CREEPOID
Creepoid | Credit: Noel Conrad
When a gloomy-sounding noise band decides to call itself Creepoid and then names two of its first three albums after graveyards, it’s natural to wonder what’s going on in that collective psyche.
But don’t freak out: Death has thematic and decorative uses for these melancholy punks, but is not an object of morbid fascination. Heirs to a wall- and well-of-sound tradition that spans Sonic Youth, Guided by Voices, Red House Painters and Low, Creepoid is more consumed with the challenges of living and rocking out.
In an interview, drummer Patrick Troxell described the band’s recordings as autobiography, beginning with the bandmates’ childhoods in a leafy Philadelphia suburb, Willow Grove, Pennsylvania, that also contains an old equine burial ground known locally as “Horseheaven.” Troxell called Horse Heaven, the band’s 2011 debut, “personal and secretive,” in the manner of children holding their experiences close and sharing them only selectively, like a private language, with each other.
The 2014 follow-up, Creepoid, was about the developmental next step — “our teen-age existence as a band,” he said, adding, “All the lyrics on that album are questions.”
For 2015’s Cemetery Highrise Slum, Troxell, bassist and vocalist Anna Troxell (they are married), singer and guitarist Sean Miller, and guitarist Nick Kulp (since replaced) looked at their present circumstances. “We’re adults. We’re in our 30s,” said Troxell. “It’s money and it’s class and it’s all these things that teen-age kids and young adults don’t think about.”
They recorded the album in Savannah, Georgia — an historic small city famed for its crumbling graveyards. Besides providing atmosphere and inspiration, Savannah was the jumping off point for a year of heavy touring and refinement as a band before a return to home base in Philadelphia.
“We played 200 shows last year. We drove almost 90,000 miles and went overseas for the first time ever,” said Troxell. “We became real musicians.”
Creepoid with Holly Hunt, Shroud Eater and Haochi, 9pm Wednesday, March 9, at Churchill’s Pub, 5501 NE Second Ave., Miami. Admission is $5. 18 and over. (305) 757-1807, churchillspub.com.
~ Sean Piccoli
