A $itdown with $quib

There’s no perfect moment to introduce $quib, because the second I think I’ve pinned down an influence or comparison, the next synth line, vocal, or rhythmic pattern I listen to blows up whatever paper trail I thought I had. Hailing from New Jersey, educated at Oberlin, and now based in New York, the "two" artists that make up the group are Brock Bierly, who Lionel talked to, and Krotida Satyra, who is an imaginary cyclops, like actually. Together they're making some genuinely kickass post-folk electronic hybrid music, and it's inadvertently making fools of the freshman-XL-electronic-duo class that's been putting 20-year-olds' music taste in a chokehold this past year.

$quib’s latest Album Erring is meant to destroy your paper trails, bringing you on a melodic and lyrical roller coaster that sounds like Nick Drake grew up on Ableton. For the past year or so, Gen Z humor/style/culture feels so wrapped in irony that it is now impossible to tell what is funny/stylish/unique, and although it is nice to get away from demarcating our identities, it is also a little disorienting; And at least for me, $quib enacts the suffocating nature of this irony through their beautifully subdued melodies, partially unshackled by Brock’s delivery and how each song seems to be a wholesome inside joke, on some level.

Anyways, after Lionel went to see $quib at one of Brock’s many shows around NYC this summer, we sat down with them, and Lionel picked their brain about their iPad songwriting process, googling, and all the meanings and red herrings behind their richly off-kilter tracks. I also made Lionel ask about all the physics references in their music.

They’re on tour in Europe this October, and you should absolutely see them if you're abroad. In the meantime, enjoy this conversation we had with Brock :)

SOUNDBORED (Lionel): How's it been different between the band and playing alone? Because I'm guessing you used to play $quib shows alone most of the time.

$quib (Brock): Yeah. Well, I appreciate that the songs are solid, written songs at their core, so they can be arranged however. And I do love rock bands, the way that Deerhoof, US Maple, or these bands where I feel like each person is a different component. I just saw Aldous Harding live, and it was really exciting. I just love bands, so that's been really good.

You've been posting up everywhere this summer. I'm guessing it's just because of your album — Erring or Air-ing? I know everything ends in "er," but how do you pronounce that album?

I guess the album's called Erring because it's like the word erring, like erring on the side of caution or whatever. But that is the joke of it.

Can you tell me a little bit about your experiences with all the shows? You've been everywhere this summer.

It’s mainly because the album dropped, so people got interested and asked me to play. Anytime someone asks me, I almost always say yes, unless the place is really fried. And even then, I do it. So I just ended up everywhere. I have a manager now who's my good friend, and he's like, "You should slow down..." It was around the Nightclub 101 show where he was like, "I'm gonna radius clause you here so you can really lock in on this show." And it helped. So, know your limits.

And you've been enjoying them?

Yes, it's one of my favorite things to do ever.

Is it about connecting with the crowd? Especially at these DIY venues, I bet it's super intimate, I guess that might throw you off a little.

I haven't figured it out yet. I get nervous and weird beforehand. And then I guess the whole show is me being nervous and weird. And then people are like, "I love your energy." I think what I get excited about most is that it is a different setting every time. Even if it's the same order of songs and I'm just singing on instrumentals, it's about how I can make it respond to where I am.

When your laptop broke before the New Music Seminar show, I remember you going on stage and being like, "I have no backing track now, nothing." I loved just hearing either guitar or keyboard, I thought it was amazing.

It was very recently that my laptop broke. I was thinking of either playing stuff off my phone or doing instrument stuff, but I brought all the instruments, and I was like, "Fuck it, I'll just do this." It kind of sounds like I'm like, "No backing track, no autotune bullshit!", but I mean, there was autotune, Anyway.

I thought it was on purpose at the beginning because it was so unique. It's funny, everyone was kind of walking about for a lot of the other sets versus yours. 

Yes. The audience jail. 

We don't get that enough anymore, you know? You really have to sit down.

I agree. How can we combat people's nicotine addiction?

Force them to look at you for a 12-minute Pete Seeger cover.

Oh yeah!

