Clementine
Preface
Hey there!
Just popping in before this conversation to let you know this interview was published in Scrapped Magazine’s latest issue for May 2022. If you don’t know about Scrapped, it’s a FoCo based magazine I’m a part of in collaboration with local non-profit Blast N’ Scrap, who plan shows, volunteer work, and more. I highly encourage you to check out Scrapped on Instagram (@scrappedmagazine) and at scrappedmagazine.org. This one published here is longer, and entails more questions that were not originally posted in the Scrapped publishing (due to page limits). Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy this interview (I know I did).
With the release of their highly catchy single “Perfume” on Valentine’s Day, ensnaring youthful energy and enthusiasm, along with a pop-punk and indie rock sound; Fort Collins young guns Clementine are ready to show you what they’re made of. What they’re made of consists of a group of high school seniors, influenced by the likes of Green Day and Foo Fighters, but pouring in ounces of pop-rock catchiness in their songs.
Composed of members Sam Claiborne, Larin Graff, Caleb Crowe, Kieran Wisell, and Elizabeth Radman, Clementine has just recently popped into my radar. Through some mutual friends Sam and I both share, I learned about their song “Perfume” while in a PlayStation party with said mutual friends (shoutout to you Jose, Liam and Kadence). As soon as it was released, I gave it a listen, and was instantly hooked. Getting the Blast N’ Scrap Seal of Approval back in November with their performance at Wolverine’s alongside Call Your Mom, and a backyard show of their own, Clementine has a lot to prove, and they’re eager to do so.
I met Sam and the rest of Clementine early on a Saturday. I get out of my car to be greeted by a smiling, and excited Sam. We talk about our mutual friends we share, and we go inside the house. The house is Kieran’s, and I’m greeted by the rest of the band as we get into the practice space. A small basement with a drum set in the corner, a ladder holding up a whiteboard with the phrase “Setlist AF” on it (as well as upcoming show dates), a shelf full of assembled and dusty LEGO sets, a couch, and a TV. The rest of the group is sprawled out on the couch, floor, and the TV stand. We all introduce each other as I get situated, and we begin to talk.
To start, where were you all born, and what sorts of creative things did you do as kids?
Larin: I was born in California. When I was two I moved to San Francisco. And then when I was four, I moved to Colorado. And then I've been here my whole life… I was a weird kid. I would like to climb stuff, a lot of the time. I won the school lottery one time, in elementary school and got this little waterproof camera… And then I got an iPad, when I was 13. And then I found GarageBand on there. So I started making weird ass songs on that for a while. And that was basically all that I did as a kid. Just make movies. Make weird songs.
Caleb: I'm kind of like Larin except for being born in California, I was born in Nebraska. And then I moved here when I was two, and have been here since then. Creatively as a kid, I feel like I didn't do that much... I didn't get into any music stuff until right before middle school started.
Sam: I was born and raised here in Fort Collins. I guess for creative things I used in elementary school I used to be really into superheroes. And I was creating really in-depth superhero characters and wrote full comic books about characters I created and stuff like that. Make like costume designs, all that. And then I started taking piano lessons in second grade, and then cello lessons in middle school. I never really gravitated that much towards music. But then I realized that guitar was the sort of instrument I liked. So I taught myself guitar. Basically starting late eighth grade, freshman year. And then that's what I did. After that, I started recording music on GarageBand on my MacBook all the time.
Kieran: I was born and grew up half my life in Vermont. Over in Vermont, there's not really a whole lot out there. So I spent a lot of my time in the woods. My parents would just kick me out of the house and tell me to come back like when the streetlights came on. So I would go out, I'd ride my bike everywhere because mountain biking was really nice in Vermont. Moved to Colorado when I was nine… I started doing music in seventh grade when my dad made me take guitar lessons and I wasn't really into it. And then I started listening to a lot more music music other than just shitty pop on the radio, like Foo Fighters and Metallica. Those are like my two big influences that got me started playing guitar. And here we are now.
Elizabeth: Alright, so I was also born in Fort Collins… So then, most of my time, I spent inside, just in my bedroom. Telling stories to myself, and listening to audiobooks and playing with Legos. So I've always been more of… Okay, I'm shit at telling stories, but I really like that sort of media and the creative writing aspect. Then in middle school, I got super into music, because I was like: “I'm not like other girls. I like Foo Fighters and Green Day.” And I always really wanted to be able to play an instrument, but my hands are not built to play guitar. Anytime I tried. I was like: “Oh, this hurts too much.” Then I found that there's, oh, there's bass. And so then I started, over quarantine, kind of at the beginning of that, I finally picked it up and taught myself. Then practice like, all the time, through all the online lectures and stuff. There would be super boring lectures. So then I would just unplug my headphones, have my computer in the corner, have that play, and then mostly tune it out. Well, just like practicing. And that's kind of still where I'm at. I'm not really good at writing music. I'm more based on whatever these guys do if I'm writing my own parts. I like figuring out songs by ear mostly.
