RECORDS LiVE

Israel: Good to see you.

Tamara: I haven’t seen him in years. It’s been years. Like 20 years, I think? It’s about 20 years now. Thank you for joining us here today. This is Israel of Israel’s Arcade fame. You brought some records for us today.

Israel: Okay, so this is your house.

Tamara: This is my home, yeah. I live here. I just cleaned.

Israel: Wow, it’s so beautiful. It’s outdoors.

Tamara: It’s outdoors, I know. I save a lot of money on air conditioning.

Song Plays: Suicidal Tendencies – You Can’t Bring Me Down

Israel: Okay, so when I was in high school, when I was like 15, I went through a really big goth phase. I was really, really skinny. I realized a few years after that I probably had an eating disorder. Anyways, I was very skinny. So, I was wearing black lipstick to school every day. It was actually dark purple. I would buy it from Walgreens. And I used to put the dark lipstick on, and then I used to put it around my eyes.

Tamara: Oh my god.

Israel: I was just a freak. I used to wear white button-up shirts every day, tucked in with a studded belt, and my hair was big. I was very goth. This song is called “You Can’t Bring Me Down.” I was very insecure, but the way I kind of covered that up was by acting tough. So, I used to wear platform shoes that were like this big. *gestures to show size*

Tamara: Damn. How tall are you without shoes on?

Israel: 6’2” around there. I was… Scary. Yeah, every single day, freshman and sophomore year, every morning I would walk into school with my earbuds on, playing this song. I look like a freak, but you can’t bring me down, you know? It would kind of motivate me a little bit and kind of help me tackle the day.

Tamara: Did this give you a lot of confidence when you’re…

Israel: It did, but I remember I would always get to class late. I was trying so hard. I would fucking just get to class. I would grab my backpack, throw it, kind of stomp down, you know? Nobody ever fucked with me. And I kind of try to make that a point, like don’t fuck with me, you know what I mean? I know I’m wearing lipstick and fucking eyeshadow, but don’t fuck with me. And this song definitely, definitely helped with that.

Tamara: How did you discover this band? Was it in high school?

Israel: Yeah, I was in high school. I was 15 and we found a song called… It’s their biggest song. It’s called “Institutionalized.” You might have heard it.

Tamara: I’ve heard of it, yeah.

Israel: It’s the one that’s like, “I just wanted a Pepsi.” Me and my buddies used to play that song all the time. And then through that song, that’s how I found out about this band, Suicidal Tendencies. They’re amazing. Punk, thrash legends.

Tamara: When you first started making music, was that in high school or no?

Israel: When I started making music? Yeah, I started recording my first EP when I was 15. I was recording songs on GarageBand and uploading them to SoundCloud, just under my name, under just Israel. I showed one of my teachers, one of my [music program] instructors, one of my songs, “Wimp,” which I later recorded properly. He liked it, and he said he would record a full album for me for free.

Tamara: What?

Israel: I couldn’t believe it. That’s why I’m here today.

Tamara: That’s so special.

Israel: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tamara: This part of the song is so good right now.

Israel: That dude, the third dude there… the one who has his leg up, he’s the bassist for Metallica. Robert Trujillo. He’s the man. Sexy, long hair, Mexican bassist.

Tamara: I love that. Do you think this inspired you to make a lot of like, thrashing music? Because at your live shows, people go nuts.

Israel: You think it’s thrashing?

Tamara: I’m going to get in there and I’m going to thrash there, yeah.

Israel: I mean, I’ve always loved just punk music, so this is right up my alley. My parents went to high school in the 90s, so I grew up with System of a Down and Metallica and Slayer and stuff like that. This was right in that, you know, in that same vein.

Tamara: How do you start a song? Do you start it with a melody or maybe some words or lyrics?

Israel: When I’m writing?

Tamara: Yes.

Israel: Something that I’m always doing is I try to always kind of keep my eyes open. I’m always trying to pay attention to everything. And so, with this recent album, if I see something while I’m driving or hear something like a phrase that I think sounds cool or a word that I think sounds cool, I’ll write it down immediately. All the songs on our recent album were just phrases or words that I thought sounded cool. And then I just wrote lyrics around them, you know, wrote songs around those, like “Nail in the Coffin.” I thought that sounded sick.

Tamara: Yeah. You’re like, “This is going to eat.”

Israel: It’s as simple and stupid as that. It’s like, “This sounds sick.”

Tamara: It’s a great song. Sorry guys, if you haven’t heard the album, it’s amazing actually.

Israel: Thanks, Tamara.

Song Plays: The Drums – If He Likes It Let Him Do It

Tamara: Okay, let’s talk about this one a little bit.

Israel: This is the blueprint right here. This is the blueprint. This is the blueprint. This is why we’re all here today, even though we don’t realize it. This album is no skips start to finish. No skips. It’s a perfect album, Portamento. Yeah, all of the songs that I chose today are songs that I just listened to religiously in high school. Like this whole album, I listened to religiously and I had to just pick one. This song sticks out to me because the title is “If He Likes It Let Him Do It.” And it’s such a simple concept or idea. I don’t know, so beautiful. If he likes it, let him do it. It’s as simple as that.

