Welcome to the feature where we talk to musicians about some of their favourite things about the industry. Today we speak to the band member Alec Cavazos of the band exPorter. The band have recently released Lusitania from the album NoBrakesNoBrakesNoBrakes. Today we talk about the favourite things about music.

What is your Favourite:

Song you have written

This is always one of the toughest questions we get asked actually and my honest answer is I don’t think you can have a favorite. Destin (brother Destin Cavazos, Bass and Vocals) and I do most of the writing and I know he feels pretty much the same way. It’s just too hard to pick a favorite. Kind of easy to pick ones maybe we wish we wrote different or want to change, but a favorite is hard.

For me it’s because you spend a lot of time thinking about what you’re writing, then working on, and when it’s finally recorded it’s this little creation of yours that’s put out there. 

I will say “Carsick” is always up there cause it’s the first song I wrote most of by myself, it was the first song ever on the radio for us, and it’s the first song we remember having people ask us to play at shows. That was a trip.

Lyric:

Pretty much the same answer…it’s tough to pick a favorite set of lyrics. 

But if I stick with Carsick, I’ll go with a line from that song – “I press the pedal and I drive by”. Not that it’s the most clever set of lyrics but more because of how I sing them. The song is usually pretty deep in our set and we’re having a good time and it’s our sort of “hit” song so we play it all the time. When we get to that part, I am always trying to come up with a new way to sing the I drive part. It’s pretty cool…sometimes it’s in spoken word, sometimes with a different voice, whatever I can do to mix it up. 

Musician:

Tom DeLonge, no question. He’s the whole reason why I even started playing guitar in the first place. I was like 10 and just starting to take lessons and I just hated it at first. Destin took up bass really quick and was in bands like a day after he started learning but for me it took a bit of time. Then one day I realized that this guy that was my hero was playing this guitar thing and it was the same thing that I was trying to figure out. It was like this light went on in my head…if he does this I should do this.

I don’t think I’ve gone too many days without playing guitar since then. 

Film or television show

Always Sunny in Philadelphia is probably my favorite show. Sometimes the show’s a bit much but I fricken love it. 

For movies that’s a bit tougher. Maybe Pirates of the Caribbean.

Venue to perform at

I think since we’re really just getting started touring we don’t have a favorite yet. We love playing live though and I think there’s something cool about any show we have done. 

I do know this stage we used to play every year would be up there but it’s not there anymore. Every year around Christmas we’d do this show at Jensen’s Guitar and Music which is this iconic guitar shop in our hometown (Santa Barbara, CA). It was a tiny room but it was always such a cool place to play. It closed down last year and we were pretty bummed about that. You can check out our Sort of Live at Jensens video to see what it was like. 

Item to take with you on tour

Tasty snacks and Triple X vitamin water are still key for me to bring on the road. Also, on our last interview with you all I made this joke about guitar strings and how just because they never break doesn’t mean they won’t. And yeah, right after that I started breaking strings at every damn show we did. So this time I will say, and mean it, extra guitar strings….lots and lots of guitar strings go with me on tour now. 

Instrument

It has to be my black on black Fender Strat. Such an iconic guitar. I like playing other guitars but that is my favorite. 

Song to play live

Like I said, we love playing live and I have so much fun just playing any song. Off the new album, “Sister Cities” has been a really cool one live. I know both Henry (Henry Kish, Drums) and Destin really like playing that one. I would also have to throw Carsick on here again. Having someone sing your lyrics back to you is pretty dang cool and people tend to sing Carsick a lot.

Album by another musician

A really tough question because there are some great albums. I think my go to answer though has got to be Blink’s self titled album. 

Memory of tour

Have I mentioned we love playing live? Obviously there are the shows and stuff but there are a lot of cool things for us just being on tour. Getting into a new venue. Stuff we’re joking about on the drive between cities. A lot of cool memories from being on the road. For a favorite though I would say something that happened on our Summer (2022) tour was very cool. We were on the way to play this radio show in Fresno for KFRR’s legendary Tacos, Brews & Jams. And we’re listening to the station when all of a sudden Destin’s saying turn it up turn it up and they were playing “Your Boyfriend” off the new album. 

It’s still really cool to hear your song on the radio but that was the first time that we were all together to hear it. We’re out in the middle of nowhere and we’re stopping in the street. I was driving and trying to get some video – yeah, I got in trouble for that – but seriously it was on a road with no one else around. 

Pretty cool memory though. 

Era for music:

We have stickers that say “90’s Pop-Punk – Since 2017” so I have to say 90s.

Part of making a record:

I actually enjoy every part of making a record and being in the studio. I know for Destin, he’ll like some parts then not other parts. Henry likes some of it too. But I fricken enjoy the whole process. It’s just kind of cool to go in with ideas and then seeing where they end up. 

Thing about performing at festivals

I think it has to be the idea of just having all of these bands on a lineup and getting to check out the other acts and having fans of other bands kind of start to check you out. The sets are usually shorter and sometimes the crowd will vary depending on what day or time so you never really know what you’re going to get. But if you just go to check everything out you never know what you’re gonna find. 

Quote

This is what I had last time and I think it’s still a good quote – “It’s all success if it’s what you need. Do what you like and do it honestly”-Angels and Airwaves

Thing about the music industry at the moment

I think the favorite thing is still one of the most annoying thing too and that’s the ability to get your songs out there for people to listen to. But I still think there are too many songs out there that sometimes our stuff gets lost. It’s really cool to think anyone can be out there listening to us on any streaming service right now.

Thing about this year so far?

I think just to be able to be getting out there and playing again is awesome. Destin was burned pretty badly last Fall so we needed to make sure he was good and healing before we thought of anything else. We had some shows we wanted to do in December and while we couldn’t commit to all of them it was really special to just be able to get a couple in. As 2023 started and with Destin getting better we were able to get back to being this band. So grateful for that!

And it’s been going well.. we have some shows we’re just about ready to announce. We also just found out that our song “Lusitania” was on Rodney Bingenheimer’s show – The Underground Garage. We grew up in Southern California and Rodney on the Rock is a legend. When you think of all of the bands that guy has found or played, it’s pretty humbling to be anywhere near that. Definitely a favorite so far for 2023

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