The Dreaded Laramie
I knew nothing going into The Dreaded Laramie’s set at FEST 21, going to see them on a friend’s recommendation. Their stage presence alone was worth it, but the hooky power-pop sealed the deal. Finding new bands is half the fun of the event.
The band released Princess Feedback earlier this year on Smartpunk Record. We reached out frontwoman MC to learn more.
Scene Point Blank: First, how many times have you played The Fest? How many times have you personally attended (if that # is different)?
MC: Last year was my first time playing or attending The Fest! 2024 will be Fest number 2 for me and The Dreaded Laramie.
Scene Point Blank: There are a million festivals these days. What makes The Fest stand out?
MC: It is wild to me the sense of continuity and loyalty in Fest-goers. Like, I feel like last year there were a million people whose story was something like “my friends and I haven’t missed a Fest in the last 15 years. I missed my son’s birth for Fest and I don’t regret it.” It seems to inspire a lot of loyalty and friendship between people. Heck, I feel like I made a ton of meaningful connections at my first Fest!
Scene Point Blank: Last year you had an early afternoon set at Loosey's. What are your memories about playing that venue at that time of day?
MC: The core memory was my incredible anxiety about playing the exact right amount of time on stage. We aren’t a band that ever plays longer than we should, but I knew the schedule is paramount at Fest and I really wanted to keep to that. The logistical stuff is usually the main thing on my mind, for better or worse.
In terms of fun memories: I remember we were playing at the same time as Eve 6, which was a bummer because the first ever Dreaded Laramie song was titled “Fly Like an Eve 6” (yeah, that’s a joint Far East Movement x Eve 6 reference). Thankfully no one will ever hear that song.
I also remember being totally blown away that we were playing to a totally packed room. Like, that was probably because people were getting to Loosey’s early for bands that were playing later (like Tsunami Bomb–that set was killer), but it was still really, really fun to have a super-full, super-engaged room. Our homie Crit gave us some TDL-themed friendship bracelets before we played, which blew me away.
Scene Point Blank: Who is a band you discovered at Fest last year?
MC: Suzie True! I wasn’t familiar with them before last year’s Fest, but saw them at How Bazaar and they were in bloody cheerleading uniforms playing red hot power pop and I was like, “Yep, that is a band after my own heart.” Also Desert Sharks!! We got to play with them in Orlando at Smartpunk’s Pre-Pre-Fest show at Lil Indie’s, and they rocked my socks off (to such a degree that I’m going to see them play in NYC this week).
Scene Point Blank: Share a random memory from Fest, be it seeing a favorite band, running across an old friend, or just some weird thing you saw in the crowd.
MC: Oh gosh, I hesitate to write this, but it is one of my core Fest memories. Unfortunately one of my many character flaws is that I am on a constant quest to shock people with things I’m willing to eat off of the ground, and on Saturday after our set I took a bite from a partially-eaten apple that had clearly been on the ground in a parking lot for a while (covered in ants, etc). Everyone was grossed out, I felt super heroic, and then I got super sick the next day but still saw a bunch of good music.
Scene Point Blank: At this moment in time, what song of Princess Feedback hits you the hardest, either playing it live or for some other reason?
MC: ”Mess,” the opening track. It has been my favorite song on the album basically since I wrote it. Every time we play it is like a 3-minute therapy session -- super cathartic, leaves me out of breath, and I feel like I get to know myself a little better. It is too honest and indulgent, which is exactly why I love it.
Scene Point Blank: Tell us a bit about the Nashville independent/punk scene. We all know about the mainstream music culture of the city (I assume). Do the mainstream and independent scenes ever co-mingle?
MC: There are so many great indie/punk/everything-in-between bands in Nashville (like Ghost Town Remedy, Khamsin, Mel Bryant & the Mercy Makers, Safari Room, and soooo many more), and I feel like I have a lot of great and talented friends playing in town, but there doesn’t seem to be much of a scene. Maybe that’s just me, but coming from a place like Lexington, KY where the local scene is robust (I lived there from 2017-2022 for grad school), Nashville’s sense of community leaves something to be desired.
