Californian post-hardcore luminaries Porch hit the UK next week for a series of shows, including a London stop at the Windmill Brixton.
Formed over 25 years ago by guitarist Todd Huth – a founding member of wonky/metal legends Primus – and former Today Is The Day bassist Chris Frey, the trio briefly worked with Jello Biafra’s Alternative Tentacles label, before putting out their self-titled debut in 1994.
Now totally reactivated, the group have recently collaborated with Oxbow vocalist Eugene Robinson and hit the road in support of the reissue of their trio of albums.
Remarkably their current European tour brings them to the UK for the first time, so ahead of their May 11 stop in the Capital at Brixton’s The Windmill (you can find tickets for that here), we caught up with guitarist Todd Huth and drummer Michael Jacobs to talk about their recent projects and why it’s taken them so long to come to Europe.
You recently collaborated live with Oxbow’s Eugene Robinson. How did that performance come about? Have you plans to work together in the future?
Michael Jacobs: Eugene is an old friend of ours; Porch played with Oxbow many times back in the day. Someone floated the idea of a ‘collaboration’ for the first PRF BBQ and it just all worked out. I think we did one ‘rehearsal’ which consisted of us just playing the song for him. As a result, it was a very improv’ style performance and we think it benefitted from that
.
Todd Huth: After the PRF BBQ experience, Eugene and I recorded a song of mine called ‘The Beaut’, which is up on my Bandcamp page. Eugene is a talented motherfucker; he did it in one take. The feel and performance was perfect. I have other songs that I’m planning on throwing at him, and hopefully we can line up our schedules to make it happen at some point soon.
Despite being together for a while now this is Porch’s debut European tour – what took so long?!
MJ: We took a shot at it when Walking Boss first came out, but the financials just weren’t lined up. Technically, they still aren’t, but we did it anyway! Our old friend and previous tour manager Wullie with Single Malt Management helped out a lot and that has been really critical in making this whole thing come together. We’ve always gotten so much more positive response from Europe for our releases, it just seems to be the region for us to focus on.
I think it’s fair to say there’s been some pretty lengthy gaps between Porch albums; are you working on anything currently? Can we expect to perhaps here some new material at your shows?
TH: Most of the songs for the next recordings are all in motion at this point. We just have to get in the studio and beat them into form. I’m looking forward to these next group of songs I think they’ll be our best yet.
I recently read Jon Fine’s book Your Band Sucks: What I Learned At Indie Rocks Failed Revolution which is an at times fascinating story of life on the road in underground bands. What keeps a band like Porch going after so many years? And how has your relationship with touring, and your expectations, changed?
MJ: Live performance is a big part of what we do. The energy and personal quality of playing live has always been important to us. Getting older, I think we just really appreciate every show a lot more. Like most bands, we’ve had to modify any expectations as times have changed with independent music. Many times, it seems like the shows you don’t expect to be great are and vice versa. We seem to be able to find good things in every experience though. We are pretty lucky in that we are all old friends and get along really well which makes the tour experience a lot easier.
TH: Touring is by far a more pleasant experience when you get along with your band mates and we do pretty well with that. One of the biggest motivations for playing live for me is to see how people respond to our music and to move them the way it moves me. I haven’t heard too many bands that are coming from the angle were coming from which keeps things fresh at least from an experimental view.
What can we expect to see/hear when we head out to see Porch in the UK later this month/next month?
MJ: A bad ass live show.
CF: Everything we’ve got: Blood, sweat, tears, various soft tissues…
Porch play the Windmill Brixton on Thursday, May 11, along with Meadows, Casual Sect and German trio Buzz Rodeo. Tickets and details can be found here
