Virginian quartet Corsair has consistently knocked our proverbial socks off — through two EPs and a full-length, this band has never garnered anything less than a stellar review here, never anything less than an 8, and all from three different reviewers. (All three of those same reviewers have featured a Corsair release in their year-end best-of lists for the past two years.) The band’s blend of stoner and progressive rock just simply rocks, with lead guitars weaving around one another in the space where dreamy space-rock runs headlong into Thin Lizzy-indebted hard rock. John Ray described the band’s debut EP Alpha Centauri as “the complete package… [its] familiarity is a function of being sincerely and deeply rooted in loyalty to heavy rock’s golden age. That is to say, Corsair’s first EP is a no-brainer for anybody with a soft spot for that era’s enduring sound.” I myself followed up that brilliance with this bit of praise for their second EP Ghosts Of Proxima Centauri: “… Proxima capitalizes on the band’s strengths whilst honing their sound to a sharper point. Now two EPs into their career, Corsair remains an uncovered gem in the rock world.” And Zach Duvall completed the trifecta with his recent review of this year’s eponymous full-length, by saying “The album is laid-back but also emotionally driven; it’s technical but never boisterous, and complex without having a learning curve. Most of all it harkens back to a time when rockin’ was free of pretension and just plain cool. You’d have to be pretty black and cold inside if you can listen to this without your hands either in the air as fists or placed in front of you on an imaginary guitar.” (And yeah, we just quoted ourselves… three times.)So it’s safe to say this: We love Corsair. We’ve been admiring them across the bar for awhile now, and we finally took the time to introduce ourselves, strike up a conversation, get to know them… And this is what we got….
MetalReview: How did Corsair come to be? Charlottesville, VA isn’t known for kick-ass guitar-driven hard rock, so what brought Corsair there or what caused Corsair to come about there?
Jordan Brunk [bass / vocals]: Charlottesville is somewhat of a vortex for talented musicians most of which will not touch the level of fame [of local success] Dave Matthews Band has, but they still hold their own level of success as musicians. Maybe it’s the number of musicians, all with similar lifestyles that makes it easy to settle down in a tight-knit scene. With many studios and a handful of decent venues, it’s a comfortable place to be an artist. Paul and Aaron grew up in the area, and Marie and I both attended the University of Virginia here in Charlottesville. Collectively, most of our friends are also in bands here, giving us support and friendly competition to help us grow. However, this is not typically a town for hard rock or metal. Those who are encouraging harder rock seem to have ties to Richmond or Harrisonburg.
Paul [Sebring, guitar / vocals] spent time in Richmond and carries the torch as the most metal/punk member of Corsair. Paul and Marie [Landregin, guitar / vocals] first cut heads as members of the annual Mass Sabbath tribute band which pooled much of the local metal talent into a 12+ ensemble and payed homage to Black Sabbath on Halloween. For a run of six years, they earned the attention of music lovers in town, snowballing to a 600-capacity packed house. This gave electricity and hope to the hard rock scene that otherwise lurked in the dark shadows of Charlottesville. With mutual respect earned, Marie and Paul set out to write original music and form a band. I started off playing in an indie rock band and brought my pop mentality and structure to the group. Leigh Ann Leary was the initial drummer for the first EP and was the part of the backbone for our early efforts. Aaron [Lipscombe, drums] later joined the group and his influence began from the second EP onwards.
MR: How does the writing process work for you guys? Do you typically jam out song ideas, does one person write the majority of the tunes, or what?
JB: It depends on the album for specifics, as some of us have written an entire song, but overall, Paul brings most of the riffs to the table at practice, and we play it out. I usually work out the structure and arrangements, and Marie tackles guitar layering or adding ambiance. She also adds the spacey intros, outros and comes up with additional parts in the studio. Marie and Paul designate where their solos will sit, or we’ll end up toying with different chord progressions for solo sections. Lyrics come after the music is written. For example, Marie wrote all of “Chaemera,” lyrics and all. Paul wrote all of “Of Kings And Cowards.” “Falconer” was a combined effort by all… so our writing morphs as the song presents itself.
Marie Landregin: Sometimes we jam ideas, but not as often as we’d like. We kind of work in cycles where we bring riffs to practice and build them out over a couple weeks. Usually, we’ll swing into an excited, amped-up mode where we’ll want to hit the studio, get drum tracks and then do the rest of the tracking at home.
MR: What bands and albums would you list as your biggest influences? Any surprising influences/guilty pleasures?
ML: The first Black Sabbath album, Black Sabbath, was a huge influence for me when I first started playing guitar. I came into Thin Lizzy a little later on, but I have a particular soft spot for any of the 70‘s era albums. The first three Iron Maiden albums and early Wishbone Ash are like guitar ear-candy for me and definitely influenced my love of guitarmony! Led Zeppelin, early Yes, early Scorpions, Dire Straits and Pink Floyd all rank up there too. It’s a hard question to answer accurately because I am influenced by so many bands. Guilty pleasures, (if it can be considered that, I mean, really!) are Steely Dan, Fleetwood Mac, Emerson Lake and Palmer, and Bread.
JB: Radiohead Ok Computer, Herbie Hancock Head Hunters, Beck’s Mutations, Miles Davis In a Silent Way, Cody Chestnut Headphone Masterpiece, Flaming Lips The Soft Bulletin and Sly and the Family Stone.
MR: Corsair is obviously a guitar band, with riffs and leads tossed everywhere. Who are your personal guitar heroes and why?
ML: I’ve always admired Toni Iommi for his wicked style and for being able to play after having lost a finger. Jimmy Page was always intriguing to me with his flashy, risky guitar licks (and dragon suit), and I pretty much always wanted to be the female version of him. Mark Knopfler, because he’s utterly brilliant and poetic with his guitar and wore a sweatband. Angus Young, because he’s crazy.
Paul Sebring: Randy Rhoads and Nicholas Liivak (of Horsefang and The Mensa Select notoriety).
MR: Corsair’s first two EPs garnered much praise from absolutely awesome websites like MetalReview.com (no bias here!), and your first full-length also rocks – why are you not signed to a label yet?
ML: We haven’t sought a label, but we’d be open to anyone showing interest, for sure. All the reviews we’ve received have honestly just been shots in the dark. We sent out music to people, sites or magazines that we thought might find the albums interesting enough to review. Most of the distribution interest we have received has been from abroad, Germany, Italy and Chile in particular. I guess now we need to start sending the album to some labels!
MR: Speaking of the EPs, any chance we’ll hear the Bowie side of the band again (ie, “Last Night On Earth” from Alpha Centauri)?
ML: Ha! Probably not. That song was sort of an inside joke and also tapped into Paul’s theatrical nature. Years ago, after practice we were outside, the moon was out and I was wondering out loud to Paul, “What would it be like, if it was your last night on earth?”… and then he just started singing the chorus. It was pretty funny. We tend to be kind of goofy much of the time.
MR: With both EPs and the full-length, you guys hand-print your own artwork – who handles the visual component and how does that work? Is that something you see yourselves continuing as the band grows?
ML: I have done everything thus far. I’m a freelance graphic designer/artist/screen printer, and I really enjoy doing anything creative. In the past, I would work on a vision/idea and present it to everyone hoping they’d like it. I definitely would like to continue to progress with the visual part of the band. Actually, it would be nice to get a little more complicated with the layout and artwork and not worry so much about how many colours the idea will be and will it be hell or not if I screen the artwork at home!
MR: Any touring plans behind the eponymous CD?
JB: We played a couple shows for the release in April, but there have been no definite plans for a tour yet.
MR: What are the best and worst gig stories you guys have? Any particularly memorable shows that you’d like to share with us? How often does Corsair get to play?
ML: Best (and most ridiculous) gig we ever did was Corsair as Spinal Tap for Halloween in 2010. We played out our characters to the maximum and even built a tiny Stonehenge… Paul did a most convincing impression of Nigel Tufnel. It was magical. We also did Thin Lizzy last year for Halloween, and that helped us learn a lot more about performance, stage presence and engaging the audience a little better. The best show we played was after driving through the night from a gig in NYC. On the way back, we stopped to buy t-shirts to screen before our hometown show. We were all whacky and loopy feeling from lack of sleep and an overdose of coffee. We played a wonderfully energetic and comprehensive set, really on point and memorable. Worst show ever was at the Velvet Lounge in D.C. There had been hardly no (if any) promotion; there was a low turn-out; and the bartender was being a jerk, so after we finished playing, we packed up our gear and drove off… Turned out the back of the vehicle hadn’t been shut all the way, and when Paul hit the gas, my ’76 Les Paul and Aaron’s snare drum flew out the back of the Jeep into the street, into oncoming traffic… Luckily, nothing was damaged, and miraculously, the Les Paul was still in tune when we pulled over to check it out.
MR: You guys often deal in fantasy and sci-fi imagery but are pretty far from the type of metal or rock band that typically write such lyrical subject matter, but it fits like a glove. How did you arrive at using these topics? Any particular authors or TV shows that come into play?
ML: Paul is really into Ray Bradbury’s short stories and Greek mythology. I remember him being into that show Firefly for a little while too. I really like George R.R. Martin, Tolkien and anything with dragons in it… Carl Sagan and David Attenborough also influence the musical scenery I make up in my head. In addition, I am obsessed with anything natural: bugs, birds, orcas, wind patterns, and the ocean.
JB: We are just trying to draw from reality something that isn’t real; it’s how we see the world. Like any work of fiction, we paint a distorted reflection of what we perceive.
MR: As far as modern bands, who are you guys listening to right now? Any favorite albums?
ML: Naked Gods from Boone, N.C, are one of my favourite bands currently. Actually the Gods and Baroness — the new album, Yellow and Green is stunning — have been holding the top two positions for a while now. Atlas Sounds’ Parallax, anything Midlake and the new Guided By Voices are also taking my fancy of late.
MR: What’s next for Corsair? Any idea of future song ideas or album plans?
JB: We were asked by an Italian record label named Doomymood Records (www.doomymood.net) to contribute to a tribute album for Blue Oyster Cult. The details are still being sorted out, but we’ll announce its release within the next year.
ML: [Laughing] I can’t resist… I think Paul is going to put out a solo album, Noodle Factory… There’ll be a lot of solos, shredding and scriddly skrees for sure!
