On July 25th, at Rohs Street Café, 5 bands are set to take the stage for what promises to be a supremely fun night of some of the best post-rock, emo, rock, and pop-punk to hit the town in quite some time.
Even with New Jersey’s Prawn headlining the show, Cincinnati’s Armslength will play to an eager crowd, likely filled with many of their own fans and supporters. Having already opened for bands like Signals Midwest and Super Heaven (formerly Daylight), Armslength has garnered quite a bit of local and regional attention for their emotive stage presence and strong songwriting. Below, you can find out a little bit more about them. Thanks to Tyler for answering my questions.
Can you give us a little background on the band? Where are you from and when did you start?
We are all pretty much from the Cincinnati area. We started in the summer of 2012 as a project between Brendan, Dakota, and Joe. Tyler was soon added afterward. We continued writing together until going into Popside Studios with Micah Carli in January 2013 to record our first demos, which was also our first time playing and recording with Brad. We immediately loved him and welcomed him into the band.
Is anyone in the band currently involved in any other projects? Were any of you involved in any before this?
Dakota and Brad have a project called Great Dane that they've been working on for a few months now. Dakota and Tyler played together in a weird little indie/math rock project that never ended up taking off, thankfully so. Tyler has been a fill-in drummer for a few bands, including doing a few shows with Cincinnati pop-rock band Aristo. Dakota was in an indie band called Starfox. Brad has played in quite a few bands over the years, most notably the horror-punk band The Creature. Joe and Brendan have been playing together for quite a long time, doing acoustic covers and things of that nature.
What’s been the best tour or show experience you’ve had so far? Do you have any records or EP’s out? Can you talk a bit about recording and releasing them?
Any time on tour that we've had anyone know the words to our songs, or had anyone come up to us after the show and tell us that they enjoy our music is always the most gratifying experience we could have while doing this. We have one EP out called Intents and Ends, which we recorded last summer with Jake Clarke at The Lonely Road Studios near Philadelphia. We released that on Either/Or Records in October digitally and on CD. We've also just self-released a split with our best friends in a band called Ghost Stories. We recorded two songs for it called “Never Meant” and “In Passing” with Vince Ratti at The Skylight Studio, also very near Philadelphia.
Do you have any releases coming up?
We don't have any future releases lined up, but we have done a limited pressing of the split with Ghost Stories on cassette through Known Pleasure Records, and we hope to be able to release it on 7 inch in the near future. You can find all of our music at armslengthmidwest.bandcamp.com.
After this show or tour, what are your plans for the rest of the summer?
A little over a week after this show with Prawn, Free Throw, and Growing up a Ghost we are planning on doing a short tour around the midwest/east coast, which is still being finalized.
Anything else you’d like to add or mention?
We would just like to thank everyone who has listened to us, or come to a show, or bought a t shirt, or supported us in any way from the bottom of our hearts. The fact that anyone cares about what we're doing at all is incredibly humbling. Also keep an eye out for summer tour dates, which should be coming soon. You can find us at www.facebook.com/armslengthmidwest, and again you can find our music at armslengthmidwest.bandcamp.com.
