Brutus VIII is the project of LA-based artist Jackson Katz. His latest record, Pure Gluttony, is out May 10 on Danger Collective Records.
Ruben Radlauer is the drummer for the NY-based band Model/Actriz; Jackson Katz is an LA-based artist who performs as Brutus VIII, and plays in Slow Hollows and Current Joys. The latest Brutus VIII record, Pure Gluttony, is out May 10 on Danger Collective, so to celebrate, the two got on a call to catch up about it.
— Annie Fell, Editor-in-chief, Talkhouse Music
Ruben Radlauer: Where are you coming back from?
Jackson Katz: I was just in Australia and Japan with Current Joys. It was sick. Tokyo is fucking incredible. It’s like a utopia — they figured it out. Everything is just maximum efficiency and still fun. Not like—
Ruben: Boring efficient. Not like Soviet.
Jackson: Yeah, not fascistic. What have you been up to?
Ruben: Honestly, not a lot. I guess Model/Actriz has been sort of writing constantly, so we’re in the studio three or four days a week, which is nice. And then kind of just poking around on different mixing and random production stuff.
Jackson: This is going to tie in perfectly to the interview, because I was going to say: How do you think your production work differs from writing with Model/Actriz? Or is it pretty similar? Are you flexing the same muscle?
Ruben: It’s the absolute opposite models. I think with Model/Actriz, we really thrive off of confining ourselves to a very limited set of tools and ideologies, and the creativity lies in us just banging our heads against this wall that we’ve put up for ourselves, until we finally figure out how to reach objectives that are so outlandish considering the constraints we’ve set. Whereas I feel like production work, it’s all about “first thought, best thought.” A good way that I like to go is just following the intuition of the artist, and what’s feeling good in the room, what’s making us happy, what’s keeping us sane in the windowless room on a nice day. I feel like Model/Actriz is a masochistic project in a lot of ways, whereas production at least aims to be much more light-hearted and fun. This makes the band sound terrifying. [Laughs.]
Jackson: Is it masochistic because there’s a goal? Because I feel like when we work together, the fun of it is that there isn’t really a goal. I mean, the last song we made, you came over and it was just sort of like, “OK, let’s make a disco loop and then sample it.” That was the only goal, and then from there, it was totally free, we could do whatever the hell we wanted. It feels fun the whole time and not very painful.
Ruben: Now that you mention it, that is kind of a similar process to us sometimes. Like we’ll start with, “Let’s create this techno loop out of the four of us playing instruments and then play it for 20 minutes straight, three times a week for a month.” I feel like repetition is really the masochistic part. It’s a slow burn; we’re just riffing on the same thing for a long time, until it kind of loses meaning and then regains meaning in a different way. It always starts with these sparks of fun and these creative projects of making disco and sampling it, or making a techno loop with instruments — it all starts with this little kernel, and then I think the masochistic part maybe is just how long it takes for all these ideas to reach their maturity. But I feel like in most other creative contexts I’ve been in, the longer something drags on, the less good it gets. Whereas this seems to be the opposite with the band.
Jackson: Yeah, that’s true. I’m very jealous of you guys, that you have each other. I mean, that’s why I like working with you and Hayden [Ticehurst], because I’m just lonely doing this, and it’s helpful to have other voices that I trust. Even though it probably can be a little tedious, it’s exciting that you guys get to just work on one thing for a really long time. I’m sure it goes through, like you’re saying, a moment of monotony. But then after working through it, it comes out the other end and it’s something that everyone’s really excited about. That sounds really cool. But I guess recording in the studio is not so different. I mean, it can be pretty tedious at times, and then usually it’s rewarding by the end.
Ruben: Yeah. I mean, music is a time art. So I feel like just like by nature, you’re just stacking minutes on each other. The end result is something that has duration. Whereas I guess physical or visual art, it’s the same process, but the time is captured in a single, viewable frame. Oftentimes, the hours poured into something are all visible on the surface. Whereas when you’re overdubbing something, it’s always three minutes. If you need to do 10 takes to get it right and then 15 takes of doubles, that’s three minutes each time. So I feel like it’s like a different type of stacking time.
Jackson: That makes sense. For whatever you decide the length of the song is going to be, that is the time constraint always.
Ruben: I’m amazed by people who do super long songs, or even ambient projects.
Jackson: Yeah, I feel like we were talking about that last time we were together, about ambient stuff.
Ruben: Yes, we were.
Jackson: I want to do it so bad. In some ways, it seems so easy, but at the same time that’s what makes it kind of the hardest thing in the world. I don’t know how to possibly structure a 10 minute ambient song in a nuanced way that holds someone’s attention. But I’m probably overthinking it. And that’s probably the point, to think about it like that.
Ruben: “Creeks” felt a little like that when we were starting it. I feel like it was six minutes of just sort of meandering, which we cut down to, what, four minutes?
Jackson: Yeah, something like that.
Ruben: It’s a confusing, kind of cyclical but also wandering journey where it never really does the same thing twice.
Jackson: Yeah. Once the musical themes are established, we’re moving forward and it seems like we’re constantly referencing those themes, but it’s never the same thing. Which is great.
Ruben: Yeah. I’m curious, what are the lyrical themes in “Creeks”?
Jackson: It’s funny, because I wrote them next to you which I very rarely can do that with people. Usually I get really self-conscious when I have to do it and then sing it immediately. But I guess because I’m so close with all of you, I don’t care. But the themes are sort of about… mortality, obviously, but I think I had a visual in my head of this specific creek that was behind my house that I grew up in. I was thinking about if I were to to become a ghost, or if there was some sort of afterlife, that I would haunt my childhood creek. That kind of was the the seed of the idea in my head, and then I just ran with it and started just vamping about things that were on my mind. Like there’s the lyric that we were laughing about, “To be English and pop.” Which I think we maybe tried a take where I did it in an English accent.
Ruben: [Laughs.] Yeah, the cheeky one.
Jackson: [Laughs.] I think that came from us admiring and also poking fun at all of the British post-punk that was coming out at that time, and how it just was just like the ticket to stardom.
Ruben: Yeah, I think we were saying if we were English, this shit would be so much easier.
Jackson: Yeah, which is always how I feel with my talky electro post-punk or whatever — if I was English, we’d be platinum by now. But yeah, the lyrics are about my life and death. I guess also — I mean, I know we’re not that old, but even still thinking about getting older and feeling old. Like looking at a 21 year old and feeling like, Oh, Jesus Christ, I actively feel old and I’m not the youngest person in the room anymore. Which I was for so much of my life.
Ruben: Yeah, I was thinking about that as well. We’re not old, but yeah, it really feels like it sometimes. I mean, we played our first show together when I must have been 17, maybe, or 16.
Jackson: And I was probably 15, yeah.
Ruben: So it’s just interesting seeing what has evolved and what has stayed the same. [When] you look back on the early stages of your involvement in DIY scenes, and the early start of the Brutus project, what do you make of that?
Jackson: I mean, I’m so grateful. I feel like we’ve talked about this a lot — I think we came up in a thriving LA DIY scene that I don’t know if it exists there anymore. If it does, I just am not in the loop. But I don’t think it does.
Ruben: Yeah, I can’t tell if we’re just old or if it doesn’t exist.
Jackson: Exactly. But I think it’s not there anymore like it was.
Ruben: I would agree.
Jackson: It seemed like there was so much going on and so many bands participating in this one scene — which was, you know, the garage rock-y, SoCal thing that I think we both kind of quickly grew tired of. But when we were 15 and 16, it was really exciting. So I’m really grateful for it, and I think it taught me how to play shows, how to put on shows, how to promote yourself and how to hold an audience. Because I think from seeing so many bands, I learned what I loved, but I also learned what I didn’t like and what really bothered me. And that’s definitely what this project came from. In a very sort of immature way, I was like, OK, I don’t want to be all those bands. I won’t name names, but, you know.
Ruben: Yeah. I feel like that’s an under-talked-about thing of great art, that a lot of times the driving things are just, “OK, well, I don’t want to be this thing,” either for a rational or irrational reason. And so you just wind up creating a new thing, or you’re doing a thing that you don’t really want to be associated with so you really try and figure out a way to differentiate yourself, so you’re not just another voice in the same room.
Jackson: Totally. And I feel like both of our projects successfully did that from the moment they started. I feel like we kind of started our projects around the same time. At that point, you moved to Boston and I was still in LA, but it was around the same time. I’ve always definitely felt a kinship to Model/Actriz in our musical styles, and in our whole thing of being like, “I don’t want to be like any of these other bands.” Even though, yeah, all of them I might like and respect, but I still want to find my own thing here.
Ruben: Yeah, I’ve certainly always felt that you did that successfully. Like, I can think of some sonic things that Brutus reminds me of, but the whole package — I feel like it lives so far emotionally outside of the world that it lives in sonically. It can be kind of confusing, because I feel like if you’re not really listening that hard, you could put it in a sort of goth post-punk thing. But the mood is so different once you kind of crack the hood a little bit. It’s really successful [at] breaking out of that box and establishing a fresh and new sounding thing.
Jackson: Yeah. Likewise — I feel the same thing about you guys and your production style as well. There’s certain things you could take at face value about it, but there always seems to be more in there.
Ruben: Do people constantly think you’re British? Is that a thing?
Jackson: It’s happened a couple times. Not a lot, but it’s happened.
Ruben: Because that happens to us as well. Not a ton, but enough where it’s funny.
Jackson: It does happen, and they also always assume that all of my influences are English — which it’s not so far off. Not all of them, but I would say the core of my musical DNA is sort of English. So I do get it.
Ruben: What’s a secret influence? If you can tell us. Just like something that would be unexpected and that you’re hiding from people…
Jackson: I would say that my biggest secret influence — this is kind of an annoying answer — but honestly, my peers. And that’s something that I always feel self conscious about, because I’m like, OK, I know some of these people, so I don’t want to blatantly rip them off. You guys, definitely. Current Joys too. Especially the bands I’ve played in, like Current Joys and Slow Hollows, because I don’t have that much involvement with the creative side of the music, but I was touring member, so it’s so ingrained in my brain that I think I’m consciously and subconsciously referencing them a lot. And then kind of kind of noticing it and either trying to hide it or just lean in.
Ruben: Nice. I mean, honestly we’re the same way. We’re always ripping things off, but we’re just trying to rip things off that are far enough where you would never notice. And even though we say it all the time, nobody’s really clocked it! I feel like there’s been a couple songs, I can’t remember which ones, where you’ve mentioned to me that you ripped off Model/Actriz, and then I’ll listen and be like, “I don’t hear it at all.” Which is cool. It’s kind of a neat thing of just a cycle of imitation. Everyone is getting something from someone. And I feel like the people who are doing it most successfully are just doing it with things that they either can’t or won’t faithfully reproduce, so it winds up sounding different.
Jackson: Totally. I think that’s also a tool I use a lot when I’m blocked: I literally just try to remake a song that I like without listening to it. And then usually, because I’m so ADD, I never finish that idea and it just becomes its own thing. I would say to your previous question, a more fun answer is, Pink Floyd is a huge influence always.
Ruben: That’s fun.
Jackson: That’s my basic rock guy answer.
Ruben: Cool. That’s what I was looking for. Because I feel like for us — I mean, we’ve said it before, but Big Thief is a huge influence on us. And nobody would ever know.
Jackson: Yeah. I wonder, can I hear any Big Thief in Model/Actriz if I think about it? Honestly, I can in each of you, in a very subtle way. In Cole’s lyrics — I don’t know if he’s into Adrianne Lenker’s lyrics, but I feel like I could get that. I could kind of hear it from your drumming and the recording style of your drums.
Ruben: Totally. Let me just reference my questions really quickly… I guess in general, I’m curious about this upcoming album, like how you feel it differs from the last ones and where it fits into the Brutus discography, character arc and musical arc.
Jackson: I think this one feels the most honest in the melding of what the records have been and what the live show is. I think it’s the best representation of those two worlds colliding. Because for years, I had these two records that have a lot of ballad-y sort of songs, or maybe ‘80s poppy things, and then I would play these shows that are pretty aggressive and loud with a lot of screaming. I think this sort of melds those two worlds pretty well, even though there’s not really that much screaming on the record. But I think it has that aggression in there.
Ruben: Yeah. I mean, the two singles that are out right now are huge. They’re so heavy.
Jackson: Yeah. Which, I don’t know if I ever voiced it out loud, but that was definitely something in the back of my head, that I really wanted to make a heavier record. Just because I’d never done it before, and it’s kind of always been on my bucket list.
Ruben: I mean, you’ve been playing punk shows for like, a decade now.
Jackson: Yeah.
Ruben: It’s always felt like it’s within the greater punk lineage, so it’s cool to really hear that liveness in the recordings in sort of a new way.
Jackson: OK, I have production questions for you.
Ruben: Cool.
Jackson: I’m going to kind of butter your bread a little bit, but why I like working with you is I can tell that you seem to be super open to ideas, and even kind of going down a silly route sometimes that ultimately spits you out in an earnest way at the end. I feel like we are able to laugh at a silly sound we’re making and then be like, “No, how do we mold this into something that is actually really cool?” A great example is the saxophone solo on “Creeks” is you chopping up — I mean, I don’t want to get in trouble, but — a YouTube clip of somebody playing a certain very popular saxophone song that we thought was so funny, and chopped up and screwed until it sounds like it’s totally something else.
Ruben: Yeah. I forgot what the song is, too, so we can never get in trouble.
Jackson: Yeah, we’re fine. I couldn’t even find it. If we can’t tell, then no one will be able to tell. But I think that’s a great example of how you’re able to create an environment as a collaborator that’s very fun, and then all of a sudden again becomes very earnest towards the end. So I guess my question for you is: How do you stay so loose? Or how do you stay… I guess sort of egoless in it, is what it seems like?
Ruben: I’m just blessed with an incredibly in-check ego. [Laughs.] Um, no. I think honestly, a lot of that comes from just, I came up as a collaborator in bands and have always loved working with people. That’s what drives me in music, the community and the collaboration. I’ve never fronted a project or been the principal songwriter of a project. It’s always felt like part of a collective, and that’s where my passion is. So that approach has basically kept my ego in check. It’s also more fun to be excited about something when you can be excited and lift other people up, because you can kind of get an ego boost by being a part of it, but you can pretend that you’re just gassing other people up. You know what I mean?
Jackson: Yeah.
Ruben: In the band, for example, it’s really easy for me to be so proud of it and feel like it’s the best thing in the world, because when I am thinking that, I’m not thinking, I’m the shit. I’m thinking, We’re the shit. We did this. It’s fun for me to be a mirror and sort of project people back at themselves. I feel like that’s the most fun I have in the studio, when someone is there for that. It’s always really light hearted, I think, because we start without any proper objective. I think just being like, “Alright, today we’re having a good time. If we fail, we’re going to fail in a fun, funny, and ridiculous way.”
Jackson: Yeah.
Ruben: Fear of failure is the worst place to be creating from. So any time you can find yourself in an environment that’s devoid of that is a blessing. And it’s not always easy and it doesn’t always work.
Jackson: Well, that’s also the blessing of collaborating — or I guess collaborating for fun, not for business. I feel like when we made “Creeks,” it was a day of us just being like, “Are you doing anything today?” “No.” “You want to go try to make a Brutus song in the studio?” “Yeah, sure.” And then we knocked out — not totally, but basically — the whole song in one day. And that’s what made it so fun. I went in thinking, I don’t know if this will make the record, but let’s just do it and see if we can make something cool. Then I became obsessed with this song in particular, actually, because it’s so weird. I was really into this Mark Fisher book that I’m sure I’ve talked to you about, called Ghosts of My Life. It’s about a lot of things, but it’s mostly about culture and the theory of hauntology. I’m going to butcher it, but basically what he’s talking about is that culture keeps repeating itself, and especially now, where we’re at this point where we’re obsessed with the 20th century but we’re we’re only perceiving it through 21st century screens. So we’re just on this big cultural loop, and what happens a lot of the time is we’ll get these weird, warped pieces of art from that that are really interesting. A lot of the time it’s frustrating and it sucks to just watch trends go round and round, but sometimes weird shit pops up that’s cool. I was really interested in making something that can sound like it’s modern in some ways, but also really retro in another way. And I think “Creeks” does that. We have the Optigan, vinyl-y sample thing, and it sort of sounds like this weird, lost exotica demo. And then it becomes this Berlin rave track by the end.
