Brooklyn based trio Tungsten Beach combine noise rock, math rock and experimental elements together to create a sound all their own.
I caught up with guitarist/vocalist Austin Fender to talk about his early musical experiences, how the group got together and the making of their latest E.P. “Organized Unit”.
CMM-What was the first music that really made an impact on you all as kids and what artists or bands did everyone enjoy the most?
A-Melvin’s, Mr Bungle/Fantomas, Zappa, SOAD, Opeth, MC5, to name a few . My dad would always be playing jazz in the car growing up, like Wes Montgomery, django, benson, etc… My brother introduced me to a lot of metal and different types of music than I normally heard because he had a CD Burner and downloaded a ton of stuff. I remember hearing him listen to Sepultura when I was a kid and I was like, “”What is THAT!”
CMM-How did the group get together and start crafting your sound?
A-It started off with myself and our original bassist and longtime friend Abdul, who was using a moog synthesizer. I had a few songs written that didn’t have a home and we spent a summer learning them. It started developing into this psychedelic doom sound with weird time signatures. We got offered a gig by the band Kahuna, who had never seen or heard us play, but we didn’t have a drummer at that time. Lukas practiced in the same rehearsal space as us with his band noDave which was like progressive mathy stuff and we recruited him for the show which was like two weeks later. We’ve been playing ever since.
CMM-Your new record “Organized Unit” is top notch in every way. What was the writing and recording process for those tracks like? Any particular gear or instruments you used during the recording sessions that helped inspire you?
A-Thank you for saying that. The writing process was a good mix of methodical songwriting and spontaneous creativity. Dig and desert were the first songs written at some point in 2020. I think they reflect this suffocating sense of fear, panic, and distrust of how it felt to be living through the pandemic in NYC. I was working as a delivery guy in Manhattan and it still creeps me out thinking about that time period. We initially recorded those songs with Pete from My Love Lucifer so shout out to him because we had no gear or anything when we first did those recordings. I don’t even think I had a guitar or computer. It was really a low point. Dig was my attempt to write a pop song at that time. We wrote those two pretty quickly. I was really struggling with a nasty case of shingles when I wrote Purgatory. I think everyone had the most fun recording Botsaris, which is an epirote folk song.
All of the recording was done in bits and pieces in our rehearsal space in brooklyn. As far as gear, we got a Scarlet 8 Channel interface, SM7B, MXL R144, some 57’s and a few other mics some friends let us borrow. Pow, who did vox on Botsaris and handles a lot of artwork, was able to procure a macbook for us which was huge. I used an epiphone SG for the guitar work and Matt, our bassist and occasional guitarist for the album, let us use his Orange Rockerverb combo for all the guitar work which was really a blessing. I usually use pedals on guitar but the amp sounded so good I don’t think we used any.
CMM-If the band could score any film director’s movie who would it be and what would the film be about?
A-A surrealist horror western by Dario Argento.
CMM-What do you have coming up next?
A-We’re playing a show in Philadelphia May 23rd with Northern Liberties, Emerald and Webb Chapel. Then hopefully we can play a few other shows in NY this summer. We’re experimenting writing in some different styles right now so we’ll see how that comes together as far as recording new material after the summer.