Well a few of you have already answered the next question, but when did you gravitate toward music? What brought you to it?
C: Me personally, it was right before sixth grade. Like I said, my cousin Jackson- at the time- was in a band called Slowcaves. My sister was getting voice lessons from my Aunt Sherry. I was like: “Man, I want to do something musical.” Part of it was a genuine desire to do something musical, and then the other part was I was just jealous of my sister. So one day I was like: “Hey, Mom, you think Jackson could give me drum lessons?” And she goes, “Why?” I said: “I don't know, I just want to play an instrument.” For some reason, drums are just what I landed on. So he gave me three lessons. I remember getting like my first pair of sticks from Music-Go-Round. Then he started to show me the basics of quarter notes, eighth notes, laying down a basic floor on the floor beat. The first song I learned how to play was “Say It Ain’t So'' by Weezer, which is hilarious to me…. As sixth grade started, I joined band… So all three years in middle school, I joined Jazz Band and that helped me grow. I stopped getting lessons pretty quickly after I started getting them. So that helped me quite a bit. Going into high school was nice, because I met way more musicians that were way better than I was. It honestly pushed me to grow even more. And then, I got my own drum kit from my music teacher in seventh grade. My cousin Jackson gave me the rest of the other stuff, like all these cymbals I have over here. It's been pretty fun.
L: I feel like the time I kind of gravitated towards singing was, I really liked the Shakira in the movie Zootopia. That fucking gazelle. I don’t even remember what the song was.
We all laugh for a moment.
L: I watched that movie 13 times. I was also into Oasis. Then there was like, some choir class at my new middle school. A lot of my friends were going into that. So I was like, “Screw it. I'll try singing and being a part of that”. And that was kind of how I gravitated towards singing and then I don't know, I just joined a band.
S: I guess for me, it's basically what I said already, but I had piano lessons. And I wasn't super big on them. It's alright, but it just felt like another thing to do. I didn't really practice much. And then I had cello lessons. What was different for those was my cello teacher. But instead of being like, play all these boring scales, and all these songs, you don't know. She was like, “What songs do you want to play?” And then I was like, “Oh, I don't know, what about…” and then I realized I listed a ton of songs, and they were all on guitar. At that point, I could play piano pretty well. Cello pretty well. So then I could, you know, read sheet music, know rhythm, tempo, just everything about just general music. So I picked up a guitar.
I remember me and Kieran started jamming here and played a little bit too. Then we sort of started playing off each other. I still wasn't super into it. But what got me was that me and Kieran made this band called Fatal Death. And it was pretty cool at first, but then I got a bass one time, but I didn't know how to tune it. So one of the strings is a half step out of tune, and Kieran was playing with the guitar. So when he's two notes off pitch, it doesn't sound good at all. And so then we posted it on Instagram. And we didn't even realize how bad it sounded. Then this kid was like, “You guys suck!” It wasn't just that which propelled me to do it, because I'd already been practicing all the time. But after that, if I didn’t play guitar for over an hour a day, I'd think I didn't play enough guitar. Then I'd saved up all my money. I bought a ton of guitars. Well, like two guitars, I guess. Then same with Elizabeth, during online school. Whenever I do have free time, I just play. That's mainly how I got into music.
E: As a kid, I also was forced to take piano lessons. My mom did piano, I think. She was like, “I really hated it, but now I can play piano and read sheet music.” And so then I had to for two years at the end of elementary school. Going into middle school, I really wanted to be a percussionist because my dad plays drums… I almost didn't do percussion, I almost joined the choir because you had to audition for it, right? And I got in and Kieran didn't.
He chuckles, and adds to it.
K: That started our beef, which has since been resolved.
E: I didn't know there was beef, Kieran just hated me, and all of the other percussionists. He was just bitter. Percussion is my main- at least in terms of playing music- that was like my main entrance. We met in freshman year. Band was super important to me in middle school, actually. But that's more classical or concert music. As I mentioned before, in middle school, I got more into music that wasn't just on the radio, starting with Foo Fighters and Green Day. I had an embarrassing Twenty One Pilots phase in seventh grade.. then I said, “I'm gonna listen exclusively to rock music.” I really liked My Chemical Romance. Still do. That was actually the first introduction I had to music where I could hear the bass and recognize bass. Going into high school, I kept doing band and drumline stuff, which really helped me with rhythm actually. Because for drumline, it's like obviously just a bunch of… introduction to super syncopated music, which just helped to expand my palate. I started playing bass and went to a Clementine backyard show. Kieran was like, “Hey, you know, we need an actual bassist if anyone in the crowd can play as long as you can play Hot Cross Buns.” I went up after the show, and said, “I can't play Hot Cross Buns, but I can play Misfits and My Chemical Romance covers.” Kieran was like, “Yeah, sure.” So then I had a meeting with him a month later in his basement, right over there.
They point to a spot next to the drum set in the corner of the room.
And he was like, “So what can you play?”
They makes a grimace face and inhales through their teeth. Then smiles.
Not really. But that's basically what happened. He taught me all the songs that you had stuff in. Now here I am.
K: My dad always exposed me to a lot of good music. Modest Mouse, Iron Maiden and Van Halen were the main bands I grew up listening to. My parents didn't really push me to do anything musical, I think mainly because my dad grew up in England. And at Catholic school, they made him take piano, and he got his ass beat if you play the wrong note. I think he didn't want that to happen to me. Then when I came into middle school, I had to like either band or art. I can do band, and I auditioned to do percussion. Elizabeth beat me into that. There are only 20 people who get let in the percussion.
E: It was nine.
K: It was nine! Yeah. And I was number 12 on the list or something. So I was pissed. I started playing trumpet. It was not a great fit for me. I'm not good at being fancy and classical. You put a bad boy, like myself, into this whole organized music section.
Then the year after that it was seventh grade, and that Christmas, my dad's like, “Kieran, I'm gonna get you a guitar for Christmas. I think you'd love to play guitar.” And he was super into the idea of me doing that. I started taking lessons. I wasn't really into it at first. So I kind of stopped for a few months. And then as I said before, I started listening to Foo Fighters, Metallica, Weezer. I'm like, “Oh, I want to learn how to do that!” From seventh grade until freshman year, I wanted to learn how to do all this thrash metal type stuff. And of course, Sam and I had our Fatal Death thing that was a lot of fun. I didn't have an amp until fall of freshman year. So I was just playing on my little rinky dinky guitar. As you know, that's like super fast palm mute picking. “I'm gonna write the sick metal song about this guy who has to go slay a dragon or something.” That year, I was listening to so much metal. After that, I started to realize, wait, ladies aren't into this. Maybe I should start playing softer music.
But I still had all these punk rock and hard rock influences. I still wanted to keep doing some of that stuff. Junior year, which was mad quarantine year, I started playing with Caleb actually. I was on bass. I learned how to play bass my sophomore year- no, freshman year- in my band class. That was a lot of fun. It was cool to learn a new instrument. After that, I was playing with Caleb. I had my gain all the way up on my bass. We were doing some crazy Drum and Bass punk stuff. And it was a lot of fun. That's how I met Caleb. And then my old band from sophomore year, Muck, we sort of got back together and became Clementine. One of the guitar players, Gia, myself, and then Sam. It was just the three of us. And of course we got the drive-in show, which was our first show… Then it was, “Okay, Larin should actually join us,” and then we all got together… Elizabeth comes up to me after the show: “Yo, I can play some bass.” So we meet here in this basement. And then we just like after I teach them all the songs that we had.
Then we just talked about our musical influences for two hours. So that brings us to where we are today.
L: What's funny about the drive-in show, Kieran posted on his story. He was like, “Yo, my band got a gig at the drive-in. Y'all should come check it out.” And I didn't know that Clementine was the thing at that point. Shit. I was like, “Yo, what the fuck? What do you mean we have a gig at the drive-in? Are you in a different band?” Then he said, “Oh, no, it was my other band. Jit, you good.” Then we needed the rest of a band. They needed a drummer. So it just made sense to merge.
E: Clementine is kind of a band that, I don't know. Is like Frankenstein? It became what it is today just by adding one member at a time.
S: The drive-in show was interesting because they didn’t let us use any distortion on our guitars.
K: We didn’t even have a beat, so we did our best to stay in time. It’s all super close. No drums.
S: No drums, a bass, and two guitars. And it was very interesting. And then once Caleb joined like I was singing, but it was only where we were doing Nirvana songs… I thought that I could just do the Kurt thing. I would just scream and just destroy my voice. I was like, “You know, I should call Larin…”
So moving on, some of you already said a few things, but what album or artist influenced you the most? Either past or present.
S: One of the first ones for me was both Nevermind by Nirvana and Weezer's Blue Album (self-titled). In eighth grade, I mean, Kieran and I would always talk about it and be like “‘Say It Ain’t So’ and ‘In Bloom’ are the two best songs ever, man.”
Kieran and Sam both laugh, then Sam continues.
S: Then I started listening to Bleach, In Utero, and everything like that. But it was based on what my parents listened to, right? I started making a whole playlist of all this stuff I liked that my parents also liked and I realized my parents don't listen to any Green Day. Then I just listened to their whole discography. And Green Day was very, very impactful for me. Green Day has a special place in my heart. Good ol’ Green Day.
E: Really, probably, like I already said. The main thing that influences my playing style at least is My Chemical Romance, because that was the first thing that I learned, right? In the middle of quarantine, I kind of regressed back to eighth grade. I just got really obsessed with My Chemical Romance and The Used. Jepha, their bass player is not really complex, but it's not super easy for a beginner to learn, right? Whereas Mikey Way, the way that he does, he just has his root note, and he just does thirds around it. Which is fine, but that's the only way I know how to write. My Chemical Romance and The Misfits, I think, are my main influence. In terms of what I want to eventually be able to play is probably OG Dead Kennedys. They were my favorite band in eighth grade, aside from My Chemical Romance because there was this guy I kind of liked, but I thought he was really cool. I was like, “I want to be him,” and he was really into punk. He introduced me to a lot of punk stuff. I just really like the bass, especially on a lot of their earlier albums, because it’s groovy.
C: When I first started getting into rock music in middle school, I finally transitioned out of Twenty One Pilots. I always admired Josh Dunn.
I still think he’s a great drummer.
C: He's definitely up there. When I started getting into classic rock, like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, they were probably pretty heavy for me. I didn't draw a ton of influence from them until John Bonham way later on. Kind of the same thing with Sam, I started listening to Nirvana and stuff as well. Dave Grohl pretty big inspo but that also didn't come until like quite a bit later. My biggest inspiration, like my actual place out, Remo Drive actually is pretty up there. My cousin Jackson, the same guy that taught me how to play, just watching him because I used to go to a ton of their shows. And, I listened to them a ton on Spotify. It was just crazy to me. I was like, “How can someone be so solid? Oh my gosh, this is crazy. The drums are so great. I just want to be able to play exactly like this.” So he's definitely been my biggest inspiration overall and then just sprinkling in the other actual super huge rock stars, right? John Bonham and Dave Grohl, mostly.
K: I think Master of Puppets was the first album I actually really enjoyed and that really kicked off a lot of what I wanted to play. I think the second album that really stuck with me, and still sticks with me to this day, is The Number of the Beast by Iron Maiden. It's the very first track “Invaders”. Everything just goes through the bass. Steve Harris is an insane bass player. It's like every guitar riff on that album is absolutely crazy. It's such an iconic album that really inspired metal. That's really what I was into at that time… Iron Maiden's my favorite band ever and I want to solo as good as they do, because they have insane guitar solos. I want to do what they do. I want to rock as hard.
L: I think my dad gave me a long time to get a sense of Don McLean, The Doors and Kansas and stuff like that, which he really liked. So he kind of passed that on to me to play all that and also U2. Then later on, I started finding Nevermind by Nirvana and Dookie. Dude, oh my god I love Dookie. Don McLean and Kansas and things are not hard rock, right? They're more…well, Kansas is organs… I didn't have much of a rock influence until later. Discovering Green Day, Blink-182. All the classic pop punk.
E: Dude, yeah. Skate punk. Oh my god.
L: Lord, I was so into it. Just the rhythm guitar.
So Sam, you were lucky to have the chance to get pulled on stage at a Green Day concert to play guitar. How was that experience? How do you think that influences you going forward?
S: It was all you can imagine. Larin and Elizabeth were there too. It was different, because at that time I had already written “Perfume”. I think that was the only song I did most of the lyrics for… That was my song that was already created, but we hadn't set up any studio sessions or anything. Then we went to the Green Day concert. At the time, I felt like Clementine was just sort of a hobby. I enjoyed it, and wanted it to go somewhere, but I didn't think it actually had the chance to. And so then Billie Joe Armstrong said, “Sam!” Well, he didn’t know my name, but he was like, “Get up here!”
E: He did that thing where he pulled someone up from the audience. It was between Sam and some 20 year old woman.
S: He picked me and then I was like, “Dang, I just played in front of 27,000 people,” right? My pants fell down, but I improvised the solo, so it works out. It was pretty cool. Even after that, the shows that we just play as Clementine, it's that same feeling where you're like, it's just like a high while playing the show. It was that same feeling with Green Day, but I just wanted this to keep happening forever. The next day, we recorded a SoundCloud version of “Kraken”, “Sorry”, and “Perfume” that we submitted to this competition that we didn't get in. We still submitted to it and did these recordings of it and then we set up studio sessions to record this EP we're coming out with. After that concert, we, at least I, was sort of like, “Well, I've already played in a stadium, so why not try again to play another stadium with Clementine and actually release music.” If it's possible to play with Green Day, then why isn't it possible to be successful? Yeah, exactly. So just keep trying and keep going with it. That was the biggest impact, I think.
Do you guys have any thoughts on it?
Sam notions across the room to everyone else sitting. Larin raises his hand and then starts to talk about his experience with it.
L: Yeah, that was pretty crazy. I was just along for the ride. Sam got called up. And then he jumped over the fence. So I was like, “Screw it, man. I'm going too.” I jumped past the security guards. I got all the way to the front, and there were all these dudes that wouldn't let me through. Some dickbags were like, “Yo, what are you doing up here? This is my spot.” I was like, “Bro, my friend is literally playing on stage right now with Green Day, let me the hell through”. So I got way up to the front. I was watching there the whole time. Then you stage dived, and I couldn't find you anymore. I was like walking around the concert the entire time, trying to find you. The rest of it was like a blur.
S: Yeah, I don’t remember. Billie Joe calls you my manager. That was cool.
L: Yeah, I’m the manager. There was this one security guard that offered to take pictures of us. I don’t know where he is now, but if he reads this and still wants to, let us know.
E: It was sick. I was watching it on the jumbo screen, watching the camera pan around to the audience and stuff. Then: “Oh, shit, it's Sam!” I didn't think that he would get to go up and play, but then he did, and I was like, “Holy fuck, he's in my band!”
C: He used to give me rides to school every day. Then the next day after the concert they were saying, “Oh, that concert was yesterday, it was pretty cool. Weezer played, Fall Out Boy played, Sam went and played guitar with Green Day.” They dropped it so nonchalantly. Wait, rewind. What? Sam played guitar with Green Day? What do you mean? They said, “Green Day always pulls people on stage to play guitar with them, and they pulled Sam on stage.” And I was like, Huh? What do you mean?
Caleb laughs.
S: At first, I didn’t tell them, I just sent them pictures of the signed guitar I got.
So you guys have a lot of shows in the coming weeks. What shows do you want to play? Or what shows are you excited to play in?
L: Mishawaka. It’s a cool venue, it has that cliff behind it. Phil Lesh and friends played there. It was like Grateful Dead, but worse. It was just Phil Lesh up there, playing bass, being an old dude. It’s a cool venue that I want to play at.
E: Washington’s would be cool, or just some of the local places like The Aggie.
C: The Aggie. It’s been on the docket for a while now, but we have a show at The Aggie coming up.
E: For FoCoMX. It’s not an official show, but it’s still at The Aggie.
S: It’s the, and I didn’t know this, but it’s the upcoming bands slot.
C: It’s not really a stage, but I want to do AudioTree. I want to play a set on AudioTree so badly. Just a free music video out of it. My cousin, when he was in Slowcaves, played AudioTree. While they were there, they played a few shows in Chicago and New York. We could play AudioTree, and then play something in Chicago, and then New York. That'd be so sick. AudioTree is the ultimate end goal for me, personally.
E: We could play NPR Tiny Desk.
S: I think it would be cool to play somewhere outside of Colorado, even if it’s just a bar or something. Somewhere out of state, even if it’s a small venue. I don’t really care where.
K:I think we should play Long Beach Arena in Los Angeles with Iron Maiden for the anniversary of their Live After Death album. We open for them, we're really big, and then they bring me out to play with them because I know all their songs. Then they’d be like, “This is Clementine. We’re gonna give them half of our profits. Now ‘Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner!’ Also joining us on stage is Kieran Wisell from the opening band, Clementine!
He has this all planned out. He’s been dreaming about this a while.
S: It’s not planned out, it’s manifested.
C: I used to always want to go to a Foo Fighters concert and get pulled on stage to play drums on one of the songs. I'm going to that concert in August, but now I'm realizing they might not have it.
With “Perfume” being the first studio song released, and with it being out for almost 3 months now, how do you guys feel about it? Now that it’s simmered out in the world for a bit, are you still proud of it?
C: Oh, yeah, it got way more exposure than I ever thought. On Spotify, the music video got like over 4,000 streams, which I did not expect. On the day before the release,I was like, “Oh my God, what if it just totally flops and gets 100 views or something.” Then when I woke up, it already had 300 or so. That's crazy. It just kept going up and up and up. I was like, “There's no way.” I was getting feedback from teachers and students at school. They're like- It's backhanded- but they're like, “Oh, that's way more professional than I thought it was gonna be.”
I feel like that’s not an uncommon thing, especially for teen musicians.
C: When we first released SoundCloud recordings, I was saying, “Hey, check these out. They don't sound that great, but it's the general idea of the songs. These are going to be released way cleaner in a few months.” Then people would tell me: “The audio isn’t that great, but the music itself is better than I was expecting.”
L: What’s crazy is the SoundCloud version of “Perfume”, the Voice Memo version, it was just some weird recording on our phone. Then it got almost 10,000 streams. I think it’s closer to 9,000, but I haven't checked it recently.
L: It was literally for us submitting to that Sonic Spotlight.
S: I was like on the judging team for Sonic Spotlight, which probably wasn't fair, but they kicked me out. So I was judging, but everyone else had seen our recordings except for the judges.
C: They said they wouldn’t judge on production quality, and then they totally did.
S: That’s garbage!
That's kind of cool. Having “Perfume” out, especially like that Poudre show that we had. I feel like I'm kind of a school celebrity now. If I walk around Fort Collins or something, no one's gonna recognize me. At Poudre, some people are like, “Oh, like you're in Clementine!” Even though we're not even really huge or anything, and it's just my school, I think that aspect of it is just really cool to me.
E: When the music video was released, there were a bunch of kids coming up to Caleb and I, saying: “Oh my God, it was so cool.” Like that. “It's more professional than I thought.” Yeah. There was this one fucking kid who just kept following me around telling me how much he liked it. Every time he saw it, he's like, “I just can't. It's so cool.” And I'm like, okay, cool. He's like, “So can you play bass on my song?” And I was like, “Sure. I mean, show me what your idea was.” He had one, and I told him, “Cool. I know how to play. And it's really simple.” He says, “Cool. I'll get back to you,” and then he still hasn't. Every time he sees me, he's just like, “Oh, your band is so cool.”
C: Yesterday, I was walking through the halls and our assistant principal is very aware of our band. The last minute before the bell rings, they play a song over the intercom. Then I sent him “Perfume”. He said he was gonna play and then I was talking to him in the hall. I was like, “When do you think you’re going to play it?” He says, “Well, since it's Women's History Month, we're trying to play like lots of rock and roll types.” There was this teacher standing next to him, and she said, “Oh, wait, are you gonna play your song request?” So I was like, “Yeah, well, no, it's an actual song of a band I’m in.” She says: “Oh, you're in a band? Do you have any music out?” I said, “Yeah, that's why he's gonna play it.”
The group laughs, and Caleb continues.
She was like, “Oh, what's it called?” “‘Perfume.’ by Clementine. We also have a music video. You should totally watch tonight.” I was walking back, and I was going up the stairs and she was like, “Hey, Caleb!” I don't know how she knew my name. She came up to me and said: “It was great!” She said the same thing everyone else has been saying: “It was way more professional than I was expecting.”
L: Every time, man.
S: It's still kind of crazy to just think about how people kind of recognize us now. The Fort Collins music scene- like I was back even before the music video and “Perfume” release- I was backstage at Washington's. And I met Jakob from Slow Caves for the first time. I told him: “Oh, I'm in a band called Clementine. You probably haven’t heard of us.” Then he was like, “Oh, no, I have. You guys played with Fernbrook a week ago, right?” I said, “Yeah!” It’s kind of crazy that people have heard of us. There was another time I was at a friend's birthday party, but there were a lot more people than I expected. I said something about Clementine and someone's like, “You’re Clementine?” No, I'm not. I'm not Clementine. I’m in the band but I mean, at least you've heard of us.
L: Spring break, I was at a party where this chick was like, “Oh my god, let me be your manager! Let me play your song over the speakers!” We already played it 10 minutes ago earlier. “Oh my god, I missed it. Let's play it again.” Well, damn, but it's cool. Yeah, it's really cool. I really appreciate it. The bit of recognition because we put so much time into that. Over recording our music video stuff. We would wake up at 8 AM. Go. I feel like it was earlier than 8am. I think it was woke up at 7 and did it the whole day. Yeah, I remember. I would just go home and pass out in my underwear.
C: We just finished our second to last song. We had one more song to go, which was the easiest to record. Then cops came knocking on the door. We had to pack up everything and move to Larin’s house.
L: I got a photo of everyone looking at the cops, and everyone’s face. Kieran looked like he was plotting his death.
C: Josh, our producer, was so upset.
L: We packed everything up, and moved to my house, which has kind of a tall ceiling, and then recorded the final song. It was such a long process. I was so tired.
E: Going back to your original question because I think we definitely went away from that: It's just cool to have recognition of all the work that we put in. Although I definitely for me personally, I can understand and sympathize with how bigger artists get super sick of their own song because they are constantly asked to play it. I hope it doesn't happen to “Perfume”, but it is getting a little bit tiring.
S: I think part of it was I was so excited to have a Spotify release that I for sure queued it up again and again and again and again and again. This is out! I listened to it 100 times in a row and yeah, it's so I made myself so sick of it too.
What is “Perfume” about? What was the inspiration for the song? How do you feel playing it live after listening to it a million times?
S: The inspiration? Basically, I went on a road trip this summer to go look at colleges and stuff. I basically was just missing my girlfriend. We'd only been dating for three months or something, but it's like what they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder. We made this whole playlist together. And it was kind of just indie bangers. I was trying to play “Sex on Fire” on guitar, but I brought an acoustic guitar on my trip. So I couldn't reach up there.
He starts playing the main riff to “Sex on Fire” on his guitar. You can see he’s playing the riff super high up on the guitar, going well beyond the twelfth fret.
