Audio By Carbonatix
Erick Jackson is worried about the weather in South Florida. He wants to know if it’s going to be hot, humid, and mosquito-infested for the Apes’ upcoming stop in the beautiful Sunshine State. Upon telling him that that’s most likely the case, one has to wonder what he’s so worried about, since his band sounds like it literally dragged itself out of the murky depths of a Florida swamp. The Apes hail from our nation’s capital, but unlike their contemporaries of the Dischord variety, the Apes don’t have a soapbox to get on. “We’re probably one of the least political bands,” Jackson says. “For us, music is about being creative and not taking ourselves so seriously.”
The quartet began playing around D.C. in the late ’90s, when its unique setup of bass, organ, and drums came together to create a heavy fuzzed-out sound. But, as Jackson reveals, rock is also about convenience: “Well, with no guitar, there are less strings to break. And with a keyboard, you don’t have to tune.”
The Apes’ latest album, Oddeyesee, picks up where 2001’s The Fugue in the Fog left off, but with a decidedly more involved concept. Oddeyesee relays the fictional tale of the four Apes; Jackson as “Jackie Magik,” organist Amanda “Majestic Ape” Kleinman, drummer Jeff “Ronald Wolf” Schmid, and singer Paul “Count 101” Weil. The Apes tear through 15 tracks of Sabbath-drenched fervor stitched into a mystical story line replete with rainbows, butterflies, and a utopian vision of the future. “Amanda decided we should write a story to go with the songs, and Oddeyesee is what happened over time,” Jackson explains. “It was more entertainment for us. I think that’s something that’s seriously missing from rock ‘n’ roll right now. I mean, over-the-top theatrics can be bad, or they can be fun. We’re not sitting around going, ‘What does this mean? Is this aaahrt?’ Playing music is like a sport for us.”
