Welcome everyone to episode 443 of Signals from
Mars. I'm your host, Victor. And for this episode,
I bring you a really cool interview with Kat
from Hoaxed. There's one small issue. There's
an issue with my mic, which doesn't sound as
good as usual. But I do think that the interview
is cool as is. So I wanted to bring it to you
guys anyway. So we'll get into that next. I'm
ready. Quick reminder that in addition to hosting
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head on over to the sponsorship page on SignalsFromMars
.com to learn more. Set up one of these recording
sessions. I mean, listen, the session itself
is live. I can edit it afterwards. But if the
audio is shitty, the only thing you can really
do is try to redo the interview. In this case,
I mean, yeah, my audio isn't up to snuff like
I usually want it to be using this mic for whatever
reason. It seems as if when the session started,
it picked up one of my other. A laptop mic or
maybe even the webcam mic. So for that, I do
apologize. I do think that the, although my audio
isn't great, it's okay. But you can definitely
hear Kat. You could hear her talk about Hoaxed,
about the new album that is dropping, Death Knocks.
And I really wanted to get her on the show because,
for example, this is in the vein that a lot of
the bands that my patrons are talking about,
like On Two Others and Lord of Lost and Creeper
and things of that nature, where they're mixing,
you know, more of a gothic element to hard rock
and metal. And I think that Hoax Slots, Right
in there. I think this is a really good album
and it sounds absolutely great, which is something
that we start to talk about at the beginning
of the interview. So I hope that regardless of
how my mic sounds for the interview, I hope that
you guys still appreciate the interview itself.
I do want to thank John Freeman for helping set
everything up. I do also want to thank my patrons,
Stephen Saylor, Stephen Hoker, Jeremy Weltman,
Mike Jones, Brad Dahl, Mark Striegel, Gabriel
Ruiz, Chris Vaglio, Metal Dan, Johan Erdström,
Ed Ferguson, Anthony Mackey, Tony Espin, and
Sean Richman. I really appreciate your support.
If you see any of the shows that I do with countdowns,
If you want to appear during the episodes, become
a patron. You can do so for as little as $2 a
month. We will be doing an episode on 1980 shortly.
So if you want to vote on that, send me your
10 favorite albums, 10 favorite hard rock or
metal albums that did come out in 1980. You can
email your list to signalsfrommars at signalsfrommars
.com. It will be a fun episode. All of us music
nerds will be debating what album should have
been one, two, what didn't appear in the top
10, so on and so forth. It will be fun as usual.
In any event, let's check out this interview
with Kat from Hoaxed. If you enjoy what you hear,
please pick up Death Knocks. Here we go. Welcome,
everyone, to the latest episode of Signals from
Mars. I'm your host, Victor, and joining me today
is Kat from the band Hoaxed. How are you, Kat?
Hey, I'm good. What's up? I'm doing good myself.
So you're about to release your new album, Death
Knocks. That's right. Instantly, when I heard
the album, what really caught me was the difference
in sound from your previous album. Not so much
the music you're playing, but there seems to
be like a sonic injection with this album where
it sounds, it just sounds over the top how good
it sounds. Oh, thank you. Yeah, I think the biggest
component on this album that's different is obviously
April writing on the album with us. She brought
a really robust classic rock background. She
loves classic metal. And I think the biggest
thing she lent to this album is obviously her
vocals. She did a lot of very harsh character
-type vocals on this album that really brings
a lot more character to the songs. And then her
bass playing, too. It was just a lot more elevated.
I mean, Kim and I wrote bass and recorded it
on the last albums, but we are not bass players,
and April is a professional. And what she brought
was just a lot more energy and a lot more nuance
to the songs and what she wrote. Okay. And how
long did it take you guys? Find April. Was this
something where you kind of knew somebody who
knew somebody who knew her or did you audition?
What was the whole process there? I wish I had
a better story than this. We just knew April
already. And we've actually never played a Hope
show without April. She's always been in the
band since we started playing live. But we didn't
add her as an official member until this album.
And that's only because we wrote the EP before
we'd ever played live. We recorded Two Shadows
while we were like going out on tours and we
just didn't have an opportunity to get her in
the studio with us. But she is part of the Portland
metal scene. We've been friends with her for
years. She's in a couple of other really rad
bands. And when we needed a live bass player,
she was just the first person we went to. She
was the obvious choice and it was a perfect fit.
