Lowertown: Conversations About Nothing
On this weeks Conversation About Nothing, the radio sits down with Lowertown after their latest show at The Rabbit Hole in Brooklyn.
We discuss the venue with best crowd west of the Mississippi, dream subheadings on their wikipedia page and figure out shitty is too shitty for a house to praise.
Avsha: Uh, I'm Avsha.
Olive: I'm Olive.
A: It's Avsha and Olive, together making music.
How shitty is too shitty for a house to praise?
O: The exterior does not matter as much as the vibe. You know, like when you walk into a room and you feel like something bad has happened—that's shitty in a way that I wouldn't praise. But if it's like falling apart, um, as long as it's not a complete biohazard, I would say it's fair game to be praised.
A: Yeah, you can have mold, as long as it's chill mold.
Define chill mold:
O: Some of them are non-toxic to humans, and some of them are. I'm very allergic to mold, so I know this. And I've lived in many houses with toxic mold.
A: I am not allergic to mold. So, bring it on.
What was an unexpected source of inspiration for ‘Skin of My Teeth’?
A: So, the interesting thing with ‘Skin and My Teeth’ is that it's a collection of songs from a bunch of different time periods. “Bline” we did while we were in London.
O: For ‘ Love to Lie.’ It was around that time.
A: And that's where the title of the album came from—came from that song. We didn't use it because there's a sample of me saying “I love to lie” at the beginning of it, and that’s where the name of the album came from.
And then “Root Canal” also was—I love to root—was no, *Gaping Mouth* time, *Gaping Mouth* sessions. Um, “Obscurity” was after both of those albums, and then “Marionette” was before both of those. That was like *Honeycomb Bed*. That was when we were still living in Atlanta.
A; But that doesn't answer your question. Oh, “Blind” was—“Blind” was crazy. Okay. Inspiration for “Blind.” I feel like I was—I really—
O: You were a compulsive liar as a kid.
A: Yeah, I was a compulsive liar as a kid, and I wasn't very good at it either. I was like—I guess, yeah, I guess that would be a great inspiration—was like my initial tendency to lie and just being terrible at it. And then like how awesome lying can be, and how basically storytelling is just lying.
O: I feel like some people are bad liars because they feel guilt from lying, so they want people to find out that they're actually lying, so they can have that allevi-moment where they can actually tell the truth. I feel like I'm a bad liar sometimes because of that.
A: That might be some people, but that's—that's not me. I really wanted so hard for people to believe my lies, and they just never did.
O: It’s because you're dumb.
A: It's 'cause I'm not good at delivery, man. Just the delivery of my speech just reads “lie” all over it. I guess my childhood is my favorite form of inspiration for that project.
What’s inspiring new music?
O: Uh, we read a lot of books and watched a lot of movies. That's one big inspiration—is a lot of the media that we consume. I got a lot into philosophy and things like that. I was trying to think about things outside of myself because a lot of my music and lyrics revolve around me and what's happening to me and how I'm feeling all the time. And it gets boring and repetitive to just be talking about yourself so close-up all the time. I also had a semi-mental breakdown, um, like before writing a lot of the songs. And once I recovered from that, I had a new perspective on life that was very good, and so I bought that new perspective to writing a lot of this music. And I got way better at controlling my anxiety, and that really helped me write a lot of the songs too.
A: For me, there was a video by a dance troupe called DV8 in London in the early 2000s. They were kind of like interpretive dancers, but they had this—I don’t—it was called *The Art of Something* and it's on YouTube. And there was one really tall, lanky guy who—of course I resonated with—that danced to the “Do You Believe in Love After Love,” the Cher song “Do you believe?”.
And he did this such crazy dance that I'd never seen anybody use their body in that way before, and that really inspired a lot of the new music. And the general direction of my creative career right now I feel like is inspired by that.
I think dance-y, and also what you—
Well, yeah, what it represented to me, which was like—it was the first time that I kind of really got the message of the person being different than the cover of the person. You know, like these kind of dorky-dressed British people, and then they all of a sudden break into these most obscure dance moves that are very original.
And I usually like—I just don’t really like modern dance—but it was something so crazy, and it was hilarious. And that kind of ability of humor to work into any sort of medium really is very inspiring to me.
