In this interview spotlight, I chat with Beltalowda about their album Unheard Language, technology, challenges and more.
Full Q&A along with links and music below.
Where are you from and what style of music do you create? (In your own words, not necessarily in marketing terms or by popular genre classifications.)
Mat: I’m based in Bloomington, Indiana and JD lives in London. We met in Evansville, Indiana a few decades ago and both moved around quite a bit since then, but have stayed in touch through it all. We’ve each been involved in various musical projects over the years – JD most notably with his solo instrumental work as Bassdbler and me with my alt. americana project Sam Lowry and the Circumstance – but we’d never played in a band together until this project.
Beltalowda is a socio-political punk/post-punk band in the vein of Mission of Burma, Husker Du and Gang of Four. It’s definitely a bit of a musical departure for both of us. I’ve always loved punk and post punk music, and I played drums in a loud crazy band called Tremendous Fucking before, but I’d never tried to write songs or play guitar and sing in this style before.
What led you down this path of music and what motivates you to keep going?
JD: Beltalowda our way of reflecting what we see in the world. Our outrage at the political malfeasance and police brutality we saw called for Mat to write the lyrics he did and for us to write the music we have… there is still plenty for us to be outraged by, unfortunately. As for music broadly, for myself, music has always been a part of who I am. I have been writing original music and playing shows out of town since I was about 15 or so.
How is this new release different than previous ones? Were you trying to accomplish anything specific?
Mat: This is our first release. It, and the band really, came about as a reaction to the various injustices running rampant today. It is in a lot of ways a protest album. Obviously the more people raising their voice in opposition is a good thing, and we’re happy to contribute to that with this release, but we’re also very pragmatic people interested in direct action, so 50% of all sales of Beltalowda music is donated to various social justice causes like The Bail Project and the Indian Law Resource Center.
Name one or two challenges you face as an indie musician in this over saturated, digital music age? How has technology helped you (since we know it does help)?
JD: Over saturation, as you say, is the biggest challenge. There is so much great music being made, but finding it can be difficult. Trying to connect and share what you’ve made is even harder. Technology has been a beautiful asset in leveling the playing field and has laid waste to the bloated, corporate music models. Technology has increased access to tools to create which have traditionally been held by a few and those with the means. You used to have to spend thousands just to have studio time in a small project studio and press physical media with a high minimum; new channels of distribution, like Bandcamp, have made that mostly meaningless. Also, we would likely not have been able to write and record in the middle of a pandemic whilst living on different continents if it wasn’t for modern ways of recording and sharing audio.
What was the last song you listened to?
Mat: “Proud” by The Minor Kind. It’s a really great song about how it feels to be a citizen of a country that has failed to live up to its ideals. It reminds me of those 80’s alternative acts who had a real heartland almost country sound.
JD: “Triumph” Wu-Tang Clan, Capadonna.Deck’s verse is still the greatest of all time.
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? CDs? MP3s?
JD: Honestly, they each have their place. Vinyl would be my pick from a purely experiential perspective. I like the mechanical and physical nature of the process of listening to vinyl. MP3s offer the most flexibility (without splitting hairs about file formats). I’d also like to give a shout out to the cassette tape. From an audio perspective, it has this unique, squashed, natural compression happening… but what I really like about the cassette is that it is the only medium where you cannot just skip tracks easily; it is designed to be listened to a side at a time.
How about this one…. Do you prefer Spotify? Apple Music? Bandcamp? Or something else? Why?
Mat: Bandcamp is our preferred site. It’s the one who treats the artists fairly, and they just do everything really really well. Obviously streaming services are very convenient for the user and can be an amazing resource for hearing just about anything you want, but they also pay the artists fractions of a penny per stream via a loophole in the law that allows them to not pay the same fair rate paid out by radio and television.
Where is the best place to connect with you online and discover more music?
Bandcamp is the place. We have the other social media sites, but they all refer back to Bandcamp. They get it, they’re there for artists.
Anything else before we sign off?
Mat: Thanks for having us.
JD: Ditto, cheers.
