Quarashi
Interview by Whitney Weiss

Wielding mic skills, tight musicianship, and a wicked sense of humor, Icelandic rap/punk rockers Quarashi are poised and ready to impress mosh pits full of American music fans this summer as they embark on the Warped Tour.

You may have seen their video for 'Stick 'Em Up,' on M2, or heard about them if you have friends in California, where they were recently touring. You may have even read the review of their latest album, Jinx, in the pages of Movement Magazine. If you know Max Michaels, you've probably heard him raving about their hilarious promo video, or their amazing blend of industrial, punk, rap (in Icelandic and English, no less), and dance music. It was a must that we put them in the magazine, so we scheduled an interview with the band's driving force, Solvi, and chatted about the band, Icelandic rap, and the joys of Pantera and...show tunes.

Movement Magazine: So you're on the Warped Tour this year?
Solvi: "Yeah, we're doing the Warp Tour in June, July, and August."

How did that come about?
"To be honest, I haven't got a clue. I guess The Warped Tour people liked our music or something. Or felt it would fit well with the other music. As far as we are concerned, we are just honored and pleased at being there, and [at being] accepted."

Well that's great. You definitely deserve it, the album's fantastic.
"Well, thank you very much."

You have rap influences. Is there a flourishing scene in Iceland rap wise, or is your band unique?
"Yeah, you know, there actually is a flourishing hip-hop scene if you would call that flourishing. There are maybe three or four bands that dominate that scene. And maybe two of them rap in English and two rap in Icelandic. And they fight all the time over that, it's like a constant war. Probably modeled over the east coast/west coast war [in America]."

So what side are you on?
"Actually, we are not considered to be a part of the hip-hop scene because all of us come out of rock, punk rock [backgrounds]. I used to play in punk rock bands for years before I started Quarashi. So we're definitely not considered to be pure hip-hop. Also, we don't consider ourselves to be pure hip-hop. You know, we're punk rock music, and that's what we do."

Definitely, and how exactly did your band get together?
"Actually, me and Hesse, the lead singer for the band..."

dead silence, lost connection. Takes a few minutes then...

"Hey! ::laughs:: I thought I had killed you of boredom, of telling you how we started out." ::laughing::

No, no, no. I thought you were like, 'I've heard that question so many times I'll just hang up on her.'
"Sorry about that."

No, it's fine. So are you in Iceland right now?
"Yeah, I'm in Reykjavik."

I have no idea where that is.
"Reykjavik is the capital of Iceland. Iceland is not as far from America as you might think. It's a five hour flight from New York City."

That's great. You just got back from a tour...?
"We just got back, maybe two weeks ago, from an MTV sponsored tour on the west coast. We did maybe eight gigs with the Lost Prophets. And that was pretty awesome. We got some really good response and got to hang out with some cool people and see some cool places on the west coast. Now, I'm just working in the studio right now and waiting to go back on tour which is going to be in the middle of May."

Are you in the studio working on more stuff for the band, or do you have a side [project] you're doing?
"Ah, I'm working on some more stuff for the band, and I also do some producing for other people. It's nothing really big, just some local stuff. For example I'm working on an Icelandic rap song with one of the members of Quarashi, Omar.  We're going to do a pure Icelandic rap song, because he likes to rap in Icelandic too, so you know, it's what we do sometimes, just to have fun."

So do you have a preference to rapping in Icelandic too or do you like the bilingual thing?
"I just like both things. I like the English rap too. It's just the way you do it. If you do it good, then I don't mind which language it is."

That's a very good point. Is there anything besides American hip-hop and British/European dance music that has been a really big influence?
"Yeah, like for an example, the last track on our album is heavily influenced by Brazilian music. One of my favorite singers, Elise Regina she's called. Yeah, I would say that Quarashi is hugely influenced by a lot of South American music like Brazilian music or Argentinean music. I'm heavily into that stuff."

Awesome. Your sound is a melting pot of styles, how long did that take to develop or was that immediate?
"It actually took some time to develop the cool rock sound. Because, we didn't want to make Quarashi sound like every other rock-rap band in America. So it took me a while to find the right guitar sounds, but it was maybe over a period of two years that it took to make Jinx. So, you know, it was a development that took two years and finally we realized that we had finished. That's a strange feeling for a musician."

Yeah. And you had albums before Jinx as well?
"Yeah, we had actually. Jinx was, you could call that our third album. And also we have done, for example, me and Hesse from Quarashi did a soundtrack for a theatre piece here in Rekjevic. Most of that is instrumental, and we've done a lot of stuff. This and that. I did a remix for The Prodigy."

