Gnaw
Gnaw may be one of Singapore’s newest bands, but they are far from late to the game — because the city’s burgeoning indie music scene is only just beginning. The band made its debut on April 10 with “Inside a Machine That’s Glistening,” a four-track EP representing a year of sonic exploration and self discovery.
Last week, band members Tara, Dan and Zak sat down to discuss their creative processes and way ahead.
Listen to this interview anywhere podcasts are available.
The following transcript was generated using transcription software and may contain minor errors or omissions.
Jack: Your debut EP, "Inside a Machine That's Glistening," came out on April 10, which is today for me here in the States, but yesterday for you. How does it feel to have met a milestone like that, and what has it taken you to get here?
Tara: For me, it feels really surreal. And also like I just feel so happy to have it finally out in the world because we spent about a year working on it. And for me, this is personally my first experience being in a band, so I had to learn a lot. And I'm just so grateful for all that I've learned from Dan and Zak and everyone along the way. So it's really great to have it finally out in the world.
Jack: That's awesome.
Dan: Yeah. It felt like a relief. It was like, we've been holding onto these songs for a while. And I think we also sat on it, you know, wanting to revisit it to make sure that after X amount of time, it still sounds decent. Yeah. So I think there is a lot of uncertainty of like, because it sounded good to us, but we weren't sure like how other people would find it. It's a huge relief.
Jack: Did you did you test out any of the music on friends or family or anything like that before?
Dan: I mean, they will always say like, "It's nice," of course. But yeah, closer to the release date, I think I sent it out to some people. I don't know if they're just being polite [laughs].
Jack: Well, I mean, yeah, I enjoyed it. Your publicist sent it to me last week, I think. And it was great. I definitely jumped at the chance to do this interview. So take it from me, I guess [laughs].
Tara: Oh my gosh. Thank you.
Jack: Yeah, of course. It's an EP, it's four songs, there's a lot of emotion packed into these just four songs. And so what typically informs the lyrics that you write?
Tara: I guess I'll answer that since I wrote the lyrics. I was thinking a lot about existentialist questions, and also the band name, or like what Gnaw means. And for us, we kind of approached it as something that just keeps gnawing away at your mind. And we wanted to kind of explore the uncomfortable thoughts that sit at the back of your mind and all these anxieties and things that kind of stay with you that are sort of persistent. And we wanted to lean into that discomfort. And I guess that is what is channeled through the lyrics. A lot of self-doubt, but also little glimmers of hope.
Jack: You mentioned it took about a year to write and record everything. What do you think you've learned about your songwriting process as a group, and how has it developed over that last year?
Dan: I guess for the first few months, Tara and I, we were testing the waters. I had a lot of pre-existing demos, but then we were just trying to see what hits and what doesn't hit, like through Tara's ability to write a song over it. So eventually through a series of trial and errors, "Treats" was the first song that we got out. And then we were like, "Okay, I think we cracked something here." So the process evolved to where it is today, which is where the instrumentals will come first, and then I'll send it over to Tara, and then she will write something over it. And then based on what she writes, I will adjust the instrumentals accordingly. So we are quite remote. Yeah, yeah. Remote songwriting.
Tara: The beginning involved a lot of trial and error. And we were both like — Dan and I were getting to know each other, also. We went to high school together, but we reconnected later on. And then when we were writing the songs, "Treats" was the one that really landed first, and we were kind of like riffing off each other. And I feel like now that I know his music sensibilities more and he does mine more, we're able to riff off each other more comfortably.
Dan: Yeah. And then the last part, the cherry on top, is we pass it to the drummer and then he would change stuff up, and then that's when we will get the final song structure based on what is organic for the drummer to play, because yeah, none of us are drummers. So I feel like our drummer has a better sense of like how a song should flow rhythmically. And it's a crazy sense of rhythm.
Jack: You mentioned how much of the EP was written sort of remotely, but I was reading that there was an attempt to capture the energy of a live band while still sort of doing this from a distance. And so do you think that you've accomplished that with this EP?
Dan: To some extent, yes. But then when we actually played it out, when we actually jammed it out, there were moments where I was like, "Oh shit, maybe I should have done it this way or I should have done it that way." But, but definitely, I felt like Zak, our drummer, he really did a good job of capturing the energy of a live band, even though the drums was like totally midi recorded on an e-kit. I think he really brought that live energy to the sound. So I don't know, to us, we've got bias, so I would say yes [laughs]. Although, there are a lot of layers for it to be for it to actually execute live. So I don't know, it's like a half and half maybe.