And so we, I mean, we kind of, I guess in a way
it was kind of an audition to go out on the road
with her for a month and see how it went. And
it was great. I mean, I. It was the perfect match.
He was just there all along. Okay. And between
Two Shadows and the new album, it's been a few
years. It's been a few years. The material, was
it something that you guys started working on
after Two Shadows? Or is it something that you
guys decided a year ago, hey, let's start writing
music? We've been working on it since before
we were done recording Two Shadows. So the first
song that's on the album, Where the Seas Fall
Silent, we actually wrote that while we were
in the studio with Two Shadows. So that one is
over three years we've been working on that.
And then the rest of the album was kind of a
slow trickle. We were on the road a lot. We were
touring. We were kind of getting like our bearings
as having like a three piece in the band. And
we just started like slowly writing together
and experimenting. And then. Once we were done
with our last tour, like we had 2024, we were
like, we want to write the album this year. Like
this is going to be the year that we buckle down
and we write it. And we did. And then Kim in
November found out that she was pregnant. And
so then all of a sudden we had like a deadline
where she was like, I want to get these drum
parts recorded before I have this baby. We were
like, all right, let's finish this album and
get in the studio. And so we were in the studio
last year, right around this time in January,
recording her drum parts. And she was pregnant.
She killed it. And now her son's here and she
plays on the record all the time. It's great.
And so it says in the press release that it took
you guys eight days to record. Eight days. Yeah.
Yeah. Kind of neat because usually unless you're
recording from home, most bands take how long
to record things? I know. And we have a dream
of one day doing that where you like rent the
house, do the studio, like spend months writing
and recording the album. We tend to write better
when we're like in our comfort of our practice
space. It's just easier for us to write. So we
had this album. We had all the parts done before
we got in the studio. And we'd actually we thought
we'd be there for about 10 or 12 days. And we
just flew through the parts. We like we're so
comfortable with them. We had such a clear vision
for what we wanted on this. And Gabe. helping
us with it again recording it like he knows us
very well he knows what we're going for and it
was just a really easy process in the recording
studio we did two days on drums which is wild
kim is a machine like she just these parts she
lays down and she did the entire album all eight
of the tracks she's on in two days and then we
moved on to guitar vocals and honestly vocals
were probably the longest uh vocals were probably
the longest uh the longest session that we were
on recording for because we were experimenting
with April and like getting that sound that we
wanted on the record and giving her space to
experiment. But yeah, eight days in and out,
the whole record was done and I'm proud to say
there's nothing that we feel like we missed.
Like there was nothing we were like, Oh man,
we forgot to get that part. So it was great.
When you got into the studio, you're saying that
you did experiment a little with April there.
What did that? help you do for example is there
anything that by including april in the studio
did it liberate you to do maybe try something
different or do something that in the past you
said no what it's better off that she handled
this now sure yeah that's so super fair i think
april brings such a power that there it like
definitely takes the pressure off of me to bring
like she's bringing that behind all of the tracks
like there's this extra oomph that she puts in
there so definitely um Takes a little bit of
the pressure off me, but I did feel the need
to experiment as well. Cause it's fun. You know,
we're all in the booth. We put me in the booth,
Kimmy and April are in the recording area. And
then, you know, we swap and it's just so fun
to like hear what everyone's trying and get all
excited. Like do it again, do this, like try
something different. And yeah, I mean, I think
I laid down more vocal tracks on this album than
I definitely did in the past ones. We played
around a lot more with harmonies and then having
April like she she can sing normal. She can also
sing harsh. She's got these crazy whispers that
she does. I mean, there's there's like so much
range there that she brought that it she had
a general idea of what she wanted to do on the
songs. But once she got in the booth, we were
like, oh, yeah, do that character like that voice
that you're doing is what fits this song. It
was we had a lot of fun. As a result of that,
is there any song that turned out better than
what you had expected once you recorded it? Oh,
man. I mean, I think my favorite song off this
album is The Fallen, which I would not have expected
that going into this. It's like kind of a more
like a ballady, like chuggy march kind of song.
And I tend to like the like higher energy ones.
