Sympathy Sympathy sees gained exposure from failed Spring Sing audition to perform its aesthetic music at gigs around UCLA
UCLA band Sympathy Sympathy will be performing at the Hardman-Hansen Hall (part of University Cooperative Housing Association) tonight. The rock band uses synthesizers and is heavily influenced by ’80s bands such as Joy Division and The Cure, as well as ’90s bands such as Blink-182. The group members’ first live performance together was at an unsuccessful audition for Spring Sing but have performed their pop-culture infused songs around campus numerous times since.
Sympathy Sympathy
Today, 10 p.m.
Hardman-Hansen Hall, FREE
By Shannon Cosgrove
May 26, 2011 11:21 p.m.
Sympathy Sympathy did not pass the Spring Sing auditions last year ““ but they did not let rejection stop them from playing upbeat songs filled with synthesizers and pop culture references.
The band will perform at a prom-themed show at Hardman-Hansen Hall (part of University Cooperative Housing Association) today at 10 p.m.
Fourth-year music composition student and bassist Mitchell Collins said that trying out for Spring Sing auditions solidified the band, as it progressed from playing at parties to performing at organized shows around UCLA. The band still kept their quirky approach to songwriting, however.
Instead of writing love songs and breakups ballads, UCLA band Sympathy Sympathy turns to hot topics like Daniel Radcliffe in “Equus” and the “Twilight” trend for its lyric material. The title to the song “R U USA” is based on a common question of non-English speakers on Chatroulette.
“That song is a pop culture joygasm,” Collins said.
According to Collins, the band does not impose a cohesive narrative on lyrics in songs like “Youth Crew” in which fourth-year music composition student, synthesizer and guitar player Kevin Gonyo sings “we don’t dream about love, we’re in love with our drugs.”
“Our songs are mainly for raw aesthetic enjoyment,” Collins said. “Lyrics don’t have to make sense in the narrative of the song if we think they’re cool ““ we try to make things tight and fun.”
Influenced by ’80s bands like Joy Division and The Cure and ’90s bands like Blink-182, Collins described one of Sympathy Sympathy’s songs, “Great Cinema,” as Sum 41 with synthesizers. The band will also cover New Order’s “Bizarre Love Triangle.”
The band dips its toes in different genres ranging from rock and synth-pop to shoegaze and new wave, according to third-year composition student and drummer Kirk Naylor. He said it is difficult to put a label on the band’s sound.
“Our sound is only garage in the sense that we play in a garage,” fourth-year linguistics and philosophy student and guitarist Taylor Inouye said.
Before Sympathy Sympathy, Collins and Gonyo were already a two-man, one-computer band called MLK. They met at auditions for UCLA’s composition school and have been friends ever since. Collins first bonded with drummer and third-year comparative literature student Daniel Carnie over Beach House and Facebook chat.
The band members said they have UCLA to thank for their congregation, as well as the logic software and synthesizers they used to record their songs in Schoenberg Hall. The songs are now featured on the website SoundCloud.com.
Despite disagreements about who the best Beatle was and whether the Backstreet Boys or N’Sync was the best boy band, the members of Sympathy Sympathy agreed that their camaraderie makes band practices easy.
“This is a completely democratic operation,” Carnie said.
Naylor said that he first learned drums at the band’s first practice. He plays electric drums that Carnie found in his garage. Carnie himself plays an accumulation of drum parts he has collected over his 12 years of playing. Collins bought a $60 bass from eBay and Inouye borrowed his dad’s old Yamaha. Gonyo’s keyboard is 25 years old.
“These instruments are all we have, but they are all we need for our sound,” Inouye said.
The addition of regular drums on top of electric ones played by Naylor required more planning, attention and care, Carnie said.
“Two heads are better than one. But it requires a lot about communication, like every relationship,” Naylor said.
The band plans on continuing to play after Collins returns from graduate school at New York University. Gonyo said he is afraid Collins will come back in a turtleneck, but Carnie seems to be taking the band’s fashion in another direction, wearing his dad’s old “Radical Taz” shirt that evokes playful responses from the other band members.
“(Carnie’s) clothing is a big inspiration for our music,” Naylor said.
The band will don more formal attire for the prom-themed show tonight, however. Some of the members said they would wear tuxedos, and they will even play a slow dance song. But this prom will not be chaperoned.
“It’s not going to be formal, that’s all I can say,” Carnie said. “Just dance.”
