While taking time from their rigorous schedule and recording sessions, Rob Whited and Eric Koch, members of buzz band Most Thieves, shared with us stories about their whole hearted determination, team work collaboration, and most importantly friendship that builds ideas into accomplishments. While sitting at Starkbucks and sharing stories, laughs, and listening to blenders we got to know how Most Thieves came to be…
Elle Vie: What’s the story behind Most thieves?
Eric: Here is the story; most of us have known each other for a very long time. Rob and I, I can’t really trace back to when we met but it’s been years and years. I really believe that I was about 19 years old. Back in December, I was meeting my girlfriend; at the Beat Coffee Shop we were meeting downtown to meet some of my closest friends (Crowd of Small Adventures). So as I am waiting in the coffee shop, Bobby who I hadn’t seen for a long time, walks in, and I said, “Bobby, what are you doing here?” and shortly after Rob and Steve walked in. So we all sat down and started drinking coffee and talking. About an hour later Rob looks over at me and asks me “who are you playing with?” I said that Sam and I talked about maybe starting something, and he asks “who’s your drummer?” And I said that we don’t have one. He said, “yes you do. Who’s your bass player?” And I said we don’t have one… and he looks over at Steve and say’s “let’s get him, he’s really good”. I looked over at Bobby and said “can we take Bobby too?” (laughs)
Rob: See how childish we are (laughs).
Eric: So that was exciting. These are guys who I have known forever, that I respect, who are phenomenal musicians. Rob is then texting me saying, “lets make this happen” and three days later we are in a room, with the band… so that’s how it all started. And a month later we were recording.
EV: I heard Most Thieves are about eight months old. How did you make this band grow so fast?
Eric: It was a chemical reaction when the five got in the room!
Rob: Very special and delicate equation to make it work. It’s really rare to find and make it collectively move very fast, especially when you go from having a four member band to a five member band. Things can potentially go wrong or right, so now we are working with five very diverse people, to form something very unique.
EV: Why did you guys decide to start this band now?
Eric: It’s a question we have been dying to ask the universe ourselves; I had actually given up on bands. I started writing a book. I spent a long time trying to find people who are like-minded and who want to do the kind of music I really want to do and that itself is a very tricky thing, especially with my taste. I grew up on a lot of different bands. I was playing classical music in school, listening to country western at my grandparents house, listening to punk with my sister, listening to Led Zeppelin with my dad, I had different sounds around me. To find a group of people that not only understood the mixture of it, but also understood how to do it, and could understand my odd vocabulary about it that isn’t technical in any sense.
[Rob makes to leave as he has a prior engagement to attend]
Eric: You have to go?
Rob: Yes, but you guys are in good hands.
EV: So are you [Eric] the songwriter? Or is it a contribution of everyone?
Eric: Well everything is done to a level, by the time it comes in. Usually there are lyrics and a structure of melodies; the arrangements are usually there. There’s been parts where I come in and I think it’s going one way and we can go to replacing the entire parts with the guys.
EV: What would you say your style of music is?
Eric: We just gotta like it! We never look at somebody else and say “we have to do that.” I can just pick up an instrument and I’ll be messing with it, and I can just start playing and hear something that will start to take shape. It just needs to catch my interest. Usually, I am always working on a melody, and sometimes a line will come up, and I will write it down.
EV: What inspires you?
Eric: Everything… A lot of things. I love all sorts of stuff; history, science. I know way more about Physics than I should probably admit in an interview about a rock band (laughs). I love learning things! I don’t necessarily think about what I’m writing sometimes, it can seem very plotted and sometimes it is, but not necessarily.
EV: How did you guys come up with the band name?
Eric: I basically stole a band (laughs). It’s Thieves for the appropriate reason (laughs). That’s actually why it was chosen. It was a joke band that was going to be started between my girlfriend and I. We have this game that we play, we would be talking through a conversation somebody will say a phrase and the other will say that’s the band name, it just becomes this joke, and we do it all the time.
EV: Do you guys have a name for your album?
Eric: There is a couple kind of floating around… it just depends on the turn it takes while we are working on it. The leader at this point is Unnecessary Maps. It came out of a conversation/joke. We were walking into our rehearsal space in town that we had used multiple times in a row, we were rehearing every single day, and one day I walk in and I look up on the board and Rob had drawn where everyone should stand with our names, and it’s exactly where we stood every single time, and I look over at him, and I go “what’s with the unnecessary map?” (laughs).
EV: So you’re not originally from Vegas?
Eric: Steve, our bass player grew up here; Bobby was born and raised in Texas; Sam’s from Louisiana, Rob and I are from California. I moved here when I was a teenager. I went to high school here. Went to Chaparral High school.
EV: You guys were the first local band to play at the Cosmopolitan. How did you guys land that gig?
Eric: Serendipity! (laughs) A friend of ours, Jeremy Bates, manages a band called Transfer, and he got Transfer into Book & Stage. Cosmo really liked Transfer so they called Jeremy and asked him who else should we book. He told them to listen to us Most Thieves and told them to check us out on YouTube. They called Jeremy back saying they really liked us and they wanted to book us. Finally, they asked Jeremy so what’s their story? And he told them “they’re a Vegas band.” But he would not tell them that before they listen to us because there’s a stigma to the term “local band.” This was really good by the way [the interview]. This is fun! Interviews are best when they are conversations.
EV: Yes I agree!
Eric: Thanks guys!
EV: Thank you for your time!
The band recently ended a stint on the road with Big Talk. Check their sites for future tours and updates on their upcoming album.