Best Crowd west of the Mississippi
A; San Antonio, Texas.
O: They were so lit. It was actually insane.
Portland was crazy too, which I never expected because—I like Portland, but I feel like the crowds are usually more awkward when we play there. But this time, people were just down.
It was the second show of the tour. People just knew what to do. Like, there was an insane amount of crowd surfing. People were singing the words of songs that hadn't been released yet. Like, it was so epic.
LA—it seems like the obvious answer, but even not—they were so great. But I usually, um, get too anxious when I play LA or New York because it feels like a lot of pressure.
A: But people also don't really move in LA.
O: Like, sometimes people just film the whole thing or have their arms crossed.
But no—people were just going insane. Like, people were on the stage dancing and crowd surfing. A lot of, uh, things got kicked around. Um, very positive crowd though. Like, they all were like, you know—they were not not chill, you know?
A: Shoutout Texas though. San Antonio. Denton, Texas too. Wild, wild places.
O: We love Denton.
Dream subheadings on the Lowertown Wikipedia Page?
O: Cursed mythology or like something to do with like mystical, strange things around our band. Enemies list.
A: Controversial muscle gain.
O: Yeah, you start using synthol oil in your muscles.
A: Like how he got so big—first is the first part of it.
O: And steroid use or synthol oil.
A: I mean, I don't want to tell them, you know—there’ll be like different conspiracies and things. I'm seeing a subreddit already.
Shape-shifting allegations.
Yeah.
Most handsome bald award.
O: Influence on modern film.
A: Influence on presidents of the United States.
O: Presidential controversy.
A: Very handsome controversy.
Is there a throughline behind all your visual work?
O: There is body horror, I think, in most, if not all, actual music videos that we make that aren't just like thrown together footage. You know, like when we intentionally put together a treatment, there’s usually body horror elements.
There's also a lot of body horror elements in the lyrics of our music too.
A: Joy between the two of us—like we, I don't know, we've never really made an intentionally not-funny, like emotional video. And even if we did, I think there would definitely still be humor in it and our personalities in it.
The most important thing for most of the things we do is that we are having fun doing it. Even if it is like really intense and difficult stuff we're talking about—we still have to be having fun either getting through it or talking about it.
Definitely in the music videos too—they were just so crazy. We had so many resources and we were just like, “Let's \[\_\_] do it big.” A guy with big arms and, uh, and like Live will have blood splurting out of our hands and we were just like—just whatever we do to make ourselves laugh.
What was your first iTunes purchase?
O: I didn't purchase things from iTunes. My mom taught me how to illegally pirate them. So I didn’t ever purchase anything. She spent $1 a month for the service online that you could pirate all the music you wanted.
So most of the Beatles discography—“I Am the Walrus” was my favorite song when I was a kid, and I was obsessed with it, and I would listen to it a million times. And my mom was like, "Why is that your favorite Beatles song? It's so weird." And it's like one of the best songs still to me.
A: Mine—actually,
O: I know what the answer is.
Actually, I don't—
I don't know if you do.
Really?.
A: Well, I have some iconic iTunes purchases.
The ones that were crucial on my iPod Nano were, um, actually not really music. It was—
It was TV shows and movies.
I had a couple of episodes of *Family Guy*—the one where Stewie gets left at home. I think it's called like *Stewie Not On Board* or something.
And then I had an episode of *Futurama*, or a couple episodes—I don't remember which episode. But so—*Futurama*, *Family Guy*, and then a full Atlanta Falcons football game from beginning to end. It was only one game. It was the Falcons versus the Bears, where the Falcons won on a field goal.
But this is like—I mean, the Falcons have never been good. So it's a two-and-a-half-hour-long thing I had on my iPod Nano. I'd watch it—
Everything I had—
Every night.
O: I didn't even know it was a Nano, bro.
A: Mhm. It's an iPod Nano. So I'd sit like this—I still do this—like, I sit like this in my fetal position and I like watch stuff like this.
O: Like your classic.
A: That's my—that's my pose.
So I would do that every single night watching *Baby Not On Board*, *Family Guy*, my *Futurama* episode, and then a full Atlanta Falcons football game.
