Does Your Party Need Oxygen? Breathe Carolina into it
Since their inception in 2007, Kyle Even and David Schmitt of the band Breathe Carolina have come a long way from their first EP Gossip, a mixture of beats created with the software GarageBand in their hometown of Denver, CO. Since then, Breathe Carolina has topped the charts with “Diamonds”, “I.D.G.A.F.”, “Hello Fascination” and their latest single “Blackout.” Laced with post-hardcore influences, this electro pop duo has toured all over the world spreading infectious dance beats that would make any wallflower migrate to the dance floor within seconds. This July, Breathe Carolina headlined the 2011 “Scream It Like You Mean It” tour, bringing their melodic mayhem to the Pharr Convention Center in Pharr, Texas. After a brief settling in on their tour bus, Kyle and David enthusiastically talked to me about their journey to get to their latest album “Hell Is What You Make It” out now on Fearless Records, keeping up with their unique clothing line BLUSH, and their opinions on this sweltering South Texas heat in this exclusive interview for Ouch! My Ego.
Cynthia Santos: This is Cynthia Santos with Ouch! My Ego magazine and I am currently in the presence of Breathe Carolina, this is…
David Schmitt: David…
Kyle Even: and (sings) Kyle…and Kevin!
David: and Kevin’s here!
Kyle: He’s our little puppy.
David: Yeah. Hey…(to Kyle) he’s chewing on something.
Kyle: (to Kevin) Hey! Don’t chew on that straw! (to me) Sorry.
Cynthia: (laughs) That’s okay. He’s amazing. (pause) So, can I ask you guys a couple of questions?
Kyle and David nod.
Cynthia (cont.): You’ve come a long way since 2007-2008’s “Gossip” to now 2011’s “Hell is What You Make It.” How can you say you’ve matured musically?
David: I think it’s just like our experiences. I mean, for the second record we were able to like, get into an actual studio and record live instruments. I feel like we’ve just expanded it a lot more too, like at first we just did it all electronic you know and we had a lot of fun. But, with the new record they have full instruments and stuff so it’s cool.
Cynthia: That’s excellent! You’ve been labeled as electro-pop/metal also known as “crunk-core.” How does this “mixing” of music genres make you different from others also in this genre?
David: Umm, I dunno. I feel that electro-pop totally makes sense, but I feel like sometimes we get labeled as a “crunk” band but I feel we’re not like that. You know what I mean? We’re like a “dance” band. I mean, we have nothing against that type of music you know, but I feel like that makes us send out more to other people. It’s just the fact that it’s, you know, like real life stories coming through our music. There’s emotional songs and stuff like that.
Kyle:Yeah. It’s like a song for song basis, it not necessarily the whole idea is captured in one song. You know what I mean? You have to listen to every track to fully understand our band. We jump around a lot we don’t stick just to one genre, period. We jump from post-hardcore, to dance, to pop, electronica, screamo, whatever you want to call it. We’re just writin’ and feelin’ out the vibe constantly and I think that that’s what it is. We’re not sittin’ here trying to be like, “Oh, we gotta be this genre,” you know what I mean?
David: Yeah.
Kyle: Or “We created this genre.” Hell no, man. Music has evolved…you know what I mean? We’re just trying to be of those pieces of evolution in music…
Cynthia: Right…
Kyle (cont.): …to survive as a band in life. We just want people to enjoy themselves. We make music because we love music. We’re not makin’ music for any other reason. We love creatin’ the sound that we created because it’s where we come from. We just hung out chillin’ in a bedroom, and now we get to hang out chillin’ in a bus…
David, Kyle and I laugh then Kyle continues.
Kyle (cont.): So you know, we’re gonna take that. We’re gonna take that.
Cynthia: True, very true.
Kyle: You know, and we thank everyone along the way. We do, we definitely do and I think that’s the big thing that we want to convey, that this is only real because of the people listening to this and the people reading this. The people watching us and coming out to the shows…those are the people that give us this life opportunity.
David: Yeah, totally.
Kyle: Yeah. We just want them to be stoked on our songs, like we’re not worried about critics. Man, f**k the critics. You know, I think if anyone is going to be a critic…it’s us.
Cynthia: Right. Everyone’s their own worst critic when it comes to their work.
Kyle: Yeah, you know what I mean. We had a lot of opportunities to work with different people on this new record and a lot of those opportunities fell through for us. It was very, you know, misunderstanding of who we are as people. You know what I mean? Thinking that we’re something else or thinking that we’re these people that are not “in tune” with music now.
Cynthia: Right.
David: Yeah.
Kyle: We listen to everything. We are very much into the music “scene” of the radio, and we are very much into the music “scene” of any labels. Our ears and eyes are open constantly. We know exactly what we want to do with our band, and that’s what we’re trying to do. We are not worried about these people or their ratings of our album, and this and that. It’s like, “That’s your opinion. That’s your opinion, bottom line.”
Cynthia: Right.
David: Yeah.
Kyle: Right on, you’ve got an opinion, cool. You’re able to put that in a magazine or book, good for you. Good for you, but in the end…it’s us that are making this life real. It’s our fans that are making this life real. It’s these people with our label, our management, and these other avenues…
Kyle picks up their puppy mascot, Kevin.
Kyle (cont.): …you know, even Kevin, man, he’s a part of this world. You know what I mean? How each and everyone one of us aspires to be this huge thing. We just wanna…exist. You know, I’m chattin’ a lot about it but…
Cynthia: Oh, it’s okay. It’s fine, really.
Kyle: I feel like that’s the thing that we want to get across…
Cynthia: Right.
Kyle: We’re just stoked to be here, you know.
