Fuckin’ Eh!

Photo by Jane Tanner

On your stereo, Death From Above (not to be confused with New York production team DFA) sound like No Means No and Sightings, only seven times scarier. Live, however, it’s 37 times scarier. The band is a mere two guys, but the bass and keyboards of Jesse Keeler suicide-attack the drums and vocals of Sebastian Grainger so hard you’ll swear they have 10 arms each. It’s enough to make all those alcoholic art-school rockers dump their F.O.B. girlfriends and actually start coming to practice sober for once.

But if it wasn’t for boozing, Jesse and Sebastian wouldn’t have met. At a party in Halifax, a really drunk girl neither of them knew told Jesse that “her boyfriend” Sebastian was looking for a bassist to start a band with. She made it up because she was horny and insane, but it was actually true. Jesse and Sebastian got wasted together and decided Death From Above was meant to be.

We met them in Chicago and got up off the floor to ask Jesse about their first tour of America.

Vice: I couldn’t believe Sebastian said a song was about Mexicans and then stopped after a few seconds and said, “No, it isn’t. It’s about wombs.”
Jesse: In Brooklyn last night he told a story about how some old black lady bumped into me and said, “Goddamn white people” and how it was the most racist thing he ever heard. The worst was in Toronto. I was making fun of how much he was sniffling and he said, “I have a fucking cold, you asshole. Would you make fun of Africa for having AIDS!?” The whole audience was silent.

You play Denver tomorrow. That’s a 15-hour drive. Are you doing an eightball to stay awake?
I’m not into coke. I got these great pills truckers use called Yellow Swarm. They’re just pure ephedrine and caffeine.

So you’re straight-edge.
What are you talking about? [It was here I noticed Jesse had been drinking a beer throughout the interview.]

Oh.
Who are you, anyhow?

Death From Above’s Romantic Rights EP is out now on Sound Virus.