Three Stars: Screen Vinyl Image

To anyone who claims that there's nothing left in the D.C. scene but jangly indie-pop, we invite you to check out Screen Vinyl Image — and then promptly eat your words. Formed from the ashes of hazy dream-pop act Alcian Blue, Screen Vinyl Image are steeped in the sound of late 80s new wave and shoegaze. That's not to say, however, that SVI is just another 80s throwback act. The husband and wife duo of Jake and Kim Reid have a wide range of influences — ranging from krautrock to no wave to house — and it shows in the eccentric flourishes that pop up in their songs. Between the blistering wall of noise that the band produces live and the saturated, Velvet Underground-esque video projections they drape themselves in, Screen Vinyl Image are one of few bands in the District that has earned the right to brand themselves as "Psychedelic" on their MySpace page. DCist recently caught up with the Reids to discuss the band's use of visuals, how much gear is too much gear and the state of experimental music in D.C.

See them next: Thursday Aug 21 at the Velvet Lounge

Visit them online: at their website and MySpace

Buy their releases: from their label Safranin Sound

Questions for Screen Vinyl Image:

Could you give us a brief history of Screen Vinyl Image--where the two of you are from, how the band came together, all that stuff?

Jake: We’ve been a band for over a little over a year now. I grew up in the D.C. area and Kim grew up in Fredericksburg, VA. We were dating while I was playing in Alcian Blue and Kim joined up with the band playing synths and guitars. When Alcian disbanded, we started writing demos for what would eventually become SVI. We wanted to do something a bit different than Alcian Blue, we were getting a lot deeper into synths, drum machines, and electronic music but still enjoyed a lot of guitar elements as well.

When I listen to your music, a few canonical bands come to mind that I'm sure you're tired of being compared to — the Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, New Order. Are there any bands or styles of music that have informed or influenced your songwriting but which might not be obvious to the casual listener?

Jake: There are a bunch of things we are really influenced by outside of the shoegaze/new wave era. John Carpenter is a big influence from his soundtracks on films like Assault On Precinct 13, Halloween and The Thing. We also got into the Italo Disco and early Chicago House sound through our friends in Manhunter. They got us into mixtapes by Ron Hardy, Frankie Knuckles, Beppe Loda, and other DJs from around that time period. That stuff was pushing the boundaries, blending sounds and atmospheres from lots of different styles of music.

In general we listen to a lot of electronic music. We’ve been getting into modern stuff like the amazing scene that has been going on in the Netherlands (Bunker/Viewlexx) and some of the classic stuff too, like Giorgio Moroder, Patrick Cowley and Tangerine Dream, just to name a few.

Kim: Our influences also include Suicide, Curve, Goblin, Public Enemy, the Stooges and the Velvet Underground. One song off our upcoming [split 10" with Ceremony] was also influenced by my brother’s poetry.

In addition to musical influences, we also watch lots of counterculture cinema and old television shows like "the Twilight Zone." We find a lot of themes and moods in movies that end up influencing the atmosphere of our music as well as the visuals we edit together for our shows.

How did film come to figure so strongly in your work? Were the two of you always film nuts? Or was there a conscious decision to expand the parameters of your work beyond aural boundaries?

Kim: We’ve always been into film but after Alcian Blue we wanted to head in a different direction. We wanted to discover themes outside of ourselves, stuff that felt more abstract and fantastic. And film is a great way to escape your world and explore another.

We do all of our writing and recording in our studio at home and while writing we often have different movies playing in the background. The visuals often influence the mood and atmosphere of the music.

What role do you feel the visuals play in your live show? Do the two of you put that stuff together yourselves?

Jake: The visuals add an extra dimension to our music for sure. We are really into the psychedelic light shows from the 60’s and we wanted to bring that element and vibe to our live performances. We both captured a lot of footage and then spent about a month splicing the footage to create a 40 minute long video. We can’t always set it up at shows, so we have an old oil projector and a bunch of strobe lights as backup.

What's the nature of your relationship with Death by Audio? I couldn't help but notice that they often use your songs to demonstrate the capabilities of their pedals.

Jake: Well, I go back a long way with Oliver [Ackermann, founder of Death by Audio and a member of Brooklyn shoegaze act A Place to Bury Strangers]. Alcian Blue used to tour a lot with the band he was in before, Skywave, and I also ended up playing with them for a while too. He was building tons of pedals back then and when Skywave ended, he moved to New York to start A Place To Bury Strangers and Death By Audio. We kept in touch and eventually we wanted to get some new sounds, so he built us some custom pedals. We love the sounds they make so we sent him some tracks that used the pedals and he decided to put some up on the Death By Audio MySpace page.

Obviously you guys generate a lot of interesting tones and textures using specific types of equipment. Is there a balance between looking for new noises and having more gear on stage than is manageable?

Kim: Definitely. Our current set-up is manageable for us and affords the ability to create a full sound with just two people. We use analog gear and prefer that over using a laptop, which we've found, with our sound, can be unstable. We also like to use a lot of effects pedals but we try to keep our line-up to only the pedals we need for the songs we play live.

Do you feel like there are other bands in the D.C./Baltimore area that take a similar approach to making music as you do?

Kim: The Antiques from D.C. and Ceremony from Fredericksburg are both great bands that have the same outlook as we do when it comes to music. We work with them on various projects like recordings and doing videos and such. Also, when Manhunter was in D.C., we felt a strong connection to what they were doing as well as Output Message, who is still here in the city and Thrushes from Baltimore.

Do you feel like there's a strong sense of community among D.C. musicians? Why or why not?

Jake: I feel like there is a strong sense of community among the musicians that we work with and go see perform. But, I don’t think I could answer that question overall for the D.C. music community.

You mentioned Manhunter leaving town and I can't help but be reminded that most of Food For Animals (***) moved to Baltimore and that Daniel Martin-McCormick and Jacob Long moved out to San Francisco to start Mi Ami... Do you think people in D.C. are as interested in experimental music as they were a few years ago?

Jake: I don’t think that experimental music has diminished at all. D.C. still has The Electric Possible as well as Scott Verrastro at the Velvet Lounge, who brings in tons of experimental music, as he has been doing for years. We also have some amazing DJ nights like We Fought The Big One and Velodrome, both of which are great events for discovering new underground music.