Cynthia: Yeah, that’s awesome.
David: Yeah, it is.
Cynthia: Okay, the “Scream It Like You Mean It” Tour is an awesome way to promote your latest album, “Hell Is What You Make It,” which debuted on July 12th. How difficult and/or how beneficial has it been to your promotional plans?
David: It’s been awesome. I mean we have a big sign on the outside of our bus.
David, Kyle and I start to laugh.
David (cont.): RockStar (Energy Drinks) wrapped our bus, so we have that, and it’s cool ‘cause it’s fresh in everyone’s minds right now. You know what I mean? So it’s like, we get to play these shows and these new songs. It feels like the first time I was playing and the kids are stoked. It was definitely an awesome call on everyone’s part to have this tour be right when our album drops…
Cynthia: Right on.
Kyle: Right. Yeah.
David (cont.): … because we have a little bit longer to play, so also we’ll be able to play more stuff. So, yeah it’s been great. It’s been awesome.
Cynthia: That’s pretty amazing. (pause) Let’s see…many bands have fashion lines. How can you say BLUSH is unique, and how difficult is it to run a fashion line, plus be in a band?
Kyle: We actually have a lot of help with BLUSH. Man, our good friend Josh… Josh White…Josh Umbrella is what we call him, he runs Umbrella Clothing and he’s been pushing BLUSH and helping us with that since we started. Honestly, man without him I think…
David interjects in agreement.
David: It’d be really, really difficult…
Kyle: It would be. It would be. He’s the mind and the one kinda really driving it to continue to push forward. We are just stoked to have him on our team and the fact that he even wanted to help us push it, create it and to help make it a reality…
David interjects to add to Kyle’s statement.
David: Yeah…it was him sitting around while we were doing music, but we had this idea. I think what makes us different is that it’s more focused on girls clothing.
Cynthia: Right, okay.
Kyle: Yeah.
David: It’s just that we’ve had a lot of help from a lot of different girls as well, umm…
Kyle interjects.
Kyle: You know I think being on tour, and being the kind of band we are, we have a lot of friends that are females…you know what I mean?
Cynthia: Yeah, of course.
Kyle: We wanted to give them somethin’ to be stoked about, you know? They come to the show and we get to give them somethin’ and it’s like, “Yeah, this is for you. Thank you for being our friend.” We get to ask them, we give them clothes and we’re like, “Tell us which ones you like and which ones you don’t like.”
Cynthia:That would help out a lot.Kyle:This is just the beginning. This is very much the beginning and we still have continuous ideas. The list goes on and on…Kyle and I laugh.Cynthia:Yeah.Kyle:It goes deeper and deeper. Let’s just see how it goes. Things are going really well, so we can’t complain.David reaches over to attend to Kevin who is attempting to eat canned nuts.David: Hey! Quit eating that! That’s not cool. (to me) Sorry…
Kyle: BLUSH is currently traveling with the “Warped Tour,” they’ve got a tent. We don’t necessarily have to be at “Warped Tour,” but it’s cool because it helps promote and it helps with everything.
Cynthia: Totally. (pause) Umm, let’s see. What do you think of the South Texas heat and the South Texas “vibe?”
David:Oh, man.Kyle:HOTT.David:It’s a good vibe you know, but yeah it is…
Kyle:Hey!Kyle tries to get Kevin to stop chewing on something. David and I laugh as he continues his statement.David: …it is hot, man. We’re from Colorado and I mean, it gets kinda hot there but nothinglike here. We woke up this morning, we walked out and it was just like…whew! Humid. I remember one time we actually played here a little while ago and…Cynthia: Was it the one with The Morning Of?
David:No…well we did play with them, but it wasn’t that time. This was actually before that. Umm…it was so hot outside that we went to the gas station and bought eggs. We actually put the egg on the ground but it didn’t work.David and I laugh at the foiled experiment.David:So, you know it was crazy.Kyle:We’ve played McAllen a few times…we’ve played Pharr before…they’re pretty rowdy.
Cynthia:Yeah…Kyle:Oh, yeah. They get down.Cynthia: They come from all the way up the “Valley,” which is about an hour to 45 minutes. Not including those who come up from an hour to 45 minutes down the “Valley,” just to come here because that’s the way this “Valley” has always worked. The “Valley” runs from about Brownsville, TX to about Rio Grande City, TX approximately. We always have to find the commonality. That onevenue where we can all convene and rock it out, because there’s never been a major city close enough, you know?Kyle and David:Yeah? Wow.
Cynthia:Everyone gets in their cars, they pick up friends from all across the “valley,” and come down to the venue, so I am sure everyone is stoked today because you take the time to swing by our town and bring these dedicated fans amazing shows.David:That’s really cool. We saw some kids earlier and they were pretty stoked.Cynthia:Yeah, they are really excited. (pause) One last question, do you have any words of wisdom for our South Texas Musicians and/or your South Texas fans?Kyle:Just be yourself, you know?David:Yeah. (pause) Don’t die of a heat stroke and…chill.We all laugh.
Kyle:Survive that heat. Don’t be meltin’.Cynthia: Well, thanks guys. This has been Cynthia for Ouch, My Ego! Magazine and Breathe Carolina.
David: Thank you!
Kyle: Thanks!
For more info on Breathe Carolina, their new album “Hell Is What You Make It,” and/or their BLUSH Clothing Line, you can find them on:
Official Band Site: www.breathecarolina.net
Twitter: www.twitter.com (@BreatheBand)
Facebook: www.facebook.com/breathecarolina
Fearless Records: www.fearlessrecords.com
BLUSH Clothing: www.wearblush.com