But what April brought to that song and like
what we were able to do in the harmonies really
changed my perspective of that one. I think that's
also my favorite song to play live, which is,
it's different when you play it live than what
we recorded, but I, I don't know. I love that
one. And I think it's because of how much fun
we had recording it. Okay. And as far as the,
the sound, which I mentioned before the album,
is that something due to the, how the album was
engineered, how it was mixed later on? Yeah.
um i mean i think we we went into this one knowing
that we wanted it to be darker and we wanted
to pull april's influence in and make sure that
it was like a very prominent part of the sound
but i will say that arthur who mixed the album
um he gave it all new life he breathed so much
more energy into this album um he was fantastic
and we never worked with him in person it was
all virtual and uh he was so great at hearing
our feedback and understanding exactly what we
wanted and what was also needed for the songs.
And I mean, I think he was like the seal on top
of everything that just brought it all together.
We had this general idea and he executed it,
made it happen. He was phenomenal. Gotcha. Okay.
What's neat though, with everything that you're
saying, what stands out to me is with you guys
incorporating April into the band, other bands.
you know well we brought somebody else on but
you know we've already written the songs we've
already done it seems like you guys right from
the start just decided that she was going to
be an equal part like the other two like you
and yeah absolutely yeah i my perspective is
like what's the point of doing it if we all like
this is a like a band democracy like what's the
point of doing it if we all don't have equal
parts i mean it's it's not as fun you know like
you want to have you all want to have equal say
we all have a say in all the things that the
band does all the choices we make everything
from like the merch the songwriting to like what
tours we go on um and yeah i mean it's great
it's it's really nice to have the support of
like two band members who are in it with you
and then it's also we all get to craft this vision
together and make it exactly what we want um
and yeah april was like game from the beginning
we asked her we were like this is this is what
we're proposing as you being a member of the
band. And she was like, I'm in. And she took
it and ran. I mean, she did the album artwork
for this one. Like she just dove straight in.
It was great. Wow. That's awesome. Yeah. The
band is classified as so many different things.
I've seen hard rock. I've seen metal. I've seen
Gothic rock. All the different labels that are
placed on the band. Which one sticks out to you?
And you say, yeah, I don't see that one. We,
oh man, I think it's hard. I have a hard time
classifying music in general into genres. And
especially with your own music, it's pretty tricky.
I think the one I'm most flattered by is goth
rock. Whenever people say that, I'm like, oh,
thank you so much. The one that we've gotten
that I totally disagree with is we toured with
a lot of black metal bands and people will call
us black metal. And I'm like, weird. absolutely
not black metal like i will not do that genre
that disturbs like love black metal we are not
black metal um but i think yeah generally like
i get where the the rock the hard rock there
are some metal elements we all love metal we're
in the metal scene here in portland um and there's
definitely you know punk goth there's a lot of
them it's music you know whatever makes you feel
good Yeah, I don't hear any jazz chords thrown
in there anywhere. Yeah, we're not doing that.
We're not that experimental. No math rock. Talk
to us a little bit about the Portland metal scene.
For those of us that are ignorant to what the
scene is up there, what it's about, what are
some of the bands that people should look towards?
What are some of the bands that... you guys look
up to or consider you know uh sisters or brothers
uh when it comes to going out and playing yeah
absolutely um the portland metal scene is it's
alive and it's super supportive um i came from
the midwest uh from like the detroit area and
i came from there thinking like that's like where
rock is and i mean the metal scene in portland
does not compare to the Detroit rock scene is
not does not compare to how Portland's vibrant
metal scene is super supportive. There's a ton
of venues. There's always shows going on and
they're packed shows. People show up and support
this community. We just did a music video last
weekend where we asked friends and family to
come out and help us. And the turnout was incredible.
Like we had a last minute heads up for people
like, hey, come help us do this thing. And they
all showed up. They all participated. It's super
supportive. And then in terms of friends, we're
really close with Unto Others. They're out here
and they're rad. We love those guys. We play
a bunch of shows with them. We've done a few
like mini tours around the Pacific Northwest.
And then the breakout of that band out of that
band, a stress test. We're pretty close with
those guys, too. I think those are probably the
main two, I would say. But there are. Yeah, the
Portland metal scene is great. It's incredibly
welcoming, incredibly supportive. Yeah, Onto
Others gets a pretty decent play amongst the
people that follow my show, so that's cool to
hear. Yeah, we love those guys. They're great.
Yeah. When people talk about the Northwest music
scene, they almost always point towards Seattle.
Obviously, Portland, completely different state.
