Interview with “Friend Slash Lover”!

Welcome to Kick Acts. Tell us a little about yourself and your band and were you can be found at on the web.

Hello. Thanks for the interview! Friend Slash Lover is an indie rock band with some electro elements. Sometimes straight-forward, sometimes quirky. Sometimes mainstream, sometimes artsy-fartsy. I’m working on turning our website (friendslashlover.com) into a non-linear, fine art piece and foregoing the traditional band site altogether. Nobody likes band websites anyway. Our new tumblr page is probably more interesting than our site: friendslashluvr.tumblr.com

Who are your musical heroes, influences & why?

David Bowie, because a white guy can’t get much cooler. (editor’s note , This is dead on, Bowie rocks!!)

Do you have any advice for someone just getting started in playing music? Any pitfalls they should avoid?

If you’re an indie artist, you should avoid all businesses that claim they are working on behalf of indie artists. Mostly, they are preying on them. In my humble opinion, this includes Taxi and SonicBids, judging from my experiences with them. They have absolutely no curation process (meaning, they will allow anyone to PAY to become members and PAY to submit to listings) but that doesn’t mean they will ever send your music through to the other side. They are not just middlemen; they are gatekeepers, for a profit. To make it in this day and age, you need to be savvy with social media and have good old-fashioned connections.

Do you have a greatest gig story you’d like to share?

We once played inside a wrestling ring and everything kept bouncing around. Every time I moved, my mic would swing back and forth and I had to chase it with my face. It somehow added to the energy of the set and people really liked it.

On the same token as the above question. How about a “worse gig” ever story.

See question above. J

Do you have any other hobbies other than playing music? Collect stamps? Collect hats from off the side of the road? Draw pictures of boobs?

I’m constantly making up quirky phrases and writing them in my journal. Sometimes I etch them onto mirrors, put them on an image and post them on my tumblr page, or they become a song lyric or title, etc. In the beginning, there was the word…

What do you think about the present music scene or lack of?

I don’t pay much attention these days. Not since I hooked up a killer surround sound system at home. 😉

Tell us something about each of your band members that we wouldn’t expect to hear… (Like their hobbies or something like that)

Jake, our drummer, is an award-winning, world-class glockenspiel player.

Frank, our bass player, is a highly respected emergency physician.

Greg, our guitarist, used to have hair.

I’ve never had a cup of coffee.

Hypothetical situation. You’re stranded on Gilligan’s island and you get to hook up with only one of the girls. Is it Ginger, Mary Ann or Mrs. Howell and why?

Ginger, obviously. I may be gay but I’m not blind. In any event, I doubt she’d be in the mood to party these days, since Gilligan just died.

# 10 is called “Shout It Out Loud”. It’s where you get to talk about whatever you want to talk about. So go ahead and “SHOUT IT OUT LOUD”!

Don’t eat sugar. It’s the worse drug people do. Really.