Every Limbeck show I’ve been to has been better than the last one and the show they played at The Whole at U of M was no exception. They always amaze me with their willingness to hang out afterwards and meet with people. It doesn’t seem like Limbeck will never be one of those bands that doesn’t sell their own merch or a band that runs into the bus right after a show and totally ignores their fans in the process. Even after playing for over an hour and a half, the guys went straight to their merch table and sold sweatshirts, tees and albums for another 30 minutes. After helping them carry some gear out to the sidewalk and waiting for Patrick to pull their rented mini van up (they were flown out to MN for 2 shows. One at Duluth and one in Minneapolis) we were finally able to get this interview underway.
Limbeck’s most recent video “Big Drag” was shot in Minneapolis and they came all the way out to this snowy abyss for 2 shows. In fact, I’ve seen them in Minnesota twice now in the span of 3 months. It makes me wonder, “Do they really like Minnesota that much, or is it just coincidence?”
Robb – We love MN and also our friend Shane Nelson, who directed the video (Big Drag), lives in St.Paul.
Patrick – We made our first record here too and people were saying, “You sound like the Replacements a little bit” and we were like, “Who are the Replacements?”
Robb – We knew who they were, but we never really knew anything about them.
Patrick – We never really gave them the time of day, but then we went out and bought all these Replacement records and freaked out. That’s when we got into the Jayhawks too. Well Jon’s known all these bands forever, I shouldn’t include him in that statement, cuz he’d be embarrassed to say that. But anyways, it’s cool because I think that somewhat lead us here. That kinda music is out here and that lead us to make out second record out here and spend a month here, and that was awesome.
Y!M! – Where did you record?
Patrick – At Flowers Studio, which Ed Ackerson works out of. And Gary Louris, who we’re about to go see-
Robb – At a bowling alley
Y!M! – Haha, oh really?
Patrick – He’s actually like a statue in Bryant Lake Bowl. No, literally
Y!M! - Well, almost literally
Robb – Haha, yeah. He’s the one you’ll see every night at Bryant Lake Bowl after midnight.
Patrick – Hey we should go meet up with him. Let’s go to BLB.
Justin – Should we call him? Nah, just go to BLB.
Patrick – Let’s call BLB. It’s more reliable.
Y!M! – So that first record you recorded was in 2000. Is that the one you’re talking about, “This Chapter is Called Titles”?
Patrick – Oh Whoa, that one is a long time ago. No we were talking “Hi, Everything’s Great”
Y!M! – Yeah, I was wondering because that one sounds completely different from the rest.
Robb – We kinda forget about that one just cuz it went out of print.
Y!M! – I saw on Amazon that a copy of it was going for, like, 65 bucks.
Patrick – It’s not worth it.
Jon – That’s actually my copy.
Y!M! – Haha, it’s been up there since 2001.
Patrick – I’ve been looking for one to sell. Shit, get 60 bucks for that? I need the money.
Y!M! – So there is a different sound between that album and the other albums. Was there anything that made you guys change your sound?
Patrick – Too many bands sounded the same. We were also going for a sound that we were not good at. We didn’t feel solid, we were still feeling it out.
Robb - We were still kinda testing things out. We were a young band and we just made this record.
Y!M! – It’s still a good record. It’s a good first record.
Patrick – You know why it’s somewhat okay, is because of Ed Rose. He was the producer on it. If we didn’t have Ed Rose, it would have been such a pile of shit.
Y!M! – That’s cool that you were able to work with him on your first record.
Patrick – Yeah, it started a good relationship. He helped us get some direction and gave us lot of good input on trying different things.
Robb - And then from there we took a lot of ideas we learned from that first record in the studio and used it when we were working towards “Hi, Everything’s Great” which was 3 years later. We went back with Ed and we made the first record we were really proud of.
Patrick – It felt good.
Y!M! - That’s an awesome opportunity for a band that’s recording their first album to work with Ed Rose. How did you swing that?
Patrick – We had money.
Y!M! – You had money? How?
Robb – We had a lucky thing happen to us where we had money. Kinda like winning the lottery, but it wasn’t winning the lottery.
Patrick – We wanted to work with Ed Rose because we’re fans of the Get Up Kids. His thing is cool though, because we like the Get Up Kids and as much as we don’t wanna say it, I’m sure we wanted to sound a little bit like them, have a little bit of a Get Up Kids sound. He’s an awesome producer in his ability to take our ideas and what we like and still make us sound unique and help us hone our own sound. He definitely helped us figure stuff out, which is how he came into play on “Hi, Everything’s Great”.
When I started to write this interview up, I was going to try to take what we talked about and just write about it, but I feel like you wouldn’t have gotten the full affect of what Limbeck is about and what they were saying. These are some genuine guys, having a good time playing the music they obviously love and are proud of. Keep checking back, because in the next few days I’ll be putting up the second portion of this interview that deals with basements in California, their first practice space and what they might sound like if they were from Minnesota.
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