One's Washington, one's Oregon. Have they ever
tried to group you guys with anything related
to Seattle as a result? Yeah. I mean, we, we
tend to use just the term Pacific Northwest because
it just encompasses all of it. But yeah, we get
a lot of crossover between that scene and our
scene. And I think they're pretty similar. I
prefer Portland cause I'm biased, but there definitely
is like a pretty robust scene up there too. Same
thing, tons of venues. We're actually playing
up there around the release. We're going to be
playing at El Corazon in Seattle, and that's
a great classic venue. I always love playing
there. Okay. You're on relapse. How big of a
deal is it for you guys to be on such a legendary
label that's had so many built bands? I mean,
like, I still can't really wrap my head around
it, and it's been four years. And when Relapse
reached out, we had, we'd self -released our
EP, the four songs, we put it online and it landed
in the right hands that I got to Relapse and
they reached out. And when we got that email,
I thought it was fake. I was like, there's no
way that Relapse is reaching out to us based
on this four song EP that we put up. I've been
in a band since I was a teenager and I've never
had label interest. And then the one passion
project we did over COVID is the one that landed.
It's a dream come true. I know it sounds super
cheesy, but like Relapse is a label that I've
always really respected and loved all the bands
that are on it. And then being a part of that
family has been really cool. And they are super
supportive. We hand them our album and they have
no notes. There's just this is what you guys
want to put out and this is what you believe
in. This is what we'll release on your behalf.
And that's been really great. They just believe
in what we want to make and they support us.
So it's been they've been a fantastic partner.
That's cool. Yeah. As far as the physical copy
of Death Knocks, what are you guys releasing?
You're releasing vinyl, CDs, cassette. What do
you have going on? No cassettes for this one,
but we are doing vinyl and CD and there's two
different vinyl colors. And then they always
do a limited run of clear vinyl just for us to
have too. So we'll probably give a couple of
those away on our socials. But yeah, I'm actually,
I'm going to get the albums. They're shipping
at the beginning of next month and I'm going
to actually have like, I'm so excited to have
them. Cool. Yeah, we're actually, for those that
are listening to this or watching the video version,
we're recording this the 22nd of January and
the album comes out in roughly a month, right?
Yeah, it's on the 13th of February, Friday the
13th, which is very fitting. Was that purposely
done the Friday the 13th? Um, Relapse picked
that date, but yeah, I think like that just fits
our vibe really well. It was like, it kind of
felt like it was either going to be a Friday
the 13th release or another release in the fall
around like Halloween time. And so when they
told us Friday the 13th, we were like, yeah,
that's perfect. That totally makes sense. That's
kind of around Valentine's or it is around Valentine's
day. There's like this, that dark, like romance
aspect of it. I think it fits really well. Yeah,
absolutely. That's cool. Um, you mentioned shows,
um, Where are you guys going to be playing around
the release of the album? And what do you guys
have planned for 2026 when it comes to playing?
Yeah, so right around the album, we're just doing
a Pacific Northwest tour. We're going to play
Vancouver, British Columbia, Seattle, Washington,
and Bellingham, Washington. And then about a
month later, we're going to be back in Portland.
We're going to do our hometown release show then.
So we've got those four shows. And those are
the only ones that we have solidified right now
that I can talk about, but we're working on tours.
We want to get back on tour so badly. We have
missed it. We really, really like to tour and
we can't wait to get back to the East coast of
the United States. I want to go to Europe this
or this year, next year. I want to go to Mexico.
I want to spend more time in Canada. There's
just so many places. And then like the top tier
dream would be if we got to like Asia or anywhere
over there. So it's just. Anywhere that will
take us, we want to go. But we're working with
a couple of different bookers right now to try
to get tours. And hopefully we'll have more soon
to share. Cool. Yeah. I can't wait. Do you think
history will repeat itself and you guys will
start writing material for a follow up while
on tour? Probably. I'm already writing lyrics
for the next album. I have no idea what the theme
is going to be. We typically figure that out
like four or five songs in. but we're already
starting to write a little bit about it. I mean,
it's, I think this last one, the stretch between
the albums was a bit longer than we typically
would like, but it was just how everything played
out and with all the life changes and everything
that was happening, it made sense. But I think
with this one, we'd love to get into the studio
a little bit sooner than three years from now.
It'd be great. Right. And that will, I mean,
for a lot of people, a lot of artists have mentioned
this to me over the years that what they write
really encapsulates a part, you know, an album,
like an old photo album, it encapsulates that
part of your life. So you guys are still, from
what you're saying, you're going to be figuring
out the theme and where you guys are going when
the balls kind of just starts to get rolling.
Yeah. Yeah. This last one, it kind of made sense.