What was the story behind that one, “Warning (If I had a hammer) 2?”

My friend in college showed me the Sam Cooke cover of the Hammer Song, and he fucks up the lyric. He says like, "If I had a song—I mean a bell, I'd tinkle in the morning if I had a bell, you understand." And then everyone laughs. But it just really stuck with me. I had this thing where I sang on a Celer song, and there were a couple of songs where I just sang my own melodies on them. And then I sampled the "If I Had a Hammer," and that kind of became what “Warning” is. 

With those shows, you're playing with so many other small bands and projects. Have you had any interesting nights with them, or is it usually business as usual?

 It's always good. I especially love when a bill has really different energies in every act. I think it helps, because you can kind of get fatigued at a show.

Any specific projects from those bills that you especially like?

I mean, firstly, the George Rogers Quartet. I know George Rogers from college. He's just the most cracked saxophonist, composer, crazy guy. Docking is the band that the drummer in the $quib band is in, and it's really cool, broken, dry rock and roll. And then Fangboner is some college friends, they're so awesome. I might remix one of their songs. I'm good buddies with poc, he's just incredible. Yeah, I kind of stand behind everyone that I'm on a bill with.

That's lovely. Are a lot of the bills Oberlin-based? I know you were in Oberlin.

Yeah. More and more so because they're all moving to New York, all the juniors and sophomores.

It's such a crazy gang of those liberal arts colleges. I go to Wesleyan, and it's like everyone is down there. There's a pretty crazy indietronica revolution throughout it. Do you connect yourself with that “indietronica” label?

Sure. I think it's a good descriptor. It may be a little bogged down by some kind of historical implication. That makes it sound like they, like, [laughs] killed people or something, but I mean, it's like 2000s pastiche. I think it can get put into this box of being 2000s pastiche, which is okay, people are really good at doing it. But I'd like to think there's something else in my music. I don't know. Something warm?

It’s funny you say warm, I remember you saying the music was "dry and sardonic" at your show. I'm curious what you meant by that.

Well, I think if you have a really systematic understanding of the vocabulary you use to communicate emotions, or to resonate with yourself when you're writing something, of course you're going to think it's maybe a little less genuine or less heartened than when somebody else does it and you're like, "Whoa, life's so beautiful, your music's so emotional." And then they probably say the same thing about you, and you're like, "This old thing?" I'm very familiar with all the songs, so in my head they're like, "Ugh, I said that line, I said this line, I know what this means."

Do you feel like it's calculated when you're writing it, or do you think it's more the repetition of playing it and revising it that makes it that way?

I would say the former. Ideally, songs are calculated. It's nice for things to be “raw”, but I feel like that comes into the performance of it. I think the structure of something should have thought put into it. I've learned through teaching my songs to my bandmates that every bar length is different, and I don't know why I did that. I think when you're used to having a computer, you get greedy and you just do shit like that.

I mean, the tools we have now are so insane. With Erring, you can tell that it took three years to make, you know? 

I've been thinking about this thing that maybe happens in some music—I call it, and I'm not the first person to say this—"emotion slop." Where a song feels really cathartic or emotional to some end, but it doesn't feel earned. Like there's no narrative for how we ended up in this place. I'm trying to avoid that. It should be earned somehow.

Sounds like you earned it. You have some songs that are so electronic and some that are so stripped back.

Bag of tricks.

Is there a separate process for writing those?

It depends. I would say every song shapes up in a different order. It's very much playing between producing, then songwriting, then producing, then songwriting. But I've been getting more into writing on instruments, like "GeoGuesser" was very much done on a piano. 

And it's usually transferred from instruments to the computer?

“Ephus roundshot & floater” started on the iPad. I took a bunch of samples of "Slide" by Frank Ocean and Calvin Harris and put it on Koala, and there's an 808 sound. But I guess that's an instrument, you know? Each concept starts from playing with a toy, and then you get an idea.

Is there anything else you do on the iPad? I've lowkey never seen someone do stuff on an iPad before.

