Howdy, friends! It’s been quiet on the Profile front for a couple of weeks, but I promise things are about to pick up in March. Right off the rip, we have Last Scene Alive and their debut album World Class Pep Talk. This trio features Amsterdam-based saxophonist Graham Robertson and Washington, DC-based synth player Zack Be and drummer Sean Sidley, and they have concocted something wonderfully… out there. I mean, come on, you just read the collective at work here. This is unique. Plenty of energy, plenty of experimentation, plenty of entertainment. So! To get us started, check out Zack’s response to our questions below. They’re just as engaging as World Class Pep Talk so be sure to hit that embed as you go, and we’ll see ya on the other side.

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How and when did you first get into playing music, or metal more specifically, and how did your band get its start? Any pushback from family/those close to you?

Zack Be: Like many, I started playing music when the clarinet was forced on me in the 3rd grade. A great regret of mine is that I lacked the presence of mind to pick trumpet instead, or something that might be more useful to me now. Regardless, the gates to the world of music were truly blown open for me when I started listening to my dad’s old favorites, especially stuff like The Doors and the Grateful Dead, wherein I was introduced to the glory of “noodling around,” which became my new obsession. Once I transitioned to the guitar the GI Joes got put away for good, and the Nintendo. Music became everything, and I would listen to anything – Metallica, Bjork, Sonic Youth, Pat Metheny, Peter Gabriel… I produced my first record when I was 17, working off the family’s desktop running Cakewalk SE on Windows XP. And credit where it’s due – no one in my family ever tried to stop me from pursuing music, and they bankrolled a lot of it when I was a teen, thanks mom and dad. Around that time, my interests fully shifted toward “production” over being “a bassist” or “a guitarist,” and this started my long journey toward being a jack-of-all-trades, although I never did try to pick up trumpet again. Most people think of me as a banjo player these days, of all things.

How would you describe your band and what you play to someone who is completely in the dark?

ZB: I’d tell them to trust that a baritone sax stacked with thick monosynths can chug just as well as any guitar/bass combo.

Is there anything about your upcoming album or about your band that no one will find in any interview or review that you care to divulge?

ZB: As a project, Last Scene Alive only exists because our friend and guitar wizard
Garrett Gleason (who appears on track two as a guest) asked me if I had any project that could open for his tour stop in DC, and Graham Roberston (sax) and I used it as an excuse to finally do the bari sax/ synth/ drums project we had been pussyfooting around for months. We threw half the songs on the record together in less than 3 weeks to be ready for the show and then rounded out the last few songs in the handful of weeks after the show before cutting the record in our basements, totally DIY. Limitations can often make for the best art.

Any funny stories from playing shows / tours / festivals, etc?

ZB: If enough people buy/stream the record then I promise I will have great stories from the resulting tour. In the meantime, what I can say is: I like to imagine whenever we walk out on stage there is at least ONE audience member who spends the whole set waiting for the rest of the band to show up or be revealed behind a curtain.

What do you see as some of the great things happening in and around the metal scene (yours or just in general) and what are some of the worst things happening right now?

ZB: I’m here for the end of genre divisions. I still like to be able to fire up a thrash vs a death metal classics playlist, but as it pertains to new music? I love to listen to
something and hear the tsunami of influences coming through the speakers. A trap-
inspired djent riff? Sign me up.

Most folks have passions for a cause or causes that are close to them. What, if any, are some of the most important issues (social/political/humorous/etc.) for you / your band and how do you insert those issues into your music?

ZB: Honestly, I find it tiresome that bands feel pressured in the content age to
demonstrate explicit support of mob-approved causes. As a listener, it takes some (re: a lot) of the magic out of the art when the rational/ logical/ categorical part of my brain feels bombarded by slogans and pressured to judge the art based on the political position of the band. To be clear, this is not an argument to remove causes from music, far from it. Rather, this is an argument in favor of trusting the audience to come to their own conclusions and letting artists operate outside the pressure of virtue signaling content. Perhaps the world has become too polarized for audiences to feel like they can engage with art that isn’t explicitly sitting in their political camp, but alas, a chat bot can dream.

Do you have day jobs or hobbies you want to share?

ZB: By day, I am a licensed couples/ sex therapist, which is surprisingly similar to
playing music. Sure, you learn theory and guidelines for best practices, but when you get in the room with your client it feels akin to the energy a musician experiences onstage when they are in flow – like a great wave of mutually arising emotional improvisation, consciously or unconsciously guided by theory. I also write science fiction/ horror (my next release will be in an upcoming issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction magazine) and I use a similarly authentic, non-judgmental, improvisational flow to get the words on the table. Graham and I first met in these improv-forward music community contexts and it shapes a lot of our approaches to music. This type of “allowing” is central to achievement across a wide set of contexts. Consider for yourself – how might accessing this flow help you?

What advice do you have for music critics and outlets out there? How can we all better serve the genre in the eyes of a hard-working musician?

ZB: I shudder even saying this, but what would probably help is if blogs and critics made brief content for Insta reels/ tik tok. Any little bit of audio/visual that can be shared and swiped through would help because these are the open pastures where attention is cultivated. People don’t really read blogs as much these days – for that matter, people don’t really read. Keep in mind this is coming from someone who spends time writing sci-fi! If we are realistic, audio/visual content is the NOW, and that’s where the audiences are sitting, waiting to be amused.

Any specific long term goal(s) in mind?

ZB: We are hoping to push “World Class Pep Talk” out to reach the types of music fans we know would enjoy it – people with diverse tastes in metal, math rock, jazz, indie, whatever. If enough people show interest in the project (streams, purchased records, etc) then we would absolutely consider a tour, another record, you name. It’s just the usual push and pull between these two sentiments: “If you build it, they will come” vs. “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.”

When you’re not obsessing over your own material, what are some of your favorite albums to listen to currently?

ZB: Recent favorite records have been:
“The Passionate Ones” – Nourished by Time
“Silent Earthling” – Three Trapped Tigers
“Stardust” – Danny Brown
“Oddworld” – Ocean Grove
“City” – Strapping Young Lad
“Emily’s D+Evolution” – Esperanza Spalding
“viagr aboys” – Viagra Boys
“Crazy Nights” – Kiss

What is the near future outlook for you or your band? Any specific events on the horizon that the masses should be aware of?

ZB: Aside from the record release on 3/6, it’s really up to the listeners. Show us you want more and we promise we’ll keep going for as long as you want us.

Summarize your band in one word.

ZB: Geothermal

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Many thanks to Zack and Last Scene Alive for the time!

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World Class Pep Talk is out tomorrow, March 6th. For more information on Last Scene Alive, head over to their website.