Ruben: Yeah, it’s a weird one, the Optigan. I mean, that was how we started, right? Because we were just messing around with it and recorded some stuff, and then chopped a little loop out of the bongos or whatever it was. It’s got such a weird stuck in time feel. But as far as I know, it wasn’t really even ever used that much in recordings of its era. Because it was produced by Mattel — it was like a kids thing. I have no idea what was up with those things.
Jackson: But for the reader, an Optigan is basically an organ, right? That you put big vinyl records in that lets you play whatever sound the record is.
Ruben: Yeah.
Jackson: And that’s what we used for the bongo-y sound that you hear throughout the song. There’s also even a vinyl guitar sample that comes from the Optigan. Which is so crazy too, because I think that’s the same thing that’s used on the Sparklehorse song that I’m also obsessed with. I didn’t realize until the day we were messing with it — when I played it, I was like, “Oh, my god.” I think it’s “It’s A Wonderful Life” by Sparklehorse.
Ruben: That’s fun. Yeah, it just has a really out of time, out of era feel, where it’s dusty but it doesn’t really feel particularly familiar or nostalgic. It’s just weird. And I feel like we really took that to heart with the song.
Jackson: OK, one more question for you: I think you have a really interesting taste in music. You manage to always stay inspired, it seems like, and you seem to be pretty optimistic about new music. And I by no means think that you think it’s all good, but I have noticed that you always find something. So I guess my question is, how do you stay so optimistic, and how do you find these things?
Ruben: [Laughs.] I have a cold right now, so I’m not feeling very optimistic — I’m feeling pretty uninspired right now, and a little bit dead inside regarding music, to be totally honest.
Jackson: Yeah.
Ruben: Which I think is natural for anyone living in 2024. I think it’s just a fucked up, depressing time. But yeah, I think there’s a fine line, but when I hear something new that I don’t understand, and especially if I don’t like it and it bothers me in some way, I’m really interested in that, and I try and see what is challenging about it. I was raised on music theory and I feel like I had a very traditional music education, and sort of the culmination of that was me just being really bored by music. So I think the thing that rocked me out of it was breaking rules and finding the things that I’d maybe looked down on as a trad music school kid or whatever. If I hear something that is repulsive to me, usually I’m just like, Woah, what the hell is going on? I hate it, but also I’m curious, and can I learn to love it? Or even just if I don’t understand it, I really try and listen to it and understand why it’s a thing.
I mean, not to beat a dead horse, but the whole shoegaze revival thing — I’ve always hated shoegaze. Oftentimes because it felt like it was pure past-worship in a lot of ways. Not that other things aren’t, but to me, it always felt very impersonal and detached. The first time where I’ve really gotten stoked on shoegaze is when there were teenagers looking up, like, “shoegaze type beat” and treating it as if it were an extension of rap music, or just kind of flipping it so past the point of where this genre was ever supposed to live. That kind of thing excites me.
Jackson: That’s exactly the just like that’s the thing I’m talking about — something that is referenced so hard that it becomes like an impression of it, or an over the top version.
Ruben: Yeah, I love when things are stretched to the point of breaking and becoming something new. So I guess that’s how I get excited about new music, or music that I don’t necessarily understand — I just nerd out over how different it is from the way I was raised or the things that I understand to be good and true about music. Because it’s all truth, and also there’s no truth. Nothing is holy.
Jackson: That’s a great answer.
Ruben: Yeah, I feel like that’s a good wrap. When’s the album come out?
Jackson: The album comes out on May 10.
Ruben: And where are the release shows?
Jackson: You’re good. This is why you’re pro. Release shows are May 29, Baby’s All Right in Brooklyn. And then June 1 at the Echo in LA.
Ruben: Hell yeah.
