Band Heinous Orca talks punk

Punk band Heinous Orca is a tale of two cities, Nashville and Bloomington. Twins Isabel and Laura Solomon, on drums and vocals respectively, are recent graduates of IU returned to their native Nashville, Tenn. while guitarist Austin Hoke and bass player Evan Latt are finishing their senior year at IU.

“I knew (Evan) before, but I met the twins in Bloomington, even though they’re literally from my street in Nashville,” Hoke said.

The band recently finished its first album, “Heinous Orca presents: prick! The incredible skunk group, in — ‘It’s bath time.’”

Isabel Solomon said she loves the exertion required for the fast, to-the-point songs.
“The sweat and the grime and the energy of it,” Solomon said. “I love the energy of punk.”

Heinous Orca’s next performance is Sept. 14 at the Comedy Attic for the comedy and music variety show “It Still Bleeds.”

“We take our music seriously, but we’re also up for anything,” Isabel Solomon said. “We’re not self-conscious.”

The Indiana Daily Student spoke with Heinous Orca members Austin Hoke and Evan Latt.

IDS How did you get started? Had you been in other bands before?

HOKE I’d been in other bands in Nashville and a few bands here, also.

LATT We played in a bluegrass country band, since we’re from Nashville, called the Oldtime Apothecary Feel Good Liquor Band, which just played on street corners in Nashville. But Heinous Orca was the first time I had actually played music. I didn’t know how to play an instrument, really, and then Austin’s like, ‘You should learn to play bass. I’m going to teach you bass by having you join a punk rock band.’

IDS Why punk rock?

HOKE Because I love X a lot, and the Buzzcocks and all those old pop-punk bands. It doesn’t have to be extremely simplistic.
You can find ways of having that kind of music sound unique and have unique chord progressions, unique attitudes.

LATT You get a lot of people who just think that punk rock is just three power chords over and over again.
Which, you know, great, the Ramones were awesome, they did that real well, but I think it’s really interesting to try and take the form and play with it. And, of course, the Buzzcocks are awesome.

IDS How do you make your music unique?

HOKE It’s a balance of finding catchy, powerful hooks and presenting them in unique ways and finding chord changes that still sound powerful and easy to listen to, but aren’t necessarily.
I’m not going to go out of my way to make it more complex for the sake of that. The kind of sound that I like — that I listen to .

LATT It’s always good when something sounds just a little bit off kilter. It sounds a little wrong, but it’s right because of how wrong it sounds.

IDS Any themes for your music?

HOKE  Absurdist stuff, really ... I don’t like writing about big things or big issues, I like writing about various small things ... We do spend a lot of time working on our lyrics.

LATT It’s shockingly hard to write nonsense.