I heard about that, how was it touring with them?
"We just did one gig, but that was great. We love The Prodigy. They've had a huge influence on our music. "

And what do you think the main differences between the other projects with and without Quarashi, and then the album Jinx?
"...Stick 'Em Up is the theme song for Jinx. That's really different from all the other stuff. All the other albums are more all over the place, you know what I'm saying? If you listen to Jinx, that's probably our most focused project. And definitely, what we were trying to do with Jinx is like, do music as if you had Joey Ramone from the Ramones, doing rap music. That was our aim here. Definitely not an attempt to be like Beastie Boys or Limp Bizkit or be like something else, you know?"

Yeah, well I promise that we do not want you to be anything like Limp Bizkit.
"OK..." ::laughs all around:: "Well it's not like we don't like them...It's just, you know."

Yeah. It's okay. Are there any unsigned bands in Iceland or America that you want people to check out?
"Absolutely. Especially here in Iceland. There are a lot of really cool punk-rock bands that people have never heard of. And just because they're from here, they'll probably never get the chance to be heard. And that's really sad, it makes me really angry, but, just because we were lucky. We're not better than anybody else, we were just luckier."

Now that you are signed have you noticed things are a lot different then when you started out?
"Yeah, you know, I've been making albums for years and years and years before I got signed, I just released them myself. The main difference is that now I can pay all my friends and homeboys that are working on my projects. That was the only difference. And that was a really good feeling, finally to be able to pay all these people."

Yeah, it's always good to get a little monetary reward for your efforts. When you're listening to music, what are your favorites? What's in your CD player right now?
" In my CD player right now I have, Pantera, Vulgar Display of Power, and I either have West Side Story or Tom Waits. Yeah, I've got Tom Waits."

So you had West Side Story?
"Yeah, I love West Side Story, that's my favorite musical in the world."

You like musicals as well as Pantera?
"Yeah, absolutely."

Well, that explains why the sound of the band is so well-rounded.
"Yeah. It pretty much is. ::laughing:: It was hard to get it. Like, this album is supposed to be pretty focused, but it was also supposed to be all over the place, and that was the hardest thing doing this album."

Where do you see the music going after this album?
"Probably, we're never going to do another 'Stick 'Em Up.' That's the only thing I know for sure. Probably, we're going to do some more melodic music. Because you know, I'm kind of fed up with, I can't explain it. I'm kind of fed up with monotonous industrial music at the time. But, I'm saying that today, I might have a different opinion tomorrow. You never know."

Yeah. Does everyone else in the band share as wide of variety of influences as you? Or is there like one...guy, that's really into punk-rock, and...?
"No, all of us are all over the place. That's the main thing in Iceland. If you only listen to one type of music you're not going to have any friends. There are so few of us here. So just to be able to communicate with more than two people, you'll have to be into more than just three music styles. So that, you know, causes us to be more accepting of different kinds of music."

...We saw your press video, it was rather funny! Quite enjoyable. And now it seems that you're real serious. How do you balance the two?
"Yeah, did you see that? :::laughs::: That's actually a good question. You know, when it comes to music creation we take ourselves relatively seriously. We take this kind of seriously. But when it comes to what we call, like, presentation of the band, we try actually to not take ourselves too seriously. It's hard to find the balance. You know? We don't want people to think that we're a bunch of assholes that never can do anything serious.

On the other hand, we just try to think if we were watching the television and we were seeing some new band that was being all serious with themselves we would be like 'Fuck that shit." You know? Who gives a fuck. I'm not interested in personalities in bands like that, I'm just interested in being entertained. And that's what we're trying to do. And you know its not all lies on that tape. Some of it's true actually."

Really?
"Yeah! Absolutely. Hesse, the lead singer...used to work as a seaman, because his father used to work on a fishing boat, too. And even though Oman is not a dogsled person, he's not completely unfamiliar with that area. And I actually used to be an ice skater when I was a teenager, even though I don't do that anymore. So it's all based on some realistic things."

Well that's great! It's like the press video exposed. So do you prefer working in the studio, or would you rather be out there touring? You mentioned that you really enjoyed the West Coast.
"Yeah, I like touring up to a certain extent. I love meeting friends and all that. But what I pray for to do, is being in the studio. That's my thing, ya know. I'm a studio person to the bone, but it's always enjoyable to go out on the road and see some new people, some new faces."

And since Jinx just recently came out are there any plans for anything else, new music for the band, or are you just touring right now?
"You know what? I'm always writing songs, so I'm definitely always preparing our next moves, but when you have a big tour coming up it's kind of hard to think of the future. You just take one step at a time, because touring is such a ridiculous state of life. You know, you just wake up, play, go to sleep, wake up, play, go to sleep. It's kind of like being a child again, because people take you to places. They tell you to eat, they tell you to sleep, and they tell you to go to the toilet kind of. It's kind of weird. I'm not a big fan of that stuff, but anyway."

Do the others in the band share your opinion on that, or are there some that go 'Woohoo! Let's go tour!'
"They love touring."

Well, that's a good balance, just like your music.

www.quarashi.net