Tamara: What is that in reference to?

Israel: I don’t know if it’s in reference to anything. Just, you know, if you’re a vulnerable person or if you’re a person that maybe has a little bit of fear and you kind of struggle to show your confidence or show who you really are, I feel like that phrase can apply to anything. But also, this melody is the chorus. If he likes it… It’s just going up a full scale.

Tamara: Yeah.

Israel: If he likes it, like, why did I think of that?

Tamara: You’re like, “Man, I’m gonna put that in my next song.”

Israel: It’s so good.

Tamara: It’s so good. I love this song. Would The Drums be a dream band for you to play with?

Israel: Absolutely.

Tamara: Yeah, let’s manifest it, guys. Manifesting it here tonight. Israel’s Arcade. The Drums. It’s gonna happen.

Israel: Yeah, I love The Drums. I was thinking, “Should I bring my pretentious side out today?” But I was like, “I’m gonna keep it simple. I’m gonna keep it just straight to basics.” This band is a big reason why I make music and a big reason of why I write the lyrics that I write and the melodies that I write, you know? Yeah, I’ve heard people call, the lead singer of this band is named Jonny Pierce… They call him “non-problematic Morrissey.”

Tamara: Wow.

Israel: Because he is like a Morrissey kind of figure, you know? His lyrics are just very dramatic, you know what I mean? Everything he sings about he’s like, “I’m gonna fucking die.” And it’s like, “You’re not gonna die, Jonny, but I know what you mean.”

Tamara: I love that. Me and Samantha over there, of Revel Girl fame, we described your lyrics as girl-coded with some of your stuff. Like, “I might get in a car crash, I just want some attention.” The Drums are also girl-coded.

Israel: 100%.

Tamara: I love that. That’s amazing. Oh my gosh.

Israel: I’ve never heard that our lyrics are girl-coded.

Tamara: We’ve been crashing out, listening to your lyrics the last few months, and we’re like, “Oh my god, he just gets it. He gets what it’s like to be a girl.”

Song Plays: Caifanes – Viento

Tamara: This is a sexy album cover.

Israel: So, that’s kind of what I looked like in high school.

Tamara: In high school?!

Israel: Yeah, but with longer hair. This is a late 80s/90s band from Mexico City, I believe. This is my parents’ favorite band.

Tamara: Oh my god.

Israel: Yeah. I grew up listening to this. Another blueprint.

Tamara: This is so good. I hear the blueprint of this in you.

Israel: Also, I’ve always kind of felt that I sing like him, but just in a different register. Like a different ring. The way he kind of pronounces shit. I don’t know, I feel like I sing similarly. They were very inspired by The Cure. Also, their band has a synth player who also plays saxophone.

Tamara: Oh my god. And then when you found Chris, you were like, “Oh my god.” Chris is his saxophone player that plays synth.

Israel: Dude, honestly, I hadn’t even realized that. So shout out, Chris.

Tamara: You didn’t even realize that connection until now?

Israel: I didn’t realize that until like, maybe six months ago.

Tamara: Really?

Israel: I was watching a live performance of them on YouTube and I was like, “Holy shit, they have a Chris.”

Tamara: I love that. You guys should dress. This looks like Chris. Is that the saxophone? The saxophone? That looks exactly like Chris right there.

Israel: You know what? Yeah, that’s it. That’s the guy?

Tamara: You guys should dress like this. One show, one show.

Israel: And how fucking cool is this album cover, man?

Tamara: It’s so cool.

Israel: It’s so simple. It’s black and white, just got dudes. They’re so smart, just into politics, you know? That’s not that cool, but…

Tamara: That’s pretty cool.

Israel: Is it?

Tamara: Into politics? If it’s very good politics, yeah.

Israel: If it’s good politics?

Tamara: Yeah, well I’m like, if it’s some evil stuff, no thanks.

Israel: True.

Tamara: So, with a band like this, this is something you listen to as a child? Like, your parents showed you this as a child?

Israel: Yeah, this is what I listened to.

Tamara: The way that they’re dressed and their own aesthetic and image, how much did that inspire you with your band? How long did you have this image in your band?

Israel: It wasn’t really a thing that I tried to do or looked at or anything. There’s a band called Christian Death that is Death Rock goth band from the 90s, late 80s. I was gonna add Christian Death to this list. They would have been the first on the list, but there’s some naughty lyrics in there that I just… I don’t know if we could do this. The lead singer of that band, his name is Rozz Williams. He was my idol for a long time. I think when I was in my goth phase in high school, I just tried to be like Rozz Williams. I just tried to be like him. I just ended up looking like a darker version of these guys.

Tamara: I love that. That’s so good. Oh my gosh. It’s such a good song. Do you have any other little quirks about this song?

Israel: We covered it two and a half years ago in Joshua Tree. We played a show in Joshua Tree. We covered this song.

Tamara: Bring it back!