So then I started, I was just like, messing around with the open E string.
Sam starts playing the main riff from “Perfume”. It sounds similar in key to “Sex on Fire”, with a rhythmic change. A lot of the notes are very similar hearing them side by side.'
Then I came up with that riff. That's like, kind of hard. I'm really bad at coming up with, I can do lyrics, but vocal melodies are where I struggle, but the verse that is the vocal melody, it's the same as the guitar parts.
He starts scatting and humming along with the guitar melody, matching its pitch. Just like the song itself sounds.
And then, sort of came up with a few lyrics. I came up with the chorus part. I really liked that:
He hums the part to the song with the vocal melody being sung as a bridge between the verse and chorus. If you haven’t listened to the song yet, this is where you pull it up to hear what he’s talking about.
Going back and forth. They got to: “I could smell your perfume.” I was like, “What do I say for this line?” So it was originally: “you could smell me too”, just because it couldn't think of anything. Originally, I pulled the “Mr. Brightside”, just because second verses are always my downfall. I can never do it. So I'd like originally it was: “I saw your face in the picture. I saw you walking through my dreams” for the first and second verse, just because I couldn't think of anything. That pre-chorus part didn't have anything and I brought it to the band. Larin came in and he did those cool ad libs with the “stay here”-s. He came up with the second verse, sort of going along the same storyline we had created. Kieran came up with the bass line while teaching Elizabeth. It all sort of- after I recorded just on GarageBand, then after I showed it- it sort of just became a whole big thing of everyone sort of throwing in all these ideas and it became what it is now instead of like a shitty GarageBand file.
E: It was definitely one of Clementine’s full, real songs. You had other songs before that, but…
K: They were Muck songs. We had “Down on My Luck”.
C: With “Down on My Luck”, we had a performance at The Lyric the same day, and the same day we wrote it. I took my notebook up there, and then Caleb wasn't there. It was just me, Kieran, and Sam.
K: That one still has to be one of my favorite songs.
S: Yeah, that one’s good. “Perfume” was the only song I did lyric writing for, everything else is just the genius of Larin. He just comes up with these things.
C: It doesn’t make sense. I asked him one time, because we have a new song called “Scenic View". There's a few lines that I was like, that’s such a clever line. “Larin, how do you do this?” He's like, “I don't know. I just be thinking and shit.”
L: Well, yeah, I'm never gonna reveal my secrets.
With “Perfume”, I really like playing it live. The last show at our school, everyone knows the lyrics to that song. Everything else is unreleased, random shit that no one knows. Then “Perfume” comes on, and they’re like: “Oh my god, I know this!”
S: You know that final part where it's just the vocals and like the outro? When we did that, most recently, it wasn't just layering.
L: It was like everyone was singing with me.
C: It was wild. A few of our closer friends that have the audio recordings of our unmixed, unreleased songs, they would sing those songs, like “Your Song” and “Down on My Luck” . Nowhere near as much as “Perfume”.
S: That audience was like, 150 people or something.
So all this talk about the EP. When’s it coming?
K and E: May 6.
L: It’ll be a big show, and be a crazy good group.
C: It's worked out really nicely. So my church I go to the Vineyard, and they have a separate building on the side that's supposed to be a youth room. That building was multi-use over the summer; it's a low income daycare. It was a school this past year. So daycares, actual school, youth groups, like a ton of different stuff that's been in use. As far as I know, there has never been a show there. They have a really nice stage, the room, blacked out. They have subwoofers, basses, monitoring board, makes a really nice sound system, they'll probably be the nicest place we’ve played. Actually, The Aggie will be pretty nice.
S: Yeah, we’ve still got time. But we have a second EP coming out too, which we're not sure yet. We have two songs recorded. The mixes come back to us right around when we're releasing our first EP, and it's a live EP, so we're not sure.
C: We’re playing Blast N Bowl April 13, which we’re gonna use to advertise our Aggie show, FoCoMX. Which we will use to promote our EP release show.
S: It should all be building up to the EP release.
You’ve already said some Sam, but what’s the ultimate goal for Clementine?
S: My goal for Clementine is stadiums. I don't know about everyone else's.
K: I think we just become like a big household known band. We start playing around. I mean, because we go to college, but you know, to have that after.
S: I keep having goals for it. And then it keeps surpassing them. “Oh, having an original song. Oh, we do have two original songs.” Recording original songs, releasing music videos. It just keeps coming. So just whatever comes is probably reaching my goals.
C: One of my personal goals: There's this guy from TikTok who does this series on here’s why this drummer right here is a genius. You could have played this song, but what they did was way better. I really want to end up on one of those. If we are a big band, I want to be able to tour around with smaller bands and be able to help them get exposure. So kind of like passing it on. Almost like Kieran said, like a household name.
