If you haven’t heard of Camino 84 and you listen to tons of disco music, then where have you been recently? His last EP, which is an extremely long name that we dare to type out, was phenomenal. In fact, we’re rather quite excited for his new album, called New Mutant Disco.
We’re expecting some of the same vibes that we got from that EP, but as always, Camino always loves to change it up.
FS: Hey all! Today we’ve got a special interview with our man, Camino 84.
Let’s start with some current affairs, shall we? What’s your current opinion with this “SoundCloud” fiasco going down?
C84: Ha… let’s. Yeah, my opinion is that the whole “SoundCloud is shutting down in 100 days!” thing was probably just sensationalism, but unless they have some sort of huge breakthrough with their business model… we’ll lose them soon. Even if they stick around for a while, the listener base has already begun to rapidly die off.
It’s just not a good experience for listeners – even a carefully curated Soundcloud feed can be filled with spammy reposts that were bought (or only done for social/political reasons). It’s just impossible for them to offer as fulfilling of a listening experience as Spotify does.
FS: Is there anyway the company can continue to be sustainable, or have they messed up completely?
C84: They aren’t sustainable. Not sure if they ever have been, quite honestly – its just that they’ve finally run out of cash from outside funding. The pathetic/desperate price drops to $3 or whatever to get people to try SoundCloud Go aren’t working… It’s all pretty obvious to anybody who works in the startup world.
FS: Say for example, SoundCloud does disappear sooner, rather than later – will the music industry be dealt a massive blow at all?
C84: I don’t think so, quite honestly. A lot of artists will have to adapt, yes, and the barrier to entry might nudge up a bit- but honestly there’s so much noise out there that it serves music lovers better if we can start to introduce a little curation back into the music marketplace.
Sure, there’ll be apps and websites that allow anybody to casually share sounds with close friends, but any platform with the kind of marketing and exposure power SoundCloud had, will probably be a little more filtered.
FS: Let’s move on from SoundCloud now, to talk about your new album! What can expect to hear from you?
C84: It’s kind of a punk record! About halfway through making this album I started to listen to a lot of late 70s dance-punk stuff from NYC and realised that the album was definitely starting to take after all that. There’s a lot of guitars, lots of moments where precision is lost in favour of energy, and a bit of an edge and a roughness to it. It’s very human.
I think mistakes can be exciting and valid- even in my DJ sets people seem to get excited when something goes wrong, a record skips or I take some sort of huge transition risk that doesn’t pay off. Draws your attention and makes things exciting.
I’m also singing on a couple tracks on the record, which is probably the most nerve-racking part about releasing this. I was originally only gonna sing on one track, but then a few collaborators fell through and I said “screw it, I’ll do these vocals myself”. No idea how people will react to my voice, but… let’s find out! If nothing else it’s certainly authentic.
FS: Will there be any collaborations on the record at all?
C84: Totally. All of the collaborators from the Don’t read this. You will be kissed… EP are back – Sidney Gish on two tracks this time, Matt Lewin on guitar, Lol-Madzz, Jesse Hall in charge of mastering. There’s another dozen plus Boston music scene staples who contribute instruments to the tracks, and then some nice raps from Latrell James and Kool A.D.
FS: Here’s a question for you: What was your favourite track, that you created yourself, in 2016?
C84: Oh My is the one that “blew up” (in a small way) and opened a lot of doors for me, but my favorite is definitely Methods of Flotation. Just the musicianship and how clearly I was able to articulate this vision I’ve had for a while… I feel like it’ll take me a while to top that one.
FS: Not gonna lie, Oh My was one of our favourite tracks of 2016! Sidney Gish really does out-do herself on the track, every time we listen.
We understand that you do a bit of crate-digging, every now and again. What are some good spots in Boston, to get some real diamonds in the rough?
C84: Well there’s a few private dealers that are really really good to me. I’ll give a shoutout to Studebaker Hawk and a guy named Jerry who co-founded a legendary Boston record store, called Looney Tunes, before selling it in the 80s (and it’s gone for real now…). But in terms of stores… In Your Ear in Allston and Cheapo Records in Harvard are the two best.
FS: Some nice recommendations there!
Can you name three of your greatest finds?
C84: Hmm… one is definitely We’ve Had Enough by Arnie Love and the Loveletts. It’s the most expensive record I own (and no, I definitely didn’t pay full price for it) and I’ve been playing it a lot lately, it’s such a good tune. Some people prefer the A-side, Invisible Wind but We’ve Had Enough is FAR superior in my opinion.
Second one isn’t particularly rare, but I love it for the history- it’s a test pressing of Status IV You Ain’t Really Down (a true classic) with a handwritten note from the Radar Records co-founders on the jacket asking some dude named Nelson if he could make room for it on his radio show and support a small indie label.
And third would be a completely forgotten EP from a Boston band named “Curious Figures” – you won’t even find this on Discogs, but my college recording professor Jim Anderson was the bandleader and it’s wild to hear younger him doing his thing. The single Speaking Of Love is a jam too.
FS: So as a last question, we ask something out of the ordinary to keep things interesting.
So Camino 84, would you fight one horse-sized FIBRE, or 50 duck-sized FIBRE’s?
C84: 50 duck-sized FIBRE’s, easy. I’d put good money on myself in that fight.
FS: Well, you heard it from the man himself. We’ll be expecting some form of charity boxing match between you both, at some point in the near future.
Camino’s next album is due out on the 22nd of August, titled New Mutant Disco. For now, check out his latest tracks below and don’t forget to follow him on his social medias!