OLD SCHOOL
Interview with Crystal and The Cutthroats
Norco, Calif.
"Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet him but not nice to know him," Crystal and The Cutthroats drummer Lucio Venegas warned of guitarist David Lucas.
This is just the start of several points throughout the conversation that involve eye rolls or softly spoken directives to "shut up" towards Lucas. But before you get the wrong idea, it's all in good fun.
The rest of the Cutthroats are made up of singer Crystal Carrera, who created the original concept for the band, and bassist Chris Rivera.
You've likely caught this band play if you're from around the Inland Empire and they've probably stuck out in the best way possible in a Southern California underground landscape that's dominated by the sounds of hardcore and street punk. Crystal and The Cutthroats is a thoughtful blend of four musicians that have managed to seamlessly meld different decades of what can largely be distilled down to good old rock and roll for an ultra modern sound. It's technical without being obnoxious. And any references to they sound like this or that band would seem a disservice to what they've managed to do in the short amount of time since their founding in May 2013.
"My idea was I wanted to do something like The Cramps and Wanda Jackson," Carrera said of the band's start. "Those are my two favorite people so let's merge those two together. And there was really no way to describe that to people. It's just rock and roll."
Crystal and The Cutthroats are spending this month fine-tuning a five-song EP. They're doing it in an alcove of a wood garage located in the backyard of Venegas's Norco home. And that's where they can usually be found on a Tuesday night as they gear up to get into the studio to record next month. The EP's slated to be out early next year. It follows an LP that came out last May and another LP roughly a year before that one.
"We're still in pre-production," Venegas said. "We don't have the deadlines of record labels or anything so that's why we like being like this."
The previous effort was a bit rushed, they said, under the gun trying to release new material to give out to their fans—a trend exacerbated by the reality the digital world has created. That is, people are more apt to download singles rather than whole albums.
"With the last CD that we released, we were releasing song by song online through ReverbNation. The CD didn't sell so well—the full CD, on CD Baby," Venegas explained.
"It's just a modern approach to everything," Carrera said. "No one want to hear—"
"The whole thing now," Lucas said, finishing the thought.
"It's kind of going back to [how it was before] because everyone's into records again," Rivera said. "But for the most part, if you're on your phone or your iPod or whatever they just want to hear the stuff they like to bounce around to."
The EP will be self-released just like everything before and they're happy with that. They've had offers from some labels, though decline to name names.
"It's a comfort issue," Venegas said of the choice at the moment to be D.I.Y.
"Yeah, because the thing is, the way it is now, it's not like the old days where it's like 'All right, we want your band. Here's X amount of dollars. Record a record. Once that's done, we're going to send you on tour or something,'" Rivera said. "It's not like that anymore. They'll do what we can do ourselves."
"It's not saying we wouldn't want to be on a label," Carrera said. "It just depends on the label and what they do for their bands. Not just us, but bands in general. We see labels that promise the world to local bands and they're still playing the same bars and the same thing."
Of course, there's always Kickstarter to raise funds for a tour but they're tepid at best about the idea of fundraising.
"I don't want to ask people for money," Venegas said. "We spend our own money. All that stuff that is here is our own money."
"It's a pride thing," Rivera added. "You know, how bad do you want this? How bad do you want your band to be on a record or be on a CD? If it's feasible to save for two years to press vinyl, cool. I'd rather go that route instead of putting something online and say hey give us money and you'll win a drum lesson from Lucio if you donate $500."
"Drums and chill," Venegas offered.
"Lunch with Dave," Carrera said, adding to the impromptu brainstorm session.
But the other reality is that they're a somewhat difficult band to classify for any record label looking to slap a genre on them. Even they have a hard time editing their response to the question of what they sound like.
"It went from rockabilly to a little more surf," Venegas said of when he joined the band.
"But it wasn't really," Lucas countered.
"But it wasn't straight rockabilly; it was 50s rock and roll," Rivera said. "And it's kind of just hard to categorize and call it what it is because people don't know."
Thenext 15 minutes, as they search for the right adjectives to describe their sound, come to encompass a dialogue that is comical only if you were there in that garage.
"It's funny because we're hugely influenced by everything from the Ramones to, like, salsa music," Lucas said in a hardly subtle reference to Venegas.
"Such a racist," Venegas said jokingly.
"You're the most ethnic one in the band," Lucas said. "The blond guy."
"Soundwise, everybody has their own tone," Venegas said. "[Dave] has his sort of metal. I bring my salsa, my guacamole—no, I listen to a lot of pop and a lot of indie rock."
There was a lot of head-butting in the beginning—and maybe there still is. Ultimately, they've learned to harness their varied influences without having them overpower each other.
"Dave [in the beginning] was trying to go hard sounding and we battled that," Rivera said. "We battled, not in a bad way. Nothing crazy. No fights or anything."
"Actually, me and him fight on texts," Lucas said. "That's the only way we fight."
"They're like sisters," Carrera said. "It's ridiculous."
It was Carrera who originally came up with the idea for the band a few years back—an interesting decision for someone who describes herself as very shy.
"Me on stage and me in real life are two different people," she said. "Two very different people. That girl [on stage], I don't know that girl. I wouldn't even be friends with that girl."
The four are self-taught musicians, although Venegas is now studying music at Cal Poly Pomona. But even the question of whether they took lessons or not prompts the most circuitous of responses—in the most entertaining way possible.
"My grand grandfather, my great grandmother—" Lucas began in all seriousness.
"Shut up," Rivera said.
"—owned a guitar business," Lucas continued. "No, I was self taught..... Well, actually, my grandparents in Mississippi, my Grandma—they actually made acoustic guitars. So my uncle, my dad and my Grandma knew how to play guitar."
"But did they ever [teach] you?" Venegas prodded.
"Actually, no I taught myself," Lucas responded.
"So then you're self taught!" Venegas said, clearly exasperated. "You freaking, that makes no sense to this conversation. My great uncle from Spain and the Aztecs, they used to play drums. But I never met them."
The rambling, the tangents—they're the best kind of anecdotes to show just how passionate they are about the band and just how much fun they have with each other—the two main motivators for why they keep doing what they're doing at the end of the day.
"For me, I have to create constantly," Lucas said. "Everyday I'm in my little music room playing guitar, playing guitar. I'm constantly creating on guitar."
"We've played with people or know people that are like 'It's about my band. Fuck your band. Your band sucks, even though you're better than us, but fuck you,'" Rivera said. "And, I don't know, we're older. I'm not going to step on anyone's back to get anywhere. And, honestly, where can we get to? We're motivated but we're not overly hungry to try to achieve some weird, random fame."
Instead, their goals are much more simple, earnest: maybe tour overseas or simply see someone in New York wearing a Cutthroats shirt.
"For me, I love the music," Carrera said. "I love performing. I never saw myself doing this and now, doing it, I'm like an adrenaline junkie. I want to play."
Next Show:
Dec. 18
Romanos Riverside
W/Tiki Bandits, the Jezebelles and Ukulele Hiro
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