“UTOPIA” BY KING WHISKER OUT NOW!
Meet the band, King Whisker, who recently just released their newest single "Utopia," which is out now on all platforms! The band consists of 5 members, Charlie Rohlfs on lead vocals and guitar, Ashoka Thalia "Thali" Busse on vocals, ogran, synth & percussion, Daniel Barboza on bass and vocals, Gabriel Dagrezio on guitar and vocals, and Jeremy Houtz on drums. King Whisker has currently been recorded here at Amplified Studios, so we thought we would take the time to ask them about this newest release and learn more about the band in general!
LISTEN TO "UTOPIA" BY CLICKING BELOW.
TELL ME A BIT ABOUT YOUR START. HOW AND WHEN DID KING WHISKER FORM?
"King Whisker came together about 5 years ago after a bunch of weirdos at a marketing agency decided they needed a way to escape from tech-bro life. Our first gig was actually the company’s holiday party where we played a set of weird a** originals… plus one cover that the company’s CEO insisted on joining us on guitar for. It was all a bit surreal…"
"The lineup has changed a bit over the years - only Jeremy and Charlie remain from the original 'holiday party' lineup, but our disdain for corporate life has endured and is a frequent subject of our music."
WHAT INSPIRES YOU TO MAKE MUSIC? AKA, WHAT DO YOU DO TO GET INSPIRED?
"We take inspiration from the mundane and the grand. Everything deserves to have a song written about it, right?"
"On our upcoming album, we have some songs about deep sh*t like our crumbling American empire, gender identity, and how to survive in a world that wants to kill you… but we also have tracks about getting your eyebrows done and dancing with skeletons."
"For us, it usually starts with a groove and a basic idea. We want people to dance - we want to challenge expectations and introduce the unexpected, but we’re also all huge doofuses… we try not to take ourselves too seriously."
LET'S TALK ABOUT YOUR LATEST NEW RELEASE, "UTPOIA." WHAT WAS THE RECORDING PROCESS LIKE?
"It was TERRIBLE! Nah, we’re f***ing with you, it was great. We wrote Utopia almost a year before we finally took it into the studio, so we had a ton of time to workshop ideas and really lock the song in before we laid it down for real."
"In terms of the recording process, we tracked Bass and Drums together, then recorded Guitars DI from home and re-amped them at Amplified. Keys were recorded both live and DI, and we did a vox in a few hours live in the studio. Additional percussion was added towards the end."
WHAT CHALLENGES DID YOU FACE WHEN RECORDING THIS SINGLE?
"The main challenge was in locking in the vocal performance - everything else came together pretty smoothly. Utopia is pretty much entirely 'spoke-sung' and there’s a fine line to ride between over-emoting, keeping things honest, and over-performing. Charlie (our singer) comes from a musical theater background and it’s an entirely different beast than recording punk vox."
Photo taken by @bloodshotmovies on IG
WHAT IS THE OVERALL MESSAGE YOU HOPE PEOPLE TAKE AWAY FROM THIS SINGLE? DOES IT REVOLVE AROUND ONE MAJOR THEME OR DID YOU FIND YOURSELF COVERING MANY DIFFERENT TOPICS?
"This is one of the more 'serious' songs on the album. Charlie wrote it, and he grew up reading fantasy and sci-fi epics where the hero saves the day and the world gets better…The reality is… we’re bleeding this planet dry and being incredibly cruel to each other. It’s a terrifying time to be alive (while simultaneously being the best time to be alive so far). It’s all within our power to fix, but we can’t even agree that we have serious problems as a damn species. 'Utopia' is about taking the blinders off, acknowledging the cold world we live in, and accepting that it isn’t going to change. It’s kind of a transition from young-adult optimism to regular-a** adult realism."
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LINE(s) IN THIS SONG?
"Mama Mia, what a humbling surprise."
"Born into the dream, watch the dreamer die."
WHAT INSPIRED THE NAME OF THIS SINGLE?
"Nothing fancy in the name of the song. It’s called Utopia ‘cause that’s what it’s about!"
Photo taken by @philtanicreative on IG
WHAT CAN FANS EXPECT FROM YOU IN THE FUTURE? ARE ANY SHOWS COMING UP, OR ANY PLANS FOR MORE MUSIC TO BE RELEASED?
"SHOWS! MUSIC! THINGS! We’re going to be super busy over the next few weeks and months dropping music off the new album. You can catch the music video for Utopia here and we’ll be dropping our next single, Lavender Royale, in a few weeks."