Interview with Take 21

Interview with Take 21 – by Beckylou in Sydney

Take 21 formed two years ago, and at just 17-years of age, their pop punk influenced mega-sound band has accomplished more than the average teen high school band. Supporting Fall Out Boy in Take 21's hometown Brisbane is among their many achievements along with having an E.P. mastered, mixed and produced by a team your mouths will drop at: recorded with Jeff Lovejoy (Powderfinger, Regurgitator and Resin Dogs), the single was mixed by Magoo, and the E.P. was mastered by Justin Shturtz (Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance).

This band has seen the Australian nation and been able to remember most of it (an achievement in itself). Take 21 comprises of Chris Bancroft (guitar/vocals), Michael Holmes (vocals/guitar), Andrew Sax (drums) and Jordan Bergman (bass/vocals). I popped by to ask a few questions about their music physically, emotionally and mentally and a few about the general lives of teen indie heroes.

Beckylou: Describe Your Sound in Five Words

Take 21: African Jungle Beats of the New Millennia ('of' and 'the' are not counted in the 5)

Beckylou: What influenced you to make music?

Take 21: We all played instruments before being part of the band: saxophone, clarinet, trombone, etc., and just really loved to listen to good tunes. We started learning instruments where you could be in a rock band and then just jamming in music class to our favourite covers. Our biggest influences would probably be Green Day, Fall Out Boy, U2, The Beatles, and The Living End. We used to go to see international acts play all the time and I guess, after seeing awesome bands, you want to do nothing more than start your own.

Beckylou: What is it like to be an unsigned band in Australia?

Take 21: It's hard. The music scene where we come from [Brisbane, Australia] is slowly dying. There are barely any venues to host all-ages shows these days, and the ones that do exist are so far out of town that kids have trouble getting there. Seeing most of our fans are underage, this makes it hard to put on local shows. There are initiatives around to help get unsigned music out there such as radio polls and competitions which help bands like us get coverage. Other than that, we just promote ourselves as much as we can. We put flyers for our shows in music stores and we get our street team members to hand out stuff at their schools. Basically, you have to make your own opportunities here which may be different from other parts of the world.

Beckylou: What does indieSolo mean to you?

Take 21: IndieSolo is an opportunity for us to get our music out there. Like I said, it's hard where we come from, because the scene is poor. IndieSolo helps us get coverage on a global scale which is going to benefit our band greatly!!

Beckylou: What influences your song content?

Take 21: Good Music, whatever we're feeling at the time. We don't try to write a song which reflects another which has already been written. We sort of just come up with ideas and just move from there, we don't really chose a style and then write a song within its constraints, we just go with it.

Beckylou: What is your ultimate goal for your music?

Take 21: Don't really know. I guess just to get our music out to as many people as possible. All we want is for kids to listen to, and enjoy our music, that's what's most important to us. I guess though, playing on Warped Tour would be pretty kick-arse!

Beckylou: Name a memorable gig experience.

Take 21: Fall Out Boy. When we supported them back in March this year, it was by far the best show we have ever done. We went from being high school kids playing for 50-100 people to opening for our idols in a stadium filled with 3500 screaming kids. It was ‘knarly'.

Beckylou: Which song would you love to cover?

Take 21: Through the Fire and the Flame by Dragonforce. You have to have godlike skills to be able to play that - it is seriously insane how fast the guitarist plays. Would be a hell of a song to cover!!

Beckylou: What was your worst day job?

Take 21: McDonalds, three of us have worked there and the three of us have quit within about three months of starting.

Beckylou: Where do you go on your nights off? (Where do you get your kicks?)

Take 21: McDonalds, (laughs) we're not all overage, so we can't go clubbing or anything, together. We do go to local shows when they are on, which is only occasionally. We also just cruise around the town, get fast food, yell at people from the car, we're still kids I guess, so we do pretty stupid stuff.

Beckylou: Which city would be your ultimate gig destination?

Take 21: Playing in your home town is great!! I don't think there could be any better show than playing for thousands of fans in the city where it all started. However, Wembly Stadium is massive, if we could sell that out, that would be nuts!!

Beckylou: First record/CD/tape ever bought?

Take 21: There's four of us, so I'll just name a couple: Green Day - Dooki. Backstreet Boys - Backstreets Back (laugs), seriously.

Beckylou: Damn the Man! (Rant on a topic of your choice)

Take 21: We are releasing our EP later this year so keep your ears out for it. It was recorded and mixed in our home town and was mastered in LA by the same guy who did Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance. It's something different, a unique sound: a Take 21 sound.

Beckylou: Last Words?

Take 21: Don't give up, (laughs), as lame as that may sound, it's so true. Back in high school, no one really thought we would go much further than being the winners of our schools battle of the bands competition and playing to 200 of our school mates. Once we graduated in November, we basically worked our asses for three months, while everyone was soaking up the freedom. Since then, we have supported Fall Out Boy, Billy Talent and also toured Australia with The Used. All those kids who thought we couldn't make it are now pretty dumbfounded by our success. If we can do it, so can anyone else who puts their mind to it!!

-end

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