INTERVIEW
THE RATCHETS
by Christer Davidsson, June 2006
Photos by: Terry Woelfer, Autumn Spadaro."Heart of Town" by: Robert Ryan.

Hi! How are you guys doing?

Jed: We’re doing good Christer. Summers hitting hard over here so we’re hunkering down and getting ready to sweat a bit.
Zak: I’m kinda hungry actually. Do you have anything to eat?

The Ratchets is a pretty new band to me. How would you describe your music to the ones reading this?

Jed: This is always the hard question, getting a musician to describe his music. We’re punk rockers who play rocknroll music- with a sprig of reggae, rockabilly and folk. We get compared to the Clash a lot, cause our lyrics tell stories and illustrate points- some people would call that political, but I think it’s more of a humanistic viewpoint. To describe our music…think of the silence between your two favourite songs. We’re a modern band that fits nicely into that silence.

For how long have you been together?

Jed: We recorded our first demo EP for Chunksaah in October 2003 and started playing shows that following February 2004.

You have been in other bands before the days of The Ratchets, right?

Zak: I was in Worthless United, Erik was in River City Rebels, and Danny was in Plan A Project.  For many years there was a real brotherhood between those three bands.  Jed, however, just kind of appeared out of nowhere.  He’s an enigma but was not in Enigma.  

How did you come up with the name of the band?

Jed: We lifted the word from a lyric in Johnny Too Bad by The Slickers. It’s slang for switch-blade knife, and the meaning is so subversive that we felt it really defined what we were about as a band. The idea that you can relay a message to listeners of your music that’s a separate layer from the melody or arrangement.

Does all of you take part in writing the songs?

Jed: Zak and I write the songs for The Ratchets. Usually we just come to table with a new tune and the band gets together to make it a Ratchet song.

What would you say that you write about in general?

Jed: I write about the world, both my place in the world and more importantly from others viewpoints as well. The latter is really important to me, trying to understand where others are coming from… and also trying to envision a world that’s a bit better than the one we’re living in. I think you can deal with these larger ideas with music because it’s such an uplifting medium. I try to couple this with talking about what is true. It’s ends up being very serious stuff but the music brings the fun back I think.

You have released two EP’s so far. Can you tell me a little bit about them?

Zak: The first one we recorded in one day after our third or fourth practice in Dan’s apartment and it sounded really good so we decided to release it.  The second one we went into a real studio for a couple days, recorded all the songs we wrote that sounded most like the Clash, and then complained for the next year how every review says we sound like the Clash.

Chunksaah, Pirates Press and Hellbent Records. Those are all cool labels. How did you get in touch with them?

Zak: Chunksaah released some of the Worthless stuff years ago and then I started working for them.  The Pirates Press guys I met because they actually press the vinyl for Chunksaah Records.  I was hanging out with them at Punk Rock Bowling in Vegas a couple years back and gave them our new CD and they really liked it and started asking us to do stuff with them.  Hellbent is not really a cool label to be on so we’ve taken our record back and will be re-releasing it somewhere else with extra tracks.

How would you feel if a major label approached you?

Jed: I would much rather have a strong indie approach us, where we could have a shelf-life and the luxury to make music for awhile together.
Zak: Did someone say major label?  Did I mention I was hungry?   

Any plans on recording an album?

Jed: Well we just recorded our debut full-length this past March at Atomic Recording Studios in Brooklyn, NY. It’s called "Glory Bound".

What can we expect from it and what label will release it?

Jed: It’s gonna be out this fall (2006) on Pirates Press Records.

Have you been touring a lot?

Zak: Touring is really just a state of mind, man. So we’re on tour all the time.

What’s the best thing about playing live?

Jed: It’s hard to narrow something like playing live down to one thing! At best playing live is the culmination of all the work you and your band has done, and when you’re lucky you’ve got an audience ready to listen- that makes it the proclamation time. 

If you could be the support act to any band you wanted, what band would it be?

Jed: It would be great to be on the same bill as The Ramones or The Replacements.

How come?

Jed: I think we would measure up quite nicely!
Zak: Cause all our bands start with “The” and are followed with “R”.

Besides from playing music what are you guys up to?

Jed: We work. A lot of what we do lifestyle wise is a product of us playing music. So there haven’t been to many vacations in the Bahamas the past couple of years. 
Zak:  The funny thing is I think there have been a couple tropical island vacations in this band.  I’m sure it’s real nice.

How is the scene in your area. Any upcoming bands you would like to tell me about?

Jed: New York’s been having quite a lull for whatever reason. It’s really hard for people to accept new bands and it takes a lot of time. We’re about halfway there and hoping this new album helps move us along. They’ve been around for a while but World/Inferno Friendship Society is an amazing band- I can’t even begin to describe them but you should check them out if you haven’t already.
Zak: I hear Bon Jovi is working on a new record, which should be pretty sweet.  I also really like The Measure (SA) and The Ergs.
 
What do you think of punk rock in general these days? Is it getting better or worse?

Jed: Punk Rock is definitely getting worse. Thank-god we’re not a punk band right Zak?
Zak: No comment. 

A lot of shows and stuff coming up this summer?

Jed: We’re gonna be playing mostly the East Coast this summer and will be doing some fall touring once the album gets released.

Anything you’d like to add before we say goodbye?
Jed: Just to keep an eye out for us, hopefully we’ll be getting to play around your parts sooner than later.

Ok, thanks you guys a lot and good luck! Nice talking to you!
Jed: Yep, thanks for taking the time to talk with us!


Links:

http://www.theratchets.com

http://www.myspace.com/theratchets