Jack: Sure. Have you gotten many opportunities to play these songs live yet?
Dan: No, we only had one show last week. Yeah, we are, like, quite a baby band.
Tara: Yeah, we're very new.
Jack: I mean, how did that feel for you guys? Was that like your first proper show?
Tara: Yes, that was our debut performance.
Dan: Yeah, it was a very small show with other great bands, like Vegtable, elo elo and Free Reina. These are really great bands that are breaking out into the international scene as well from Singapore. So it was super, like —
Tara: We were so happy to be on the lineup. I was really nervous to perform, but it ended up being a really great experience, and having people vibe with our sound. I think we were pretty noisy, but it was so much fun.
Jack: And you mention these local bands who are doing really well — what can you say about your local scene? How would you describe it, and then how do you feel like you guys fit within it as a newer band?
Dan: Honestly, in the last ten years, the Singapore music scene has became super diverse. There would be genres that I would have never thought would exist in our music scene starting to come up, like there's a new group — they're called scum boys. Hyper pop act. They've been around for like two or three years. It was unimaginable ten years ago. So it's nice to see bands like this coming up. So I would say in Singapore, if you scale the population to the size of our community in the scene, it's quite small, but still it's good to have this diversity.
Tara: Yeah, I think it's a really exciting time to be in music in Singapore. There's so many acts — a variety of acts — emerging. And it's really colorful. It's never been like this before. Like, this is really a new era. I just hope that — and not hope — I'm positive that we will have a reach further than Singapore as well.
Dan: And yeah, there are also a lot of shoegaze bands in Singapore, which is a movement that I guess in the last five years has been really — the sound has been proliferating like crazy. It's cool that there's already this base of sound that we can lean into.
Jack: So do you guys feel like you're really part of something when it comes to your local scene? I know you've just played the one show.
Dan: I was talking to the organizer after the show, and he pointed out something really interesting, which is that there are a lot of bands doing super refreshing stuff in indie rock, but there is no centralized space, or even like a community, for this new generation of indie rock music. So we hope to really see that come into fruition one day. There are talks of maybe potentially having a few bands doing this — like, same ethos, same sound — doing like a split EP or split album. So, I hope that more initiatives like this come up. And I think that would really fortify that sense of community around this sound. Yeah. It's still very "early days" stuff.
Jack: Yeah, but I think that's really exciting to be sort of a part of it almost at its birth. I think that's really cool. I want to just circle back — you guys mentioned that "Treats" was your first track together. Looking back at that song in the context of the full EP now that it has been released, how do you think it set a tone for the rest of the record, or did it set a tone?
Dan: I think personally for me, I felt like "Treats" was a super bright and jolly song, but the ethos, the approach is still there, which is like, you know, instead of verse-chorus-verse-chorus, it's like, I want to put in a little — for lack of a better word — like, breakdown, you know? So I think it wasn't a conscious choice, but the next song was "Gash." So it was a super huge departure from "Treats." And I think knowing Tara and the things that she wanted to write, it felt more appropriate to, you know, fine-tune the sound to something that serves as a more conducive vehicle for what Tara writes. So yeah, the rest of the songs, we lean into that kind of darker tone. And we thought that "Treats" would be a nice little break from that, because after a while, it gets very like —
Tara: Kind of heavy.
Jack: Yeah. And then do you have any like outtakes from the EP that you think might be able to make their way onto a future release? Maybe an album?
Dan: Oh yeah. We have this one song that we were contemplating whether we wanted to put on the EP, but I think we all thought that it was too good to be put in there. So we were like, okay, save it for an album.
Jack: Wow. That's promising, though. I find — at least for me — creatively, if I'm just completely starting from a blank slate, it's a lot more difficult to start the next project, but it sounds like you guys already have a really good reason to keep going and continue this momentum.
Dan: Yeah. And also that song felt very different. So Tara, I guess she recommended that, you know, it sounds like a whole different universe. We should, like, put it in like a —
Tara: I think as we wrote more songs, we found that our sound kind of evolved. You can think of it as like a "Gnaw 2.0." And we hope for our next release we can lean more into that sound.
Jack: Well, I'm looking forward to it. You mentioned "Gash," "Star" was obviously the first single, and you have a couple videos out for each of these songs as well. How did you go about translating each of these songs into a visual medium? Because I think it just feels like what you're seeing should definitely go with what you're hearing.
Tara: Well, we can talk about "Star" first.
