ROLLED UP SLEEVES

It's about musicians and their day-time jobs that they have or used to have. http://instagram.com/rolled_up_sleeves

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THE SECRET (ITALY)

Damn, it's been a long time since the last post. But we return with a great story from a great band! No need to introduce these guys. Each album of them is another attempt to reach the highest level in their sinister blend of black metal, grindcore and hardcore (or maybe it would be more correct to say "to reach the lowest, deepest and darkest level"). And they perfectly make it every time, but as we all know - there's no boundaries. Anyway, while we all wait for their new album, read the story about their regular life, outside the stage:

Michael Bertoldini (guitar)

"I've done few different jobs in my life. For almost 10 years i worked for a flyer distribution company owned by my father. The job was extremely uninteresting and lame but the cool part was that i could tour as much as i wanted without really getting fired. 

The bad part is that working with your family sometimes can turn into a kind of nightmare and on top of that i was dealing with total crazy weirdos all day/everyday. 

The job itself was so uncool that only attracted people who could't keep any other better job. Through the years i worked with junkies, ex-prostitutes, ex-members of organized crime, schizophrenics, burglars, alcoholics and a bunch of guys missing their front teeth. Even if the whole situation was absolutely dysfunctional i think that dealing with these people made my days less boring than they would have been doing the same thing with more "normal" employees.

A few years ago the company closed down and i started working for an Italian microbrewery but even if the job was cool things didn't go as i expected.

I moved to Amsterdam, The Netherlands a year ago and since then i've been working for a British fashion brand at a luxury department store in the heart of the city. 

Now i'm making some plans to start something music-related again in 2015.

Our singer Marco started his own screen printing company called Perpetual Lab last year and he recently started working at a tattoo shop in Trieste, Italy.

Our drummer Tommaso works as a welder for a company close to his hometown in Friuli and our bassist Lorenzo chills very hard, plays tennis all day and is the guitar player of a band called Hierophant."

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ART BRUT (United Kingdom)

Well, now we've got your attention and we would like to confess that this article isn't about all members from Art Brut. Actually this article is about Toby MacFarlaine (which is that guy on the left up there on photo) who is guitarist of Art Brut, bassist with Graham Coxon and guitarist/vocalist in O.W.L.S. Please, do not think that we're cheating, we just want to post a little story that is connected to such a cool band like Art Brut! And also, what a story! So, here it is:

"Hello. 

This is Toby (guitar). I don't mind sharing that when I'm not playing guitar with Art Brut, bass with Graham Coxon or guitar and vocals in O.W.L.S, I do a bit of landscape gardening/ tree surgery/ general construction. I find it far more rewarding than the few jobs I tried over the years. I get to be outside, occasionally use big, loud, heavy, dangerous machinery and improve the environments and lives of people I don't really know. Oh, and get paid for it. Working construction also improves one's ability to swear immeasurably. 

Obviously I don't want to ruin my rock-star mystique idol status. I am a golden God who eats, shits and sweats rock n' roll mayhem between the hours of 5pm and about 2am.

You can follow me on instagram too, if you like (http://instagram.com/tobelorone) for pictures of both worlds, so to speak. 

Yours lounging around in a guitar shaped jacuzzi with a bunch of supermodels and bottles of Jack Daniels,

Toby Macfarlaine"

Art Brut wiki

Art Brut website

Art Brut Facebook

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MARUTA (USA)

Every time i want to say "Maruta" i say it like this: "MAARUUTAA!!" These guys sounds so fucking loud so i can't pronounce their name quietly. They fuse dissonant guitar riffs, elements of doom, powerviolence, and death metal into their massive sound. Unfortunately, at the end of 2011, the band members decided it was time to go their separate ways. It seemed like their truly perfect "In Narcosis" was their opus-magnum, however, in January 2013 the group got back together again, and they are currently working on a new album to be released soon by none other than Relapse Records! So watch closely! In the meantime, they found time to answer our questions about their employment and here they are:

Mitchell : I work in post production for Bangbros and various other adult websites. I edit videos and put together trailers. I also do freelance video editing work when it comes my way.

Mauro : I work at a small engineering firm doing mostly software engineering, but some electrical engineering and field testing too. I'm also finishing up my EE degree and occasionally work showpro on weekends. I'm all about that dough.

Danny : I work at a call center for an HR solutions firm specializing in tax deferred benefit programs.  I handle both client executive and customer escalations.

Eduardo: I work for a moving company. Lifting things and packing things all day. I also get to drive a truck sometimes. Manual labor. Brown style.

Bandcamp

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DEERHOOF (USA)

What do we know about this band? They're from San Francisco. This year is their 20th anniversary, by the way. Satomi Matsuzaki plays bass and sings, Greg Saunier plays drums, John Dieterich and Ed Rodriguez play guitars. "But what is Deerhoof really? Hell if we know. Pitchfork went so far as to label Deerhoof as “the best band in the world.” The New York Times described them as “one of the most original rock bands to have come along in the last decade.” And you know what - that's absolute truth. And - we've got a story from John, check it out:

"When I joined Deerhoof, we all had "main" jobs that paid the rent.  Satomi was waiting tables at a restaurant and also working as an editor of a magazine in San Francisco.  Greg and I both had office jobs, he doing filing work and me doing data entry sorts of things.  I remember when I entered 7th grade, my parents highly recommended taking a typing class because "you can always get a job."  Strangely enough, they were very right!  Being able to type fast meant that I didn't have to work in restaurants (which I did try -- dishwashing and busing --  but was terrible at), and it also meant I could sometimes listen to music at work, which was highly fun -- I even had a job for a little while wherein there was so little work that I could bring in my laptop and work on electronic music at work.  When Ed joined Deerhoof, he had just left a job at a yoga magazine company in Berkeley.  I think it was a telephone job or something.  He also worked as a cashier at a great video store called Lost Weekend, and he kept that job for several years as he liked it and had a lot of close friends there.  At the moment, none of us have second jobs per se, though some of us sometimes do production work (recording/mix/master/remix) for other bands, and all of us play with other people sometimes, and that can occasionally bring with it the possibility of a free ice cream cone or something.  There have been times over the years that we considered going back to our day jobs so that we didn't have to be so worried about how everything went in Deerhoof, but at the moment I feel happy to be what we're doing and very lucky that we're able to make a living doing it.  It's a wonderful job, and it also enables me to meet interesting people and start different collaborations that never would have materialized otherwise."

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LALI PUNA (GERMANY)

So, today we're going to relocate from anything that is harsh, noisy and brutal (in case you think that we write only about grindcore, black and hardcore acts). Today our subject is this magnificent german band who plays pensive, ethereal electronic pop with near-whispering vocals, but sometimes they include rock in their music. We've got an answer from Valerie, their former and permanent singer:

"I work as a journalist for a german radiostation. Currently I do a feature about a very special Munich label called Trikont and it's radical left history. There were times when I could have lived from doing music, but I never stopped working for the radio because I most of the time like working as a journalist. Now I have to work because you don't earn that much money from doing popmusic anymore. Our keyboard-player writes music for theatreplays and our drummer works for the same radiostation I do. So the only one who can actually live from doing music is Markus - as he is in another band called The Notwist."

Website

Soundcloud

Facebook

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HEXIS (DENMARK)

We continue to acquaint you with some rowdy, destructive and really loud bands. Previous band was Celeste, today it's Hexis - five guys from Copenhagen whose music is really gonna hurt you. They combine hardcore with black metal and sometimes even sludge and as a result we have truly nordic black masterpiece. But when they're not on stage they do not burn churches or killing people, they work, as many of us do. And here's little story from them:

"I (Filip) work as a paver for my father (he has a company), our bass-player Kenn works at a gas station, our drummer Simon works in a kindergarden, our guitarist Toby is working with some computer-stuff for the danish state and our second guitarist Rasmus is looking for a job at the moment. Non of us is earning any money from the band and we are spending all our free time on this project, we are 100% doing it because this is what we like to do and not because we are expecting to be famous and rich."

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Bandcamp

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CELESTE (FRANCE)

Well, there's something strange about these guys. We think that all of you who read this know them, but we barely could find any article about them (even Wiki has an article about them only in german which is kinda weird). Like they perfectly maintain their mystery, but in other hand - there's no mystery. Anyway, these "four french horsemen of music apocalypse" answered us and here's their story:

"We definitely all have a job. Music doesn't pay bills. When we were younger we were students or we had shitty part time jobs, but since a few years we evolved and had much more stable jobs which doesn't necesarily mean that we are less free now.

Antoine (drums) works in a restaurant.

Sébastian (guitars) is a senior salesman for an Internet provider.

Guillaume (guitars) works for his own as a free lance consultant for advertising companies

And I, Johan (bass and vocals) I own a restaurant

I would definitely recommend anybody to never think about making a living from his music. I think that it's the best way to go wrong musicaly speeking and to face great deceptions. I'm pretty sure that most of the bands who make real money never intended to do so when they started up their band. Success happens but shit happens most of the time."

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KRISTIAN TOIVAINEN (of ROTTEN SOUND) (FINLAND)

Have you ever thought what could be the coolest place to work at for a musician? Of course the best way is to achieve money by playing music, but as you know now, that's a very hard way. But Kristian, in our opinion, has very cool work now. Wanna know why? Then read his story:

"As probably everyone, I’ve had quite many crappy summer jobs as a kid. When I managed to get a degree in information technology, I got a job in a hospital as a part of their communications team which was actually really interesting.

