[OC Music Awards Interview] Semi Sweet Rock Out With Full-Flavored Attitude

Photo: John Gasca

Celebrating it’s 10th anniversary, the OC Music Awards kicks off on January 4th with seven weeks of free showcases at different venues across the county. 35 local artists will compete for the titles of Best Live Band or Best Live Acoustic and a performance slot at the 2011 OC Music Awards, March 5 at the Grove of Anaheim. And, the voting is open now!

While only a few bands can win, one band that is ready to take the bitter with the sweet is Orange County’s sexed-up post-punk dream pop pretties, Semi Sweet. With music that spirals through an erotic entryway into a nocturnal wonderland, one would imagine a group of darkly-tinged individuals.But Semi Sweet prove that they are a multifaceted punch to the palate and partial to good-spirited mischievous revelry–both as a band and as a collection of personalities. 

As the interview started, infectious laughter oozed through the phone. Semi Sweet is not a band composed of socially awkward, tortured artists; each minute consisted of soft sarcastic jabs and toothsome black humor that made it hard not to remember that we weren’t swilling scotch at some local dive bar which–might be perfect for drummer Vanessa Barnes who says that if she was a flavor, she’d be “whisky flavor, because it’s my favorite thing to drink and it runs through my veins like the rivers in Egypt.”

Perfect for the early morning afterglow of just such an alcohol-soaked evening, Semi Sweet’s grungy, libidinous musical romps are thanks to the talents of  Cassie Walter (vocals/guitar), Vanessa Barnes (drums), Heather Patton (keyboard), and Derek Liner (bass). When listening to their two EP’s, self-titled Semi Sweet and A Little Bitter, I was reminded of the sprawling, shoegaze-y sound of Silverlake veterans, Autolux, and the raw, grunge-grit of the seemingly-defunct Verbena.

Almost eerily, this sound apparently transmogrifies Semi Sweet’s audience members into living embodiments of their art. A video for their song, “Sleazy,” includes a burlesque dancer popping balloons on her body, and eventually dying in a self-induced bloodbath after popping her vital organs. While this may sound like fantastical, gory fiction, more than one of Semi Sweet’s fans has followed suit:

“Some guy cut his hand on a bottle with broken glass on the floor, instead of going to wrap it up, he just started dancing, like flinging his arm around and blood started squirting all over the place. You think people would be, like ‘Eww, Aids!’ and run away but they were really into it.”

“Another guy cut himself open on the mirror and he started writing on the wall in blood.”

Semi Sweet is a band that elicits complex feeling, pleasurably overwhelming with the amount of variant musical influences that make up their songwriting process to create a product which they cheekily describe as Bitch Pop, or as Semi Sweet would say, “Bitch-pop portrays our ATTITUDE [Authors note: The band requested I put attitude in capital letters] towards pop-rock while being a part of it at the same time.”

If this doesn’t entirely describe the core principles of the Cult of Bitch Pop for you, Cassie Walter eloquently summarizes what makes Semi Sweet’s sound so darkly delicious:

“We’re mostly influenced by heavy nights of drinking and bad relationships. But mostly, I really think we are influenced by each other because when we start writing music, we all add something. I bring in The Cure; Derek brings a little of The Growlers; Heather brings in the Mozart; Vanessa brings the metal.”

“ We think that the best thing about the showcase and all these local bands is that we are all friends with each other.
” Vanessa Barnes, Semi Sweet

Newly-minted father and Semi Sweet’s masculine lone-ranger, Derek Liner, described his extensive inspiration from old-school Orange Country bands like the aforementioned Growlers:

“I don’t know if you remember the Simpletones or Surf Punks and Agent Orange; all those punk bands that came out in the ’80s. A lot of bands that come out today have that sort of half-LA/half-Orange County sound like My Pet Saddle, The Growlers, and Tomorrow’s Tulips…There’s a lot of bands for me that really influence me to bring my music to the band because watching bands like them grow up and do their thing really shows that something can come out of here.”

Liner’s positive attitude is symbiotic with the entire band’s feelings about the Orange Country music scene. Drummer Vanessa Barnes explains how–despite the nature of competition inherent in an awards show–all the bands are just happy to get up on stage “to have fun and have a good time.”

“We think that the best thing about the showcase and all these local bands is that we are all friends with each other. It’s not really that competitive; it’s more like it’s a big group of friends and we just play shows and have fun with each other.”

“It’s like a big family and even if a band is better or they are going to win, there’s no hard feelings. Everyone is just as supportive as if their own band would win.”

So, with all this warm-hearted communal gratitude and forward-looking friendliness, when exactly does bitter overshadow the sweet? Or the inner bitch terrorize the face of pop in “Bitch Pop?”

Maybe the answer is in Semi Sweet’s hilarious sojourn into gangsta rap, when they all started freestylin’ Dr. Dre’s “F**k You,” giggling as they spit words like:  ”I just wanna f**k bad bitches. All them nights I never had bitches.”

Perhaps, being a proponent of Bitch Pop has nothing to do with outside perspective and more to do with a self-confident swagger that embraces both the socially accepted “sweet” image of woman and the sexually-confident “bad bitch” image in Dr. Dre’s song, lending more merit to the savory bitter that balances out the overly saccharine sweet of the world.

“Far From Summer”- Semi Sweet

The 2011 Showcase Series runs every Tuesday night, January 4 -February 15 with stops at:

Jan 4 -  Detroit Bar
Jan 11 -  The District at Tustin Legacy
Jan 18 -  The Gyspy Lounge
Jan 25 -  The LAB
Feb 1 – Tiki Bar
Feb 8 – The Gyspy Den of Santa Ana
Feb 15 – The Slide Bar

Five Showcase Series finalists in each live category will then move on to the Showcase Series Finals.

Feb 24 – Best Live Acoustic Finals, Fullerton Museum
Feb 25 – Best Live band Finals, The Galaxy

2011 Best Live Band winner will receive a performance slot on the four Southern Christmas Vans Warped Tour stops!

Night One of the OC Music Awards Showcase Series featuring nominees for Best Live Band will be hosted and co-judged by KROQ’s Kat Corbett of Locals Only, Tuesday, January 4th at the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa with doors opening at 7:30PM.

READ MORE INTERVIEWS ON KROQ.COM FROM SHOWCASE NIGHT 1 BANDS:

Friday, December 31st - Preacher’s Sons
Saturday, January 1st - The Colourist
Sunday, January 2nd - Semi Sweet
Monday, January 3rd - The Steelwells
Tuesday, January 4th - The New Limb

VOTING:

You have the power to send one Showcase artist to the Best Live Acoustic Finals and Best Live Band Finals.

Cast your vote and enter to win a massive prize pack from the OC Music Awards partners (To be Announced). Voting will begin on December 27 and will be open through the last Showcase on February 15. The votes will be tallied and the band with highest score will automatically move on to their Series Finals! Click here to vote

LEARN MORE AT: OCMUSICAWARDS.COM

CONNECT HERE: