With the promise of Spring comes the music festival season. TCP, daring Mother Nature’s temperament, is taking a little road trip down to Athens, Ohio for Hoopla in the Hills March 27-30. We had the chance to chat over the phone with percussionist Jason Hann of EOTO during his brief stop at his home in LA. We talked to members of the band String Cheese Incident, Hann and Michael Travis, about their side project, life in two different bands, what it’s like to form a new audience and playing inside Superman’s Fortress of Solitude.
Headlining two nights of Hoopla is Athens bred-up and comers Papadosio. TCP caught bassist Rob McConnell during some down time on the band’s West Coast tour to hear just how exciting it is for the Ohio natives, now living in North Carolina, to get back to their roots.
EOTO:
For someone who might not be familiar with EOTO, how do you describe your sound?
It’s an alien disco party with lots of lights. You can feel free to be weird or shed your skin or whatever you need to do. The thing that makes us way different is that it’s all improvised; we’re making a lot of it up on the spot. Every show is a unique experience. We make every night special.
Coming from a relatively well known band with traditional instruments, what sparked the idea to branch out into the electronic side of things and start something new?
It came out of not really trying to put anything together. I’d come out to Colorado to play with String Cheese and Michael Travis and we would stay up late playing instruments together. We would just try to make those sessions more and more fun … We’ve been using the computer and software as another instrument that we control.
Was it different or difficult having to essentially start over to build a following?
It was one of those things where when we first started doing it, we weren’t sure if anyone else was going to like it. We knew after our first show that we had really good feedback. There were a lot of times in the club with the technology we were still working out and there’s all kinds of “what are we doing?” going on. We didn’t know if that was the same experience for the audience but we liked what we were doing and booked a ton of shows and kept getting better. It was humbling in the fact that it wasn’t an immediate crossover where String Cheese fans were just going to love it. There was a big division. Most wouldn’t enjoy it at first and we built a whole other audience on our own from people who liked the technology side of it, people that kinda knew us before but really liked what we were doing and eventually the younger String Cheese fans came around.
Do you have a different mindset when you guys go on stage as EOTO versus playing a String Cheese show?
All the same rules apply for playing your part of the music. Sometimes with the really big shows, the crowd becomes a little more anonymous and at the smaller festivals, it feels more personal. Even though there’s a point where you can’t see anymore faces, it’s a different kind of energy. The same rule applies to try to play the best show of your life by the end of the night.
Because your sound is so rooted in not only your instruments but in the capabilities of technology, do you find ways to evolve as the technology you use evolves?
It’s that thing where we’ve explored the gear that we do have, that we’ve been doing relatively the same thing in terms of using the same kind of effects. We’ve explored everything we’ve got so we add or take away to make it better. Travis got a new program that takes signal from his guitar and converts it to a different sound and that was a breakthrough.
Do you still tour with the lotus?
We are not touring with the lotus. This year it’s the observatory. It’s still structures on stage and project mapping but they are crystal shaped, like Superman’s Fortress of Solitude. They will be able to project map off of those and include hanging video cameras on stage so they can capture of a lot of what we are doing live. There are so many groups that have backing tracks and [being 100 percent improvised all the time] we are just doing something really different and separating ourselves. We will also have mega lasers. Hunter Owen, who does the lasers, he’s just kind of a freak about his lasers. [The effects] are set up pretty much for us and whatever environment we’re in.
Papadosio:
Having formed in Athens and now living in Asheville, NC, how exciting is it to be playing close to your roots?
It seems like it’s going be really fun. It’s a mile from OU’s campus, so I think they’re all pretty stoked for us coming back. My parents are going to come. It’s gonna be cool.
Do you prepare differently for shows in Ohio and other venues where the crowd is more familiar with Papadosio rather than shows in places like the West Coast where you tour less?
We try to throw in some older songs that people are more familiar with and I think that also we want to show people the new stuff we’ve been working on too. It’s always more of a classic set when we go back to Ohio. I’m really exciting to play for some of the people closest to me, who have known me for all my life. We will have been on the road for six weeks so it will be good to be revitalized. They usually take care of us when we go back.
Is there anything in Athens that you absolutely must do when you’re there?
Everybody loves Casa’s [Casa Nueva]. I gotta get my Bagel Street in and maybe do the pickle eating contest. We always have to go to Jackie O’s for their beer. That’s where we met when I was like, 19 years old. Now it keeps getting bigger and more of a crazy awesome business. [Writer’s note: Jackie O’s recently began distributing their delectable microbrews in Toledo.]
Has pulling out of your involvement with Rootwire Festival’s planning and production opened up your summer to any new opportunities?
Without Rootwire, we have more time to go play at other people’s events and we can focus on just making music and not having to worry about that stuff. That was a great learning experience but at this point, we just want to focus on the music part of it. There are so many festivals going on – I can’t say that’s a bad thing – we just felt like we needed to give it a break and rethink what we’re doing as a band and as event throwers. The idea is to think of something drastically different than what festivals are doing right now.
For those who are just discovering Papadosio, how would you describe your sound?
It’s definitely a rock and roll band. We have an experimental side, but I don’t know if we go super far out there. But one thing is for sure – we’re a dance band. Sometimes I feel like it’s really dancy and sometimes it’s more mellow, but it keeps people moving. We all pull from such different influences and more and more you’re starting to hear that.
