Woven is an ambient/alt rock band from Los Angeles, and Ory Hodis is their singer/guitarist. I had the pleasure of interviewing Hodis recently. The following is the interview piece I wrote, portions of which appear in the February 4th issue of The Siskiyou, in a review of their January 31st performance at The Mobius.
1/25/08
A lot can happen to a band in eleven years. For Los Angeles’ Woven, it was enough time to release a couple major label discs, tour the country, run from police, stockpile an arsenal of vintage musical gear, and convert their diesel guzzling RV into a vegetable oil powered rig.
Â
I spoke with singer and guitar player Ory Hodis about life in a five-piece alternative/electronic outfit.
Â
You have a lot of gear.
Â
We have way too much gear. My favorite piece right now is a Yamaha PSS-30. It’s just a junk sampler keyboard, but I went in and rearranged the circuitry so you can record samples and get these really crazy sounds. It’s wild. You can take Barbie Karaoke and turn this keyboard into a crazy, oscillating feedback machine.
Â
Your guitar player, Steve Abagon, seems to like effects pedals.
Â
Oh yeah. He’s completely inundated with pedals. It’s interesting watching him play, because he plays the pedals more than he plays the guitar. He used to skateboard, so he just applied that to hopping around everywhere. I’m trying to cut down on that, so I can sing more.
Â
How much do you take on the road?
Â
All of it, including two drum sets. One full set is just electronic triggers. If you listen to our music, you’ll notice there’s hybrid sound. We’ll have a drum kit and an electro kit playing a jungle beat. We do all that live; there’s absolutely no loops.
Â
That sounds like a lot of work onstage.
Â
It’s insane. We work so hard at this, and people think we’re just firing off samples. I can safely say we’re one of only bands playing electronic music that does not use loops. We wanted to see if there was a way to use electronics without being a slave to [pre-recorded] sequences. So we figured out that if we chop the drum loops up into the smallest possible pieces, we can play them on the triggers like an instrument. We can speed them up, slow them down, make **** ups, do what bands do.
Â
Tell me about your experience with major labels.
Â
Woven was signed by Interscope, and we got a really great deal. They asked us what we wanted, and we said a real recording studio. At that time, we were recording on really ghetto gear. Now we have a plush studio. Even though we were dropped by Interscope two years ago, we got to keep the studio.
Â
What happened?
Â
It just wasn’t working out. We didn’t want to be on Interscope anymore. We were promised they’d promote us, but they didn’t do a video or pay for our tour. It happens a lot. Most of my friends that were signed to major labels ended up leaving. The labels invest a lot of money in the band, but they forget to nurture the record. Luckily, we got two songs on CSI (Crime Scene Investigation, CBS), and that’s how we funded the tour.  It’s the oddest thing, why someone would invest in band but not promote it. But if you look around the industry, you see these A&R guys running around like chickens without heads, and you realize how mistakes like that can happen.
Â
So big record deals can actually hold an artist back?
Â
A lot of the bands that were signed at the same time as Woven aren’t even around anymore. They thought once they got a record deal, they’d arrived somewhere. It’s actually the beginning of the true test. When they get no love, the band sinks; their egos are crushed. It’s painful. A lot of bands just break up after they get dropped. For Woven, it was always about the music, never the money. That’s why we’re still together.
Â
What inspired the band to convert your touring RV into a bio-diesel rig?
Â
The two things I’m really opposed to are the meat and oil industries. It’s a lot of energy in, and pollution out. When we drive from LA to New York, that’s a lot of gasoline. Plus, we’re all broke. So it’s a win-win situation. We also started talking to local farmers, because we really wanted to put out the word about alternative things to eat. Big corporations are making it too easy to use their services; people are forgetting about smaller farms and businesses. We need diversity in the world. I don’t want everything to be a plaza.
Â
Any crazy tour stories you care to share?
Â
There’s a lot of things I can’t reveal. One of the best was when Steve got really drunk and decided to hop over a bar to take some wine. He did it in front of a camera. All of sudden the cops show up, so he locked himself inside his hotel room. There were all these cops swarming this hotel. We ended up sneaking out a window and climbing down. We all booked. They charged our credit card $2,000, so we were actually the losers. It was still fun running from the cops. That’s the tame version of that story, anyway.
Â
You can check out Woven at wovenmusic.com.