I will say, though, that is kind of changing. A lot of people have shared the feeling that there isn’t a lot of community in town, and many are really putting in work to change that. Two people in particular come to mind. Nathan Childers (of the excellent band Smallville) has done a lot of grassroots work to bring DIY musicians together and has collaborated with DRKMTTR (a totally great all-ages space) to put on a monthly meetup for DIY people. TJ Maher (of the equally excellent band Ghost Town Remedy) has also been organizing Jorts Fest for the last couple of years, which is focused on highlighting Nashville DIY indie/punk and building community. I have a lot of respect for both of them and others doing work to build a sense of belonging in Nashville.
Scene Point Blank: Personally speaking, I really love how you capture anxiety in "Fishnets." Was that your purpose as the song took shape, or was there a moment in songwriting where all the ideas really came together? Do you set goals with songwriting or kind of see where it goes?
MC: Thank you! I’m glad (and I’m sorry) that it resonates. Yeah, that was the goal of the song, to have it be like a pendulum swinging between the verses and choruses, to emulate the feeling of being totally cool one moment and then reeling the next. Sometimes I will set songwriting prompts like that for myself. That was the case with several songs on this album. For instance, the intro kind of betrays this, but with “Mess” I was initially trying to write a lullaby, which transformed into what it is now over the course of the next four years. My only hard-and-fast rule in songwriting is that I write the melody first, and everything else follows and works in service of that.
Scene Point Blank: I think I first heard of Laramie as a brand of cigarettes in The Simpsons before learning it was a city out west. What is the inspiration behind the name for you?
MC: Look, we were in college, okay?
Scene Point Blank: The band used to live in different locales but now you're all in Nashville? Can you tell us a bit about where you've all lived and how that's inspired the sum-of-the-parts we get today with The Dreaded Laramie?
MC: Well, it’s more like everyone lived in Nashville, then I moved away, and then I moved back. Zach and I (the founding and only permanent members of the band) both grew up in different parts of the country. He’s from Denver and I’m from the panhandle of Florida. We met in college, and then I moved to Lexington for grad school for five years and kept the band going. As I alluded to earlier, the local scene in Lexington Absolutely Rules, and I’d say it’s kind of responsible for us deciding to take this band seriously. When we were only playing in Nashville, no one really cared about what we were doing, but then we found that when we started playing in Lexington (and generally outside of Nashville), people were a lot more receptive to the music.
Scene Point Blank: You’ve mentioned school a couple of times. What was your graduate degree? Are you using it with your career (if that is something you’re open to discussing)? What does the rest of the band do, outside of the band?
MC: I got my PhD in Philosophy. Now I teach philosophy at a university in Nashville. For me, philosophy and songwriting are mutually necessary -- I see philosophy as a fundamentally creative practice, and songwriting as a vehicle for self-discovery, so they feed one another. Our other permanent member, Zach, is a full time Pokémon trainer outside of the band.
Scene Point Blank: Are you touring to Fest or on the way home?
MC: We sure are! We are going to be on tour with Rozwell Kid, who are total heroes of ours. It’s kind of a dream tour. Other than Fest, we’ll be in DC, Richmond, Raleigh, Atlanta, and Nashville. You can buy tickets to those shows here.
Scene Point Blank: Anything you'd like to add?
MC: Scene Point Blank rocks!! Thanks for supporting our band, reviewing the album, and caring about what we have to say. I really appreciate the chance to get to answer these questions.
In general, I wanna say that I’m just very grateful to have so much support for this band and for Princess Feedback. Between the guidance and enthusiasm from our producer Dave, Smartpunk, our homies at Death To Slow Music and Pirate, and our friends and families, the support I feel for this project at this exact moment feels unprecedented and kind of surreal. I’m very thankful.
Now, a rapid fire Fest-focused Q&A:
