When I first saw Rubblebucket at a summer concert series in my tiny hometown, I got hooked on the band’s danceable grooves and flair for putting on an entertaining and interactive show. It took two years and a handful of shows in between to finally catch up with the band at our SXSW party at Maggie Mae’s last week and with plenty of live energy and even a couple of robots (see our own Kate taking on the machine in the clip of “Came Out of a Lady” below) it was easy to see that the Brooklyn via Vermont group stole the show. The band played a variety of songs from their catalog and even showed off a brand new song called “Deeper Rage” (see video below).
I asked them about their trip to Austin, their highlights from SXSW and what goes in to creating their impressive live shows. Read on below to see what Kalmia, Adam, Ian and David had to say.
Sonicbids: What was it like travelling to Austin with seven people and two robots?
Rubblebucket: It was better than it usually is, we usually have nine people and four robots. The robots all pack down though into a little travelling case that has all the amenities that robots love.
Sonicbids: You guys have always had creative ideas to bring a new flavor to your live shows, whose idea was it to get the robots involved?
Rubblebucket: We toured with this band Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt! and their whole deal is that type of stuff times a million. Their whole stage is covered with insanity. We were really inspired by them and we were like, do you have any ideas for us to bring more of a spectacle to our show? They came up with a bunch of ideas and we liked the robot one the best.
Sonicbids: What has been the highlight of your week so far here at SXSW?
Rubblebucket: We caught Lee Fields who put on an incredible show and Reptar too, they were amazing. They have exceptionally fun dance music. Unfortunately the sound was awful at their set, but they just trooped through it and made it work. Gardens and Villa were great as well. We played with them at a showcase so we got to see those guys twice; they’re real nasty.
Oh and the bbq, we went to this place called Ruby’s last night and they have all of this grass fed organic beef, the most tender brisket we have ever had.
Sonicbids: Could you talk to us a little bit about the new live DVD that you guys have coming out?
Rubblebucket: There’s this group called Audiotree that is a production company in Chicago and they came to shoot the show at The Double Door. We didn’t really have anything in mind for the video, but it came out amazing so we knew we had to use it. The Double Door is an incredible venue, they have this really awesome lighting setup, the space is great and of course it helped that the crowd was into it. The whole video came out very nicely so we thought, why not share it?
Sonicbids: Obviously your live shows are very interactive, what goes into planning out your set during rehearsals?
Rubblebucket: What rehearsals? We tour a lot so we have built up the show mostly on experience from a bunch of years of playing together. We don’t rehearse nearly as much as most bands do. In the last three years we’ve done maybe 15 rehearsals and 10 of those have probably been in the last year. All of the songs get refined mostly on the road and since we play a lot of shows we get used to them quickly.
You can catch Rubblebucket next in a city near you by checking out their tour page and let us tell you, you definitely don’t want to miss it.
