Crobot: Dragons, Ice Cream, and Grief
Wizards, werewolves, swords in stones, and smoke-breathing dragons… no, this isn’t a premise for an epic Dungeons & Dragons campaign, but a standard stage design for stoner metal band CROBOT. “We like to get the dragon involved in our extracurricular activities,” vocalist Brandon Yeagley ambiguously explains. “It’s cryptic, I know, but the props are just another part of our personality that we try to bring into everything we do.” If you think it sounds like a scene out of Spinal Tap then you’d be absolutely correct, as the insanely energetic frontman even pops out of a giant egg on occasion. Ambition is a constantly hungry beast though, and no amount of physics, gravity, and laws of nature can stop the Pennsylvanian quartet from conceptualising their creative visions.
Creativity isn’t just restricted to the band’s music however, as guitarist Chris Bishop, who is a tattoo artist by trade, is responsible for designing and building all the stage props as well as all the album and single artworks. The artwork for the funkadelic outfit’s latest full-length release however, Feel This, uses a child’s hand brandishing brass knuckles holding a deliciously extravagant melting ice cream. “The irony of that is that I can’t have ice cream because I’m lactose intolerant. I’m a sucker for chocolate chip cookie dough though,” Brandon regretfully confesses. The brass knuckles had to be custom made to fit a child as, unsurprisingly, they don’t make them for children. CROBOT brass knuckles aren’t in the pipeline to becoming the next unique piece of merchandise, unlike the band’s signature collection of hot sauces that are released in conjunction with each LP cycle. Quirky, unrealistic merch ideas are always floating around inside the brains of Brandon, Chris, drummer Dan Ryan and bassist Tim Peugh though, including the desire to create a CROBOT video game. Perhaps more realistically, considering they use a lot of wizards and werewolves in their lyrics, a board game similar to Dungeons & Dragons could be more doable.
In the decade that CROBOT have been a fully-fledged funkadelic fuzz machine, each release has seen them mature lyrically whilst still being able to keep that swaggering, playful edge that makes them so entertaining. The new record Feel This doesn’t just incorporate flangey riffs and squelchy bass lines, but the guitar work is often delicate and Brandon’s lyrics are more soul-baring than ever. The ballad Golden explores themes of grief, specifically the tragic passing of SOUNDGARDEN’s Chris Cornell almost five years prior. Now, with the scars as close to being healed as possible, is the right time to share it with the world. As the song was being written alongside Johnny Andrews, who also helped to write the band’s first single from previous record Motherbrain, Lowlife, those in attendance claimed it had a SOUNDGARDEN vibe to it. “So why not make this song a tribute to Chris Cornell, considering how much of an inspiration he’s been to us as a group, me personally as a singer, and to all of us as a musical community.”
Set You Free is a track that encapsulates all of what CROBOT can be and more. Soft, haunting pianos notes and vocal melodies ring out before Bishop’s ass-kicking riffs decimate any shred of innocence. “The approach for this record was, as always, very guitar orientated because Bishop is just a monster. He’s somewhere between Angus/Malcom Young with a Southern blues vibe akin to LYNYRD SKYNYRD, but then there are Tom Morello elements too. The man can just excrete stoner riffs for days.” Of the yet-to-be-released tracks though, Brandon is most keen for fans to hear the gut-punching song Dizzy. The tracks from Feel This have been undergoing baptisms by fire on the live-circuit whilst CROBOT have been playing throughout the US, designing each night’s 11-track setlist with at least seven of the new songs. “We’ve always been a band who like to test the waters with our fanbase, and these songs feel so genuinely at home that without them the set just doesn’t have the same energy.”
After four studio albums and three EPs, they’ve finally found the winning formula that works well with CROBOT’s ethos. “We hadn’t really worked with anybody in the studio who goes against the grain as much as Jay Ruston does.” The sheer lunacy that is exorcised onstage is a hard one to capture on record, yet producer Jay Ruston was the one that showed the band what they were missing when it came down to recording the tracks. The standard process for most bands, CROBOT included, is to record each track by instrument first. “Record all the drums first because everything’s already set up and the mics are in the perfect place and we don’t want to move anything. That way all the sounds sound the same and there’s less variables. But I think that’s just the pit recording as a whole has fallen into,” concludes Brandon. This time however, each song was recorded as a live band to capture the energy and authenticity on record, before moving onto the next track. “If it had been up to us, we would have always recorded as a live band. Now we have this piece of work that says it’s doable and it’s not impossible. We did it this way last time and we could definitely do it this way again.”
Lyrics have the power to conjure up mental images. Sometimes they’re heartfelt, sometimes they’re graphic, and sometimes they’re hilarious. ‘Let’s go dance with the dead, they know how to kill it’, from the new track Dance With The Dead, is one of them. In the event of the looming zombie apocalypse, Brandon has some tricks up his sleeve should he find himself without access to a gun, sword, or baseball bat. He’d use his hips. “They’re the swiftest part of my body and at this point they’ve had lots of practice. I think I could dodge a zombie pretty quickly.” The speed and precision with which this answer came is suspicious, like it’s been a common thought that’s probed Brandon’s mind on more than one occasion. “Honestly though, I don’t need to reload them, I just need to oil them. That’s all. Like the Tin Man. I’d only have to limber up, which is rule number one in Zombieland.”
Balance is an imperative part of life, in all areas, and can sometimes be hard to get right. The combination of soulful vulnerability in CROBOT’s lyrics and vocal melodies, coupled with their psychedelic oscillators, fuzzy bass lines, and diabolically distorted guitar riffs are what makes Feel This CROBOT’s magnum opus.
Feel This is out now via Mascot Records/Mascot Label Group.
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