INTERVIEW: Au Revoir

Au Revoir, post-rock instrumentals out of New Jersey are coming to The Radio Room in Greenville tomorrow, aka Thursday, June 28th. I got to talk with Eric a little bit about the band and why you’re a loser if you don’t show up.

Karen: How did y’all choose the name Au Revoir and why? Et est-ce qu’il y une de vous qui parle francais?

Eric: When I was thinking of a band name i wanted something that wasn’t common for American bands (even though Latin/French band names are becoming more popular) and also something that had a slightly darker tone to it (to go along with the music.) Somehow, Au Revoir came to mind, it kind of stuck, and then a couple friends said they really dug it as band name. Unfortunately at the moment, none of the band members do actually speak any french, but our old drummer was somewhat fluent.

Karen: And y’all haven’t been around too long, 6 or 7 months, what’s that like? Did you guys play in other bands before? Do people ever rag on you for that reason?

Eric: I started writing some of the music in 2009 as my old band was breaking up but the music really didn’t come together until late 2010 when i was able to steal some friends to help out the writing process. Our idea was to write an entire album, record it, print merch, get absolutely everything together AND THEN start playing shows. But I got the bug from not playing shows and decided to just move ahead. We played a couple in Late 2011 and then started really hammering down on out of state shows for January 2012 and for the rest of 2012. So technically we’ve been together since early 2011 but didn’t start playing out until early 2012. Dayn, Matt Olsson (our first drummer) and I have been in bands together since we were in high school. Corey we knew from our bands playing together and Corey knew Matt Carpenter (new drummer) from their bands playing together. The response has been quite amazing so far, everyone is always excited to hang out and play shows, as we always are, and everyone has been super supportive! Its a really really wonderful thing to work so hard on something and actually see a payoff even if that is just a handshake from a kid who thought the music was cool or other bands wanting to have you come back to the area or promoters letting you crash at their place and cooking food for you. I can’t ever express my appreciation enough.

Karen: How did you figure out your sound?

Eric: The sound kind of worked itself out between what Dayn and I wanted from a “Post-Rock” band. Its simple and emotional and that’s what we were going for.

Karen: What’s with the buffalo shirt?

Eric: The buffalo guy came from a book I read called “American Gods.” There’s a character in the book that had a buffalo’s head and a human’s body and I just thought it would be a really awesome t-shirt design.

Karen: When touring, what has been your favorite city so far?

Eric: We haven’t toured that much, this tour to Florida being our first real tour. Out of the cities we’ve played so far, I would say Boston and Baltimore have been that best to us. We’ve made tons of friends in those areas and the turn outs have been great and the support has been amazing and everyone has been so nice. They both have great DIY scenes and millions of bands that blow your mind time after time. Its so crazy. But I hear Greenville is beautiful and we’ve really been having a great time in every city we’ve played so far!

Karen: I saw y’all stopped at South of the Border. When I was a kid I used to beg my parents to pull in there all the time, what did y’all think of it?

Eric: Corey and I love South Of The Border. We were kind of on a tight schedule getting to Savannah that day but as we were passing Jon (our fill-in drummer for the tour) said he’d never been there, so we immediately veered toward the exit and proceeded to break Jon’s SOTB cherry. haha Needless to say, we had a blast. I mean, how could you not?!

Karen: Why should people come out and see your show in Greenville this week?

Eric: People in Greenvile should come out to our show on Thursday because we know how to party! haha Or because they enjoy some solid tunes from some very nice dudes.

So you heard the man, get up, get on up!

The show is tomorrow night at The Radio Room: WPBR.