimes it’s like “ Oh, I’m taking the solo and you got to follow.” It’s fun. It helps you develop musically too.
Zach: Yeah, absolutely.
Caleb: None of us really played this before, not really. We also come from different backgrounds. I grew up playing metal and stuff. So, this is a little different. I’m like don’t be extra here just play the beat.
Zach: Except you can.
Destin: Until the pocket comes where you could be extra.
Caleb: I haven’t added the double kick band yet.
Destin: But, overall, just dynamic. That’s a big thing we all try to do, keeping the practices, keeping the live shows, the overall sound dynamic has a sound, has your part, help the dynamic you know.
Zach: Teamwork, you know, teamwork makes the dream work.
Caleb: Did you come up with that?
Zach: Yeah, I did. That’s original. That was actually the name of the new song.

Q: Do you guys have a favorite part of all this?

Zach: I think for me, personally, it’s the very first show that I ever played in my life. I totally bombed and I saw everybody. I saw the faces and reactions of people and I was like “Oh shit, I can make people feel something with sound”. Now that we’ve been doing it for a while I’m with these guys. It’s so rewarding to see people enjoy it. That’s my favorite part. Not that I do this for people’s like enjoyment, that’s part of it. But seeing it and having that come to fruition and knowing that people are digging it. That’s my favorite part.
Caleb: Hey, Shawn what’s your favorite part?
Shawn: His favorite part. There’s a Jim Morrison quote that kind of summarizes that, and it’s like ‘If you can make a room full of stoned and drunk people get up and start dancing, you’re doing something right’. Something like that. Yeah. That’s definitely one of my favorite parts of it. I think just in general, everything being new, the style of music, my part in the big picture and not being the ringleader. It’s everything has been new to me this whole past year, and I’ve liked it a lot. I think on a personal level, what I’ve enjoyed or I’m glad I got the most out of it is being able to know that I can apply myself to a different kind of music that is not totally in my comfort zone and still being able to pull it off to an extent. It’s been like a self-proof journey or some bullshit.
Zach: You’re enlightened. What about you Big-D man?
Destin: Don’t call me that.
Zach: Sorry, Little D?
Destin: My favorite part is definitely just freaking jamming out in front of a bunch of people who love our shit. Yeah honestly, like I play better. We all play better when everybody is getting down, dude, and everybody is three sheets to the wind or sober, you know? Just like loving it, dude. That’s the best thing. Honestly, that’s what keeps me going, you know, putting up with these guys all the time would get old if it wasn’t for that.
Caleb: I actually prefer practicing, like, shows are cool, but I don’t know, I’m an anxious person. I just like screwing around and hanging out with friends. I just like practicing together honestly.
Shawn: But half of our practices are just like cooking dinner together.
Zach: That’s what yesterday was.
Caleb: Hey, you make black bean burgers, I will do the dishes.
(tangent about black bean burgers commences)
Zach: Can I change my answer? It’s cooking with the bros.
Shawn: It’s fun watching the high-energy shows, like the Birdhouse shows. Kind of like we were talking about before bringing other people into different areas of music that they might not have been ready for. We start playing like ‘Sweet Summer Days’, and you’re like “Oh, ok, it’s basically like a trippy Wheezer song.” But then we’ll go into a jam or start playing a solo. Nothing’s ever set in stone. Sometimes if the energy is really high I’ll just keep going because I’ll look at the crowd and I’ll see people just like Zach said, responding really hard to what I’m doing. I do this one big bend that’s not like even hard, but people are just like yeah star power. Running off the energy of the crowd is one of my favorite things.

Q: If you had to describe your music to someone whose never heard it before, how would you describe it?

Destin: Sucks, don’t listen to it.
Zach: I guess trippy Wheezer would be.
Caleb: That’s pretty good actually.
Zach: That’s actually a good way to describe it.
Destin: If I was gonna pick a couple of bands it’d be like Pixies, Wheezer, Dinosaur Jr.. 90s – 2000s alternative-ish rock. Let’s touch jam.
Zach: A little bit of seasoning on there.
Destin: Shania Twain
Shawn: A lot of Creed influence.
Zach: So much Creed.
Caleb: Too much.
Destin: Marvin Gaye.
Zach: We also really like 100 gecs. We implement a lot of that like hyper-pop sound into what we do.
Shawn: If you’ve ever listened to the Tony Hawk Pro Skater album, it’s basically what they do but they do it better.

Q: One thing I talk about a lot is community, especially in Fort Collins. What do you guys think makes a good music scene? What are some of Fort Collins strengths and weaknesses?

Zach: The friendship, you know. You go to a show and you end up meeting all these people, and everyone is so accepting of all your differences. You end up partying and having a good time. I think that one of the most important parts of a good scene is the people who are going there. Are they genuinely good people? Fort Collins has got that locked and loaded.
Shawn: There’s a lot of good authenticity with the people that we play with, the crowds that we played for. A lot of the authenticity, a lot of good vibes. It all seems fake sometimes.
Destin: We’re also from New Jersey.
Shawn: When we started playing music in high school. I’m almost 25 now –
Caleb: Whatever you say.
Shawn: We started playing music. There’s always like the weird kind of rivalry and like every show that we went to, even if there were like 4 bands on a bill. There was always a weird battle of the band’s mentality. Everybody here is really authentic. Everybody here genuinely wants to push each other forward.
Destin: Yeah, and I’m almost 18 now. The fans and the musicians both. I’m a musician and a fan and I go out of my way just to see some of these bands play. I’m sure that we have people that do the same for us. $10 at the door, good music, cheap beer, darn tootin.
Shawn: Sometimes it’s hard, when things pick up a lot, it’s hard to find a free day to go see music. But around Fort Collins, you get the music first of all like every day. We’re always going out to local things when we don’t have a show because that’s what we would be doing anyway.
Caleb: I like how DIY it is, everyone just does things themselves.
Shawn: That’s what DIY means.
Zach: Wait, really?
Caleb: Everyone is like, “We don’t have a venue, anyway well I have a garage.” Everyone will just show up.
Destin: We love Fort Collins, it’s awesome. I don’t know about these guys, but I’ve played a bunch of places and it’s definitely one of the more welcoming communities for sure.
Zach: Yeah, even when I would perform in Old Town Square or in front of Trailhead at 2 am, the authenticity of people definitely shows through everywhere. Venue or not.
Shawn: It’s also really nice living in the area too, cause I’ve never lived anywhere where I could drive 5 – 10 minutes and find a venue to play.