10 Quick Ones with THE TIME FRAMED – November 2017

According to the bands bio: “Greater Tampa Bay area band, The Time Framed, composed of vocalist/guitarist Jeremy Benjamin, bassist Britt K, and drummer Brandon C, explore the boundaries of post rock by blending aspects of other genres including progressive, punk, ambient, and jazz together to form their own sound. Together for two years, The Time Framed has been playing numerous shows and festivals around the state of Florida with a few successful endeavors out of state as well.”  We get the band to answer our 10 Quick Ones about new music, their influences, and more…

1. Tell us a little about your latest release.  What might a fan or listener not grab the first or second time they listen through?  Are there any hidden nuggets the band put in the material or that only diehard fans might find?

The latest release is an EP titled Chrono Dementia. It’s a nod at our cartoony steam punk inspired time travelling pirate aesthetic (that’s a mouthful isn’t it?) as well as our desire to be heard and unique. What musician doesn’t want people to put their album on repeat? That question offers a hint to the subtle things going on in this EP! Much of the ways the songs link from one to the next and even from the ending track to the opening one were a series of happy accidents and sort of epiphany moments for us as writers. There are a lot of metaphysical constructs being used in the lyrics, with one of our favorites being a line in the song Limited Infinity (track 4) “I am not the body. I am not even the mind.” That’s one of those phrases that can help you break out of a negative mental cycle if you choose to use it and interestingly enough, most of the other songs were actually inspired by nightmares our guitarist/singer experienced and wrote down. Limited Infinity reflects how he deals with having those regular nightmares and is the most ambient and dreamy so as to express a mirroring effect between the lucid and physical realities.

2. What got you into music, and can you tell us about the moment you realized you wanted to be a musician?

Britt wanted to be in a band when she was a teenager. As an adult the normal “go to college, get in debt, work till you die” career paths seemed too boring and lacked any meaning but after using music to help herself overcome feelings of trauma from surviving an abusive relationship, she feels that music is the most meaningful profession for her to pursue. Our drummer Brandon grew up with music being the way of life. His dad (owner of Dreamlabs Studios, where we recorded the EP) has always been a producer, teacher, or session musician which paved the way for Brandon to gain the talent he has now. At 7 he learned his first drum beat and hasn’t changed his mind about being a musician since. Jeremy (the guitarist/singer) got started playing guitar in middle school because his best friend was taking lessons and showing him what he learned. After getting a guitar of his own he quickly began writing his own ideas and the joy of creation inspired him to want that as his career.

3. Who would be your main five musical influences?

The Mars Volta, Joe Satriani, Tera Melos, Mike Portnoy, and Igor Stravinsky are easily the biggest influences to us as a whole. Their musical proficiency and willingness to explore new boundaries form the basis of what we identify ourselves as. Mike, Joe, and Nick (of Tera Melos) have tons of videos where they talk about their thoughts about music and the different aspects of their approach to writing new music which makes a certain level of emulation of their energy very accessible. Igor is one of the more infamous musical composers of his time for his interest going to new sonic places. His music tells an oft elaborate story and pairs amazingly well with the works of H.P. Lovecraft. As for The Mars Volta, our guitarist has a habit of forcing us to listen to them over and over again while picking out little moments of their songs/albums and expressing his enthusiasm for their creativity and attention to detail. After a while stuff like that starts to sink into your subconscious.

4. If you could call in any one collaborator to do a song with, who would it be?

We’d pick Lindsay Sterling for her ability on violin, her energy, and because every talented musician falls in love with Brandon for his drumming.

5. How would you describe your music to someone who’d never listened to you before?

We define ourselves as experimental, alternative, and theatrical rock. You can find elements of nearly every genre peeking out behind the veil but we are a rock group at heart. We like to have fun, we don’t take ourselves too seriously, and things will get trippy!

6. What’s the best thing about being a musician?

The feels! This is kind of a cop out way of saying everything about it is the best thing about it but yeah… We love the excitement of travelling, the anticipation before a set, and the celebrations afterwards. Bringing elements and ideas together to turn a song into something we can display and emotions we can express is magic. Having strangers give us hugs and tell us how good we made them feel is empowering and humbling at the same time. When people tag us on social media because they found our stickers up on a wall or caught a friend wearing our shirt it really matters to us and brings the smile to our face that we want to give to everyone else during and after our show.

7. When the band are all hanging out together, who cooks; who gets the drinks in; and who is first to crack out the acoustic guitars for a singalong?

Britt is the cook (omg the mac and cheese) unless all we have is Ramen noodles and spices, then Jeremy goes all kitchen-witch on us and it’s great! Brandon is the guy who can turn every moment into a time to jam. Jeremy is the one who gets all the drinks. Our usual hangouts tend to always involve some kind of practice set because Britt and Jeremy live an hour away from Brandon. Once practice is over we often troll through YouTube listening to stuff we liked as kids or songs we’d like to pull ideas from.

8. If you weren’t a musician, what would be your dream job?

If he wasn’t doing music, Jeremy’s dream job would be teaching or translating English in Japan. He has studied Japanese for years and most of his favorite bands are part of the Visual Kei movement there. Britt has gained a love of creative marketing and video editing. She is a co-owner of PixelFuze, a marketing company with a focus on graphics design, web design, and branding. If she weren’t a musician she’d still be doing the kinds of behind the scenes work she does for The Time Framed but only for other businesses. Brandon, if he wasn’t killing it on drums every day, would be a WWE superstar.

9. Looking back over your career, is there a single moment or situation you feel was a misstep or you would like to have a “do over”?

It really seems like all of the missteps and weird circumstances have led us to where we are so we just try to stay grateful for the odd synchronicity of it all. Even our previous recording attempts, despite being of lesser quality, have taught us valuable lessons and helped us make more connections with people in our local music scenes

10. If you could magically go back in time and be a part of the recording sessions for any one record in history, which would you choose – and what does that record mean to you?

Any one of the grunge super hit records like Superunkown by Soundgarden or Nevermind by Nirvana would be great. We’re not saying that Nevermind was Nirvana’s best, but it is the one people seem drawn to if they don’t really listen to the band and it would be great to have an album with that kind of effect even if the magic isn’t capable of being replicated.

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Category: Interviews