With a nonchalant, laid-back tone of voice which reflects the better days of Green Day and The Offspring, backed up by surf-rock guitar and an ennui-ridden attitude, Kill Vargas‘s music should be on your watch. I interviewed Logan Bush (Drums) on behalf of Griffin Bush (Vocals, Guitar) and Austin Engler (Bass) to introduce the three-piece from Wichita, Kansas.
Logan says that their influences are bands like FIDLAR, Dinosaur Pile-up and Weezer, combining punk with “alternative rock and beach-pop”. He continues by describing how they started: “When we were about ten years-old, we would write songs with the ‘Create-A-Song’ mode on Guitar Hero. Then we’d take one of our MP3 players, set it next to the TV speakers, hit record, and Griffin would sing over it”.
Kill Vargas are from the middle of America. It’s one of those places which I shouldn’t attempt to describe, as any description of Kansas is divisive – it’s like the Marmite of American states. Logan has nothing but praise for the local music scene, nor Wichita itself. The difficulties surface with their ages, as they’re still drifting through high-school. “There’s a lack of all-ages venues, so we usually have to do house shows and parking lot shows, stuff like that”, says Logan. “Once in a while we can convince a bar to let us do an all-ages show, and those always end up being fun. Being from Wichita has helped us become a better band because of all the local talent around us, pushing us to constantly work harder”
“The good side of being young outweighs the bad side. For one, I feel like its nice to get out there and learn how a music scene works and how shows work at a young age. Also, being this young provides a shock value of sorts. People think it’s really cool that we’re doing these shows with older bands. We’ve never played with a band that has been younger than us, and I think that helps us gain an identity in the Wichita music scene.”
They’re releasing a new album, ‘Agitator’, via Naughty Dog records on March 14th. “There isn’t really a strict theme behind the album. We don’t write heavy, deep lyrics or anything like that. I guess the overall theme of ‘Agitator‘ is just having fun”, says Logan.
The difficulties of being under-age don’t really seem to be affecting Kill Vargas, who are playing their album release show on March 14th, then a bunch of other local shows and festivals throughout the summer in the surrounding states. “It’s kinda difficult balancing touring, school and a job but we’re not touring super hard right now. It’s hard to think that far ahead because so much can change in a year. Maybe we could open up for some bigger bands on tour in the future, but we just hope to continue to grow and play shows”, says Logan.
“And about people saying punk is dead”, he adds, “There are great bands out there, you just have to look. We think that today’s music is better than ever.”, he adds. Of course I agree wholeheartedly, all the more after listening to ‘Agitator’.