Western Medicine

Review - Abort Magazine

A while back, in a mystical suburb of Vancouver, BC, a vision was born. Some guy with a barnyard nickname decided to form a band… and not just any band. “I wanted to form the last band I’d ever form”, Says Roost. “The perfect band… at least to me!” Plastering the internet with ads for local musicians, the slicing talents of Jake Cummins were the first to be found. “I’d talked to a few guys, but Jake was the first one to actually come over to my house and jam”, but it almost didn’t happen. “I walked out my door and was thinking: ‘what am I doing? I’m going out to some suburb to go jam with some guy I’ve never met’, I almost turned around”, says Jake. But he didn’t, “I knew as soon as I saw him play,” says Roost, “The style, the weird chords he was using, everything was just what I was looking for… all the things I couldn’t do!” The distinct difference in their guitar playing is part of what makes for such a unique sound; rarely does either one play what the other is playing. The chemistry was instantaneous, and the nucleus of this imagined band was formed.
Besides playing styles, the other thing they both agreed on was the need for an outstanding drummer. Powerful, intricate, and off the wall; this of course posed a problem: finding a drummer up to the task! Over the next few months guys came and went, and after a couple false starts they found Matthew Ball. “I walked into the local rehearsal room and saw this little dude setting up the kit and I thought: ‘really?” After playing the first song through it was obvious why you don’t judge a book by its cover. “We had three songs up on myspace with programmed drums, and he nailed them! After the first song we were like, holy shit, potato! (The contact of knuckles with clenched fists,) Next song, potato, next song, potato… I think we’ve found our guy!”
Initially they thought finding a bass player would be really easy, but they found that something was always missing. “I’ve always had a love for female singers, and I thought, why not find a chick that can play bass and sing!?” says Roost. “I knew I wanted a real crazy vocal aspect to this band, with multiple singers, so lets make one of us a girl!” The first to respond was April Reed. “We took one listen to her acoustic songs online and thought: wow, her voice is so amazing, if she can play bass at all she’s in!” And play bass she does. April’s powerful fingering, stop-gap style, and hauntingly beautiful voice add an entirely different dynamic to the band’s sound. “When she started singing with us we all got chills! It stepped everything up to a new level!” This, however, was after they completed the search for the all important front man… which was the hardest part yet.
Knowing the front man of a band can make or break it, they set about searching for the perfect piece to their puzzle. “We held a lot of auditions over the course of a few months… all of them painful! I was like, ‘we’ve got to find a guy soon… I don’t want to be the best band to never play live,” says Matt. Then in January ’09, in walked Bowsh. “We knew him from his myspace name: Kiabowsh,” says Jake. And like all other names in the band, it was shortened. “We’re an extremely hard working band, but we focus our energy in the right places, so we save valuable syllables on each other’s names,” says Roost. Again, it almost didn’t happen. “I almost didn’t go,” says Bowsh. “I said if these guys are another bunch of old, long haired metal heads I’ll shoot myself!” Having gone to many poor auditions of his own, Bowsh was frustrated, but his girlfriend convinced him to go to the audition. “I walked in and started handing out beers. When they cracked a joke at my expense over the brand I’d brought, I knew I could work with these guys!”
The band that almost wasn’t was born. “It’s really uncanny actually,” says Roost. “Everyone in the band was chosen due to gut instinct, some were the first ones contacted! Others like Bowsh were harder to find, but it all kind of fell into place… like it was fate or something.” Now the only problem was finding a name to fit this rather strange brew. “We have a song called Western Medicine, and one night we were crushing some pints at a restaurant by our jam space trying to come up with names. Jake was like: ‘what about Western Medicine?’ and we all knew then and there we’d found it.” The next couple months were spent writing lyrics to the songs that were up to that point instrumental. “It all came together really naturally. Bowsh would write where he felt like, and I just did the same. We threw it out there, and it just worked!” says Roost. Sometimes overlapping, sometimes picking up where the other leaves off, their vocals mesh in exciting contrast to each other. Both can sing, both can scream; and then there’s April, soaring over both with the most intriguing harmonies and counter melodies, and a few tricks all her own. Their raw talent and enthusiasm when playing live are infectious, and Bowsh’s tendency to spend much of their shows in amongst the crowd never ceases to ignite a powerful reaction! . They have also recorded an ep at Vancouver’s famed Greenhouse studios with LA trained engineer/producer Chris ‘Hollywood’ Holmes, and have since been building their buzz like a hive of obsessive bees.
Finding a genre to fit them into is rather difficult. Often showing different styles within the same song, their riffs are usually metal or groove based, with complex progressive arrangements, yet seems to be wrapped in an outer shell of post hardcore and punk angst. “We all have such different influences and interests, that when we get together it’s anything goes! And we all respect each other so much that when an idea comes in from left field we tend to embrace it,” says Bowsh. Whatever mood they are in, every song comes off with an energy and excitement to it that never fails to get blood pumping, and audiences writhing!!
The band is now poised to bring their music to the masses. Armed with an insatiable hunger to perform, combined with an inspiring set of tunes and impressively entertaining show, they will no doubt win over new fans wherever they go. With their debut EP set for release in September, it seems big things are on the horizon for Western Medicine!




Interview by: Candice Chic
Dynamic Fashion
July 21/09 - Dynamic Fasion inc