We recently featured Mistakes, the new single from Washington DC hardcore punks Technicians, which dropped ahead of their album Now That We’re Home. It’s a record that was first recorded in 2015, but, unhappy with the results – the band went back and re-recorded the whole thing. It’s filled with adrenaline soaked melodic punk, that references the likes of Deftones and Discharge.
We spoke to the band to find out a little more.
Hi, can you give us a potted history of Technicians?
Nick and Navid met at a show in 2005 and decided to start a band. Our first show was at the Korean Embassy to celebrate Obama’s first election. It was weirder than it sounds. Hobbs and Steve joined shortly after and we slowly evolved into to this moody sort-of-punk band.
I read you were brought together over anger towards the bush administration. Would you describe yourselves as a political band?
Not an overtly political band—yet—but we are very political people. ‘Shells’ from our upcoming album is anti-war, but it’s more humanistic than political. We’re currently working on our second album,
though…
So what’s going on in America right now (trump etc), must feed some of your anger / ideas / ideals?
Yes—we are bombarded with daily insanity that could fuel at least three new albums. But we’re writing about our personal relationships to that insanity—straightforward protest songs are not really our bag.
You’re from Washington, DC – a place that has quite some history in Punk and hardcore music – were you steeped in some of that growing up, with your record collections, mates etc?
Not all of us! Most of us became aware of DC punk in college, and it was important for a while—especially Rites of Spring and a few Fugazi records—but it definitely does not define us. Our love of angry, distortion driven 90’s and 2000’s rock is really the foundation of Technicians. Bands like Tool, Deftones, Smashing Pumpkins, etc.
And what sort of scene is it now? Still healthy?
We definitely don’t have our finger on the pulse of every local scene in the city, but the rock scene seems sort of fragmented. This may have always been the case! We’ve noticed a few different cliques: The jangly house show bands. The synth-driven, polished and poppy bands that eventually leave for LA. The DC Punk knock-offs. The hand-lettered show-poster hardcore scene, and the alternative-rockers that don’t really fit with any of the above—so they play extremely miss-matched shows. Oh, and everyone seems to own a label! I suppose it’s as healthy as it’s ever been.
Tell us about your debut record – you recorded it, didn’t like it so threw it away and started again?
That is true. It’s called Now That We’re Home.
We thought we would go the studio route and went to Inner Ear to get it all done, but at the end of the day, it was going to cost too much to get the results we wanted. The tracks we were left with required too much work to be practical, so we ended up scrapping them and starting over. We still paid someone to do the drums and mix, but we recorded everything else ourselves.
And presumably you’re much happier with the results?
Absolutely. We especially like some of the vocal treatments Albert (our new engineer) added.
What sort of themes, ideas do you cover on the record?
Now That We’re Home was written over a long period, so naturally
we’re all over the place. It’s more a document of our lives and less a concept album. Over the course of the record, we sing about war, break-ups, the Arab spring, toxic masculinity, love and nostalgia.
Give us all the info, – when is it out, where can we get it, what format is it in? etc.
April 14th! There is a pre-sale on Bandcamp right now, but you’ll be able to get it on Google, Amazon, iTunes or stream it on Spotify/Tidal etc. Our first single ‘Mistakes’ is out now and also available on all the aforementioned outlets.
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