Robex Lundgren virkblogg.

Have you had other previous members? Nope!

Where are you from? Based in Oslo, Norway, but formed the band in a small town few miles outside the city.

What year did the band form? 2013

What's your style of genre? Our sound took shape through common interest in grunge and the Seattle sound but our latest record draws more from contemporary post-punk and post-hardcore bands.

What inspires you? Playing live and getting better at this, other hard working bands.

Are you looking for a booking agency, and what are your thoughts around that? We're not actively looking for a booking agency. Before the pandemic, I invested a lot of time in trying to book a EU tour for 'Inflated Sense of Purpose.' It's not easy but figuring out how to do things on your own is fun and will get back to it soon, hopefully. We'll be sure to appreciate their work if we ever get one.

Are you looking for a label, and what are your thoughts around that? It's not really on our minds and not something we talk about either. We've invested so much from our own pockets that we might've become stubborn about doing it on our own. There are great labels out there that seem fair and put out music for incredible bands regardless of their status. One that seem to do it because they love their artists' music is Exploding in Sounds, which has a lot of amazing bands.

What are your songs about? There are 13 songs about different things but we named our album 'Inflated Sense of Purpose' because that should cover the general approach to whatever issue at hand. 

Who does the composing and writes the lyrics? We work together on arranging songs and Lars writes the lyrics.

Do you compose in a certain inviroment? No

Have you done any covers live? No

What are the least and most people to attend one of your gigs? Least maybe 15-20 and around 100 at most.

What ages are most of your concert attendants? I'd guess 18-35

Do you always play the same songs live, or do you vary? Vary. When we started out, we added a new song to our setlist with each gig.

Do you have a regular place you play live often? No

What was your first gig like? Amazing. It was in the basement of an occupied building. The bartender was smoking a joint while selling beers 1/5th of standard price. The place was packed and we got a lot of nice feedback from the crowd and bands we played with.

What was your latest gig? Vaterland, Oslo in august last year. Also a great show. It's a relatively new venue and when they opened we immediately wanted to play there, so we're happy about that.

Where have you played live this year? No shows in 2020

When did you start to sell merchandise, and what do you have for sale? We haven't got around to it yet, but we plan on printing vinyls of our latest record and use some of the artwork we used for singles as t-shirt print.

Where can people buy your merchandise? We'll bring it with us to shows and put it up on bandcamp.

What do you think about people downloading music instead of buying records now a days? We're fine with it. Of course, we'd like people to listen to the album as one piece of work, but expecting people's attention for an hour might be far fetched. When I first got into Pixies, I didn't like much of it right away, but I'd bought the CD and felt like I should go through the whole thing. It turned out to be my go-to band for about a decade now.

How do you think the music industry have changed because of this? Tough to have much of an opinion about it as we've just been around for how it is today. I know that it's good for newly formed bands to be able to reach out like you can today. I don't think bands should expect to earn money on an album alone without playing it live. Live shows are essential and there are ways to make money on playing small venues.

What do you think of my work? It's cool that people search for unknown bands and take interest in spreading the word. Good work, mate!

How do you think and know that this interview will help you in the music business? Maybe somebody looking for bands will read it, check us out and book us for a show. We'd love to play shows in Sweden.

For me (Lars), not as much as before. I used to be a fanboy of Kurt Cobain and Black Francis and it had a lot to do with their image and not just musicality, I guess. Now there are other traits I find admirable about artists, like work ethics, how they interact with fans, how they're developing as musicians.

Anders likes Atom Willard from Against Me! a lot in terms of attitude and musicality.
Is it easier to find inspiration from older bands, or bands that are more active today? I find newer bands more inspiring. A lot of progress has been made in terms of rock music in my opinion. It's kind of a pity that people are so nostalgic when it comes to alternative and punk. It often seems like attention is drawn to bands that are recycling old tricks.

What have been your biggest obstacles? Bad luck and a messy approach.

What advice would you give other bands or artists? Play live, don't get stuck in the same patterns, develope your sound and focus on getting better rather than making it. I think that's important to appreciate it.

Do you have any new material? Yes, we released our second album 'Inflated Sense of Purpose' on April 30th. We're happy about it. We show more of ourselves, I think. A song like 'Dementia' could've been two or three different songs if we worked the same way we did on our last record, but we decided to work toward more movement in our songs. It's got riffs dating back to 2013, like 'Fatigue' which we arranged with new ideas. We recorded it at Ocean Sound Recordings, like our first, but were lucky enough to have Kevin S. McMahon mix and master it.

What are your web sites? @carcosaband on instagram, facebook and bandcamp.