 What's your response to fans who thought you sold out by doing those dates?
Ben: That's their problem.
Jeff: We're just doing the same thing we've always done. If we'd never tried to cross over from like, the kind of nouveau-esque jazz scene from when we first started touring into the festivals and stuff, a lot of people might never have gotten into us at all.
Ben: You know, my reaction to that really is, sell out of what? You know, like, we just play music, you know? We're not a very political band by any means. We just play music, we played the same music that we play for all of our fans, just for a different group of fans, and if that's sellin' out, then, by all means, we sold out.
Jeff: And we plan to do it many more times! (Laughs)
What's your take on today's music scene -- an environment where a band like Galactic can sell out shows so consistently with no radio airplay. Do you even think radio is relevant to the success of a band any more?
Ben: …If you want to sell millions of records, then definitely.
Is that a goal for you?
Ben: It wouldn't suck, but it's definitely not a goal. You know, it's sort of like, at this point, what we do is we play live. If something else comes out of that, that's fantastic.
Jeff: I mean, it's every musician's dream to have a hit, you know? I don't think any musician would find it a bad thing. Like, Theryl has a totally different attitude about having radio play, it's very much the older type of mentality about it, like, "You gotta get on the radio," he's always talking about "the hit, the hit," but you know, we make our money live, primarily, and the records have always been … not secondary, but not the focus of what we're doing.
Ben: It's gonna be one of those things that just happens, you know, just happens naturally. If you concentrate on that, on trying to make that happen, that's usually when the music suffers, because, for the most part, you have to dumb music down to get it on the radio, and that's just like, that's how bands die.
 There are some fans who don't necessarily care for the direction you're going in, you know, that sort of hard-edged, balls-out, almost rock energy compared to that smooth, buttery funk of '96-'97 …
Ben: Well, the buttery funk of '96 - '97 is really the buttery funk of '70. But it's still there, I mean, I think it's a little bit of everything, and they'll have to live with it. It'll probably change -- who knows, we might start playing jungle music tomorrow, then start getting into a Latin bag … I'm just kidding.
Have you seen an effect on the shows as the venues grow in size? Is it harder to connect with the audience if the venue lacks intimacy?
Jeff: Yeah, definitely. But it's more exciting, sometimes, to be in front of a giant crowd. It can give the band more energy I think, and also, it's just always good for us to be thrown into different situations and have to play. And I think that sort of creates growth among us; as we get better at doing the bigger venues, we're connecting more than we were when we started doing it.
Ben: A lot of musicians probably say this -- that the best gigs you'll ever have are the ones you play for nobody. I think because, subconsciously, you're not as concerned. You have a real "fuck it" attitude going in, so it's like … you kind of change from that kind of "fuck it" attitude to feeding off the energy of the audience. But I much prefer smaller venues. |
