KEXP Q&A: Skyler Ford of Snuff Redux

Snuff Redux has burst on the scene, wooing the hearts of KEXP DJs, with their EP, Toy Kingdom. Comprised of Daniel Chesney (bass), Dylan Arlick (guitar), Alex Paulino (drums) and Ford (guitar, vocals), this young, fresh-faced four-piece seems ready to take on the world. KEXP caught up the group to talk about living together, making music and angry neighbors. 

What can you tell me about "Boy" and "Girl" Haus?

Boy house is where Skyler and Daniel currently live in Ravenna, girl house is our friend's house in Montlake. We walk through each other's doors frequently.Give me a window in – is there lots of music, drawing, TV watching? What happens?

Besides 80s music (Tears For Fears, Talking Heads, Stevie Nicks) blasting at all unholy hours, we have had to keep most music volumes to the dullest roar, we live super close to our neighbors. We got through 20 seconds of a song when we moved in before the neighbor was punching the door until his hand bled. We have a practice space so that's where the noise happens!

The past month has seen long nights, drinking two or four bottles of red wine, a handful of spliffs and the cast of familiar faces we call our friends. We laugh sputter smoke and giggle and probably don't sleep enough. Daniel is the serious painter of the crew, he is always meddling with his oil paints. We don't have cable but we have been playing NFL Blitz on Nintendo64 a lot.

Sounds like beautiful youth at its best! What's the plan with more music: playing, recording, rehearsing?

Daniel is working with this noise collective amongst the post UW experimental arts scene, and through that, we found out his buddy has converted this bunker under Mars Bar into a recording studio, which we plan on hitting ASAP. We have five more songs ready to go, just gotta record. We wanna make another video too. We are gonna have practice today at Crybaby studios, we are playing the Girl Haus house show then playing at the Josephine in Ballard on Saturday.

When you get together, how does practice proceed? What sorts of conversations do you have leading up to making music?

Up until November, we didn't know who our drummer was. It was a flip-flop situation throughout the fall, having shows booked and finishing the record, etc. We had our buddy subbing on drums until I met Alex after the Death From Above show. From there, we have just worked hard to get the old songs done and sounding sweet, but Daniel and I have been messing with new songs, there are like 6 new ones so it's cool to have a set where we can say we would like to play this song or skip it.

With that, we have been all just getting comfortable in our present situation together because our vibe works well. We get off work and set up, light a spliff and be on our way. If we need to go over a flubbed song, Alex likes to say "Hit it and quit it" so we are always getting better.

If you could compare the band to one famous group – fictional, real, cartoon, superhero, whatever – who would you be?

We are often compared to The Warriors [1979 cult action thriller], though instead of the violence and switchblades we are just running around the city sippin' Gatorade and hanging out with our goons, it's all good fun.