A Chat With: The Nude Party
During Warble Daze last month, Alec Castillo and Shaun Couture of The Nude Party took some time to quickly catch up with ANCHR about their new music and what's next for them in 2018. Although the six piece have yet to put out a full length debut and they hadn't played Chicago since January of this year, they remained one of the most anticipated and buzzy bands of the two day DIY showcase. Based on the energy they stirred up during Warble Daze with their gritty blend of garage, surf, and psych rock, their set surpassed the high expectations. Prior to their rambunctious set, we caught up with Castillo and Couture to talk everything from the process behind their upcoming full length to their best and worst Halloween moments. The two also recalled their early days of getting naked at parties and filled us in on their favorite bands at the moment...Tune in now to our chat with The Nude Party!
Photo By Devon Bristol Shaw.
ANCHR Magazine: What do you guys remember as your first musical memory, or what inspired you to first start playing?
Shaun Couture: My older brother got an acoustic guitar. I remember the first song I ever learned was this Linkin Park song.
Alec Castillo: I played drums when I was younger but I never really stuck with it. I didn’t really have anyone to teach me or anything. So I just stopped music until I met Shaun and the rest of the band members in college. We’ve known each other since high school.
ANCHR Magazine: Who initiated the band starting then after you met?
Shaun Couture [To Alec]: Probably you, cause you had a lake house.
Alec Castillo: Yeah, I had a lake house and we all went there one summer.
Shaun Couture: We tried to play music during that summer.
ANCHR Magazine: Do you have any good stories from the time at the house?
Alec Castillo: Uhh one time we sunk the canoe when we were all naked.
ANCHR Magazine: Is that where you got the name from?
Alec Castillo: I guess so. We had nude parties.
Shaun Couture: We joked around what if you have parties where you had to be nude to get into. Then we just realized it was only us at our parties that were all naked.
Alec Castillo: One time we waxed Shaun’s ass.
ANCHR Magazine: Waxed Asshole could have been a good band name...Are you working on new music then? I saw you guys were recording on your Instagram.
Alec Castillo: Yeah we just finished recording our like first full length record.
ANCHR Magazine: Right the last one was more of a long EP with 7 tracks. What can you tell me about the recording process?
Shaun Couture: We recorded it at this studio outside of Woodstock. It’s called Dreamland. It’s an old Church. It’s got like a house connected to it, so we lived there for four days while we were recording. We did a bunch of pre production stuff beforehand, but we did 14 songs in 4 days, so we were pretty busy.
Alec Castillo: Our roommate Oakley Munson produced the record and Matthew Cullen engineered it.
ANCHR Magazine: Have you been playing the new record live?
Shaun Couture: Yeah the songs we’re playing tonight are mostly off the new album. We usually play one or two off the last one. But they’re pretty much all new songs.
ANCHR Magazine: Which songs are some of your favorite?
Shaun Couture: We got one called "Chevrolet Van" that we all really like.
Alec Castillo: We’ll play most of the new ones. I like "Chevy Van" too. It’s one of my favorites.
Shaun Couture: We have a slower one called "Astro Man." It’s about a spaceman...It’s about space and shit. That one’s really fun to play.
ANCHR Magazine: You just played yesterday with The Evening Attraction in Carbondale, IL. How did that show go?
Shaun Couture: It was fun!
Alec Castillo: It brought us back, or at least reminded me of the first shows we ever played. Which were all in basements. People are getting down and dancing and having fun. You don’t see a lot of that in venues. People are just arm folded and don’t care, but at parties like that, everyone is getting down.
ANCHR Magazine: So you toured a bunch this year, playing SXSW, etc...What have been some highlights?
Shaun Couture: I think we all really like San Francisco.
Alec Castillo: I liked San Diego!
Shaun Couture: San Diego was cool. Salem, Oregon was really cool...
Alec Castillo: Yeah, Salem was very cool.
ANCHR Magazine: Yeah, I love that part of the country.
Shaun Couture: We met some long time friends there.
ANCHR Magazine: What albums have you guys been listening to? Or other bands you’re really into? I know, it’s always hard to think on the spot.
Shaun Couture: We have to look on our Spotify! Oh, I really like this band from San Francisco called Mapache . They’re like a West Coast Flying Burrito Brothers... Cosmic Americana.
Alec Castillo: We’re really into the Allah Las right now.
Shaun Couture: I think both of us have been into Drugdealer.
Alec Castillo: I think I saw Drugdealer filming a music video on the beach actually a couple weeks ago.
ANCHR Magazine: What are some good bands from your local scene?
Alec Castillo: We don’t have one where we actually live right now. There’s not a scene at all.
Shaun Couture: Acid Dad is from New York!
Alec Castillo: Yeah, the city...we live upstate now.
Shaun Couture: New York City is like our scene now. White Lighters is really cool. BOYTOY! Ghost Funk Orchestra.
ANCHR Magazine: What are your best and worst Halloween moments, either as a band or individually?
Shaun Couture: Remember that time we played--so we used to live in Boone, North Carolina. Which is like a college town in the mountains up there. There’s a venue called Black Cat and it’s a burrito place but they move all the tables and the bands just play on the ground. Those shows were basically house parties. We played there one Halloween and Connor had to piss, so he fucking jammed the top of a PBR Tallboy and pissed in it. And I drank his piss.
ANCHR Magazine: That was the worst I’m guessing?
Alec Castillo: Definitely the worst. One Halloween, Don got beat up by a fraternity.
Shaun Couture: Those are two really bad ones.
Alec Castillo: It ended up being really funny. He was dressed up as a nun.
Shaun Couture: I was Alan Jackson the last two years in a row, so I was pretty happy about that.
ANCHR Magazine: Nice, anything else you’re looking forward to in the next year, besides the new album? Do you have a timeframe for the release?
Alec Castillo: It’s not really up to us. We’re looking forward to getting it out, though. We like to make music videos. We’re starting to plan some stuff. We don’t know which song yet...
Shaun Couture: We have chickens at our house now, so I’m looking forward to eating their eggs!
The Nude Party at Warble Daze