Now I work in a small organization where we are educating bands and artists about self-management, touring, music business and that sort of stuff. We are funded by third parties, so our services for the bands are usually free. One of the best things in this job is that I have been able to take time off for touring and doing shows with the band. I know it isn’t that simple in every job, so I’m quite happy with the situation right now. 

-  Kristian/ bassist of Rotten Sound "

When you're a musician and your work is connected to music, but also really helpful for other people - we think, that's really great.

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Wiki

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Myspace

By the way, photo is taken by Kevin Scullion.

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EVERYDAY MISTAKES (SWEDEN)

If you're expecting to read some big article today, then you may be disappointed. But wait, first of all, these swedish band play the music we don't know how to call. It's like some western gloom, it's like some ethereal folk, it's like swedish country, it's like some not-too-evil version of Those Poor Bastards...but their FB has the most interesting version: Funereal Brill Building / Surf of the Apocalypse / Grave Crooning. Actually, this band has a center which is founder, singer, songwriter & multi-instrumentalist Mattias Malm. And secondly, here's what he told us, believe it or not (this time, for sure):

"I have been out of work due to mental illness for very, very long and I have never had a real job. However, I am starting to build up a studio and I have high hopes that it will be my future job."

What, you're still not listening to them?!

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DO MAKE SAY THINK (CANADA)

This canadian post-rock band isn't so simple as you may think, just in case you haven't ever heard of them. They combine jazz, distorted guitars and wind instruments. And by the way, after 5 years of kinda "disappearing" they're preparing a new album, to be released in 2015. And here's little information about their non-band lifes:

"Justin from the band here...Post rock is not the deepest well in terms of financial gain for the art you produce. We've all had jobs to pay the rent. As years went by most of us have landed in and around the film world, Dave (drums) is a film editor, Jimmy (drums) a location chef, Myself and Ohad (guitars,basses,keys) compose score music, and Charlie (bass,guitar,trumpet) makes a ton being mustached."

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Facebook

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BATS (IRELAND)

What do we know about Bats? They're from Dublin, Ireland (for us that's exciting!) And they play fascinating blend of post-punk, hardcore and math-rock (which they call progressive post-punk) that sound really cool! And now, after that we asked them, we also know a little bit more about them:

"I (Noel) am a 9-5 graphic designer for a branding and web design Company and also work my free time as a designer for an online gaming company (a tad immoral but pays cash money), am also a full time dad to boot. Conor and Tim run their own Animation- Design- post production (they would probably correct that description) Company called Digital Beast, which is a ton of work for them, they made the music videos Starwormwood and Shadow fucking and also nautilus vs Irish ferries. Rupert works in an advertising firm and Craig is also a Graphic Designer, a much better one than me and you may know that he has designed all of our album artwork some of our t-shirts / posters as has Timmy, who's illustrations you would know from our ep cruel sea scientist and the liner artwork for red in tooth and claw."

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Andrew Elstner (of TORCHE, TILTS) (USA)

This time we have a story from Andrew, member of the band that doesn't need to be introduced. But anyway, he's from Torche, that awesome guys who play, as they say, "stoner pop" or "sludge pop". Actually, it doesn't matter what genre it is. What matters is their music. By the way, he's second from the left on this photo (in case you don't know). Here's the story :

"So, outside of playing in Torche and my St. Louis band, Tilts, I've had a bunch of jobs, usually whatever I can do to make money when not on tour.  

The main "problem" is trying to find employment of some kind while still having the autonomy to tour whenever possible or whenever the opportunity arises.  Most employers, understandably so, don't want to hire and train someone who's going to be gone six months out of the year.   

But, I started touring in bands around the year 2000 with my old band, Riddle of Steel. Since then I've worked in record stores, worked as a banquet server and bar tender, live sound engineer, loader at a stage production warehouse, guitar teacher, odd jobs like painting, guitar and amp repair, etc.

In Atlanta, during down time I'm currently scraping by working as a door guy a few nights a week for different venues as well as making a few bucks playing records at bars. I wouldn't call it dj'ing.  Then there's always selling stuff on eBay, selling old clothes and records at resale shops, again, whatever I can do to both make some money and have a totally open schedule. 

It's not a sacrifice at all because "sacrifice" means giving up something I don't want to give up.  This is the life I've chosen, and though it isn't perfect, I've never been more happy.  

I will say this though, the jobs where I'm happiest - outside of the band(s) - are the ones furthest away from the music scene.  Working at a venue is tough because it just makes me realize I would rather be on tour, or that I'm wasting my time.  My favorite part time gig has to be guitar and amp repair.  I enjoy working with my hands and I'm good at it.  But oh man, I would always rather be on tour!"