"Not the Thinker" is basically entirely done on the iPad, "3boder" was almost entirely done on the iPad, both on GarageBand. “Ephus” started on Koala, went onto GarageBand, and then went onto Logic because mixing was killing me. That's all on Erring. But yeah, I love the iPad.

For "3boder," I know that's about the three-body problem, and I saw in another interview that you named your project $quib because of an electrical diagram. Drew is a physics major, and he was really curious about your relationship with physics. 

Well, I was naming stuff like calculus things when I was in calculus class, and [laughs] I did take AP Physics. I think any kind of codifying of natural phenomena—maybe it sounds like I'm using a bunch of five-dollar words—but trying to systematise something is very interesting because it is almost kind of surreal and funny usually. Like the terminology for physics cracks me up with "work" and "power" and these big words that have very specific meanings. But I think a lot of $quib hinges on the fact that I actually don't know shit. I'm very much a pseudo-math, kind of just playing around with the words and things. I took a thing on that in college, but I kind of lost the sauce.

I guess when I say it's about the three-body problem, it's a little disingenuous, because it is about the unpredictability of adding a third body. That's about the pendulum, or the way orbits work. It's about being friends with two other people, and it's a three-person friend group. And it's strange that that exists, you know what I mean?

Is a lot of what you write about relationships? Because it's a lot about your own life, but at the same time there are almost personalities that you talk about, you know?

[In a cute alternate personality voice] "Hey, I'm Pippi". No, yes, it is all about relationships because it's about communication and how that changes something, like knowing that you're communicating. And so that can be a relationship with myself, that can be a relationship with a lover, with friends, or with enemies, or objects.

Has making your music evolved based on your environment? Because the hop from Oberlin to New York City was probably huge.

My first show, ironically, was in Ridgewood. It kind of predicted where I would end up.  And so it almost felt like, internet-wise, I was already in the New York scene in a weird way. But in New Jersey there is no scene, that's where I'm from.

I'm from Westchester, so I have that trip to get down, too.

Get down. [motions sensually]

It is funny how geographical the internet can get. It's supposed to be so wide-spanning.

Oh yeah, well it's because it spills into real life. But that means real life spills into the internet. It is real life being documented a lot of the time, aside from porn bots and all the lies on the internet.

Are you a big Googler?

Yes.

I wanted to ask about the music you’re listening to now, and if it’s at all affecting your writing.

Well, I haven't been writing. I'm actually quite a slow worker. I mean, it makes sense the album took three years to make, because Schrodinger is a single from 2023. But what am I listening to? I was getting really into this album called Cafe Life by Vanessa Amara, which is this duo. It's organ chops and samples of pop songs, and it's like plunderphonics, but it's really well executed. I feel like stuff like that can be a little too fried or unstructured sometimes, so it's really exciting. What else have I been listening to? I was getting back into US Maple. I never shut the fuck up about them, but they're incredible. Oh and, I re-listened to Testing by A$AP Rocky recently for some reason.

Drew and I were listening to Micros a little and then I was listening to Erring, and I feel like you become a lot more vocal, literally singing more. Did anything specific change?

What changed from Micros to Erring? I think I just got better at songwriting, and I got worse at producing.

Why do you say worse at producing?

I'm just lazier. And I mean, luckily, when songs are stronger, it doesn't matter, and people are like, "So raw and minimal," but it's a lot less layered now, except, you know, Warning has its things going on.

Definitely.

I basically listened to "Baby" by Dijon and I was like, "Fuck, I have to lock in."

I wouldn't say it's less layered, though, because perhaps the layers come from the songwriting?

That's what I'm hoping for. I think especially with how finicky the songs get, it would suck if there were air raid sirens over it, and you're like, "Yes, sound collage."

Anything else that you would like to say...?

Do I have anything? I'm going on tour in Europe. Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, London, Berlin, I think. Is it mad blurry out there in Europe? [Points to Lionel’s blurred background]

Yes, bro. This is what it all looks like.

It's a humid day. Well, it's because it's all these film majors putting butter on their lenses.

Exactly. 

Good conversation. 

Yeah, I really appreciate it.

$quib is on tour, go see them while you can!!! Check out the instagram for dates.