Olivia, what inspired you to incorporate a flute into recent performances?
O: One of my exes, who I still really rock with, um, used to play flute when we were seeing each other. And he sort of taught me how to play it a little bit, or he just taught me how to make a noise out of it.
It's actually really hard to make a noise out of a flute. Um, and sometimes he'd just wake up and—immediately, the very first thing he would do before anything else—would just start playing flute in bed.
And I started to get really hyperfixated on the flute because I love how—'cause I'm not a very rhythmic person. I'm a very melodic person. And it's like one of the most melodic instruments to me.
And also, I really like how different it is than guitar or any other instrument that I play. Like, your breath—like you're literally breathing life into an instrument.
So, I really wanted to play flute. And then, um, when we were touring in 2022, my mom got me a student flute for my birthday. And then after that tour, I just hyperfixated on flute. I didn’t talk to anyone for like two months except for Avsha.
I just holed up and played flute and learned how to do it. And after that, I started getting okay at it and started writing solo music with it.
A: And then eventually Ash and I wrote that song together—“Cover You.” And I think it came from a jam or something like that. I had like this guitar progression I really liked on my nylon string.
O: And yeah, when we used to live together, he would just play sax and I'd play flute, and we'd have like sax and flute jams.
And our neighbor hated us. She really hated us.
But yeah, that was sort of how it came about.
Yeah.
A: She was like, "What? Who are all those people up there?" And we were like, "It's just the two of us."
Many shuffling of feet.
Yeah.
O: Yeah. You're like, "Okay, well, we—we make enough noise for many. We have enough party in us for a hundred."
A: Ultimately, she won and we moved out. So what does that teach you about life?
O: We—we rolled over. We lose in the end.
Avsha, would you ever bring out a grand piano at a show?
A: No yea, I mean, we have a song—one of my favorite songs of our whole discography is a song called “Waltz in A Flat Major,” which is—I play piano on it and, like, we wrote together.
And my dream has always been that we would have enough money to be able to tour with a piano. I don’t know—I grew up playing classical piano, so I get snobby about electric piano.
I just feel like I feel silly when I play classical stuff on electric piano. I feel like especially for that song too, 'cause it's so emotional, that if it was on electric piano, it would be so corny—and not even in a funny way—it would just be like, “This sucks.”
But actually, I'm putting together the means to do a couple of classical shows around the country. Like, I want to do some offshoot solo things and then also put out a couple of classical pieces and perform all that kind of in one sitting.
O: I saw him perform recently, and it made me cry. It was so beautiful. Also, it reminds me of when we were first becoming friends—when we were like really young, when we were like 15 or 16. And we'd be at his house and he'd have to rehearse a couple hours every day. And I would just sit and do homework while he'd rehearse piano.
Yeah.
Or practice piano—not rehearse piano, right?
Yeah.
A: It was—I was pretty serious about it when I was in high school. Liv would sit there and be like, “I can't focus on my homework because you play piano so much. It's the same thing over and over again.”
Last song you were listening to?
O: But yeah, I'm going to look on my phone.
A: I think I might actually know what my last song is.
Actually, you know what? I don’t.
I'm going to look at my phone too.
It is—
You know what it honestly might be—
No, no, no, it's not that one.
O: “Super Falling Star” by Stereolab.
A: I think it was when I was getting ready and coming here.
I think it was actually God's Wisdom, who just opened up for us.
God's Wisdom.
Yeah, God's Wisdom is fucking wild.
O: That was my song. “Super Falling.”
A: Yeah, God's Wisdom, man. You could just look at him \[**] shredding it up on the stage.
Beautiful mix.
God's Wisdom merch.
God's Wisdom. A beautiful mix of dub and rap and every genre you can think of.
And he's created a new genre that has not been named yet, I would say.
Self Plug
O: Yeah, we're dropping a freaking album, and it's been like three years since we've dropped an album.
It's called *Ugly Duckling Union*.
There's no specific day we're going to say yet, but it is coming very soon, and it's one of the best things ever made.
So, don’t miss out or that'll be really sad for you.
A: Enough said.
Thank you guys for being on *Nothing Radio*, and thank you for being out.
Yeah, thank you for having us.
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