Torche Facebook

Torche Bandcamp

Torche Website

Tilts Bandcamp

Tilts Facebook

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RINGO DEATHSTARR (USA)

Today we've got a little story about this, as internet says, rock group from Austin, TX. In case you don't know them, you should know that they "channel influences such as My Bloody Valentine, Fugazi, The Cure, The Smiths and The Velvet Underground into their own unique sonic fingerprint". And be sure to check out their latest album "Gods dream"!

So,

Alex (bass/vocals) works at a designer consignment boutique and has recently appeared in a mayonnaise commercial.  

Elliott (guitar/vocals) works as a door man at a local club and does producing/engineering gigs on the side.  

Daniel (drums) works as a waiter at a fancy restaurant.

"It would be nice to be 100% full time rock n rollers but the money just isn't there yet."

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JUSTIN PEARSON (of RETOX, THE LOCUST, ALL LEATHER & HEAD WOUND CITY)

So, today we've got something special - a story by legendary person, well-known musician, the man who runs Three One G label and a member of famous Retox, The Locust, All Leather, Head Wound City and many more - Justin Pearson. 

Work LOAD by Justin Pearson

I can recall a few things that have been said to me over the last few years, anything from “You bigheaded rock star” to the basic “faggot” type stuff. Nothing is more humbling than working a “day job” in between tours, but in my case, it’s technically a night job. Going in to a bar most nights of the week, doing the back end stuff, or as it’s called, being a bar back, when I am not on tour is actually how I survive financially. As any weird-o artist knows, this music stuff does not pay the bills. Even when I wear a mask at large festivals in front of thousands of people, or manage to get in a movie, or even when I sell my personal belonging on eBay. Nothing gives me financial security than working what my mom would call, a real job. On top of the basic stalking of items, and filling bins ice, I get to stop people from jerking each other off on occasion, I get to clean up vomit from various places, I get punched in the face every so often, I get to sweep up thousands and thousands of cigarette butts even though I am allergic to cigarettes and have never smoked in my life, all the way up to the occasional proposition to have someone suck my dick for cash even though I have always passed for various reasons just shy of becoming a prostitute in some respects. Have I “made it”? You tell me. I get to tour and do rad shit for at least half of the year. The other half, well, I get to do work-type stuff as well as hang out with some really interesting people, as well as really annoying drunk people, who occasionally get into interesting situations. Oh, and I might add that I run a record label, which costs me money. Good thing I was cute enough to get hired at a gay bar. Now who’s the faggot? 

Justin's Facebook

Justin's twitter

Retox Facebook

Retox Bandpage

The Locust Facebook

All Leather Facebook

Three One G label website

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WHIRR (USA)

  Here's what everyone used to do until we got rich :

Loren was an adult film acting

Joey was an amateur boxer

Devin was a marine biologist

Eddie worked in the fields picking strawberries along the coast of California.

Nick worked at orange crush as a soda tester.

Bandcamp

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Tumblr

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CALL OF THE VOID (USA)

We definitely have full time jobs when we are not touring, although it pays the bills, we would rather be on the road.

Gordon and I (Patrick) work for a company called Sparkfun Electronics that specializes in electrical engineering circuit boards for hobbyists.

Gordon works in customer service and I do engineering revisions for the quality control department.  The work does not stop when touring happens, I work from the road so that I don't have to make as much of a financial sacrifice or waste PTO.

Steve our singer works for at a huge bike store, repairing bikes.

Gabe our new guitarist works for a dry cleaning company.

Alex our bass player for a while was teaching elementary school music class.  But now he has a desk job and works security at a music venue called The Marquis Theater.

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PYRRHON (USA)

Like most young musicians playing wacky non-commercial material, we try to find jobs that involve some scheduling flexibility but that aren't utterly soul-crushing and horrible. We've got a pretty diverse job history between the four of us, but all of us have worked gigs that directly involve music outside of the band at least once or twice. 

The most obvious example is Alex (drums), who's a full-time session musician and instructor who's also getting involved in the recording side of things via a tracking studio in Pennsylvania. He performs pretty much every style of music you can think of.

Erik (bass) currently works in the warehouse for a company that provides audio and musical equipment for major sporting events. He also does live session work from time to time, and has held a number of other odd jobs, including greeter at a King Tut exhibit in Times Square. 

Dylan (guitar) has consistently worked in a restaurant for a number of years, but he also interned at record labels during college, and is getting into teaching private lessons. 

Doug (vocals) currently makes his living as a freelancer writer and researcher. He worked at the same restaurant as Dylan for a time, and has also worked as an SAT tutor. Doug has also been writing about metal online for about ten years, including a year-long stint as the editor-in-chief of Invisible Oranges from mid-2013 until mid-2014.

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