Creepoid with A Place To Bury Strangers,
Depth & Current and Power Pyramid
7 p.m. Wednesday, March 4, 2015
The Conservatory | Oklahoma City
Hurdling across Interstate 10 between New Orleans and Houston, Patrick Troxell — drummer for the Philly-bred rock act Creepoid — is at ease. With his wife and bassist Anna Troxell, along with guitarists Sean Miller and Nick Kulp, in tow, the van is as much as home as the spooky, eroding Savannah, Georgia residence the band of Northeasterners packed their possessions into last June. They’ve spent as many days rolling down the road on two axels as they have in that house, and they are happy to do it, bringing their shoegaze-wrung rock noise to any crowd that will have them.
That dedication to making things work as a full-time touring band, the desire to fill every would-be off-night with a gig, doesn’t come as easy to everyone. A founding member couldn’t make that commitment, but Creepoid is creeping on with a new guitarist open to forgoing creature comforts or the safety net of a 9-to-5 for the opportunity to support a band like A Place To Bury Strangers on tour. It’s all or nothing now. Not a hobby. Not a lark. Life is what you make it, and for these four, it’s this band.
“We decided last summer, ‘Fuck working full-time jobs and fuck grinding it out as a side thing.’ We literally packed our things, moved to Savannah, Georgia into a big, haunted house,” Patrick explained. “When we were in that house, it was different. We woke up to Creepoid everyday. It made us want to do even more.”
It’s a year ago that things became real. “Intense,” Patrick said. But it was the good kind of intense — like having your heroes reach out and offer spots on shows or labels tripping over themselves trying to sign you. 2012’s Horse Heaven brought the first flirtations with the spotlight, but it was last fall’s self-titled effort that kept it there. The release of the album coincided with Austin’s little music conference that could, and it was there that the fantasy of every day spent dedicated to Creepoid started to feel, well, possible.
“Shit is going to be crazy,” Patrick said of the band’s return to Texas this March. “Last year, South by Southwest, that’s when stuff really started happening for us. We got asked to open for Dinosaur Jr. in New York. High Times hit us up to do a full spread. Laura Jane Grace emailed us and asked for us to tour with Against Me!. This year, with a new record on the way and being a full-time band that can commit to the opportunities we are given, I think it’s going to put some cool things out there for us.”
