You may not hear Vancouver organ powered progressive rock band Bend Sinister on the radio, but you may have seen them at South Country Fair or at a sold out show at the Slice last year. And that’s the way frontman/ keyboardist Dan Moxon likes it. The band starts a quick tour at the Slice, March 26.
They had an insanely busy year last year when they released their third album “Animals.”
“We released the album in February and went on tour. Then we went to SouthbySouthwest in Austin and toured for a month and half around the United States,” Moxon said adding that lead them into a busy summer followed by an extensive European tour in the Fall.
“ It was nice tour Europe for real. We had played five or six shows in Germany, but this time we played 25 shows all over Europe with a tour bus and all the fixings,” he said.
“So it was a good way to end the year. We got to see Spain and Italy and did seven dates in the United Kingdom and we ended up in Sweden,” he said.
“It’s hard to pick one highlight, it was just a blur of good times,” he said adding audiences responded well to the band.
“Everybody we talked to liked it and we were excited it had been added to many Top 10 Prog rock and rock lists,” he said.
The band took a month long breather after returning and have started rehearsals and writing for a new album they expect to record later this year.
“It’s got a lot of attention from the prog rock community. We didn't set out to record radio songs. We went to San Diego to record it and did whatever we wanted to on it,” he said.
They released a couple of self produced videos for the CD including one with an IPhone.
“ For ‘I Got Love’ I went to Future Shop and got a $500 camera and shot the footage then returned it four days later when i realized I could do the same thing on an iPhone. So I grabbed the new iPhone 6 when it came out and shot a bunch of footage in New York. I saw how cool it looked in slow motion. I thought maybe I could capitalize on the new features of the iPhone, but it didn’t,” he said noting they most likely won’t make another video for “Animals” though they looked into grants for videos.
“ We thought it would be a better idea to record a video for a new single for the new album,” he added, noting that won’t be until later in the year.
He said he hopes the band’s new music will split the difference between their previous two albums.
“ We’re just getting started. We’re still not writing three minute pop songs. My favourite song on ‘Animals’ is nine minutes long and ‘Teacher’ is six minutes long,” he said adding they have got some play on college and university radio as well as around their home base of Vancouver.
“ We had to decide whether we wanted to play the industry game or not,” he said noting they would rather do their own thing.
They are excited to return to Alberta.
“Southern Alberta has always been good to us. The last time we played the Slice it was sold out. This time we have a better day of the week, so hopefully people will come back,” he said adding the band will be playing a lot of the music from “Animals” and the “ Small Fame” CDs plus a couple of new songs.
Bend Sinister play the Slice, Thursday, March 26. Tickets cost $12 in advance, $15 at the door.
