With most local bands, you are lucky if they play one live show in a month, but it just so happened that A Slight Breeze played THREE times in the past two weeks. That must qualify them to be the hardest working band in Jacksonville right now. In spite of their prolific performance regimen I still missed every show. But since they are A) performing at the upcoming Big Pineapple Music Festival this weekend and B) a band that played the Step It Up 2007 gathering last weekend, which fits perfectly into our "Jax Gets Green" feature, I couldn't resist calling them up for an interview.
Although I am somewhat acquainted with the former guitarist, now drummer for the band, Jared Bowser, I have never seen or spoken to any of the other members. The other members include Ryan Adams, aka "Mr. Breeze," on bass, harmonium, laptop and keyboard, Jason Wells on guitar, Ben Wallis on "auxiliary instrumentation," newest addition Joel Willis on guitar and Brandon Highfill also on guitar. I caught up to Brandon early in the morning and made him define his band is minced terms.
EU: Jared told me a little while ago that A Slight Breeze was just a project and not necessarily a serious endeavor, when did it become something you all started thinking of as a serious band?
BH: I guess when we all formed together and realized what we are capable of. There is more in store than we originally thought, so we decided to go with it. I started talking to some people I know and got good response. We were just accepted to the Aftermath Florida Music Festival in Orlando, which is a big conference and showcase for record labels and scouts.
EU: You say you started writing songs with A Slight Breeze because Bernard only satisfied a part of your creative urges, with the dissolution of Bernard do you find yourself putting more of both bands into ASB?
BH: Ryan was writing songs every weekend to satisfy what he wanted. He wrote a bunch of songs and then approached us about playing them with him. l would say this is a totally different animal than Bernard.
EU: Other than musical peers, what things influence and inspire your writing?
BH: The day-to-day grind. Like you said in the review; to alter someone's mood or emotions without words. My dream is to compose scores for films and this is kind of along the same lines. Moods inspire me, relationships, friendships, work, a lot of things.
EU: Are your songs completely created in your practice space, or do you bring compositions to the space and evolve them from there?
BH: We don't practice, really. We have the CD and we video tape every live performance and watch them to determine what to change and what we like. The advantage of working with good musicians is that we don't have to spend a lot of time yelling at each other in a sweaty practice space, we just go show-to-show and use the video as reference material.
EU: How difficult is it to engage an audience without words?
BH: I don't find it too difficult at all. We have projection running and a different stage approach that engages people, because it's out of the ordinary in Jacksonville. We have a few more tricks we are going to pull out too. I like to think the music engages them enough, but it's not always the case.
EU: Wasn't Bernard on the brink of releasing an album nationwide? Is A Slight Breeze likely to have that opportunity?
BH: Bernard had between two and five songs recorded, but Floodgate went under, so that opportunity went away. Us as a band now, we're still pretty new, so we're trying to get on festivals and showcases and take it from there. I don't know about label recognition yet.
EU: So far, who has been you favorite artists to share the stage with?
BH: Sparta and mewithout You, by far. That was a great second show.
EU: How did you get involved with the Pineapple Festival?
BH: Orlino contacted us via myspace and was interested in our sound. He hadn't heard many instrumental bands before. He was looking for someone to help him score a film his friend made and now here we are.
EU: Do you improvise and write on stage?
BH: Our first two shows were a little more that way, but now they are pretty solid and set in stone. Chinese Horses [Brandon's side project] is more of an improvisational band. We know our songs now and play a tight show. We keep it loose enough to mess around, but we are post-rock, so we don't like to noodle around too much.
EU: Define post-rock.
BH: Ryan is the perfect guy to answer that, he has a long and great definition. It is more about people contributing as a whole instead of what one person contributes. Not like modern rock or radio rock. I don't like defining a genre, it's just a name you put on something. Call us what you will, post-rock, instrumental, ambient, who cares, we just play.
A Slight Breeze performs the Big Pineapple Music Festival on Saturday. Visit myspace.com/aslightbreeze to hear a little post-rock for yourself.
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