Interview with Cable-Knit at Silk City
Cover photo and photo above taken by Manny (@burnout_050)
This interview took place on October 18th, 2024
We’re outside of Silk City Diner in Philadelphia, I’m Natalie, and I’m here with Cable-Knit. If everyone wants to introduce themselves.
[Justin] What’s up, I’m Justin.
[Chris] Yo, I’m Chris.
[Collin] Collin.
[Adrian] I’m Adrian.
[Justin] And shoutout to Kyra, who is not here right now. She’s in the band as well.
Okay! So, first of all, I want to say you guys had a great show. This is my first time seeing you guys, and I really enjoyed your set. I know you guys are a relatively new band, so I kind of just wanted to ask about the name, Cable-Knit, and what that means/how you guys decided on it.
[Justin] Yeah! Well, generally in the fall, autumnal, winter weathers, I enjoy wearing sweaters. I think they look nice. They feel comfy, feel cozy, and I like to feel comfortable…yeah. Yeah, so I like cable-knit sweaters, they’re just nice to – I like the pattern – they’re just nice to wear.
Okay, nice! I know you guys are all part of various other projects and bands, so what kind of brought you guys together and made you make the decision to start this band with each other?
[Justin] Yeah, well it started with Adrian and I. We’re like childhood friends. We grew up together, and we grew up playing in church a lot. That’s kind of where my musical journey started, and then as we got older, we started venturing off into the like actual music and bands and everything. We got our own music tastes, and then at some point, we were just like, “Why aren’t we in a band together?” So, we decided to make one, and then along came Kyra, who I’ve known since high school. She has her own project, shoutout to Hotel Shmotel. And Chris, who I met through the music scene through my other band Away Game - shoutout. He’s in The Customers – shoutout to them as well. I just saw a bunch of talent that’s in this band, and I’m very lucky. Oh yeah, and shoutout to Collin as well. He’s in Hotel Shmotel too, he’s filling in for Kyra tonight. He killed it.
[Collin] Happy to be here.
[Justin] Thanks for playing with us man.
You were talking about your love for sweaters and warmth, I know you have on your Instagram that you’re a comfy-indie and cozy-rock band. So, what does that exactly mean? What is that sound to you? What does that genre mean to you?
[Justin] I mean at first, I kind of wrote it as a joke. I think I generally wrote it because I don’t really know what our genre is necessarily, but I think it’s something easy to the ears. Something ear wormy. Something warm. You know what I mean? Like a sweater. Something that, hopefully, everybody can listen to. Yeah, that’s kind of what I strive for when I write music and everything.
What does a typical rehearsal look like for the band and what does everyone bring to that rehearsal? Whether that be mentally or physically.
[Justin] Well, I think the songwriting process starts with me first with the chords and lyrics. Then I kind of go individually to the other members, mainly Chris and Kyra first, and kind of more so have a finished song, and then we rehearse together kind of all knowing our parts and everything. With Adrian, he kind of writes his own parts. What do you have to say?
[Adrian] I mean, I like asking JJ what he wants and then kind of just working off that. Yeah, but then I just write the drums and sometimes later in the song, I’ll suggest some unison band moments where we could do some stops or cool starts. Something like that.
[Justin] How about you Chris? What do you bring to rehearsal?
[Chris] I do whatever you want me to do.
[Justin] Chris is like that. I kind of just ask him and he puts his own, you know, pizzazz on it. We have Collin here who learned a bunch of the parts. What do you have to say? What is a Cable-Knit rehearsal like from an outsider?
[Collin] Cable-Knit gets shit done. These guys are super efficient. I’ve practiced in a few bands now, and you know I learned these songs in a couple weeks, and coming in, everybody knew their stuff. We had really tight practices, so you can tell everyone gets along and is really good friends so definitely a great group of guys - and Kyra obviously when she’s here. Really just a tight, efficient group, and everyone is super talented.
[Justin] You killed it dawg. You killed it. That was such a short span of time that you had to learn these parts and you killed it.
I know you discussed how you guys played in church together, do you guys think – all of you – the way you were brought up in music and how you started in music still affects the way you write and play music today?
[Justin] I would say it definitely helped out my musicianship. It taught me how to play with other people for sure. Song structure and everything. I grew up playing in church and everything and that’s kind of how I started to learn music. What about you Adrian?
[Adrian] I think as I was growing up playing in churches, I learned a lot about how to balance out sound and play as a group instead of just individuals playing together. I think that’s what I learned and what it taught me.
I know you guys don’t have any official music out on any platforms yet. Are there any plans on recording music that you could share with us?
[Justin] Yeah for sure. I mean we would love to record music. That’s probably a main goal of ours. As of right now, we’re just all kind of busy. We all have like full-time jobs and everything so it’s kind of hard to schedule out. But yeah, I would love to record and have people listen to our stuff and have myself listen to my own things. That’d be cool. Yeah, that’s one of the main goals as of right now, I would say for sure.
Last question, with recording, do you guys think you’d be working towards just putting out singles or shooting for an EP or an entire album?
[Justin] Yeah, as of right now I think we can stick with the singles. It’d be nice for people to get to know who we are first and what our sound is. I would love to write an album with these guys though. I think that would be a really cool, creative venture and everything. I think that’s another goal maybe a little later down the line, but it would be nice for people to maybe know who we are first and get used to our sound and what we’re about. So, maybe singles is the wave for now.
Well, that’s everything I had. Thank you guys so much for meeting with me and letting me interview you. You guys had a great set tonight. Thank you very much.
[Justin] Thank you for having us. We appreciate it.
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