Israel: Later that night we camped out in Joshua Tree, and a serial killer pulled up on us.

Tamara: What? Oh my god.

Israel: It’s a long story. Basically, he just pulled up immediately in his truck. We were camping out. We had a fire going in Joshua Tree. Sometimes they don’t let you have fires in Joshua Tree, but this night they allowed it. So, we had a fire. We had music. We were dancing. We were drunk. Then this dude pulls up in a truck and gets out really aggressively. He’s like, “What are you guys doing? You can’t have a fire here tonight.” And we were like, “Oh, shit.” He just scared us. He pulled up really aggressively, really fast. Then he’s like, “Oh I’m just kidding.” I just wanted to make a friend, so I just immediately offered him a beer and started talking to him. He just started being really weird to everybody and really scary. He started speaking in different languages.

Tamara: Speaking in different languages is scary to you? That’s crazy.

Israel: And then two days later, we found out that night there was a serial killer who was killing. I never thought I’d be sharing this…

Tamara: Are you lying?!

Israel: I swear to God. There was a man found in his car, dead. All right, this got dark… I apologize. This has nothing to do with Caifanes.

Tamara: You thought he killed the guy in the car?

Israel: Yeah. I do think it was him.

Tamara: Scary.

Song Plays: Beach Fossils – Careless

Israel: Another blueprint. We opened for them once.

Tamara: Really?

Israel: In Tijuana. This is one of my favorite bands of all time. One of my favorite albums of all time. I think this song just captures so well what it felt like for me to be a teenager. I didn’t give a fuck about anything or anyone or myself. I was just like careless dude, you know? And this song just captures that so well. It’s kind of hard to listen to sometimes because it was such a wild time.

Tamara: Did they play this when you opened for them?

Israel: They did not play this. But yeah, we opened for them. It was a festival. I can’t remember what the festival was called, but it was five bands. Beach Fossils was headlining, and we were the openers and the flyer was like “every single band and more.” And we were the only band that was “and more.”

Tamara: You were the “and more”? Nooo.

Israel: I was like, “Dude, it’s an easy fix.” But yeah, it was really cool. It was in this old amphitheater, really old amphitheater from the like 40s. I think it was missing the roof. The roof was just gone. And yeah, it was amazing. It was amazing. So cool.

Tamara: Besides the nostalgia of being careless when you were young, what else about this song is a blueprint for you? In the melody or the lyrics?

Israel: I have a song called “she made eyes at me” and I literally stole the lead guitar part from this. So, I literally steal everything I make. I just steal shit. That’s all I do. I just Frankenstein everything.

Tamara: Music is an interpolation. Everything in music is like a copy of something else and you know music is inspired by music.

Israel: I agree.

Tamara: Yeah. That’s a valid thing to say about this song.

Israel: I found this band through their song “Sleep Apnea” on SoundCloud. Back in my SoundCloud days. That’s how I found a lot of punk and indie, and bands like The Garden and Mac DeMarco. I was 14. That’s how I found this.

Tamara: Just on SoundCloud? Were you popping off on there when you first started posting music or no?

Israel: Weirdly enough, for some reason, I don’t know what happened, but we had a song that just like blew up on SoundCloud.

Song Plays: Surfbort – Hippie Vomit Inhaler

Tamara: Hell yeah.

Israel: Surfbort. Okay, this song is really fast.

Tamara: Oh, yeah. We gotta talk about it really quick.

Israel: This was the first punk band that I ever saw. I was 15 and lead singer, Dani Miller… There was probably like 30 people in the crowd and she came out in a bikini with a mullet, missing teeth, hairy legs, you know what I mean? Just completely like unshaved body and I’ve never seen that before. It blew my 15 year old mind. I saw her perform and I was like, “This is it. I’m never going back. This is the coolest thing ever.” You know?

Tamara: That’s sick.

Israel: And then like the rest of her band are all dudes in like their 40s and 50s.

Tamara: Damn, this is a short song. That’s crazy, but it was life changing for you to see a female punk singer subverting beauty standards and stuff, too.

Israel: I’d never seen anything like it before. My young mind was just like, “What the fuck is happening right now?” Yeah.

Tamara: I love that. That’s beautiful.

Israel: Is that all the songs that I’ve got?

Tamara: That’s all the songs we have today.

Israel: I chose very short songs.

Tamara: I know, but it was such a good time. We got to hear about a serial killer. We got to hear about you in high school.

Israel: We have to do a part two about that serial killer story.

Tamara: I know! Do you want to plug yourself? Where can we find you? Did you just release a new album or something?

Israel: I actually did. Israel’s Arcade. We released an album called Pray for Rain. We’re playing next month here in Riverside with a band called blood club. Then we’re playing in Santa Ana at The Observatory in November. And then we’ll probably take a break for a little while and start doing shows again in February, March.

Tamara: Hell yeah. When are you going to start writing again?

Israel: Oh, I’m writing.

Tamara: You’re writing?

Israel: Yeah.

Tamara: Awesome. Thank you guys for joining us here today.