Dan: Okay, but before before we talk about "Star," fun fact: Tara has actually been involved in a bunch of film projects. She's an actress. So with that in mind, okay — Tara.
Tara: Oh, yeah, my lore is that actually, I'm a theater kid. I come from a theater background [laughs]. I love film and was also studying a bit of filmmaking and editing when I was a student. So for "Star," the content of the song also kind of shaped the narrative that we built around for the music video. And although we never really explicitly announced it, the video pays homage to this manga called "Helter Skelter" by Kyoko Okazaki. And I just felt like it kind of really spoke to that story, and we wanted to just kind of cosplay that manga in our music video. So that kind of influenced the whole aesthetic. And a friend, an artist, Kelley Really, also helped with the editing. She added in the glitches, which was very, like, our kind of aesthetic and also made a really fun karaoke caption below. So we just kind of blended all these aesthetics together, and that's the "Star" MV.
Jack: Nice.
Tara: Yeah. For "Gash," which we just dropped yesterday, the MV was actually conceptualized by Dan.
Dan: Oh yeah, I always had this idea of a story being told from a stalker's perspective. I thought that it would make a cool movie, but I guess I'll have to settle for a music video [laughs]. I think for "Gash," I was inspired by this movie called "Creep" — "Creep" one and "Creep" two — actually more of two. It's about a serial killer documenting his life, and then I guess his crimes as well. And it's filmed from his perspective. So I thought that it would be cool if we were all getting stalked in Singapore. A lot of it was just us doing normal things and basically having the stalker fixating on us for no apparent reason. Yeah, the premise is very simple. It's just us getting stalked and then eventually, like, confronting the stalker. Yeah.
Jack: That's cool, yeah. And then, for you guys — Tara, of course, coming from sort of a film and theater background where you at least have like some sort of experience — did it scratch like a different kind of itch making a video as opposed to a song as a band?
Tara: Oh, yes. Yes. I think visuals are so important. In music, music isn't just what you hear, but it evokes all these feelings and sensations. So having the right visuals paired with the music, it just hits. And it was really satisfying to create these videos with my band mates, Dan and Zak, and really make our music come even more alive.
Zak: We can also mention that we did a design exercise when we first had all our songs. It wasn't only the three of us, it was also with our designer collaborators who did the album art. So we did like a board where everyone kind of discussed what works and what feelings our music invokes. So with that, it gave us a guidance to how the visuals would actually turn out. So that actually helped us a lot in figuring out what kind of things to even propose before we even have an idea.
Tara: Yeah. Shout out to Shawn and Kelley for being on our creative team.
Jack: Speaking of visuals and artwork, this is reminding me of: you guys actually have a physical release out for this EP. You can buy it on CD on Bandcamp or through your label. And I know a lot of new bands usually don't have for a very first release — a debut EP — don't have a physical release. And so I think that's really cool that you guys have something like that. How did that come about?
Dan: Well, we were honestly super lucky because, yeah, you're right. It's very rare for a debut band to get all these. So what I did was I reached out to labels that might be interested in this sound. And Loide heard the EP and they really liked it and they really wanted to get our stuff out on the CD. We also sent it to a Japanese label called Miles Apart Records, and we're gonna announce the cassettes in a bit. Yeah, they also were very keen on printing cassettes for us. So yeah, we're actually super lucky because this is basically almost unheard of — two labels wanting to, like, yeah. It's true. I have a database of potential labels that would be interested and we could reach out to to get the physical releases out.
Jack: Does it feel really validating to have two labels, for now, really interested in you guys?
Zak: Definitely.
Dan: Yeah.
Tara: We're so grateful. Thank you.
Zak: Yeah, we just feel very lucky.
Jack: Are there are there any other shows on the horizon for you guys? Do you have anything booked?
Dan: I think maybe we have a few shows, but trying to get overseas shows as well. So yeah, fingers crossed I guess.
Tara: Yeah, we'll be playing more in Singapore in the coming months. And yeah, hopefully we can play abroad too. We'll see.
Jack: That'd be cool.
Dan: Yeah.
Jack: Like I said in the beginning of the interview, this is a pretty big milestone. You just released your debut EP. It's all like very exciting. What comes next?
Tara: Writing more music.
Dan: Yeah, I guess sonically we hope to also evolve but still retain some of the essence of like what Gnaw is in the first place.
Zak: Yeah, I will add that it is about finding our sound after this EP exercise. We were experimenting with a few different things in this EP. So I guess moving forward is still really figuring out what exactly that we like and what to recreate in the coming releases.