S: “Yeah, of course I’ve heard of Clementine.”
K: “Clementine? That band’s great. Can’t believe that kid is playing in Iron Maiden now.”
C: Instead of it being like, “Oh, yeah, I'm in this band. You probably haven't heard of us.” It's like, “Oh, yeah, I am in that band.” I think that'd be nice.
S: I always picture people in 20 years, and then “Perfume”, or just any of our songs come on, and they’re like: “This takes me back to 2022.”
K: Way back when that kid wasn’t in Iron Maiden.
We all laugh, and then continue.
E: Yeah, I don't know if I have any specific goals. It's sort of just seeing where it goes. I have, obviously, my whole backup plan of going to college and getting a real job and whatever. If Clementine does well, I think it would be really fucking cool to be an actual musician, and have that be the job. At least for like a little while because I'm sure it's not gonna last forever. We'll just see how long it goes essentially. I don't want to like be here in 30 years and fucking hate all of you. We do a reunion tour that we're like, “Well, we're never speaking to each other again.” That would be really sad.
What pieces of advice do you have for teen musicians, or just people that are interested in playing music? What pieces of advice do you have to say for those people?
C: I'd say don't sell yourself short. It might seem far-fetched to release music or write full length songs, but you really got to give yourself credit where it's due because I didn't think we'd ever make it to this point. I'd hoped for it, obviously, but it was just like, “Oh, yeah, that'd be nice if it happened, it would suck if it didn't.” I just didn't know what the process looked like. See, I think the biggest thing is don't get discouraged.
L: If you think something's a good idea, then do it. And don't knock yourself down too much. None of the: “This is stupid, no one will like like this or anything.” With those first backyard shows, we just did it. Because we thought it would be cool and fun. Then we recorded this EP, because we like to play music. You didn't really think about anything too much. “Yeah, this sounds like a good idea. Let's do it.”
E: I think, especially as a younger musician, there are a lot of people who play instruments, but not a lot of people who are going to actually commit to like being in a band, right? I was really lucky in finding these motherfuckers. It's super cool that it's worked out, but I know a lot of people who have tried to start bands a million different times and half the people flake out like that. There's no shame in making your own music and being like a one man band situation. Larin does that a lot on GarageBand and his songs are sick. I don't know. If you can't find other people to jam with. Do it yourself.
K: If you like playing music and you like what do you do? Keep freaking doing it. Because you never know if you can get another chance to do it. You never know if you're gonna get hit with another pandemic. So even if you're making shitty prog metal music, if you enjoy doing it, just just do it.
S: Mine's kind of cheesy, and it sounds really cheesy at first, just don't give up. Like I was talking about with Fatal Death, Me and Kieran’s band and we had guitars tuned out of tune. Just because you're not super amazing at one point doesn't mean you can't get amazing. You just have to keep practicing. Just crank the amp, just keep practicing, and just keep going. You know?
Last question, what do you have to say to people reading?
L: I love you.
K: Thank you, for sure. Shout out to our fans. Without all you guys, we wouldn't be here having this interview. You give a damn about us, you like our music. Not only are you guys fans, you're friends of ours. All around, thanks. I really appreciate you and everything you do, and keep it up. Also, hi mom.
S: I would say, just keep an eye out for our EP coming out on May 6.
C: I would also say- same sort of thing like Kieran- thank you to our fans. All the support we've seen and received is crazy. I did not expect that much of a positive reaction to what we've done so far, it’s super encouraging to say that the show we played at Poudre. I wasn't thinking that there were gonna be a ton of kids. I thought it was gonna be 20 while we're playing on a big stage, whatever, no biggie. It’s still fun to play, right? Then it was super big. There's this tradition I started with when we play “Down On My Luck”, turn on your flashlight. Then everybody in the crowd does it. There's a picture of Larin sitting down on the steps and you can see other flashes in the back. Picture goes unlawfully hard.
E: Thanks to everyone’s parents for putting up with us.
Our conversation ends there, as we say our last pieces to each other and get ready. I leave the house having met a great group of kids, with big dreams, and a big sound you just need to hear.
Special thanks to Sam, Caleb, Kieran, Larin, and Elizabeth for being awesome and working with my schedule to talk. Thank you to Jose, Kadence, and Liam for putting me on to the cool music your friends make. Lastly, thanks to everyone supporting your local musicians in the Fort Collins scene, without you, there is no FoCo scene to be had.
You can find “Perfume” and the rest of The Basement wherever you stream music. You can also find Clementine on Instagram as @cl3mentine.band. They have shows on April 22 at The Aggie for FoCoMX from 5:00 to 5:40, and May 6 to ring in the release of The Basement at the Vineyard Church of The Rockies at 7:30, with special guests Fernbrook and Hospital Socks as the openers.
-M