Like we went on tour with a bunch of black metal
bands and got like very in touch with the idea
of death and like, it's clearly a product of
what we are experiencing and going through together.
So yeah, this next one we'll see. I'm like, it
feels like there's another evolution that can
happen for sure. And we'll figure out where we
land. Cool. Where should people go to pick up
death knocks that ensures that the most amount
of money gets back in his pockets. Oh, that's
so kind of you to say, thank you. Um, relapse
sells it through band camp. But if you really
want to get it direct, you can buy it from us
at shows. We sell it on the road. And then we
also have a band camp where we're selling our
own merch. And those are like most of the T -shirts
and that kind of thing. We're actually shipping
those ourselves. I get a lot of requests from
people to sign merch. And I think like if it's
the music merch, typically it's shipped from
Relapse on the East Coast. So I can't sign those.
But if you buy like the T -shirts off our band
camp, I can sign those. Yeah. How involved are
you guys in the t -shirt design? You mentioned
that April was the one who designed the album
cover. Yeah, the new one that just is coming
out that's with the pre -lease right now, that's
Relapse. They took our album art and made their
own version of it. But all the other t -shirts
like Candle Master, the High Seas shirt, Where
Good Won't Go, those are all ones that we work
with artists that we like to make. um there's
like a different artist on each one and uh it's
all people that we just loved what they were
doing in this scene and reached out to them with
ideas and they came back with this artwork and
it's a collaborative process but um yeah we do
that in all of our shirts and i love it it's
like this fun extra side of the music part you
get to work with other artists doing their craft
too it's great any artists that you haven't had
a chance to work with that you wanted to oh man
we do have like a short list of artists right
now that we like honestly we see other bands
t -shirts and we're like that is such a sick
t -shirt who did they work with and then we find
out who that artist is and contact them so there
are a few people we're going to reach out to
for this next run but um we haven't figured out
which one specifically so we'll see we'll see
but hopefully in the next couple of months we'll
get another one rolling okay should people wear
your band shirts to your shows i love this question
um so i do that Like when I go to see my friends
bands, I'll wear their shirt, but I'm doing it.
Cause like, I know what the stigma is and I don't
care. I think it's fun to be like in front of
them. Like I'm wearing your shirt. Um, I mean,
I love it when people show up and they're wearing
the hoax merch. Like it always starts a conversation
of like, where did you get that shirt? Like,
did you come to another show? Have I met you
before? Um, so that's great. And I, I honestly
like. If you support the band, I'm not going
to thank less of you for wearing our merch. That's
great. You're supporting us. It's rad. And if
you show up with another band shirt, too, then
we can talk about that band. Right. Yeah. What
about wearing your own merch? I do not wear my
own merch to shows, but I respect it when I see
a band get on stage and they're wearing their
own shirt. That is a new level of confidence.
I love that. I mean, all of our shirts that we
make, I love them because I... we picked the
design. We worked with the artists. So it's,
that's, we don't make a shirt that we wouldn't
wear. So if someone runs into me in the grocery
store, I might be wearing my own shirt, but I
wouldn't do it on stage. Gotcha. Okay. A little
bit too meta, you know, playing the songs, wearing
the shirt. Where should people go to keep up
with the band? Yeah. We're pretty active on social
and Instagram. We love to chat with people on
there and any engagement. We're stoked on. So
that's a really good place to find us. We also
have a website. We're hoaxband .com and we're
always posting things there. But I mean, honestly,
the best place is live at shows. Like we really
enjoy seeing people. We're always back at the
merch table to meet people at the end. That's
my favorite part about what we're doing is sharing
music with people and meeting them in person.
Great. I want to thank you for your time, Kat.
Oh, yeah. A lot of fun talking to you. And the
album sounds great, as I said at the beginning.
And I wouldn't say that if I didn't really mean
that. Well, thank you so much. And yeah, thank
you for the time. Thanks for doing this. I love
the name of this podcast. This is so fun. It's
like Signals for Mars. I like it. And yeah, thank
you for the time. I appreciate that you listened
to the album and that you're giving us the platform
to talk about it. Absolutely. My pleasure. Anytime
you guys want to come back on. discuss uh hoax
i'm more than happy to have you guys back on
oh hell yeah yeah next time um we might be able
to get april and kim to join me too he'd do a
dual interview sounds good okay great yeah all
right well thank you so much all right thank
you have a good day thank you for listening to
the signals from mars podcast You can subscribe
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